June 29.

At half-past ten went to Lord Rosslyn’s, to arrange with him the Lords’ Address.  Went with him to Peel’s, to show it to him.  He was reading when we went in, and hardly looked up.  He heard the Address which I read, and approved of it; but he hardly took any notice of us or of it.  He seemed really ill, and quite broken down.

Called on Hardinge.  We had some conversation respecting the state of the Government.  His idea is that the strength of the Government in the House of Commons is much injured by Peel’s being in a subordinate situation to the Duke.  That if he was Chancellor of the Exchequer and First Lord of the Treasury, things would go on better, the Duke taking a secretaryship of State.  This would do very well in the House of Commons, but very ill in the Cabinet.  He is for getting Mr. Stanley, and suggests (or Rosslyn did, or both, for having talked to both on the same subject I may confound them) that Lord F. Leveson should be made a peer.  I think that a good idea.  He is of no use in the Commons, and his peerage would open a place which Mr. Stanley could fill.

Rosslyn thinks Aberdeen’s notions upon foreign politics have, together with his assumption of independence which is of recent date, made the Duke rather sore, and that he would not be sorry to have another Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs.  Lord Rosslyn wants to have Lord Grey in, and says he would as soon be First Lord of the Admiralty as Foreign Secretary.  Rosslyn would, I think, like to go to Ireland as Lord Lieutenant.  He would willingly give up the Privy Seal to Aberdeen.  He thinks Sir G. Murray would make an excellent Governor General.  I fear he would be too indolent.  He said he knew, if there was a vacancy, the Duke would be glad to make him Master General.

I had said I believed Lord Beresford would go to Portugal as Minister, if Miguel would be on good terms with us.  It seems Goulburn would be glad to be Speaker.  That would open a proper office for Herries, and his offices might be divided, Lord Althorpe having the Board of Trade.

I really think some arrangement must be made to give us strength in the House of Commons.  Saw the Duke at two.  He approved of the address.  Rosslyn, was with him.  I told him how ill Peel seemed.  He said he would go to see him.

House.  The Duke moved the Address.  He gave a character of the late King as one of the most accomplished, able, and remarkable men of the age.  I saw Lord Grey smile a little, but the House generally was grave and formal.  Lord Grey assented to the Address, but laissait entrevoir that he should be hostile to the Address to-morrow, hinting at the Regency.  The same thing was done in the Commons.

The Duke told me the late King had three disorders which must have proved fatal, and he died of bursting a blood-vessel in the stomach.  He had a concretion as large as an orange in his bladder, his liver was diseased, and his heart was ossified.  Water there was not much, and all proceeding from the interruption of circulation about the heart.  I read the report, signed by Halford, Tierney, Brodie, and A. Cooper.