BOOKS.
DELANE OF THE "TIMES." *
No survivor of the mid-Victorian period will be disposed to challenge the accuracy of Sir Edward Cook when he says : "The Tithes of Delane was a national institution ; and Delane of the Time.s deserves a place among the notable Englishmen of the Victorian era." The famous editor is, indeed, fully entitled to have his biography included amongst those who were the "Makers of the Nineteenth Century." As to the manner in which his biographer has accomplished his task, there can be but one opinion. In a single volume which, considering the great variety and importance of the subjects treated, may be con- sidered a model of condensation, and in not a single page of which the interest is for one moment allowed to flag, Sir Edward Cook has given us a vivid account of the character and abilities of the man, accompanied by some very judicious comments on the transactions in which he was engaged. He does not attempt to conceal Delane's shortcomings and limitations; but he does full justice to his talents, and he enables the present generation— who require these things to be interpreted to them—to under- stand how it was that, under special political conditions which ean never recur, those talents were singularly suited for display on the field of action to which a fortunate chance destined their possessor. • Himself an eminent journalist, Sir Edward Cook is particularly qualified to understand the pitfalls which lie in the , • Atone of tho "limes." By Sir Edward Cook. -London: Cons-to- Lle -a-h-d Co. ja. net.) path of a fellow-craftsman. He can appreciate better than others the delicacy of the relations between proprietor and editor. He can estimate the extent to which an editor who aspired, to a degree unknown to the present generation, to monopolize the guidance of public opinion, was constantly placed between the Charybdis of indecision and the Scylla of undue. haste in pronouncing an opinion, often on very imperfect information, upon the current affairs of the day, and fiow a flagrant error in either direction must necessarily have resulted in a loss of influence and a sacrifice of public confidence. Delano, in fact., owed the maintenance of his commanding position very largely to the circumstances of the time. If any one who had lived in the days of Pitt and Fox, or even in those of Chatham and Walpole, had been reincarnated during the mid-Victorian period, he would not have experienced much difficulty in familiarizing himself with the political situation. He would, indeed, have found that power had been transferred from the aristocracy and the landed interests to the middle classes. But the transfer singularly falsified the gloomy predictions of the Tory prophets of 1832. No great political or social upheaval took place. Tories and Whigs were, as of old, playing their time-honoured game. They railed against each other, but, how- ever little they may themselves at the time have recognized the fact, and however much their methods may have differed, they both in reality aimed at the same object.. That object was to check a very decided advance of democracy either by stubborn resistance or by timely and very moderate concessions. Nevertheless, the change which had taken place singularly facilitated the action of a journalist possessing the peculiar characteristics of Delano. When Kinglake said something to the effect that the average Englishman, on reading his Times after breakfast, found his own rather inchoate ideas very faithfully reflected and very intelli- gently uttered, he was merely stating in another form the fact that there is in all countries, and notably in England, a stamp of conventionality on middle-class ideas and opinions which exists to a far less degree either amongst the aristocracy or the pro- letariat. It is this conventionality which renders it a com- paratively easy task to cast the horoscope of middle-class political views, and to indicate beforehand what attitude the members of that class are likely to assume in dealing with any special issue. Their attitude will be essentially one which avoids extremes. It will be conservative, but not averse to moderato reform. It will be liberal, but will shrink with alarm front subversive change. Delane was the interpreter of this frame of mind. It was greatly to his credit that he rarely erred, but no man could hope to play the part which he played when the circumstances which contributed to his success had passed away. Those eircumstqnces underwent a complete transformation in 1865. Lord Palmerston's death was the close of an historical epoch. From that time onwards, triumphant democracy advanced with a rush. A political Rip Van Winkle, who had lived in the days of Pitt and Fox, had he descended on earth a quarter of a century after Lord Palmerston's death, would have found himself in a new world which he would have had much difficulty in understanding.
The history of Delano may in some respects be described as the history of backstairs politics during the eventful period which immediately preceded and immediately followed the accession of democracy to power. It cannot be said that Sir Edward Cook's biography tends generally to give a very exalted idea of the characters of the leading politicians of the time. Still less is it calculated to inspire any regret that the system of government which then obtained has passed away, never to return. The prevailing note throughout the whole of this period was excessive deference, amounting at times even to sub- serviency, paid by the politicians to the all-powerful journalist. Sturdy old Lord Russell appears to have been the only exception. He steadfastly refused to bow the knee to the journalistic Baal. He was scandalized, and not without reason, at Lord Derby "submitting his Ministerial appointments to Mr. Delane before submitting them to the Queen." But, with this exception, Ministers, of whatsoever party, sCCIII to have vied with each other in attempts to secure the good graces of the redoubtable " Thunderer." Lord Aberdeen communicated an important Cabinet secret to him. Lord Clarendon, whose letters to Delano "would fill a volume," shivered when the Times sneered at him for accepting the Chancellorship of the Duchy of Lancaster, and angrily asked why Lord Palmerston had not endeavoured to stifle the criticism. Lord Palmerston, although he had the courage of his opinions and triumphed over the Times on the occasion of his celebrated Civis Romanus sum speech, had no secrets from Delane. The persuasive voice of Lord Granville, and the honeyed flattery in the use of which Lord Beaconsfield was an adept, were alike employed to keep Delane in a good temper. Even Mr. Gladstone, although there was not much sympathy between him and Delane, and although he at one time caustically remarked that the Times "ought to be prohibited from changing sides more than a certain number of times during the year," did not altogether escape the contagion. Sir Edward Cook records that during the formation of the Cabinet of 1867 Mr. Gladstone "in personal letters to Delane reported progress from Windsor," and that at a dinner party given by Lord Granville he was "most attentive" to Delane's observations. Delane's power, though not boundless, and perhaps not, as Abraham Lincoln thought, only inferior to that of the Mississippi, was very great. He practically named Mr. Denison to be Speaker, Sir Robert Peel to be Irish Secretary, and Mr. Ward Hunt to be Chancellor of the Exchequer. He used very plain language in tendering advice, and, it must be added, very sound advice, to the most august personage in the realm, who did not scorn to explain in an anonymous letter addressed to the Times why it was not accepted. Ministers hung on his words, and the average Englishman suspended his opinion on the current topics of the day until Delane had told him what he ought to think.
"No public character," Lord Acton has said in one of his essays, "has ever stood the revelation of private utterances and correspondence." The verdict is severe—in my opinion, too severe. But if this test is applied in the case now under dis- cussion, it must be admitted that the journalist comes out of it, on the whole, with greater credit than the politicians. It is, indeed, almost impossible that any individual should, without having his head turned, be the subject of such adulation and solicitation as were offered to Delane. The view taken by his subordinates is sufficiently indicated by the following circum- stance which is narrated by Sir Edward Cook, and which reads as if it were an extract from Thaekeray's Book of Snobs. "It was a proud moment," Sir Edward says, "for an old retainer of the Times, who used to be fond of recording it, when he saw the editor riding down Whitehall with a duke walking on each side." But Delane himself does not appear to have lost his head or to have abused the advantages of his position. The sole fault of which he can be accused is that of boasting, in what Sir Edward Cook very justly calls a somewhat " thrasonical" strain, of his independence. The assertion of that independence did not involve the display of any great amount of moral courage. Delane was shrewd enough to know that it was his main asset, and that his position and influence depended wholly on its maintenance. " 11 y a toujours," the worldly-wise French proverb says, " un qui baise et an qui tend la joue." Delane was in the happy position of being generally the party which dispensed rather than that which solicited favours.
The present generation need have no hesitation in answering the question to which, when addressed to him by Lord Granville, Lord Beaconsfield characteristically refused to reply until after Delane's death. That Delane was a supremely able journalist does not admit of the least doubt. But was he in other respects a really able man ? As regards the affairs of his own country he was, as Sir Edward Cook says, generally an accurate "political meteorologist." He usually divined which way the wind was blowing, and trimmed his sails accordingly. He does not seem to have shown any great degree of moral courage in resisting a popular outcry with which he entertained no sympathy. Thus, he sup- ported Lord John Russell's Ecclesiastical Titles Bill, and at the same time confided to Charles Greville that he thought "the whole thing gross humbug and a pack of nonsense." , But on purely English matters he was usually on the side of common- sense and sound statesmanship. As regards foreign affairs, Sir Edward Cook says that Delane "was seldom more far-sighted than the majority of his countrymen at the time." The verdict is lenient. It cannot, indeed, be justly imputed as a fault to Delane that he was unable to approach the Schleswig-Holstein question or the Crimean Was by the light of the knowledge now in the possession of his posterity, but it is certain that in respect to other matters his want of foresight was far less excusable. As regards the American Civil War he was egregiously wrong, and did an amount of harm which it would be difficult to exaggerate. He was wanting in sympathy for the cause of Italian unity. He strongly opposed the commercial treaty with France, and his forecast of the results of the Franco-Prussian War was
utterly erroneous. "Nothing shall ever persuade me," he wrote to Sir William Russell, "except the event, that the Prussians will withstand the French, and I would lay my last Shilling upon Casquette against PumpernickeL" The record is sufficient to nullify any claim on the part of Delane to statesmanship of a high order.
In 1855, Mr. Walter, the proprietor of the Times, boasted that "he did not know of the existence of the Daily Telegraph." The phrase may be regarded as a measure of the degree of journalistic despotism exercised at one time by Delane and the Times. Such a state of things can never recur, neither in the public interests is it at all desirable that it should recur.
exclaim,
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