Queen Victoria: A Personal History. Christopher Hibbert

own house, Brocket Hall. The Prince did not appear to advantage in any of them. He disapproved of the rivalries of adversarial politics which set ‘families by the ears’, ‘demoralised the lower classes’ and ‘perverted many of the upper’.¹⁵ The Crown should be above such partisanship; and he told the Queen that it really was her duty to be so.¹⁶

      Yet when the Tories won their resounding victory she could not disguise her disappointment; nor did she attempt to do so. She declared that she would never send for ‘that bad man Peel who had behaved so wickedly in the past’. She declined to attend the opening of the first session of the new Parliament; and did not conceal her strong reluctance to accept Sir Robert Peel as her Prime Minister in place of Lord Melbourne whom she had seen almost every day for four years. ‘Eleven days was the longest I was ever without seeing him,’ she told King Leopold, ‘so you may imagine what this change must be.’ She had grown so very accustomed to him, whereas Peel was always so shy and awkward with her. Charles Greville thought she would get on better with him if only he could keep his legs still.¹⁷

      Melbourne tried to comfort and reassure her: he agreed to write to her regularly as what she termed a ‘very useful and valuable friend out of office’; and so he did for some time, much to the concern of both Peel and of Baron Stockmar who spoke about it to Melbourne who burst out angrily, ‘God eternally damn it!’ But when Stockmar warned him that Peel was threatening to resign and that Melbourne’s old friend, Mrs Norton, was entertaining dinner parties with stories based on what she was told of the correspondence, Melbourne wrote far less frequently and then not on delicate political matters.

      Certainly, as Melbourne admitted to the Queen, he hated the idea of not seeing her regularly and did not at all relish the thought of losing office; but he was tired, he told her, and the rest would do him good. Besides, he was leaving her in excellent hands. ‘The Prince understands everything so well,’ he said, ‘and has a clever able head.’ She could rely upon his advice and assistance with confidence. He had, so he said, formed ‘the highest opinion of HRH’s judgement, temper and discretion’.¹⁸

      To ease the way for them both, he had advice to give to Peel in his dealings with the Queen. Rather than give it to Peel himself, he asked Charles Greville, whom he met at a dinner at Stafford House, to pass it on for him.