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Art. 4.-SHELBURNE AND WINDHAM.

1. The Life of William, Earl of Shelburne, afterwards First Marquess of Lansdowne. By Lord Fitzmaurice. Second and Revised Edition. Two vols. London: Macmillan, 1912.

2. The Windham Papers. With an introduction by the Earl of Rosebery. Two vols. London: Jenkins, 1913. No two contemporary figures in our political history offer a more obvious contrast, alike in character, record, political creed and outlook on life than the first Marquess of Lansdowne, better known as Lord Shelburne, and William Windham, the disciple of Burke and the colleague in office both of the younger Pitt and of Charles Fox. Shelburne's and Windham's lives are an effective epitome of the reign of George III. From the Seven Years' War and the Peace of Paris, through the struggles that centre round Wilkes and the American question, down to the war with Revolutionary and Napoleonic France, and the issues raised by the movement for Parliamentary Reform, the Industrial Revolution and the unequal contest between British 'Jacobinism' and the champions of order,' every important episode, imperial, domestic or economic, the problems alike of policy and ideas, of intellectual and moral evolution are raised in succession

by their careers. The careers themselves ask a peremptory and personal question. Why do these two men

occupy so meagre a place in our text-books, and why is the imprint to-day of their memory and reputation so faint? Both fill a large, at times an imposing, space in the contemporary records. Shelburne was a Prime Minister. Of Windham it was said in 1793 that his judgment and line of conduct might make or mar a ministry and decide the destinies of Great Britain. Yet it is no uncharitable exaggeration to assert that posterity has forgotten Shelburne's ministerial achievements, and remembers him only as the Jesuit of Berkeley Square' and the subject of some immortal lines in the Rolliad. And if Windham is remembered at all, it is with a vague recollection that he was responsible apparently for disastrous military enterprises, and was the intimate friend of the Tory Johnson and the Whig Burke-a

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friend whom to know was to love, and to love was a liberal education. Why did Shelburne and Windham fail? If biography is life without theory, it ought to supply a convincing answer to a question from which no student of 18th century history can escape.

When Lord Fitzmaurice's biography of Shelburne was published nearly forty years ago, it was at once recognised as a first-rate and solid contribution to historical knowledge. The three volumes were based on original sources, and for the first time the case for Shelburne was adequately set out. The new and revised edition in two volumes increases the student's debt to the author. Since 1876 the material both for a study of Shelburne and of his times has enormously increased. A careful comparison of the revised with the original edition reveals that Lord Fitzmaurice has spared no pains to utilise and incorporate, where necessary, the new sources, particularly the evidence in the numerous Reports of the Historical Manuscripts Commission; while the text and the notes show, in more instances than it is possible here to enumerate, that the new edition is no mere reprint of the old, but a careful, honest and scholarly revision, actuated by the desire of an expert to make his monument of pietas to a notable ancestor as complete and finished as industry and knowledge can make it. The biography of statesmen must always gain if the biographer can add to the requisite qualifications of an historical expert a firsthand knowledge of public life, and the indefinable touch that personal and prolonged acquaintance with politics, public affairs and public men alone can give. Academic judgments in history may be the outcome of a meritorious erudition and an earnest determination to find the truth; they are too often deficient in the direct knowledge of political and public life and in the subtle nuances and readjusted values which practical experience of men and great affairs imparts. Lord Fitzmaurice as a biographer has the advantage of knowing diplomacy and public affairs at first hand. A peevish critic might remark that his writing is cold, his treatment too objective, his attitude so judicial that the judgments are balanced into a disappointing neutrality. If enthusiasm for Shelburne is impossible, as it probably is, we could wish that Lord Fitzmaurice had not, on more than one occasion, denied

himself the luxury and duty of telling his readers not only what he really thought of Shelburne, but of many other persons and affairs, and of pronouncing a clear verdict on the many transactions with which Shelburne was directly concerned, instead of presenting us with weighty considerations for suspending sentence or refusing to adopt the traditional view. For one reader in particular he has failed to draw a convincing and living portrait of Shelburne-the man-and to solve the conundrum why, if Shelburne was what the sifted evidence suggests, his career has to be carefully reconstructed in order to justify his contemporary reputation; why, if he had the many attractive qualities and gifts that investigation reveals, the opinion of all his contemporaries was so uniformly and depressingly unfavourable. But these be toys,' as Bacon said. Lord Fitzmaurice's biography is and will remain the standard authority, in which critics must quarry for their material, and with which they must seriously reckon.

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Windham has fared worse; nor indeed has the singular and persistent misfortune which has robbed both Windham and history of an adequate biography ended yet, though a full-length portrait of a subject, personally so attractive and so conspicuously concerned with high affairs and momentous issues, deserves and would reward the skill of a sympathetic and expert hand. The material for that portrait is rich and accessible. Apart from the copious sources in print for Windham's epoch and contemporaries, and the biographical data in the previously published speeches, letters and diary, there are the ninety-four volumes of manuscript acquired by the British Museum in 1909. It is difficult, however, to ascertain the purpose of the anonymous editor of the two volumes of Windham Papers' now given to the public. They are not a biography; nor are they, like the Reports of the Historical Manuscripts Commission, a complete Calendar of the British Museum collection with verbatim reproductions of the more important items. They are a selection; and, as with every selection, the value depends on the editor's knowledge, judgment and technical equipment. It is not easy to discover, still less to be satisfied with, the principles on which matter has been excluded or retained. The important and the unimportant are

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jumbled together; nor are we informed how much has been omitted, at what points, or why. Material is included (e.g. letters from Burke or from and to Windham) which is available already in Burke's Correspondence, the Dropmore Papers and other printed sources, though the editor generally forgets to state the fact or to give the reference. Extracts from the Diary are inserted without any reference to the printed edition, so that the reader must ascertain for himself whether the extract is from a suppressed passage or is a faithful reproduction of the extant text. The prefaces, too, suggest many uncharitable doubts about both the editor's skill and knowledge. For example, the note on H. Flood (i, 37) is remarkable for its assertion that on July 16, 1783, Flood was in league with Grattan to secure the independence of the Irish Parliament.' On p. 26 and p. 31 the events between Rockingham's death and the formation of the Fox-North coalition are summed up in three or four misleading sentences. The editor claims for Windham that he was the first to suggest and was the chief agent in the removal of the Duke of York from the command in Flanders. But when Windham started on his important mission, Pitt, as Lord Ashbourne has shown, had already decided that the Duke must be removed and had already selected Lord Cornwallis as his successor. Windham's share was creditable to his courage and candour, but really he did little more than confirm on the spot the justifiability of the removal and facilitate the execution of a disagreeable decision. Nor can the two following notes be regarded as happy examples either of English, brevity or accuracy: 'Whitworth, the British minister at Paris, having presented an ultimatum, left on May 12, and the war that must inevitably follow the unpopular treaty was formally declared six days later' (ii, 209): 'General Sir John Moore, Commander-in-Chief of the British Army in Spain, advanced from Lisbon to Coruña' (ii, 339).

More serious is the half-hearted, scrappy and dismembered presentation of Windham himself. A reader, starting with the laudable desire to master the career of a forgotten but prominent statesman, but unprovided with considerable special knowledge, together with leisure and energy to pursue elusive clues and fill in patent gaps, would speedily find himself mystified, and

would either abandon the task or wonder how on the disjointed evidence offered him Windham could be considered to have any importance at all. Certainly he could not learn from these two volumes the varying and baffling circumstances in which Windham was placed, the nature and complexity of the problems statesmanship, between 1780 and 1810, was called upon to solve, nor the character, merits or demerits of Windham's contribution to them. Take, for example, the difficult question of concerted British action with the Royalist insurgents from 1793 to 1801, or Windham's ideas and policy in the organisation of our military forces alike from 1793 to 1801, and again from 1805 to 1810. Both of these are unquestionably important but dark chapters in British history and in Windham's life. The story from Windham's point of view has never yet been adequately told, nor is it now told, nor is the full material for judgment set out. The editor indeed requires, though he does not warn the readers of the fact, that his book should be read in a first-rate library containing the other relevant sources and authorities. To understand the chief actor it is essential at every page to refer to the Speeches and Diary, to quarry in Burke's correspondence, to hunt in the index of and check the extracts from the Dropmore Papers, to be on familiar terms with every phase of the careers of Pitt, Dundas and Portland, Fox and Grenville, to have dogseared the Parliamentary Debates, and always to have at one's elbow an armoury of notes on the works of Mr Lecky, Lord Stanhope, and the other great secondary sources, as well as a nice acquaintance with the critical and most recent researches of Dr Holland Rose and Mr Fortescue and half a dozen foreign scholars. For those, who have so equipped themselves and are not averse from the labour, some new and rewarding material, some fresh glimpses, some corroborative or corrective suggestions are provided in these pages, though not as many as they would like, if they remember the aforesaid ninety-four volumes in the British Museum. Those who dislike mystification and are in search of a plain tale, told with adequate skill and the knowledge that commands respect, had better content themselves with Lord Rosebery's charming introduction, and wait for a competent biographer.

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