The Timaru Herald. SATURDAY, JANUARY 7, 1911. ROSEBERY ON CHATHAM.

Timaru Herald, Volume XCIV, Issue 14393, 7 January 1911, Page 4

The Timaru Herald. SATURDAY, JANUARY 7, 1911. ROSEBERY ON CHATHAM.

For many reasons it was eminently fitting' that Lord Rosebery should write a lifo of Chatham. Lord Rosebery has himself been a Foreign Minister- and. a Prime Minister of England, through tho Stanhopes he has some of Pitt blood running in his own veinß, and, as a leading orator of the present time, he was unusually qualified to do justice to the declamatory eloquence which astounded tho contemporaries of tho " Great Commoner." 'Aided by these advantages, tod also 1 by access to a great number of manuscripts ana letters which hnva never before been, mado publao. Lord Rosebery, by the;verdict of all critics, has produced another of those _ masterly historical studies which go far to reconcile his countrymen-to the withdrawal of his brilliant personality from the field of political conflict. Chatham has hitherto been known to us only as the towering and majestic, but icy and unapproachable figure' that held/the admiring eyes of Europe in the later, days of his lofty aloofness arid power. Lord Rosebery makes Us acquainted for the first time with an impetuous, warm-hearted, youthful Pitt, writing tender letters to his " dearest Sister Nanny." "I am now locked into George's room," writes young Pitt when he, is twentythree years old, " the girls thundering at the door as. if -. heaven and earth would eomo together. I am certainly the warmest Lover or the coldest Gallant in the universe, to suffer the gentle, impertinences, the sportly solicitations x of two girls not quite despicable, without emotion, and bestow my time and spirits upon a sister. But in effect the thing is not so strange or unreasonable, for every Man may have Girls worthy his attention, but few Sisters so conversible as my dear Nanny." Pitt continued for years to correspond with this sister, who was one of the most brilliant women of her day,. in terms of the most ardent affection, and it is remarkable that she ultimately found his character too domineering for her endurance, and complained that lie "expected her to live with him as his slave. Lord Rosebery has only dealt with Pitt's life until the voar 1767, when he first became Secretary of State, and the long roll of his European triumphs commenced. His excuse is that it is too lato to throw any new light on the later career of his 'hero, whose life after that date_ was lived in the full blaze of publicity, and is a part of the familiar history of England. _ He has attempted, however, in some meusure to explain the contrast; between the aifcctiotifvto mid mate Pitt of earlier years, and the remote, terrifying force of Inn mature ascendency. The Chatham of tho famous period bore himself constantly as a magnificent actor; Garrick used to 6a 7 that ho could have exceeded nil on the stage. Lord Rosebery explains the apparent transformation by a theory that he deliberately assumed a character _ of austerity and sublimity which was not native to his disposition. He condenses the main features of Pitt's meteoric career in an illuminating paragraph which, we are told, is characteristic of the whole biography: " Born of a turbulent stock, he j» crippled by pout at Eton nnd Oxford, tin.il launched into a cavalry and tlicn into Parliament. For eißnt years lie is Rraom-in-wmtinK to a prince. Then lie holds subordinate office for nine yours more. Then he buudonly flushes out not ns a- royal nttMul* ant or « minor plncomnrt, but as tfte people's darlinp:, nnd tho champion of the country. In obscure positions ha lms become the first man in JtniruUj which -lie now rules absolutely for ioiiP venrs in a continual bla«> «'t triumph. Then he is sncrficed to nn intrißUp, I ii.it. remain* the supremo stntesmnn of

his country for five years more, Then he becomes Primes Minister amid general acclamation; but in an instant he shatters his own power and retires distempered. if not mad, into a cell. At last lie divests himself of office and recovers his reason; iie lives for nine Tears more a lonely sublime figure, but awful to the last, an incalculable force." It is to be hoped that Lord Kosebery will yet reconsider tjje reasons which have made him for the present limit his biography to the formative and probationary years of the great statesman who knew, and confidently declared himself to be, the only man who could save England, whose foreign policy produced the era which made Horace TValpole inquire cheerfully each morning, lest the news of some fresh victory should escape him, and whose advent to the highest power caused Frederick the Great to announce that "England has at last brought forth a man." It was the wonderful oratory of Pitt, almost more than the victories which resulted from his policy, that amazed and impressed his contemporaries in his own country. Of the qualities of that oratory Lord Rosebery gives us a new and invaluable description, written by Pitt's nephew, and subsequent enemy, Lord Camelford. " Tn Parliament," says this reluctant admirer, "lie never spoke but to the imtant, regardless of whatever contradictions he might afterwards be reduced to, which' he carried off with an effrontery without example. His eloquence was supported by every advantage that could unite in a perfect actor. Graceful in -motion, his eye and countenance would have conveyed his feeling to the deaf. His voice was clear and melodious, and capable of every variety of inflection and modulation. His wit was elegant, his imagination inexhaustible, his sensibility exquisite, and his diction flowed like a torrent, impure often, but always varied and abundant. There was a style cf conscious superiority, a tone, s gesture of manner, which was quite peculiar to him —everything shrunk before it; and even facts, truth and arfament were overawed and vanquished v it.. On the other hand, his matter was never ranged, it had no method. He deviated into a thousand digressions, often, rororted back to the same grennd, and seemed Bometimes like the lion, to lash himself with his own tail icr rouse his courage, which flashed in periods and surprised and. astonished, rather than convinced by the steady light of reason." This description tells us more of Chatham's personality and oratory than any cold report of his actiial words could 3o<