Volume 1

The letters of Queen Victoria : a selection from Her Majesty's correspondence between the years 1837 and 1861, published by authority of His Majesty King Edward VII / edited by Arthur Christopher Benson and Viscount Esher.

  • Victoria
Date:
1911
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: The letters of Queen Victoria : a selection from Her Majesty's correspondence between the years 1837 and 1861, published by authority of His Majesty King Edward VII / edited by Arthur Christopher Benson and Viscount Esher. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    1843] Governor-General, signed by the three members of the Secret Committee of the Court of Directors. The Secret Court of Directors—that is, the whole Court act- ing in secret—have come to a Resolution (in Sir Robert Peel’s opinion very unwisely and precipitately) expressing the gravest doubt, on their part, as to the policy and justice of the recent transactions in Scinde.^ The Court is aware that your Majesty’s servants disapprove of this proceeding on their part, and that they have declined to transmit officially to Lord Ellenborough, through the Secret Committee, the condemnatory Resolution of the Court. One of the grounds on which they deprecated the Resolution was the passing of it in the absence of full and complete information from India, in respect to the policy and to the events which led to the occupation of Scinde. Under these circumstances, as well on the general Con- stitutional ground, as with reference to the present state of the public correspondence in regard to Scinde, and the particular relation of the Governor-General to the East India Company, and the Court of Directors, Sir Robert Peel humbly advises your Majesty to forbear from expressing an opinion, in a private communication to the Governor-General, with regard to events in Scinde or to the policy hereafter to be pursued in respect to that country. Sir Robert Peel begs to add that in a private letter by the last mail to Lord Ripon, Lord Ellen- borough observes that he is going on very harmoniously with the Members of Covmcil at Calcutta. Viscount Melbourne to Queen Victoria. Melbourite, Ith November 1843. Lord Melbourne presents his humble duty to your Majesty, and thanks your Majesty much for the letter of the 4th inst., which he has received this morning with great satisfaction. Lord Melbourne hears with great pleasure of the gratification which your Majesty and the Prince received in your visit to Cambridge. Lord Melbourne collects from all the accounts that the proceedings in the Senate House were not only full of loyalty, enthusiasm, and gratitude, but also perfectly de- corous, respectful, academic, and free from all those political cries which have recently prevailed so much in the theatre at Oxford on similar occasions.® Lord Melbourne hopes he is within [the mark] ; if he is it forms a remarkable and ad- 1 See Parker’s Sir Robert Peel, vol. iii. chap. 1. 2 See ante, p. 292.
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