eed that the discussion
should be taken on Monday. On Saturday Clarendon spoke to
Melbourne himself, and urged him to consider seriously the
inconvenience of a battle on this point, and prevailed upon him
to go to the Duke of Wellington and talk it over with him. He
wrote to the Duke, who immediately agreed to receive him; when he
went to Apsley House, and they had an hour's conversation.
Melbourne found him with one of his very stiffest crotchets in
his head, determined only to give the Prince precedence after the
Royal Family; and all he could get from him was, that it would be
_unjust_ to do more. All argument was unavailing, and he left him
on Saturday evening without having been able to make any
impression on him, or to move him by a representation of the
Queen's feelings to make concessions to meet those the Government
were prepared to make; for the Queen would have been content to
accept precedence for her life, and saving the rights of the
Prince of Wales. This, however, they would not consent to; and so
determined were they to carry their point, that they made a grand
whip up, and brought Lord Clare all the way from Grimsthorpe, to
vote upon it. Under these circumstances the Government resolved
to withdraw the clause, and they did so, thus leaving the Prince
without any specific place assigned by Parliament, and it remains
with the Queen to do what she can for him, or for courtesy, tacit
consent, and deference for her Consort to give him the precedence
virtually which the House of Lords refuses to bestow formally. I
think the Duke has acted strangely in this matter, and the
Conservatives generally very unwisely. _Volentibus non fit
injuria_, and the Dukes of Sussex and Cambridge, who alone were
concerned, had consented to the Prince's precedence. The King of
Hanover, it seems, was never applied to because they knew he
would have refused; and they did not deem his consent necessary.
There is no great sympathy for the lucky Coburgs in this country,
but there is still less for King Ernest, and it will have all the
effect of being a slight to the Queen out of a desire to gratify
him. There certainly was not room for much more dislike in her
mind of the Tories; but it was useless to give the Prince so
ungracious and uncordial a reception, and to render him as
inimical to them as she already is. As an abstract question, I
think his precedence unnecessary; but under all the circumstances
it would have been expedient