to tell Sir Robert how much he admired a certain speech. 'I!'
exclaimed the minister; 'he would kick me away if I dared to speak to
him.' 'A man,' Hobhouse observes, 'who will not take a civil truth from
a subaltern is but a sulky fellow after all; there is no true dignity or
pride in such reserve.' Oddly enough, Lord John was complaining just as
loudly about the same time of his own want of hold upon his party.

The tariff operations of 1842 worked no swift social miracle. General
stagnation still prevailed. Capital was a drug in the market, but food
was comparatively cheap.[163] Stocks were light, and there was very
little false credit. In spite of all these favouring conditions, Mr.
Gladstone (March 20, 1843) had to report to his chief that 'the deadness
of foreign demand keeps our commerce in a state of prolonged paralysis.'
Cobden had not even yet convinced them that the true way to quicken
foreign demand was to open the ports to that foreign supply, with which
they paid us for what they bought from us. Mr. Gladstone saw no further
than the desire of making specific arrangement with other countries for
reciprocal reductions of import duties.

In one of his autobiographic notes (1897) Mr. Gladstone describes the
short and sharp parliamentary crisis in 1844 brought about by the
question of the sugar duties, but this may perhaps be relegated to an
appendix.[164]

V

From 1841 to 1844 Mr. Gladstone's department was engaged in other
matters lying beyond the main stream of effort. 'We were anxiously and
eagerly endeavouring to make tariff treaties with many foreign
countries. Austria, I think, may have been included, but I recollect
especially France, Prussia, Portugal, and I believe Spain. And the state
of our tariff, even after the law of 1842, was then such as to supply us
with plenty of material for liberal offers. Notwithstanding this, we
failed in every case. I doubt whether we advanced the cause of free
trade by a single inch.'

The question of the prohibition against the export of machinery came
before him. The custom-house authorities pronounced it ineffective, and
recommended its removal. A parliamentary committee in 1841 had reported
in favour of entire freedom. The machine makers, of course, were active,
and the general manufacturers of the country, excepting the Nottingham
lace makers and the flax-spinners of the north of Ireland, had become
neutral. Only a very limit