BOOKS.
MR. PAGET AND LORD MACAULAY.*
THAT Lord Macaulay's History of England, though a splendid achievement in a purely literary point of view, cannot be implicitly re- lied upon as a perfectly axeurate chronicle of the events which it undertakes to narrate, is an opinion which has for some time been gradually gaining ground with the reading public. Within the few years that have elapsed slate the appeaismee of the first instalment of this great work, attempts have been made in several cases to ob- tain a new trial, on the ground that the verdict pronounced by the Whig historian was not in accordance with the evidence on which it professed to be based. Among the most pertinacious and the moat successful of these vindicators of historical truth is Mr. Paget, who has published from time to time, principally in the pages of Black- wood's Magazine a detailed statement of the reasons which have, hieeveralmstances' induced him to dissent entirely from the conclu- sions arrived at by Lord Macaulay. These scattered papers he has now collected together, and has republished in the volume before us. In thus securing to his historical contributions a more permanent and substantial position than any periodical publication is able to ensure, Mr. Paget has performed an act of simple justice. Independently of the special interest which attaches to his essays by reason of their subject, they possess a distinct value of their own, on account of the amount of historical research which they unquestionably display. There can, we think, be no reasonable doubt that he has in more than one instance succeeded in convicting Lord Macaulay of having— to use the mildest possible language—dealt with historical evidence with a freedom for which it is exceedingly difficult to frame any ade- quate excuse. The weight of these strictures is, doubtless, con- siderably enhanced by the fact that they do not owe their origin to any difference of opinion on political matters between their author and their object. Mr. Paget tells us that, "sharing in Lord Mac- aulay's opinions, sympathizing with his feelings, and sincerely at- tached to that party iu politics of which he was so brilliant an orna- ment, he permitted himself to be carried away by the eloquent torrent of his declamation; and it was not without many a struggle that he found himself compelled, by a dry examination of facts, to surrender the illusion by which he had been enthralled." The result of this examination is, that Mr. Paget applies.to Lord Macaulay the words which he himself in his essay on " History," has applied to Herodotus—" He has written an incomparable book. He has writ- ten something better, perhaps, than the best history ; but he has not written a geed history ; he is from the first chapter to the last an in- ventor."
The points on which Mr. Paget impugns Lord Macaulay's judg- ments are five in number. Three of them relate to his estimates of the characters of Marlborough, Dundee, and William Penn ; while the other two refer to his endeavour to free William III. from the charge of having sanctioned the massacre of Glencoe, and to the account which he gives of the condition of the Highlands of Scotland at the commencement of the last century. Of all these attacks the first is, beyond question, by far the most successful. Lord Macaulay has, it will be remembered, brought to bear upon the Duke of Marl- borough the full force of that terribly invective of which he is so ac- complished a master. Referring to his connexion with the Duchess of Cleveland, he brands the great Whig general with infamy, as having been "kept by the most profane, imperious, and shameless of harlots ;" he charges him with obtaining money under false pretences, by wilfully falsifying the muster-roll of his troops, and drawing pay in the names of men who had long been dead; and, finally, he de- nounces him in distinct terms as the murderer of Lord Talmash. Mr. Paget's answer to the first of-these imputations is, comparative at least, somewhat vague and unsatisfactory. As regards the seco he shows that the sole authority on which it rests is that of a single anonymous Jacobite pamphlet; a production belonging to a class whose authors are stigmatized by Lord Macaulay himself as " habi- tual liars." His refutation of the third is so complete and conclusive as to merit a somewhat more detailed notice. Lord Macaulay's statement is, that the failure of Lord Talmask's attempt ou Brest was owing to Marlborough's having sent, through James II., timely information of the despatch of the expedition, whereby. the French were enabled to condentrate their forces on the point of attack, and so to repulse the English troops, whose leader was mortally wounded in the course of the engagement. The authority cited. by Lord Mac- aulay for this account of the transaction is the Stuart Papers, which, he says, have made it "known to the public that Talmash perished by the basest of all the hundred villauies of Marlborough ; ' whose motive he states to have been to force himself into the service of the existing government, by depriving it of the only Englishman, besides himself, who had shown himself fit for high military command. Mr. Paget takes the identical authority upon which Lord Macaulay relies, and proves therefrom, in :the most: conclusive manner, that informa- tion of the intended attack on Brest had been obtained from Godol- phin by an emissary of James IL, and was in the possession of the French king as early as May 1st, 1694; whereas Marlborough's letter to James was written, as Lord Macaulay himself allows, on May 4th, the day before the sailing of the expedition. Whatever, therefore, may have been 'Marlborough's design in writing it, the letter was not the cause of the failure of the attack. Mr. Paget brings forward an abundance of corroborative evidence in support of his statement, all of which is exceedingly interesting, but which we • ne New "Examen;" or, An Inquiry into the Evidence relating to certain PassaganesdinLonL°don:Macii"BlackwYldRisandrySo. Sons. John Paget, Barrister-at-Law. rri"er."4"r. have notpace bo ,go into in detail. As regards Marlborough's 'ma- uves, he toiL nks that he was actuated by a desire to preserve his credit with the exiled king; and his well.known •intimacy with Go.. dolphin renders it probable that he was acquainted with the designs upon Brest at amuck earlier period, and purposely delayed his reve- lation of them to James, until too late to do any harm. This view is, we are inclined to believe, more in accordance with the cha- racter of the man. However this may be, Mr. Paget's task is not as he observes, to determine the precise amount of blame to be awarded to Marlborough for his share in the transaction, but to show that the deliberate and specific charge brought against him by Lord Macaulay is not only unsupported, but is absolutely contradicted, by the evidence on which it professes to rely; and this task he has cer- tainly performed in the most effectual manner. Few who read this portion of his volume will, we fancy, be able to dissent from his con- clusion, that Lord Macaulay's version of the affair is distinguished not less by tuggeatio laid than by auppressio veri. Mr. Paget's advocacy of Dundee and William Penn appears to us to be, on the whole, less successful than that of Marlborough. In the case of Claverhouse, he somewhat injures his cause by endeavour- ing to say too much for his client. Not content with merely proving the inaccuracy and exaggeration of many. of Lord Macaulay's state- ments respecting this scourge of the Western Lowlands—a task which he performs very effectively—he proceeds to cite additional evidence from various sources, with a view of demonstrating that :Dundee, so far from being, as the historian asserts, "rapacious and profane, of violent temper and of obdurate heart," was, in fact, no less distinguished for humanity and forbearance than he was, unques- tionably, for dauntless courage. In this, as in many other cases, the truth probably lies somewhere between the two extremes. Mr. Paget's portrait of him, which has no shadows, is probably a not less unfaithful representation than Lord Macaulay's, which has no lights. The stern and cruel work which he was called upon to do he did effectually, possibly without any wanton and needless barbarity, but certainly without scruple and without remorse. But of all the attacks made by Mr. Paget upon Lord Macaulay, that which is based upon his treatment of Penn is decidedly the weakest. Out of nine distinct charges which the advocate of the courtly Quaker undertakes to re, fate, the first is the only one which is answered in a perfectly satis- factory manner. The evidence adduced by Mr. Paget in this case renders it exceedingly probable, though it does not prove to. demon- stration, that Lord Macaulayhas confused two distinct persons, and that George Penne, not William Penn, was the agent actually em- ployed in the disgraceful affair of the maids of Taunton. Mr. Paget is very indignant at a remark made by Lord Macaulay when narrat- ing the somewhat singular fact that Penn was present at the men- tions of Henry Cormsli and Elizabeth Gaunt, both of which took place on the same day, the one at Cheapside and the other at Tyburn, to the effect that "for him, exhibitions, which humane men generally avoid, seem to have had a strong attraction;" and he wishes us to be- lieve that Penn attended Cornisl in a capacity similar tothat in which Bishop Juxon waited upon Charles I. He does not, however, adduce onejot of evidence in support of this supposition, with the exception of the single fact, which is mentioned by Lord Macaulay, that Penn subsequently bore witness to the propriety of Cornish's demeanour .when on the scaffold. Nor does he seem to perceive that the ob- . noxious remark refers, not to Penn's attendance at Cornish's execu- tion, but to his hastening from it to that. of Elizabeth Gaunt ; a cir- cumstance which, whatever may have been the Quaker's sympathy with either victim, does certainly seem to argue at least an absence of natural repugnance to such spectacles. With regard to the affair of William Kiffm, we entirely dissent from the interpretation assigned by Mr. Paget to the words "they knew" .in Kiffin's statement, which seem to us to bear far more naturally the sense in which they are taken by'Lord Macaulay. The part taken by Penn in the contest between the fellows of Magdalen and James II. is by no means satisfactorily explained by Mr. Paget. His conversation during his second interview with the lellows was, even.by Dr. Hough's account, so extraordinary as-to be susceptible even of the most unfavourable
interpretation ; and unless we are to. consider his remark about Dr. Hough's being made Bishop of Oxford as absolutely unmeaning, we cannot but regard it.as designed to suggest thepossibility of a com- promise. Dr. Hough's assertion that Penn "did not so much as offer at any proposal' by way of accomodation," is of very little value; for it is clear that he and his colleagues were resolved not to put that interpretation upon anything that Penn could possibly say. But it is, surely, tolerably obvious that Hough could not be Bishop of Oxford unless the see were vacated by Parker; and Mr. Paget will have some difficulty in pointing outlaw that event was likely to be brought about in any other manner than'by the election of the latter to the presidency of Magdalen. In Mr. Paget's remarks on the massacre of Glencoe there occur, among much graver matter, some amusing instances of Lord Ma-
caulay's inaccuracy in minor points. One of these is commented on in the following passage, which will serve at the same time to give the reader a fair idea of Mr. Paget's style : " Lord Macaulay, with some philological assumption, introduces his description of the glen by telling his readers that `in the Gaelic tongue, "Glencoe" signifies the Glen of Weeping.' It signifies no such thing. According to the simplest and most apparent derivation, it signifies the Glen of the Dogs, ' con' being the genitive plural of ' en,' a dog. Had Lord Macaulay's knowledge of Gaelic been sufficient to tell him this, he would probably have urged it as conclusive proof of the estimation in which the inhabitants were held. But in fact the name
• signifies no more than the Valley of Conn or Cons, that being-the name which the stream flowing through it bears in common with many other rivers in Scot-
• land, derived either from the Scotch fir or from the common moss which covers the valley, both of which bear the name of cone.' The word which signifies lamentation or weeping is the unmanageable compound of letters caoidh,' which probably would be quite as great an enigma to 1.adifacaulay as the mystital M.O.A.I. was to Malvolio."
When speaking of the injustice of the representation given by Lord Macaulay of the Highlands of Scotland, Mr. Paget draws attention to the fact that the paternal grandfather of the historian was a Highland minister, while his mother was the daughter of a Quaker ; and takes occasion to observe that " with Highland and Quaker blood flowing in equal curreats through his veins, it is diffi- cult to say whether a Highlander or a Quaker is the more favourite object of his satire, and butt for the shafts of his ridicule." That such a conjunction of circumstances should have tended to produce such a result is not to us such a matter for surprise as it appears to be to Mr. Paget. We can scarcely imagine a more thoroughly mm- congenial atmosphere for such a boy as Lord Macaulay must have been, than that which is likely to prevail in a household composed of such elements; and we find no difficulty in conceiving that his early recollections of the Highland and the Quaker character and tempera- ment may not have been altogether favourable or pleasant. Granting that in after life Lord Macaulay was not disposed to look upon either Highlanders or Quakers with an especially friendly eye, it seems to us that the circumstances of his descent, so far from rendering this feeling either unnatural or inexplicable, tend rather to account for its existence in a probable and natural manner. Nor is it quite fair of Mr. Paget to put such an interpretation on the fact as is implied in the following observation : "No quarrel is so bitter as a family quarrel; when a man takes to abusing his father or his mother, he does it with infinitely greater gusto than a mere stranger."
Although Mr. Paget has, in more than one instance, convicted Lord Macaulay of inaccuracy and partiality, it is, we think, quite possible to overrate the injury which has thereby been inflicted upon the reputation of the historian. No really great history can possibly be strictly impartial. The man who confines himself•exclusively to an accurate statement of facts, produces, not a history, but a collec- tion of materials for history. The historian has to deal with motives as well as with actions; and in the performance of this most difficult part of his task, it is impossible that his judgment should not be in- fluenced to a material degree by his political bias. In the matter of Talmash, Lord Macaulay may have been unjust towards Marlborough; but the general impression which he conveys of his character is, though perhaps too highly coloured, on the whole, correct. lord Macaulay's picture of the period which he undertakes to describe is drawn from a peculiar point of view; and looked at from that point of view, it is not only a singularly brilliant, but also, in the main, a faithful representation.
Previous page
