Number 10 (1983) s01e04 Episode Script

Long live the Duke of Wellington! Here comes the strongest man in the world! Here comes Copenhagen, the biggest horse in the world! - Halt! - Welcome to number ten, sir! Three cheers for the new Prime Minister! - Hip-hip! - Hooray! - Hip-hip! - Hooray! - Hip-hip! - Hooray! - My dear Arthur! - Good gosh! Transport the supplies, Harriet.
All driven on.
That's what licked the French.
As for my incomparable army, scum down to the last man, but, by God, they could fight! No reminiscing just now, I think.
Come inside.
Charles.
Turnham! Get it all in hand.
Yes, sir.
Right.
Right, then, look lively.
We want this lot in afore dark.
Duke of Wellington don't stand no backsliding.
Now we'll be all right, now the Duke's in charge.
First man in all of Europe parlez-vous to kings.
Don't parlez-vous much to the likes of me.
Ha! Going to run things from his palace in Piccadilly, he was, but it's being done up.
£2oo,ooo it's cost him.
Crying scandal.
Well, it's his money, isn't it? And he'll get value.
Sent him the platoon of Royal Engineers to make sure the builders don't weasel him.
I see he got one of his beauties to see him safe in.
That was Harriet Arbuthnot and her husband.
- Good family friends.
- Oh, yeah.
Yes, and less of the disrespect if you don't mind.
The point is, the Duke's never bungled a job in his life.
He'll sink the Catholics, that's for sure.
As long as you don't sink all of us at the same time.
Listen to the cheering.
I don't care for cheering, Charles.
It's an expression of opinion from the mob.
Once you let the mob show approval, you open the door to their showing disapproval at another time.
Frowned on it in the army.
Still don't like it now.
It's good of you both to be here to ease me in.
But you know my wife.
Dear Kitty shrinks from responsibility like a Frenchman from the bayonet.
Ah.
Careful with that now.
- What on earth is that? - My old camp bed.
Had it ever since I went soldiering.
But it's so narrow.
How do you manage to turn over? When it's time to turn over, it's time to turn out.
Hooray! - Hip-hip! - Hooray! They're giving the Beau a fair old rowser, I'll say that for him.
That's a mouse squeak compared with some we've had.
After we smashed the French at Vimeiro, the whole army, Spanish as well, cheered him for a solid hour.
- All spread out over two miles.
- You been with the Duke all that time? Never left his side.
Always in the thick of it, he was.
Not like your ordinary general, sitting on his backside a mile behind the blood and guts.
I've seen him hit by six shots, I have.
Always bounced off his sword hilt or his saddle.
- Had two horses shot from under him.
- Cor blimey! Yeah, charmed life.
He's got the devil in him.
Well, goon.
Get on with it.
How is it with you, Arthur? Well, if people think I like this station, they're mistaken.
The nation has already over-rewarded me, a dukedom and untold fortune.
My line is to command the army.
But it's the King's wish, I'll serve him wherever he wants me.
Now here I am stuck with four damned democrats in my cabinet.
Certainly, Palmerston's not to be trusted.
Hm, there's very little to choose.
Huskisson, Dudley and Grant.
I wouldn't put them in against a platoon of drummer boys.
Robert Peel's the only man of mettle I've got.
Damn fellow had the guts to say he wouldn't come in unless I resigned as commander in chief.
Too much power for one man, he said.
I sometimes think, Arthur, that you listen too much to Mr Peel.
Democracy's on its way all over Europe.
Which is why the King has put me in.
I had audience of him in his bedroom at Windsor.
George IV of England sitting up in a greasy nightcap.
"Arthur," he said, "the Government is defunct.
"I want you to take over and stop the wild men.
" Wild men! Does he still believe he led the great charge at Salamanca? Yes, disguised as General Bock.
But he's no fooI in his lucid hours.
He knows it was democracy that led to the terror in France, that led to Bonaparte, that led to the sack and ruin of Europe.
Well, I mean to stop that sort of thing happening here.
And by God, I will.
I have no doubt, Arthur, that you will prove yourself as great in civil as in military matters.
But you are not to take too much upon yourself.
Yes, Harriet.
Now, as soon as you are settled in, let me have your social engagement book, - and I will tell you where you may go.
- Yes, my tyrant.
I don't know why you put up with it, Arthur.
She's my wife and I wouldn't.
Here you are, Prince of the Netherlands, High Constable of England, Duke of Wellington, Prime Minister.
He puts up with it because he must.
Isn't that so, slave? As you say, O Tirana.
There's something you may have to put up with also.
- Oh? - My demonic nephew.
Oh.
William Long-Wellesley.
His vendetta against me is coming to a head.
He's trying to get possession of his children again.
He'll use anything.
He may use you, us, to paint a lurid picture.
I think he'll destroy himself by his own absurdity.
Oh, don't fear for us, Arthur.
You look to yourself.
Why, a public man, he's always in the stocks.
He'll say vile things.
Bad water from a bad source is its own condemnation.
God knows I don't want to lose you two.
You're my family, more than my own.
How is Kitty? Oh, much as usual.
Won't come up to town.
Sits in the country getting her accounts in a muddle.
And when she does come up, she turns into a mouse.
She's so short-sighted she can't see anyone, so she won't meet anyone.
- She adores you.
- I don't care to be adored.
I love her, but I can't live with her, nor she with me.
Damn it, the woman's frightened of me.
Mr Huskisson, I'll have no truck with Catholic emancipation.
The King brought me in on the understanding it was to form no part of my policy.
It was also the understanding of the Tory Party and the House of Lords.
Which is why you were invited here this morning, Lord Winchelsea.
So that you may be reassured by Mr Peel here and by myself there will be no reneging in the matter.
Catholics will consider you to be prejudiced.
Not so.
I have nothing against Catholicism.
To those of my troops as were Catholic, I gave open permission to attend Mass as often as they wished.
The result? There was no grumbling, and nobody bothered to go.
Ha! No matter what English Catholics may feel, the Irish will no longer tolerate Catholics being disbarred from sitting in Parliament.
Are you aware that the Catholic associations are active again? Trouble-makers with a respectable name.
Mm.
We have formulated certain views on how to deal with them.
You're not advocating force? Not at all.
We shall draw their sting by acknowledging them.
- What? - Have no fear, Winchelsea.
I shall never allow them to do what I do not wish.
Change will come, Your Grace, whether you wish it or not.
Huskisson, you are talking to an Anglo-Irishman who knows of what he speaks.
Nobody is denying that.
But the associations are now laid by Daniel O'Connell, a formidable man.
I know I speak for my colleagues Palmerston, Dudley and Grant when I say that you are standing in the path of history.
Ireland has been connected with Great Britain solely by the presence of the Protestants.
They are the English garrison.
Abolish the distinction between Protestant and Catholic, and all will be Irishmen alike.
Show me an Irishman, and I'll show you a man whose most anxious wish is to see his country independent of Great Britain.
That is the most disgraceful analysis I have ever heard.
- And the most realistic.
- Hear, hear.
Give the damned Papists an inch and you'll have a revolution.
Very well.
Let us come nearer home to Nottinghamshire.
The opposition are pressing for a division tonight on the redistribution of the East Retford seats.
They are determined to extend the votes more to the common man, and we are in sympathy.
And I am not.
The common man is best off in the hands of his betters.
There wasn't a man in my army who wasn't the most villainous scoundrel in his village.
Yet forged by me they conquered Europe.
You are not in the army now, Your Grace.
No man ever spoke a truer word.
In the army you say toone, "Go", and he goes.
In the Cabinet they argue, and so I There you are.
- That's it, sir.
- Thank you, Uncle.
And so I have to debate, persuade, even reassure idiots on my own side like Winchelsea.
But everyone knows Lord Winchelsea's head is full of pepper.
My dear Lady Jersey, that is an affliction shared by most politicians.
I was at St George's last week.
He was giving away one of his cousins in marriage.
As he escorted her up the aisle, I swear I heard him murmuring under his breath, "Left, right, left, right.
" Oh, the man is a clutch of contradictions.
He's a genius at war, and yet loves children.
Always surrounded by nephews, nieces, grandchildren.
- He's a splendid violinist.
- What? Mm, but at 24, Arthur wanted to marry Kitty and was told, "Violinist has no prospect.
" So burnt his violin and went for a surgery.
Oh, I do find him so adorable.
Mm, yes, there's something about the man.
The moment Harriet and I met him at the embassy in Paris, we both fell in love with him.
Love, Charles? Now, Lady Anne, someone said that there is a middle state between love and friendship, which is more delightful than either but more difficult to remain in.
I think that describes our case.
You must be a patriotic dictator, Arthur.
You must mount your thoroughbred, Copenhagen, and ride roughshod over anyone that opposes you.
Oh, Lady Jersey, Copenhagen is used only for treading on Frenchmen.
Englishmen come harder.
Then Copenhagen must be shod more heavily or Englishmen made softer.
I would never wish Englishmen to be softer even if they finally drive me into the ground.
Oh! What's this? A surprise attack? Come on, Uncle! Waterloo, Waterloo! Who are you, Marshal Ney? Have at you, then! Crawford! Come on in! - Come on, we must even the odds.
- I never fight! Fire! - Fire! - Attack the centre! Take them on the flank! There we go! Fire again! Fire! - Fire! - Fire! Onward, platoon! Aim carefully.
- Don't waste your ammunition.
- Fire! Splendid! - Fire! - Cease fire! - Yes, Fellows? - Mr Huskisson, Your Grace.
Most urgent.
Show him through.
Battle's over, children.
Back to your billets.
- We've hardly started, sir! - We've hardly started! Forgive me, Your Grace.
The House is just divided on the electoral reform issue, and I have to tell you that I did vote with the opposition.
- Did you? - A matter of conscience.
A promise given months before you took office.
Was it? So I thought it only proper tooffer you my resignation.
- I accept it.
- I beg your pardon? I accept your resignation.
You don't seem to understand.
It's purely a matter of form, of good manners.
I understand perfectly.
A gentleman does not offer his resignation unless he means it.
You have resigned.
I accept your resignation.
Very well.
It was a misjudgement on my part, a mistake.
No, there is no mistake, there can be no mistake, and there shall be no mistake.
You realise that if I do go, I take Palmerston, Dudley and Grant with me.
Then I shall have to soldier on without you.
Good night, Huskisson.
And goodbye.
Well? I've got rid of those damned democrats, all four of them, at a stroke.
They exposed their flank to me, and I rolled 'em up.
Thank goodness for that.
Now you can get on with giving the country what it needs.
Government with a little sinew.
- What happened, Arthur? - Huskisson offered his resignation.
Please, Your Grace, your nephew Mr William Long-Wellesley is downstairs.
He is offering violence.
- Show him into the study.
- Very good, Your Grace.
Do you think you should? I'm perfectly sure the man's a madman, and probably drunk.
- That's my nephew.
- Do be careful, Arthur.
I've come here to kill you.
I've had 1oo,ooo men at a time trying to do that.
None with a motive that speaks so loud as mine.
You have deprived me of my children.
You deprived yourself of them.
You abandoned them and your wife in Italy without a penny and ran off with another man's wife.
You seem to know a great deal about it.
I've known and cherished your wife since she was a child.
You broke her heart.
It was her dying wish that you should never get your hands on her children again.
I know where they are.
They're either here or with my wife's sisters, those twoold maids in Hampshire.
Have a care, sir.
By order of the court, I am their legal guardian and my duty is to protect them.
And who will protect you? Wellesley, for 30 years I faced the most practised killers in the world.
Do you really think you're going to frighten me with your stickpin? Thrust that point an inch further, and the gallows rope is already round your neck.
I know what you're about.
Mistake me not.
You mean to plunge your hands into my elder son's trust fund! You attribute your own motives to me, sir.
- You're a scoundrel.
- Look to yourself, sir! - A libertine and a gambler! - Sire! Even had your wife not asked me, I would have done all in my power to remove the children from your influence.
A father has his rights! And some men have no right to be fathers.
I shall appeal to the courts.
And I warn you, I shall use every weapon that malice can devise to bring you down.
I am prepared for that.
And now I'll tell you my plan.
I will adopt your children and bring them up as my own.
- Your own? - As my own.
My children? That never will happen, sir.
Do you hear me? - Never.
The Duke wouldn't like it.
- Never! - He could kill His Grace.
- That ain't very easy.
Given your known character, there's very little you can do about it.
And now, if you're quite finished, I have other guests.
Show Mr Long-Wellesley out, will you, Fellows? Very good, Your Grace.
- What's that for? - Just on my way to the stables, Your Grace.
You never know who's about these days.
- Good morning, gentlemen.
- Prime Minister.
Glad to see you are a deal more punctual than my previous Cabinet.
May I present Mr Charles Arbuthnot, who's to have the Duchy of Lancaster.
General Sir George Murray, my Colonial Secretary.
- How do you do? - With me throughout the Peninsula Campaign.
- Sir Henry Hardinge.
- How do you do? My Liaison Officer at Waterloo.
He's to be Secretary at War.
The Home Secretary, of course, you know.
- Morning.
- Good morning.
- Field Marshal - Damn it, George! I resigned as Commander-in-Chief when I took on this job.
What the deuce do I call you, then? Prime Minister? "Arthur" would do well enough.
See here, Arthur, we think you're making a mistake.
They're going to call us the Regimental Cabinet or some such.
George and I know nothing about politics.
- You can't run a government like the army.
- Why not? The other day I asked the Treasury to make some change in one of their accounting systems.
Impossible, they said.
Can't be done.
"Then I'll put in six Pay Corps sergeants to do it for you," I said.
The thing was done within 24 hours.
Now, gentlemen, the reason for your presence here today is to bring you up to date.
First, Catholic emancipation.
Burdett's bill recommending it is before the Commons at the moment.
I expect it to be defeated.
- On that subject, Mr Prime Minister - Mr Peel? I do not share your optimism.
I think the bill will scrape home.
Do you? Then I'll have it thrown out in the Lords.
Even so, to use your own military terminology, I believe you've made a tactical error in appointing Lord Fitzgerald to the Cabinet.
Oh? According to the rules, now that he is appointed to the Cabinet, - he must put himself up for re-election.
- I know that.
He sits for the Irish constituency of Clare, does he not? You know he does.
Daniel O'Connell has decided to stand against him.
- What? - O'Connell's a Catholic.
- He's not allowed to stand.
- Oh, but he is.
He's come alive to the fact that though he's not permitted as a Catholic to sit in Parliament, there's nothing to stop him standing for election to it.
Hm! Seems a pointless exercise.
Not at all, Sir George.
If O'Connell wins He won't.
Fitzgerald is the best-liked man in the country.
If he wins, against all the odds, it will have great effect upon the minds of men, and the minds of men are more potent than cannon.
- Don't I know you? - Yes, Your Grace.
Corporal Maggs.
I was with you with the sepoys in India, sir.
Then you must be a damn rogue, Maggs.
- There's for your trouble.
- Thank you, Your Grace.
Copenhagen, old son.
If you was to fall sick I'm damned if I wouldn't carry you myself.
Walk on.
Now, my fine fellow, what are you for when you grow up? - The army or the navy? - Mm? There's, um red for the army, and blue for the navy.
- Which is it to be? - But I'm a girl, Mr Duke.
Oh dear.
Then, you'd better have 'em both.
Give 'em to your best beau.
Thank you, Mr Duke.
Ah, Harriet.
Arthur, what is this? A long history about a toad? Oh, that's Jack's boy.
He had to go away and leave his pet toad behind.
I promised I'd look after it, send him regular reports.
Oh, you take on too much.
Ah.
You look tired.
Where have you been? Visiting a godchild.
She's at a day schooI in Kensington.
Her parents are not so wealthy, and in consequence her classmates are being high-nosed with her.
I took her a bunch of flowers, delivered 'em personally.
Let 'em be grand with her now.
My dear Don Quixote.
You must spare yourself.
You should clear the house of all these people, the comings and goings, the children Couldn't do that, Harriet, my dear.
I love to have the house full.
I've lived for the best part of my life in the army and the Mess might bite sparks around me.
I couldn't exist in a stillness.
Nevertheless, I think you should cancel your soirees next week with Lady P, Lady M and Lady T.
It's all too much.
May I be permitted to be seen somewhere abroad in Mayfair? I shall consider it.
Excuse me, Your Grace.
Mr Robert Peel is here.
- I have shown him into the Cabinet Room.
- Thank you, Fellows.
Returned from Ireland so soon? I trust he's brought good news.
Can there be any doubt? Well? I never would have believed it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes.
The whole countryside rallied to O'Connell.
Flags and banners were marched through the street, thousands slept in the open overnight, not to miss his speeches, yet no man lifted a hand in violence, he forbade it.
The result? Came the time to vote, and the Catholic priests led their flocks to the polling booths.
Their discipline would have done your army credit.
Perfect order prevailed.
I was frozen by that exhibition of sober and desperate enthusiasm.
The result, man.
The vote.
O'Connell won by an avalanche.
Fitzgerald has lost his seat, and O'Connell threatens to come thundering on the doors of Westminster to demand admittance.
The tide that Arbuthnot mentioned earlier in the year, I fear it's become a flood.
- You really think so? - Mm.
I believe that if we do not emancipate the Catholics, we could be plunged into civil war.
I had Burdett's Emancipation Bill defeated in the Lords while you were away.
- Ah.
- No, no, no, I was conciliatory.
I said if the matter could be left for a little while without agitation, something might at some time be arranged for the Catholics.
I'm not a bigot.
Civil war.
You really think so? I never was more sure of anything.
A deuced odd time for a staff conference.
Huh! I've known the Beau choose odder.
Arthur, you can't leave now! It's my turn to ride you! Hold your horses, Caroline, I've not forgotten.
I'm sorry to keep you waiting, gentlemen.
The ladies insisting on their favourite game, coaching.
Sit down, sit down.
You're to keep this quiet for now, but I thought I should let you know as soon as I could.
- I'm letting the Catholics in.
- What? I've made the most rigorous enquiries since Peel's report, and I'm satisfied he's right.
To refuse would mean civil war.
I'll not have that.
But you'd win it hands down.
I wouldn't fight such a war.
It's too horrible to contemplate.
The people will call you the greatest turncoat and coward in the history of the kingdom.
Well, I shall have to bear it, for their sake.
With you in one minute, Charles.
Wouldn't it be quicker to dictate? Never took it up.
Lord Winchelsea to see you, Your Grace.
His horse is in a lather.
Ah.
Better get it done with.
Show him in, Fellows.
I'll come back later.
- Lord - The Party's in an uproar.
They've always believed you were the great Protestant.
Their reaction is immoderate.
You've been damnably sly about it.
You and Peel have evidently been working on it for months, getting around the King.
Tickling him like a trout until you landed him on your side.
His Majesty has a right to first knowledge of his Prime Minister's thoughts.
Damn it, sir! The Party feels betrayed and I've taken it upon myself to tell you, sir! You came in You came in as the iron champion of the English Protestant constitution.
Now you intend to swamp us in Roman fripperies and wafer cakes.
I believe you to be in pay of the Pope! Get a grip, man, or I'll have you bowled into the street! What would you have me do, fight a battle that can't be won? Bring down the Government? Let in the opposition? In which case the Catholics'll be admitted anyway.
This way we steal the opposition's clothes, and stay in power.
My God! Wellington, you've come a long way down from the man who hacked his way across Europe, through hell and damnation.
You know nothing about me, sir.
I won my battles by knowing when to retreat.
I never tried to hold an indefensible position in my life.
Any damn fool can stand and be cut to pieces.
I hear the King dines with you tonight.
At least your information is more reliable than your opinions.
Yours, perhaps, is not.
His brother, that staunch Protestant, the Duke of Cumberland, is with him now, cleansing his mind of your Papist sophistries.
Impossible.
Germany is under five feet of snow.
He set off ten days ago because of it.
That is what you're up against tonight.
I give you good day, sir.
We shall have trouble with the King tonight.
- Cumberland? - Yes.
Yes, that's what I was going to tell you.
There's something else too.
- What? - No, no.
No, it can wait.
You have enough.
Come, man, what is it? Oh, it is Why, it is pity in the extreme, but it Well, it has its effect on the thinking of the public.
This this is a worthless sheet, a frolicsome companion, but it deals in scandal.
Now, in it there's a lengthy piece by your nephew Lord Wellesley.
He says, among other things, that the Long sisters, to whom you gave charge of his children, have taken into service two prostitutes as governesses for 'em, one of the sisters is committing incest with her own uncle, and the sisters themselves have a a libidinous relationship with each other.
I'm surprised he left out the sheep and the goats.
The fellow should be a French novelist.
- Arthur, there is more.
- Oh, I spoke too soon.
He further states that well, that Harriet is your mistress and has been for many years.
His appeal against my guardianship of his children comes forward soon.
As I feared, he'll say anything, use anyone to discredit me.
Charles, we mustn't let him spoil what you and Harriet and I have come to mean to each other.
No, there's there's no question about that.
It's the effect on the minds of the public.
And they'll have forgotten it by the next issue, when we shall no doubt learn the Archbishop of York is a woman.
Mm.
The word is already on the streets about Catholic emancipation.
They'll say you let rich Irish Catholics into Parliament but you won't give poor English Protestants the vote.
Arthur, you're not popular.
Popularity is for pugilists and jockeys.
- Do tell.
- Mm? Oh.
I had three superb uniforms made specially for the occasion.
I didn't know you'd fought in a battle, sir.
Oh, yes, I was with Arthur at Salamanca, you know.
Majesty, how exciting! And dangerous.
Oh, yes! It was I who led the great cavalry charge.
It's not widely known, since I was disguised as General Bock at the time, - Isn't that so, Arthur? - I've often heard Your Majesty say so.
Mm.
Pity you can't terrify the rabble as you used to do the French, eh, Arthur? As for terrifying them, Your Majesty, I have no desire for it.
If they be law-breakers and scoundrels, I believe Mr Peel and I have the answer.
Tell me, Peel.
At the suggestion of His Grace, Your Majesty, we are forming a force somewhat like the military but not the military, to police the country for the benefit of honest citizens.
Your Majesty will have full details in due course.
It's precisely what is needed.
This very week I was accosted by a cutpurse at the corner of Pall Mall.
My coachman saved me.
I have seen your coachman.
I'm sure you rewarded him appropriately.
An admirable idea, Peel.
The very thing we need to keep those damn Catholics quiet, eh, Arthur? I hardly see the necessity, Your Majesty, now that we are to emancipate them.
We were wrong about that, Beau.
My brother clearly demonstrated it to me.
It would be against my oath as a Protestant king.
I believed I had satisfied Your Majesty on that score.
My brother pointed out to me my duty, sworn by my coronation oath to uphold the Protestant faith.
Well, allowing Catholics to sit in Parliament would hardly undermine it.
Great oaks by little acorns grow, hm? Isn't that so? You have given your word.
I was misled.
Is Your Majesty suggesting that I misled you? No, no, I'm not saying that.
- I consulted many people.
- I was of that number.
I have upheld the Protestant ascendancy more than any man in Parliament, yet my advice is the same as the Prime Minister's.
I am not bound by any man's advice! We're in danger of boring the ladies.
Fellows, more syllabub for His Majesty.
You are very kind, Lord Prime Minister.
Turn your back on the Catholics now, after accepting them, as you did in your speech from the throne, and you declare war on Ireland and on a proportion of England.
And do not expect me to fight it for you.
Arthur! You are my prop, my mainstay! You cannot desert me now! I have spent more of my life in war and killing than most men.
When people thought I was celebrating my triumphs, I was weeping.
Yes, weeping over casualty lists.
I tell you this.
If I could avold by any means whatever even one month of war for this country, I'd sacrifice my life in order to do it.
Oh, what am I to do? You tell me one thing, my brother tells me another, I Do nothing now.
It's late.
Go back to Windsor.
Mr Peel and I will attend on you tomorrow.
We will put all to rights then.
Oh, very well.
But I don't know how.
Well, I fear the King is proving more difficult than Arthur anticipated.
They say he left here at dawn.
Pope's man! Oh, God.
He looks as if you'd ridden him all the way back from Windsor.
I have resigned.
So has Peel.
So will the whole Cabinet.
- Resigned? - A feint.
A retreat to victory.
- But how can that be? - The King was impossible.
He used his customary tactic of talking interminably about anything except the subject in hand.
I employed my usual tactic of letting him talk himself to a standstill.
Then I brought up the subject he could no longer avold.
And? Peel was magnificent.
I think I was tolerably persuasive.
The King turned us down.
We resigned and left.
But can you be so sure that the King won't accept your resignation? Dear Harriet, he cannot do without us.
Who else can he turn to? The opposition Whigs? He believes they'd be preparing a republican revolution within the month.
Yes, but that is not true.
It's what the King believes that matters.
And for once, I am unable to read his mind.
I must believe that he'll surrender.
And if you're wrong? Then God help the country.
By special courier from His Majesty, Your Grace.
"My dear friend, as I found the country would be left without an administration, "I have decided to yield my opinions "to that which is considered by the Cabinet "to be for the immediate interests of the country.
"Let them proceed as proposed with their measure.
" My dear Arthur! Postscript.
"God knows what pain it costs me to write these words.
"George Rex.
" - You were right.
- Another successful strategy.
Thank you, both.
But I know what it cost the man.
There's only one thing as sad as a battle lost, and that's a battle won.
Nevertheless, Arthur.
The measure already has a majority in the House of Commons.
All I have to do is to bring the Lords to heel.
And gain the approval of the people.
How much of the Pope's gold's in your pocket? - No Popery in England! - Papist lackey! Traitor! You sound just like the House of Lords.
How is it that when I became Prime Minister I was the most popular man in England? - Eighteen months later, I'm the most hated.
- It's quite simple.
You fought Catholic emancipation and against voting reform.
How was it in the Lords? Principally, Winchelsea roaring as usual, as though he was addressing a crowd in a storm on Hampstead Heath.
Apparently, I'm the Antichrist.
He threatened something about pillorying me before a wider tribunal, whatever that may mean.
And there's a new joke going the rounds that my policy is, "My Lords, 'tention! Right about face, quick march.
" Thank goodness the campaign of lies against you affects only the simple-minded.
Unfortunately, they seem to be the majority.
It's becoming a damn nuisance.
More than that, it may affect the outcome of the bill.
Your nephew Long-Wellesley doesn't help.
He's just published a supposed list of your lady loves.
Charles, spare me that.
Well, Bishop Salisbury, he's been active with his pen.
Fears Catholic emancipation will undermine the established church.
He's a brilliant and a very great wit.
Bugger the Bishop of Salisbury.
I intend to carry my bill.
- Have you seen the Standard? - I make it a rule never to read newspapers.
Well, you'll want to read this one.
There's a letter in it from Winchelsea in which he publicly accuses you of lying in your speech upholding the teaching of the Protestant faith at King's College.
He says that it is a blind behind which the noble Duke might more effectually carry on his insidious designs for the infringement of our liberties and the introduction of Popery into every department of the state.
That settles it.
This must stop.
What are you going to do? I mean to call him out.
- A duel? - Arthur, you can't.
I can and I must.
If I let this pass, I'll lose my honour and all my influence in the country.
During the whole of your time in the army, you expressly forbade duelling amongst your officers.
I didn't see why my officers should do the enemy's job for him.
This is different.
- Arthur, this is wrong.
- Hardinge, I expect you to be my second.
Pray deliver this personally, then ask my doctor, Hume, to attend you tomorrow morning at Battersea Fields a quarter after seven, bringing with him a case of pistols.
- Who shall I say the duellists are? - Simply persons of rank and consequence.
- Have you - That is all! I don't know, but I know the Duke, and there's mischief in his eye.
You realise that if you kill him, it will be the end of you.
I've always said it takes a good general to know when to retreat.
He needs to know something else, when to make a stand.
- The time has come.
These libels must stop.
- People pay no regard.
They have their effect.
My character is under fire.
- And if he dies? - Well, I shall aim to miss him.
- Arthur, for God's sake, don't do that.
- Oh? You're the greatest general the world has known and the worst shot in England.
Aim to miss him and you'll nail him through the heart.
You exaggerate.
What happened on your last pheasant shoot at Lord Granville's? You bagged a gamekeeper, a beater, a village woman hanging out her washing, and put nine pellets in Lord Granville's cheek.
I got a couple of pheasant, though.
Besides, bird shot never hurt anyone.
It won't be bird shot.
It'll be a duelling pistoI.
Come, we shall be late.
Trot, trot.
There's Dr Hume.
- Your Grace.
- Good morning, Hume.
I daresay you didn't expect to see me.
Indeed I didn't, Your Grace, and may I say No, you may not.
Got the pistols? Certainly, Your Grace.
- Where the deuce is he? - Perhaps he's backed down.
No, the fellow may be a fooI, but he's a gentleman.
Walk on.
- Hardinge! - Come on.
Goon, goon.
Goon.
See to it, Falmouth.
I'm terribly sorry, Hardinge.
- Our coachman took us to Putney by mistake.
- That's the least of it.
Falmouth, I blame you for letting things reach this extremity.
You're Winchelsea's friend.
This matter could soon be resolved even at this late hour were he to apologise.
I have pleaded with him all the way from Mayfair.
He will not.
Very well, let us make ready.
My Lord, if you would allow me There's no need, Hume.
This is a desperate bad business you're into here, Winchelsea.
It might be less worrying if I could be sure of having a properly charged pistoI.
- Better have the doctor do it.
- I shall be well enough in a minute.
- Prime Minister.
- Obliged.
Now then, Hardinge, look sharp.
Step out the ground.
I've no time to waste.
My Lord, if you would care to position yourself here.
Damn it, don't stick him up so near the ditch! If I hit him, he'll tumble in! Perhaps here, my lord.
I would remind you, gentlemen, that what you are about to do is against the law, against God's ordinance, and contrary to common sense.
Do you wish to reconsider? Then, gentlemen, I shall ask if you are ready, then give the word "fire" without any further signal or preparation.
Gentlemen, are you ready? Fire! Having stood your fire, Your Grace, I feel free now to apologise for my letter, which I now feel to have been ill-judged.
Regrets his accusations.
This won't do.
This is no apology.
"Regrets" is no apology.
Apologises for? Very well.
Good day, my Lord Winchelsea.
Good day, my Lord Falmouth.
My nephew Wellesley has lost his appeal, my new children are enjoying the spring at Stratfield Saye with Kitty, the Emancipation Bill is passed with thumping majorities in both Lords and Commons, and for once I haven't got a damn cold in April.
There's noother man in England could have brought it off, Arthur.
When I think of the slaughterhouse the country could have been.
It was the duel that did it.
Once a politician puts his life where his policy is, it has a most powerful effect on public opinion.
I hear that His Majesty is telling everyone that he wishes he'd fought the duel himself.
My dear Harriet, it's only a matter of time before he believes he did.
You are the most popular man in England again, Arthur.
This week, Charles.