The Dominion. TUESDAY, JULY 16, 1912. THE "LIFE " OF KING EDWARD.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1493, 16 July 1912, Page 4

The Dominion. TUESDAY, JULY 16, 1912. THE "LIFE " OF KING EDWARD.

A few brief cable messages at the lime conveyed to us some idea ''of the intense interest aroused in England last month by the publication of. Sir Sidney Lee's life of King ■Edward in the new volume of the Dictionary of National Biography. We. give' some extracts from the article in, another column, and it will be generally agreed that the prime conclusion to bo drawn from the facts' of the late King's education and,career is that ho :was a man rich"in the virtues of kindness and unselfishness. His treatment up to the ago of twenty would have ruined' most princes, as "it would have spoiled most young men. Hedged in by a chain of'tutors, fed with the mid-Victorian platitudes that made up so much of his abnormally "serious-minded" father, burdened with ponderous 'memoranda 'from his parents writing as monarchs,. forbidden to read novels at all, guarded from any real companionship with boys of his own age, compelled to keep a diary, denied the right to' purchase his own (-lollies until he was over !:evente::ii, and cut off at Oxford from the freedom of the ordinary undergraduate —he must indeed, as one critic observed, have been a youth of remarkable character to be as little harmed by all this blundering as he was. Worse than this he was denied. access, after his coming 'of age, to the correspondence of the Crown, iiiul it was actually not until lie was nver 50 years nf age that ,Loill> Sausih'lsv- succeeded, where many of his.predecessors Had failed, in persuading QITEN' 'VICTOIi'IA that till.' Prince should receive as a matter of course all foreign dispatches. The Only reason put lor ward by.Sir Sin.s-nv Lee for this strange behaviour by the Qnxx is that h?r Majesty felt strongly concerning her

son's "lack of discretion,'' and "inability to keep a secret from his intimates. An acquaintance of tlio late | king, .-huv.-ov.-i-, furnished tin: London correspondent of the Man thcslcr Guard inn with the following explanation uf the Queen's policy: "If the Prince Consort had lived another year the question woul-J have arisen as to the precedence of tile Prince of Wales ovei his father. There would have be«n no way of changing or cloaking the situation. The Queen had made her effort, and to tin: end of her lil> always resented bitterly the refusal of her Ministers to create her husband, the King Consort. As soon as the Prince of Wales.was of age he would have had to take precedence! The nation would not have been slow to show indignation at any attempt to prevent it." This authority also emphasises the patience of the' Prince, who althourli charged with much of the' forma! and. ceremonial labour of his mother, and denied all responsibility in great affairs, was not known' ever to have uttered a word even of implied reproach. The most remarkable portion of Sir Sidney' Lee's article is that which dismisses, in almost contemptuous language, the idea that the King, after his accession to tin: Jnronc, was of any account in diplomacy. _ He is denied all responsibility in connection with the entente cord idle; "a modest estii mate, we are told, "was set on his pouical acumen when in informal talk he travelled beyond safe argument, indeed, '.'to his unguarded utterances no real weight attached in official circles cither at Home or abroad. A moment's reflection will lead lo_ wonder as to how anybody could give Sin Sidney Lee information justifying such sweeping asserThat they are positively untrue is shown by the author of the still-recent volume on the Empress Kugexie. He quotes several Continental authorities, amongst them Count d'Haussonville, who records, as an observer, the deep impression made by the King's Speech in Paris on Apv.il. so, 3903. Count d'HausSONvule also declares that when tin Marquis de Breteuh., speaking shortly after the Franco-llussiar Alliance, . declared that Engl.iad should come in, he was onlv echoine the opinions expressed to" him b'v ir ' n. i;i " cc of Walcs (not y st Kin *o jU. Jardieu and other'authorities are also quoted in proof of the reallty, Hi I VI NG Edwaiid's diplomacy and Sir Sidney Lee himself records <i i• i „ KlNo ' s fir st' public speech, which, as one of the British newspapers rscalls, "impressed everybody and made people wonder what Minister had had the skill" to word it,' was actually composed by the. King himself in the',train oil the way from Windsor to London, and not oven written out. It is very unfortunate: that. Sir Sidney Lee carries his analysis and criticism nght up to the death of the King, whom he represents as having been greatly opposed to the' Asquitii Government's assault oh the Housj' of. Lords, but just as greatly op-< posed to the stubbornness of the. Unionist leaders. Most people, who followed the events of 1909 and 1910 knew (chiefly from the manner of several articles in the Spectator) what was taking place.. But this is not the time'to guess, from a place oi apparent authority, at' the late" Kings views... Most of the fcadinc; British. newspapers. abstained from critical comment in their editorial columns upon the obvious points of propriety raised by the publication of Sur Sidney Lee's article. The iknhj Telci/rapfi, however,'issued'-a .comprehensive condemnation of the article as "a serious blunder, 'an ■act of gaucherie and tactlessness which most thinking men will do. plorc." It-contended that the re.-, presentation- of the King as an opponent of the. Unionist tactics—a false representation perhaps—wilj tend to a lowering of the Crown's prestige. It also protested against this new presentation—which might be a misrepresentation,' and which certainly was rough and sharply unsympathetic in places—of a well loved King as an outrage on public feding. We all rqmembcred nis tact, his. knowledge of the world, his kindliness and good-heartedncss, and his undoubted influence for goodupon the peoples,''at anyratc, of the world. "Was it," the Teh.qmph asks, absolutely imperative that we ■should pass a verdict-upon the virtues and failings-of our dead King, and only a -few months after'■ we have lost him talk glibly of the .abilities under which he lay so forfg as Queen' Victoria ' was on the Throne 1" Most people . will" sav it was not.. - What an eiibi-nV.iii amount of confidence must have been reposed in Sir Sidney Lee by a great number of pei'sons not at'liberty to'give their confidences, how enormous must have been the wisdom and knowledge in t:;ose persons, how unparalleled the know ledge and skill of Sir Sidney Lee if the new Life, is to be regarded as even a roughly correct judgment! .Such a combination of l!io requisites is manifestly impossible. For what purpose, one is left wondering, was the- strange article written? Perhaps only for the purpose oi: making particularly , "up-to-date" the supplement of-the great work in w-hich it appears.