t p o'connor: sir henry campbell-bannerman

8/12/2019 T P O'Connor: Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman

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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN


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Sir HenryCampbell-Bannerman

BYT. p. O'CONNOR, M.P.

HODDER AND STOUGHTONLONDON MCMVIII


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Sir Henry Campbell-BannermanTwo of the great and mournful summaries oflifefamiliar to the worldnaturally rise toone's thoughts in presence of such a tragedy asthe death of Sir Henry Campbell-Bannermanwithin a brief period of his reaching almost thehighest and most potent of earthly dignities. Vanity of Vanities is the one ; Youth ablunder ; manhood a struggle ; old age a regret,is the other. The second epitaph of life comesas the first from one of the Jewish race andis a faithful echo of the original through themany thousands of years which separate thetwo philosophers and the two epochs.A youth of obscuritya manhood of un-recognised struggle ; and then, when every giftof fortune crowned the old age, first a devasta-


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2 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANting domestic sorrow and then a sudden strikingdown followed by the slow but sure approachof death ; this is a summary of the career ofthe late Prime Minister. That dramatic ironyin which Life is so much richer than the mostdaring dramatists, almost obtrudes itself in thesight of this man at the very height of fame andpower, seated in a chair, propped up by pillows,and with the outwork of his frame first assailedand then the centre citadel taken by slow assaultin a top room in the plain building which is thecore of a world-wide Empire. The splendourof the general environmentin the very centreof the house from which the Rulers of the

Empire reach their historic and world-movingdecisionswith the haughty palaces all aroundfrom which India is ruled and our Foreignrelations touching every nation in the worldare inspiredand then this room of sicknessand pain and death : here is a new text forthose who preach the futility in which all thingsare crumpled up in face of the approach of the


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 3fell sergeant Death. Though the record hasto be a career of great and unexpected pros-perity and success, there is room here for tearsand the wringing of hands. It is the tragedyof final and mighty success coming when itcan no longer be enjoyed ; the goal reached,but after the struggler has ceased to have thepower to keep or to relish its sweetness oftaste.

If there be anything that might appear assome compensation for this tragic contrast inwhich the life of Sir Henry Campbell-Banner-man finally culminated, it would be in thenational outburst of grief and sympathy whichhis taking-off has evoked. It would be foolisheven in the softening presence of the pallidand appealing face of the deadto compareCampbell-Bannerman in intellectual gifts withthe greater men who have been his prede-cessors in his high office; but in one respecthe stood, perhaps, above any of them ; and thatwas in his extraordinary personal popularity.


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4 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANFoe as well as friend loved him. In times offierce political excitement, of course, he had toendure the passionate resentment which mustalways be felt by one party against another,and especially against its chief figurehead ;but the feeling in his case was never per-sonal. That constitutes the difference betweenhim and many other men who have held thesame high place. For instance, there werepeople who would have been delighted atany day to hear of the departure from life ofMr. Gladstone at certain stormy moments inhis career ; and though no man could inspiresuch vast multitudes of men with such infec-tious and stormy enthusiasm as Mr. Glad-stone, there was no man, also of his time, whocould inspire such devastating and even cruelresentment.Men of my generation who went all through

the storm of the controversy when Russia andTurke}' were at war, will remember the terribleSunday when stones were thrown at the house


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 5in Harley Street which Mr. Gladstone thenoccupied ; and when doubtless he himselfwould have been assaulted if he could havebeen caught hold of by the exasperated mob.And here let me tell a little bit of secret his-tory which I think has never appeared inprint before about that very occurrence onthat very Sunday. Among those who werein entire sympathy with that anti-Gladstonemob were Charles Stewart Parnell and one ofhis sisters. Parnell was then quite a youngand inexperienced man, but he had an ideathat one of the first things he had to do tobring into being the fighting independentIrish Party, which afterwards he created, wasto break down all faith in any English Partyor any English statesman ; and that as Glad-stone and his party were the most trusted,Gladstone and his party were to be the mostfeared and the most violently attacked. Andthus it was that he and his sisterwho entirelyshared his viewswalked along Harley Street


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6 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BAXXERMANwith their pockets bulging with stones theywere prepared to throw at the windows of thehated Liberal leader.

Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman excitednone of those fierce feelings in any sectioneither in public or Parliamentary opinion.On the other hand, he enjoyed among hisown followers an intimacy, so to speak, ofpersonal affection which Mr. Gladstone didnot command even in the days of his power.There is the difference between the attitude ofthe ordinary man to the two leaders whichyou feel towards the different beauties of theAlps and the Pyrenees. As you gaze on thebleak and lonely and gigantic splendour ofthe Jungfrau or the Matterhorn, there is acertain awe in your admiration ; when yougaze on those mountains between the southof F rance and the north of Spain, whichgradually and slowly rise from sunlit meadowsand short trees to the craggy and snow-cladheights, there is a certain homeliness in your


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 7affection it is free from the stunning emotionof grandeur and of awe. And so Gladstonehad the power to awe the men near himrather than to win them, and fear ahvayscasteth out a Httle of the love. There wasno sense of awe with regard to Sir HenryCampbell-Bannerman. He was too brotherly,too gentle, too familiar a spirit to suggestany such feeling. And this was one of thereasons why he was regarded as so extra-ordinarily powerful an asset of his party,and why he exercised such a strange ascen-dency in the present House of Commons.That ascendency was one of the most

remarkable experiences of even the oldestParliamentarian. And, indeed, if it had notbeen for Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman it isvery hard to know what would have becomeof the present House of Commons in its firsthours of inexperience and intolerant exulta-tion. With a huge majority, which is alwaysa danger ; with groups divided from each


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8 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANother by tremendous differences, especially asto tactics ; with men new to Parliamentarylife, and dreaming great dreams of impossiblethings, the Liberal Party might well havebeen shattered into a score of fragments ifit had not been for the immense cohesiveinfluence which radiated all around from thepersonality of its leader. Even the sternestmember of the Independent Labour Partyrelaxed his grimness when the Premier goton his feet. The Irish Nationalist had anaffection for him, such, probably, as he neverfelt for any Prime Minister before. The mostdifficult man in this House is the ultra-Non-conformist, but even he could be brought tosomething like reason by a smile and ahumorous word from Sir Henry.What was the secret of this ascendency ?

It was mainly the transparent honesty ofthe man. This transparent honesty waswritten by Nature's legible hand all over theface. The broad and somewhat short and


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 9typical Scotch face, with good humour andshrewdness combined ; the stout, robust, well-knit figure, above all, the large eyeslightblue or grey, and open, lucid, fearless, andsteady ; all these things proclaimed that thiswas not one of those subtle, complex, anduncertain spirits that are never to be trustedto give the direct Aye or the direct Nay.Everybody knew what Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman thought about every great ques-tion of public interest ; and when he hadtaken up a position he was never known toabandon it.When, therefore, he recommended a certain

course to the House of Commons, he startedout with the enormous advantage of his bigreserve of faith and confidence in the breastsof the men he addressed. Then his modestyhelped a lot. He once described himself asa politician devoid of ambition ; and that wasa fair, though a self-applied, description of hisplace and part in politics. He never did push


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10 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANhimself forward ; for years after he had becomea member of the Cabinet he was content to beknown simply as a head of a department ; andwhen he did attain to the leadership, it wasbecause it was almost thrust upon him, andbecause all other competitors had got out ofthe way. And few people then realised thatthe leadership was one which would ultimatelyland him in the lofty position of the Premier-ship.

Indeed, up to almost the last moment itseemed still possible that he would not haveattained the great prize. I have heard of effortsbeing made within a few moments of the lastGeneral Election to bo)'cott him and to refusehim all recognition. This is also one of thesecret, though perhaps unconscious, reasons ofthe hold he had on his followers. They knewhow he continued to lead the Liberal Partythrough those days of darkness and divisionwhich followed the disappearance of Gladstoneand the terrible fissures created in the ranks by


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN iithe Boer War. They knew, too, of the attemptsto rob him of the place he had won so gallantly ;and this gave his friends the temptation to tryand pay him back by the abounding gratitudeof to-day for all the rebuffs, the soreness, thehardships of the bitter past.The ancestry of Sir Henry Campbell-Ban-

nerman was as essentially Scotch as his owncharacter. The father of the future PrimeMinister was one of those hardy and daringScotch provincials who early in the nineteenthcentury migrated to Glasgow, in some dimanticipation of the gigantic size and wealthto which the city was by and by to attain.He came from the Port of Monteith in 1805,and with his brother William, started the firmof James and William Campbell. This oldJames Campbell was a man of force, of initia-tive, and of something of the same kind ofobstinate self-will which characterised his sonin higher spheres. He was a draper by trade ;he found that drapery shops in those far-off


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12 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANdays still stuck to the spirit of haggling whichwas universal once in Europe and still subsistsin Oriental lands. Old James Campbell intro-duced a reform ; the way in which he wasinduced to do so is characteristic of him andof his race. He and his brother sat under thegreat Presbyterian preacher, Dr. Chalmers, andone of the topics which Dr. Chalmers chose forone of his Sunday deliverances, was the systemof haggling. He roundly denounced it asdishonestespecially to the poor. The twoyoung tradesmen listening to him were deeplyimpressed, went back to their shops, and fromthat time forward set forth the exact pricesof their goods, and neither asked more nortook less. They were rewarded by a greatincrease in their business, and soon they be-came one of the great houses of Glasgowremoving from street to street as their businessprospered and new and more central quartersbecame necessary.

In time James Campbell entered the Munici-


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 13pal Council, and in time became Lord Provostof his adopted city. Again, in the public careerof the father, one can trace some of the domi-nating features in that of his son. Twice insuccession Lord Provost Campbell was censuredby the Council of which he was the chief officerOnce it was in connection with his efforts toimprove the water supply of Glasgow ; onanother occasion it was because he had thegood sense and the courage to defy the narrowand irrational formalities of the law. He wasone of those who had agitated for the extensionof the boundaries of the city ; but before hecould attain his purpose, a fire broke out in alarge mill just outside the then city boundaries.When application was made for the assistanceof the fire brigade it was refused on the groundthat the brigade had no right to do dutybeyond the city boundaries. Application wasmade to the Lord Provost at his privateresidence ; he brushed aside the cobwebs of thelaw, ordered out the fire brigade on his own


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14 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANresponsibility, and, to make assurance doublysure, mounted himself the first of the enginesto go to the burning mill. He was severelycensured, one Town Councillor declaring thatif the Lord Provost repeated his offence, heshould be taken into custody.Of this stock Henry Campbellas the

Premier was known in his young dayswasborn in the year 1836. His place of birth wasin Kelvinside, then a rural suburb consideredfar enough from the centre of the city as tobe a retreat in almost full country. Indeed,Sir James Campbellas the prosperous LordProvost had becomeused annually to removehis family in the summer from his place ofbusiness in Bath Street to Kelvinside, as aLondoner does from London to Margate.Kelvinside House was the name of the mansionwhere the future Premier first saw the light ;it was demolished some years ago. Theboundaries of Glasgow extend several milesnow beyond that spot which sixty or seventy


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 15years ago was considered a country resort.The early years of young Henry Campbellwere like those of millions of other Glasgowboys that have preceded and succeeded him.His education became the prime duty of hisparents, and his width of reading in after-lifewas one of the many proofs how well hisparents performed this work. He started atthe High School of Glasgowan excellentschool, with numerous and industrious andambitious young students preparing for theirfuture struggles with the thoroughness of theirrace. It is some testimony to the ability andthe industry of young Campbell that, thoughalready destined to great wealth, he becamethe duxas the leading boy is called inScotlandof most of his classes. Then whenhe entered the University of Glasgow, he wasequally distinguished : he took a high place inclassics ; Greek, curiously enough, was one ofhis strongest subjects ; he won the Cowan goldmedal at a Blackstone examinationa prize


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i6 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANwhich was considered by Glasgow Universitystudents the blue ribbon of the Greek class ofthose times.The Scotch student, if he be the child of

wealth, generally emigrates to one of theEnglish universities to complete his educa-tion. Young Henry Campbell followed thetradition ; he went to Cambridge University.Here again he proved that he was no idleor perfunctory student ; and he took up mathe-matical as well as classical studies. In 1858he was a Senior Optime in the mathematicaltripos, and took classical honours at thesame time. But this stay in the Univer-sity of Cambridge had effects much moredecisive than a mere increase of his know-ledge ; it was then that he was converted in the political, not the religious sense.Sir James Campbell, his father, remainedthroughout his life an ardent and uncom-promising Conservative, and so long as hisson had been under home influences in Glas-


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 17gow he adhered to the paternal faith. Butin Cambridge he and two Glasgow friends,who had accompanied him, were transformed,and it was then that Campbell-Bannermanadopted the political creed to which headhered all his days afterwards.

Evidently the difference thus created in theirpolitical opinions did not alter the relationsof father and son. It did not affect theirrelations even when the son resolved to enterpolitical life. And yet the two were foryears in close contact, for immediately afterthe close of his university career Campbell-Bannerman entered his father's house of busi-ness, and was at his desk there every morningfor nearly ten years, with the same punctualityas the typical Scotch man of business. Oneof the little things in which the young mandiffered from the old, was that at this epochof his existence, young Campbell followed themode then among young men by wearing asingle eyeglass. He was short-sighted in his


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i8 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANyouth, and when he was old he had to holdhis notes close to his eyes after the mannerof the short-sighted ; he had, however, thecompensation of the short-sighted in beingable to read without glasses at a time oflife when most men require such aid to readanything.A significant glimpse is given into thecharacter of both father and son, and intotheir relations with each other, by the termsof the first election address which youngCampbell addressed to his fellow-countrymen.Here is an extract :

I am the son of a staunch Tory, and Iam not here to say a word in excuse for thatfact, or to apologise for being the son of myfather. On the contrary, there is nothing Iam prouder of than my close connection withone who has always been respected in Scot-land even by those who have been mostbitterly opposed to him. But if you wish todraw any augury from my close connection


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 19with Sir James Campbell, this I would haveyou believethat possibly the staunchnessmay run in the blood, that I may inherit histenacity without his principles, and that as myfather, through a long public life, throughgood report and evil report, in fair weatherand foul, has stuck to his party and hisprinciples, so his son, in like manner, willstick to his.Everybody will admit the candour and the

courage of this declaration of the youngpolitician ; it is a proof that in politics, aselsewhere, the boy is father to the man.Whatever were the demerits of Sir HenryCampbell-Bannerman as a politician, nobodyever denied him courage and consistency.

This first attempt to gain a seat in Parlia-ment failed, but a few months afterwardscame the General Election of 1868 ; the youngman was then elected for the Stirling Burghs,and for the Stirling Burghs he remainedmember to the end of his days. This be-


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20 SIR HEXRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANginning of his Parliamentary career was theend of his career as a business man ; heretired from his father's place, and from thattime forward he was a politician, pure andsimple. This career he was able to pursuethe more easily as he inherited not one butseveral fortunesa fortune from his father,another from his uncle on the paternal, a thirdfrom an uncle on the maternal side. Hisaddition of Bannerman to his original nameof Campbell was due to the last fortune, asBannerman was the name of one of his bene-factors. Among other possessions he inheritedfrom an uncle a beautiful country seat inKent.So far, therefore, as pecuniary circumstances

were concerned, his life had always been oneof ease ; and that, perhaps, partly accountedfor the geniality and equanimity of temperwhich were so characteristic of him. Through-out his life he never knew the small and squalidwants and the bitter personal struggle which so


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 21often darken the early, and sometimes evenblight the closing, years of so many politicians.

Campbell-Bannerman was just the man whowas pointed out for office at an early age. Hewas rich, he was well married, he was eminentlydiscreet, he entertained largely. He was butthree years in Parliament when he was ap-pointed Financial Secretary of the War Office,thus beginning an association with that depart-ment which was destined to be renewed severaltimes later on. With his party, he retired in1874, and again when his party returned topower in 1880 he went back to the War Office.When Sir George Trevelyan was foolish enoughto leave the Secretaryship of the Admiraltyin order to take up the killing and thanklessoffice of Chief Secretary for Ireland, Sir Henrywas chosen to succeed him at the Admiralty.Another change in the fortunes of Sir GeorgeTrevelyan produced a change in those of SirHenry. When Sir George left Ireland, a pre-maturely broken and grizzled man, and at the


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22 SIR HEXRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANvery moment when things looked nearly asblack as they could be, Campbell-Bannermanstepped into the place.The office is one which, as everybody knows,

severely tests men, and this was still more truesome years ago, when Ireland was fiercely dis-turbed, and when a powerful and united IrishParty, under Mr. Parnell, was so effective aforce in the House of Commons. Consideringhis love of ease, his geniality of temper, hishatred of violent measures, Campbell-Banner-man showed enormous public spirit in accept-ing this office. There are several amusingstories told of the feeling with which the Irishmembers received the news of the new appoint-ment. At that period one of the most pro-minent and able of the Irish members wasthe late Edmund Dwyer Gray, proprietor ofthe Dublin Freeman's Journal, then, as now,the most important Nationalist organ in Ire-land. Absorbed in other occupations, Mr.Gray's attendance in the House of Commons


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 23was rather irregular, with the result that hedid not know well-known colleagues, evenby sight. One afternoon he formed a groupof three men, who were discussing the newChief Secretary. At all events, said Gray,everybody seems agreed that he is a suffi-ciently dull man. One of the group of threewas Campbell-Bannerman himself There wasnobody, however, who would more heartilylaugh at such a joke at his own expense asCampbell-Bannerman ; he was certainly a gooddeal happier over it than poor Gray, who nevertold the story afterwards without visibly colour-ing, in his vivid recollection of his confusionwhen he heard of his mistake. Another Irishmember put the prevalent feeling of the partyeven in stronger language. In the very firstIrish debate at which Campbell-Bannermanappeared, this member said the Governmentreminded him of a beleaguered capital. Firstthey tried stone fortifications, then they triedguns ; finally they resorted at the last ex-


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24 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANtremity to a sandbag. For a while the nick-name stuck, and Campbell-Bannerman wasknown as the sandbag Chief Secretary. ThatIrish member lived to regret the incident,and became one of Campbell-Bannerman'swarm friends and admirers. It is he whosehand has written this memoir.

In spite of these things, however, the Irish-men found that they had met with a verytough antagonist in the new man. When theywere confronting Mr. Forster, they could makeeven that rough and rude giant writhe as theydenounced his rigime. Mr. Trevelyan's facewould shrivel up almost with visible painhehimself said that he would sooner face a batterythan these furious and eloquent Irish benchesand it was expected that Campbell-Banner-man, much less known, with a much smallerreputation, would prove a far easier prey.But the real Campbell-Bannerman was un-known to the Irishmen and to the Housegenerally. Up to this time people had


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 25thought of him simply as one of the in-dustrious, painstaking, eminently respectable,and eminently dull officials who are chosenby every Government for the smaller places inthe official hierarchy. It was expected thathe would meet Irish wit with dull, unimagina-tive answers, and that he would be, so to speak,roasted alive. What turned out to be the factwas that Campbell-Bannerman had wit as readyas that of any of his opponents, that he hadimmense force of character ; above all, that hehad unfathomable, unreachable depths of im-perturbability. It might have been self-con-fidence, it was probably indifference ; but therewas no human being who seemed so absolutelyimpervious to attack. One night, for instance,after the Irish members had been hammeringaway at him for hours, he calmly got up anddescribed the position of Chief Secretary asone eminently calculated to improve one'smoral discipline. One was taught to penetratethrough one's own self-esteem, and to discover


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26 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANone's hidden iniquities ; and then he proceededto give a plain, unvarnished account of thetransaction which had evoked thunders ofdenunciation from his opponents opposite.There was nothing to be done with a ChiefSecretary like this. He laughed at vitupera-tion ; he was jaunty under a cyclone of attack.What would have been the end of the duel

it is impossible to say, for it was brought to asudden and abrupt conclusion by the defeatof the Gladstone Government on the nightof June 8, 1885, by the famous combinationbetween the Conservatives and the Parnellitesagainst the Budget of Mr. Childers. Whennext Campbell-Bannerman and the Irishmenmet, it was as allies and not as foes. It mayhave been his experiences in Ireland, it mayhave been his strong and instinctive love offree institutions ; whatever the reason, he wasone of the very first to give in his adhesionto Mr. Gladstone's policy of Home Rule. Hewas, indeed, the inventor of a phrase which


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 27became popular. Asked by the late Mr.Mundella, whose views with regard to HomeRule were undergoing a transformation, whathe thought about it all, his answer was thathe had found salvation six months before.It was a phrase quite characteristic of the man,and it so aptly described the curious, and insome cases rapid, conversion of many Liberals,that it was caught up, and became the familiarcry of the platform especially among theenemies of Home Rule. Another consequenceof his Irish experience was that for everafterwards Campbell-Bannerman remained aninflexible Home Ruler. One who knew himwell declared that there was no subject whichseemed to make so strong and so promptan appeal to his innermost convictions andwarmest sympathies as the subject of Ireland,of which central fact in Campbell-Bannerman'spolitical life proof will often appear in thecourse of this narrative.

In the new Cabinet which Mr. Gladstone


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28 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANformed after the General Election of 1885Campbell-Bannerman became Secretary forWar, and that office he continued to hold inthe next Liberal Administrations as well. Hewas a highly popular administratorpartly,probably, because he was entirely free fromany wild eagerness for change. Fuss, worry,loquacious zealall these things to him werea torment and a bore.

In the Government of Lord Rosebery,Campbell-Bannerman again was a prominentfigure. He had been rather on the side ofSir William Harcourt in the domestic quarrelwhich rent the Liberal leaders when themoment came for choosing the successor toMr. Gladstone ; but when the decision wasmade, he loyally stood by Lord Rosebery.The strong tie of a common nationalityaswell as, perhaps, a strong sense of the main-tenance of disciplinemade him get over theinitial difference with his chief, and he be-came one of Lord Rosebery's most confiden-


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 29tial friends and advisers. There are severalscenes from that period between the two menwhich are characteristic of them. When, speak-ing on the Home Rule question, and depen-dent on the Irish votes for existence, LordRosebery made the famous and infelicitousutterance as to the predominant partner,Campbell-Bannerman was one of the friendsto whom he unburdened himself, and whomhe asked, in some bewilderment, the meaningof the unexpected storm which had begunto rage about his ears. The younger politicianpointed out that what he had said was, afterall, true. Campbell-Bannerman used to re-count the story with great amusement asan instance of the ingenuousness of the Peernot trained in the atmosphere of the Houseof Commons. It showed, he said, how smalla distance Lord Rosebery had gone in hispolitical and Parliamentary education whenhe thought it a sufficient defence of anypublic utterance that it was true


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30 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANAnother scene between them took place on

a more eventful occasion. The Government ofLord Rosebery was in a very difficult position,as everybody will remember. Their majority,which began with a nominal forty, had gradu-ally diminished until it sometimes ran down toten or even seven. In addition, it was honey-combed by disaffection, the struggle betweenLord Rosebery and Sir William Harcourthaving descended down to the rank and file,and there being besides, among the unofficialmembers of the party, plenty of men who hadtheir own scores to pay off with Lord Rose-bery, Under these circumstances, it was evi-dent that the doom of the Government wassealed, and that some fine night it would wakeup and find itself in a minority. Until thememoirs of this generation are published, thewhole story of the intrigues which followed willnot be known, but sufficient is known alreadyto justify the statement that there was a veryclear, if unspoken, and a very definite, though


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 31a certainly unwritten, understanding betweenthe enemies of the Government of Lord Rose-bery and some of its supposed friends, to bringabout the defeat of the Government. The endcame in a very unexpected way, and on asmall affair. Among the items in the WarEstimates was one for cordite. Cordite was aform of ammunition on which there had been agood deal of litigation and a good deal ofnewspaper controversy. Nobody felt verykeenly about the subject except, perhaps,the inventor, who was supposed to havesuffered by the action of the War Officeexperts ; but, all the same, the idea got abroadthat it would be a good subject on which totry a throw with the Government. The planswere well laid. In that terrible Parliament of1892-95 members had to attend to their dutieswith an assiduity unknown and unprecedented.Any division might mean the end of theGovernment, and divisions were taking placeevery hour of the day and night. Members who


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32 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANXERMANfound themselves entering Palace Yard at aquarter-past three o'clock, went to their placeswith their hearts in their mouths lest theirabsence for even a quarter of an hour mightmean the destruction or the escape of theGovernment. A surprise division was preparedon cordite ; but it was not an easy matter,under such circumstances, to escape the vigi-lance of the Government Whips, It is saidthat, in order to do so, a number of Unionistswhose presence was not expected, were takeninto the House through an unusual and aback entrance ; that when the division was un-expectedly called, they appeared as if theyhad sprung from the earth, and so put theGovernment in a minority of seven.The fatal division took place comparatively

early in the evening, and when the Liberalleaders met immediately after to decide ontheir course in this crisis, it was Campbell-Bannerman who made the observation thatprobably the one man in London at that


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 33moment who did not know of the fall of theGovernment, was the head of the Government The justice of the observation was immedi-ately seen, and Campbell-Bannerman was im-mediately sent off to discover Lord Rosebery.It was Campbell-Bannerman's voice, it isgenerally understood, which finally decidedthe Government on resignation. He certainlywas resolved to take the vote on cordite asa vote of censure on himself, and if theGovernment went on, it would have had togo on without him. This decided the ques-tion, and the resignation of the Governmentfollowed. It may have been that Campbell-Bannerman had himself joined the ranks ofthose who were comparatively indifferent tothe fate of the Administration. He had beenbaulked in an ambition which he cherishedwarmlyan ambition the existence of whichwas not even suspected by his closest friends.When Lord Peel announced that he could nolonger delay his resignation of the laborious

4


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34 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANXERMANoffice of Speaker, it was announced that

Campbell-Bannerman was one of the candi-dates for the vacant place. Everybody wasastounded. For the Campbell-Bannerman ofserious purpose, strong convictions, iron will,had not yet revealed himself to the world.As he was then judged, he was a man ofwealth, a lover of ease, a cool and cynicalman of the world, fond of his dinner, of hisfriends, of his vacation, of his persiflage,secure in all the gifts that fortune can bestow,and it seemed incredible that such a manshould crave the laborious duties, the terriblehours, the awful boredom, the solemnities ofthe Speaker's chair And yet it turned outto be quite true. The report was circulatedat the time that Campbell-Bannerman wasnot eager for the place, and that his name hadbeen put forward, not by himself, but byover-zealous friends. But this report was nottrue. Campbell-Bannerman let it be distinctlyunderstood by all those who were intimates


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAX 35and whom he trusted that he wanted theoffice, and even that he wanted it badly.And there was no doubt that he could easilyhave had it. The Liberals would have votedfor him to a man, the Unionists would nothave opposed him ; there was but one obstacle,and that was Sir William Harcourt. TheLeader of the House took the view that itwas inconsistent with the position of a CabinetMinister to accept the office of Speaker, andhe stuck to Mr. Courtney as his candidate,until Mr. Courtney in his turn was preventedfrom accepting the office by the action of hisown friends.Campbell-Bannerman may have resented

the action of his leader, but he was too easy-going and too good-tempered a man to allowthis or anything else to rankle ; and whenhis party was in opposition, he attendedregularly in his place and took his share of allthe work that was going. He adopted inopposition the same attitude to the War


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36 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANOffice as in office. In one of his speeches hepoured considerable ridicule on the Committeeof Public Safety, by which he meant whatwas called the Service Committee, that hadappointed itself to watch and to criticise theconduct of the War Office ; and he gave buta lukewarm support to the many and variedprojects of reform on which his successors hadentered.Up to this the career of Campbell-Banner-

man had been steady, prosperous, and some-what undistinguished. People thought of himas a Minister who attended to his own De-partment, and did not worry himself orothers about anything else. His socialposition and reputation were stronger, perhaps,than his political. Here is how he was de-scribed at the time b}' one who knew andliked him ; though the description is some-what inapplicable to him in his final pha.ses,it is worth reproducing as indicating whatwas thought of him generallyeven by tho.se


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 37who belonged to his circle and shared hisopinions : He is said to be fond of the pleasures ofthe table, but he is gourmet rather thangourmand ; that is to say, he loves qualitymuch more than quantity in both his food andhis wines. He has a splendid and spacioushouse in Grosvenor Gardens, and his littledinners and big receptions are well-knownfeatures in every London season. He is ad-mirably assisted by his wife, a most kind-hearted and hospitable lady, to whom he isgreatly attached. In appearance he is ratherlike his inner character. His head wouldhave been called a bullet head if it were notlarge enough to be almost called a cannonhead. The face is broad and short ; he wearsthe mutton-chop whiskers of the official ; hiseyes are large, deep blue, and bright ; he issomewhat above the middle height, and oflarge but not stout build ; he walks with theslow stride of the easy-going man of the


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38 SIR HEXRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANworld. He has not a particle of snobbery inhis disposition ; he enjoys life and laughs at it,and perhaps a little despises it.

In politics, as every active politician knows,it is the great god Chance that ultimatelydecides the destinies of politicians. Neverwas that central fact of political adventuremore remarkably brought out than in thesudden turn which the career of Campbell-Banncrman took at the epoch in his lifewhich has now been reached. Seated on theFront Opposition Bench, regularly but nottoo frequently, speaking only when a WarOffice vote was under discussion, and thenspeaking with hesitancy, without much em-phasis, and without any of the prestige ofgreat position and commanding oratory, henever attracted to the House a largeaudience, never raised a ripple of disturb-ance or enthusiasm on its surface ; and whenthe dinner-hour came, and there was nothingassociated with his old departmental activities


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 39under discussion, he quietly slipped away andwent off to his home and his friends. Theprevalent opinion about him may be furtherillustrated by a quotation from an articlewhich was written about him by Mr. W. T.Stead. Mr. Steadwho is always famousfor almost brutal frankness of speechwrotethat Campbell- Bannerman ought to be puton a vegetarian diet for some years, and thatthen he might be expected to do some reallyactive work for his party. As a matter offact, there was considerable exaggeration inthese ideas of C.-B.'s devotion to the pleasuresof the table. As has been said, he wasgourmet rather than gourmandliked a goodcook and good cookery, liked a good glass ofwine, and liked, above all, the intellectualcommerce of the good dinner party. But herarely indulged in champagne, and when hedid, he suffered immediately, and for manyyears he either abstained from stimulantsaltogether or confined himself to those light


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40 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANand sour wines which come from the Moselleor the Danube. But still the idea of hisindolence and love of pleasure was universal ;and, in fact, it was probably true to theextent that he was one of the men whorequire the pressure of opportunity and ofresponsibility to bring out their qualities. Leftto himself, he would have ambled on in hiseasy-going, modest, unambitious Scotch waytoo rational for impossible, too modest forexalted, hopes.The condition in which the Liberal Party

was left by the disappearance of Gladstone,gave the stimulus which Campbell-Bannermanrequired. For the division in the Liberal Party,which began in the Home Rule struggle, andin the disappearance of the dominating and,therefore, reconciling personality of Gladstone,was opened wider rather than healed by thedisastrous and short lived Administration ofLord Rosebery. Sir William Harcourt, whonever ceased to resent his failure to reach


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 41the Premiershipand it was natural that apolitician of so many and such brilliant andprolonged services to his party should look tothe highest rewardSir William Harcourt, Isay, found that his personal differences withLord Rosebery were aggravated and widenedby difference of political opinion, or, to be morecorrect, political tendencies. Sir William Har-courtbrought up in the old school of theWhigswas what would be called a LittleEnglander. He always repudiated the termhimself, but it will suffice as an indicationof political tendencies as they were under-stood in his day. Lord Rosebery was quiteas emphatically a Liberal Imperialist ; hebelieved in Democracy at home and Imperial-ism abroad ; in other words, while in mostdomestic affairs he was in favour of the mostadvanced reforms, he differed very slightly inforeign affairs from the views of his politicalopponents.These differences were accentuated by events


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43 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANXERMANas time went onall such cleavages havealways the tendency to grow greater. It wasthe Armenian massacres which brought thecrisis. Mr. Gladstoneretired, old, dyingslowly from a painful diseasewas draggedout of his retreat by the old appeal of theChristians subject to the Turkish Power ; andhe began an agitation against Turkey whichbore some faint and spectral resemblance tothe agitation which swept like a cyclone over

England in the 'seventies and the 'eighties.Lord Rosebery, sympathising with the denuncia-tions of the massacres, thought that the agita-tion was fraught with great perils to the peaceof Europe ; and finally, in a great meeting inEdinburgh, resigned from the leadership of theLiberal Party.These fissures in a party do not always or

usually end with a single resignation. SirWilliam Harcourt felt that his position alsohad become impossible ; that he was left re-sponsibilit)' without power ; and that the effect


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 43of Lord Rosebery's resignation would be toleave him the leadership of a divided andbroken party, and therefore to throw uponhim the responsibility and the odium of thedefeat which would undoubtedly overcome theLiberal Party at a General Election. Mr.Morley, sharing Sir William Harcourt's viewsof antagonism, both to the policy and theaction of Lord Rosebery, united his forceswith those of his old friend, and the worldwas startled one day by the announcementon the part of both these distinguished politi-cians that they had retired from the leadershipof the Liberal Party, and would no longer be

responsible for its policy or its action.And

then it was that C.-B.'s great chance came.Looking round, the Liberal rank and file

were puzzled to know whom they should raiseto the vacant throne. Mr. Asquith and othermen who afterwards became notable in theLiberal ranks, were as yet too young and toolittle known to command the adhesion of the


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44 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANwhole party ; and by a process of eliminationrather than of choice, Campbell-Bannermanwas elected. It is significant of the generalimpression held with regard to him at thetime that one of the things which was noticedand was afterwards commented upon as almosta phenomenon, was the fact that in makinghis speech in reply after his election, he raisedhis right arm and brought it down with someemphasis on the table in the room of theReform Club where the election took place.For a speaker to raise his arm is no greatmuscular or intellectual strain, nor any veryeloquent proof of abounding activity, but itwas held to be something wonderful in thecase of a man so easy-going, and, as it wasthought, so incurably indolent. It might bealso urged in favour of the election of Camp-bell-Bannerman at the time that the crownwhich was placed on his head was a prettyempty one. His party had been in Opposi-tion for )'cars ; seemed destined to remain in


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 45Opposition for many years more ; was help-lessly divided at the momentin fact, passingthrough the valley of the shadow. Never didit stand lower in present fortune or futurehope than it did at the moment when, in aspirit, half of despair and half of exhaustion,it put Campbell-Bannerman at its head.The estimate prevalent with regard to him,

even among his own friends, was proved after-wards to be inaccurate ; but for several yearsafter his election it seemed to be only toowell justified by events. For, on top of othersources of division, came the Boer War. Sucha national emergency is always calculated todivide men even of the same party ; nationalpassion submerges all minor emotions. Butin the case of the Boer War this division wasmade the more natural and inevitable by thetendencies which had already shown them-selves so distinctly and had already producedsuch strange and momentous manifestationsas the resignation from leadership of three


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46 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANsuch important figures as Lord Rosebery, SirWilliam Harcourt, and Mr. John Morley.Though he was detached from active partylife, Lord Rosebery was still a great force,even in the ranks of Liberalism, and his viewwas consistently that the Boer War was inevi-table ; or at least that if it had been provoked,it was not through the fault of the Britishpeople, but of the Boer Government. It wasa further personal factor in the situation whichthen arose that Lord Milner, on whom somuch of the brunt of the war and the eventsbefore the war fell, was a personal friend, andto some extent even a political friend, of thegroup of Liberals who followed the lead ofLord Rosebery. He was entertained by themwhen he went out to take up the position ofHigh Commissioner in South Africa, and hewas entertained again by them when he rushed

home for a short vacation during the agonyof the struggle.This original difference of opinion was only


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 47accentuated by the disasters in which the warbegan. John Bull set his teeth, and resolvedto see the thing out to the bitter end. Andwhatever were the merits of the contest atthe start, everything was forgotten by themajority of the people in the idea that thewar should be pushed until the prestige andthe might of the Empire were restored. Thenthere came a twofold influence to divide theLiberal ranks. There were some who, likeLord Rosebery and others, thought both thatthe war was justified and that it should befought out to a finish ; there were others who,though they might have their doubts on thefirst issue, were quite clear with regard to thesecond.

This scission of opinion was aggravatedby the violence of view taken by the othersectionthe section numerically very much thestrongerin favour of the ending of the war.This section was indicated sufficiently by thenameor, rather, the nicknameof pro-Boers,


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48 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANXERMANwhich was bestowed upon it in the heatednomenclature of the time. Between opinionsso clear and so fierce on both sides, it wasimpossible to make any compromise ; and thusit was that the Liberal Party became publiclyand violently divided. A proclamation of thisfactif proclamation were required was givento the public by the foundation, under theauspices of Lord Rosebery, of the LiberalLeague. This was open mutiny, for it meantthat, in addition to difference of opinion, therewas also to be conflict and rivalry of organi-sations within the Liberal Party. Thesedifferences spread themselves, like an infectiousdiseaseas is the rule with internecine strugglesover all the operations of the Liberal forces.Whenever there was a by-election the twosections fought over the choice of a candidate ;and even before that contingency arose, theconstituencies were approached by the organi-sations of the two sections, and over a con-siderable area of country the Imperialists


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 49succeeded in getting their nominees accepted.This success naturally exasperated the othersection ; and such a success was made, ofcourse, the more intolerable, from their pointof view, because it represented a minority ofvotes but a majority of wealth.

This was the party which was left to SirHenry Campbell-Bannerman when he took onthe duties of leadership. It will be seen thatit would be very hard to have had a moredifficult or a more thankless task. If in hislater years Campbell-Bannerman seemed to beraised, honoured, and magnified beyond hisdeserts, it is to be attributed to the fact that hehad so many years of stress and difficulty topass through ; that he showed in these yearsextraordinary courage, tenacity, and consis-tency ; and that when he did at last reachvictory, he had more than earned the palm.To understand these difficulties it was onlynecessary to drop into the House of Commonsduring any of the evenings when the Boer War

5


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 51during the epoch of the Boer War, you sawCampbell-Bannerman opposite the box ; thatmarked him out as leader of the Opposition.A short time before that seat had been occupiedby the mantling form of Sir William Harcourta figure both physically and mentally bulkyenough to fill a great space and to leave agreat void. It was indicative, however, not onlyof his departure from the place of leader, butalso of his detachment^self-imposedfromany share in guiding the policy of the LiberalParty that Sir William Harcourt, instead oftaking a seat immediately at the side ofCampbell-Bannerman, had taken a seat justlast but one on the Front Opposition. Hehad as his next-door neighbouroccupyingthe very last seat on the front benchMrJohn Morley. The manifest, avowed, con-spicuous isolation of these two former Liberalleaders from the existing leadership could notbe proclaimed more openly to the inner worldof politics. It might be added that the


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52 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANlargeness of Sir William Harcourt's figurehis head, with his six-foot three or four ofheight, rising above those of all the men aroundhim, and a certain characteristic pose of Mr.Morley's head which seemed to suggest apersistent air of rebuke and isolationadded afurther proclamation, if that were possible.

But this was not all ;- Sir William Harcourtand Mr. Morley were detached, but they werenot hostile. There were others of those whowere supposed to be Campbell-Bannerman'scolleagues in the Liberal leadership who werenot only detached, but openly hostile. Themost notable of these was Mr. Asquith. Mr.Asquith had held the high office of HomeSecretary in the administration of Mr. Glad-stone and of Lord Rosebery ; had alreadymarked himself out for the greater distinctionhe has since attained by the great oratoricaland debating gifts which he had displa)'ed ;and, as we now know, was destined later on tobe one of Campbell-Bannerman's most powerful


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 53lieutenants and universally accepted successor.But for the moment he belonged heart andsoul to the Rosebery and Liberal Imperialsection of the Liberal Party, declared overand over that the hands of his country wereclean, and defended the Boer War and thecontinuance of the war till the Boers were con-quered. A second and equally importantmember of the Liberal Imperialist group wasSir Edward Greyan able, self-restrained, andeminently House of Commons figure who hadhis following. A third was Mr. Haldaneabarrister in large practice at the ChanceryBara great student and scholar, speakingthe language of Germany as fluently as hisown, and credited even with the power ofunderstanding Hegel and Schopenhauer, and,what was more important for Parliamentarypurposes, credited also with unrivalled powersin the art of political wire-pulling.There were othersless important but also

to be seriously reckoned withas is every


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54 SIR HEXRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANman in politics who happens to be the enemyof the particular policy or particular leader forthe time being of his own party. AgainstCampbell-Bannerman were Mr. Perks, a solicitorof large practice and immense wealth; Sir HenryFowler, a former Cabinet Ministera formerpartner of Mr. Perks in his law business, and,also like Mr. Perks, a man of widespread influ-ence among Nonconformists ; and there weremen also of such known powers and promisingfuture as Mr. Lawson Walton and Mr. Robsonas they were thendestined later on to beCampbell-Bannerman's law officers. Finally,the mutiny had reached even the subordinatemen who were around Campbell-Bannerman onthe Front Opposition Bench ; Mr. McArthurand Mr. Munro Fergusson, two ex-Whips,separated themselves from their nominal leaderand refused now and then to tell in divisionsfor which Campbell-Bannerman was respon-sible.When a debate took place under these con-


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 55ditions in reference to the South African War,the Liberal Party, and especially its unfortunateleader, were placed in a very humiliating posi-tion. Campbell-Bannerman had by his sidebut one of the many colleagues of olden timesMr. Bryce ; and Mr. Bryce, though a manof very high gifts and acquirements, had not,up to that time, shown any distinguished Par-liamentary debating powers. It was alwayspossible that Mr. Asquith, or some other ofthe Liberal Imperialists, would rise and say thevery opposite to what Campbell-Bannermanhimself had laid down. If, on the other hand,he displayed any lack of fervour in denouncingthe war, he had to count with Mr. Lloyd Georgeand Lord Loreburn, as well as with Mr. Morley,who were as vehement on the one side as Mr.Asquith and his friends on the other. Theresult, of course, was that when the divisioncame the weakness of the Liberal Oppositionwas proclaimed more loudly than ever ; therewere abstentions to lower still lower the number


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56 SIR HEXRY CAMPBELL-BAXXERMAXof the small Opposition and to augment stillhigher the majority of the Ministerialists.By and by differences developed on other

subjects. The question of Home Rule for Ire-land, which had first rent the Liberal Party intwain, threatened its integrity even again, yearsafter Gladstone had committed the party to theprinciple as a whole. Lord Rosebery hadannounced a change of conviction which hadpracticalh' converted him into an opponent ofHome Rule. His followers in the LiberalImperialist camp did not adopt the same policy,but they advocated a change of tactics ; in otherwords, they suggested that Home Rule shouldbe proposed by instalments instead of at once,as Gladstone had done. Mr. Asquith, Mr.Haldane, Sir Edward Grey, all made speechesin the country which pledged them againsttaking any part in proposing a full Home Rulemeasure in any Parliament that was to beelected for some time. This brought theLiberal Imperialists into serious conflict with


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 57the Liberal Home Rulers, and Campbell-Bannerman had to try and repair the furtherscission in his ranks which such a quarrel wascalculated to produce.

It is not surprising that, under the circum-

stances, he and his friends should have beenignominiously beaten when the General Elec-tion came in 1900. Each Liberal leader gaveto his supporters a different policy. A dividedarmy is nearly always a beaten army, and thisfact aloneapart altogether from the fever ofthe war still going onwould have beensufficient to account for the great defeat whichCampbell-Bannerman sustained. In the endthe defeat became such a complete rout thatit grew to be almost farcical. Everybody saidthat it was an electoral disaster which couldnever be repeatedone of the many politicalprophecies which stand out in history by theirfalsification. Campbell-Baimerman became thechief object of attack in this campaign, and,indeed, throughout the whole of the struggle


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58 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANover the Boer War. The Liberal ImperiaHstscould claim to be on the same side as themajority of their countrymen for the moment,but it was different with Campbell-Bannerman.He not only was hostile to the war, but onceor twice uttered words of condemnation whichwere bitterly resented. In one case he spokeof methods of barbarism in reference tosome acts of the British troops. The phrasewas caught up, and for the time being the manwho uttered it was visited with fierce reproba-tion. The history of the phrase is character-istic, and throws light on Campbell-Banner-man's character. Before he used it he had hadan interview with Miss Hobhouse, a lady withstrong pro-Boer sympathies who had visitedthe concentration camps. She recounted to SirHenry what she had seen and felt ; the recitalworked upon his emotions, and his emotions,for all his outward phlegm, were always promptand ready in response to any story of wrongor suffering; and while fresh under the impres-


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 59sion of Miss Hobhouse's narrative he madehis speech, and dropped on the phrase whichcreated so much angry comment. As a matterof fact, his long association with the WarOffice would have prevented him from passingany condemnation

on British soldiers as awhole, and it was understood afterwards thathe was talking only of certain dutiessuch ashouse-burnings and the concentration campswhich the grim necessities of war and thecommands of the officers had forced uponthem. The episode is valuable as a glimpseinto the other side of Campbell-Bannerman,which was so long ignoredhis strength ofconviction, his power of profound emotion anda certain impulsiveness, not altogether usualin his tone or suspected in him.

It seems curious, considering the sequel, butit is true that at that particular moment thestar of Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman wasat its nadir, and that, on the other hand, theone man on his side who at that moment


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6o SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANhad any hold on the confidence of the nationwas Lord Rosebery. When, for instance, itwas announced that Lord Rosebery was toaddress a meeting at Chesterfield, that littleDerbyshire town became the centre of attrac-tion and interest for all parts of the kingdom.An audience ten times as large as that whichany hall in the town could accommodate wouldhave been glad to get admission, and thespeech was reported verbatim in every journalin the kingdom. For a time it seemed as ifthe Boer War were destined to force backupon Lord Rosebery the crown which he hadonce worn and then thrown away. In Liver-pool, after Lord Rosebery had made a speechof commanding eloquence, Sir Edward Russell,editor of the Liverpool. Daily Post, and a con-sistent as well as brilliant Liberal writer, hadvoiced the general feeling among Liberals atthe time, when he rose up and said, Let usacclaim him as our leader. At once a criticof the methods of the Unionist Government in


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BAXNERMAN 6idealing with the warand their mistakes, orthe mistakes for which the}- had the responsi-bility, laid them open to abundant attackatonce a critic of the methods of the Governmentand an advocate of the war and of its con-tinuance to final victory, Lord Rosebery seemedto hit the via media on which the minds ofmost of the people were setthat is to say, acontinuance of the war, but a change of themen and the methods by which it was beingconducted.

It was only natural under these circum-stances that attempts should be made to bringtogether the two men. No Liberal was for-getful of the fact that Lord Rosebery exercisedan enormous influence on his countrymen. Hissocial station, his wealth, his great giftsespecially as an oratorand his fervid patriot-ism, seemed to plainly mark him out as justthe figure which might exercise a magnetic andinspiring influence on a democracyand es-pecially a democracy which largely consists of


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62 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANthat vast middle class that still retains some-thing of the old respect for title, station, andwealth. There was no idea at that time thatCampbell-Bannerman could ever be anythinglike a strong rallying-point for the masses.His powers, though they had developed, hadyet shown none of the strikingly popularforms which dazzle a crowd, and the divisionsin his party and its weakness were naturallythrown back upon his head. The two menthemselves had no personal feeling againstco-operation. They remained on friendly termsalways. They were both Scotchmen ; theywere both endowed with some of the character-istic virtues of their countrymen. But thoughthey addressed to each other from the plat-forms friendly messages and polite invitations,they never seemed to get to close quarters.Adopting the theological phraseology dear totheir countrymen, they spoke of worshippingin different tabernacles. The truth was thatthey were separated by irreconcilable opinions


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 63on some things and by irreconcilable tendencieson nearly everything.

It is impossible to say what might havebeen the issue of their friendly duels if ithad not been for the advent of the greatFree Trade issue. When, amid that deadlyand almost visible silence that marks thesense of an audience that it is hearing andwitnessing epoch-making events, Mr. Chamber-lain avowed his conversion one afternoon in1905 to the doctrine of Tariff Reform, awhole new chapter was opened in the historyof English political parties. It divided forthe moment the Unionist Party, and itdivided, more than all, the Unionist Ministry,Before many months had passed Mr. Chamber-lain himself had left the Ministry ; he wasfollowed in succession by Mr. Ritchie, LordGeorge Hamilton, and later on, by the Dukeof Devonshire ; and there came into the campof the Conservatives that division into sec-tionsFree Fooders, as they were called, and


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64 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BAXXERMANTariff Reformerswhich corresponded to thedifferences between the pro-Boers and theLiberal ImperiaHsts in the Liberal Party.On the Liberal Party, of course, the effect

was quite different. The Boer War had bythis time been concluded ; what divisions ofopinion there had been among Liberals onthat great issue had been healed ; and thisnew issue on which they were all in completeagreement, gave to them a welcome oppor-tunity to emerge from their divisions into thefull and blazing day of perfect accord. Be-tween Lord Rosebery and Sir Henry Camp-bell-Bannerman, between Mr. Morley and Mr.Asquith, there was not one particle of differ-ence of opinion or tendency ; they could gonow together, honestly, whole-heartedly, to theend of the struggle. This change in theirown position, this closing up of their ranks,was a natural incitement to greater, moreunited, more enthusiastic effort among theLiberals ; and this tendency was, of course,


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 65enormously helped by the spectacle of thedivisions among their political opponents,divisions which broke up a combination ofdifferent elements that had withstood the testof stormy times for quite twenty years. Thepromised land of office and power was atlast in sight, after years of weary and ap-parently hopeless wanderings in the chilly andsandy deserts of Opposition.For a time it looked as if there were no

reason why this combination between SirHenry Campbell-Bannerman and Lord Rose-bery, which had been sighed for during somany years, should not come to pass ; theyspoke with equal fervour in denunciation ofTariff Reform, in advocacy of Free Trade.It was still a possibility that Lord Roseberywould be chosen as Commander-in-Chief ofthe Liberal forces, with Campbell-Bannermanas his lieutenant in the House of Commons.Thus it happened that, up to almost the lastmoment, Campbell-Bannerman's future lay

6


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66 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANtrembling in the balance ; either he mightget the dazzling supremacy of the first placeor the comparative mediocrity of the second ;between the two there yawns a very widegulf.

There was one other rival who stood inCampbell-Bannerman's wayin some respectsas formidable even as Lord Rosebery, LordSpencer had served the Liberal Party in postsof great difficulty and terrible peril for manyyears. He had twice in succession takenhis life in his hands by accepting the LordLieutenancy of Ireland at a moment whendisturbance in that unhappy country hadreached almost to the proportions of civilwar ; he had never swerved from Liberalprinciples with regard to Ireland once he hadthrown in his lot with Mr. Gladstone in thegreat Home Rule upheaval of 1885 ; he wasuniversally esteemed for his simplicity, hishonesty, his consistency ; and he had theadvantage of a great title, great possessions,


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAX 67great traditions from former Liberal chiefs ;and, unlike Campbell-Bannerman, had saidnothing during the Boer War which anybodycould resent as unpatriotic. In that desirefor compromising on an individual which ischaracteristic of all political parties, there wasa strong set for Lord Spencer. But justabout the time when his claims were to comeup for consideration Lord Spencerunex-pectedly, suddenlywas struck down byillness, and he was removed thus from therunning in a race where with many he wasfirst favourite.What illness had done in the shape of re-

moving one rival, difference of conviction andhis own hand did with the other. In thecourse of the speech-making which precededthe General Election, Lord Rosebery carriedon an active campaign in the West ofEngland. There were many circumstances inthis very campaign which seemed to point tohim as destined to be the leader and the


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68 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANPrime Minister, Everywhere Lord Roseberygot a reception which was regal in its enthu-siasm, in the multitudes who took part in it,in the fanatical admiration which his inspiredutterances excited everywhere he spoke. Theintoxication in the air which always precedesand accompanies a General Election inclinesmen to dream dreams, and already many sawLord Rosebery once more in the Premiershipbut in the Premiership, not as the helplessslave of impossible conditions and rebelliousand hostile chief lieutenants as in 1903, butas commander of a great party and asacknowledged and powerful chief of a bodyof assistants rather than colleagues. AnyhowLord Rosebery's star was in the ascendant,and the struggle between him and Campbell-Bannerman for supreme power seemed to beleaning towards his side.A good many other things, besides the

merely personal struggle between the two men,lay trembling in the balance at that moment.


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANK ERMAN 69For the success of Lord Rosebery would haveinvolved an entirely different attitude on manysubjects, but most of all on the question ofIreland. As has been seen, Lord Rosebery hadvirtually changed his opinions on the questionof Home Rule ; to all intents and purposes hehad become a Unionist. It was true that someof his most powerful friends and associates hadnot imitated him in this respect ; they hadjoined him in thinking that Home Rule shouldbe approached by very different methods fromthose of Mr. Gladstone, but none of them hadshown any desire to withdraw from the positionthat Home Rule must be the ultimate solutionof the Irish difficulty. At the same time, onecan see what a difference it would have madein the political situation and in the wholetemper of the Government if the PrimeMinister had been Lord Rosebery and notCampbell - Bannerman. The head of anyorganisation, and especially of such anorganisation as the British Cabinet, must


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70 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANalways exercise a powerful and even domi-nating influence on the whole policy and temperof the organisation. This is especially andpeculiarly the case with such a body as theBritish Cabinet. Bismarck used constantly tocomplain that his position as head of theMinistry in Germany contrasted unfavourablywith that of the head of the Government inEngland ; and the chief reason he gave forthis complaint was that in Germany the PrimeMinister was only one of several otherMinisters, practically independent of him ;while in England the Prime Minister wasgiven the right to choose his own colleagues,and if they differed from him, had the rightto ask that they should go while he couldremain. It will be seen, therefore, that if LordRosebery had been called to the headship ofthe Government, the Government would havehad to wear his colours ; and one of thesecolours was hostility to the Gladstonian policyof Home Rule.


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 71With Campbell-Bannerman as its head, on

the other hand ; the Ministry, of course, wouldhave been of an entirely different complexion.There were several of the old comrades ofLord Rosebery who would have found itimpossible to serve under him again, especiallyif the abandonment of Home Rule were oneof the conditions. And there would havebeen a further complication in the situationby the effect which a Rosebery Premiershipwould be certain to have had on the IrishNationalist Party. That party, as is known,has a considerable following in Great Britainas well as in Ireland. It is computed thatthere are something like two millions of anIrish population in Great Britain ; and mostof these are dwellers in great populous centres.In several constituencies they have a largevoting power ; and that power would certainlyhave been doubtful, if not hostile, if a RoseberyPremiership had been created. The IrishNationalists had already become restive. For,


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72 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BAXNERMANwhile not repudiating Home Rule as an ulti-mate solution, several of the friends andadherents of Lord Rosebery among the leadersof the Liberal Party had proclaimed that theywould not only not support but would resistany attempt to introduce a Home Rule measurein the Parliament that was about to be electedby the constituencies in the coming Election.

It was under these circumstances that I hadan interview with Campbell-Bannerman of anylength for the last time. He invited a friendand me to breakfast with him. It is but alittle over two years since that meeting ;and yet how remote it seems now Campbell-Bannerman had just moved into BelgraveSquare. For years he had occupied the vastmansion which stands at one of the cornersin Grosvenor Placejust close to Hyde ParkGate. For some reason or other he had movedinto a house in Belgrave Square. The housewas still, more or less, in the hands of thedecorators ; and this gave a certain air of


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 73preparation and of setting up housekeepingunder new conditions, which corresponded withthe coming change in the fortunes of the owner.There was, further, that air of rush whichalways proclaims the rising of a new sun, andall the crowds of satellites that seek to begathered into the orbit. There were constantknockings at the door ; telegrams seemed tobe coming every second ; and cards werepiling themselves up in the hall. It seemedas if one were entering not a private dwelling-house, but a great public department.Campbell-Bannerman in vacation times had

the early hours and the plenteous breakfastswhich are characteristic of his countrymen.It is needless to say that he was an idealhostsimple, cordial, and, when it came toan exchange of views, frank. This exchangeof views was brief, for there was completeagreement as to both policy and tactics.There was no need for discussing any suchpossibility as the abandonment of Home Rule


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74 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANby Campbell-Bannerman ; to have done sowould have been an insult to his intelligenceand to his honesty. One point only couldbe suggested for discussion, and a few wordsshowed that even that required little if indeedany discussion. A smile, half-amused, half-canny, showed that Campbell - Bannermanhad not the slightest idea of embarrassing him-self and his friends and all the friends ofthe National cause of Ireland by such self-denying ordinances against a Home Ruleproposal in the coming Parliament as hadbeen uttered by some of his future colleagues.One little personal and curious incident ofthat to me memorable breakfast I recall.When we had all disposed of the excellentdishes which make up the Scotch breakfast,Campbell-Bannerman, looking at me wistfully,and evidently with a desire to show to methe generous and amiable hospitality of aScotchman to an Irishman, remarked thatwhen he was at Cambridge there was a


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 75curious custom of finishing up breakfast witha glass of strong old ale. Would I like torevive the custom ? I am sure that poorC.-B. would have suffered if I had acceptedthe invitation ; so I had to refuse, and C.-B.then remarked that he had never repeatedthe Cambridge tradition since he had left theUniversity, and I am sure was quite gratefulthat I had not compelled him to do so onthis occasion.

It was shortly after this that he made hishistoric speech in Stirling. That was thespeech in which he laid down the policy thatwhile Ireland might not expect to get at oncea measure of complete Home Rule, anymeasure brought in should be consistent withand leading up to the larger policy. Such adeclaration was all that the Irish NationalistParty could have expected at that moment,and it enabled them to give their full supportat the elections to the Liberal Party. Butdown in Cornwall and on Lord Rosebery thespeech had quite the opposite effect.


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76 SIR HEXRY CAMPBELL-BAXNERMANIn one quarter of an hour the whole situation

for him and for Campbell-Bannerman waschanged, and changed for ever. Taking up thespeech which Campbell-Bannerman had madein Scotland, Lord Rosebery denounced it asmeaning the advocacy again of Home Rule,and under that banner, added Lord Roseberyemphatically, I will not serve. Lord Rose-bery either singularly miscalculated or wascarried away by the intensity of his convictionsinto over-emphatic utterance ; whatever was thereason, this little speech sealed his fate as theleader of the Liberal Party and as PrimeMinister for that epoch ; the Liberal leaderswere all against him in principle, however muchsome of them may have sympathised with himin tactics, and Campbell-Bannerman, Mr.Morley, and other powerful men, as well asthe rank and file of the Liberal Party, wouldnever have consented to the abandonment ofHome Rule. In addition, there was theformidable body of eighty-two Irish Nationalist


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BAXNERMAN 77members, without whose assistance it seemedimpossible for any Liberal Government to becarried on, and, in short. Lord Rosebery cuthimself, by his speech, adrift from the LiberalParty and from the Liberal leadership.

Thus, then, by a series of events, someof them accidental, some of them unexpectedby certain gifts which were unsuspected forthree-fourths of his political lifeabove all, bythe ultimate throw of the dice by the great godChanceCampbell-Bannerman was pointed toas the man who had to be summoned by theKing, when the duty devolved on the monarchof calling for the formation of a new Cabinet.That duty came, in the end, unexpectedly. Mr.Balfour had shown such extraordinary powerof conducting an Administration in the faceof almost impossible conditions, had survivedso many separations of powerful colleagues,had so obstinately refused to be forced by hispolitical opponents into the resignation ofpower until a majority of the House of Com-


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78 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANmons decided against him, that it seerned quitelikely that he would face yet another sessionof Parliament. He had closed the session of1905 with the announcement that he wouldbring in during the following session a newRedistribution Bill, one of the chief features ofwhich was to be a considerable reduction in therepresentation of Ireland. But this proposaldid not suit his party. It was, in fact, almostas unwelcome to his own friends as it was tohis political foes ; not so much, indeed, thatthey disagreed with the policy of such a pro-posal in itself as with the timeliness of themoment when it was brought forward. Theview of those who had given their adhesionto Tariff Reform was that that question hadbeen placed in the very forefront of theUnionist programme, and that to introduce anyother questionespecially of so provocativeand difficult a character as Redistributionwasto divert the attention of the party from thegreat and supreme to the minor and the un-


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 79essential. This section of the Unionist Partybesides, had already come to the conclusionthat the longer the appeal to the country waspostponed, the more complete would be thedefeat of the Government. To this convictionMr. Chamberlain, with his immense know-ledge and instinct in electioneering, gaveutterance several times while Mr. Balfour stillheld on to office. This period in the careerof Mr. Balfour will always be one of the mostinteresting psychological studies even in hisinteresting life. The general theory acceptedat the time was that, having been deserted byso many people, he was resolved to show thathe could get on without them ; and certainlyhe did surprise everybody by the tenacity andthe power he displayed. But in the end hisCabinet had been reduced to something verylike a Cabinet of head clerks and privatefriends. Some of these, too, were not verymuch enamoured of Tariff Reform, and werepartly responsible for the attempt to side-


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8o SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANtrack that issue by raising the Irish Ques-tion in an acute form. But an end was putto these dilatory and tangled tactics by aspeech of Mr. Chamberlain's, which so clearlycalled for the clearing of the situation thatMr. Balfour was left no choice but to hand inhis resignation. This he did on December 4,1905.Thus it was that England found herself

in the middle of a Ministerial crisis just atthe epoch when the festivities and the familygatherings of the Christmastide dispose allmen to forget the struggles of public life. TheLiberal leaders had been lectured by many oftheir followers for months on the evil of takingoffice before the appeal to the country ; it waspointed out in a thousand leading articles thatthis would be a tactical mistake ; that it wouldgive the Conservative Party the advantage ofchanging from the place of responsibility andattack into that of irresponsibility and criticism,and it was even reported that Mr. Balfour


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANXERMAN 8ihimself had justified his resignation, and theconsequent exchange of roles with his oppo-nents, on the ground that he would therebygain or save thirty seats.

But all these arguments were not even heardof when the King sent to Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman the request that he would form anAdministration. Sir Henry at once acceptedthe task, and set to work. His task was notvery easythat of forming a Governmentnever is. Mr. Gladstone, who could sleep any-where and at any time in normal circumstances,declared that this task was the only one whichever cost him a night's sleep. In the case of SirHenry Campbell-Bannerman that difficult taskwas made more difficult by the existence of thetwo sections among his nearest comrades. TheFree Trade controversywhich now rushed tothe front as the main political issuehad, it istrue, done much to unite the scattered andbroken ranks of the Liberals. They had foundan even more effective and potent bond in the

7


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82 SIR HEXRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANprospect of a great victory, with all that such avictory involved of fame, and salary, and power.But still, the recollections of the split over theBoer War were still fresh, and the feelings ofexasperation between the two sections had allthe bitterness which is always conspicuous inthe quarrels of friends. And the Irish Questionraised above the gestation of the new Govern-ment its menacing and haggard form. Theresult was that the formation of the newGovernment by Campbell-Bannerman pro-ceeded somewhat slowly, and for some threedays it was almost at a standstill. The chiefdifficulty was the Liberal Imperialists. Smallin number among the rank and file of theLiberal Party, the Liberal Imperialists had, onthe other hand, the enormous advantage ofhaving as leaders the most powerful and for-midable Parliamentarians of the whole party,and it is well known to all students of politicalmanoeuvres that a body of politicians, thoughthey have comparatively few adherents in the


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BAXNERMAM 83rank and file, is often disproportionately power-ful from the fact that it has its leaders withinthe very heart of the citadel, or, to use the lessreverent x^merican expression, that its leadershave more or less control of the machine.Mr. Asquith, Sir Edward Grey, Mr. Haldanehere were three powerful men, whose absencefrom the leadership and counsels of the LiberalParty might exercise an extremely prejudicialeffect. And all the negotiations, it must beremembered, were overshadowed by the su-preme and dominating fact of the moment,that the new Government would have to enterimmediately on all the perils, uncertainties, and hecklings

of a great General Election, and

that nothing could be more calculated todamage their chances than to present to theworld the spectacle of a party divided againstitself A party divided against itself is neveras sure to fall as when it reaches to a pitchedbattle, either in the field or at the pollingbooths.


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84 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANIf it had not been for this decisive fact it

is quite possible that the Government of Camp-bell-Bannerman would have been of quite adifferent character. Neither section was par-ticularly enamoured of the other, either person-ally or politically, and there was, indeed, evenan approach to strong personal dislike betweenCampbell-Bannerman and one of the mostprominent of the Liberal Imperialist group.Sir Edward Greywho was in manner themost mild, in speech the most discreet, indemeanour the most correct of all the groupturned out to be the one who gave the mosttrouble, and for days the question was at issuewhether or not he would join the Ministry. Ifhe had not joined the Ministry it would havebeen difficult for either Mr. Asquith or Mr.Haldane to have done so, and in that case,though the Government would, of course, havebeen ultimately formed, it would have been ofquite a different complexion. It might havebeen more powerful, or lessthat is a matter


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SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN 85of conjecturebut it would certainly havebeen dififerent. The fact also remainsitmust be dwelt upon, for it governed the wholesituationthat the Government was formedbefore the General Election was fought.

In the last resort a politician, even more thanthe average man, is controlled by his personaland his party interests more than by his privatesentiments ; and men who are true politiciansare able to work for a common political purposeeven with men they dislike. As anybody mighthave anticipated, the tangled web of negotiationand intrigue was unravelled in the end, andthe Liberal Imperialists received some of thehighest places in the new Ministry. Mr. Hal-dane was supposed to look to the Lord Chan-cellorship ; but Campbell-Bannerman had nointention of leaving the charge of his personaland political views in one House of the Legis-lature in the hands of anybody whom he couldnot implicitly trust as both a personal andpolitical adherent; and such a man he found


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86 SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMANin Sir

t p o'connor: sir henry campbell-bannerman

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