ent districts of the metropolis,
and making such arrangements as may be necessary in the event of
sickness breaking out. There is no lack of money or labour for
this end, and one great good will be accomplished let what will
happen, for much of the filth and misery of the town will be
brought to light, and the condition of the poorer and more
wretched of the inhabitants can hardly fail to be ameliorated. The
reports from Sunderland exhibit a state of human misery, and
necessarily of moral degradation, such as I hardly ever heard of,
and it is no wonder, when a great part of the community is plunged
into such a condition (and we may fairly suppose that there is a
gradually mounting scale, with every degree of wretchedness up to
the wealth and splendour which glitter on the surface of society),
that there should be so many who are ripe for any desperate scheme
of revolution. At Sunderland they say there are houses with 150
inmates, who are huddled five and six in a bed. They are in the
lowest state of poverty. The sick in these receptacles are
attended by an apothecary's boy, who brings them (or I suppose
tosses them) medicines without distinction or enquiry.

I saw Lord Wharncliffe last night, just returned from Yorkshire;
he gives a bad account of the state of the public mind; he thinks
that there is a strong revolutionary spirit abroad; told me that
the Duke of Wellington had written to the King a memorial upon
the danger of the associations that were on foot.

Roehampton, November 19th, 1831 {p.211}

[Page Head: OVERTURES FOR A COMPROMISE.]

On Tuesday last I went with the Duke of Richmond to pass a day at
Shirley Lodge, a house that has been lent him by Mr. Maberly, and
there we had a great deal of conversation about Reform and general
politics, in the course of which I was struck by his apparent
candour and moderation, and when I told him that nothing would do
but a compromise between the parties he acceded to that opinion,
and said that he should like to go to Lord Wharncliffe, and talk
the matter over with him. This was on Wednesday. Yesterday morning
I called on Lord Wharncliffe, and told him what Richmond had said.
He was sitting before a heap of papers, and when I told him this
he laughed and said that Richmond was behindhand, that matters had
gone a great deal further than this, and then proceeded to give me
the following account of what had passed. A short time ago
Palmerston spoke to his son, John Wo