The Express.
London, England, 1864-10-19 00:00:00

[Stamped, id. Additional.]

DEATH OF THE DUKE OF NEWCASTLE.

The Duke of Newcastle died yesterday evening, at
a quarter to seven o'clock, at Clamber Park.
The late Duke, Henry Pelham Clinton, Lord
Lincoln by courtesy, was born in 1811. His early

'characteristics seem to have been the same as those
the world now knows so well. At Eton and Christ-
church he manifested the sound, substantial, but
not brilliant quality of mind which made him for
thirty years one of the most useful of public ser•
vants. He was a remarkable illustration of the
operation of the moral on the intellectual nature.
It was his conscientious activity, his moral energy,
that set his faculties to work, at all times, and where-
ever he went; and it was his personal disinterestedness,
his public spirit, his power of subordinating his
own feelings to other people's interests which
enabled him to keep his faculties at work, in
defiance of discouragements which would have
daunted many a man of higher original capacity.
It was probably on account of these moral qualities
that Sir Robert Peel adopted Lord Lincoln, as he
did Sidney Herbert, into his political band. The
young man entered upon office at three-and-twenty,
on the first opportunity that occurred. He was
made a Lord of the Treasury during the short ad-
ministration of Sir R. Peel, from December, 1834,
to the next April. He had then been in parlia-
ment two years, sitting for South Nottingham.
During the interval till the return of Peel to power
in September, 1841, Lord Lincoln won upon the
expectation of the house and the notice of the
country, so that when his opportunity arrived, he
scarcely answered to the idea formed of him. His
ability and his reach of political view were as yet in
no proportion to his activity and readiness ; and
that activity and readiness were easily mistaken for
self-sufficiency in a man yet so young. He was
only First Commissioner of Inland Revenue ; and
he could hardly show what was in him to any oue
but his chief and master. Peel understood him
rightly, and by his support enabled him to become
what we have since seen.

In January, 1846, he seomed to have obtained
scope to show what he could do in real statesman-
ship. He became Chief Secretary for Ireland ; but
the ministry went out in July, on the discomfiture
of their Coercion Bill for Ireland, which was under-
stood to be au act of vengeance caused by the re-
peal of the Corn Laws. During the five years more
that he remained in the Commons, as member for
the Falkirk boroughs, because his father spoiled
his chances in his own county of Nottingham, he
was one of Peel's most trusted lieutenants, and one
of the securities that a Peel party should exist
which, however small in numbers, should compen-
sate by its character for some of the dangers
attending the disintegration of parties which
the policy of its chief had necessarily effected.
From time to time, Lard Lincoln showed
that he was not idle, though in opposi-
tion, and, as all the world knew, unhappy in the
domestic relations in which, of all men, he "mimed
the most likely to deserve and obtain happiness.
His marriage in 1832 bad issued in great misery,
and he obtained a divorce in 1850. His father's
treatment of him was the world's wonder for herd-
ness and absurdity of wrath, considering that the
ground of parental displeasure was merely dif-
ference of political opinion. Lord Lincoln worked
away at such work as he could find or make, keep-
ing silence on his filial injuries—about which,
indeed, the Duke took care that the public should
be sufficiently informed by himself. One of the
ablest speeches made by Lord Lincoln in this
interval was in 184 i, on emigration from Ireland
as a means of relief during and after the famine,
and the disorganization of affairs which it must
occasion. While witnessing such an emigration as
is going on at this day, we ought to remember bow
sorely such a relief was needed and desired when
the Irish were far greater in numbers and far poorer
in food and work than now.

At the beginning of 1851, Lord Lincoln suc-
ceeded to the dukedom, and left the house of par-
liament in which he had built up the groundwork
of the general expectation of good service from
him. The next year introduced him at last to each
office as would show what he could do. He be-
came Colonial Secretary under Lord Aberdeen at
the close of 1852, little imagining what responsi-
bilities and labours he was undertaking. The
charge and government of half a hundred colonies
has long been considered an absurdly onerous task
for one member of an administration ; but
to this was in those days added the vir-
tual management of war in its distant operation.
When war with Russia was declared in }larch,
1854, the Duke was relieved of his colonial duties,
which were undertaken by Sir George Grey, and
the new Secretaryship for War was filled by the
Duke. We all remember but too well what fol-
lowed—the suffering and mortality among our
troops in the East, and the too natural popular
impression that the War ministers must be to
blame. and the wrath and cavil and ostentatious
disparagement with which those two men—the Duke
and his friend, Sidney Herbert—were treated while
they were working their frames and faculties day
and night as few men have worked before, and
effecting achievements in the mere neutralising of
other men's blunders and deficiencies which from
another point of view would have excited admira-
tion and gratitude. It was not their fault that our
soldiers suffered and died ; and it was their doing
that many more did not perish.
The Duke joined Lord Palmerston's cabinet in
Jane, 1859, in the midst of the excitement of the
Italian war. He was again Colonial. Secretary, as
he was till his final resignation. It was in this
capacity that he was naturally chosen to attend
the Prince of Wales in his Canadian travels ; but,
apart from that particular fitness, he was the very
man to discharge the office of temporary guardian
in so responsible a case. There is no need to de-
scribe to the existing generation what the guard-
ian's qualities were found to be on a trial so unusual
and so stringent. Political wisdomand firmness were
requisite, as well as the sense, temper, and manners
needed in the guide, friend, and companion of the
young heir to the throne. It is enough to
mention the Orangemen of Canada to show what
we mean. As to his management of his share of
the American intereourses, it is not too much to
say that the disposition to peace between the two
countries may owe as much to the exemplification
the Duke presented of the English gentleman and
statesman as to the genial and hospitable temper
with which the American people welcomed and
entertained the Prince and his guardian.
Those who were personally acquainted with the
Duke of Newcastle must ever feel that the impress_
sion he made on them was more peculiar than can
I be easily accounted for from his type of character,

[TWOPENCE

and yet those who did not know him may
truly believe that with the mind's eye they
see him very much as be was. Frank,
honest, unassuming, with a genuine sense of
human equality always overriding any conscious-
ness--or rather remembrance—of his rank, here-
ditary or official, he was easy to know and to un-
derstand from afar. Those who were nearest to him
were subject to frequent surprises froin his sim-
plicity, his uncoucealable conscientiousness, and his
abiding sense of fellowship with all sincere people,
whoever they might be. As a nobleman of aristo-
cratic England, he was in this way a great blessing
and a singularly useful example. When we think of
his candour in his place in parliament, his dili-
gence, and overgrowing knowledge, and practiced
sense in his department, and the national confidence
he had thus won, we feel that the public loss is
irreparable. He never was and never would have
been a great political philosopher, or sage, or leader.
That was not In his line. But while we need no
less a staunch upholder of the natural and honour-
able welfare of our country, a patriotic promoter of
its dignity and lustre, and a devoted servant of the
commonwealth, from the sovereign on the throne
to the poorest adventurer landing in a distant
' colony, we shall miss and mourn the late Duke of
Newcastle, and anxiously watch the rising genera-
tions of " the governing classes," to see if we may
hope for more like him.