Flower beds and shrubs suffered a good deal, not so much from wanton destruction, as from the pure boisterousness which came of an unexpected opportunity for horseplay.

There were a good many little encounters with the police; stones were thrown on the one side, and truncheons used on the other pretty freely.

A few heads were broken on both sides, and a few prisoners were made by the police; but there was no revolution, no revolt, no serious riot even."[81] The Guards were called out, and a detachment arrived at the park, but the people only cheered the soldiers good-humouredly.

Not even a blank cartridge was fired that day.
The Government, however, took the Hyde Park disturbance with extreme seriousness.

"Nothing can well be more certain than the fact that the Hyde Park riot, as it was called, convinced Her Majesty's ministers of the necessity of an immediate adoption of the reform principle."[82] Disraeli, who in 1859 had proposed reform without getting any support, now saw that a great opportunity had come for a constructive Conservative policy, and boldly insisted to his party that Parliamentary Reform was a necessity.
"You cannot establish a party of mere resistance to change, for change is inevitable in a progressive country," he told his followers.
All through the autumn and winter great demonstrations took place in the large towns and cities of the country in support of the demand for the enfranchisement of the workman, and when Parliament met in February, 1867, a Reform Bill was promised in the Queen's Speech.