CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME 
 OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT 
 FUND GIVEN IN 1891 BY 
 
 HENRY WILLIAMS SAGE 
 
Cornell University Library 
 PN 5123.E74A3 
 
 3 1924 027 504 368 
 
FN 
 
The original of tliis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924027504368 
 
PLATFORM, PRESS, POLITICS AND PLAY. 
 

All Rights Reserved. 
 
 Platform^ Press^ 
 Politics & Play. 
 
 BEING 
 
 PEN AND INK SKETCHES OF CONTEMPORARY 
 CELEBRITIES 
 
 ffrom tbe XCone to tbe XCbames, 
 
 Vid A VON and ISIS. 
 
 BY 
 
 T. H. S. ESCOTT, M.A., 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 "ENGLAND: ITS PEOPLE, POLITY, AND PURSUITS; 
 "LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL: A MONOGRAPH;" 
 ETC., ETC. 
 
 BRISTOL: 
 
 J. W. Arrowsmith, II Quay Street. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 SiMPKiN, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co. Limited. 
 
 Ef-- 
 

MY WIFE, KATIE, 
 
 Uo Sue Cbilicen, 
 
 EDITH KATE, CECIL ALDRED HAY, 
 
 THESE PAGES ARE INSCRIBED, 
 
 IN AFFECTIONATE RECOGNITION OF DISCOMFORT BRAVELY BORNE 
 
 AND HELP UNGRUDGINGLY GIVEN, 
 
 DURING A PROTRACTED PERIOD OF SOME TRIAL, 
 
 BY THEIR LOVING 
 
 T. H. S. ESCOTT. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 •A friendly " Picnch" Reviewer, iphen noticing 
 one of my earliest contrihutions to the periodicaL 
 press after the beginnings of slow recovery ]from 
 an illness brought on by twenty-five years over- 
 work, kindly wished me "health and happiness; " 
 humorously adding, "All will look forward now 
 to what Mr. Escott cannot look forward to him- 
 self—his reminiscences." * This suggestion I have 
 ventured to take seriously. Of that interpretation 
 this volum,e is the result. 
 
 I can only hope that my kindly critic of the 
 " London Charivari" will not find reason to regret 
 his original mention of the idea; or the public, 
 my best and steadiest friend throughout my 
 career, to resent my literal and practical adoption 
 of the complimentary proposal. If these aspira- 
 
 * Punch, July 14th, 1894, page 22. 
 
vi Preface. 
 
 tions are realised, I shall he abundantly satisfied 
 and gratefvbl. 
 
 "A man's best things lie nearest him." iN'ot 
 unnaturally I have inscribed on the dedicatory 
 page the names of those "best things" of mine, 
 whom my travels after health often did not permit 
 to be near me at all. Among those who are no 
 more, who will always rank in the list of West 
 Somerset worthies, whose loved and honoured 
 memories I wish to associate with these pages 
 are the names of my uncle, the late Bichham 
 Escott, of Hartrow Manor, sometime M.P. for 
 Winchester ; of A. W. Kinglake, and of Edward 
 F. Smyth-Pigott. 
 
 I would also hope that, in the number 
 of those who, outside the members of my own 
 family, especially my parents, the Rev. and 
 Mrs. Hay S.- Escott, Jtave shown an obliging 
 interest in the welfare of myself and those dear 
 to me, I may be permitted gratefully to mention 
 H.KH. the Prince of Wales, the Lord Bishop 
 
Preface. vii 
 
 of Hereford, the Marquis and Marchioness of 
 Salisbury, the Earl of Bosebery, E.E. Sir Philip 
 Currie, Sir Charles W. Dilhe, the Bt. Hon. W. E. 
 Gladstone; G. E. Buckle, of the "Times", Sir 
 Algernon Borthwick, Sir Edward Lawson, my 
 fifteen years' editorial chief, W. H. Mudford, 
 F. C. Btvrnand, Henry Labouehere; Sir Henry 
 Irving; the late William Beverley, of scene- 
 painting renown, the late Charles Waring, and 
 Professor Bywater. 
 
CONTENTS, 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Page 
 INTRODUCTORY I3 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 INFANTILE EXPERIENCES (1844 — 56) . . .21 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 SOMERSET FOLK HALF- A- CENTURY SINCE (1848 — 56) 47 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 ON THE BRISTOL AND EXETER LINE (1856 — 60) . 61 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 BATH AND ITS SCHOOLS (1855 — 6) ... 79 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 IN THE DIOCESE OF BATH AND WELLS (1856 — 60) 93 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 THE SOMERSET COLLEGE, BATH I04 
 
Contents. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Page 
 
 BATH SOCIETY AND SPORT IN THE SIXTIES . . Il8 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 OXFORD, 1861 — 65 134 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 TOPICS AND PERSONAGES ON THE ISIS (1861 — 65) I48 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 FAMOUS FOOTPRINTS AT OXFORD (1863 — 7) . . 170 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 BEGINNING WORK {1865 — 6) 180 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 FURTHER GLIMPSES OF OLD BOHEMIA (1866 — 70) . I95 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 FROM PRESS TO POLITICS (1867 — 74) . . . 2IO 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 POLITICS AND PRESS (1865 — 74) .... 224 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 PAPERS WHICH HAVE PASSED 
 
 238 
 
Contents. xi 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 Page 
 LIONS AND LIONESSES IN THE SIXTIES AND SINCE 256 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 MAGAZINE EDITORS AND WRITERS IN THE SEVENTIES 268 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 BEHIND THE SCENES — POLITICAL AND SOCIAL 
 
 .(1868, &c.) 287 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 FROM AND ABOUT THE "PRESS GALLERY" . . 30I 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 SOME SOCIO-POLITICAL EXPERIENCES . . . 313 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 PARLIAMENT AND PLATFORM 324 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 THE 1874 AND 1880 ADMINISTRATIONS . . . 340 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 king's COLLEGE, STRAND, AND TEACHING ELSE- 
 WHERE, IN THE EARLY SEVENTIES . . 354 
 
xii Contents. 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 THE NEW JOURNALISM i 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 NEW MEN 3^ 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 FAMOUS FACES OUTSIDE LONDON .... 373 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 PEN AND PLAY 386 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 The Author's apology: if a place for minor poets and 
 historians, why not for minor antobiographers 7 Possible 
 advantages to all concerned, from new lights about to be 
 thrown upon familiar or famous persons or events, as 
 firom fresh reminiscences of occurrences and characters 
 not BO well known. The author promises to bear Horace's 
 caution in mind, and to confine himself strictly to his own 
 experiences, drawing entirely &om his memory and nothing 
 from his invention. Periods into which this work sub- 
 divides itself roughly sketched: (1) 18^ to 1851, chiefly 
 local, and West of England ;' (2) 1856 to 1861, Scholastic 
 Characters and Life ; (3) 1861 to 1865, Oxford ; (4) 1865 to 
 1895, Platform, Press, Politics, Flay. 
 
 WHEN one has ascended a hill, the natural 
 impulse is to pause a moment in one's 
 walk and to survey the view from the eminence 
 attained. To judge by the action of many 
 whom I am privileged to know, an analogous 
 experience and impulse are incidental to persons 
 who after having pursued devious or circuitous 
 tracks, at last reach the period which may be 
 
14 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 called one of existence's tablelands. Somewhat 
 earlier perhaps than most of my contemporaries, 
 I find myself irresistibly led to one of these 
 retrospective surveys, and by considerations whose 
 exhaustive efiumeration it is not needful to inflict 
 upon the reader, for my own pleasure or profit, 
 and, as I hope, for the interest of some few others, 
 from that threshold of middle-age arrived at on the 
 morrow of a severe, tedious and protracted illness, 
 to look down upon the years, personages, and 
 events, some of which are, alas ! already growing 
 dim in the distance. 
 
 As one makes acquaintance with the beginnings 
 of fogeydom, incidents seem to fly past with the 
 lightning - speed of the landscape to passengers 
 travelling by the " Flying Dutchman." Each after 
 the other, with scarcely a word of warning, the lights 
 first flicker and then go out ; till at last the elderly 
 juvenile asks himself whether he is not making, 
 morally, experience of an Indian twilight, whose 
 last gleam of sunshine will in an instant shade off 
 into the deepest hues of nocturnal gloom. During 
 the actual malady's course, brought on by a 
 quarter of a century's superabundantly active and, 
 therefore, abnormally exhausting life, as well as of 
 an industry in my vocation that, unwisely enough, 
 had been varied by no considerable interval of rest 
 
Introductory. 15 
 
 since I took my degree at Oxford, some acquaint- 
 ances of mine, universally regretted, notably the 
 genial and entertaining R. O'Hara, of the Parlia- 
 mentary bar, passed away. At, what now seems to 
 me, an early stage of my convalescence, at least one 
 eminent man, into constant contact with whom I 
 had been brought during many years by my journal- 
 istic pursuits — Lord Iddesleigh, better known as Sir 
 Stafford Northcote — joined the majority. Some time 
 later, Matthew Arnold, awaiting his daughter's 
 arrival from America on the Liverpool landing-quay, 
 suddenly felt the mortal pangs of the malady which 
 had carried off his father just half a century before, 
 and within a few minutes had ceased to breathe. 
 The next of those personally respected or beloved 
 by me, whose names are household words to their 
 countrymen, that went into the Silent Land was in 
 the fulness of years, his life's work in all branches 
 accomplished, A. W. Kinglake, author of the most 
 classical work of travel, and the most popular 
 military history known to English readers, as well 
 as the most illustrious among Somerset's modern 
 sons. Another luminary of English prose, whose 
 light was extinguished about the same time, and 
 whom I had long been privileged to know, was 
 Henry Sumner Maine, one of the earliest and ablest 
 contributors to the Satwrday Review, under that 
 
i6 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 king among editors, John Douglas Cook, of whom 
 more hereafter. Martin Farquhar Tapper, of Pro- 
 verbial Philosophy immortaUty, during this term of 
 seclusion which Nature, the only effectual healer I 
 have yet met with, had inexorably prescribed for 
 me, preceded the Poet Laureate, Lord Tennyson, 
 to the tomb by about a year. And Tupper, then in 
 the prime of a remarkably handsome manhood, I 
 vividly recollect visiting my father's house in Lans- 
 down Place, Bath, as well as presenting his hostess 
 with a leaf and blossom of the thorn planted by Joseph 
 of Arimathea, and blooming perennially at Glaston- 
 bury, whither he had made an expedition. Robert 
 Browning, who, together with Kinglake, had for 
 years honoured my modest dinner-table by his 
 presence, had already disappeared. When, in the 
 autumn, of 1894, James Anthony Froude said adieu 
 to the children of men, the last of the great literary 
 artists whom I knew intimately was extinguished. 
 Already a man belonging to a very different category, 
 exactly, as I think, in point of age, my own contem- 
 porary, the eighth Duke of Marlborough, had joined 
 his predecessors in the title. 
 
 When, therefore, within the octave of Christmas, 
 though in the same year that I now write in, his 
 younger brother, Lord Randolph Churchill, from a 
 tour round the world, revisited London only to die, 
 
Introductory. 17 
 
 I began to feel as Walter Savage Landor may have 
 felt when, at Bath somewhere during the earlier 
 sixties, he spoke of life's half-hours striking audibly in 
 his ears. That it will be in my power to make any 
 very original contribution to the history of the epoch 
 through which, or into which, I have lived ; that I 
 shall succeed in casting any entirely new light upon 
 individuals who have aheady achieved immortality, 
 or upon incidents which have long since taken their 
 permanent place in history, and my very subordinate 
 connection with which resembles nothing more 
 dignified than the relations of one among the 
 " Adelphi guests " to the central personages in the 
 melodrama, I cannot suppose. 
 
 There are, however, upon a lowlier level of 
 existence and reputation those with whom I have 
 had to do, who deserve permanently to be remem- 
 bered, who are in danger of being entirely forgotten, 
 and of whom I, out of those in the habit of 
 using their pen, am one among the few still sur- 
 viving, qualified alike by intimate intercourse as 
 also undying affection, to speak. There is a place 
 for minor poets in our national literature. Nor are 
 Waller, Philips, and Denham elbowed out of the 
 way by Milton, Dryden and other mighty masters 
 their co-evals. Even by the shadow of Gibbon's 
 or Horace Walpole's Letters, Sir 
 
i8 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Nathaniel Wraxall's Memoirs are not quite eclipsed. 
 To descend towards contemporary instances, my 
 friend Justin McCarthy's A History of Our Own 
 Times is permitted a niche in the immediate neigh- 
 bourhood of Mr. J. R. Green's final volumes, and in 
 close proximity to Mr. Lecky's monumental work. 
 So it is possible even in reminiscences of inferior 
 calibre a future generation may charitably discover 
 some function of interest and usefulness faintly re- 
 flecting, modestly approximating to those qualities, 
 as they are discovered in the pages of my elders 
 and betters, whose acquaintance I have long been 
 permitted to enjoy, such as Mr. George Augustus 
 Sala and Mr. James Payn. 
 
 Primarily addressed, as this volume is, to a 
 "West of England public, by a West of England 
 writer, and therefore not unsuitably given to 
 the world by a West of England publisher, I 
 venture to hope it may interest also that wider 
 audience which from the first day of my literary 
 career till now has been my best, my most constant, 
 and my only remunerative friend. For, sprung of 
 an old-established West Anglia stock ; connected by 
 birth, by marriage, or by immemorial ties of family 
 acquaintance with other houses of historic name 
 between the Tone and the Tamar, I have from my 
 very infancy beheld a series of Western worthies 
 
Introductory. 19 
 
 who, if their names will not rank with that of him 
 who wrote upon the human understanding, will, 
 during several decades yet to come, wear their 
 posthumous memory fresh and green. One danger 
 to which I imagine persons whose recollections date 
 back to a very remote era, and who were literally 
 brought (perhaps by their nurse in short frocks and 
 pinafores) into the company of at least local celebri- 
 ties, I shall try to avoid. I shall, that is, endeavour 
 clearly and inexorably to draw the line between 
 scenes, events, and individuals of which I have had 
 personal cognizance, and occurrences, occasions, 
 and persons, known to me by traditions, however 
 authentic, and on hearsay, be it never so circum- 
 stantial. I shall, in a word, take heed that others 
 may not reluctantly be constrained to apply to me 
 the scathing condemnation levelled by the poet of 
 Venusia upon those who, that they may gain the 
 reputation of a raconteur and a sayer of sharp 
 things, are by the kindliest of satirists branded with 
 a black mark, as persons for his countrymen to 
 shun.* 
 
 The pictures of men famous in the Pulpit, in 
 
 Parliament, in the Press, and on the Stage, as well 
 
 as of certain notabilites among the audience before 
 
 the footlights, whom my memory's colours will 
 
 • Horaxie's Satires, Book I., iv., 80-S4 
 
 a * 
 
20 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 enable me, as I hope, to portray in the following 
 pages, will be divided conveniently into certain 
 separate groups. The first will consist exclusively 
 of those whom, being the bearers of patronymics 
 familiar probably to most, I myself first knew at a 
 period when, to put it mildly, I did not yet take a 
 very active interest in public affairs, but who were 
 good enough, for others' sake, to observe me. The 
 background against which these figures are drawn 
 is mainly such as the landscape of our Western 
 shires provides. The second gallery whither I shall 
 beg my forbearing companions to go with me, will 
 be hung with delineations of originals, many of 
 them, I trust, still alive and vigorous, who have long 
 since made their mark in the scholastic and 
 collegiate life of England, whether their labour's 
 field has been on the shore of the Isis, or on some 
 less notable ground of exertion. Thence, it may be, 
 my readers will courteously accompany me in a 
 direction that will seem more familiar to some of 
 them, and will consider the impressions I have 
 received of men and women who from the year 
 1865 down to the present day have prominently con- 
 tributed to make the press and literature, the pulpit, 
 the play-house, and Parliament what we all of us 
 know each of these at the present moment to be. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 INFANTILE EXPERIENCES (1844-56). 
 
 The only other Escotts; Reform Club hospitalities, and its 
 Porter, my namesake. A Strand Publican ; the " Castle of 
 Comfort," on the IStowey and Villiton Road. Ancestral 
 origins and personal details, for family consumption only. 
 Concerning Hays, Sweets, Escotts, &c. Hartrow Manor as I 
 first recollect it. Notable guests. Sidney Smith; the big 
 tureen and the small Archdeacon. A historic bowling party. 
 The great Duke, Sir Robert Peel, Lord Lyndhurst. Bickham 
 Escott and county politics — County and domestic unpopu- 
 larity caused by his fidelity to Free Trade. Thrown out for 
 Winchester ; unsuccessful elsewhere. The lady rough-rider 
 in West Somerset. Bickham Escott's personal popularity 
 and charms. Opinions of the Duke of Wellington, Sir Robert 
 Peel, Lord Lyndhurst, Principal Jelf, Dr. Pusey, and others 
 about Bickham Escott. His candidature for Cheltenham ; a 
 picturesque incident, and how remembered in the Gloucester 
 country. Lady Westbnry's tribute. Admiration for Charlotte 
 Bronte's novels, and himself like "Hr. Rochester" in "Jane 
 Eyre." John Bright's opinion of Bickham Escott, and his 
 death from a politically broken heart. 
 
 SOME years ago I used, in the capacity of guest, 
 to frequent the pleasant table of my hos- 
 pitable and valued friend, J. C. Parkinson, at 
 the Reform Club, as at a subsequent period of 
 other entertainers in that establishment, whereof 
 I am not, never was, probably never shall be, 
 a member; no less agreeable and kindly than 
 
22 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 G. W. E. Russell, or George Errington. The 
 janitor of the institution, whose first vestibule 
 reproduces with architectural and [decorative ac- 
 curacy one of the apartments of the Pitti Palace 
 at Florence, was the only namesake of my own 
 I have ever encountered during my many years 
 residence in the metropolis. Whenever he saw me, 
 this worthy doorkeeper of the establishment which, 
 as a guest, I was entering, smiled almost affec- 
 tionately. His massive square face beaming upon 
 me a radiant welcome, as he said to the attendant 
 page-boy — mentioning, not without the suspicion of 
 a grin, his own patronymic and mine — " Tell Mr. 
 Parkinson Mr. Escott is here." 
 
 I have also caught sight of my inherited nomen- 
 clature on my nightly drives to the Standard 
 newspaper office, as it was thrown into relief by 
 a gas lamp announcing the keeper of a certain 
 public-house in the Strand, styled the " Devonshire," 
 to be one, Escott, from Exeter. There is, too, a 
 jockey with whom I might perhaps claim thousandth 
 cousinship. But barring these exceptions, the 
 metropolitan and provincial directories would, un- 
 less I am mistaken, be searched in vain for any 
 namesakes of mine : although the appellation is 
 not unheard of amongst the inhabitants of the 
 furthest West ; while one individual of this clan is, 
 
Infantile Experiences. 23 
 
 or was, the landlord of a little inn, the " Castle of 
 Comfort," on the road between Stowey and Williton. 
 Although during many generations my family 
 has been numbered among the county gentry 
 of that shire whose capital is my own birthplace, 
 Taunton, an industrious genealogist, Mr. James 
 Slie, whom some years ago I employed to simplify 
 one or two complexities of pedigree, has given 
 me an expert's opinion that my forebears, in King 
 Stephen's time, were settled in the yet further 
 Occident, and were possessed of considerable 
 properties on the Cornish side of the Tamar. My 
 paternal great - great - grandfather, George Sweet, 
 a lawyer of high local eminence, had, I believe, a 
 home divided between Lord Palmerston's old 
 borough of Tiverton and Launceston, near which 
 latter town he was possessed of a fine old country seat, 
 "Penheale." This place will be perfectly familiar 
 to many West Country readers in the days when it 
 belonged to my father's first-cousin, Charles Sweet, 
 and was rented by a memorable Cornish worthy, 
 the late Rev. Henry Simcoe, who had established 
 an industrial village outside the park gates ; 
 whose Herculean form in its old-world costume, 
 and whose tasselled Hessian boots were familiar 
 wherever, between the Exe and the Fal, clerics met 
 in conference or squires assembled in session. 
 
24 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 From a time, to the contrary whereof West 
 Somerset memories do not run, the headquarters of 
 my race have been Hartrow Manor, some eleven 
 miles from Taunton, in that picturesque and fertile 
 country which lies between the Brendon and the 
 Quantock Hills. This delightful old residence, with 
 the whole property, first passed from the family 
 of Rich, through the Hays, into the hands of the 
 (Sweet) Escotts. My ancestor, or, to speak more 
 definitely, my own father's great-grandfather, married 
 a Miss Hay, daughter of the Rev. Prebendary James 
 Hay, rector of Clatworthy, four miles from Hartrow, 
 across Brendon Hill. This lady {nee Sarah Hay) when 
 she had become Mrs. Escott, inherited from her sister 
 Margaret the Hartrow property ; the said Margaret 
 having herself received it by bequest of Mr. Rich, of 
 Hartrow, who intended her for his bride, but dying, 
 left her his heiress. In the church of Stogumber, 
 which shares with that of Brompton-Ralph the 
 custody of our ancestral ashes, is a memorial tablet 
 to Miss Hay, indicating her relation to the original 
 lord of the manor of Hartrow, by the words : 
 
 " Quam vivus uxorem moriens heredem destinavit." 
 
 Not having myself enjoyed much leisure for 
 genealogical research, and prepared rather to 
 echo the disparaging question of the Roman 
 
Infantile, Experiences. 25 
 
 satirist, Stemata quid faciunt, I have not tried to 
 ascertain the ramifications of the Hay pedigree. 
 There seems, however, good reason to suppose that 
 certain of these Hays were settled in Sussex 
 during the Georgian epoch, and that one of their 
 members, James Hay, born at Glyndebourne, 
 sitting for one of the Cinque Ports sometimes 
 voted for, and at others opposed, the Ministry of 
 Sir Robert Walpole, thus prefiguring at a subse- 
 quent day the action of his descendant, my uncle, the 
 late Bickham Escott, towards the Governments 
 of Lord Grey and Sir Robert Peel respectively. I 
 should, perhaps, add that I am admonished by heraldic 
 authorities to associate the Hays of Somerset with 
 the Hays of ErroU ; since, it seems, in the armorial 
 bearings to which .we are entitled, the Erroll 
 arms, consisting of shields, blend with the Escott 
 escallop-shells, as with the Griffin's heads of the 
 Sweets. 
 
 Hartrow Manor was first known to me when it 
 was the property of, and occupied by, my uncle, Mr. 
 Bickham Escott, who, during some time, represented 
 Winchester in the House of Commons, and who 
 successfully or unsuccessfully, for the most part the 
 latter, contested more boroughs or counties than 
 most men of his day. This gentleman had inherited, 
 as the eldest son of the Rev. Thomas Sweet- 
 
26 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Escott, the Hartrow property, which he also did not 
 a little towards beautifying by art and increasing by 
 acquisition. He it was who restored with certain 
 architectural additions the great dining-hall, which 
 is to-day the main feature in the pile, and which has 
 few superiors of its kind among the country houSes 
 of West Anglia. Here he used to entertain guests 
 of every kind, political, social, literary, and artistic, 
 from London, where his town house was, if I re- 
 member rightly, i8 John Street, Mayfair, confronting 
 the present site of Canon Teignmouth Shore's 
 Episcopal Chapel. I have myself a recollection, 
 very likely rendered more clear by the circumstance 
 that the late Duke of Wellington related to me the 
 whole incident, of a historic party assembled on the 
 bowling green, in the days when I myself had not 
 very long donned any of those garments distinctive 
 of masculine attire. The most famous figure in the 
 group was the conqueror of Waterloo ; his figure, 
 erect as ever, and his natural vigour shown in 
 his elastic step as well as the kindling expression of 
 his eyes, unabated even at eighty-three, which would 
 have been about his age when, just escaped from 
 the nursery, I beheld the great man about the year 
 1851 or 1852. 
 
 The second member of this group was one who in 
 those days cannot possibly have been to a child in 
 
Infantile Experiences. 27 
 
 frocks even so much as a name — Lord Lyndhurst, 
 Sir Robert Peel's Chancellor, as he had been also 
 Goderich's and Canning's. This Nestor of Con- 
 servatism had more than once popularly been spoken 
 of as a not unlikely First Minister of the Crown. 
 He had already, as is related by a writer in the 
 Edinburgh Review of 1857 — 8, in view of such a 
 contingency, semi-publicly intimated his intention 
 of offering places in his Administration to Sir 
 Frederick Thesiger, who had already been Attorney- 
 General in 1845, and to Bickham Escott. Of 
 these two gentlemen, the former subsequently 
 became Lord Chancellor twice, in 1858 and in 1866 j 
 while the latter died within a very few years of his 
 following Sir Robert Peel in his abolition of the Corn 
 Duties, and before his death, like other Free Traders, 
 had ceased, even in name, to be a Conservative. 
 The chilling dignity of the great Sir Robert, who 
 did not perhaps conceal his opinion that very 
 young gentlemen were better in the nursery than in 
 the company of Cabinet Ministers, impressed me 
 more than even his remarkably handsome face and 
 well-groomed figure. 
 
 Near me there then stood my uncle's nephew, at 
 the date now spoken of a Harrow schoolboy, subse- 
 quently one of the Balaclava Light Brigade, after 
 that, Colonel of the 7th Hussars, Harrington Astley 
 
28 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Trevelyan. He, out of his own superior schoolboy 
 knowledge, condescended, I well recollect, rather 
 contemptuously to enlighten my ignorance as to the 
 identity and achievements of the guests at this West 
 Country manor-house during the early fifties. The 
 incident, however, which impressed me most power- 
 fully at the time, and has lingered longest in my 
 unassisted memory, was the suggestion mentioned, 
 as I fancy only to be negatived, the day being 
 Sunday, that the bowls, a very popular pastime with 
 Somersetshire squires at this period, might be 
 produced. Often since then has it struck me that 
 if in my presence these great men had actually 
 engaged in the sport, for which the beautifully 
 levelled sward beneath the shadow of the purple 
 Quantocks artistically had been prepared, I might 
 claim to have witnessed a rubber at this old English 
 and specially West English recreation, scarcely less 
 historically memorable than the match at which, on 
 Plymouth Hoe, Howard of Effingham, Sir Walter 
 Raleigh, and Drake were engaged when the news 
 reached them that the Armada was in sight, and 
 which they continued, this alarm notwithstanding, 
 with the laughing remark that there was plenty of 
 time to play the game out, and to thrash the 
 Spaniards afterwards. 
 
 West Somerset, at this period, was rich in living 
 
Infantile Experiences. 29 
 
 notabilities, or recently historical associations of 
 them. Sidney Smith's death had but quite lately 
 deprived Combe Florey of its wittiest rector, and 
 made a vacancy in that benefice for my uncle by 
 marriage, the Rev. Prowse Lethbridge. The famous 
 canon of St. Paul's had been, in the time of my 
 grandfather, dead before my birth, a frequent guest 
 at Hartrow. I can remember being told that a ' 
 chair of peculiar construction was the one in which 
 he liked to sit, and also hearing of a certain big 
 soup-tureen that it was the juxtaposition of a 
 physically diminutive Archdeacon with this colossal 
 bowl, which caused the waggish divine to turn round 
 and say in an audible whisper to the servant, "Take 
 care, butler, that the gentleman doesn't tumble in ! " 
 The names in the Hartrow visitors' book during 
 the epoch now spoken of must have been curiously 
 mixed ; extensively representative, if not uniformly 
 celebrated. Bickham Escott, in addition to his 
 parliamentary distinction, was not only a first-rate 
 shot as well as a most expert fisherman, but a water- 
 colour artist of considerable achievements, whose 
 landscapes had hung upon the screens of the old 
 Sussex Street Gallery. His two chief artistic 
 friends were George Cattermole and Field Talfourd. 
 The former of these I cannot remember to have 
 seen. The latter, who also executed in crayons and 
 
30 Platform, Press, Politics and. Play. 
 
 colours singularly spirited and breathingly lifelike 
 portraits of my uncle, was well known to me in less 
 immature years, when his picturesque presence 
 appeared to be framed in the peculiarly suitable 
 environment of the charming rooms, occupied during 
 the sixties by the Arts Club at the Tenderden Street 
 corner in Hanover Square. 
 
 Another personage of whom I can dimly 
 remember to have caught a glimpse in these early 
 days was spoken of rather vaguely in my relative's 
 household, whether in Mayfair or the Western shire, 
 as " that foreign gentleman." I seem to see a pale 
 inscrutable face, decorated with, what was then very 
 rare upon the upper lip, a gigantic moustache. The 
 master of Hartrow must, I think, have first met him 
 at the Blessington — D'Orsay menage, Gore House, 
 Kensington. The illustrious alien in question was 
 none other than he, on whose lip for twenty years 
 all Europe trembled, the Prisoner of Ham, the Man 
 of September, the Imperial inmate of the Tuileries, 
 the Captive of Sedan, the Refugee of Chislehurst, 
 Napoleon HI. Never having visited Paris during 
 the Second Empire, I had no opportunity of testing 
 the Imperial affection to my relative's memory. But 
 within a few days of the catastrophe which came in 
 September, 1870, I chanced to be in that portion of 
 Kentish soil where the ex-Empress Eugenie and her 
 
Infantile Experiences. 31 
 
 consort had pitched their tent. Calling to inscribe 
 my name in the Camden House visitor's book, 
 Monsieur Pietri, who had followed the Imperial 
 exiles, conveyed to me a message from His fallen 
 Majesty, that if I were related to Mr. Bickham 
 Escott, the illustrious refugee would be pleased to 
 see me. 
 
 It has ever been gratifying to me to find how 
 this uncle of mine lives in, and is endeared to, the 
 minds of the few who knew him in the flesh, and 
 have not yet passed away. The late Dr. Jelf, when 
 Principal of King's College, London, spoke of 
 my relative as a man whose abilities were expected 
 by his contemporaries to place him in the front rank 
 of English statesmen. A few years later, the great 
 Dr. Pusey, when I called upon him at his house in 
 Tom Quad., Christ Church, not very long before he 
 died, seemed to think it incredible that one of my 
 then comparative youthfulness should have affinity 
 to his own undergraduate contemporary, born, as 
 my uncle, like Dr. Pusey himself had been, in the 
 infancy of the present century. These were the 
 words of John Henry Newman's friend : " Amongst 
 the undergraduates of my time, whose affections 
 were set on the State rather than the Church, 
 Bickham Escott had few equals, and no superiors." 
 The only three persons outside my own family. 
 
32 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 within my experience, who, remembering him 
 clearly, have talked to me much about him, are my 
 ever lamented friend and Somerset compatriot, 
 Edward F. S. Pigott, the late Dramatic Censor, Sir 
 Algernon Borthwick, the late Duke of Wellington, 
 and the late Sir Robert Peel, who has repeatedly 
 dwelt on the high esteem entertained by his father 
 for my uncle ; while each of these have confirmed 
 from their own experience not only the traditions of 
 his personal charm, but the truth of the West 
 country saying, almost a local proverb even now, 
 that " for twenty miles round there was no one who 
 could walk, talk, shoot, sketch or fish like Bickham 
 Escott, of Hartrow." 
 
 Popular among his country contemporaries, this 
 gentleman probably was not. He carried too much 
 of "the reformer's fervour," to quote the late A. W. 
 Kinglake's words, into quarter sessions' proceedings, 
 and was, perhaps, in manner, a trifle too autocratic 
 as well, to endear him to his brother magistrates. He 
 had, however, in a rare degree, the faculty of attaching 
 persons of all kinds and of both sexes to himself. 
 In the early days I can recall, there was a very noted 
 equitation instructress, and rough-rider of ladies' 
 horses, who had an extensive stable establishment in 
 the Willesden neighbourhood, called, if I remember 
 correctly, Miss Reynolds. This lady used to visit 
 
Infantile Experiences.' 33 
 
 professionally West Somerset for the purpose of 
 putting into form the steeds ridden by my uncle's 
 daughter (Anna), the Miss Escott to whom the 
 property descended, and who died in Paris some 
 years since, bequeathing her estates to their present 
 possessor, her and my first cousin — William Escott. 
 Miss Reynolds may perhaps have been an early 
 specimen of the "new woman" born out of due time. 
 Her manner was, I recollect, to say the least of it, 
 masculine. Her costume was amazonian to an extent 
 then unknown, certainly in those remote latitudes. 
 She had too, an occasional weakness for carrying 
 the conversational embellishments of the paddock or 
 stable-yard into the drawing-room. The eifect upon 
 her of my uncle's presence was almost that of Mr. 
 Rarey upon some fiery untamed steed, or of herself 
 upon a hitherto uncontrolled member of the Hartrow 
 stud. The slanginess dropped from her talk as 
 it were a garment cast aside. She confined her 
 conversation on current topics, to the novels of the 
 day, especially those of Charlotte Bronte, in which 
 Hartrow was especially interested just then ; or to 
 such blameless topics as parliamentary rhetoric 
 and quarter sessions' procedure, in none of which 
 themes can she have felt the slightest interest in 
 the world. 
 
 Bickham Escott, as thoroughly pre-scientific in 
 3 
 
34 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 all his tastes as the fourteenth Earl of Derby, 
 fashioned his oratory upon the tersest models of 
 Greek eloquence. 
 
 Not a few will thank me for interpolating here a 
 specimen of my relative's scholarly and pointed 
 rhetoric gathered from provincial newspaper files. 
 The occasion was a Somerset county meeting to 
 restore the Wellington Pillar, held in January, 1853. 
 The report is taken from the Sherborne Journal of 
 the 20th of that month, and runs as follows : — 
 
 " Mr. Escott stood forward amid loud cheers and 
 said : Mr. High Sheriff, Ladies and Gentlemen — I 
 am obliged to those gentlemen who had the arrange- 
 ment of these proceedings for having allowed me to 
 second this resolution. I am certainly very anxious 
 to have this opportunity of saying a very few words 
 upon the great occasion on which we are met 
 together. I will not now mention all the reasons 
 for that desire, but it is enough, I should think, 
 that I have been born a Somersetshire man. I 
 suppose that there was no Somersetshire man who 
 followed the obsequies of the great Duke of 
 Wellington who did not feel very happy that from 
 his soil had been derived the noblest lineage and the 
 most renowned of titles. And, certainly, it is very 
 fit and proper that we should finish and perpetuate 
 what others, now no more, have well begun amongst 
 
Infantile Experiences. 35 
 
 us, and not allow any memorial of a great man 
 to be to us a reproach for our negligence or our 
 parsimony. There is no fear of such a misfor- 
 tune in such an assemblage of English gentlemen. 
 Wherever Liberty has been established and Genius 
 honoured, the memory of their dead has been 
 to the Good part of their holy institutes, and 
 the tombs of great men have been raised up as 
 the consecrated altars of their country's love. 
 It is very beneficial for the people that such a 
 practice should ever be maintained ; the example by 
 which a nation is exalted is the same that kindles 
 individual energies to noble actions. It was the 
 immortal eulogy of those that fell at Platsea that 
 warmed the breasts of the survivors, and fostered 
 the growing glories of the young Athenian name. 
 It was said of them that the whole world was the 
 sepulchre of illustrious men. The man whom we 
 have lost was illustrious for every virtue which it 
 becomes his country to remember, to admire, 
 and, if we nobly dare, to imitate. He began 
 life poor; that is commonly the lot, perhaps 
 the advantage, of youthful power ; but he vaulted 
 at once into the place which he alone had 
 the energy to fill, and that place, which was the 
 foremost of his [countrymen, he never quitted till 
 he died. I will not attempt to review here his 
 
 3* 
 
36 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 threescore years of labour, nor to condense into 
 a poor epitome the story of his triumphs. The 
 annals of England are the records of his glory, 
 A great minister, now no more, has chosen a 
 noble attitude in which to portray him for the 
 contemplation of the world — it is but a sentence,. 
 I will repeat his words: 
 
 " ' He stood with his back to the sea on the rocks 
 of Lisbon, and saw all Europe in subjection before 
 him, and never ceased from his mighty and heroic 
 labour till the whole of Europe was free.' 
 
 " It was no part of his duty to scan the question 
 how far that freedom was complete in all its parts. 
 He fought the battles of his King and country 
 according to their decree, and his was no mean 
 encounter. The hero of antiquity prayed for kings 
 for his competitors ; our captain had for his 
 competitor the conqueror of all other kings. And 
 when his first work was done, and the sword 
 which had never been blunted was sheathed at 
 last, and he commenced his second work, and 
 spoke for himself in the assembly of statesmen — 
 he, who had conquered all, counselled peace. For 
 thirty years more he was the sage of Europe ; and 
 in every civil and political effort of England he 
 bore the first part— a part which the wisest had 
 wished for, but none but he had the power to execute 
 
Infantile Experiences. 37 
 
 «^he overcoming of faction, which some call party, 
 and the setting at naught all his formerly-fexpressed 
 Opinions, ay, even for a time his own reputation, so 
 that he might consult the necessity and promote the 
 honour of his sovereign and his country, 
 
 ' Spartam nactus es banc exorna.' 
 
 "Truly this man has fulfilled the precept and 
 adorned the land of his destiny. And we who 
 remain — ^the greatest and the least amongst us — 
 may learn something from this example; we need 
 not too curiously examine how far that which was 
 human was exempt from error, but rather observe 
 how the greatest among us became so great by the 
 performance of manly duties; how Fame followed 
 in the train of virtuous toil, and the love of a 
 great people was bestowed on him who sought 
 it least. And not only of this people, but of all 
 nations and all languages who assembled on that 
 dark day, and stood amongst us Englishmen around 
 that grave, to mourn, and to testify that for- 
 him indeed the whole world was a sepulchre ; that 
 the rivalry of arms had but lighted up the veneration 
 of heroism, and that when they heard that England's 
 great champion was dead they knew that the world 
 was bereaved." [This speech produced a great 
 sensation, and the hon. gentleman resumed his seat 
 
38 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 amidst great applause, which was again and again 
 renewed.] 
 
 It will be inferred from these extracts by all 
 competent judges that my uncle was a capital 
 scholar of the old style. Although, indeed, at 
 Oxford he had just missed a first class ; yet through- 
 out his life he studied Greek and Latin authors of all 
 periods as literature, Reading Thucydides chiefly 
 for style, he took the same sort of interest in 
 that historian's description of Athenian politics as 
 he might have done in an analysis of English parties 
 by a writer behind the scenes in the days of 
 Melbourne or Grey. 
 
 In 1846, Bickham Escott had been among those 
 Conservatives who went with Sir Robert Peel when 
 the statesman turned his back upon Protection. 
 After this departure, my uncle incurred the hostility 
 not merely of the Western squirarchy, but of his 
 own family. His first cousin, then Warden of the 
 College, who had previously exerted his influence to 
 secure his relative's return for Winchester, opposed 
 him with a resolution which must have done violence 
 to the natural affections of that admirable, 
 upright, but almost Quixotically conscientious 
 ecclesiastic. Having been classed immediately after 
 his secession from the Tory fold as a Liberal Con- 
 servative, the master of Hartrow gradually became 
 
Infantile Experiences. 39 
 
 identified with the advanced reformers' section. 
 His chief political and social friends during this 
 period were, I fancy, in addition to John 
 Bright, Mr. Milner Gibson, Mr. Leader, member 
 for Westminster, Colonel De Lacy Evans, with 
 whom he had himself contested the constituency of 
 Fox in the year following the first Reform Bill. 
 Colonel Evans I may have beheld in my earliest 
 childhood, but cannot recall. Nor have I any 
 recollection of Mr. Milner Gibson, unless it be a 
 handsome elderly gentleman with clearly cut 
 features, smoothly shaven face, soft manners, a silky 
 voice, who gave me sugar-plums when I was in 
 pinafores. 
 
 Mr. Disraeli, from having been a close personal 
 friend of my uncle's in the Gore House, Blessington, 
 and D'Orsay days, was of course now his bitter 
 opponent, and as old numbers of Hansard should 
 show, turned round on him rather sharply more 
 than once in the House of Commons. Mr. C. P. 
 VilHers is one of the few now living who remember 
 my relative well, but having an idea that Wolver- 
 hampton's venerable representative is gratifying his 
 friends by preparing his autobiography, I have not 
 deemed it right to trespass upon that gentleman's 
 kindness, or with respect to Bickham Escott, 
 anticipate in my remarks any of the interest which 
 
40 Platform, Press, Politics ctnd Play. 
 
 must attach to this Nestor's retrospect of his 
 eventful and illustrious career. The late Mr. John 
 Bright, however, regarded my uncle naturally as a 
 paragon amongst country gentlemen. "At his 
 best," were the veteran tribune's words to me in 
 1882, " your uncle could be as pointed as Dizzy ; as 
 persuasive as Mr. Cobden. He was not, I think, 
 ever quite happy among his own people, or indeed 
 till he came over to us, and shortly after he had 
 done this, to our great misfortune, he lost his seat, 
 could not get one which suited him, and died of a 
 broken heart." The iinal statement may not be 
 literally true, but as a child I can well remember 
 the worn and hunted look upon my uncle's face at 
 the time when he was unsuccessfully fighting con- 
 stituency after constituency, and, of course, like all 
 speculative politicians in those costly days, seriously 
 mortgaging his paternal acres for the sinews of 
 war. 
 
 But his good nature, his charm of manner, and 
 his affectionate interest in those he loved never failed 
 him. In the thick of his struggles and pre- 
 occupations, he constantly found time to visit his 
 mother, then living with her youngest son, my 
 father, at Budleigh Salterton, in South Devon, and 
 to supply his nephew with the fishing tackle and 
 drawing materials in which he knew that small 
 
Infantile Experiences. 41 
 
 person to be chiefly interested. Family considera- 
 tions, that alone move me to dwell, in passing, upon 
 this stage of my narrative, must serve as my apology 
 if I mention another rather pretty illustration of the 
 power possessed by this remarkable man of attracting 
 all classes and all individuals to himself. When 
 the father of my present friend, Mr. J. T. Agg- 
 Gardner, had, in 1848, declined, on the unseating 
 of Mr. Craven Berkeley, to come forward for Chel- 
 tenham, Bickham Escott, filling his place, con- 
 tested the borough against the ci-devant Member's 
 brother, Mr. Grenville Berkeley. The circumstances 
 of Mr. Craven Berkeley's disqualification, that gentle- 
 man having been unseated for bribery, caused local 
 feeling to run very high. The late Lord Selborne 
 had been on the parliamentary committee which 
 cancelled Mr. Berkeley's choice. Bickham Escott's 
 opponent incurred* grave trouble with the future 
 Chancellor's fellow-committeemen by stigmatising 
 that rising lawyer publicly as " Sir Scoundrel 
 Palmer," My uncle goodnaturedly joined with Lord 
 Palmerston and Sir Roundell's colleagues to com- 
 pose a feud, which was only just kept out of the 
 Law Courts. 
 
 During my relative's candidature, at one of his 
 meetings, a sudden darkness came on. Lights were 
 sent for, and several ladies wearing his colours 
 
42 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 insisted on holding the candles round him in order 
 that he might both the better be seen and himself see 
 the notes of his speech. " His eloquence," writes to 
 me my friend, Mr. J. T. Agg-Gardner, with whose 
 family my uncle at the time had stayed, " was con- 
 sidered extraordinary, and if speaking could have 
 availed, he would certainly have been returned at the 
 head of the poll. But though speech may be silver, 
 silence was golden, and the house of Berkeley's 
 treasures kept the constituency faithful then, and for 
 many succeeding elections." 
 
 To the long-standing friend of my family and 
 myself, the Dowager Lady Westbury (nee Luttrell), 
 I am indebted for some vividly interesting remi- 
 niscences of my accomplished kinsman. " He was," 
 writes that lady, " the most intimate friend of my 
 father. I cannot remember any period of my child- 
 hood with which he was not closely associated. He 
 used to walk over the hills from Hartrow every 
 Sunday, frequently staying the night with us. We 
 children hailed his arrival with the greatest delight, 
 for we all adored him. He was so full of sympathy 
 with us, and loved us as if we had been his own. I 
 can see his beautiful face now as it used to light up 
 with pleasure when he saw us coming to welcome 
 him. Such a delightful companion I never saw. 
 The great bliss of these days was to be allowed 
 
Infantile Experiences. 43 
 
 to go out with him on his painting and fishing 
 expeditions. 
 
 " There was no cleverer water-colour artist then 
 living; though he only began to use paints nearly 
 at the age of forty. He should be described as a 
 disciple of De Windt, and later, of David Cox. 
 Like the former, he used to limit himself to six 
 colours in his box. He was one of the hand- 
 somest and most highly - bred men I ever saw,, 
 possessing an exquisitely shaped head, finely cut 
 features, and the most beautiful tender grey eyes. 
 He was very proud of his hands, which were quite 
 perfect in size and shape. He had a trick of playing 
 with his eyebrows that we used to teaze him about, 
 and tell him it was only to show his hands off; but I 
 think his great charm was his voice. I have never 
 since heard anything like it; so sympathetic and 
 melodious ; so full of fire and expression, or exercising 
 so magnetic an effect upon his audience. It was not 
 only the eloquence, but the humour and elocution of 
 his speeches which carried every one with him. He 
 was also a first-rate shot, and when at a private 
 tutor's near us, while quite a small boy, shot a couple 
 of woodcocks right and left. He was also a good 
 fisherman and a great pedestrian, thinking nothing of 
 walking twenty or thirty miles a day. 
 
 " As to politics, he was naturally indignant at not 
 
44 Platform, Press, Polities and Play. 
 
 being returned by the Tory party for West Somerset, 
 und as you know went into the opposite camp with, 
 I grieve to say, no better luck." 
 
 The traditions of Bickham Escott's polished and 
 condensed oratory live in his own county, not less 
 than in his friends' memory, to this day. During the 
 later forties, when I was an infant in arms, he had, as 
 a Free Trader, contested West Somerset, in con- 
 junction with Mr. P. P. Bouverie, of Brymore, the 
 father of the present owner of that demesne. His 
 command of his temper never failed. This self- 
 control, some years previously, had received a signal 
 illustration on the Westminster hustings. Speaking 
 then amidst a storm of dead cats and decayed 
 eggs, he warded off the malodorous missiles as 
 calmly as if playing a ball in his favourite pastime of 
 tennis, without a single word of wrath escaping him. 
 After his defeat in the county which he loved, and 
 whose Parliamentary representation was his life's 
 ambition, he removed the curb from his tongue. 
 Speaking of the future, and drawing in picturesque 
 words the horoscope of the happier era to be ushered 
 in by Free Trade, he said :— " Still will our Quan- 
 tocks rejoice in the purple of their heather, the 
 gold of their gorse. Still will West Somerset be 
 renowned for the fatness of its soil, and the folly of 
 its country gentlemen." 
 
Infantile Experiences 45 
 
 " Those, however, can laugh best who laugh last." 
 The aforesaid country gentlemen carried their two 
 candidates, Mr. Charles Moody and Sir Alexander 
 Hood, the latter a descendant of a North Petherton 
 clergyman, comparatively a local stranger, neither of 
 them of high ability, or even of commanding county 
 position. The exact spot from which this parting 
 shot was discharged by my uncle at his victorious 
 enemies was pointed out to me as a child, and is 
 visible at this moment to my mind's eye — the balcony 
 outside the Clarence Hotel at Bridgwater, whence he 
 looked down upon the yelling yokels, whom the 
 champions of monopoly had hired to hoot and hiss 
 him. 
 
 Another defeat at Plymouth followed the West 
 Somerset discomfiture some three or four years 
 later. The dark brow of. my handsome, gifted, 
 but not fortunate relative grew daily darker ; 
 his fine features became more and more palhd 
 and haggard ; without any visible malady, his 
 strength ebbed from him. At last a slight local 
 injury, contracted while riding, led to a high fever, and 
 considerably less than sixty years of age, this 
 brilliant man passed away. To-day, perhaps, out of 
 West Somerset, my uncle's name is best remembered 
 in the Cheltenham country, by the fact that after his 
 visit to Mr. Fortescue, during his Gloucestershire 
 
46 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 campaign, he gave to one of that gentleman's nieces, 
 the present Dowager Lady De Saumarez, a horse, 
 mounted on which, this lady, a noted equestrienne, 
 achieved a great reputation in the Gloucestershire 
 country. 
 
 I have mentioned that Currer Bell, by which 
 name the novelist was for many years best known, 
 supplied my uncle with his favourite modern reading! 
 His parting words to my mother at Budleigh 
 Salterton were, " The next time I come, I hope you 
 will have read Jane Eyre." The book was procured 
 and perused, but the visit, against which this had been 
 done, was never paid. Child as I was, I still insisted 
 on examining for myself Charlotte Bronte's recom- 
 mended novel. My critical faculties, however 
 imperfectly developed, enabled me to detect a 
 resemblance between my uncle, with his haunted 
 look, strange voice, and bitter-sweet manner, to the 
 "Mr. Rochester" whom the Brussels governess 
 created, — a likeness that to this day I am convinced 
 was something more than imaginary. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 SOMERSET FOLK HALF-A-CENTURY SINCE. 
 (1848—56.) 
 
 True Somerset bred. Bridgwater as a parliamentary borongh. 
 "Eothen" Kinglake and Charles Tynte, M.Ps. Kinglake's 
 flowery speech on the hustings, preferring West Somerset 
 to Syria. An electioneering infant. Reasons why the 
 reYolntionary year of 18JS was memorable to me. 
 Bridgwater characteristics. Living up to its past. A 
 notable family, the Anstices. From Bridgwater to Bristol. 
 W. E. Forster on saving common sense of Quaker 
 blood. Bristol as I first knew it. The Balls— Richard and 
 William. A Quaker poet next door to Wordsworth at 
 Bydal. His "Times" sonnet on Wordsworth's death. Hy 
 only legacy. 
 
 UP to the age of boyhood, I had never travelled 
 further to the east in my native county than 
 its chief towns. The College School, Taunton, 
 was then popular among western squires. Of this 
 institution my father, under the titular Principalship 
 of Dr. Crotch, was head master. Shortly after my 
 birth his health failed ; consumption, as some of the 
 faculty opined, was imminent. Both my parents, in, 
 as I remember, a ship called the Tagus, sailed on a 
 valetudinary voyage to the south of Europe. The 
 period happens to be impressed in my memory 
 because it was the revolutionary year of 1848. 
 
 47 
 
48 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Daily newspapers were not often seen in the house 
 of the relatives with whom I was quartered, and so 
 soon as I was able to read with any ease I used to 
 stop, on my way back from a dame's school, at the 
 stationer's where the Times was taken in, and spell 
 through the meagre records of events in Italy and 
 Greece where I knew my father and mother to be. 
 Any interest I have since taken in politics dates 
 back, I am convinced firmly, from this stormy era 
 in modern Europe's annals. Both my excellent 
 grandparents, to whom as to every member of my 
 family, except my uncle Bickham, the idea of 
 political progress would have seemed to emanate 
 from the author of all evil, held, I fancy, that 
 the common choice of the Continental peoples 
 in this memorable '48, to live under Governments 
 of their own, presaged the triumph of the Beast 
 in Revelation, and must be followed speedily by 
 the end of the present dispensation. Just as a 
 little later in my life I was taught (a piece of 
 instruction for \yhich I can never be grateful 
 enough) that a false concord or quantity in the 
 Latin language argued a state of moral obliquity, 
 ominous of a discreditable life and ignominious 
 death; so was I uniformly in my infancy encouraged 
 to identify any approach to political Liberalism with 
 sheer wrongheadedness. 
 
Somerset Folk Half-a-Century Since. 49 
 
 The Members for Bridgwater at this time were 
 Colonel Charles Kemeys Tynte, of Haswell, and 
 A. W. Kinglake, of " Eothen." These gentlemen were 
 variously, but never, I think, successfully, opposed by, 
 in earlier times, Mansell, and FoUett, the great advor. 
 cate ; as in the days that were to come, by Henry 
 Westropp, and Padwick, the famous bookmaker and 
 money-lender, who laid the foundations of Disraeli's 
 fortunes by advancing him on, as Lord Beaconsfield 
 loved to recount, the security of his own talents 
 alone, ^5,000, when his fortunes were at the lowest 
 ebb. The old Colonel Tynte, father of the Bridg- 
 water M.P., was immensely popular in the neigh- 
 bourhood, while his son, the senator, a roue in 
 appearance as in character, was, to say the least of 
 it, sometimes embarrassed for want of ready money. 
 But his sire's influence and his parliamentary 
 colleague's reputation sufficed to pull him through ; 
 money was spent like water by the house of Haswell. 
 A few days before the polling, the " Man in the 
 Moon " descended like Jupiter of old in a shower of 
 gold upon the free and independent electors, and 
 until the borough was finally and most properly dis- 
 franchised, "Tynte and Kinglake" were regularly 
 returned at the head of the poll. In those days the 
 hustings were stationed in front of the market-place, 
 looking upon that quarter of the town called the 
 
 4 
 
50 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 • 
 
 Corn Hill. A, W. Kinglake had returned lately 
 from his Eastern travels, a remarkably handsome 
 vigorous man, scarcely arrived at early middle age, 
 wearing the then rare facial appendages of beard 
 and moustache. In London he was a lion of the 
 first order. Many years afterwards recalling that 
 epoch, he said to me : " Women used to look as if 
 they thought I should be acting below my reputation 
 if I did not promptly propose elopement." 
 
 In his native shire, " Eothen Kinglake " was 
 regarded less perhaps with affection for his unfailing 
 amiability than with admiring and perplexed awe for 
 the variety of his accomplishments, and the distance 
 of his travels. My excellent maternal grandfather, 
 not himself without literary tastes, was held, I 
 recollect, by his brother clerics to have compromised 
 his cloth because, instead of plumping for the Tory 
 usurer, Padwick, he so far recognised the distinction 
 reflected by Kinglake on his county as to give 
 "Eothen" a split vote. The electoral manner of 
 Charles Tynte's colleague was a memorable mixture 
 of urbanity and reserve. His hustings eloquence 
 was rather florid, but exactly suited to his hearers. 
 I was certainly under ten years of age when, defiant 
 of restraints imposed by a Tory nursemaid, I called 
 at the house of Kinglake's agent, Mr. Charles Bate, 
 whose son, I believe, still adorns his profession in 
 
Somerset Folk Half-a-Century Since. 51 
 
 ' — f . 
 
 the town, with the request that for my uncle's sake 
 he would let me stand by him on the hustings when 
 he made his speech. " Certainly, my little man," 
 he said with an amused look, " if you can manage to 
 get up the steps." The ascent, with the aid of a 
 Liberal glover on Mr. Kinglake's committee, was 
 accomplished, and with an effort, I could to-day 
 write out a very fair report of " Eothen's " speech. 
 Fresh from the glories of Syria, he assured Jiis 
 supporters that in his youth he had always con- 
 sidered the Parret a finer river than the Jordan ; 
 the Mendips or Quantocks nobler ranges than 
 Hermon or Antilibanus ; the tawny waters of the 
 Bristol Channel lovelier than the blue Mediterranean ; 
 and that subsequent experience had not wholly dis- 
 abused the speaker of this belief. 
 
 Three decades later, when the sometime Member 
 for Bridgwater was well stricken in years, but 
 vigorous in mind though frail in body, I recalled 
 this incident to his mind, and he found it correct in 
 every particular. 
 
 Corrupt though the borough was, it numbered 
 some notable worthies among its citizens. The 
 whole of England, I imagine, might have been 
 travelled through before one encountered finer speci- 
 mens of manhood and womanhood than were 
 presented by the family of Anstice. At the period 
 
 4* 
 
52 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 _ 
 
 now recalled, this household consisted of a father 
 and mother who, in mature years, retained much of 
 the good looks they had transmitted to their son 
 and two daughters, each of whom were in their turn 
 superb specimens of Anglo-Saxon beauty ; each tall 
 of stature, and with the exquisite pink and white 
 complexion that is the envy of foreigners. 
 
 Bridgwater in these days was rather oppressed 
 by the grandeur of its earlier history, and was 
 engaged, not very successfully, in an attempt to live 
 up to the fame of its historic citizen, Blake, equally 
 great as soldier and sailor during the Parliamentary 
 wars. The competition of the seaports on the 
 Welsh littoral, together with the absorbing attrac- 
 tions of the ever-growing capital on the Avon, had 
 caused the trade of Bridgwater to dwindle to vanish- 
 ing point, and already threatened to make the once 
 busy Parret as silent and commercially unimportant 
 as the Styx. Nature herself was not thought to 
 be all that formerly she was. The elder inhabi- 
 tants lamented that the tidal wave or bore had 
 grievously diminished, and that the current from the 
 Severn Sea no longer chased up the muddy estuary 
 with the vehemence or volume of a more prosperous 
 epoch. As a county town, Bridgwater had been 
 eclipsed finally by Taunton. The only equipages 
 of any pretensions which on market-day woke the 
 
Somerset Folk Half-a-Century Since. 33 
 
 • 
 
 lethargy of its streets were those of the Princeites 
 from the neighbouring Agapemone ; and even these 
 were not all which they had been. Somewhere 
 towards the close of the fifties, a rumour, the pro- 
 duct of the wildest invention, diffused spasmodic 
 animation through the town, that Thackeray had 
 hired a house adjoining the Taunton road, and 
 was about to transport his household gods from 
 Brompton thither. This outworn capital on the 
 Parret, probably on the strength of containing 
 within one of its neighbouring villages the Capel 
 Lofft mentioned by Byron in his English Bards 
 and Scotch Reviewers, as well as Mrs. Gordon 
 Smythies, a forerunner of the later society novelists, 
 who died, I suppose, some thirty or forty years ago, 
 piqued itself on possessing literary associations. 
 Wordsworth, Coleridge, Southey, the whole company 
 of Lake poets, had been the guests of a certain 
 Mr. Poole of Enmore, some three or four miles 
 distant, whom I can just remember, in his very 
 advanced old age, to have seen. Not far from him, 
 there had lived at Broomfield Hall, Andrew Crosse, 
 the electrician, who survived into the last half of 
 this century, while his widow, a vivacious lady and 
 accomplished authoress, has not, I fancy, very long 
 passed away. 
 
 The consciousness of early obligations to the 
 
54 Platform, Press, Politics and Play, 
 
 impersonal influences of the neighbourhood, causes 
 me to dwell so long as I have done upon these 
 purely local topics. My excellent maternal grand- 
 father, the Rev. J. C. Collins, beneath whose roof on 
 the Parret's banks many of my early years were 
 spent, was singularly well-read in the minor poets of 
 the Elizabethan or Caroline periods, and among 
 later bards, had a consuming admiration for the 
 melody and humour of him who sung " The Song of 
 the Shirt." He never, I think, knew personally 
 that great and delicate genius ; but during his last 
 long illness, the Somersetshire vicar, being well 
 acquainted with Hood's daughter, placed his house 
 at her father's disposal, should his physicians advise 
 him country air. 
 
 This lady's brother, the late Tom Hood, had not 
 then finished his undergraduate course at Oxford. 
 She was herself the wife of the Rev. Somerville 
 Broderip, Rector of Cossington, some five miles to the 
 east of Bridgwater, and was also, I verily believe, 
 nearly the best and kindest woman who ever lived. 
 Herself an industrious and versatile authoress, she 
 devoted, in conjunction with her brother, years of 
 labour to preparing a collected edition of her father's 
 scattered works, accompanied by a biography. Her 
 husband's health was always precarious. Her own 
 was never strong. Indefatigable in the discharge of 
 
Somerset Folk Half-a-Century Since. 55 
 
 parochial and charitable duties, she plied her pen as 
 earnestly as if .it was the staff of the whole family's 
 existence. No trials or disappointments disturbed the 
 calm amiability of that heroic temper. The ripe word 
 of solace or helpfulness for those whom she thought 
 in need of it, was ever ready from the lips of this 
 self-effacing lady. In appearance she was nearly 
 the exact opposite of her brother, and had nothing 
 of his strongly marked aquiline, rather Jewish 
 features, dark complexion, or flashing black eyes ; 
 but in common with him she had inherited from her 
 father an indomitable fortitude, from which boasting 
 and failure were equally distant. To her was I 
 indebted for my introduction to the clever, courage- 
 ous, and versatile journalist, who, like so many 
 toilers of the pen, began life as a clerk in the War 
 Office. The record left behind him by Tom Hood 
 in the West Country, from the Mendips to the 
 Land's End, was uniformly pleasant, and is, I 
 suppose, even at this day not quite forgotten. Few 
 brighter or more attractive spirits had ever flashed 
 upon that western neighbourhood than, when at his 
 best and happiest, the great humourist's son. A 
 lecture delivered by him, under the fanciful title 
 " The Poets in the Valley of the Shadow," describ- 
 ing the treatment of death by the singers of all 
 countries, was something more than a popular 
 
56 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 success, and reached a higher mark of thoughtful 
 excellence as a prose composition than he ever after- 
 wards cared to touch ; while in every western town 
 to the furthest limit of Cornwall, crowded audiences 
 applauded the young lecturer, who, having inherited 
 a great name, was f6ted by the whole country-side, 
 and seemed to have the ball at his feet. 
 
 The chief hostess in the west of poor Tom Hood, 
 as of innumerable celebrities in various degrees of 
 pen or stage, was Lady Molesworth, of Pencarrow, 
 near Bodmin, a witty and kindly representative of 
 an almost vanished generation, who, till within the 
 last year or two, was hospitably flourishing at her 
 pleasant house in Eaton Place, with its superb 
 banquets, and unparalleled display of gold-plate 
 upon the buffet. With Bristol, which in these days 
 Bridgwater considered it had some pretensions 
 to rival, I inherited, as with the less considerable 
 and more western borough, some family connection. 
 \ If, as somebody has said, one owes to one's 
 grandmothers any success that life may have 
 afforded, I ought to have been a more serviceable 
 member of my generation and a less undis- 
 tinguished member of the community than, thirty 
 years of incessant industry notwithstanding, I can 
 as yet boast to be ; for my maternal and paternal 
 grand-dames were each of them remarkable women, 
 
Somerset Folk Half-a-Century Since. 57 
 
 to whom I ascribe respectively much of the taste for 
 literary work that I possess, and all the devotion 
 that deepens in me every day to the Church of 
 England as by law established. Mrs. Escott, my 
 father's parent, bequeathed to some of her posterity, 
 especially to her daughter, Mrs. Lethbridge, and 
 through her to the existing generation of that family 
 whose head is my first cousin, Charles Lethbridge, 
 formerly of Chargate Lodge, West Somerset, now 
 of Sherfield Manor, Basingstoke, the beauty which 
 is shared in by all of his name and race to-day. For 
 myself, I impute it solely to her generous and dis- 
 criminating influences upon my early boyhood that 
 I grew up with a loving admiration for the noble 
 English of our national liturgy, and with some desire 
 to emulate the deeds of those who having served 
 their generation in secular life, " fell on sleep." By 
 the time I was a dozen years of age, I knew by heart 
 most of the collects and epistles ; while I have not 
 forgotten to this day the Prayer-book version of the 
 Psalms. The other excellent and noticeable lady, 
 Mrs. ColHns, took, I think, scarcely less interest in 
 my earlier years. She was of a well-known Bristol 
 family, named Ball. With the Balls are connected 
 by close ties of cousinship the Reynoldses and the 
 Rathbones ; the extant chief of which latter clan is 
 my respected friend Mr. Rathbone, of Liverpool, 
 
58 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 M.P., whose personal acquaintance I did not, how- 
 ever, make till a far subsequent period, beneath the 
 hospitable roof of the present Sir M. E. Grant- Duff, 
 at York House, Twickenham. 
 
 I have no personal recollection of that William 
 Ball, remembered to-day as a Bristol worthy and 
 philanthropist, who hailed originally from Shrop- 
 shire. But my uncle, Richard Ball, with his tall 
 erect figure in age, and in youth his conspicuously 
 comely and well chiselled features, is as fresh in my 
 memory as if I had seen him yesterday. He lived 
 at "The Fort," in the district called, I think, 
 Gotham ; took an active part in many civic affairs of 
 his neighbourhood, as well as in all religious matters 
 allied with the Evangelical interest. No shrewder, 
 more pious, or morally better being ever inhaled the 
 breezes on Durdham Downs, not far from which he 
 had encouraged his acquaintance and co-religionist, 
 George MuUer, to build his orphan asylum, that 
 remarkable monument to directly answered prayer. 
 From his death-bed this gentleman sent me an 
 affectionate message, my practical heed to which 
 might have spared me many later troubles. His 
 daughter, Mrs. F. A. Prideaux, an accomplished 
 authoress as well as a beautiful and saintly woman, 
 lately left her husband, the eminent conveyancer, 
 Frederick Prideaux, a widower. To him, the sole 
 
Somerset Folk Half-a-Century Since. 59 
 
 male relative in that generation so far as I am aware» 
 of Richard Ball, do I respectfully dedicate these 
 particular words. 
 
 Some years ago the late W. E. Forster, then a 
 member of Mr. Gladstone's Cabinet, often invited 
 me to his house, and as I was then writing leading 
 articles daily for the Standard, imparted his views 
 on men and things somewhat intimately to me, 
 nor confined himself always to politics. With 
 good humoured banter he rallied one he was pleased 
 to call a Conservative journalist, slack as my 
 Torsdsm, I fear, has often been, upon certain 
 " sensible " qualities, to be explained only, as he 
 ^aid, by my possessing Quaker blood. This reference 
 was to my grand-uncle, William Ball, who deserves 
 mention by me as having been the only person by 
 whose death I ever pecuniarily profited, although, I 
 grieve to say, the testamentary benefit was never 
 very substantial, and has long since ceased to be 
 appreciable. This excellent member of the blame- 
 less Society of Friends, possessed among his various 
 domiciles in several parts of England, an excellent 
 house, next to which the poet Wordsworth had 
 lived, at Glen Rothay, near Ambleside, in West- 
 moreland. Within a walk were Thomas Arnold's 
 country home, Fox- Howe, and Harriet Martineau's 
 cottage. My relative had known Southey, Coleridge, 
 
6o Platform, Press, Politics and Play, 
 
 De Quincey, and, I think, all the " Lakists," big or 
 little. He was, too, himself not without poetic gifts 
 as well as tastes, and published innumerable pretty 
 little verses; while just as Wordsworth had cele- 
 brated Arnold's death in the Times by a sonnet, so 
 my poetic kinsman sent to the leading journal a 
 brief elegy on the then Laureate's departure, wherein 
 Printing House Square saw merit enough to honour 
 it with insertion. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ON THE BRISTOL AND EXETER LINE. 
 (1856-60.) 
 
 Early obligations to the Ball family — especially Alfred. Eia 
 hints on English vriting and suggestion to send in something 
 for the " Saturday Review." How acted on fifteen years 
 later. The Bristol Channel to my childhood that which the 
 Uediterranean was to the ancient monarchies. Further 
 west on the Bristol and Exeter Line. South Devon in the 
 fifties; Sidmouth, Exmonth, Budleigh Salterton. A quiet 
 watering place, whose dulness is relieved by scandals and 
 shipwrecks. "Amazon" memorials washed ashore; other 
 like calamities. Educational progress in early years ; great 
 parental debt. My father as a teacher. How he communicated 
 to me some taste for English poetry and Latin elegiacs.. 
 Excellence of the old system of teaching Latin verses by 
 " nonsense copies," in like fashions. Benefits accruing to the 
 writer from this early training and its solace during sub- 
 sequent illness. General character of orthodox religious 
 teaching and family discipline forty years ago. Good 
 doubtless resulting &om severities endured or escaped. 
 
 TH E three members of the Ball family best 
 known to me at the time now spoken of, 
 and for some years after, were my mother's first 
 cousins, the sons of a Mr. Ball, who married 
 Miss Reynolds. Of these brothers only one to-day 
 survives — Canon Charles Ball, of Peterborough; 
 when I first recollect him, a high-spirited, athletic, 
 ,and strikingly good-looking Cambridge under- 
 
 61 
 
62 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 graduate. His brothers were each of them men 
 with keen literary interests and great general in- 
 telligence. The eldest, after varied experiences 
 in our Antipodean colonies, being a member of 
 the Inner Temple, practised, with no very great 
 success I fancy, at the English Bar. The second, 
 Tertius, was an army surgeon of mark, and rendered 
 great public services in various capacities during the 
 Crimean War. The third was well known in com- 
 mercial circles from Penpole Point to Pendennis 
 Castle as manager of different branches of the 
 West of England and South Wales District Bank. 
 While he shared the family gift of humour, he sur- 
 passed his brothers in thoughtfulness as well as 
 general culture, and, if I mistake not, before he 
 died, had taken Holy Orders. This relative, whose 
 Christian name was Alfred, gave me much help and 
 encouragement in my childish ambitions and efforts 
 after literary authorship; desiring me to write, by 
 way of exercise, an essay on " The Life and Genius 
 of Thomas Hood," which most severely, but no 
 doubt most wholesomely, he criticised afterwards. 
 The Saturday Review was then beginning to be first 
 heard of. Alfred Ball bade me study the topics and 
 style of its articles, and if I could write anything 
 which did not seem quite nonsense, to send it to the 
 editor. Ultimately, after an interval of some fifteen 
 
On the Bristol and Exeter Line. 63 
 
 years, when I had taken my degree at Oxford and 
 settled to work in London, I recalled this counsel, 
 acted upon, it, and without any introduction or 
 knowledge even of the editor's name, forwarded to 
 the office in Southampton Street the first of a long 
 series of social or middle articles, written by me, if 
 not for the Saturday Review, for other journals which 
 distinctly owed their genesis to that organ. 
 
 Before and since the days of Childe Harold, it has 
 been remarked that the earlier acts of the world's 
 drama were almost exclusively confined to the shores 
 of the Mediterranean. That which the inland ocean 
 was to the empires and monarchies of the earth's 
 youth, the Severn Sea has been to the juvenility 
 and adolescence of the hand which pens these lines. 
 There is scarcely an inch of the country between 
 Mendip and Quantock, or in the interspace separating 
 Wordsworth's Alfoxton from Brendon, Blackdown, 
 or Exmoor, where, between the age of eight and 
 seventeen, my foot or that of the pony in whose 
 saddle I loved to live has not trodden many times. 
 In the course of these early wanderings I must have 
 first met that son of the Devonshire solicitor who, 
 as Sir John Karslake, was afterwards to enjoy the 
 highest honours of the English Bar during a sadly 
 short period, which had as its sequel blindness with 
 a too early and profoundly pathetic eclipse. 
 
64 Platform, Press, Politics and Play, 
 
 Riding with the North Devon and Somerset 
 staghounds is not exactly what a Leicestershire 
 "goer" would call fine sport, but it tries the mettle 
 of horses, the wind of men, and the sagacity of dogs. 
 The bursts of very hard horsemanship are com- 
 paratively few and short. The flying leaps are not 
 many; the conditions of the chase are, however, 
 exhausting, and only steeds regularly bred for it can 
 bear the strain. The heat is often extreme when, at 
 the end of August or early in September, the season 
 begins. The " meets " are fixed at some point near 
 the Devon or Somerset frontier : to-day perhaps 
 Holford, in the Quantocks ; to-morrow Cloutsham, 
 further westward ; the day afterwards Hawkridge 
 Water or Exford, still further in the direction of the 
 Occident. Much of the line of country traversed 
 leads through mossy glens (locally Coombes), whose 
 soft or spongy upper soil covers the fetlocks. The 
 way is as long as it is heavy. Nor is it, or at least 
 was it, by any means an unknown thing for a stag 
 found in some Quantock covert to run in a straight 
 line not much less than thirty or forty miles, till, 
 turning to bay, it betook itself to the waters where, 
 as at Porlock or Lynton, the Atlantic waves mingle 
 with the tawny tide of the Bristol Channel. The 
 best book on this subject extant is probably that by 
 Dr. CoUyns, of Dulverton, in whose composition he 
 
On the Bristol and Exeter Line. 65 
 
 found no less gifted a colleague than " Jack 
 Karslake" himself. 
 
 Longevity has always seemed to be the special 
 quality developed in the human beings who pursue 
 this sport. When the famous "Jack Russell," 
 nearly, I suppose, the last of the very great hunting 
 clerics of North Devon, first entered upon his cure 
 of souls in the living of Anstey or Tor Down, he 
 had resolved not to sully his sacred cloth with 
 associations of sport. He observed Saints' days 
 and all ecclesiastical festivals or fasts with full 
 services, surpliced choirs ; seldom mounted a horse, 
 eschewed anything like a hound. Gradually the con- 
 gregations, attracted at first by the ritual's novelty, 
 fell off. The reason, it seemed, was that the parish- 
 ioners had always been accustomed to parsons who 
 either kept a pack of their own or followed the packs 
 of others. Russell, being remonstrated with by his 
 churchwardens, took the hint, read out the week's 
 hunting fixtures after the second lesson in church on 
 Sundays, set up a modest stud of his own, dis- 
 tinguished himself not less as a rider than he had 
 already done as preacher, and was rewarded by his 
 concession to parochial prejudices with overflowing 
 congregations to his dying day. 
 
 The great professional friend and venatical ally 
 of this ecclesiastical Nimrod in the Exmoor district 
 
 5 
 
65 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 lived in West Somerset, in his rectory at East 
 Quantock's Head, where he had been the friend of 
 I know not how many generations of my family. 
 Parson Russell must have reached the eighties 
 before he rode his last chase or baptised the youngest 
 member of his flock. The Rev. Alexander Luttrell 
 had left fourscore some way behind ere he discovered 
 that his hunting days were over. He cannot have 
 been far removed from his century's completion 
 when the vital machinery refused to work any longer, 
 for no other reason than that it had been incessantly 
 going since George HI. was King. The last time 
 I visited this neighbourhood was the occasion of 
 Her Most Gracious Majesty's Jubilee, 1887. Mr. 
 Alexander Luttrell, the present squire of Dunster 
 Castle's uncle, and the extant Lord Westbury's 
 grandfather, seemed a little perplexed at the idea of 
 celebrating so very juvenile a monarch's anniversary. 
 He had himself, he said, assisted at the seventieth 
 birthday rejoicings of King George, and still spoke of 
 that Sovereign's descendant as " our young Queen." 
 On the final occasion of my visiting this venerable 
 divine beneath his own roof, he told me that he had 
 not slept a night away from it since he had taken 
 his eldest son, " Hal " Luttrell, formerly of the Rifle 
 Brigade, to school at Eton, a trifle of forty or fifty 
 years ago. 
 
On the Bristol and Exeter Line. 67 
 
 This gentleman's brother was the Colonel Luttrell 
 whom I first knew, then living at Kilve Court, and 
 keeping on his own premises the West Somerset 
 foxhounds. The old Colonel scarcely boasted the 
 handsome features which some, though not many, 
 of his race possessed ; but he was an old Waterloo 
 man, had lived all his life in Courts or camps, and 
 wore his Peninsula medals over his old-fashioned 
 coat with pre-eminently the grand manner. 
 
 About the same time that he passed away, there 
 disappeared also the ancient Sir Peregrine Acland, 
 of Fairfield, near Stogursey, who, whether as regards 
 appearance or way of life, might have given another 
 Addison a fresh original for a new Sir Roger de 
 Coverley. This remarkable old gentleman enjoyed 
 throughout West Somerset, a popularity, against 
 which nothing could stand in opposition to him, or 
 to those over whom he cast his aegis. His daughter, 
 and heiress, married the late Sir Alexander Acland 
 Hood, of St. Audries, and by doing so settled firmly in 
 his family not only the Acland estates, but also a share 
 in West Somerset's parliamentary representation. 
 
 One rather dramatic incident attesting the steady 
 nerves of the then very aged Sir Peregrine I can 
 recall. It was Christmas Eve. An immense party 
 was being entertained at dinner preliminary to a 
 tenants' ball, always given at this season by the 
 
 5* 
 
68 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Somersetshire baronet. One of the guests, a gentle- 
 man of particularly distinguished appearance and 
 rather artificially polished manners, walked up to 
 his host's chair without having previously betrayed 
 any sort of eccentricity, and suggested in an audible 
 whisper that they should toss up to decide which 
 of the two should cut the other's throat, pointing 
 as he did so to a carving knife that had just done 
 duty on the turkey. Two ladies who were sitting 
 near, and of course overheard the proposal, became 
 deadly pale and fainted. The octogenarian master 
 of the feast, metaphorically speaking, turned not a 
 hair, but whispered in his butler's ear : " D. Ts. ! 
 
 Captain would like to see the ball-room." 
 
 The host, it seems, knew at least by repute his 
 guest's vagaries, and had heard that a brandy-bottle, 
 usually three-parts empty by the morning, was 
 stationed side by side with the water-carafe on the 
 visitor's dressing-table. The guest retired. Nor 
 was the harmony or hilarity of the evening at all 
 disturbed by the little incident which had sent the 
 two fair ones into a dead swoon. 
 
 That earlier boyhood's education, which was 
 finished on the Avon at Bath, soon had its venue 
 changed from Minehead, on the Bristol Channel, to 
 Budleigh Salterton, on the South Devon coast. This 
 little hamlet lies nearly midway between the larger 
 
On the Bristol and Exeter Line. 69 
 
 resorts of Exmouth and Sidmouth. I have not 
 beheld the place for something like forty years. I 
 had not encountered its name since childhood till I 
 heard that my lamented friend Captain Hawley 
 Smart, author of Breezy Langton and other first-rate 
 military-sporting novels, had gone thither if possible 
 to recruit his strength, prostrated by chronic attacks 
 of asthma and bronchitis, but, as alas! it turned 
 out, only to meet his much-mourned death amid the 
 delicious odour of the myrtles and gorse that are the 
 common products of the sail. 
 
 The two chief sets of events in this out-of-the- 
 world region were shipwrecks and scandals. For 
 weeks and months after the Amazon's burning at 
 sea, in 1852, charred fragments of her hull and cargo 
 were washed ashore. Rather later, a Spanish 
 barque, commanded, as was said, by a Don of high 
 degree, foundered betwixt Lardrum Point and the 
 entrance to Sidmouth Harbour. The spoils of this 
 calamity kept the whole neighbourhood in oranges 
 and chestnuts for the best part of a year, while the 
 Celtiberian Grandee and his crew were hospitably 
 entertained at the coast-guard barracks on the 
 Esplanade, eventually, like the Armada remnant, 
 wrecked off the Galway coast, matrimonially mingling 
 themselves with the native population. 
 
 As for the periodical violations of the proprieties 
 
70 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 which, with the outbursts of the elemental fury, 
 divided the attention of the Saltertonians, they 
 uniformly, I think, arose from the simplicity and 
 inexperience of the resident gentry. Our lives were 
 uniform in their monotony, not to say desperately 
 dull. Country clergymen, retired military officers, 
 or civilians, elderly and amiable spinsters were the 
 chief personages in the society. All were in fairly 
 comfortable circumstances. Many were romantically 
 credulous. None had any experience in the world's 
 ways. Exeter, fourteen miles distant, was practically 
 the last point touched by the railvray. 
 
 Budleigh Salterton, therefore, the eminently salu- 
 brious, picturesque, and eclectically respectable, as 
 landlords and lodging-house keepers advertised it to 
 be, was marked out by Fate as the happy hunting 
 ground of adventurers or adventuresses in all degrees. 
 One day the village found itself in a flutter of excite- 
 ment over the fact that the haunted house on the East 
 or West Cliif had been taken by a family of distinction 
 and piety, intent on building and endowing a new 
 parish church, to say nothing of raising the place to 
 the same pinnacle of prestige as its supercilious 
 neighbours, Exmouth or Sidmouth, arrogated to 
 themselves. In something less than a year the 
 inevitable denouement was sure to arrive. The 
 devotional philanthropist who was to Christianise 
 
On the Bristol and Exeter Line. 71 
 
 the fisher folk, to enrich the tradesmen, and generally 
 to inaugurate an era of Halcyon prosperity proved 
 to be an uncertificated insolvent, a promoter of bogus 
 companies. Upon one occasion it turned out he was a 
 homicidal coasting-skipper who had defrauded his 
 employers, pitched his tell-tale mate overboard, 
 scuttled the ship, and finally taken to piety and good 
 works as a preliminary to going on again da capo. 
 Sometimes a reputedly "lone lorn widow" of blame- 
 less exterior, shocked us all profoundly by the fact 
 suddenly transpiring that she was as much married 
 as her Samaritan predecessor. 
 
 These little humours notwithstanding, I and 
 mine have every reason to speak well of this 
 particular spot on the South Devon littoral. Very 
 slowly, though, D.V., as it proved, surely, my 
 excellent father recovered his health. All symptoms 
 of phthisis disappeared and the man for whom in my 
 infancy the medical pundits predicted a speedy 
 tomb was, in the good providence of God, after a 
 protracted residence on these myrtle-clad slopes, 
 enabled to start upon a busy professional life, which 
 would have tried the strength of many others than 
 the ci devant incurable invalid. 
 
 The second claim possessed by Budleigh Salterton 
 on my gratitude is that my education not only com- 
 menced in good earnest, but first made appreciable 
 
72 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 progress on this portion of the English Channel's 
 shores. I can recall a book, published, I think, 
 about this time, by the title of Learning Without 
 Tears. I never saw the manual, nor had I much 
 experience of the instruction indicated by its 
 nomenclature. But however painful the process may 
 have been, or whatever discomforts my own obsti- 
 nacy or stupidity may have compelled it to involve, 
 I possess only one feeling, that of unutterable thank- 
 fulness for the results. To my father, and to him 
 alone, am I indebted for the training of those tastes 
 which from my earliest years caused me to take an 
 interest in English and classical literature. These 
 aptitudes disciplined and informed by him, as in the 
 earliest instances they were, have enabled me subse- 
 quently to support myself and those dependent on 
 me, with, I trust, some comfort to them and without, 
 as I hope, discredit to any one of us. An excellent 
 and self-improving scholar as well as teacher in 
 Latin or Greek, the author of my existence has 
 always had a large and accurate acquaintance with 
 the whole range of English literature, especially 
 Shakespeare and Sir Walter Scott, as well as a keen 
 eye for the proprieties and elegances of English or 
 Latin composition, verse and prose. 
 
 That I myself never arrived at a facility and 
 correctness much above the average of fairly 
 
On the Bristol and Exeter Line. 73 
 
 instructed proficients in the dead languages, and 
 that I lack all pretensions to the philological science, 
 which justly fills so large a part in modern scholar- 
 ship, is due to indolence or inaptitude on the 
 learner's, rather than defective skill or industry on 
 the teacher's, part. It is no small thing to be grateful 
 for, that there was successfully imparted to me by my 
 father in my early boyhood an interest in Homer, 
 Virgil, Horace, and Cicero, and a disposition to regard 
 them not as pedagogic inventions for childhood's tor- 
 ture, but as really having something to say for the 
 amusement or delight of their readers. Further, that 
 this taste has clung to me as yet through life, and 
 especially that it has served to mitigate the ennui 
 inseparable from the tardiness of a very protracted 
 convalescence after the illness to which I have more 
 than once referred, calls for no common gratitude. 
 
 It must have been, I think, on my seventh birth- 
 day that I was called into the paternal study, looking 
 out upon the garden's fragrant myrtle-bushes, for the 
 realisation of a " treat " I had long been promised 
 against this anniversary. The indulgence proved to be 
 my earliest introduction, by way of "nonsense verses," 
 to the making of "longs" and "shorts." The method 
 reproduced by my father from Eton, where he was 
 under the headmastership of the eminent Keate, was 
 to select any words at random, without of course 
 
74 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 regard to meaning, so that they made perfectly 
 scanning hexameter and pentameter lines. This 
 old-fashioned method of instruction has, I suppose, 
 long ago been reformed out of existence. But it 
 enabled me in the course of years to acquire a 
 delightful and, as I venture to think, far from 
 practically unprofitable accomplishment, to win an 
 open scholarship at Oxford, to be among the first 
 few in the competition for the Hertford, and only 
 just to miss a first-class in Moderations. By degrees 
 I was promoted from " nonsense verses " to writing 
 copies on such themes as Ver Redit or Fuit Ilium. A 
 gift of Sir Walter Scott's poems followed the attain- 
 ment of elementary proficiency in this art. Then, 
 having committed to memory most of Ovid's Trisiia 
 or Epistles, I was permitted and encouraged to learn 
 by heart the Lady of the Lake, as well as certain essays 
 in Addison's Spectator. Without ever possessing a 
 remarkable, I have always had to thank Providence 
 tor a serviceable, memory. Being by habit a pains- 
 taking sort of person, I have generally contrived 
 to produce from its mental pigeon-hole the fact or 
 illustration which the matter in hand rendered it 
 desirable to recall. These qualities, if humble endow- 
 ments, have yet their uses for a working journalist. 
 Nor do I doubt that for their possession I am indebted 
 to the gentle rigours of my early training. 
 
On the Bristol and Exeter Line. 75 
 
 Things have changed a good deal since then. It 
 suits fathers and mothers in the present day, as well 
 as the sons and daughters immediately interested, 
 to bring up their offspring not as reverential depend- 
 ents upon them, but as casual friends, on terms of 
 equality. This was not the theory with which in my 
 earlier days I was practically familiarised. The habit 
 of addressing one's sire as " sir " had become some- 
 what relaxed, on the condition of there being no 
 remissness in deference of manner towards one's 
 parent. The Mahommedan or extreme Calvinistic 
 conception of the Divine Being, as One Whom it 
 was a kind of impiety to invest with much practical 
 concern for His creatures in their temporal sufferings, 
 was not unknown among excellent persons of this 
 period. The idea may perhaps have been borrowed 
 unconsciously from the theological philosophy of 
 Professor Mansel, who, by his doctrines on the 
 Divine Unknowableness, as John Stuart Mill and 
 F. D. Maurice foresaw, has, I suppose, done more 
 to drive men into agnosticism or atheism than all 
 the works of Huxley and Darwin ever published. 
 The democratic conception of paternal and filial 
 relations that to-day gives the tone to family 
 arrangements had not, at the era now spoken of» 
 invaded literature; although some of the Oxford 
 sketches, wherein undergraduates alluded to their 
 
76 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 sires as "governors," occasionally appearing in 
 Punch, were held to betoken the social corruptions 
 prognosticated by inspired writers for the closing 
 years of this dispensation. 
 
 The ground on which Dickens was objected to 
 by the excellent evangelicals of these days appeared 
 to be, less the levity with which he portrays such 
 moral delinquencies as Mr. Pickwick's subjection 
 to milk-punch, or the general aroma of lemon-peel, 
 ardent spirits, and hot-water diffused thoughout the 
 novelist's pages, than the tendency on the author's 
 part to identify mere kindliness, charity, and amiability 
 with the Christian religion's essence. Some gentle- 
 hearted writers, like Mrs. Barbauld, Miss Edgeworth 
 in her juvenile tales, and others of that school there 
 were who as an inducement to good behaviour held 
 out the approval which such conduct would secure 
 from one's fellow-men, and the merely human felicity 
 that was certain to follow in its train. These con- 
 cessions to humanity's weaknesses were denounced 
 sternly by evangelical censors as a misrepresentation 
 of the Christian genius, amounting to rank idolatory 
 of the flesh. All this was no doubt very well 
 meant and very elevating doctrine, but it was about 
 as practicable for children as would have been that 
 Stoicism, whose reproduction in effect it was, on 
 which, in a famous passage, Cicero poured such 
 
On the Bristol and Exeter Line. 77 
 
 scorn.* Evangelicalism, even of the most orthodox 
 kind, has, I suppose, been in some degree humanised 
 of late. But a more spiritually Spartan regime, a 
 more pitiless despotism of soul than that to which, 
 at the time now spoken of, really good parents 
 (though not mine), with the most admirable inten- 
 tions, subjected their children cannot be imagined. 
 Nor, probably, was slight mischief done by teaching 
 that sternly repressed all the more tender elements 
 in human nature, and banished their indulgence as 
 sinful. One result of the ghostly terrorism funder 
 which the kindest parents trained their offspring 
 was to generate an infantile despair, making ffits 
 victims tearfully indifferent as to what they said or 
 did. Always suspected of cherishing some nefarious 
 intent, never believed when they protested their 
 innocence with kisses, the small victims of this iron 
 rule ceased to vex their souls about the theory or 
 practice of virtue. 
 
 The notion of regarding a parent in the capacity 
 of a friend seldom entered into the juvenile mind ; 
 might, perhaps, rather have been discouraged as 
 an impious familiarity by the seniors themselves. 
 Thrice-happy seemed the little boy or girl who was 
 absolved from addressing the authors of his or 
 her being by any formula more deferential than^that 
 * In, I think, his defence of Archias, the poet. 
 
78 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 merely indicating the natural tie, and able to boast 
 to his or her playfellows of being believed by the 
 household's heads, nor being gratuitously charged 
 with felonious designs on apple orchards or jam 
 pots. Probably the self-same excellent people who 
 once considered parental lenity a sin have since 
 discovered love as well as fear to be a useful 
 instrument in childish development and discipline. 
 That either discipline or development, under the 
 conditions enumerated, took place was, indeed, a 
 marvel of Providential mercy. I was not, I imagine, 
 myself at all a precocious child; but I had my 
 faculties of observation : I noted and brooded over 
 what was of every-day occurrence around me, and 
 felt, even to weeping point, grateful that the grip ot 
 the prevailing tyranny was, in my own case, thanks 
 to the humanity and wisdom of those about me, so 
 much relaxed. 
 
 Nor have I at this day any feeling save one of 
 thankfulness for the affectionate care and adroit 
 management by which there was thus early com- 
 municated to me an intelligent interest in schoolboy 
 lessons as well as in their subjects, and in the master- 
 pieces of ancient and modern literature. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 BATH AND ITS SCHOOLS. (1855-6.) 
 
 Bath and its schools forty years ago. The Grosvenor College 
 under Dr. God&ey. "Horner's." The embryo Lansdown 
 College. The Proprietary College at the bottom of Pnlteney 
 Street, near Sydney Gardens. Modern and classical depart- 
 ments. Principal Whale. The SeY. Hay Sweet-Escott as 
 classical vice-principal. The Council of Proprietors; its 
 internal feuds and jealousies. Hy father's loyal friend, Ur. 
 P. C. Sheppard, a "walking volcano." Bev. H. M. Scarth; 
 Bev. James Pycroft. Beligious education superintended by 
 Dr. Magee, of the Octagon Chapel. Characteristics of 
 Magee's preaching. The British Association sermon. The 
 Prime Minister in the congregation. "Beckoning to their 
 partners in the other boat." " Ve must have that man in 
 the House of Lords." Magee as a Bishop, at Westminster 
 and in his diocese. His Parliamentary success. A historic 
 dinner party at the Devonshire Club. Mr. Gladstone on oaths 
 generally, and the Duke of Cumberland's in particular. 
 Archbishop Howley libelled. Magee among his clergy. A 
 Paradise without Eve. Magee compared with Wilberforce : 
 nature and source of legends about both men. 
 
 THE reputation of my father at Oxford and his 
 educational successes with private pupils in 
 South Devon had, before the time now reached, won 
 for him a tolerably extensive reputation throughout 
 the world of teachers. On the Isis, his health had 
 prevented him from special preparation for the final 
 honour schools in classics. Beginning his under- 
 
 79 
 
8o Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 graduate career at Exeter College, he had very soon 
 been elected to an open exhibition at Balliol in the 
 same term that Benjamin Jowett, from St. Paul's 
 School, had won a scholarship. Jowett " came up " 
 early, and wearing still a schoolboy's round jacket, 
 looked, I have heard, younger even than he was. 
 The acquaintance thus begun between that year's 
 Balliol scholar and the exhibitioner developed in 
 their student days into a close friendship, which 
 continued and increased during the late master's 
 life, with increase rather than diminution on either 
 side. 
 
 Arthur Penrhyn Stanley, the erewhile Dean of 
 Westminster; Dr. W. C. Lake, to-day Dean of 
 Durham ; the late Sir Stafford Northcote, who had 
 also been his coeval at Eton, were among my 
 father's Balliol contemporaries and friends. Archibald 
 Campbell Tait, the future Archbishop of Canterbury, 
 was his fellow undergraduate first, his college tutor 
 afterwards, and his intimate acquaintance till in 1882 
 there occurred the vacancy at Lambeth which Dr. 
 Benson was nominated to fill. The distinguished 
 Jenkyns, who laid the foundation of the College's 
 latter-day greatness, while my father was in statu 
 pupillari, occupied the chair which five centuries 
 earlier John Wycliffe had filled. My father's earliest 
 private tutor was, I think, the poet Arthur Hugh 
 
Bath and its Schools. 8i 
 
 Clough. Another leading member of the Balliol 
 teaching staff was Robert Scott, who was to succeed 
 Jenkyns in the Mastership, who had been Dr. 
 Liddell's partner in the monumental lexicon. Scott, 
 a superb scholar, by his administration paved the 
 way for Jowett's more showy, but not more genuine, 
 success subsequently. The mathematical tutor in 
 my father's day was the eminent Ward, who after- 
 wards joined the Church of Rome. 
 
 Such good use had been made of these 
 opportunities by the undergraduate, " without whom 
 I had not been," that before the third day's papers 
 in the "pass" schools, wherein he modestly 
 presented himself, were finished, the examiners 
 wrote him a note, begging him to transfer himself to 
 that quarter of the building set apart for those qui 
 honores ambiimt, with the result that in a year when 
 there was an exceptionally small " first class," and I 
 believe no second, there appeared in classis tertia 
 the name of Hay Sweet-Escott. College prizes for 
 Latin essays, as for English verses in heroic couplets, 
 had already been won by Jowett's friend. After his 
 degree, he was a candidate for what was then the 
 blue ribbon among graduates, an Oriel Fellowship. 
 There existed in the old and unreformed statutes a 
 clause disqualifying for election those who did not 
 satisfy the medical inquisition by the stethoscope. 
 
 6 
 
82 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Here my father failed. The Oriel Fellow for the 
 year was Mr. Christie, now a member of the Jesuits' 
 Order, who had previously at Eton won the 
 Newcastle Scholarship. My father was held greatly 
 to have distinguished himself, and did, as a matter 
 of fact, beat rather handsomely a clever barrister, 
 as he afterwards became, well known by name 
 throughout the West, Tom Phinn, sometime M.P. 
 for Bath. 
 
 Bath, in the early sixties, when I first knew it, 
 was the city of schools, as well as the capital of the 
 Waters of the Sun. The most ancient foundation, 
 the "Grammar School," was adorned by the 
 archididaskalate of the distinguished scholar and 
 urbane gentleman who edited Horace amongst many 
 -other classics — the late Arthur J. Macleane. Next, 
 probably, in order of time, came the Grosvenor 
 College, founded and long presided over by the Rev. 
 Dr. Daniel Race Godfrey. Not in point of age much 
 inferior to this was a private venture establishment 
 Jiept by a Mr. Horner, on the slopes of Sion Hill, 
 very popular and successful among the commercial 
 ■classes. Lansdown Hill was surmounted by a very 
 handsome building, of the most strictly collegiate 
 architecture, for the training of Wesleyan ministers. 
 The structure which subsequently confronted it, 
 Lansdown College, to-day, I believe, transformed 
 
Bath and its Schook. 83 
 
 into a seminary for officers' daughters, had not come 
 into existence ; although its embryo was domiciled 
 in Lansdown Crescent, beneath the roof of an 
 industrious private tutor, the Rev. Joseph Glover. 
 The foundation that claimed to be the great school 
 of the city was situated at the bottom of Pulteney 
 Street, in a capacious edifice which, if I mistake not, 
 had previously done, or rather failed to do, duty as a 
 hotel. This haunt of the Muses was strictly styled 
 The Bath Proprietary College, but from its immediate 
 propinquity to the gardens of that name was 
 popularly spoken of as The Sydney College. In 
 process of years, the institution passively acquiesced 
 in the vulgar nomenclature, and dubbed itself that 
 which street talk had created it. 
 
 This school, in conformity with modern usage, 
 was divided into two "sides" or "departments," 
 the classical and the modern ; the former being 
 practically subordinated to the latter, as might have 
 been expected, seeing that the titular head of the 
 entire college was a Cambridge mathematician, a 
 former scholar of St. John's, named Whale. To the 
 control of the classical division, in less pretentious 
 language, to the chief classical but relatively second 
 mastership of The Bath Proprietary College, was my 
 father, who previously had been suggested by Jowett 
 to Dr. Tait, as a Rugby master, elected in the 
 
 6 * 
 
84 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 second half of this century's fifth decade. Mr. 
 Whale himself, so far as I have any remembrance of 
 him, was a man of not unpleasant, if not of very 
 refined appearance, of unpolished address, and a 
 manner which was not likely, from its superficial 
 heartiness, to inspire character's captious critics with 
 any profound degree of confidence. I, unfortunately, 
 never had the smallest aptitude for the humblest 
 branches of mathematics ; did not at Oxford without 
 some difficulty master the first two books of Euclid, 
 for " Responsions," and at this earlier period did, I 
 fear, inadequate justice to Mr. Whale's endeavours 
 to instruct me in Simple Equations. 
 
 This school was, as I have said, proprietary after 
 the model of Cheltenham College, then in the full 
 swing of its renown and serviceableness. The council 
 of shareholders was rent by mutual jealousies and 
 internal feuds. The most energetic, probably the 
 most capable, spirit among them was the late 
 Mr. P. C. Sheppard, of Bathampton Manor, at 
 whose instance my father had accepted the vice- 
 principalship. This gentleman was literally devoured 
 by his own sleepless thirst for employment, and 
 seemed chronically possessed with an instinct of 
 ubiquitous exertion. His tall wiry figure, with his 
 keen grey eyes, sharply cut eager features, reminded 
 one of a walking volcano in suppressed action. A 
 
Bath and its Schools. 85 
 
 loyal and useful friend to all my family, Mr. Sheppard 
 had a manner so much the opposite of conciliatory, 
 and was so undisguisedly contemptuous of certain 
 among his fellow-creatures' feelings, that he did not 
 attract any great share of popularity, and operated 
 as a sort of firebrand on the College Council Board. 
 Other members of that body were the Rev. H. M. 
 Scarth, a Mr. Batson, the leaders, I fancy, of the 
 anti-Sheppard faction, and the late Rev. James 
 Pycroft, Mr. Sheppard's rather critical ally. The 
 consciousness of this division among their supreme 
 rulers operated mischievously upon the boys. The 
 discipline of the school was thus not altogether 
 satisfactory. 
 
 The divine chiefly responsible for the theological 
 instruction was Dr. W. C. Magee, then incumbent 
 of the Octagon Episcopal Chapel in Milsom Street, 
 subsequently Dean of Cork, later in succession 
 Bishop of Peterborough and Archbishop of York. 
 This ecclesiastic used to attend once a week, to 
 lecture the elder boys in the facts of Scripture 
 history, as well as to expound the main doctrines 
 of the Christian religion. But the real religious 
 teaching of the place was done, of course, in the 
 different boarding-houses by Mr. Whale's staff 
 officers, and, as my father's pupil, I now began 
 to make my acquaintance with that excellent 
 
86 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 repository of the Reformed Faith's fundamental 
 tenets, NowelVs Catechism. 
 
 Dr. Magee was at this time the chief preacher in 
 a city that always piqued itself on its pulpit 
 traditions. His eloquence was undoubted, but of 
 the arid and severely logical rather than of the softly 
 persuasive kind. He delivered his sermons in the 
 manner of a barrister speaking to his brief. The 
 argument was close and flawless, the dialectic was 
 irresistible, the phraseology was terse and apt, the 
 orthodoxy was unimpeachable. But as Magee's 
 presence suggested the legal advocate rather than 
 the divine, so his whole method recalled forcibly 
 the pleader who conscientiously tries to convert a 
 jury to his own views, and savoured little of the 
 dying man preaching to dying men, as if he ne'er 
 might preach again. Argumentative cogency more 
 than spiritual fervour distinguished this great homilist 
 at the period of his Bath ministrations. 
 
 But it was in the Octagon pulpit, or upon the 
 Bath secular platforms, that Magee acquired the 
 extraordinary vigour which some years later, in 1868, 
 was to secure for him the succession to Dr. Jeune in 
 the Diocese of Peterborough. At Bath, too, he 
 learned the rhetorical savoir-faire and address which 
 within the Peers' Chamber enabled him to fill much, 
 the same place as that once occupied by Samuel 
 
Bath and its Schools. 87 
 
 Wilberforce. The circumstances of Magee's elevation 
 to the Episcopal Bench have not yet been correctly 
 stated in print, and are so historically characteristic 
 as to deserve a place in this narrative. The aifair 
 happened on this wise. The British Association 
 was holding its annual meeting. The penultimate, 
 or fourteenth, Lord Derby and Mr. Disraeli happened 
 to be in the town where the savants were congre- 
 gated. Magee had been appointed preacher for the 
 Sunday service in the local Cathedral. The astute 
 divine took as his text the words, " They beckoned 
 to their partners in the other boat to come over and 
 help them." The " other boat " was, of course, the 
 whole company friendly to the Establishment in 
 England ; in other words, the British Conservatives, 
 who, under Mr. Disraeli, were the sole hope of the 
 Hibernian Orangemen, threatened with the first 
 stroke of the Gladstonian axe upon the national 
 Upas tree. When the fiery and closely reasoned 
 address, preached at his illustrious auditors, was 
 concluded, and Magee's congregation began to dis- 
 perse, Disraeli said to Lord Derby, as the pair passed 
 down the aisle, in a whisper, audible to more than 
 one bystander, "We must have that man in the 
 House of Lords." Within a few weeks, by Dr. 
 Jeune's convenient death, a mitre was vacated, and 
 the ci devant pastor of the Octagon Chapel, the feu 
 
88 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Dean of Cork, was, in accordance with the states- 
 man's decree, Peterborough's new Bishop. 
 
 Once in the Upper House, Magee soon stepped 
 into the position, as well as began to discharge the 
 role, of Samuel Wilberforce. He showed himself also 
 a fighting prelate of the old Hanoverian kind. His 
 vehemence against the Disestablishment Bill might 
 have satisfied even the Duke of Cumberland, of 
 somewhat profane memory. The whole oration was 
 pronounced by critics not less experienced than 
 Derby's fourteenth Earl and the first Lord Cairns to 
 be faultless, whether judged by a rhetorical or logical 
 standard. These exhibitions of purely intellectual 
 force did not surprise the critics who remembered 
 the new Bishop's Milsom Street homiHes. What 
 did somewhat transcend the expectations of those 
 who had observed his earlier epoch was the con- 
 summate ease with which Magee accommodated 
 himself to the social idiosyncrasies or prejudices of 
 his new environment, and the conspicuous felicity 
 with which he caught the genius of debate in the 
 Peers. 
 
 The latest comer to the most fastidious and 
 unsympathetic assembly the world has ever seen 
 had not gone through the curriculum of those 
 prelates who began their career, as a matter of 
 course, with being birched by Keate at Eton, con- 
 
Bath and its Schools. 8g 
 
 tinued it by sitting under the pulpit orators of St. 
 Mary's, and then consolidated their reputation by 
 annotating a Sophoclean play or marrying a 
 person of quality's daughter. His lordship had 
 in fact, almost fresh from Trinity College, Dublin, 
 come to the Western Capital a " hungry Irishman ; " 
 had never associated with the great ones of the 
 earth, nor was even, I shrewdly surmise, on the day 
 of his consecration a member of the Athenaeum Club 
 in Pall Mall. Yet by his native genius and tact, 
 William Connor Magee had not donned the lawn 
 sleeves a month before he had imbibed faithfully the 
 social dispositions and oratorical tastes which 
 sway the Gilded Chamber. " S. Oxon " himself in 
 his most inspired moments could not surpass the 
 choice mixture of sub-humorous or sub-satirical 
 thought and studiedly sesquipedalian phrase that 
 represents the nearest approach to a joke welcomed 
 by their spiritual and temporal lordships, and in 
 which blend the late Earl Granville was so dexterous 
 an adept. A rare instance of this occurred when I 
 happened to be listening to a debate somewhere 
 during the seventies. The philanthropic Lord 
 Shaftesbury had rather bluntly charged the Peter- 
 borough prelate with stigmatising certain words 
 uttered by himself as "malodorous." Dr. Magee 
 warmly resented the idea of such an epithet's 
 
go Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 employment by him. " My Lords ! " he pro- 
 tested, "the utmost my poor words could have 
 conveyed was that upon the impossible hypothesis 
 of the noble Earl's using such-and-such an adjec- 
 tive, then his syllables might appear to a less 
 prejudiced critic than myself as verging on the 
 unsavoury." Never probably since the historic 
 Senator indignantly disclaimed having intimated his 
 assent by reiterating — 
 
 " Plain words, my Lords, are always understood ; 
 I did not say I would, I said I could," 
 
 was so facetiously pedantic a refinement, clothed in 
 such portentous vocables, devised for amusing the 
 Hereditary Legislators. 
 
 The only occasion on which I can remember 
 during his later life in London socially to have met 
 Dr. Magee was at a Devonshire Club dinner given 
 by Canon Malcolm MacCoU, the other guests being 
 Mr. John Murray and Mr. Gladstone. Lord Huntly^ 
 who was also of the party, had uttered some moral 
 common-place on the absence of impious garniture 
 from the polite conversation of the period. The 
 Bishop, appealed to, would express no opinion on 
 the ground that whereas he had heard reports of a 
 certain gallant officer who, unlike the Pinafore's 
 Captain, did occasionally use a big, big D, he opined 
 
Bath and its Schools. gi 
 
 it to be unlikely that professional blasphemers would 
 not exercise some restraint in the Episcopal 
 presence. The Prime Minister seemed to agree 
 with Lord Huntly so far as to think it probable that 
 not even a Tory peer would, on high State occasions, 
 permit himself such unlicensed latitude of tongue as 
 was indulged habitually by the Duke of Cumberland, 
 whom he could remember. This, it appears, was 
 the occasion, " Archbishop Howley," prefaced Mr. 
 Gladstone, "was the meekest mouthed and mannered 
 among men. His Grace of Cumberland, much 
 angered by a Church Rate Bill then before the 
 Peers' Committee, insisted with an oath upon the 
 Archiepiscopal presence. Unable to control himself 
 any longer, he quitted the Chamber in quest of the 
 Primate; presently returning with the assurance, 
 ' It's all right, my Lords ! I've seen the Archbishop, 
 
 and he says he'll see its promoters to 
 
 before he will vote for the Bill.' " Such„ 
 
 it appears, was the terrific formula into which His 
 Royal Grace had, from mere force of habit, trans-^ 
 lated the blameless Howley's words. 
 
 Not being a member of the Athenaeum, I seldom 
 had the honour of meeting Bishop Magee en gargon 
 in town. Family matters, however, frequently took 
 me into the Peterborough diocese during his Epis- 
 copate. Here I heard a variety of neat but by no 
 
92 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 means brilliant phrases fall from his lips. / A certain 
 Rutlandshire rector, possessing a beautifully ordered 
 house and garden, though a celibate, was visited by 
 his prelate for a consecration or some such other 
 business. Having exhausted the vocabulary of 
 appreciative panegyric on the establishment's per- 
 fections, the Right Reverend Father on stepping 
 into his carriage remarked, " My dear Brother ! this 
 is Paradise, but where is Eve ? " 
 
 Magee has suffered from his reputation for good 
 things in the same way, though not to the same 
 extent, as Wilberforce, the explanation in each case 
 being the same : that both, while perfectly sincere, 
 were also many-sided men; acting on the Pauline 
 principle of being all things to all persons, and not 
 measuring their phrases invariably for the delectation 
 of key-hole reporters. So many dishonouring and 
 wildly apocryphal ana are often imputed to the 
 excellent, essentially God-fearing and sin-hating 
 Magee, that it seems a duty on the part of one who 
 was to some extent in boyhood his lordship's pupil, 
 to repel circumstantially these gratuitous if not 
 malevolent myths respecting him. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 IN THE DIOCESE OF BATH AND WELLS. 
 (1856—60.) 
 
 Contrast to Or. Hagee in Canon Fleming— hii loyalty to 
 Eyangelioaligm in evil days. Pleasant manners, deserved 
 popularity, and elocutionary skill acquired under W. C. 
 Hacready, the actor. Other Bath clergy; Revs. Wood and 
 Way at Christ Church ; sporting parsons generally con- 
 fined to extreme West. Exemplary parish clergymen in the 
 Qfiantock district— Rev. W. E. BuUer, Rev. W. Gresvell. 
 The Greswell family. Oxford fame. "Disgraced himself 
 by only getting a ' single first.' " Over-Stowey, Lord Taunton, 
 H. D. Lahouchere; Hr. Gladstone's visit in the sixties. 
 The yeoman who thought he had met "Labby" at Pixton 
 snubbed for his recognition. Dr. Forbes Winslow's eloquent 
 sermons at Grosvenor Chapel. 
 
 A MORE complete contrast among the Western 
 See's clergy to the future Primate of the 
 North could not be presented than was realised in 
 the person of the exemplary ecclesiastic, who is 
 to-day Canon Fleming. When I knew him first 
 he was the curate of St. Stephen's, Lansdown, 
 before his promotion to the ministry of All Saints' 
 Episcopal Chapel, Sion Hill. .Strength, rather than 
 sweetness and light, grace or benignity, was Dr. 
 Magee's dominating attribute. His shaggy eye- 
 brows almost met each other, and invested his face 
 
 93 
 
94 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 with a look of chastened ferocity. One could fancy 
 him in his clear but not very musical, sometimes 
 almost raspingly strident or sibilant, tones, remon- 
 strating with an impenitent sinner from pulpit or on 
 the altar-steps, much as if he had gone to the Bar 
 he would have reprimanded, perhaps even bullied, an 
 obstinate, stupid, or exasperatingly nervous witness. 
 The massive jaw, the bull neck, the severe eye, the 
 disciplined, but still aggressively resolute, voice, all 
 proclaimed the strong man, not less than his lofty 
 forehead revealed the intellectual one. 
 
 The Rev. James Fleming, on the other hand, 
 might in respect of urbanity, of grace, amiability 
 and polish of manner, have furnished the original 
 for Samuel Warren's clever sketch of the " Rev. 
 Morphine Velvet." Magee was, unsuitably enough, 
 located in a building that would have served 
 admirably for Thackeray's " Charles Honeyman." 
 So far back as the Georgian epoch, a pew at the 
 Octagon had been considered the proper supple- 
 ment to a box at the theatre for the Bath quality 
 during the season. There was not perhaps much 
 of the Savonarola about Magee. With eyes which 
 had the slightest suspicion of a cast in them, 
 he noted the florid dowagers, elderly bucks, 
 simpering misses, and vacantly - staring young 
 exquisites, who used principally to affect this temple 
 
In the Diocese of Bath and Wells. 95 
 
 of Christian piety and provincial fashion. But 
 he did rap out occasionally in his unadorned pun- 
 gent manner some remarkable home truths, which 
 made the hoary-headed old dandies, card-playing, 
 scandal-mongering matrons, and the feebly-Hirting 
 subalterns feel uncomfortable, and eye each other 
 as if the pulpiteer had been preaching at them, 
 which I am perfectly convinced he never had the 
 slightest intention of doing. 
 
 Like Dr. Magee, Canon Fleming was Irish by 
 origin. But he had been at Shrewsbury under 
 Kennedy, had graduated at Cambridge, while any 
 remnant of brogue left in him had been expelled 
 effectually by the elocutionary discipline of Macready. 
 From this great artist of the voice and good man, 
 Mr. Fleming had taken lessons in all that pertains 
 to oral delivery or to gesture. If anything, his style 
 was too perfect, and his interpretation of the sacred 
 text from the lectern, or his declamation from the 
 pulpit, too uniformly polished. Outside the sacred 
 precincts, in salons and assembly rooms, a better 
 reader of Shakespeare was never heard. He may 
 have lacked Bellew's richness of vocal inflection, and 
 suppressed fervour of histrionic action. But his 
 organ was scarcely less powerful, or less effectively 
 managed. An exceedingly pleasant presence, kindly 
 manners, fairly good features, lightened with a 
 
96 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 winning smile, crowned his very considerable accom- 
 plishments and genuine piety, while they certainly 
 made Mr. Fleming the object of a good deal of by 
 no means undeserved idolatry. He must, at different 
 times, have been constrained to receive from the 
 ladies of his flock as many pairs of slippers as, with 
 the worsted or silk expended on them, would have 
 sufQced to stock a Berlin wool shop. Had he 
 not cherished a firm attachment to Evangelical 
 principles, he would doubtless have been enriched 
 with enough of birettas, chasubles, copes, cassocks, 
 pontifical robes, and all other conceivable articles of 
 hierarchical costume to furnish for years the ward- 
 robes of the St. Andrew's, Margaret Street, clergy. 
 But as Mr. Fleming's good sense kept him from 
 degenerating into a "pet parson," so his patriotic 
 Protestantism prevented any flirtations on his part 
 with the " Scarlet Lady." 
 
 He stood by the declining Low Church party, 
 in the city that had once been a Simeonites' 
 stronghold, even when successive Prime Ministers 
 passed over the conforming representatives of the 
 old Puritans. Called to a Chapel-of-ease in the 
 Paddington district first, Mr. Fleming after this 
 became successively Vicar of Camberwell, Rector of 
 St. Michael's, Chester Square, and Canon of York. 
 Meanwhile at All Saints', Bath, there had been 
 
In the Diocese of Bath cmd Wells. 97 
 
 inducted the Rev. Elias Thackeray Stubbs, whose 
 names worthily concentrate in one individual various 
 associations of prophetic, novelistic, and historic 
 greatness. Notwithstanding his Hibernian affinities, 
 Mr. Fleming's pulpit manner was without much of 
 the Celtic fervour, nor did he often offer at the 
 altar of patriotism so slight a sacrifice even as an 
 occasional bull. One, and only one, utterance 
 faintly suggestive of Sir Boyle Roche's compatriot 
 can I recall. It was in the form of a notice to the 
 effect that a professional engagement elsewhere 
 would prevent his holding his usual week-day lecture 
 during Lent. Its exact words were : " Not having 
 the power to be in two places at once, and being 
 obliged by the Bishop's visit to go to the Abbey, 
 I shall not be able to meet my congregation on 
 Thursday next as usual." 
 
 Other considerable pulpiteers there were, at this 
 era, in Bath. The Rector-in-chief of the city, who 
 held forth at the Abbey Church, Mr. Kemble, was 
 the eloquent nominee of the Simeon trustees, in 
 presence and tone a veritable Boanerges, whom I 
 heard "read himself in" somewhere, I suppose, 
 about the fifties' close. Queen Square Chapel was, 
 however, the home of a very vigorous and genuinely 
 Irish clergyman, Mr. Macnaught, and either here, 
 or at Laura Chapel, a Mr. Tottenham hadj 
 
 7 
 
q8 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 rather before my time, held large concourses spell- 
 bound by his devotional rhetoric. Next to the 
 Abbey, the two most important churches were 
 probably Walcot, in which parish all the higher 
 town lies, and Christ Church-. To the fact that the 
 Bath Abbey is one of the very few historic shrines, 
 consecrated originally after the Reformation, within 
 whose walls, therefore, Mass has never been said, 
 may perhaps be attributed the predominantly Evan- 
 gelical traditions not only of this church but of the 
 whole city. Certainly in my time the two places 
 of worship just mentioned were as manifestly 
 innocent of Rome-wards or Ritualistic tendencies as 
 the good Canon Fleming himself. 
 
 The representative of an old Bath family, the Rev. 
 Sidney Widdrington, was Rector of Walcot when I 
 first knew the parish. He was succeeded by a very 
 accomplished, exemplary, and eloquent theologian, 
 the Rev. T. D. Bernard, formerly Bampton Lecturer 
 at Oxford, and quite a master of Christian apolo- 
 getics. Christ Church, a long lofty building, one of 
 the few whose sittings were free and unappropriated, 
 was administered by a dual control. The two 
 members of this were a Mr. Wood and a Mr. Way. 
 Both were strenuous pious clergy, as well as con- 
 scientious preachers. One of them was, I remem- 
 ber, troubled with a weakness in his facial muscles 
 
In the Diocese of Bath and Wells. 99 
 
 that even in most solemn moments gave his coun- 
 tenance the similitude of a scarcely repressed smile. 
 Attached to the Grammar School was, at that time, 
 the diminutive benefice of Charlcombe, probably 
 with the exception of Culbone, Porlock, the smallest 
 church in the United Kingdom, where Maclean, 
 the editor of Horace, used to preach, and in whose 
 churchyard his remains rest. 
 
 As the metropolis is spiritually subject to the 
 Bishops of London and Winchester, the latter of 
 whom's province extends to Westminster Bridge, 
 so the allegiance of the Somerset clergy is divided 
 between their Lordships of Bath and Wells, or 
 Bristol and Gloucester in the east, and Exeter in 
 the extreme west. The terrible "Henry of Exeter," 
 Bishop Phillpotts, I cannot remember to have set 
 eyes upon ; while only of one Wells prelate do I 
 retain a personal recollection. Lord Auckland was 
 a descendant of that family with which the younger 
 Pitt was on terms of close friendship, one of whose 
 daughters, if credibility attaches to Sir Nathaniel 
 Wraxall's Memoirs, the great statesman wished to 
 make his wife, though he never declared his affection. 
 This Right Reverend Father, whose family name 
 was Eden, notwithstanding his episcopal head-gear 
 and prelatic gaiters, in his deportment and speech 
 reminded one more of a Western squire than of the 
 
 7 * 
 
100 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Apostles' successor. But he understood his clergy 
 thoroughly, ruled them wisely, and could, if need be, 
 discipline them sharply. By Confirmation, after 
 due preparation at Mr. Fleming's hands, Bishop 
 Eden admitted me into full membership of that 
 Church to which I find myself, however unworthily, 
 attached with deeper loyalty every year of my life, 
 and which, as having been good enough for Pusey 
 and Jowett, Faber and Mozley, Maurice and Mansel, 
 is, I venture to think, good enough for me and mine, 
 as well as for the whole English people. 
 
 Somerset's priestly Nimrods were pretty exclu- 
 sively confined to the Quantock or Exmoor district, 
 though in my time by no means common even there. 
 If the western district of that shire, preferred by 
 Southey to Devon, had so thoroughly secular a priest 
 as Mr. West, of Aisholt, it could boast in a still 
 more occidental region so learned, devoted and 
 actively loyal a son as the late Rev. William Gres- 
 well, my father's predecessor in the benefice of 
 Kilve-cum-Stringston. This gentleman was a dis- 
 tinguished member of a most uniformly distinguished 
 and erudite Oxford family. From a time, to whose 
 contrary human memory runneth not, Balliol, 
 Brazenose, Corpus, and Oriel, have possessed 
 Greswells among their chief pundits in classics, 
 divinity, metaphysics. The Harmonia Evangelica 
 
In the Diocese of Bath and Wells. loi 
 
 is the least imposing monument of the research and 
 knowledge of this extraordinary stock, of whose 
 Somersetshire representative I must say a few 
 words. The Rev. William Greswell, later to become 
 Fellow and tutor of Balliol, and as a matter of 
 course, a " first-class " man to boot, was, I believe, 
 the only brother who failed to take a "double." 
 He was held, therefore, by his relatives to have 
 discredited his name, and is fabled to have received 
 remonstrances on his indifference to study. He 
 was, however, not only as learned as any of his 
 gens, but added to the ancestral laurels the reputa- 
 tion of a blameless, benevolent, beneficent, parish 
 priesthood in the Quantock region for I know not 
 how many lustra of his long life. Somewhat absent- 
 minded he might have been, and there is a story, 
 ben trovato perhaps, but possibly not vero, of his 
 meeting a bridal party at the altar with the book of 
 Common Prayer opened at the Commination Service. 
 His memory, as it deserves, still lives, and will live 
 long, not only in the parishes he served so well, but 
 by the whole country-side ; for he was an urbane 
 and amiable, not less than a most erudite and godly, 
 gentleman. His widow, only just dead, was of the 
 gifted Sterling family; retained even in advanced 
 life the lineaments of uncommon beauty, has 
 transmitted her own endowments to accomplished 
 
102 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 daughters and sons, among the latter of whom I 
 possess a former schoolfellow and present friend, in 
 the Rev. W. P. Greswell, an accomplished writer 
 for the periodical press, as also an Oxford scholar of 
 repute. 
 
 Another distinguished representative of the 
 Somerset priesthood and pulpit recurs to me in 
 William Edmund BuUer, of Over Stowey, still, I am 
 happy to think, surviving, though others of his 
 family have passed away. His rectory and church, 
 both of them nestling in a fertile valley, almost at 
 the foot of Danesborough, after Willsneck the highest 
 of the Quantock range, were models of their sort, 
 such as George Herbert's spirit might have loved to 
 haunt. Hard by, stands Quantock Lodge, the 
 mansion built by that Mr. Labouchere who was also 
 the first and last Lord Taunton. Here it was that 
 more, I suppose, than thirty years since, my eyes 
 first fell upon that other, rather more notbrious, 
 Mr. Labouchere, the "Henry" of that ilk who owns, 
 edits, and adorns the broadsheet of limitless circula- 
 tion. Truth. Mr. Labouchere's visits to his ennobled 
 relative were by no means infrequent. On the 
 present occasion Mr. Gladstone, then an illustrious, 
 not pre-eminent Englishman, was a guest at Quan- 
 tock Lodge, previously, it may be, to visiting Sir 
 Thomas Acland at Holnicote, or the Luttrells 
 
In the Diocese of Bath and Wells. 103 
 
 at Dunster. Whether subsequent events cast any 
 anticipatory shadows upon the meeting between the 
 "Grand Old Man" and the "Labby" of the future 
 I cannot remember, but one rather characteristic 
 incident I do recall. An insinuating yeoman, who 
 aimed at being "genteel," approaching the host's 
 nephew, reminded him of, as he said, a previous 
 meeting further west at Pixton (meaning, of course, 
 Lord Carnarvon's seat). Mr. Labouchere, with 
 something between a simper and a sneer, and pre- 
 tending not rightly to have caught the last word, 
 re-echoed incredulously : " Brixton ? There must 
 be some mistake. I never desert Camberwell ! " 
 
 One of the best known pulpit rhetoricians at 
 the Bath that I recall, was Dr. Forbes Winslow, 
 the Nonconformist minister of Kensington Chapel, 
 who, I believe, towards the close of his life took 
 orders in the Anglican Establishment. Even in his 
 dissenting days he was listened to by almost as 
 many Church of England hearers as those belonging 
 to his own denomination. Nor have I ever heard 
 sentences more clearly constructed, arguments more 
 popularly intelligible, a-ppeals more winningly 
 directed to the average citizen, than those which 
 proceeded from this able and devout homilist. 
 
CHAPTER VIL 
 
 THE SOMERSET COLLEGE, BATH. 
 
 Xhe old Proprietary College, Bath. Elements of disrnption on 
 its Council Board. The classical versus the modem view of 
 education. General culture against professional specialism. 
 Educational ideas of Benjamin Jowett, Dean Lake, Dean 
 Stanley, Dr. Temple, as represented by the Rev. H. S.-Escott, 
 lead to a secession tram Sydney College and the founding 
 of Somerset CoUege, Bath, 1858, domiciled in the Circns. 
 Somerset College Masters. Rev. T. Grylls, Classical Com- 
 position Master ; his scholarly neatness. Rev. Dr. Lane, 
 my House Master ; his good sense and helpfulness to general 
 intelligence. Monsieur Achille Dubarle, rough on poor me ; 
 a Latin insult wisely pocketed. Canon Fleming's good work 
 as elocution teacher. Bath athletics. Matches with the 
 Lansdown Club. The Graces — especially "E.M." The 
 " All England " Eleven of 18S9 against Lansdown. Jackson 
 and the Graces. Other Bath athletic champions. The 
 Attflelds and Sainsburys. C. N. Jackson preparing for his 
 Oxford Championship on the Sydenham Field. 
 
 IN the former chapter it has been indicated that 
 the Bath Proprietary College, with the Rev. 
 Thomas Whale as Principal, or Head Master, with the 
 Rev. Hay Sweet-Escott as vice- Principal, or second 
 master, contained within itself the germs of inevit- 
 able disruption earlier or later. On the one hand, 
 among the teaching staff as well as at the Council 
 Board, there were those who agreed with Mr. Whale 
 in depreciating a purely, or mainly, classical education 
 
 104 
 
The Somerset College, Bath. 105 
 
 as inadequate to the complex needs of nineteenth 
 century professional life. These, though theoreti- 
 cally admitting a knowledge of Greek and Latin not 
 in itself to be reprehensible, were prepared to 
 tolerate its inculcation only so far as was necessary 
 to enable boys to win University scholarships, or 
 pass Oxford and Cambridge examinations, and thus, 
 for the proprietors' benefit, to advertise the insti- 
 tution at which they had been trained; But this 
 admission was qualified by the requirement that at 
 the earliest moment possible the effete classical 
 traditions should be dropped ; that the dead 
 languages should be buried decently, or indecently ; 
 should not, for an avoidable moment, be, as Cowper 
 styled them, "the bane of every boy to decent 
 station bred." 
 
 The cardinal contention of this party was, there- 
 fore, that no time should be lost in enabling boys 
 intended for the military or naval services, indeed 
 for any modern vocations, to discontinue all training 
 in antiquity's tongues, and to concentrate their 
 attention upon mathematics and modern dialects. 
 That they might the better do this, they were to be 
 segregated from lads preparing for the Universities. 
 Lest they should contract any taint of liberal 
 culture or humane letters, they were to be organised 
 into a modern school, under special masters, as 
 
io5 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 ignorant and intolerant of Greek or Latin as could 
 be found. The other educationists, rightly or 
 wrongly, held that a longer adherence to the system 
 which had produced a Wellington, or trained a 
 Canning, would be beneficial to the boys themselves 
 in the present not less than to their professional 
 prospects in the future. The most reasonable plan 
 was, they urged, to subject University and non- 
 University pupils to the same general training and 
 intellectual discipline up to the age approximately of 
 sixteen or seventeen, and then to begin the special 
 education, exclusively modern in some cases, purely 
 classical in others. 
 
 Neither party was in the least degree convinced 
 really by the arguments of their opponents. A 
 truce was arranged between the disputants, but 
 cordial co-operation was practically impossible. 
 Mr. P. C. Sheppard was not less tenacious of his 
 views, which happened to be those of my father, 
 than, on the other side, were Mr. Whale's loyal 
 supporters of theirs. After some time the difference 
 culminated in a formal secession of the Sheppard 
 faction from the Proprietary College Council and in 
 arrangements for the foundation of a new educational 
 establishment under the title of the " Somerset 
 College." There were good reasons for the choice 
 of this name. The first Head Master of the 
 
The Somerset College, Bath. 107 
 
 new school bore a well-known Somerset patronymic, 
 and was born of a not inconsiderable county family. 
 Blundell's School, Tiverton, long the seminary most 
 favoured by the Western gentry, had fallen on evil 
 days. Its historic name retained only a portion of 
 its old prestige ; its latterday successes in games or 
 studies had fallen below its ancient standard. The 
 place, therefore, which in past generations it had 
 filled was consequently to some extent vacant. 
 The local epithet chosen for the fresh foundation 
 was thus likely to appeal to that class in which the 
 Tiverton society had found its chief support. None 
 of these anticipations were altogether falsified by 
 the result. Some of them were more than literally 
 fulfilled. 
 
 The Somerset College, domiciled at No. 11 
 Circus, came into existence during the April 
 of 1858. Its success was decisive and not long 
 delayed. The distinctions won by its pupils at 
 Oxford or elsewhere exceeded those achieved by 
 any other school consisting of the same number of 
 boys. The Balliol Scholarship, that blue ribbon 
 of school competition, was not, I think, won by 
 any Somerset boy. But my friend and contem- 
 porary, Mr. Evelyn Abbott, carried off the Senior 
 Classical Exhibition of his year at the College of 
 Wycliffe, and has since borne some practical 
 
io8 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 testimony to the thoroughness of the training he 
 received under my father, not only by the position 
 he holds to-day on BaUiol's teaching staff, but by 
 beating distinguished competitors for the Gaisford 
 Greek prizes. I myself have had the satisfaction of 
 being succeeded in the editorship of the Fortnightly 
 Review by another old Somerset boy, who before 
 then had won unrivalled distinction in the Oxford 
 philosophy and history schools, independently of 
 having attained a front place in English helles lettres. 
 I refer, I need not say, to Mr. W. L. Courtney, 
 several years, I am afraid, my junior, and whom I 
 recollect first as a little lad, astonishing all by his 
 quickness as much as he delighted them by his 
 amiability. When, after many decades of successful 
 but exhausting toil, the Rev. H. S.-Escott took the 
 Balliol living of South Luffenham, in Rutlandshire 
 first, and of Kilve, in West Somerset next, he was 
 succeeded by Mr. Courtney himself, who continued 
 with the same success to send up his pupils for 
 entrance scholarships at Oxford, and for commissions 
 at Sandhurst or Woolwich. One of the Somerset 
 boys, within two or three years of my own standing, 
 the son of the Bath clergyman already mentioned, 
 E. P. Way, while an undergraduate at Brasenose, 
 pulled an oar in the University Eight in the annual 
 race with Cambridge on the Thames. 
 
The Somerset College, Bath. 109 
 
 Other boys, during Mr. Escott's, or his immediate 
 successor, Mr. Courtney's, Headmastership, ac- 
 quitted themselves brilliantly in military examina- 
 tions. Thus I can recall that during this period 
 Kunhardt won the fourth place at the Woolwich 
 entry examination, while eventually he came out 
 first in his year. Similarly Pelham Von Donop, a 
 distinguished naval officer's son, was among the 
 initial half-dozen in both competitions at the Royal 
 Military Academy. Other like honours were won by 
 Frank Eustace, now of the Royal Horse Artillery. 
 Mr. Jackson, as well as Mr. Hunter, of the same body, 
 may also be mentioned. Francis Aylmer Graves- 
 Sawle, to-day a Colonel in the Coldstreams, who 
 distinguished himself in the Guards Camel Corps 
 during the Nile Expedition of 1884-5, though at 
 Eton, also passed the earlier portion of his school- 
 days at Bath, and with his handsome presence 
 and polished habit, can be recalled by me as clearly 
 as if I had seen him yesterday, though it must be 
 more than thirty years since we last met. 
 
 These instances are worth mentioning. For the 
 views held by the Rev. H. S.-Escott, and his Oxford 
 friends, e.g. Mr. Jowett, Dr. W. C. Lake, Dean 
 Stanley, Dr. Temple (Headmaster of Rugby), were 
 vindicated by each one of them. Once more it was 
 proved that the system most likely for enabhng lads to 
 
no Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 do full justice to their powers in any after profession, 
 is one under which the first moiety of their school 
 life shall be filled by what is called a general and 
 liberal, rather than a special or modern, education. 
 The latter of course not to begin until the learners 
 have mastered those elements of knowledge which 
 are said to soften the manners. 
 
 The Somerset College, during its quarter of 
 a century's independent existence, with its compact 
 little army of from a hundred to a hundred and fifty 
 boys, contrived to hold its own, as in scholarship, so 
 in cricket or other sports, against all neighbouring 
 institutions of the same size. Especially, I recollect, 
 two or three brothers of the name of Owen ; Paley 
 Ashmore, member of a well-known Bath family; one 
 of Dr. Winslow's sons, as each of them not much 
 behind public school form, whether at the wickets or 
 in the field. The last mentioned of these, whose 
 Christian name, since he was uniformly known as 
 "Ocky," must, I presume, have been his father's 
 "Octavius," while good in all respects, "back- 
 stopped" at cricket with a neatness and activity 
 scarcely inferior to one of the consummate Lytteltons. 
 Richard Bethell, as in those days he was, now the 
 third Lord Westbury, also received his education at 
 Somerset College. My impression is, that while show- 
 ing not a little of his famous grandfather's intellectual 
 
The Somerset College, Bath. iii 
 
 quickness, he did not, as a boy, in the cricket or 
 football field, display the same interest and skill 
 which have since won him a reputation as a consider- 
 able shot, and given him a place among the bold and 
 dexterous horsemen of the shires. 
 
 All the masters of the Somerset College 
 interested themselves much in the boys' games, 
 especially when their opponents at cricket or football 
 happened to be teams belonging to that Proprietary 
 College, near the Sydney Gardens, whence the 
 Somerset foundation itself had sprung, and with 
 which the rivalry was always especially keen. 
 My personal remembrance of the Sydney College 
 masters is confined chiefly to the Parisian Bachelier 
 es lettres, Monsieur Achille Dubarle. If this gentle- 
 man still lives, I hope he has become more reconciled 
 to my memory than, in the time when I first knew 
 him, he was to my presence. A typical Frenchman 
 of the Orleanist regime, he united the shortest of 
 tempers with the most comfortable of persons, and 
 I doubt not, the kindest of hearts. But in those 
 days I was a very nervous, therefore rather awkward, 
 and to one not having some special interest in me, I 
 have no doubt, a very trying boy. So, at any rate, 
 thought Monsieur Achille Dubarle. With a vigour 
 recalling his Homeric eponym's onslaughts on 
 Thersites, this Gallic graduate, who boasted of I 
 
112 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 know not how many diplomas, railed at me for my 
 misplaced accents in reading aloud a long passage 
 from Moliere, and then proceeded, with every variety 
 of taunt, to upbraid me for my vile rendering of the 
 original. Finally, when the choleric and corpulent 
 Gaul had grown purple with fury, and was perspir- 
 ing from every pore in his skin with embittered 
 agitation ; just at the point I really feared he was 
 going to have a fit,, he found vent to his rage as 
 follows: — "They have told me that this dunce" 
 (indicating me with his snuff-discoloured forefinger) 
 "does understand some Latin. Perhaps he will 
 translate this hexameter for me : — 
 
 ' Inter discipulos omnes micat ultimus Escott.' " 
 
 Fortunately, my good father's communicated 
 interest in Latin ^wrsification enabled me rather to 
 appreciate this effort of the Frenchman. Sensibly 
 pocketing the insult, I applied myself with such dili- 
 gence to the language that I henceforward received 
 his commendation, and at the " half s " end won 
 the first or second prize in his class. 
 
 The particular members of the Somerset 
 College magisterial staff whom I remember are the 
 Rev. Thomas Grylls and the Rev. Dr. Edmund 
 Lane. The former of these was a Cornish gentle- 
 man, of that purely Celtic amusingly fiery type to be 
 
The Somerset College, Bath. 113 
 
 found chiefly in the Western peninsula, and in the 
 nearly opposite Principality of Wales. Mr. Grylls 
 was one of the neatest classical scholars with whom 
 the Cambridge of his day enriched recently the 
 schoolmaster's profession. He had, moreover, the 
 rare capacity of stimulating his pupils' interest, as 
 well as of imbuing them with his own correct taste 
 and considerable knowledge. Dr. Lane, in whose 
 house I boarded, was to an extent unusual among 
 pedagogues, a clear-headed, equitable, man of the 
 world, with a practical conviction, greatly to his 
 pupils' and his school's advantage, that any sort of 
 intelligence or industry on the part of the boys 
 should be encouraged ; even though these attributes 
 were displayed somewhat outside the conventiona 
 limits of the scholastic curriculum. 
 
 Mr. Grylls, I am afraid, has ceased to teach the 
 art of composition in Latin elegiacs or Greek senarii, 
 but if, as I trust, my old house master and never 
 failing friend survives, he will, perhaps, accept his 
 old pupil's gratitude for kindnesses not perhaps 
 enough appreciated once but unforgotten to this day. 
 The divine who is now Canon Fleming greatly 
 encoufaged by his own generous prizes the practice 
 of recitation of English verse from memory, in that 
 school where he lectured upon the art of elocution. 
 Paley Ashmore, already named by me, learned 
 
 8 
 
114 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 perfectly by heart, so as to repeat without a mistake, 
 the whole of Paradise Lost. I never rivalled, nor 
 could ever have hoped to rival, this exploit ; but 
 thanks to Mr. Fleming my memory was braced and 
 strengthened while my enunciation was permanently 
 benefited under his winning and effective tuition. 
 The same kindly and radiant divine was at the 
 period now referred to, nearly the best chess player 
 in Bath and one of the best in Western England. 
 He helped on largely the formation of a chess club 
 among the boys, and with untiring kindness, spent 
 wet afternoons in their chess room teaching them the 
 secret of novel gambits, or of unsuspected mates. 
 He was, too, the first person I ever saw play more 
 than one game at once, and that blindfolded. 
 
 The chief patron from a superior eminence of 
 the athletic sports of the Somerset boys was 
 the well-known author of The Cricket Field. The 
 Rev. James Pycroft, after some years of school- 
 mastering at Cheltenham College, was living that 
 life of lettered leisure on Bathwick Hill ; whose 
 venue he transferred subsequently to Palmeira 
 Square, Brighton. Recently, at the epoch novvf 
 mentioned, he had written two or three novels, 
 Elkerton Rectory, Agony Point, and it may be one or 
 two more. These fictions had deservedly many 
 readers. They were certainly not undervalued by 
 
The Somerset College, Bath. 115 
 
 their accomplished author, who lived happy in the 
 faith of possessing a mission to perform ; while he 
 died, I am sure, not less happy in the conviction of 
 its thorough accomplishment. Pleased with himself, 
 Mr. Pycroft was not less pleased with all his fellow 
 creatures, save only, perhaps, those who supported 
 the pestilent heresy, as he held it, of displacing 
 classical training by professional culture in the case 
 of boys not yet midway through their teens. His 
 enjoyment of existence was, however, at its height 
 when he was watching that game whose panegyrist 
 and historian he was, as it proceeded on the 
 Somerset College field, behind Pulteney Street, or 
 better still on the Sydenham Field of the Lansdown 
 Club at the bottom of the town. 
 
 On this last arena the brothers Grace first ac- 
 quired, or, it may be, publicly confirmed their extra- 
 ordinary reputation. To the best of my memory, it 
 is not the immortal "W. G.," but the agile and 
 ubiquitous E. M. Grace who in these days was the all- 
 round family champion. Having no books of cricket 
 reference by me as I write these lines, I am unable 
 to particularise scientifically the unparalleled feats, 
 as batsman, bowler, fielder, which somewhere 
 towards the close of the fifties "E. M." achieved 
 against an All-England Eleven. But I^ do remember 
 the expression on the face of Jackson, I suppose the 
 
 8 * 
 
Ii5 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 fastest and hardest of then professional deliverers, 
 when " E. M,," unawed by his unparalleled prestige, 
 calmly hit the first ball of the over to "square 
 leg" for six, and when it was the turn of the 
 ball's champion at Lord's to be at the wicket> 
 sent his off-stump flying at the second or third 
 attack. To his juniors, the Somerset boys, when 
 they played against the Lansdown team, this 
 gentleman was a perpetual terror. If he was 
 stationed at the opposite end, the youthful batsman 
 either found his bails flying about his head before he 
 had realised that " Play ! " was called. If Mr. Grace 
 was bowling, the umpire had given the wielder of 
 the willow " Out ! " ere he perceived his own failure. 
 Should this inexorable athlete be standing at "point," 
 then he had fairly caught the leathern globe directly 
 it had been poked off the polished blade. At this 
 time Somersetshire as a whole had not won the fame 
 as a first-class cricketing county which under Mr. 
 Hewett and Mr. L. C. H. Palairet it has lately 
 secured. But Bath and the Lansdown Club, for 
 cricket purposes, including as they did some part 
 of Gloucester not less than Somerset, boasted pro- 
 ficients in all kinds of games, who could compete 
 with the giants of any shire. 
 
 Apart from the historic Graces, I remember 
 a respected Bathonian, even then not in his 
 
The Somerset College, Bath. 117 
 
 earliest manhood, who continued to be a cricketer 
 of renown long after old age had technically set in. 
 This gentleman, Mr. Sainsbury, had at least three 
 sons, who I suppose might have held their own even 
 with the Graces; while against the latter there 
 might have been pitted successfully the family 
 triumvirate of Attfield. These brethren, William, 
 Robert, and Henry, were often backed at racquets 
 or tennis as well as at cricket against all comers 
 from the West of England gentry. 
 
 Certain of my Somerset College contemporaries 
 have good reason to remember with pride this same 
 Sydenham Field. Here it was that C. N. Jackson, 
 to-day Fellow and tutor of Hertford College, Oxford, 
 acquired that speed, strength, endurance, nimble- 
 ness and pluck which made him uniformly victorious 
 in the hurdle-races of his own University, as well as 
 won for him victory in the three mile race against 
 Cambridge. 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 BATH SOCIETY AND SPORT IN THE SIXTIES. 
 
 Importance of the Sydenham field and the Lansdovn Cricket 
 Club at Bath. Popolarity of archery thronghout West of 
 England and elsewhere during the sixties. Meeting of the 
 Grand National Archery Association, Bath, 1860. Champion- 
 ship of Ur. H. A. Ford, Hrs. Horniblow. Social and 
 fashionable rivalry between Bath and Cheltenham during 
 the sixties. Comparative failure of clubs at both places. 
 The Imperial Club, Cheltenham. A deaf and dumb expert 
 at pool, at the Imperial Club. The billiard room at Amery's 
 Christopher Hotel, Bath. Charles Straghan and others at 
 pool. The Rev. J. Pycroft, Bath's literary lion. Bishop 
 Percival on Bath education. "Graphic" exhibitions at 
 Assembly Rooms. A literary dining club. Great popularity 
 of Peach's Library, Bridge Street. Hr. R. E. Peach's grand 
 manner. Bath as a theatrical city. Quin; the Sheridans. 
 Bath Theatre in the sixties. Manager Chute. Likeness to 
 Yincent Crummies. A schoolboy's daylight visit behind the 
 scenes. Literary associations of Bath and neighbourhood, 
 and of East Somerset. 
 
 WHAT the Olympian or Isthmian course was to 
 Hellas of old, that, during my earlier know- 
 ledge of the place, the Sydenham Field, fringed by 
 the Somersetshire Avon, was to Bath. Cricket, and 
 upon grand occasions football, or gymnastic sports, 
 were not the only amusements provided on this area 
 by the Lansdown Club for public delectation. Bath 
 possessed, still, it may be, possesses, an archery club 
 
 ii8 
 
Bath Society and Sport in the Sixties. 119 
 
 which usually held its meeting on a field in the 
 suburb of Weston. The venue, however, of more 
 pretentious toxophilite competitions was the 
 spacious sward belonging by proprietary right to 
 the cricketers. Here, in i860 or 1861, the Grand 
 National Association of bowmen and bow-women 
 'celebrated their annual re-union. Archery in this 
 year, 1895, is experiencing some sort of revival; 
 enjoys, it would seem, an after-math, or Indian 
 summer, of its historic popularity. 
 
 But in the period anterior to croquet, or when 
 suburban grass-plots had not uniformly been con- 
 verted into lawn-tennis grounds, the old English 
 pastime, on a larger or smaller scale, was extensively 
 popular. Toxophilites mustered strongly along the 
 valley of the Exe or Dart. The little South Devon 
 watering-place of Budleigh Salterton, mentioned 
 before, had a field exclusively dedicated to the sport, 
 whose calendar it marked by grand match days from 
 May to September. In the North the Lancashire 
 votaries of the bow and arrow were famous. In the 
 Midlands, Nottinghamshire boasted in both sexes 
 Robin Hood's titular descendants ; Warwickshire 
 took pride in its bowmen of Arden. Gloucestershire 
 rejoiced exceedingly in the possession of England's 
 champion targeteer. This gentleman, Mr. H. A. Ford, 
 practised for several hours daily during the summer in 
 
120 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 the umbrageous Gloucestershire Spa. Even during 
 the winter forty-eight hours seldom elapsed without 
 his shooting one or two shafts in the Cheltenham 
 Gardens, just to keep his hand steady. Mr. Ford at 
 this time was simply unapproachable in the pastime 
 of his choice. On the occasion now spoken of, I do 
 not think any of his arrows flew wide of some part 
 of the target ; while his golds and bull's-eyes sent up 
 his score, before the competition was half done, to a 
 figure whichj as the total of that day's achievement^ 
 no ordinary performer could hope to surpass. As 
 for the markswomen, they were, I think, headed 
 easily by Mrs. Horniblow ; though Mrs. Ford, at her 
 best, was nearly equal to her incomparable husband. 
 If their hosts did not appreciate at its full value the 
 honour of being visited by them, the ladies and 
 gentlemen, of the Grand National had a full sense of 
 the honour conferred by their presence, and, missing 
 the triumphal arches, the flower-decked balconies, 
 the bunting-displaying shops, which in other towns 
 were the usual insignia of the visit, resolved to 
 betake themselves in future to spots at which more 
 demonstrative receptions awaited them ; nor for 
 some years displayed their skill in the Sydenham 
 field again. 
 
 The social competition, as to some extent the 
 scholastic, between Bath and Cheltenham was at 
 
Bath Society and Sport in the Sixties. I2i 
 
 this period undoubtedly keen. The fashionable 
 civilisation of the two places ran upon identical 
 lines. The quality of the population at each bore 
 a close resemblance. Retired military officers, 
 for the most part, with livers affected by tropical 
 suns and Indian curries, gave the social tone to, and 
 set the fashion in, the Gloucestershire, as well as the 
 Somersetshire, watering - place. Their incomes 
 naturally were limited. Their marriageable, but 
 frequently unmarried, daughters were, in virtue of a 
 similar sequence of the universal mother, many. 
 The sons were seldom endowed with more than the 
 average abilities. The sires exhibited a pardonable 
 impatience to start them betimes in the military, if 
 not in some more self-supporting, profession. These 
 are not the parents with whom a head master finds 
 it easiest to deal. Bishop Barry, like his excellent 
 predecessors in the control of the College near the 
 Cotswolds, experienced at an earlier date the same 
 difficulties which subsequently confronted the pur^ 
 veyors of liberal culture for ingenuous youth in the 
 Avon's valley. Educationally, too, Bath, during the 
 moribund fifties, suffered from the established fame 
 of Cheltenham, as, ten years afterwards, it was 
 eclipsed by the rising glories of Clifton, under Mr. 
 Percival, to-day Bishop of Hereford. 
 
 This gentleman, though born north of the Trent, 
 
122 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 and reproducing in his manly independence not a 
 few of his Cumberland sires' fine qualities, is 
 almost entitled, apart from his present episcopate's 
 geographical associations, to rank as a West of 
 England worthy. In 1858, being then a Fellow 
 of Queen's College, Oxford, he came from his 
 University to test the classical attainments of the 
 " Somerset " scholars. At this time his experience 
 of his juniors was confined to undergraduates in 
 his lecture room. He seemed to the Bath boys 
 he examined a perfect type of the college student 
 who had developed into the college don. His 
 height was not less than six feet, while he was thin, 
 I fancy, in proportion. We all of us rather dreaded 
 the impending tSte-a-tete with the examiner at 
 viva voce when the paper work should be finished ; for 
 the studied tranquillity, even softness, of his manner 
 was of that sort which seemed likely to conceal 
 merciless severity in the detection of juvenile short- 
 comings. His native kindness, however, took an 
 early and, under the circumstances, a considerately 
 unusual opportunity in showing itself, and in reas- 
 suring one of the most nervous of his inquisition's 
 subjects. " My boy," he said, in the friendliest of 
 voices, to a lad who had just finished a piece of 
 Latin prose, and was about tremblingly to place the 
 composition in the " poser's " hands, " I looked over 
 
Bath Society and Sport in the Sixties. 123 
 
 your shoulder while you were writing ; you have 
 every reason to be satisfied with yourself, and, with 
 care, will get a scholarship easily, and a good class 
 in 'Mods' as well." 
 
 The season happened to be winter, and a few 
 hours later, a different side of the future prelate's 
 character had occasion to show itself. The Avon 
 was frozen over. Examiner and examinees alike 
 were skating upon its surface. Mr. Percival, not 
 less at home when steel-shod than when hearing a 
 Greek chorus construed, was sailing along with 
 great agility. An ill-conditioned overgrown lout, 
 resenting the discovery that so mortal an enemy 
 as the detecter of his ignorance in Greek grammar 
 could take his pleasure on the ice like less 
 learned mortals, conceived the idea of obstructing 
 his progress by placing to a considerable height 
 in his path such obstacles as happened to be 
 available. The Fellow of Queen's ignored appar- 
 ently the device; but, presently sweepmg up to it, 
 with a single stride lifted his sesquipedalian form 
 across the barrier, just as Goliath might have done 
 over the brook whence David picked his pebbles. 
 When the mischiefs contriver saw the success with 
 which the examiner had negotiated the impediment, 
 like the ranks of Tusculum in Macaulay's ballad, 
 " he scarce forbore to cheer." " My young friend! " 
 
124 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 were the words that fell clear in the frosty air, on 
 his astonished ear, " the next time you want to play 
 any of these monkey tricks, try them on one of your 
 own height. And now, remember that you have in 
 front of you for to-morrow the verbs in Mi, which 
 may present difficulties to you, greater even than 
 this truck and broomsticks did to me." Thus, 
 gently and effectively, did the present year's Spiritual 
 Lordship turn the laugh against the ill-mannered 
 urchin, who, as Mr. Percival left the Avon, peni- 
 tently raised in a panic-stricken and remorseful 
 treble the cry of " Three cheers for the Examiner ! " 
 More than once subsequently, Mr. Percival paid 
 his periodical visits to the school in the Circus. He 
 had, of course, by his good-humouredly contemptuous 
 display of tact and temper, in the manner aforesaid, 
 created for himself a popularity and respect which 
 endured collectively so long as Somerset College 
 existed, and which in individuals survives to this 
 day. How deeply Dr. Percival was impressed by 
 the good work of the Somerset boys may be judged 
 from his retrospective tribute to it in a speech 
 delivered at Coventry twenty-seven years later, 1885. 
 The occasion was the opening of new buildings in 
 King Henry VI IPs School, Coventry, whose then 
 Headmaster was my late brother, the Rev. W. W. 
 S.-Escott (a too short career marked by performance, 
 
Bath Society and Sport in the Sixties, 125 
 
 not less than by the highest professional promise) ; 
 the words of Dr. Percival were these : — " Your 
 Headmaster was brought up in a school second 
 to none, in the distinctions which it won rela- 
 tively to the opportunities which it had. What his 
 father did at Bath he himself may hope to do at 
 Coventry." >■ 
 
 The Somerset College, in respect of popular 
 prestige, undoubtedly suffered from never being 
 located in a separate structure of its own, such as 
 the two academic buildings on Lansdown slopes, or 
 even the ci-devant hotel, within whose walls the 
 Sydney College found its home. Gradually after 
 Mr. Escott's and his successor Mr. Courtney's reign, 
 the conclusion forced itself upon the minds of 
 sensible persons, that Bath could not support advan- 
 tageously for itself, or successfully for each of them, 
 two competitive Colleges ; that if Clifton was not to 
 be practically supreme, the Somerset and Sydney 
 establishments must fuse their energies, centralise 
 their resources, and as ea,ch of them had sprung of 
 old from a common single stock, so the two should, 
 after years of separation, revert to their original 
 unity. Mr. Courtney, whose shrewdness and clear- 
 ness of perception no one who knows him can doubt, 
 wisely, as I believe, encouraged any overtures to 
 union made by the College in Pulteney Street 
 
126 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 towards its rival in the Circus. It was my privilege, 
 as my family relationships made it seem my duty, in 
 Mr. Courtney's company, to visit the capital of 
 Beau Nash some decade since ; and to discuss, with 
 the then Sydney College Headmaster, the detailed 
 arrangements for the easily accomplished amalga- 
 mation. A judicious compromise as to the re-united 
 foundation's name was arrived at. The distinctive 
 appellations of the Bath Proprietary, or the Somerset 
 College, were both discarded. By the more com- 
 prehensive nomenclature of "The Bath College," 
 the dual institution of the old Sydney and the new 
 Somerset, to-day combines in itself both these 
 foundations, and under the able management of the 
 Rev. T. W. Dunn, is in a fair way to continue, or 
 repeat, those triumphs whether in studies or sports 
 which, in an independent state of existence, were 
 achieved by the two societies now fused together 
 and domiciled beneath a single roof. 
 
 If the already mentioned Sydenham Field was 
 the common centre and catholic meeting place of 
 athletic Bath, a certain bibliopolist's emporium in 
 Bridge Street, not far from the Market Place, was, in a 
 degree scarcely second to the Pump Room itself, the 
 favourite rendezvous of social or fashionable Bath. 
 Mr. R. E. Peach was the proprietor of the city's 
 chief circulating library, as well as the stationer 
 
Bath Society and Sport in the Sixties. 127 
 
 exclusively patronised by all Bath teachers with any 
 pretensions to breeding or refinement. To know 
 Mr. Peach was indeed in itself a liberal education. 
 He was the last Bath tradesman with that grand 
 manner, for which the minor merchants of King 
 Bladud's capital were found in Mr. Cyrus Angelo 
 Bantam's days by members of the Pickwick Club to be 
 famous. To say that this polite trader's deportment 
 recalled the Regency's manners would be to convey 
 a wholly inadequate idea of the man. Only from 
 some sire who possessed the advantage of personali 
 or traditional knowledge of Versailles under the 
 Grand Monarch, could Mr. Peach have learned his 
 stately bow; that dignified manipulation of the 
 wares on his counter; that majestic wave of the 
 superfine cambric handkerchief. There may be, if 
 this gentleman has retired from business or from 
 existence, other librarians as accomplished and 
 obUging as Mr. Peach in the metropolis of chaly- 
 beate springs. But it is unlikely in point of urbanity 
 of address, or polish of bearing, that he has left 
 behind him any successor. 
 
 Club life has never become thoroughly naturalised 
 in Western England's modish capitals. Cheltenham 
 had, and I doubt not has, an excellent club, by name^ 
 the Imperial, where one could dine as well as in 
 Pall Mall, and where I have seen a deaf and dumb 
 
128 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 gentleman, whose patronymic has escaped me, wield 
 his cue with a skill which poor Arthur Chapman, W. 
 E. Stokes, Frank Morgan, or Christmas, the marker, 
 himself, at the "Cocoa Tree," St, James's, could 
 scarcely have surpassed. Bath was not of course 
 theoretically in respect of clubs less handsomely 
 provided. But not even the perfectly appointed 
 joint-stock caravanserai in Queen's Square really 
 filled the place occupied in London's civilisation by 
 the Carlton, Reform, or the Wyndham. More or less 
 elderly gentlemen predominated among the County 
 Club's members. They seldom took their meals else- 
 where than at their own homes, and found that they 
 could read the same newspapers at much less cost in 
 Mr. Peach's entrepot, as well as hear all about the 
 newest books into the bargain. At the same time 
 they came across their old cronies from Calcutta, or 
 encountered their comrades-in-arms from Allahabad 
 quite as conveniently, much more inexpensively. 
 The younger habitues were unpleasantly conscious, 
 when they dropped in at the club, of associating 
 exclusively with gentlemen of whom they saw enough 
 in their fathers' houses, and were proportionally as 
 well as undisguisedly ill at ease. Both classes, 
 therefore, seemed to have a direct interest in letting 
 their subscriptions drop. The elder found all the 
 diversion they needed in Mr. Peach's or some other 
 
Bath Society and Sport in the Sixties. 129 
 
 kindred establishment ; the younger got their game 
 of billiards, or obtained their smoking lounge to 
 their heart's content, in some less expensive resort 
 like Amery's " Christopher," or the " Castle Hotel," 
 without the inconvenience of being dunned for 
 yearly subscriptions. The tavern chiefly frequented 
 by the younger men of Beau Nash's city was the 
 former of these. Here some tolerable billiard 
 playing could be seen. There was an old gentleman 
 who might have sat for a typical miser's portrait, 
 and who, by strict adherence to the " marker's 
 game," must have made at billiards or pool enough 
 petty cash appreciably to contribute to his bachelor 
 housekeeping. There was another younger man, 
 named, if I forget not, Straghan, who seldom seemed 
 to enter the room with pockets that were full, or 
 rarely left it with a purse that was quite empty. 
 
 The town of Anstey's Guiiie had by no means 
 parted company with its literary or artistic tradi- 
 tions. At the Assembly Rooms there were periodical 
 exhibitions of pictures by a society called the 
 " Graphic." The chief contributors to these 
 expositions probably were that Mr. Sheppard already 
 mentioned, whose son, Philip, was, and is, among the 
 most finished of modern water-colour painters ; just 
 as that gentleman's brother, my old schoolfellow, 
 Osborne Sheppard, always showed himself among 
 
 9 
 
130 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 the manliest and most skilful of athletic Britons. 
 Another vertu collector, who often lent his treasures 
 on these occasions, was the late Mr. Maude, also of 
 Bathampton, who in London and elsewhere had 
 known every prominent personage of Theodore 
 Hook's generation, who to his dying day continued 
 a chief representative of "light and leading" in 
 these parts. The Rev. James Pycroft, however, re- 
 mained throughout these years Bath's chief literary 
 lion. He seemed, indeed, to have entered upon 
 nearly that heritage of local fame which was left 
 vacant some time earlier by Walter Savage Landor ; 
 ■while there still lived and flourished in Bath a family 
 immortalised by Lander's difference with them — 
 mamed Yescombe. 
 
 A second organisation of Bath culture was a 
 rspecies of provincial Grillions, a cultivated society. 
 The members of this comprised most residents 
 who sometimes opened a book or who liked to 
 consort with those that did so. These gentlemen 
 numbered among them the well-known antiquarian 
 cleric, Mr. H. M. Scarth, and after my time the 
 invincible chess-player of the West, Mr. Thorold, 
 as also the metaphysical and accomplished teacher 
 -of mathematics at the Somerset College, Mr. 
 Pierpoint. Two other gentlemen who, sometimes 
 .bringing with them a retinue of intellectual associa- 
 
Bath Society and Sport in the Sixties. 131 
 
 tions, visited Bath at this epoch were Mr. Thomas 
 Phinn, my father's Oxford contemporary, and Sir 
 Arthur Elton, of Clevedon Court. Both had formerly 
 represented the city in Parliament ; while Sir 
 Arthur had lately written a novel, which locally 
 obtained immense vogue — Below the Surface, the 
 chief motive of the book being the exposure of 
 the social iniquities committed by ritualistic parsons 
 or Popish priests. If I remember right, this work 
 had on its title page the pre-eminently happy 
 motto : — 
 
 " Scire domus secreta volunt atqtie inde timeri." 
 
 By his second marriage, this gentleman connected 
 himself with one of the oldest families in the county, 
 the Stradlings, whose members perpetuated their 
 name by a monument not far from Bridgwater on 
 the Bath road called to this day "Stradling's 
 Folly," just as a similar structure reared by Fonthill's 
 lord on Lansdown retains its title of "Beckford's 
 Folly." In Western Somerset, the ground is conse- 
 crated by the muse of Wordsworth, so long a resident 
 in the Quantock region. The Eastern division, 
 where it abuts upon the Channel, is rich in Coleridgian 
 memories. To these latter centres, especially to 
 Brockley, the home of the Smyth- Pigotts, and its 
 
 g * 
 
132 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Hallam-haunted district, pilgrimages were frequently 
 made. One of the excursions I remember was 
 personally conducted by Martin Farquhar Tapper, 
 in his earlier manhood a vigorous pedestrian as well 
 as a remarkably handsome man, and a frequent 
 visitor to Bath about the time that his Proverbial 
 Philosophy was being read by everybody. 
 
 James Quin, till Garrick appeared, the greatest of 
 our tragic actors, has his grave in Bath Abbey. 
 Memories of the Sheridans haunt the lower part of 
 the town. From these days onwards the Bath 
 Theatre had a special reputation of its own, was a 
 serviceable histrionic nursery. In the epoch now 
 recalled its lessee and manager was Mr. James Henry 
 Chute, a cheery genial gentleman with a rather 
 pompous old-fashioned professionally theatrical 
 demeanour. On the occasion of his showing me 
 when a mere schoolboy over his premises, and thus 
 innocently gratifying my curiosity by taking me for 
 the first time in my life, though in broad daylight, 
 "behind the scenes," he seemed to reproduce the 
 manner and the expressions of " Mr. Vincent 
 Crummies" as he lives in Nicholas Nickleby. Mr. 
 Chute had his own company, which then boasted a 
 lady equally apcomplished as a corypMe and general 
 utility actress. Miss Kate Mandlebert. Miss 
 Robertson, Miss Wilton, Miss Kate Terry and 
 
Bath Society and Sport in the Sixties, 133 
 
 others frequently reinforced the Chute company. 
 The old manager's son, James Macready Chute, 
 had thus been trained admirably for the managerial 
 position he now fills at the Prince's Theatre, Bristol. 
 Certain amateur performances wherein Mr. Slingsby 
 Bethell often figured, were a prominent feature iO' 
 Mr. Chute's theatrical season. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 OXFORD, 1861 — 65. 
 
 Oxford in 1861; a transition &oni the old to the new. Pre- 
 ondergradnate sisits to Balliol as Ur. Jovett's gaest. 
 Jowett's manner with yonng men; his conyersation and 
 favourite reading. Dr. Scott, Master of Balliol, contrasted 
 with Jowett, as tntor. Other Balliol tutors. Classical 
 scholarships at Queen's College. ProYOSt Thompson, snc- 
 cessiYely Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol, Archbishop of 
 York. The Uagnificent Man. Queen's College tutors. 
 Byrne, Capes, Rennisou, Falcon, Magrath, and others. 
 
 THE Oxford with which I first made acquaint- 
 ance had indeed ceased to be the cloister 
 that it was a decade or two earlier, but was still 
 separated by a strongly defined boundary from the 
 highly modernised Oxford of to-day. The place 
 was still redolent of that medisevalism whose dis- 
 appearance Matthew Arnold has so eloquently 
 lamented. The movement for " University exten- 
 sion" had, however, already begun. The Oxford 
 local examinations were actually in existence. An 
 academic board was about to resume the respon- 
 sibility of appointing examiners for any secondary 
 schools which might apply for them. Certificates 
 obtained at these ordeals were soon to be recog- 
 nised officially by the Oxford authorities, and to 
 
 134 
 
Oxford. 135 
 
 absolve undergraduates furnished with them, from 
 the obligation of presenting themselves for " Re- 
 sponsions." Lord Salisbury's commission, radically 
 reorganising as it did the distribution of College 
 endowments — drawing a hard and fast line between 
 " prize fellowships," " teaching fellowships, the en- 
 dowment of research — was yet in the future. No one 
 seriously regarded the University as anything else 
 than an examining and disciplining body. Recourse 
 to the University lectures of the Corpus Professor of 
 Latin, or the Regius Professor of Greek, was not very 
 general among undergraduates ; nor was it, I think, 
 greatly encouraged by College tutors. In the case of 
 men nearly at the end of their course, and about to 
 enter Holy Orders, it was not uncommon to attend 
 the prelections of the various theological Chairs' 
 occupants who, as in Dr. Stanley's instance, were 
 frequently Canons of Christ Church. Inter-collegiate 
 lectures were nearly as unknown as the system of 
 combined examinations for entrance scholarships. 
 
 Each society on the Isis was a separate, independ- 
 ent, whole. The competition between it and other 
 similarly self-contained corporations was habitually 
 keen. The ties that affiliated the different founda- 
 tions to a common mother were theoretical rather 
 than practical, or were realised most powerfully 
 when the time came for the selection of an " eight," 
 
136 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 or an "eleven," to compete against Cambridge at 
 Putney, or Lord's ; for in this epoch athletic sports, 
 as an inter-University contest, had no recognised 
 place. Celibacy among Fellows and tutors was the 
 rule. The domestic suburbs of the Parks, Iffley, 
 or Headington, socially existed but in embryo. Few 
 perambulators or nursery-maids with their charges 
 had invaded the fields or walks adjacent to St. 
 Giles'. Outside the heads of houses, the married 
 representatives of College authority might almost 
 have been counted on one's fingers; nor can I at 
 this moment recall any Benedick Fellows save Mr. 
 Merry, now Rector, then tutor of Lincoln, and just 
 after my time, my College tutor, the Rev. H. Byrne, 
 as well as my then private tutor and life-long friend, 
 j. Y. Sargent, successively of Merton, Magdalen, 
 and Hertford Colleges, the last of which, at the 
 period now spoken of, was known by no other name 
 than Magdalen Hall. 
 
 My first acquaintance with the University was 
 made in a College of which I was not, nor was des- 
 tined to become, a member. My father, like more 
 than one of his ancestors, had passed his under- 
 graduate days at Balliol, where he obtained an 
 Exhibition in the same term that Jowett won the 
 scholarship. Directly Balliol's future Master had 
 heard that a schoolboy of my name happened 
 
Oxford. 137 
 
 to be lodging in the old Star Hotel, since ex- 
 panded into the Clarendon, in the Corn Market, 
 he sent me a hospitable command to transfer myself 
 bag and baggage to the foundation, whose chief 
 controller was at that time Dr. Scott. The 
 partner of Dean Liddell in the famous lexicon had 
 been my father's fellow-undergraduate first, and 
 subsequently tutor at Balliol. Dr. Scott then was 
 in the prime of vigorous middle-age, a remarkably 
 active, well-set-up man as to physique, with the 
 most urbane manners, the most delightfully varied 
 conversation, and with no small amount of humour. 
 Sir Walter Scott's son-in-law at Balliol (Lockhart) 
 was recalled by him traditionally; while under 
 " The Scorpion's " editorship, he had actually con- 
 tributed at least one article still classical on Greek 
 tragedy to the Quarterly Review. Scott and Jowett 
 co-operated with some show of cordiality, and 
 treated each other with almost artificial courtesy. 
 As, however, some years previously the latter had 
 in the competition with Scott lost the College 
 Mastership by only a single vote, it is not sur- 
 prising that the relations of the two were tinged 
 by some suspicion of amicable rivalry. Already 
 Jowett's intellectual achievements and fame had 
 increased the prestige of the Society. But after 
 Jenkyns, it was Scott whose administration con- 
 
138 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 firmed conclusively the local and national pre- 
 eminence which Balliol had long since begun to win. 
 Widely different in character as in their con- 
 ceptions of life, the two presented a contrast in their 
 personal appearance as well. Scott was decidedly 
 above the middle height, of dark complexion, and 
 with a countenance which under fatigue or agitation 
 wore a look of gauntness. His rival and coadjutor, 
 on the other hand, never, at least in these days, struck 
 one as being other than untired, unembarrassed, 
 and fresh, even to " chirpiness." Nor, indeed, dur- 
 ing the many years of my unofficial acquaintance 
 with Jowett, did he ever seem to have changed from 
 that which I first beheld him. /His face was smooth, 
 almost wrinkleless, and plump. His hands were 
 soft and chubby as a child's. His predominant 
 feature was undoubtedly his forehead, which seemed 
 to over-shadow the whole body, and, as it were, to 
 slope away till it reached his boots. His manner 
 appeared to be a little constrained. The youths in 
 his company found themselves not particularly at 
 their ease; while the great man gave them the 
 impression of constantly considering what aspect of 
 the son of Sophroniscus he should next reproduce 
 for their edification. The transparently Socratic 
 system of his conversation could be rather appalling 
 to the uninitiated. The questions that he was fond 
 
• Oxford,. 139 
 
 of putting were'not in themselves specially terrible 
 or perplexing : Sut the judicial air of the interrogant ; 
 the conviction Bhat one might irretrievably commit, 
 or even disgraje, one's self by a reply to the most 
 apparently sinple enquiry ; and the terse, dry, com- 
 mentary comiig from the interlocutor on these 
 answers, constituted an ordeal which it required 
 experience ard education as well as constitutional 
 courage ever to face without discomfort or awe. 
 
 At this tme the senior tutor of Balliol was 
 identified with Oxford Liberalism, while his titular 
 chief faithful^, I fancy, was more disposed to the 
 Toryism of lis predecessor Jenkyns. Both, how- 
 ever, in the same way as many of their colleagues, 
 were equally«conservative in the matter of costume. 
 Like my faifaer, and nearly all the country clergy- 
 men whom in my early youth I ever saw, Scott, 
 Jowett, and among the other Balliol tutors, cer- 
 tainly Wodlcombe, wore a black swallow-tail coat 
 throughout the day, of nearly the same cut as is 
 now reserved generally for evening dress. When, 
 so lately as the eighties, I revisited Oxford to 
 call on Dr. Pusey, that same upper garment 
 was affeded by the Tractarian movement's illus- 
 trious chief. The shapeless gaberdine, half frock, 
 half lounging coat, now worn by Anglican clergy no 
 less than by their Nonconformist brethren had not» 
 
140 Platform, Press, Politics atd Play. 
 
 at this period, come extensively intc fashion ; and if 
 only it were possible, would, I fanfty, to-day be a 
 custom more honoured in the breach than in the 
 observance. Certainly in the West ipf England all 
 the Establishment's officers with any^pretensions to 
 breeding or station whom I can recajjl would have 
 no more slouched about in shapeles? integuments 
 that are a compromise between a labourer's smock 
 and a Frenchman's/iafc^^f, than they wojuld have gone 
 to a diocesan meeting "in laic mufti" Thus, the 
 teaching clergy then constituting, as I, suppose they 
 still do, the majority of its population presented, 
 alike in their lecture rooms and in thefHigh Street, 
 an exterior very different from what oifie associates 
 with their successors now. 
 
 In the early sixties, Mr. Jowett's iDoms looked 
 out upon that portion of St. Giles' where the 
 Martyrs' Memorial stands. Their ornsanents were 
 books, arranged in cases only a very fevr feet above 
 the floor, so that the great-little professor might 
 reach them without difficulty. Nothing c(iald exceed 
 his minute attention to my comforts. A bedroom had 
 been assigned me just above the porter'slfodge, and 
 I have some reason to think that a sense cf responsi- 
 bility for my physical welfare prompted the kindly 
 professor to satisfy himself by touch thai; the sheets 
 were properly aired. This regard, of course, pro- 
 
Oxford. 141 
 
 ceeded less from riny immediate interest in the 
 schoolboy who was'ibis guest, than from a vicarious 
 concern for ■ my faSher, to whom the great man 
 showed himself tSroughout his life a loyal and 
 practical friend. Uilike most other Balliol tutors, 
 Mr. Jowett dined, i think nearly always, in his 
 rooms. At half-paS six each day we sat down, 
 usually tite-d-tSte, to a simple but excellent dinner. 
 The only undergradulte, or indeed any, guests whom 
 I can remember as pksent were Mr. J. A. Symonds, 
 the famous Clifton piysician's son, then an Exhi- 
 bitioner in the Collej^ ; Mr. G. A. Simcox, at that 
 time scholar of Corjais, subsequently Fellow and 
 tutor of Queen's; Mr. Robert Raper, from Chel- 
 tenham, a candidate, ks it proved a successful one, 
 for a scholarship at Tjuity. 
 
 A great deal, as 1 cannot but think, very in 
 correctly, has been saW about Mr. Jowett's interest 
 in, and encouragemeiit of. Art. In his later years 
 he amiably submitted to the influence brought to 
 bear upon him by the accomplished and ingenious 
 patrons of the histrionic movement — especially 
 Mr. W. L. Courtney, formerly Fellow and tutor of 
 New College, — and sanctioned the establishment of 
 an academic theatre. But at the comparatively 
 remote epoch when I was his guest, the drama 
 was not among the subjects which engaged the 
 
142 Platform, Press, Politick and Play. 
 
 thoughts or entered into the conversation of the 
 Greek Professor. Oxford w^ at this date un- 
 touched by the aesthetic mafement. The only 
 picture decorating Mr. Jow^tt's rooms was a 
 print, hung above his mantelp|Ece, of Leonardo da 
 Vinci's representation of " Thf Last Supper." The 
 sole modern author of whom, prhile I was his guest, 
 the future Master spoke to me was Tennyson. 
 When I entered his room for Jreakfast or dinner, he 
 was vacantly gazing into his ,lre; or if he had any 
 printed matter in his hands, i;( proved to be either a 
 volume of Shakespeare or t|e Bible — the latter, I 
 think, generally open at thqfBook of Job. 
 
 The interest taken in nfy early career by Mr. 
 Percival, who was still a F]{llow of Queen's or a 
 Rugby master, led to my standing, in the year 
 1861, for an open classical scholarship on that 
 foundation where my old jexaminer had himself 
 been educated. The paper ^ork occupied the best 
 part of a week. The actual ceremony of election 
 took place among the fellows in chapel. On a raw 
 October morning I inquired at the porter's lodge in 
 Queen's Lane when the result would be known. 
 His reply was to hand me a paper whence it appeared 
 that one of my name had been chosen for the senior 
 classical scholarship of the year. Those who shared 
 my good fortune were William Sells, subsequently 
 
Oxford. 143 
 
 my most intimate friend, characterised by a charm 
 of manner and sincerity of heart not often sur- 
 passed ; Herbert Morris, now, I think, dead ; H. 
 O. Balleine, who not very long since succeeded 
 Dr. Lebreton in the Deanery of Jersey. Within 
 a week or two I began my residence at Queen's. 
 The College's Provost was at that time the 
 Bishop designate of Gloucester and Bristol, Dr. 
 Thomson. Before I had been very long in residence, 
 Dr. Thomson, on a vacancy occurring in the 
 Northern Primacy, was translated by her Majesty's 
 special desire from the Western See to the Archie- 
 "piscopal Chair of York. Some years later, this 
 fortunate divine, recounting in friendly conversation 
 with Bishop Wilberforce his professional preferments, 
 mentioned among other things that any fresh 
 promotion had been signalised invariably by an 
 addition to his family. "In that case, my lord 
 Archbishop," rejoined his lordship of Winchester, 
 " let us hope your quiver is now finally full, for only 
 two promotions are possible — one is Canterbury, the 
 other is Heaven, — and I am not quite sure of your 
 being fully fit for either just yet." 
 
 Provost Thomson, who continued even in his 
 semi-episcopal state to rule the College for a time, 
 always impressed me, and many others, as the 
 reaUsed ideal of Aristotle's " Magnificent Man," so far 
 
144 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 as gait and manner were concerned. His presence 
 was really fine, his mien was naturally dignified, his 
 voice deep, full, and not unmusical. He had taken 
 the chief part in throwing open those endowments 
 which were previously confined to North countrymen, 
 and so made the first step to developing an opulent 
 but geographically exclusive society into the nation- 
 ally useful institution which it has since become, and 
 under its present Provost, Dr. Magrath, still is. 
 The tutorial staff of Queen's had become in my 
 time remarkably effective. The chief classical teacher 
 for the Moderation schools was the Rev. H. B. 
 Byrne, as painstaking an instructor as he was con- 
 scientious a scholar. Great was this sorely tried 
 gentleman's forbearance. Nor was it his fault if 
 his lecture-room's habitues failed to equal his own 
 accomplishments as a writer of Ciceronian prose. 
 
 In mathematics and for the final classical schools 
 Queen's College in the early sixties boasted, I 
 suspect, the two most valuable tutors upon the Isis. 
 If anyone could have imbued an undergraduate with 
 a taste for the higher branches of abstract science, 
 it would have been the painstaking, amiable, as well 
 as genial, Thomas Rennison, whose training did, as 
 a matter of fact, enable one of my contemporaries, 
 Herbert Durham, a brother, scholar, to carry off all 
 the highest prizes by which the University encourages 
 
Oxford. 145 
 
 mathematical studies. Mr. Rennison was in his 
 vacations an Alpine climber of distinction ; he 
 returned each October to his lecture room, bronzed 
 with Swiss suns, invigorated with the bracing air of 
 "peaks, passes, and glaciers." Other prominent 
 members of the old Queen's foundation hailing from 
 the North Country were two brothers named Falcon, 
 as well as an elderly gentleman called Dykes, who 
 was senior Fellow during all my days, and who, as 
 the College custom was, exercised his authority by 
 insisting that the Bible clerks should, in properly 
 reverent fashion, mount the dais where the dons sat, 
 and in clearly audible tones pronounce the Latin 
 " Grace " before dinner in Hall. This. mature cleric 
 took no part in tuition, but was reported to be a 
 profound and ingenious discoverer of etymological 
 origins. The tradition, in fact, was that sometimes 
 the midnight air in the front quad, was broken by 
 Mr. Dykes' shouting through the open window to his 
 next-door neighbour, R. S. Falcon, " I have at last 
 hit upon that * deri.' " (derivation) " we were talking 
 about in the Common-room." 
 
 The younger Falcon gave excellent lectures in 
 Tacitwi and Aristophanes, and alike in appearance, 
 dress, as well as scholarship, was the personification 
 of neatness. His elder brother, resembling himself, 
 a remarkably handsome man, had in his time won 
 
 10 
 
146 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 both the Hertford and the Ireland, but in my day 
 did not combine a tutorship with his Fellowship. 
 He used the College rather as a country gentleman 
 might use his Pall Mall club. When it was not the 
 season for Norwegian travel or sport ; when the May- 
 fly had not begun to flutter over the Westmorland 
 streams, or the grouse were scarcely strong on the 
 wing, the brilliant and chivalrous Bob Falcon was 
 generally to be found in his Oxford rooms, occupying 
 himself with theological or classical treatises in the 
 intervals between cleaning his guns or " hanging " 
 his salmon-flies. Both the Falcons have, I regret to 
 hear, ceased for ever to cultivate sport or meditate 
 study. But with these and one or two other excep- 
 tions, the gentlemen who formed the tutorial staff 
 at Queen's thirty years since are, I am glad to think, 
 alive and well. 
 
 No more high-minded and painstaking tutor existed 
 on Egglesfield's foundation than the present Principal 
 of St. Edmund's Hall, Dr. Edmund Moore, who has 
 since achieved European reputation as a Dantean 
 scholar and expositor. 
 
 The College's special boast was, however, the 
 accomplished, acute, and stimulating teacher of 
 political philosophy and history, the Rev. W. W. 
 Capes, now Rector of Bramshott in Hampshire. 
 In these days Mr. E. A. Freeman had not for- 
 
Oxford. 147 
 
 mulated his famous aphorism as to history being 
 the politics of the past, and politics the history of 
 the present. Even Mr. Grote's modernised repre- 
 sentation of Athenian parties and Attic politics had 
 not generally possessed the Oxford mind. To Mr. 
 Capes belonged the distinction of employing his 
 encyclopaedic reading to illustrate, from all ages and 
 all countries, the American Federal writers not less 
 than the Italian mediaeval speculators, or the latest 
 authorities on the Seine or the Spree, the chief facts, 
 positions, and lessons contained in the philosophy 
 or statesmanship of Greece and Rome. No prepara- 
 tion can, I think, have been more useful for publicism 
 or politics than this gentleman's discourses. He 
 had, too, a pleasant wit of his own, never maliciously, 
 but often pointedly, exercised, e.g. : A rather little 
 and fidgety undergraduate was once balancing his 
 chair against a cupboard in the lecture room, beating 
 the while the " Devil's Tattoo " with his feet. " If," 
 
 said Capes, after a while, " Mr. particularly 
 
 wishes to get into my cupboard, pray let me open 
 the door for him." 
 
 10 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 TOPICS AND PERSONAGES ON THE ISIS. 
 (1861—65.) 
 
 General Yieyr of intellectual influences at Oxford during the 
 early sixties. Professor H. J. Smith as Dean of College at 
 Balliol under Scott ; mathematician and scholar. Hark 
 Pattison's impressiTe figure in Oxford; his anticipation at 
 Lincoln of Jowett's social and educational mission at Balliol. 
 Professor Hansel and St. John's Toryism ; his opposition to 
 Jowett and religious influence not proportionate to his 
 orthodoxy. ProYost HawkinB, of Oriel, and Mr. Bnrgon, both 
 historic. J. T. Sargent as a classical "coach." Famous 
 fellow-pupils under him, — Baker, Dallin. J. E.Thorold Rogers; 
 Professor Coniugton at Corpus; great influence of Bishop 
 Vilberforce and Canon (afterwards Dean) Stanley. Jowett, his 
 methods and his pupils. Prominent undergraduates. W. E. 
 Stokes, cueist and vocalist. F. S. Price, Reggy Luttrell, of 
 "TheTaYcrn." Illbert, and Papillou, of Balliol. F. H. Jeune, 
 M. W. Ridley, A. W. Milroy, "Baby" Morrison. Hoare, of 
 Exeter. Jowett's manner with athletic undergraduates like 
 Socrates and Alcibiades. The Scot on the Isis, G. R. Luke, 
 D. B. Monro, John Nichol. 
 
 ON the same level as Dr. Scott, or Mr. Jowett, 
 accounted by those who knew him personally, 
 which I scarcely did, their literary or intellectual 
 equal in all respects, their superior in some, was 
 Henry J. Smith, mathematical professor, who had 
 given proof of his eminence in classics, not less 
 than in abstract science, during his undergraduate 
 
Topics and Personages on the Isis. 149 
 
 days by winning the Ireland in addition to the 
 University Mathematical Scholarship; and who 
 during my sojourn on the Isis, was Dean of 
 Chapel. In this latter capacity, it was Mr. 
 Smith's business to announce in the College Hall 
 the names of the successful candidates for Balliol 
 Scholarships. On such occasions undergraduates 
 from all Colleges were pretty sure to be waiting 
 for the news. In the November of 1861, or 18621 
 a friend and schoolfellow of my own, Evelyn Abbott, 
 now Fellow and tutor, happened to be standing ; but 
 the choice had not fallen on him, and when, amid 
 intense and scarcely suppressed excitement. Professor 
 Henry Smith's tall figure took up his stand by the 
 Hall doorway, the names actually read were, I think, 
 those of F. Paravicini, from Marlborough, and 
 Francis Jeune, the present judge, from Harrow. 
 From this latter school in the previous year M. W. 
 Ridley had preceded his friend and contemporary, 
 Jeune. Both of these were prominent figures during 
 my time in undergraduate life on the Isis. The two 
 in appearance, though not in attainments, presented 
 a marked contrast. The future baronet, even in his 
 first youth, showed a tendency to anticipate the later 
 dimensions of his portly presence. The predestined 
 Parliamentary counsel and Probate Court judge 
 strikingly resembled the oldest and most authentic 
 
150 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 portraits of Charles I.'s Strafford. He was, too, a 
 kindling and impressive speaker in the Union de- 
 bates. It wanted indeed the exercise of but a little 
 imagination to identify his tall, dark, picturesque 
 figure, pointed features, and flashing eyes, with the 
 incarnation of "Thorough" haughtily defending 
 himself at the bar against the Commons' impeach- 
 ment. 
 
 . The most assiduous participant in the Union 
 debates was, I fancy, Mr. Abbot, of Christ Church, 
 soon to become Lord Colchester. He had already 
 caught and reproduced with artificial care the 
 Parliamentary manner's traditional idiosyncrasies, 
 the rotundity of utterance, the pomposity of elocu- 
 tion, the forensic phrases, satirised so amusingly in 
 Coningsby, but all of which form essential parts in 
 the sum of Westminster statesmanship. Edward 
 Stanhope, also at Christ Church, had taken his 
 degree some time before I came up, but his 
 amiability, magnanimity, and attainments were 
 freshly remembered far outside the walls of Wolsey's 
 foundation ; while a college essay which he had 
 written, but not published, was privately reputed 
 worthy of the distinction actually conferred about 
 the same time on the Holy Roman Empire tractate 
 of Mr. J. Bryce, then a scholar of Trinity. 
 
 As a rostrum, the Oxford Union did not enjoy, in 
 
Topics and Personages on the his. 151 
 
 the early sixties, all its historic prestige. A fair 
 allowance of good speaking and fair debating there 
 may have been. But the purely collegiate principle 
 had then in all ways the ascerijdancy. There was a 
 general tendency to reserve for College essay clubs 
 and dialectical associations the reading and rhetoric 
 which at an earlier, as possibly at a later, era might 
 if exercised elsewhere, have won for their possessors 
 something of the fame that on the arena of Univer- 
 sity debate had been obtained by a Cardwell, a 
 Gladstone, a Manning, or a Wordsworth. About 
 this time, too, the Club principle in its social 
 development had grown exceedingly popular in 
 Alfred's University. The Eton and Harrow, as well 
 as the Loder's, had long been domiciled in High 
 Street. The Phoenix was, if I remember rightly, 
 exclusively a Brasenose institution. The Canning 
 was, at least in its earlier days, largely recruited 
 from St. John's, while its founder was reported to 
 have been none other than Mr. Auberon Herbert, by 
 founder's kin a Fellow of the College of Laud. 
 
 St. John's, while Professor Mansel took any part 
 in its teaching, justified its political traditions ; was 
 the nursing mother of Toryism, as the headquarters 
 of resistance to Mr. Gladstone, then Member for the 
 University, and to whatever savoured of Liberalism. 
 Mansel, I suspect, may correctly be said to have 
 
132 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 divided at this time with Jowett the intellectual 
 supremacy and influence of the place. " Some 
 rhetorical ability" was the phrase in which the 
 Balliol sage summed up the qualities that he 
 allowed his rival to possess. But in the glades and 
 gardens of St. John's, Mansel secured a reverence 
 not less than belonged to the Liberal champion, as 
 Jowett was then reputed to be, in the College of 
 Wycliffe. One, and only one, of Dr. Mansel's 
 sermons in the pulpit of St. Mary's may I have 
 heard. It seemed more like an extract from the 
 Prolegomena to his edition of A Idrich than a homily 
 on Christian ethics ; and was studded with phrases 
 such as militant schoolmen might have applied to 
 each other in the Middle Ages, but which did not 
 seem eminently congruous with the Gospel genius. 
 Probably no firm believer in the New Testament 
 Revelation, or no conspicuously good man, ever 
 rendered less practically useful service to the Faith 
 he accepted and adorned. Mansel's controversy 
 with F. D. Maurice shook the belief of many earnest 
 persons at Oxford and elsewhere far more seriously 
 than the Teapot Tempest excited by Essays and Reviews. 
 The Tory theologian had been understood to say 
 that notwithstanding the Divine condescension to 
 human intelligence as shown in the Incarnation, the 
 gulf between Creator and created yet remained im- 
 
Topics and Personages on the Isis. 153 
 
 passable, that no words employed by earthly lips 
 could even faintly indicate the nature of the Divine 
 standards by which right or wrong, truth or false- 
 hood, are judged. Great as may have been the 
 intellectual authority justly enjoyed by the logician 
 of St. John's, the theological ideas with which, 
 rightly or wrongly, he was identified prevented him 
 from exercising much of the higher kind of influence 
 upon those who were still in statu pupillari. There 
 was a certain cultivated bulldog aggressiveness in 
 Hansel's manner and voice, as well as in his written, 
 like his spoken, words. He seemed to be so keenly 
 on the defensive, as to be impelled by a sense of 
 self-preservation to carry the war into the enemy's 
 country before the foe had " shown fight," or was 
 actually lying dormant. In figure he was probably a 
 little taller than his opponent Jowett. His features 
 were more sharply cut ; his eye was more restless. 
 His manners had none of the repose which 
 characterised the serene and chubby Regius Professor 
 of Greek. 
 
 It has been my fortune to hear at least three 
 good sermons in my life. One was from Bishop 
 Samuel Wilberforce, addressed to a congregation of 
 paupers in a village workhouse, delivered from an old 
 woman's wooden arm-chair by way of pulpit. Another 
 was from a curate named, I think, Pearse, in a West 
 
154 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Somerset church. Yet another was from the Rev. 
 T. D. Bernard in Walcot Church, Bath, on "Our 
 Lord's appearances after His resurrection." To 
 these I think I might add a fourth — in point of 
 time, and perhaps of excellence, the first of all. 
 Never having contemplated ordination, I did not 
 attend, at Oxford, Arthur Stanley's professorial 
 lectures on the Jewish Church. But from the vivid 
 impression made on me by a University sermon of 
 Stanley's, which I did hear, as well as from my own 
 close acquaintance with him as a family friend, I 
 can well understand the extraordinary admiration 
 he excited in the breasts of those undergraduates who 
 regularly attended his courses at Christ Church. 
 The keen yet gentle countenance in which high 
 breeding was combined to a nearly equal degree 
 with intellectual radiancy; the expression illuminating 
 the delicately chiselled features, so eloquent of scorn 
 for whatever was base, impure, ungenerous, cowardly, 
 or illiberal. These at once impressed everyone who 
 even looked on Stanley, and must still live in the 
 reverent memories of those who knew him but a 
 little. Probably it was the union of aristocratic 
 mien and of mental supremacy which in these days 
 made him an unique figure in the academic polity, 
 investing him with a charm absolutely irresistible to 
 the ingenuous impressioijability of youth. The 
 
Topics and Personages on the Isis. 155 
 
 subject of the particular discourse, whose text was 
 a verse in the song of Deborah, was Oxford's 
 opportunities. "This," he said, "is our river 
 Kishon, on our present side of which we should 
 form good habits, and discard evil ones." None 
 who heard them will ever forget the way in which 
 these words came at the end of that masterpiece of 
 pulpit oratory. The charm of the discourse lay in its 
 happy blending of appeals to the conscience and the 
 intellect with graphic pictures of the genius and 
 culture which centuries had concentrated on the 
 fields and buildings that surrounded the Cherwell. 
 
 Leaving for the moment the other of these pulpit 
 addresses, to which I may revert hereafter, I would 
 say a few words concerning great University teachers, 
 who, during the sixties, wielded a power upon the 
 Isis not inferior to that of Jowett or Mansel. Mark 
 Pattison was, to the majority of students outside the 
 gates of Lincoln, little more than an illustrious name 
 and an eccentric personality. The tall gaunt figure, 
 who might often be seen striding down the High 
 Street towards Headington Hill, was in the eyes of 
 undergraduates encompassed with a mysterious 
 atmosphere of encyclopaedic learning. Some of them 
 Pattison might have examined in the schools. 
 Others, of a literary turn of mind, might have read 
 his dissertations in the Oxford essays, or knew that 
 
156 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 he was among the greatest authorities on Pope, and 
 that his contribution to the now forgotten volume, 
 then stigmatised as the septem contra Christum, was 
 only one among many compositions with which he 
 enriched the better class of periodical literature- 
 Yet Mark Pattison had anticipated Jowett in nearly 
 all those social movements that have won for Balliol 
 its repute in the fashionable world, or which have 
 made the College of Jenkyns so popular and power- 
 ful a link between the I sis and the Thames, the 
 Oxford cloister and the Pall Mall club, or the 
 Westminster Senate. 
 
 Among those who had been undergraduates at 
 John Wesley's society are John Morley and T. E. 
 Kebbel: the former a distinguished publicist long 
 before he entered Parliament; the latter a literary 
 champion of the Constitution, who, in the Press, has 
 served the Tories with the same loyalty, and with 
 not less ability, than his literary master, Addison, 
 once served the Whigs. Of both these, his former 
 pupils, as they subsequently were his close personal 
 friends, Mark Pattison was, with good reason, proud. 
 Long before the College in Broad Street acquired 
 under Mr. Jowett the same kind of modish vogue 
 for its Saturday to Monday hospitalities which 
 belongs to Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild's 
 Waddesdon chateau, the end of the working week 
 
Topics and Personages on the his. 157 
 
 often saw Morley or Kebbel, having walked up from 
 the railway station, enquire of the Lincoln porter 
 whether their luggage had been dropped by the cab 
 or the omnibus at the lodge. Others of Pattison's 
 guests, subsequently famous, were J. Cotter Morrison, 
 William Stebbing, R. C. Christie, the last of whom 
 rivals even Pattison in his knowledge of all which 
 concerns the history of learning. 
 
 Two other historic, and in one case picturesque, 
 personages, both of them survivals from a famous 
 past, were among the University celebrities of my 
 youth. One was the tall stately form of Burgon, 
 then Rector of St. Mary's, without whom, as he 
 swept past " The Mitre " with a look of disgust, 
 should he see undergraduates entering therein, the 
 High Street would not have seemed quite itself in the 
 afternoons. The other human landmark of whom 
 I speak was the then Provost of Oriel, the Venerable 
 Edward Hawkins. Under his long rule it was 
 that the present Mr. Justice Wright and Professor 
 James Bryce, not less than in a bygone generation 
 John Henry Newman and Richard Whately, were 
 admitted to that common room which at its zenith 
 was accounted the nearest approach to Heaven 
 attainable on earth. Dr. Hawkins had not perhaps 
 been popular with any generation of undergraduates, 
 • and with those undergraduates of my time was 
 
158 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 certainly most unpopular. Kinglake, in Eothen, 
 has spoken of the courage of six battalions as incar- 
 nated in the almost dwarfish person of Dr. Keate. 
 Within the not gigantic figure of Dr. Hawkins there 
 were concentrated the amalgam and quintessence of 
 Oxford donship's prejudices and antipathies. But 
 he was very far from being an unkindly personage. 
 To my father, in whose favour he would have gladly 
 suspended the Health Statutes that had disqualified 
 him for an Oriel Fellowship, the Provost proved 
 himself a lifelong friend and supporter in the same 
 degree as Jowett himself. Nor did he refuse to take 
 a condescending interest, tempered with severe 
 reprimands, which were perhaps not the less neces- 
 sary because they were unwelcome, in my father's 
 son. In after years, one finds it to be with Oxford 
 much as it is with Don Quixote, the Pilgrim's Progress, 
 or Gulliver's Travels. One makes acquaintance with 
 them before one is of an age to appreciate their 
 value, or understand their inner meaning. Had I 
 availed myself of all Provost Hawkins's invitations 
 to walk, talk, breakfast, and have tea with him ; had 
 I cultivated, as I ought to have done, the faculty of 
 listening to my seniors and superiors on the Isis, I 
 might still retain sufficiently fresh a recollection of 
 the incidents of the Oxford movement from the lips 
 of one who had been a great part in it, to compose 
 
Topics and Personages on the Isis. 159 
 
 an original narrative which might compete with the 
 reminiscences of a Mozley or a Church. 
 
 The University lectures that I attended in the 
 sixties and which, next to Jowett's, left the deepest 
 impression on me were those held by John Conington, 
 then Professor of Latin in the Corpus Hall. He 
 was. the first great Oxford teacher who took any 
 trouble to improve my mind, or to give me any idea 
 of what was meant by taste, as distinct from know- 
 ledge. The Professor was in the habit of reading 
 aloud, at his lectures, those compositions previously 
 sent in by undergraduates which pleased him best. 
 I had forwarded him a copy of hexameters, that 
 were a Latin rendering of an Enghsh passage he 
 had set. Great was my delight when, on entering 
 the Hall, I recognised my own Latin lines, as in the 
 act of being recited by the Professor. He was then 
 living in some rooms over a tailor's shop, looking on 
 the High Street. Here he desired me, a few days 
 later, to wait upon him. In this, his sanctum, with 
 its walls lined three or four volumes deep, by book- 
 shelves, I received the first of a long series of 
 invaluable hints on the composition of Virgilian lines, 
 and on the idiosyncratic differences between ancient 
 and modern poetry. 
 
 It was not, however, by professors, distinguished 
 or painstaking though they might be, that the educa- 
 
i6o Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 tional work of Oxford was performed during the early 
 sixties. Private tutors, outside one's college walls, 
 were a luxury rather than a necessity. Undergraduate 
 carelessness rendered them eminently convenient at 
 some period or other of one's course. Mr. J. Y. 
 Sargent, who, at that time, was not in the enjoyment 
 of a College Fellowship, but was the most sympa- 
 thetic and successful instructor in pure scholarship 
 then on the Isis, received private pupils in his 
 Merton Street rooms, just opposite the walls where 
 he had been an undergraduate. On one occasion, I 
 remember, the winners of the Hertford and Ireland, 
 as well as most of those who obtained first-classes 
 in Moderations, had been Mr. Sargent's private 
 pupils. From early morning till evening this 
 exemplary "coach" sat in his little chambers 
 alternately hearing his pupils read their own compo- 
 sitions to him, and communicating to them his own 
 version of the same passage. Amongst those whom 
 I met most frequently in this pupil-room were 
 William Baker, scholar and Fellow of St. John's, to- 
 day Head master of Merchant Taylors', and T. F. 
 Dallin, subsequently Fellow of Queen's and public 
 orator, now no more. Mr. Sargent, one of the 
 earliest Oxford "Norwegians," had always been a 
 great walker and keen sportsman. He had an equal 
 genius for the composition and teaching of terse 
 
Topics and Personages on the Isis. i6i 
 
 Augustan Latinity, and the discovery of unknown 
 streams where trout-flies could be thrown. Yet it 
 was seldon: that during the tempting period of early 
 summer, J. Y. Sargent took twelve hours holiday, or 
 even found, on some particularly iine afternoon, that 
 his health required a long stretch over the Dorchester 
 road. 
 
 A fellow Moderator of Sargent's, also a renowned 
 teacher, was the late J. E. Thorold Rogers, at one 
 time University Professor of Political Economy, who 
 more recently divested himself of his Orders, and 
 went into the House of Commons. Mr. Thorold 
 Rogers was intended by Nature for a barrister. He 
 had a remarkably clear, far-seeing mind, a great 
 power of incisive or persuasive speech as he desired, 
 and a conspicuous faculty for applying general 
 principles to particular cases, or presenting abstract 
 truths in cogent and homely form. Long experience, 
 combined with his native shrewdness, had made him 
 a master in reducing to their simplest elements the 
 complexities of scholastic logic. To him alone do I 
 owe it that I became tolerably versed in all the 
 processes of Barbara celarent, &c., &c. ; that gradually 
 I learned to like my Aldrich as much as I had first 
 feared and detested it ; and that some years after- 
 wards, when I had taken my degree, I was chosen to 
 succeed my old tutor in the Chair Of Logic, at King's 
 
 II 
 
i62 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 College, London. Mr. Rogers, though a sincere 
 Christian, disregarded the cleric alike in his conver- 
 sation and costume. He was even then a disciple 
 of Cobden, and had an inexhaustible fund of good 
 stories chosen from innumerable memoirs of 
 politicians, American, as well as English. An 
 enthusiastic, if not a very skilful, equestrian, he 
 sometimes rode to hounds, but more frequently 
 confined his excursions to visits to neighbouring 
 friends, among whom the then Bishop of Oxford, at 
 Cuddesdon, Dr. S. Wilberforce, was counted. 
 
 Nor among the higher influences of Oxford 
 during the sixties must that episcopal name be 
 omitted. Dr. Pusey, though still living in Christ 
 Church, was identified rather with a past generation. 
 On Bishop Wilberforce had descended the mantle of 
 Pusey's active power. Hundreds of undergraduates 
 worshipped the ground he trod upon ; nor when he 
 preached, either at the Cathedral or St. Mary's, were 
 many places vacant. All, in fact, of the Tractarian 
 movement five and twenty years earlier which was 
 visible in the early sixties, so far as undergraduates 
 were concerned, centred around this remarkable 
 man. In my own College, he had a devoted following, 
 whose chief members were S. Grindle, now, I thinkj. 
 Principal of a College hostel (Roman Catholic) in 
 Beaumont Street ; H. J. Galton, son of a very high 
 
Topics and Personages on the Isis. 163 
 
 Anglican Devonshire rector; J. R. Madan, son of 
 St. Mary Redcliffe's venerable incumbent. Each 
 of these former friends (whom to know was to 
 love) has, I think, now definitely joined the Roman 
 discipline, towards which they always seemed well 
 on their way. 
 
 Amongst undergraduates nearly, or quite, con- 
 temporary with me, who subsequently became more 
 or less well known were one or two of whom some 
 people may like to hear. In my own College were 
 Ingram Bywater, now Greek Professor; the late 
 Walter H. Pater, my friend first, as always, my private 
 tutor afterwards, ever sympathetic and sage in his 
 counsel, and the present Reader at the Temple, the 
 Rev. A. W. Milroy. Even then this young Scotsman, 
 some three or four years my senior, united extreme 
 tenacity of purpose with adequate ability and 
 studious habits, marking him out for distinguished 
 service in Church or State. The only other West 
 of England undergraduate besides myself whom I 
 can recall at Queen's was W. E. Stokes, like his 
 friend, schoolmate, and brother cricketer, F. R. 
 Price, a product of Cheltenham College, as well as 
 equally distinguished by his great skill at billiards 
 and his carefully cultivated tenor voice. Of his 
 father I may speak presently. Some defects of 
 temper and a constitutional intolerance of the 
 
 II * 
 
164 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 tobacco-smoke, which is generally the accompani- 
 ment of balls and cue, prevented Mr. Stokes from 
 doing justice to his remarkable aptitude for the 
 game, and rendered him a somewhat uncertain 
 player. But at his best, there were not many 
 amateurs who, in regimental mess-rooms or at 
 London clubs, could surpass the elegance and ease 
 with which W. E. Stokes accomplished the most 
 difficult cannons and losing hazards, or who ap- 
 proached the mastery of " force " with which he 
 executed the spot stroke, then in its infancy. As an 
 undergraduate, receiving only a hundred points, he 
 easily defeated, if I remember aright, the professional, 
 Dufton, at Russell's tables in Oriel Lane. After 
 having taken his degree while titularly reading for 
 the Bar, he was among the champions of the " Cocoa 
 Tree," in St. James' ; more than holding his own in 
 the afternoon handicaps with such players as Mr. 
 Chinnery or the veteran Lord Drogheda, matched for 
 even money against Mr. Arthur Chapman or Mr. 
 Frank Morgan, and running very close the celebrated 
 marker Christmas, of the wooden face and the in- 
 scrutable manner. 
 
 For generations, to whose contrary human 
 memory runs not, the West of England Luttrells 
 have been represented on the Isis. The only one of 
 this clan and name in my day, Reginald, had during 
 
Topics and Personages on the Isis. 165 
 
 the better part of the decade, a regularly recurring 
 difficulty in passing his " smalls," for which he 
 periodically presented himself. He had long ceased 
 to be the member of any College, and was comfort- 
 ably domiciled at New Inn Hall, alias "The 
 Tavern," of which he was not merely in my day the 
 oldest, but the sole occupant. His aged gentleman 
 commoner's gown, with much - battered cap to 
 match, were familiar in all those queer haunts 
 on the Isis where, in defiance of academic law. 
 Gown then loved to hob-and-nob with Town. 
 Examiners, tutors, proctors, and bull-dogs might 
 look askance at him, but if a plebiscite of cabmen, 
 ostlers, and river-side cads, headed by "Oxford 
 George," could have been available in place of a 
 "Testamur," poor Reggy Luttrell, who had no 
 enemies but himself and his tankard, would have 
 issued forth with flying colours from all the ordeals 
 of the schools. 
 
 A more illustrious undergraduate of Occidental 
 origin, with whom at Mr. Jowett's table I first 
 became acquainted, was Mr., to-day Sir, C. P. 
 Ilbert, who in the same year as T. L. Papillon, like 
 him from Marlborough, had a little earlier than 
 Jeune and Ridley, won the Balliol scholarship. As 
 a rare instance of Jowett's foresight, it should be 
 mentioned he actually predicted in the early 
 
i66 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 sixties for his brilliant pupil the honour 
 which, as legal member of the Indian Council, 
 Ilbert subsequently achieved. Together with 
 Marlburians, Etonians constituted in those days 
 one of Balliol's most famous groups. Like his 
 friend Hoare, also an Etonian "Blue," "Baby" 
 Morrison, so-called from his gigantic proportions, 
 vindicated the fame of Waynflete's school upon the 
 river. Both these superb oarsmen being always 
 in readiness for feats of Herculean strength, could 
 afford to train upon their own principles, relaxing at 
 discretion any unpalatable restrictions, and even, as 
 they often did, smoking their pipes tranquilly an 
 hour or two before the College race in which they 
 were to pull. 
 
 But the mightiest of the Eton athletes was 
 R. A. H. Mitchell, captain of the Eton and Oxford 
 elevens successively ; nearly the most popular under- 
 graduate who ever trod the Shades of Jenkyns, as he 
 became since one of the favourite House-masters at 
 his old school. In his bearing towards these mus- 
 cular alumni of his College, the stranger who met 
 them on social occasions in the tutors' rooms, was 
 reminded by Mr. Jowett of the manner which 
 Socrates might have put on towards Alcibiades. 
 The future master desired apparently to impress 
 upon them that though their own lines and his were 
 
Topics and Personages on the Isis. 167 
 
 not exactly the same, they were yet partners in a 
 common concern, possessing an identical degree of 
 interest in the same object ; namely, the College's 
 prestige. In this way, Jowett contrived to get much 
 good work out of unlikely subjects, and by judicious 
 suasion, or providential interposition, propelled many 
 constitutional idlers into a " first-class " at *' Modera- 
 tions." Some years before my time he had dealt 
 after such a fashion with a very troublesome under- 
 graduate, who in after life became a justly dis- 
 tinguished diplomatist. The future Ambassador 
 was, in fact, within an ace of being " sent down." 
 Apparently acquiescing in the Common Room 
 decision against his protege, the Professor casually 
 remarked, he was sorry the expulsion had not 
 taken place before the peccant student had won a 
 certain University prize which Jowett declared his 
 exercise was sure to obtain. When it had been 
 decided to give the scapegrace another chance, his 
 champion set him to work on the composition in 
 question. The result was that the competitor 
 malgre lui wrote for, and winning, the prize, reflected 
 on the Society the credit so courageously predicted 
 by his bold patron. 
 
 The fact is, that just as Disraeli had been a Jew 
 before he was a Christian and retained throughout 
 his life much sympathy with Semitic theology, so 
 
i68 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Plato's translator regarded the youths submitted to 
 his care from the standpoint of old Attic as well as 
 of modern Christian responsibility. The State was 
 a conception only less paramount with him than it 
 had been with Aristotle. Like Xantippe's husband, 
 he knew no better way of morally training young 
 men than by first stimulating them to the best 
 performance, according to their capacities, of citizen- 
 ship's functions, whatever the particular sphere of 
 these might be. 
 
 Balliol, at the time now spoken of, performed on 
 the Isis an academic missionary's tasks. The 
 strenuous and gifted Scots who, outside Balliol's 
 walls, did such good work, had mostly been educated 
 at the College of Tait. The late G. Rankine Luke, 
 who by his blameless life, patient teaching, and the 
 personal magnetism inherent in his shy, reserved 
 presence, wrought a moral revolution in Wolsey's 
 quadrangle, had been a Snell Exhibitioner. So, too, 
 was D. B. Monro, who accomplished a like work at 
 Oriel, where to-day he is Provost. A similar training 
 had also been received by John Nichol, who, though 
 Professor of belles lettres at Glasgow, spent the 
 summer term on the Isis, reading with private 
 pupils for the final philosophy schools. Nichol, 
 probably, has not yet been dead long enough to be 
 appreciated at his real worth. Each of these men 
 
Topics and Personages on the Isis. 169 
 
 was the not unworthy successor of Sir Alexander 
 Grant, who, some generations earlier by his edition 
 of the Ethics, as well as by his lectures, gave so 
 durable an impetus to the study of Aristotle in the 
 University, where Sewell first, and Jowett after- 
 wards, have done so much to popularise Plato. 
 
CHAPTER XL 
 
 FAMOUS FOOTPRINTS AT OXFORD. 
 (1863—7.) 
 
 Political intereBt amongst undergFadnates much less thirty 
 years ago than to-day. Excitement caused at Oxford by 
 different yisits and speeches of Ur. Gladstone. Mr. Disraeli 
 and Lord Derby. The Prince of Wales at Oxford. Notable 
 Christ Church tufts, thirty years ago. The Duke of Hamilton. 
 A modern "Lord Carabas." "0! Ruddier than the Cherry." 
 The ill-starred Marquis. Famous Oxford dignitaries. Dean 
 Liddell. Oxford political parties and their leaders. Canon 
 Liddon, 
 
 EXCEPT among those who were destined for 
 public life, or who had been born into a 
 governing family, the interest in political affairs 
 and personages taken by undergraduates during 
 the early sixties was very much less than, on the 
 occasion of my frequent visits to the place since, 
 I have found it amongst their successors to be. 
 Only two or three times can I remember student 
 opinion to have been stirred deeply. Once was 
 when Mr. Gladstone, in the early sixties, spoke 
 in the Sheldonian Theatre on behalf of Lancing 
 College, and Canon Woodard's " middle - class 
 school" movement. The second, and far the 
 more dramatic, occasion was when, a year or 
 
 170 
 
Famous Footprints at Oxford. 171 
 
 two later, Mr. Disraeli, in the same building, 
 delivered his amusing manifesto in favour of Revela- 
 tion, and against Darwinism. He had, if I remember 
 correctly, been visiting friends in the neighbour- 
 hood. Casually, it would seem, or (as perhaps it 
 was) with artistically concealed purpose, he dropped 
 in at a diocesan meeting on his way to the railway 
 station. That which chiefly impressed the admiring 
 youths was his histrionically bucolic costume. A 
 soft white billy -cock hat surmounted his marble 
 brow, over which there still clustered the ringlets 
 that had once been jet black. He wore a short 
 black tailless velvet coat. His nether limbs were 
 encased in knickerbockers, with gaiters. At first he 
 spoke in a studiedly commonplace strain. Only a 
 few platitudes about lay and clerical intercommuni- 
 cation, or the advantages in this respect enjoyed 
 by Oxford, escaped his lips. More than once he 
 seemed to have lost the thread of his discourse. 
 These, probably, were mere artifices, or rhetorical 
 feints. 
 
 Presently, struck, as it seemed, by a sudden 
 inspiration, he warmed to his theme. First came 
 his description of the national Church. This was 
 memorable because, though it has not, I think, 
 yet been noticed, Disraeli's Oxford words prefigured 
 the policy which ten years later, as Prime Minister, 
 
172 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 in 1874 he was to embody in his Public Worship 
 Bill. The Church, he said, would not be dis- 
 established ; but Parliament, disliking an imperium 
 in imperio, would tighten its hold over it. Then 
 followed a series of rattling sentences, verbally 
 prophetic of the preface written by him many 
 years later for his collected novels. The Broad 
 Church party received some airy badinage. Dean, 
 then Canon, Stanley was complimented on his 
 "picturesque sensibility." Mr. Jowett was indicated 
 as a nebulous professor, who, if he were condemned 
 to read in perpetuity his own works, might gather 
 some idea of that endless punishment which he and 
 his school were said to doubt. Next epigram- 
 matically summarising the discussion, Disraeli 
 remarked : " The question, after all, is whether man 
 is an ape or an angel. As for me, my lords and 
 gentlemen" (Here the speaker put his hands into 
 his velvet sack's side-pockets, and strutting, as one 
 of his Hughenden peacocks might have done, across 
 the platform, uttered this startling and historic 
 sentiment), " I am on the side of the angels." 
 
 The commemoration week in the year of the 
 Prince of Wales's marriage, 1862, had brought to 
 Oxford one of her most famous statesmen in the 
 fourteenth Lord Derby. As Chancellor of the 
 University, he delivered an address of welcome to 
 
Famous Footprints at Oxford. 173 
 
 Her Royal Highness. No more graceful specimen 
 of flowing, flawless Latinity had been listened to by 
 heads of houses or undergraduates. The scholarly 
 effort was worthy of the man who sometime after- 
 wards finished his spirited translation of the Iliad. 
 The allusions to the Princess's race and beauty 
 were managed with consummate rhetorical effect. 
 Through his peroration, recurring at periodic 
 intervals, there ran the refrain. Ipsa adest ; some 
 firesh group of Royal attributes being described every 
 time the phrase was introduced. The speaker 
 had a picturesque presence. The eagle face was 
 lightened by the flashing eyes of the illustrious 
 " Rupert of Debate," now of almost patriarchal 
 years, yet still upright and easily bending in supple 
 and dignified courtesy towards the Princess's chair. 
 The historic building was crammed with scarlet- 
 cloaked doctors in the pit, and clamorous under- 
 graduates in the gallery. All these constituted a 
 memorable scene. 
 
 The Heir Apparent himself had brought his own 
 academic residence to a close just about the time 
 that mine was beginning. Certain among His 
 Royal Highness's contemporaries or acquaintances 
 there were on the Isis during my own sojourn 
 there. A very vivid recollection is that which I 
 have of the ill-starred, but not unamiable. Marquis 
 
174 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 of Hastings. He was a young man, as I remember 
 him, with rather a weak, but not unpleasant, 
 face, and a slightly effeminate manner. He enjoyed 
 the reputation of coming up to Oxford more deeply 
 involved in school debts than any Etonian of 
 his time. Such patrician state as he may have 
 surrounded himself with at Christ Church was 
 altogether eclipsed by the feudal splendour in 
 which lived his contemporary, the Duke of Hamilton. 
 That descendant of Scotch princes was a young 
 man of not very gainly figure. Both in his coun- 
 tenance and costume he impressed the beholder 
 with a sense of rubicund or crimson, which I think 
 he sustained throughout his life. Not the " Marquis 
 of Carabas" himself, of Puss-in-Boots fame, seemed 
 more ubiquitous in point of influence and posses- 
 sions than this scion of a historic house. If one 
 saw a particularly showy steed led by its groom 
 down the High Street, it was sure to belong to the 
 Duke of Hamilton. If an undergraduate set his 
 heart upon some specially " loud " article of costume 
 in the tailor's shop, it turned out already to have 
 been bespoken by his glowing grace. If a squire 
 or rector from the country, revisiting his alma mater, 
 desired to entertain his son with some friends at 
 the Mitre Hotel, mine host regretted that the best 
 suite of rooms on the first floor had for many weeks 
 
P'amom Footprints at Oxford. 175 
 
 been pre-engaged for a dinner party by the inevit- 
 able and all-dominating Duke. 
 
 In return for the ducal empire's ubiquity J some 
 of his contemporaries at Christ Church were 
 occasionally rude enough to serenade his rooms in 
 Canterbury Quadrangle, singing, in allusion to his 
 complexion's hue, the old English glee, ! ruddier 
 than the Cherry. His grace had, I think, a good deal 
 of the canniness which the poor Marquis lacked, and 
 though to the end he was lived upon by toadies and 
 parasites of all degrees, he was never, perhaps, so 
 ruthlessly rifled and stripped as the luckless Marquis. 
 
 To-day, thanks to the theatrical tastes and skilful 
 management of W. L. Courtney, of New College, 
 collaborating with Balliol's late master, Oxford 
 possesses a regular theatre, where most successful 
 plays are sooner or later given. In the earlier days 
 now spoken of, only two sorts of entertainment were 
 known on the Isis. One was the occasional lecture 
 or concert given in the old Town Hall ; the other 
 was, in my freshman's term, a panorama with a 
 musical accompaniment in the "Assembly Rooms," 
 on the premises of the old Star Hotel in the Corn 
 Market. Nor do I think it would be easy to 
 imagine drearier functions than both classes of 
 amusements were, ^stheticism, which has every- 
 where sprung up within my own recollection, only 
 
176 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 existed at Oxford, at this period, in a very 
 embryonic stage. It was, I remember, "the 
 correct thing" to admire the cartoons, with their 
 subjects taken from Arthurian romance, that 
 decorated the ceiling of the chief reading room at 
 the Union. Mr. Ryman's gallery of fine arts was 
 not less popular than it has no doubt ever since 
 been. There was a picture sale-room called 
 " Richardson's," where cheap prints or paintings of 
 turf favourites, prize fighters, pretty barmaids, often 
 changed hands, and could be got cheap. But with 
 the bulk of lads who had not taken their degree 
 art, save in close connection with religion, was 
 unknown ; and the very few who reproduced in 
 their rooms the decorations of the Oratory and 
 the boudoir found their taste less appreciated or 
 respected than may to-day be the case. 
 
 Foreign travel during these days was still in its 
 infancy. Cheap Japanese or Indian ware, Palais 
 Royal nicknacks, were little known. Sometimes a 
 popular coach made up a long-vacation reading 
 party for Heidelberg or Bonn, and a few ardent 
 youths returned with the resolve to master the 
 German language and literature. But foreign travel 
 for those still in statu pupillari was the rare excep- 
 tion instead of being, as to-day, the general rule, 
 ^stbeticism was, in fact, as much unknown as, at 
 
Famous Footprints at Oxford. 177 
 
 this time, was athleticism, using that latter word to 
 denote the sports in which Oxford and Cambridge 
 now contend against each other regularly. 
 
 Among Oxford dignitaries of my day far the most 
 conspicuous physically was Dr. H. G. Liddell, Dean 
 of Christ Church ; who, but quite recently, resigned 
 the office which is the nearest academic equivalent 
 to the command of a crack Guards' regiment. " It 
 was impossible," Mr. Kinglake often remarked of 
 Keate, whose person he never tired of recalling, 
 " not to be impressed by a man who had, in his day, 
 flogged every Member of the Cabinet and the whole 
 Bench of Bishops." Similarly the prestige stamped 
 visibly on Liddell's handsome and patrician presence 
 was emphasised to all Members of "the House" 
 by the circumstance that probably a majority of 
 England's governing classes had at one time or 
 other been gated or rusticated by the great Dean, 
 His family were fully equal to him in point of 
 appearance ; nor would it have been possible for the 
 University on all ceremonial occasions to have been 
 represented more picturesquely than by the Deanery's 
 denizens. 
 
 Dr. Liddell sometimes, but not invariably, acted 
 with the Liberal party, and thus, like Jowett, H. 
 J. Smith, Stanley, Pattisoft, and Gold win Smith, 
 might be spoken of as a political leader ; while the 
 
 12 
 
178 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 most active politicians on the same side were, I 
 fancy, J. M. Wilson, afterwards President of Corpus, 
 and among the younger dons, T. Fowler, then 
 Fellow and tutor of Lincoln, now President of 
 Corpus. As for the Conservatives, they were 
 usually reinforced by most heads of houses, uniformly 
 by successive Presidents of St. John's. Their titular 
 leader was Mr. R. Michell, Principal of Magdalen 
 Hall, 1861 — 5, in 1868 first Principal of Hertford 
 College. Mr. Michell, though rather short of stature, 
 was an imposing specimen of the Oxford don (old 
 style). He was, also, the father of a remarkably 
 comely family; while his son, E. B. Michell, was 
 champion sculler, certainly of all Oxford, I believe 
 of all England. On the same side as Michell, 
 •serving under him, were Professor Mansel, already 
 spoken of, and Henry Wall, then Fellow of Balliol, 
 and Professor of Logic. 
 
 Henry Parry Liddon, a notable son of Western 
 England, had not then become the dominating 
 presence on the Isis which during many years after- 
 wards he was. But his tall ascetic figure was 
 reverently noted as under Dr. Wilberforce the High 
 Church leader. When towards the end of the 
 sixties I revisited Oxford on the occasions of the 
 foundation-stone laying first, the opening after- 
 wards of Keble College, 1868 — 9, as well as Lord 
 
Famous Footprints at Oxford. 179 
 
 Salisbury's installation in the Chancellorship, 1870, 
 Canon Liddon, in the power he exercised amongst 
 all sections of the Anglican party, foreshadowed the 
 influence that, as Canon and preacher, he was 
 later to wield from the pulpit of St. Paul's. 
 
 12 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 BEGINNING WORK. (1865 — 6.) 
 
 A pictnresqae gaard on the Great Western Kailway system. 
 Triumphal progresses &om Paddington to Tintagel of the 
 first editor of the "Saturday ReYiev." J. Douglas Cooic's 
 appearance, habits, methods, friends, life at the Albany 
 and Tintagel. Mr. Kinsman, Rector of Tintagel. The 
 "Saturday's" staff under Cook. Sev. W. Scott, Philip 
 Harwood, and others. Clement Scott's acquaintance made 
 at Tom Hood's. Tom Hood's editorship of " Fun ; " dinners at 
 the Solferino Tavern, and hospitalities in South Street, 
 Brompton. Hood's guests. T. W. Robertson ; his couYersa- 
 tion, disappointments, and first successes after long waiting. 
 Founder of a new school of social comedy, a Trollope among 
 dramatists. His first great hit with " Society," whose recep- 
 tion foreshadowed the fashionable premieres of latter days. 
 Success, about the same time, of another "Fun" writer, 
 W. S. Gilbert, with burlesque. Other members of Hood's 
 staff, and social guests. W. J. Prowse, of the " Daily Tele- 
 graph." H. S. Leigh admired as social versifier by Frederick 
 Locker. Tom Hood's editorial skill, personal qualities, and 
 failing health. 
 
 AMONG the travelling staff of the Great Western 
 Railway there used to be conspicuous by his 
 costume and figure a guard named Paddon. Tall 
 and erect as a Lifeguardsman, he took the same sort 
 of pride in the carriages under his care as his pre- 
 decessors of the " Road " had felt in the appearance 
 of their coaches. Periodically I observed him to be 
 
 180 
 
Beginning Work. i8i 
 
 agitated as by the pressure of unusual cares. On 
 these occasions it generally turned out that the 
 Saturday Review's first and great editor was quitting 
 Paddington for his little house on the North Cornish 
 coast. To the excellent official now spoken of, Mr. 
 Douglas Cook, with his retinue of servants and royal 
 allowance of baggage, was a journalistic Monte 
 Christo. The Great Western guard, like the whole 
 neighbourhood honoured by Cook with his holiday 
 presence, regarded this gentleman as the embodiment 
 of all that was great, powerful, and opulent in the 
 London press. 
 
 Fabulous stories circulated between the London 
 terminus and Bodmin Road of the luxury, splendour, 
 good cheer, fine guests, to say nothing of proof 
 sheets, piled high as mountains, with which the 
 astute and apolaustic Aberdonian surrounded him- 
 self while he sojourned in King Arthur's Land. 
 Cook himself was a typical Scot; even though he 
 indulged his tastes for this world's pleasures with a 
 profusion seldom found among his compatriots 
 when they enjoy themselves at their own charges. 
 Not much above the middle height, he wore his 
 sandy hair cut so close as to make his short thick 
 neck and round head assume a more bulldog and 
 bullet-like appearance than Nature had bestowed 
 on these parts of his person. The Falstaffian 
 
i82 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 outline of his figure and the general expression of 
 his face proclaimed the apolaust. The penetrating 
 expression of the , keen deeply-set eyes, twinkling 
 under the intellectual brow, revealed the man's 
 mental power and reminded his critics that the 
 Epicurean was only one aspect of his many-sided 
 character. The square-cut massive jaw told every- 
 one who approached him of a will which would be 
 dangerous to cross, and difficult to deflect from its 
 purpose. His portly frame suggested little fondness 
 for physical exercise. When at Tintagel he would 
 pass day after day in deep-sea angling; but his 
 exertion was exclusively confined, I think," to 
 dropping his line into, and drawing it out of, the 
 deep. A staff of Cornish fishers were always in his 
 pay, furnishing his Albany dinner table while he 
 himself was in London. 
 
 Shortly after my own literary career began, 
 before I had been brought into any contact with 
 John Douglas Cook himself, that fiery viveur had 
 been incensed greatly by a novel fi:om the late 
 Walter Thornbury's pen, Great Heart, in which the 
 Saturday's editor held that he had been lampooned 
 scurrilously. Libel actions were spoken of, but the 
 matter never got into the Law Court, while I rather 
 fancy that when he had gasped off his first fury's 
 steam, Mr. Cook abstained from so far advertising 
 
Beginning Work., 183 
 
 the work as to sanction its castigation in his 
 own hebdomadal. My impression is that in the 
 Albany, as well as in his Western "Tusculum," the 
 great editor was often alone, and that when he 
 received company it was not usually drawn from 
 labourers with the pen, still less from those writers 
 with whom he was officially associated. The great 
 Duke of Newcastle had been for years his intimate 
 friend and frequent guest. Both in Piccadilly and 
 in Cornwall he probably entertained those who 
 belonged to the family of his colleague and partner, 
 Mr. Beresford Hope. To that member of the Hope 
 family who is now Lady Hayter, Cook bequeathed 
 the comfortable but plain and wholly unpretentious 
 little house whither he escaped from town whenever 
 he could to the society of his proof sheets and fish 
 pots. His chief local associate was the late Rector 
 of King Arthur's village, Mr. Kinsman, a highly 
 cultivated clergyman of the old style, possessing 
 considerable property in the neighbourhood, who 
 outlived his friend many years, and has, in fact, 
 quite recently died. Never for an instant when 
 taking a holiday in the manner which pleased him 
 did Cook relax his hold upon his journal. The daily 
 newspapers, read by the light of a private commen- 
 tary on the times' topics from never-failing lady 
 correspondents, enabled the editor to choose each, 
 
184 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Tuesday, as well as if he were in the Albany, his 
 subjects for the week. Nothing remained but to 
 select appropriate writers for each theme, and to 
 revise the proofs. The paper's " make-up " was 
 entrusted to the titular sub. or assistant editor, 
 Philip Harwood, who on his chief's death suc- 
 ceeded to the authoritative chair. When in London 
 Douglas Cook was assisted editorially by others of 
 his staff than by this gentleman. The chief had 
 little of the poet in his nature, certainly nothing 
 in his appearance. Harwood, on the very few 
 occasions I ever saw him, struck me by his re- 
 markable likeness to Longfellow and by a certain 
 dreamy abstractedness of manner that, however 
 graceful in itself and appropriate to a bard, seemed 
 a little out of place in the shrewd Aberdonian's 
 executive adlatus. 
 
 To an extent, certainly not less than on Mr. 
 Harwood, was Cook in the habit of relying upon the 
 Rev. William Scott, an East End Rector, formerly 
 an intimate friend and literary associate of the 
 Mozleys in the Christian Remembrancer. Mr. Scott, 
 father of my friend Mr. Clement Scott, was famed 
 equally for the depth as well as accuracy of his 
 scholarship, for the polished facility of his pen, for 
 his clear insight into the topics and phases of the 
 passing hour. These results of personal acquaintance 
 
Beginning Work. 185 
 
 with Mr. Cook were acquired long after my pro- 
 fessional connection with him had begun. The 
 Saturday Review in these days enjoyed a position 
 quite unique in nineteenth century journalism. The 
 late E. A. Freeman, then Fellow and tutor of Trinity, 
 Oxford, had long been in the habit of enriching its 
 pages by his historical criticisms and research. 
 With him were associated, among Oxford residents, 
 the late Lord, then George, Bowen, the present 
 Lord Justice Wright, then Fellow of Oriel, and 
 sometimes, among a much younger generation, the 
 late Robert Williams, junior student of Christ 
 Church, during several years not less a successful 
 "coach" for the "Greats" honour schools than 
 some decades earlier Robert Lowe himself had been. 
 It seemed, therefore, as natural, thirty years since, for 
 a young man fresh from his University and desirous 
 of using his pen, to approach the Saturday Review 
 as it would have been, had he adopted the law for 
 a career, to enter at the Inner Temple. When, 
 therefore, after having taken my degree, and estab- 
 lished myself in London lodgings, I put pen to paper 
 for the first time in my life professionally, I sent the 
 result to the editor in Southampton Street, and was 
 gratified by finding it, without a week's delay, included 
 amongst the Saturday " middle " articles. The sub- 
 ject was the false view of life and pathos encouraged, 
 
1 86 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 as seemed to me, by the Guy Livingstone series of 
 novels about which people were then raving. The 
 essay's title was Broken Hearts ; the date of its 
 appearance was, I believe, September 5th, 1865. 
 Notwithstanding the entree which I had thus effected 
 into the most popular weekly of the epoch, I owed 
 to no merits of my own my personal acquaintance 
 with its editor. 
 
 This came nearly a year afterwards and in the 
 following fashion. I have already mentioned my 
 early knowledge of the great humorist's son, the 
 late Tom Hood. At this time he, though on the 
 point of ceasing to be so, was still a clerk in the 
 War Office. At the little house in the Brompton 
 district. South Street, Thurloe Square, where he 
 and his wife were then settled, Tom Hood received 
 weekly his literary friends. To him I was indebted 
 in the first place for the only introductions to the 
 inner life of practical journalism which I ever 
 received. Hood was just appointed to the conduct 
 of Fun. Great had been my pleasure accidentally 
 to encounter him and his proprietor at a little 
 restaurant, the Solferino, in Rupert Street, W.C., 
 then a favourite haunt of him and his contributors. 
 Here at each working week's close, which for them 
 was practically the Friday evening, he and a few 
 others used to dine before returning to South Street 
 
Beginning Work. iSy- 
 
 to meet his guests. Most of those who then tasted 
 Tom Hood's hospitality have during the interval 
 which has since elapsed, made their mark, or passed 
 away. After a long spell of heart-breaking disap- 
 pointments, Tom Robertson was on the threshold 
 of a fame he only just tasted, as of a prosperity 
 which he never lived fully to realise. Call-boy, 
 prompter, actor, adapter, author. Such were some 
 of his career's vicissitudes, as they had been also, 
 for that matter, those of Shakespeare himself. His 
 pungent humour, and the merrier wit with which it 
 alternated, had long been noticeable in the columns 
 of Fun. Many of his pieces, original or translated, 
 held the stage, but I do not fancy any had yet 
 attracted great attention, while Sothern was still to 
 win by his impersonation prosperity and fame for 
 the title r61e of poor Robertson's David Garrick. 
 Society had been played with some success to 
 provincial audiences at Liverpool and elsewhere. 
 It had been discouraged by more than one 
 London manager; nor was it till 1865 that Miss 
 Marie Wilton made the experiment of producing 
 it at the Prince of Wales's Theatre (previously 
 "The Queen's"), in Tottenham Street. The drama's 
 success was immediate and unequivocal. It was not 
 only the first of an equally prosperous series from 
 the same writer; it set a new fashion in dramatic 
 
l88 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 composition, and did practically for the stage what 
 Anthony TroUope's example had already done for 
 the English novel. 
 
 London premieres thirty years ago having none 
 of the prestige they enjoy to-day, were matters 
 of interest only to players, playwrights, and their 
 immediate friends. The initial presentation of 
 Robertson's Society dimly foreshadowed the " first 
 nights " ala mode of the present day. The author's 
 name was familiar among all theatrical circles. He 
 liad reputation for bitterly epigrammatic conversa- 
 tion among innumerable friends. Much interest had 
 been excited by his courageous struggle against 
 difficulties which would have crushed tempers less 
 stout. There were widely -spread rumours about 
 strong points in the new play. Lastly, there was a 
 very general desire to encourage the managerial 
 venture of so popular a favourite as Miss Marie 
 Wilton. All these things conspired to fill with a well- 
 disposed audience the newly-decorated play-house off 
 the Tottenham Court Road. The piece hung a little 
 at the very first opening. There was just a moment 
 Avhen its fate seemed trembling in an adverse balance. 
 But as soon as the scenes in the London square and 
 ball-room, especially those in which " Tom Stylus " 
 drops his pipe, were reached, all went well. By the 
 time that Mr. John Hare, in his character of the 
 
Beginning Work. 1891 
 
 somnolent " Lord Ptarmigant," brought down the 
 house, the failures and disappointments of years 
 were retrieved ; the fortunes of manager, com- 
 pany, dramatist were alike made; and good, true- 
 hearted, if sometimes bitter-tongued, Tom Robertson 
 had turned the corner to decisively triumphant 
 result. 
 
 About the same time, and on the same boards^ 
 another dramatic writer was to achieve a fresh 
 success. H. J. Byron, whose fame was already 
 established, was an occasional member of Tom 
 Hood's Fun staff. Here he had written a short 
 sketch, subsequently developed into a burlesque, 
 and produced soon after Society by Miss Wilton. 
 The extravaganza had a flavour entirely of its own. 
 Its fun and pun, profusely scattered throughout it, 
 possessed certain strange qualities which altogether 
 distinguished the composition from most contem- 
 porary extravaganzas. Needless, of course, it is to 
 say that Mr. Byron's "hit" was largely empha- 
 sised by Miss Wilton's pretty and delicate drol- 
 lery, not less than by the broad fun and humour 
 of John Clarke and other members of the com- 
 pany, as well as by Miss Fanny Joseph's dainty 
 dancing. 
 
 These are only a few of Tom Hood's guests at 
 South Street in the old days. Art was represented 
 
zgo Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 on the comic sheet and in the Brompton gatherings 
 by William Brunton, Thomas Morten, and Paul 
 Gray. Brunton was a real humorist and farceur 
 with his pencil in much the same line and occasion- 
 ally of almost as great excellence as Bennett, then in 
 the prime of his genius on Punch. Paul Gray, like 
 Brunton, who had introduced him to Hood, an 
 Irishman, was possessed of a delicate sense of 
 beauty which he sometimes put forth with rare effect 
 in his large cartoons for Fun. One of these, repre- 
 senting the miscarriage of the first Atlantic cable, 
 portrayed Puck weeping for his lost wire, and is 
 likely still to dwell in some memories. Poor Tom 
 Morten spasmodically exercised his draughtsman's 
 skill, and powerful faculty of subtly picturesque con- 
 ception, in the magazines ; but never did himself 
 justice, and came to a sadly tragic end. George 
 Rose, better known as "Arthur Sketchley," was then 
 first introducing the public to " Mrs. Brown," a sort 
 of "Sarah Gamp" brought up to date in the pages 
 of Fun. He had first been in Anglican Orders ; 
 had then joined the Roman Church, in which he 
 seemed to take a keen interest. Gray, like his inti- 
 mate friend, Clement Scott, belonged to the same 
 discipline. It was rather pleasant to note the 
 paternal interest taken by Rose, whose presence 
 and manner might have fitted him to play "Fal- 
 
Beginning Work, igi 
 
 staff" — his eye sparkling with humour, his form 
 inclining to rotundity, and his hair just beginning to 
 be silvered by years — took in these two younger 
 adherents of his adopted communion. Shortly after- 
 wards, George Rose introduced his feminine creation, 
 with her Cockney moralisings on life, to the general 
 public at the Egyptian Hall. But the entertain- 
 ments in this building depend largely for their 
 prosperity on provincial patronage. The gossiping 
 old lady who had amused the public in the comic 
 periodical saw all things so exclusively through the 
 Cokaigne spectacles as to be unintelligible to 
 those not nurtured within the sound of Bow 
 Bells. Other of Tom Hood's guests in South 
 Street, or contributors to Fun, at this time were 
 the late W. J. Prowse and the late Henry S. Leigh. 
 Both of these were effective vers de socieU writers, as 
 well as unusually interesting figures in that London 
 Bohemia which has not, as some people think, 
 by any means passed away; but has rather been 
 annexed to, and absorbed in, more modish regions. 
 
 Prowse deserves to be mentioned, together with 
 G. A. Sala, Edwin Arnold, and others, as one of 
 those whose pen made the Daily Telegraph's literary 
 fortune. Possessing intellectual power of a high 
 order, and an admirably balanced brain, he com- 
 bined with rare gifts of fancy and humour a cultivated 
 
192 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 faculty of clear, picturesque expression, as well as 
 the aptitude for hitting the popular taste of the 
 hour and selecting the subject of special interest to 
 railway and omnibus passengers, which are the social 
 publicist's paramount endowments. He had also an 
 innate, unaffectedly manly sympathy with all open- 
 air games, cricket especially, and with whatever 
 contributed in his opinion to the robustness and 
 daring of that national character which had given 
 England her place in the world. These tastes 
 enabled their owner to write in a manner much 
 appreciated by other readers than those of the penny 
 press. During several years he furnished the Field 
 newspaper with a weekly article on some aspect of 
 sport or rural life that was a highly popular feature 
 in that journal. He also created a distinct character 
 in his sketch of the bibulous, mendacious Cockney 
 tipster "Nicholas," which has reappeared in the 
 contemporary " Ally Sloper," obviously " Nicholas' " 
 literary offspring. 
 
 So sound a critic, and admirable performer, as 
 the late Frederick Locker awarded Leigh a high 
 place among the lighter versifiers of the age, and 
 was fond of quoting some lines, contributed to Fun 
 as a specimen of the really good work to be found 
 in newspapers. This composition, entitled, I think, 
 A Victim, described certain fluctuations of health 
 
Beginning Work. 193 
 
 and feeling ; much, if I remember correctly, as 
 follows : — 
 
 " Sickness and Health have been having a game with me, 
 Tossing me just like a ball, to and fro ; 
 Pleasure and Pain have been doing the same with me, 
 Treating me simply as something to throw." 
 
 The cleverest piece which ever came from poor 
 Harry Leigh's pen was, perhaps, a little satire on the 
 failure of the dramatised version of Charles Reade's 
 story, It is Never Too Late to Mend, played at the 
 Princess's, somewhere during the sixties. As this 
 fragment is not less pointed than it is unfamiliar, 
 there are those who will be amused by a few extracts 
 from it here : — 
 
 " Mr. Reade, you 've written stories 
 By the dozens, and your best 
 Goes to show ad honos mores 
 Vid sera nunquam est. 
 
 " Well, there may be something in it. 
 But I always shall contend : 
 That in life there comes a minute 
 When it is too late to mend." 
 
 Having given instances, some comic, some 
 pathetic, of this truth, the poet concludes : — 
 
 " When a vulgar play arouses, 
 Nought but hisses at the end ; 
 And is played to paper houses. 
 Well, it is too late to mend 1 " 
 
 13 
 
Ig4 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Poor Leigh's father had kept a drawing school 
 near Oxford Street, and was reputed to have been 
 the original of the "Gandish" whom Thackeray 
 described in The Newcomes, Like his friend Prowse, 
 this graceful versifier had a weak constitution, and 
 a feeble physique. These, in the case of each, 
 were tried to their full extent, and prematurely gave 
 way. Some half-dozen years after poor Prowse had 
 lost each of his lungs, Harry Leigh followed him to 
 the grave, whither Tom Hood, like Tom Robertson, 
 had preceded him. Much of the literary merit 
 shown by Hood's contributors was due to the 
 example of the editor, who, besides being a miracle 
 of literary industry and professional good faith, had 
 inherited not a little of his father's faculty for semi- 
 serious humour, and for smoothly flowing compo- 
 sition. Towards the end of the sixties Tom Hood 
 removed his household from Brompton to Penge. 
 His hospitalities were continued, till his wife's death 
 inflicted on him a loss which he never quite sur- 
 mounted. His own health began to fail, and, 
 scarcely older than Prowse or Leigh, this bright, 
 good, and gifted fellow, the very brilliance of whose 
 opening manhood had made him such enemies as he 
 possessed, was laid by the side of the woman who 
 had been a loyal and kindly helpmeet to him. 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 FURTHER GLIMPSES OF OLt) BOHEMIA. 
 (1866—70.) 
 
 Tom Hood. His Bohemian afBnities and friends and resorts. 
 The little fish-supper room and its landlady's literary 
 reminiscences recalled by Wilkie Collins. Andrew Halliday, 
 T. W. Robertson, Arthur Sketchley, Paul Gray, Clement 
 Scott, H. S. Leigh, W. J. Prowse, John Brough, Sterling 
 Coyne, Westland Marston, Hepworth Dixon. BYans' Supper 
 Rooms in bygone days. The Cafe part ; notable habitues. 
 Sir £. Lawson, Douglas Straight, Uontagu Williams. 
 Serjeant Ballantine. Starting on circuit ; preparing for 
 court en route. Ballantine's zenith and decline. Last 
 glimpses of him in his Castle Street Lodging. Famous 
 Taverns between Temple Bar and Regent's Circus. Stone's, 
 Blanchard Jerrold, Sir H. Anderson, Mayne Reid, Oxenford, 
 Davison. A Bohemian E3ng, G. L. M. Strauss. 
 
 NOTWITHSTANDING his Oxford culture, as 
 well as certain social ideas which he carried 
 away with him, or exemplified in his daily life, in 
 addition to his Pall Mall training at the War Office, 
 Tom Hood liked to consider himself, and to be con- 
 sidered by others, a Bohemian. Long before I had 
 any professional connection with him, while I was 
 yet an undergraduate paying only contraband visits 
 to the metropolis, Fun's future editor introduced me 
 
 13 * 
 
 19s 
 
196 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 and my Oxford friend, W. E. Stokes, to a tiny estab- 
 lishment in the Strand, kept by two elderly maiden 
 ladies, respectable to primness, for fish suppers and 
 other light refreshments. These hostesses were of 
 exclusive demeanour, reserving their conversational 
 confidences for patrons of established position. 
 Thackeray had often dropped in here after the play. 
 Their narratives of him, of Douglas Jerrold and the 
 elder Mathews were too simple not to be true ; while 
 when many years later I spoke of this resort to 
 Wilkie Collins, the Woman in White's creator remem- 
 bered it well in the days before dyspepsia had 
 marked him for her own. 
 
 That portion of Evans' Supper Rooms, then 
 in their full glory, which lay right and left of 
 the entrance used, in the sixties, to be called 
 "The Cafig," and was "reserved for conversa- 
 tions," or informal gatherings of friends. When 
 the journalist had seen his week's work well behind 
 him, he was wont, in this epoch, to dine at the 
 ridiculously early hour of 6.30 p.m. at the Savage 
 Club, then domiciled in, or near. Maiden Lane. 
 Hood and his merry men, Tom Robertson, Prowse, 
 Leigh, Andrew Halliday, Edward Draper, a solicitor, 
 Arthur k Beckett, James Macdonell of the Daily 
 Telegraph, Godfrey Turner, the late William Woodin, 
 ventriloquist and entertainer, George Grossmith, 
 
Further Glimpses of Old Bohemia. 197 
 
 father of the present George and Weedon, W. 
 Beatty Kingston, used to be regular attendants. 
 But as yet, there were no formal entertainments on 
 the close of the meal ; nor had princes of the blood, 
 field marshals, and other grand transparencies con- 
 tracted the habit of looking on while the Savages 
 dined that they might be amused by the high jinks, 
 musical or otherwise, thereafter. Kingston, who 
 had a cultivated voice, and was also a cricketer, 
 would sometimes respond to poor Harry Leigh's 
 punning request to sing Tom Bowling when the 
 dinner cloth was drawn ; or another guest might 
 give a recitation. But the modern Savage Club 
 "function" patronised by Royalty or the peerage, 
 had not yet come into existence. Evening dress 
 was never worn. No one thought of being engaged 
 for Mayfair receptions or Belgravian crushes. The 
 idea was, when hunger's pangs were appeased, and 
 a cigar had been begun, to stroll off to some theatre, 
 on whose free list all members of the club practically 
 were. Marvellous stories at this epoch were afloat 
 of the brothers Brough. Two only of them, John 
 and William, survived to my day, while even these, 
 I suppose, are now long since gone. Concerning 
 the most gifted, as possibly erratic, Robert, I have 
 heard countless diverting, and no doubt historic, 
 anecdotes from Edmund Yates and others. These, 
 
igS Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 according to my promise at the outset of this work, 
 *I shall not attempt to repeat here. 
 
 William Brough, an occasional looker -in at 
 the old Savage Club, and also his brother John, 
 were socially at least the antitheses of the Robert 
 with whose tradition I am acquainted, being 
 each models of quiet, middle-class respectability. 
 William, I think, was, in my time, a Liverpool 
 theatrical lessee. John was, I fancy, a chemist, 
 and otherwise scientifically occupied. He was 
 a kind, simple-hearted, unaffected host, who lived 
 comfortably at Clapham, where nothing pleased 
 him more than to see his friends weekly at suppers 
 just like those with which Tom Hood regaled us ia 
 his South Street dining room : cold beef, capital 
 floury roast potatoes, Stilton cheese, and the best 
 bitter ale which Messrs. Fuller, Smith, and Turner 
 of the Chiswick Brewery ever sent to a private 
 customer. Many were the less prosperous wielders 
 of the pen who in these days were not perhaps so 
 sure of anything else as of kind John Brough's 
 simple fare, and not infrequently seasonable help. 
 For half-crowns were with some of us, at this era, 
 almost as rare as " Sidney Daryl," in Society, on his 
 visit to the "Owls" was amused to find them, in 
 the case of those night birds. I wonder whether 
 John Brough, as methodical as he was generous. 
 
Further Glimpses of Old Bohemia, 199 
 
 kept account of the number of these convenient 
 coins which he placed at his weekly guests' dis- 
 posal, or whether any of the little loans negotiated 
 on his hospitable premises were ever repaid. 
 Other workers in letters or art there were who 
 in this pre - fashionable period did not think it 
 shame to place before their visitors simple, honest, 
 homely fare instead of more pretentious cookery, 
 purchased at the confectioner's shop. Such an one 
 was the last survivor of the gifted Mayhew brothers, 
 a strikingly handsome old man, Horace, affection- 
 ately entitled "Ponny"; though in his last days his 
 entertainments were limited to lunch or supper at 
 the Caf6 de I'Europe in the Haymarket. 
 
 Such a host, too, was the veteran Sterling Coyne, 
 of whose house in the Talbot Road, Bayswater, I 
 was made free by my old friend Joseph Knight, I 
 know not how long since. To the same category 
 belonged also Westland Marston, the dramatist, 
 then living in Regent's Park. When he had a new 
 play nearly ready, he was in the habit of securing 
 the company of the actress-heroine and her friends 
 to hear the author read it. My old Oxford acquaint- 
 ance, Philip Lee, of Brasenose, had married in the 
 full blush of her beauty the actress Lilian Adelaide 
 Neilson. Lee himself was naturally the most 
 amiable of men. Since his disappearance, those 
 
200 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 who knew him in undergraduate days must have 
 been horrified by the dastardly and lying stories 
 put into circulation concerning his private life. 
 Marston was among the earliest of competent 
 judges who had been struck by Lee's future wife's 
 "JuHet" at the Royalty Theatre in the sixties. 
 Marston's friend, the late Hepworth Dixon, soon 
 shared this opinion, and the A thenceum's then editor 
 was seldom absent when the playwright gathered 
 round him Lee's and their well-wishers to hear the 
 new play. There was nothing at all " smart," such 
 as journalism now affects, in any of this. But it 
 was an honest, healthy system, notwithstanding, 
 and, if I may say so, not socially inferior, even 
 to the latter-day regime under which a second-class 
 paragraphist migrates from Brixton as bourgeois to a 
 villa in genteel Regent's Park, that the fashionable 
 print may chronicle the entertainments at which 
 his shoddy patrons assist, and at which the regula- 
 tion peer who has been pressed into attendance 
 laughs contemptuously on driving away in his lordly 
 brougham. 
 
 Another notable publicist of the era whither 
 I am now looking back was James Hannay, who 
 died during the seventies as H.B.M.'s Consul at 
 Barcelona. This accomplished and intellectually 
 vigorous Scot ought to have lived in that Augustan 
 
Further Glimpses of Old Bohemia. 201 
 
 epoch of English letters which he always recalled 
 with a sigh. He seemed to play the part of 
 " Samuel Johnson " to his friend, James Peddie 
 Steele's, " Boswell." If, instead of going into the 
 Navy as a lad he had been sent to Oxford, he 
 would have developed into Professor Jowett's social 
 rival. As it was, he showed to advantage when 
 entertaining his visitors in his old Bloomsbury 
 house. The polyglottic Steele, with his white tie, 
 frilled shirt, florid complexion, was there, of course, 
 ready to lead the applause which his host's polished 
 periods or pungent phrases deservedly elicited. 
 
 Steele himself, to-day, I believe, a prosperous 
 physician in Rome, curiously doubled the part of 
 an old-school doctor in appearance and title with 
 that of an indefatigable journalist by employment. 
 Few men, on the press or off it, had a wider 
 knowledge of literary anecdote, or of the "day before 
 yesterday's" Continental politics. Such a com- 
 mand of sonorous English, to designate homely 
 realities, is never met with now. He had been 
 educated in Edinburgh when the traditions of John 
 Wilson, the Ettrick Shepherd, even of the great 
 Sir Walter himself, were fresh ; had picked up a rich 
 variety of picturesque anecdotes about them ; had a 
 droll aptitude for recalling stories and verses which 
 had impressed his mind at any period. I never 
 
202 Platform, Press, Politics and Play, 
 
 myself beheld the late Sir James Simpson, professor 
 and practitioner in the modern Athens. All that I 
 know as fact about this son of Galen, with the 
 huge intellectual head, the brown suits, and the 
 shuffling gait, is that he was a surprisingly good man 
 of business, and was always consulted upon his 
 investments in this country by Napoleon III., whose 
 wife, the Empress Eugenie, Simpson had long 
 attended. Steele seemed to have committed to. 
 memory most of the rhetorical passages with which 
 the eloquent gynaecologist adorned his academic 
 discourses. Especially was James Peddie Steele 
 great on the scientific antidotes for sea-sickness 
 prescribed by Simpson. " The man," he declared, 
 " who, when crossing the Bay of Biscay, lunches on 
 devilled lobster and dry champagne will never know,, 
 thanks to these blessings, what mal de wey is like." 
 The Epicurean anecdotalist smacked his lips with 
 rapture as he repeated the appetising words. 
 
 Another of James Hannay's regular visitors, 
 was the capable and fiery Gascon-Scot, Francis 
 Espinasse, who had succeeded his host as the 
 Edinburgh Courant's editor, and who has also written 
 a biography of Voltaire, and one or two auto- 
 biographical volumes. T. E. Kebbel, then, as to- 
 day, a Conservative journalist, powerful and well- 
 informed, was also "one of those about Hannay."^ 
 
Further Glimpses of Old Bohemia. 205 
 
 Another guest was a Scotchman residing in the 
 modern Athens, but at rare intervals visiting 
 London. This gentleman, Pat Alexander by name, 
 had two claims to distinction. He could parody 
 Carlyle with a felicity which Mr, H. D. Traill 
 could not, I think, himself surpass ; he could fish 
 Highland salmon and trout streams with a dexterity 
 that can be attested to-day by one of the Realm's 
 editors, Mr. Earl Hodgson. In the short-lived 
 Rqutledge's Magazine during the sixties, , there ap- 
 peared some of Alexander's remarkable Carlylean 
 burlesques, forgotten, of course, now, but exciting a 
 great sensation then. Others among Hannay's 
 guests frequently, in their turn, his hosts, were the 
 lady novelist, nde Annie Thomas, with her husband. 
 Rev. Pender Cudlip, as well as the late Henry 
 Saville Clarke, with his graceful and amiable wife» 
 Clarke had been a medical student in Edinburgh, 
 while Hannay was an editor. Very few men who, 
 with comparatively such slight equipment, took to 
 journalism and playwriting, wielded whether for 
 prose or verse a more facile or graceful pen than 
 this gentleman who long divided with Mr. Moy 
 Thomas the editorial labours of Messrs. Cassell's 
 establishment. James Hannay was fanatically 
 devoted to feudal Toryism and to ancient pedigrees. 
 Himself a Scottish gentleman of fair descent, he 
 
204 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 used, on meeting him at Evans' Supper Rooms, to 
 go down on one knee that he might render the pre- 
 scribed homage to the appalling superiority by birth 
 ■of his friend J. G. Edgar, who had passed away 
 before my time. 
 
 Other notable figures were almost nightly 
 assembled in that historic Covent Garden saloon. 
 The late Serjeant Ballantine was not then less 
 regularly Retained on the establishment than the 
 patriarchal Herr von Joel, skilled in extracting 
 musical airs from walking sticks. The Daily Tele- 
 graph's editor, to-day Sir Edward Lawson, was 
 pretty sure to be found at the same little table with 
 the late Montagu Williams, and the surviving Sir 
 Douglas Straight ; while the forgotten, not very 
 long dead, and for a few weeks famous, Leopold 
 Lewis, author of The Bells, seldom missed an 
 attendance. This gentleman had the reddest hair, 
 the kindest heart, and the least polished manner of 
 all Evans' habitues. His sudden success with the 
 piece immortalised by Henry Irving, prompted him 
 to forsake his legal business in a way which may 
 have consolidated but scarcely augmented his fame, 
 and certainly did not improve his professional for- 
 tunes. Serjeant Ballantine was then at a handsome 
 manhood's zenith, and his forensic practice's prime. 
 He seemed to have a constitution which nothing 
 
Further Glimpses of Old Bohemia. 205 
 
 could assail, a digestion that would thrive on horse- 
 nails, a brain and frame which nothing could fatigue. 
 The first streaks of dawn were often visible before 
 he left his supper-table and entered the cab waiting 
 to drive him to some railway terminus en route for 
 an Assize town, where " cases " waited him' in court. 
 His brief and instructions were meanwhile in the 
 handbag, whose contents he reserved to study for 
 the first time on his circuit journey in the railway 
 carriage. Some years after this, the Serjeant's 
 health failed. But he recovered so far as to fre- 
 quent the Union Club in Trafalgar Square once 
 more, and even to receive a large fee for undertaking 
 an Indian case. He did not, however, fully re- 
 establish himself in his practice. Nearly the last 
 time I saw him was in his little lodging near 
 Portland Place. Here he was writing for Bentley 
 the Autobiography which not only secured many 
 readers but inspired many imitators, from 1874 down 
 to the present day. His latter years were largely 
 passed at Boulogne. Notwithstanding the huge 
 income he must at one time have commanded, his 
 fortunes sank to zero. Keenly though he felt his 
 decadence, his spirits were fairly maintained, his 
 conversation, especially when the Bar and its orna- 
 ments were the subject, was brilliant and delightful. 
 The identity of two other habitues of Evans' had 
 
■206 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 from my Oxford days much puzzled me. One was 
 tall, thin, with glittering black eyes, and pointedly 
 bird-like features* The other had a head nearly bald, 
 features benevolent and chubby. The two cronies 
 were inseparable. Nor was it till some years after- 
 wards that on joining my first St. James' Street club, 
 then the Civil Service, now the Thatched House, I 
 was introduced to the taller and gaunter of the two 
 friends by his name of M. C. Conry ; to the shorter 
 and less spare by his name of Henry Spencer Smith, 
 the well-known surgeon, long attached to St. 
 Mary's Hospital. Conry was of old standing as a 
 clerk in the House of Commons' Bill Office. The 
 peculiarity of these two gentlemen was that they 
 never seemed to go to bed, and did not begin their 
 evening till about midnight. 
 
 Hard by Evans', but nearer Drury Lane 
 Theatre, was, and doubtless is, a tavern almost 
 exclusively patronised by gentlemen connected in 
 some degree with "the profession" — The Albion. 
 Here, at one time, John Oxenford, the Times' 
 dramatic critic, and Davison, its musical repre- 
 sentative, used not only to sup but to discuss 
 the problems of the universe after their meal into 
 the small hours. Both had a knack of applying 
 pungent and homely phrases to the same inscrutable 
 mysteries. One of their arguments I can generally 
 
Further Glimpses of Old BohemiUi 207 
 
 tecall in outline, and can recollect especially Oxen- 
 ford's clenchingly resonant last phrase, as well as 
 the impressive tone in which it was uttered : "And 
 now, Davison, I have brought your cosmic King 
 to his last ethical fence ! " Of Davison I saw com- 
 paratively little. But Oxenford I met habitually, 
 especially on the occasions of the Westminster 
 Latin Play. He was a conspicuous combination of 
 the working journalist and universal scholar. His 
 English, conversational or literary, was idiomatic as 
 Addison, and terse as Swift. A speech delivered by 
 him in 1866 at a dinner given to Godfrey Turner on 
 returning from his Jamaica correspondent's mission, 
 Tvas nearly the best of its kind that any one present 
 can have heard. "Whether," said Oxenford, 
 " Governor Eyre flogged the Jamaica women, or 
 the Jamaica women flogged Governor Eyre, 1 don't 
 know, and I don't care ; but this of our friend, in 
 the Latin Grammar words, I may say, 'In colummem 
 te rediisse gaudeo.' " A well-known figure at all these 
 and other like haunts was that of the tall, athletic 
 Henry Vizetelly, who survived his more volatile 
 and romantic brother Frank, and who was a useful 
 friend to me and countless other workers with the 
 pen. 
 
 Tavern life, during the earlier sixties, was a real 
 feature in journalistid London. This particular 
 
2o8 Platform, Press, Polities and Play. 
 
 region, roughly speaking, stretched from the "Cock" 
 and the "Cheshire Cheese" on the east, to Air Street 
 and Panton Street in the west. At the former of 
 these occidental addresses Captain Mayne Reid, the 
 boys' author, had a house of call where all business 
 communications were addressed to him and where 
 a special bin of sherry was reserved for his con- 
 sumption. The prominent customers at Stone's 
 in Panton Street were William Jerrold, the son 
 of Douglas, accomplished in every department 
 of journalism, for a long while editor of Lloyd's 
 Weekly News, and a graceful critic ; a pleasant talker 
 in a sub-acid vein. With him was also his brother- 
 in-law Sidney Blanchard, long a leader-writer for 
 the Standard, and earlier in life Disraeli's private 
 secretary, with a neat knack of facetiously antithetic 
 hyperbole. The ornamental centre of this motley 
 company was an ex-Indian civilian, Sir Henry (?) 
 Anderson. At an earlier , day he may have ruled 
 provinces, prepared budgets, averted famines. In 
 this, his life's evening, he divided his time between 
 the Bohemia of the Haymarket resort, and the 
 pomp of official entertainments at his own Hyde 
 Park house. When Sidney Blanchard, some time 
 later, was starting for India, to edit a Bombay paper, 
 J. P. Steele, in his sonorous way at a farewell dinner 
 expressed the hope that, "following Sir Henry 
 
Further Glimpses of Old Bohemia. 2og 
 
 Anderson's example, the evening's guest would in a 
 few years return and be the more famous Maecenas 
 of a nobler Stone's ! " 
 
 The quaintest specimen of London Bohemia 
 whom I ever encountered was a certain Dr. G. L. 
 M. Strauss, a German- Jew, of course, occasionally 
 employed for translation purposes in newspaper 
 offices, full of desultory scraps of knowledge, and 
 in this way of educational service to many among 
 the journalistic craft. He had written, too, a novel, 
 The Old Ledger, soon after I came to town. The 
 book, neither better nor worse than most novels, 
 was attacked severely by the Athenceum for its 
 alleged blunders in Latin. The Doctor brought 
 an action, subpoenaed me as an Oxford graduate 
 to give evidence in his favour. The trial actually 
 began at the Kingston Assizes. I hung about the 
 court waiting to go into the box. At the eleventh 
 hour "a juror was withdrawn"; the action dropped, 
 so that I could say of myself, as Horace did 
 under closely similar circumstances, "Sic me servavit 
 Apollo ! " 
 
 14 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 FROM PRESS TO POLITICS. 
 (1867—74.) 
 
 Unique position of the " Saturday ReYiew " during the sixties. 
 Its surviving influence on Parliament, society, and indi- 
 vidual statesmen. Passing rivalry of the " London Review " 
 under W. Barry's and another's skilful editorship. The 
 old "Saturday's" Greenwich dinners. Great writers, and 
 small contributors "Jbelow the salt." Rise of the "Pall 
 Mall Gazette." Its hit with the amateur casual. Mrs. 
 Bancroft's mot. Frederick Greenwood's notable contributors 
 and his own great gifts. Lord Strangford, diplomatist and 
 writer. Fitz-James Stephen as the soul of the " Saturday 
 Review " ; and in society. Disraeli's opinion of Greenwood. 
 How the Suez Canal shares were purchased. Differences 
 between the old and new journalism ; Fleet Street a 
 whispering gallery. 
 
 TILL, some score of years since, the Spectator wSiS 
 purchased by Messrs. Hutton and Townsend, 
 the Saturday Review was without any serious rival. 
 An idea of opposition animated of course the London 
 Review's projectors. With the last-named sheet 
 I had, towards the sixties' close, much to do. It 
 was then issued from the same office as Public 
 Opinion in Wellington Street. Its first editor known 
 to me was an elderly little man, not unlike the late 
 
From Press to Politics. 211 
 
 Thornton Hunt, quick and skilful in discerning 
 subjects or suggesting treatment, courteous and 
 precise in all his dealings. To him there suc- 
 ceeded a young Irishman, William Barry, friend 
 and contemporary of William Black, the novelist. 
 This gentleman was divided between the claims 
 of journalism on the one hand, of fashion and 
 sport on the other. But he knew his business, 
 and followed closely the example of Douglas 
 Cook, by whom, I suspect, he must have been 
 trained. 
 
 Once a year, at the Trafalgar tavern, Greenwich, 
 Mr. Beresford Hope and Douglas Cook entertained 
 at dinner not only all their staff, but everyone 
 who within the past twelvemonth had written an 
 article in their journal. Ladies, so far as I know, 
 were excluded ; for though once or twice as a name- 
 less item I assisted at this banquet, I never beheld 
 any variation upon masculine attire among those pre- 
 sent. Every barrister, Oxford tutor, Rugby master, 
 or country clergyman who had recently had an 
 article accepted attended this function. The guests, 
 therefore, were miscellaneous, and the invitation 
 not a distinguishing favour. On the few occasions 
 I was there, I never missed seeing the late Mr. T. C. 
 Sandars, Justinian's editor, Fitz-James Stephen, 
 W. Vernon-Harcourt, if I mistake not. Professor 
 
 14 * 
 
212 Platform, Press, Politics and Play, 
 
 Albert Dicey, and I am quite certain Professor 
 Neville Storey Maskelyne. The more famous diners 
 sat together, kept to themselves, and from the height 
 of their superiority looked upon the miscellaneous 
 guests sitting, morally, "below the salt." The 
 two hosts had good reason to be proud of their 
 company, the absent even more than the present. 
 Dickens has impressed his work on popular jour- 
 nalism more visibly than any other great writer ; 
 so the Saturday Review, as Cook and- his confederates 
 created it, has exercised an influence, not only on 
 newspapers, but upon society and politics, which 
 still survives. 
 
 In all his parliamentary speeches, even in some 
 passages of his Warren Hastings masterpiece, it was 
 justly said of Sheridan that the School for Scandal's 
 author stood revealed. If Francis did not write The 
 Junius Letters, he succeeded surprisingly in intro- 
 ducing touches suggestive of their author into his 
 St. Stephen's harangues. Analogously, one may 
 remark that Lord Salisbury, Cook's "crack" con- 
 tributor, Sir William Harcourt, Mr. John Morley,each 
 scarcely less illustrious members of the same body, 
 to this day, alike in their orations and despatches, 
 perpetuate the Saturday Reviewer's style. The fre- 
 quent, sometimes forced antithesis, the tendency to 
 strain at paradox, the pungent flavouring, the bitter- 
 
From Press to Politics. 213 
 
 sweet humour, the besetting note of caustic irony 
 dear to the educated. These qualities, which, during 
 the last three decades, have tinged social conversation 
 at large, were first cultivated systematically by writers 
 for the Saturday Review. At this epoch the editor's 
 authority ruled every paragraph, directly disciplined 
 or indirectly inspired nearly every phrase. Nothing 
 would have horrified Douglas Cook more than 
 the idea of giving his contributors a free hand. 
 " Once," he remarked in his homely way, " let 
 newspaper articles declare their authorship on their 
 faces, and the London press will become the happy 
 hunting-ground of every jackass that can bray, of 
 every quack who wishes to advertise his name, or 
 sling his venom." If Cook found certain contri- 
 butions troublesome to revise, their author was 
 cold-shouldered and gradually dropped. But some 
 correction from his pen all the compositions that 
 he published received. "This Review," he said 
 once, " is an organ of opinion, not a mountebank's 
 platform." Unceremoniously as this principle was 
 expressed by the astute Aberdonian, its practical 
 acceptance was pretty general with the conductors 
 of the London press throughout the sixties. The 
 idiosyncrasies of study or stj'le, the specialities of 
 research, the happy peculiarities of humour which 
 newspaper writers on the daily or weekly press are 
 
214 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 now encouraged to display at their own sweet will 
 as they amble with humorous dignity through their 
 allotted columns are the innovations, it may be 
 the improvements, of the new journalism. They 
 found no place whatever in the old, would assuredly 
 not have commended themselves either to Delane 
 or Cook. Any attempt of the kind would have been 
 eliminated from the proof-sheets in which it was 
 detected. 
 
 No better authority on the publicism of the past 
 and present epoch is extant to-day than my old 
 friend and long erewhile chief, Frederick Greenwood. 
 "We have," he writes to me, a propos of changes 
 recently witnessed in Fleet Street's economy, "to 
 remember that in the days you speak of journalism 
 was much more an anonymous business than it is 
 now. Nobody asked about the names of editors or 
 writers. All sorts of good work was done by all 
 sorts of good workmen that had no record, and for 
 which there was to be no memory. You speak of 
 Scott as a Saturday Reviewer. I have heard scores 
 speak of Venables, Sandars, Harcourt, Stephen, and 
 Maine, but never heard of Scott. Yet he was as 
 effective a hand as any of them ; if not so con- 
 siderable a man as some in a general way." These 
 words will be admitted by every one possessing a 
 working knowledge of the press to be absolutely 
 
From Press to Politico. 215 
 
 true. Amongst other things, the newspaper writer 
 habitually if unconsciously practised when abroad 
 the reserve with which, in Pendennis, " George 
 Warrington " admits his connection with " the 
 mighty engine which has her travellers on every 
 highway, her correspondents in every capital, her 
 ambassadors at every court; that makes and un- 
 makes Ministers, deposes or crowns Kings." All 
 this has been changed. The fashionable type of 
 modern publicist is not the taciturnly " stunning " 
 chamber mate of "Arthur Pendennis," but the 
 femininely prattling " Percy Popjoy." 
 
 Till this year, just three decades, that is, after 
 the event, I have never mentioned my old con- 
 nection, slight as it was, with the Southampton 
 Street hebdomadal. In those days I had not many 
 acquaintances on that or any other paper. It so 
 chanced, however, that I frequently encountered in 
 Cook's Albany vestibule a Saturday Reviewer, whose 
 name I subsequently discovered to be Oliver (?) 
 Lathbury. Him I did once meet about this period 
 at a social gathering. Something like an expression 
 of conscious guiltiness came over his face as I looked 
 at him and he appeared to recognise me. It was as 
 if he would have said : " Don't let us betray each 
 other's secrets ! " To-day two writers for the same 
 paperj confronting each other at a strange table, would 
 
2i6 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 probably " talk shop " throughout the meal, and for 
 the company's edification discuss their fellow-con- 
 tributors from the great, but uncrowned, laureate, 
 the idol of a clique, to the master-colourist of the 
 prose pen, a pedestrian Pindar. As a very young man 
 in the late sixties, I enjoyed the IvJspitality of Mr. J. 
 T. Delane at his little house in Serjeant's Inn. The 
 only other guests, to the best of my remembrance, 
 were my subsequent friends, William Howard 
 Russell and Antonio Gallenga. These two men had 
 then won the very highest honours in journalism. 
 Not a word was said by them of their Printing House 
 Square employments. In these latter years, when 
 a leader-writer dines out before he goes to his news- 
 paper office, he seems to be disappointed should the 
 hostess not direct conversation to his electrification 
 of the world on the broadsheet to which he is 
 attached. If, thirty years ago, no one knew who 
 the really considerable writers in the press were, the 
 reason is that professional etiquette did not allow 
 the journalists, when abroad, to divulge the secrets 
 of the prison house. 
 
 All this has been changed. As regards the 
 daily, still more the weekly press, the periodical 
 is transformed from an organ into a platform, 
 that any smart writer with an affix to his name, 
 with a grudge to gratify, a fad to ventilate, or an 
 
From Press to Politics. 217 
 
 axe to grind, is invited to ascend. The professional 
 writer regularly retained on the staff is harassed by 
 these rivals, who perhaps appropriate his ideas. In 
 consequence the anonymity of the press survives 
 only in theory. Fleet Street, once a literary high- 
 way, has become a whispering gallery. Its superior 
 ornaments now take very good care to acquaint the 
 eight o'clock diners and five o'clock tea-drinkers 
 throughout South Kensington with those particular 
 products of their genius that adorn the broadsheet 
 to which they are attached. If they are charged 
 by some Laura Matilda of their acquaintance 
 with having " written the whole newspaper," 
 there is more of admission than of repudiation 
 in the pretty air of coquetry with which they 
 disclaim the soft impeachment. The shrinking 
 scholar who a year ago was lecturing on the 
 Symposium to his upper school favourites, but- 
 who is to-day a pervading genius of the press, 
 blushes guiltily behind his sunflower when Postle- 
 thwaite rallies him in Mrs. Maudle's drawing-room 
 on having scarified Lord Tom Noddy's detractor 
 in the Scorpion ; on having penned " the noble 
 prose poem " descriptive of Margate Sands, which 
 astounds the Pioneer'' s Nonconformist readers ; on 
 having shown conclusively in the Cynosure Mr. 
 Swinburne to be an impostor, but the journalist and 
 
2i8 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 his College umbra to be the true bards of the future- 
 If, in addition to this, the gifted Universalist is 
 playfully remonstrated with at dinner for having 
 entirely annihilated "poor Mr. Gladstone" in the 
 Scourge, or having discovered a fresh divinity in the 
 Comet; the gifted creature, vainly trying to conceal 
 his blushes behind his pince-nez, can only lament that 
 there is " such a cruel run " upon his all-describing» 
 all-conquering pen. These are the gentlemen who 
 now bewail the impertinent violations of journalistic 
 secrecy committed in those portions of the new 
 journalism which their own pen has not quite 
 annexed. 
 
 Those who, in the sixties, found themselves at 
 the same dinner-table as George Dasent, Robert 
 Lowe, then his daily contributor, George Brodrick, 
 Louis J. Jennings, Leonard Courtney, would have 
 listened in vain for newspaper talk, for incessant 
 cackle about "copy" and proof-sheets, "long 
 primer," "small pica," "bourgeois," and other 
 kindred topics. The men of whom I speak, and 
 whom it was once the fashion to consider dis- 
 tinguished, never dropped a hint of their vocation, 
 still less insinuated how they were about to " slate " 
 Slumley, or how the world would shortly be dazzled 
 by the greatest leader ever written on the gutter- 
 snipe question. The truth is that in other days 
 
From Press to Politics. 219 
 
 men did good work, and neither thought nor 
 talked about its excellence. The compositions 
 given to the world to-day are probably quite as 
 meritorious; while if they are not, the defect is 
 more than compensated by superabundance of 
 self-advertisement. 
 
 In my career's early days, the Pall Mall Gazette, 
 under Frederick Greenwood, was still a compara- 
 tively new growth. That paper marks, for many 
 reasons, an epoch in journalism. The miscellaneous 
 article of sensation first saw the light in its columns ; 
 was, in this instance, contributed by the editor's 
 brother, Mr. James Greenwood, who, long known 
 to the craft as a capable workman, then first found 
 himself famous as the amateur casual. His dis- 
 closures in that capacity provoked a movement for 
 further workhouse reform, recalling the ameliorations 
 for which Oliver Twist had earlier paved the way. 
 Incidentally, too, the Pall Mall's "tramp" inspired 
 the witty lady, now Mrs. Bancroft, with an unmeant 
 mot. When it had been mentioned in her presence 
 that a contributor to the Pall Mall had passed his 
 night in a workhouse, her innocently enquiring 
 comment was, " Poor fellow ! Do they pay their 
 contributors so badly as all that ? " To the brothers 
 Greenwood there thus "belongs the distinction of 
 having set the fashion for a literary commodity 
 
220 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 which has since been found indispensable for every 
 ambitious broadsheet. The great coup that this 
 newspaper was to make under its first and greatest 
 editor came about many years later. Trained under 
 Thackeray, Frederick Greenwood saw in his evening 
 print the legitimate opportunities afforded by the 
 translation into reality of the paper for which 
 " Pendennis " wrote. 
 
 Disraeli was not personally, at any time of 
 his life, enamoured of journalists. He had some 
 favourites amongst them, such as Alfred Austin, 
 and him of whom I have just spoken, to whose 
 merits he testified in these characteristic words : 
 " Whenever I am reading one of Greenwood's 
 articles, I feel myself in the grip of a statesman." 
 The fact is, in addition to his natural ability and 
 rare experience, Greenwood possessed the advan- 
 tage of numbering among his contributors some of 
 the time's most powerful intellects. ' Such was the 
 late Lord Strangford, brother of the George Smythe 
 who figures prominently in Coningsby, to reappear 
 as " Waldershare " in Endymion. This Lord Strang- 
 ford, a born philologist, had been attached for 
 some time to the Constantinople Embassy. There 
 he had acquired a thorough mastery of the Eastern 
 question in most of its branches; had also first 
 made the acquaintance of the singularly gifted lady. 
 
From Press to Politics. 221 
 
 Miss Beaufort, who subsequently became his wife 
 and intellectual helper. Lord Strangford's manner 
 was cold, rather finnicking, suggestive, almost more, 
 of the University don tban the scientific diplomatist 
 or practised man of the world. But he had few 
 rivals within his own department, whether as thinker 
 or writer. 
 
 Incomparably the two ablest men in this line I 
 have ever met were the late Laurence Oliphant and 
 the late Ralph Earle. Both on all subjects of the 
 kind would have acknowledged Strangford as their 
 master. His contributions to the Pall Mall Gazette 
 in its earliest days produced the same sort of 
 brilliant, immediate, and widely - sensible effect 
 which, I have it from Greenwood himself, always 
 followed the publication of a literary article by 
 James Hannay. Nor was Strangford's fellow-con- 
 tributor, Fitz- James Stephen, a whit less remark- 
 able either in his work itself, or in the impressions 
 he produced on those with whom he was brought 
 into contact. Stephen's manner was not conciliatory. 
 He seldom concealed his contempt for feebleness 
 of thought and talk. His conviction that the world 
 was administered by Providence on the stern 
 principles of an unbending morality made him take 
 severe, often unamiable, views of character and life. 
 But he could be courteous and even kindly to 
 
222 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 those whose acquaintance he really desired to 
 make. At his own house he was a polite host, 
 liking to make his guests at their ease. In society 
 which pleased him, such as that he met beneath the 
 roof of his friend Mr., now Sir, Mount Stuart Grant 
 Duff, he showed himself invariably courteous and 
 amiable. No one could have remained in his com- 
 pany long without receiving an impression of Fitz- 
 James Stephen's intellectual superiority to the bulk 
 of mankind. When he was legal member of the 
 Indian Council, I have heard from a high official, 
 Sir William Egerton, of the North - Western 
 Provinces, that Stephen fairly dazzled or over- 
 whelmed the exceedingly able coteries among 
 whom he was thrown, by a sense of his own tran- 
 scendant powers. Yet during his stay in our Asiatic 
 Empire, the glamour cast over the great jurist by 
 the brilliance of the Viceroy's, Lord Lytton's, gifts 
 was at least comparable with the effect which 
 Stephen himself produced upon others. When, 
 therefore, the lawyer returned to England, it 
 was as the Viceregal proselyte, the literary 
 advocate of the glittering views on Imperial 
 policy held by Disraeli and his favourite Anglo- 
 Indian officials. 
 
 As a journalist, Fitz-James Stephen did not only 
 help to make the Saturday Review. He was the 
 
From Press to Politics. 223 
 
 Saturday Review. His views of life set forth in 
 casual conversation, if they could have been 
 correctly reported, would have run naturally into 
 Saturday Review articles. The most characteristic 
 effusions -of Cook's best contributors on ethical or 
 serious social themes were the echoes of Stephen's 
 mind, bodying themselves forth in articulate ex- 
 pression. The gifted lady happily still survives to 
 whom pertains the honour of having penned the 
 Girl of the Period, that real progenitress of a later 
 day's " New Woman." Mrs. Lynn Linton would no 
 doubt admit Sir James Stephen to have been the 
 schoolmaster who led her into her present paths of 
 scientific and literary righteousness. 
 
 Thus, for more reasons than one, the Saturday 
 Review indicates the point of transition on the part 
 of press into the politics of practical life. 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 POLITICS AND PRESS (1865 — 74).. 
 
 First introduction to politics. Lord Palmerston at his Treasury 
 office in 1865. Confuses tlie nepliew with his uncle. His 
 views on handwriting, his method of worli and life. 
 Public interest divided between "Pam" and Mr. Gladstone. 
 General grief at his death shown in the London streets. 
 First experiences of Conservatism. Successor to Arthur 
 a Beckett at the "Glow-worm" ofBce; the "Glow-worm's" 
 staff. Its sporting proprietor, Captain Batchelor. No money 
 in the till, strange oaths at the counter. Amusing but 
 abortive negotiations to sell the paper. Colonel Taylor 
 at the Treasury and others. The "Worm's" end. Early 
 days at the "Standard" ofBce. Personal reminiscences of 
 the Marquis of Hastings, and his death. Sport and press. 
 Tom Hamber's pen-and-ink portrait. His many good 
 qualities; his abrupt departure &om Shoe Lane. 
 
 WHEN in 1865 my working experiences of 
 politics and press began, London, like I 
 suppose England generally, found its attention 
 divided between two subjects — Lord Palmerston's 
 past, and Mr. Gladstone's future. The Chancellor 
 of the Exchequer had just lost his seat for Oxford ; 
 had but yesterday "come unmuzzled" amongst 
 the South Lancashire electors. The national favour- 
 ite, the jaunty Premier, was never seen, nor 
 heard by me in the House of Commons. But I 
 
 224 
 
Politics and Pxess. 223 
 
 could form some idea of his parliamentary, manner 
 from the only, occasion on which I ever beheld him 
 in private. That meeting happened in this wise. 
 My kinsman, my father's first cousin, the late 
 Samuel. .Trehawke Kekewich, was then one of the 
 Devonshire Members. He had been in earlier 
 manhood a noticeably fine and handsome figure. 
 He was now the very ideal of a highly bred, 
 kindly hearted, rather brusque -mannered country 
 gentleman. His face and eyes presented all those 
 attributes that his Christian name seemed onomo- 
 topoeically to suggest. Like many Western squires, 
 he seldom stayed in town beyond the parliamentary 
 session. Then he practically lived at the old 
 University Club in Suffolk Street, with a bedroom 
 a few doors off. 
 
 Walking with him one day, shortly after I had 
 settled in London, we passed Downing Street. 
 Here he had some business with Lord Palmer- 
 ston, then Prime Minister, kept in by Conservative 
 votes. " If," good-naturedly said my relative, 
 "you come with me, I will tell him who you are. 
 He knew your uncle very well." When we entered 
 the Treasury' chamber, the great man was engaged 
 in conversation with a private secretary, to whom 
 he was grumbling about his own or somebody 
 else's handwriting, satirically, I think, remarking 
 
 15 
 
226 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 that "cypher need only be used in confidential com- 
 munications." For a moment the Premier absently 
 looked at me, with the remark, "You are much 
 younger than when I saw you last." He had, of 
 course, a dim memory of my uncle, and not any 
 knowledge of, or interest in, my identity. None the 
 less, the incident was an experience. It showed me 
 the statesman in his habitual aspect, enabling me to 
 understand why Punch always depicted him with a 
 straw in his mouth. While he chatted a little with 
 a genially abstracted manner, he chewed assiduously, 
 with great apparent satisfaction, first one toothpick, 
 then another. He stood at his desk nearly the 
 whole time. His ink-bottle was placed on a separate 
 pedestal a few steps off, in order, as I suppose, that 
 the old gentleman might exercise his limbs between 
 his pen's different dips. His general air of youthful- 
 ness was extraordinary. His countenance and colour 
 were the perfection of health. 
 
 All these gifts were, I believe, attributed by him 
 to extreme care in diet, especially to a particularly 
 dry sherry which was the only beverage he ever 
 sipped. It was not my fate to see this remarkable 
 man again. Almost as soon as I had got actively 
 to work, when the autumn was just setting in, 
 the whole town was in mourning for his death. 
 The cabmen and cadgers of Westminster presented 
 
Press and Politics. 227 
 
 a specially funereal appearance as to their costume. 
 Lord Palmerston was, I think, about the last of 
 the great gentlemen who, following "the Duke's" 
 example, habitually rode on horseback, often un- 
 attended, through the Metropolitan streets. Many 
 loafers, young and old, in the parliamentary pre- 
 cinct, were on the look-out for some small coin 
 from him. All these, like the cabmen on and off the 
 rank, reflected in their costume their grief at his 
 death. Nor, perhaps, has any more spontaneous 
 tribute of humble woe since been shown in every 
 quarter of the great city. 
 
 Though it was about this time that my connection 
 with the Standard as a leader-writer began, I had 
 not, till several years later, an opportunity of be- 
 coming practically acquainted with the men who 
 make or direct politics, as well as with the agencies 
 which sometimes control them behind the scenes. 
 During the later sjjcties, the titular controller-in-chief 
 of the great Conservative newspaper was Thomas 
 Hamber. He is one of the many good friends 
 whom I made on the pleasant premises of that 
 stronghold of Bohemian London, the Arundel Club 
 in Salisbury Street. Here, as at other social resorts 
 like his more political house of call, the Junior 
 Carlton, my early editor found time to take his 
 pleasure amid the intervals of professional cares. 
 
 15 * 
 
228 Platform,- Press; Politics and Play. 
 
 About this period "the ' Shoe Lane journal, after 
 one or two pfoprietbrial vicissitudes, had passed 
 into the' ownership' of James Johnstone. Ashley, 
 Maxwell, ' one or two ' riio're,' ' were the names of 
 some who previbusly' possessed an interest in the 
 paper. Mr. Johnstone had known professionally 
 Mr.' Hamher's father. Hence that' gentleman's 
 succession to the chair formerly filled' by Gifford or 
 Magirin. Educated ' at Grieli ' Thonias Hamber 
 subsdqtiently joined, during the Crimean War, the 
 Swiss' Legion;- not,- as was sometimes said, the 
 Bashi Bazouks. Whatever his services in the field 
 may or may not have been, they had given' hiin the 
 titular rank of captain, and had invested him with a 
 bluff, gehial, military manner, which he has, I think, 
 never lost. 
 
 Before giving any sketch of the Standard's internal 
 economy at this epoch, a few glances at a yet earlier 
 and droller introduction to Conse#irative journalism 
 may have a personal interest for some readers. At 
 the Savage Club I had made the acquaintance of 
 one whom I have now agreeably known ever since 
 I have known London itself. No moire versatile 
 journalist gifted with a keener faculty of humour 
 has of late lived than Arthur a Beckett, the youngest 
 son of a noticeable family. He had, I think, been 
 nursed in proof-sheets and himself manufactured 
 
Press and Politics. 229 
 
 " comic copy " at the age when other children are 
 playing with their Noah's arks. The venture where- 
 with he was associated when I first knew him was 
 a sheet probably forgotten to-day, which first intro- 
 duced to the London press features that have since 
 made their imitators' fame and fortunes. The Glow- 
 worm only needed better business management and 
 a more wisely lavish expenditure to anticipate the 
 prosperity, as it foreshadowed not a few of the 
 attractions, which belong to the penny evening 
 newspapers in their existing shape. Among the 
 Glow-worm's ornanieiits were, or had been, Frank 
 C. Burnand, editor of Pmmc^, Corney Grain, then 
 barrister, not yet entertainer, the charming vocalist 
 and accomplished musician^ James L. MoUoy, 
 Alfred Austin, and, the now Sir, Douglas Straight. 
 Gradually the Glow-worm's editor found an irresistible 
 attraction in exclusively humorous journalism. He 
 started, and won more than a success of , esteem for, 
 the Tomahawk ; also, a little later, the Britannia 
 Magazine, from whose back numbers many ^ good 
 things might be; disinterred., . 
 
 Mean\yhile, he had secured for .me the reversion 
 of his editorial chair in the Strand. This, if for no 
 other reason than the diverting experiences involved, 
 it was well worth my while to assume. The print!s 
 proprietor was Captain Sam Batchelor, formidable 
 
230 Platfoi'm, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 for his whist, a familiar figure on the turf. Not 
 without native shrewdness, but with no turn either 
 for letters or politics, he aimed first at extracting 
 enough silver and gold from the Glow-worm's till to 
 supply him with the means requisite for his after- 
 peon's ventures in the "Temple of Trumps." If 
 the cards ran well, he might condescend to recoup 
 liis tremhling cashier. He was a big man with a 
 loiid manner. His anathemas, delivered in tem- 
 pestuous tones during his forays upon the counter, 
 struck terror into the whole establishment, which 
 always knew by the vehemence of the language 
 when fortune frowned, or when exceptionally many 
 writs were out against the gallant Captain. Im- 
 prisonment for debt then existed ; the Glow-worm's 
 proprietor passed his life barricaded against bailiffs 
 in a state of perpetual siege at Eccleston Square. 
 When I repaired thither to interview him, I was 
 admitted with great caution only by a back door 
 through a maze of mews. My editorial duties were 
 far the lightest part of my work. My chief and far 
 more arduous business was the vain attempt to find 
 a capitalist who would put money into the concern, 
 or, better still, buy it out and out, to give its gallant 
 owner relief from the legal missives on blue foolscap 
 which for ever rained upon his cashless person. He 
 was perpetually engaged in drafting schemes for a 
 
Press and Politics. 231 
 
 company that he hoped would float his broadsheet. 
 Equipped with these as my credentials, I passed many 
 hours going to and fro between the Strand, where, on 
 the present Vaudeville's site, the offices stood, and 
 Westminster. 
 
 Colonel Taylor was then powerful at the Treasury 
 in Whitehall. The Conservative party's practical 
 management was divided between him. Lord Nevill 
 and Mr. Markham Spofforth. Colonel Taylor, 
 as I recollect him, seemed a courteous, shrewd, 
 humorous, heavily-bearded Irish sportsman. He 
 evidently regarded the " Worm " and all its affairs 
 as a huge joke, telling me more than once that I 
 had better go back to Oxford. Mr. Markham 
 Spofforth treated the matter a little less facetiously. 
 But no practical results, satisfactory to my gallant 
 but impecunious principal, came from these media- 
 torial duties. Not a sixpence from the Carlton 
 or Treasury coffers augmented the Glow-worm's 
 slender capital. Though newspapers have nearly 
 as many lives as a cat, the paper's vitality was 
 at last exhausted. Poor Sidney Blanchard, one 
 of my staff, complained that when contributors' pay- 
 day arrived, "the eel, compared with your cashier, 
 is an adhesive reptile." Theatrical and music-hall 
 advertisements fell off; Captain Batchelor swore 
 more violently than ever, and when there was no 
 
232 Platform, Press, Politics and Flay. 
 
 squeezing blood out of deal boards, _hawked the 
 paper's "plant" about the highways and byways. 
 The classical J. P. Steele, who, like James Hannay, 
 T. E., Kebbel, Sir Henry Hicks- Hocking, to-day 
 Jamaica's Chief Justice, Sir Baldwyn Leighton, most 
 chivalrous and kind : of niy early friends and staff, 
 endeavoured to interest Sir Michael Hicks-Beach 
 and others in the struggling sheet. But all these 
 repeated efforts were fruitless. Soon after, I had 
 been able to make other arrangements for myself, 
 the " Worm " was bought by the late S. O. Beeton 
 for an old song. By him it was, under his literary 
 editor, Frederick Young, a thoroughly good working 
 man of letters, carried on upon various political 
 platforms, till, towards the sixties' close, it expired. 
 When, in his Shoe Lane sanctum, there took place 
 my opening interview with the Standard's then editor, 
 the first of several whom I have known, Tom Hamber 
 was seated at his table,, with, his friend and manager 
 D. Morier Evans opposite him. The paper's evening 
 edition announced the death of the ill-starred Mar- 
 quis of Hastings. " There," said Hamber, " is a 
 good subject for a young Oxford man like you.." It so 
 happened that two or three times since I had left the 
 University, I had run against the unfortunate young 
 nobleman who had been my contemporary there. 
 Once, while I called at Long's Hotel, upon some 
 
Press and Politics. 233 
 
 person else in that military caravanserai, there stood 
 the Marquis refreshing himself at the bar. When he 
 put down two silver cpjns. in payment for his draught 
 and was asked for more, jW.ith^ a resolution I had not 
 expected,, he , said : ." My price for, a ,big, drink is 
 eighteen pence, and if I've done nothing ;more, they 
 can write on my tombstone, ' He brought down the 
 price of brandies and sodas at Long's' ! " A second 
 occasion must have been on the Brighton Grand 
 Hotel's steps. He seemed rather low. Possibly some 
 one suggested the foaming beaker, which he liked. 
 " Thanks !.'.' was the reply ; "but I 've had five 
 within the last half hour, and I don't feel a bit, 
 better." Before this, even, the hand of Death was 
 visibly on the young man who had " lived every one 
 of his ' short days '" since he took his place in the 
 Eton lower fourth. 
 
 The ", smash "^ probably began in 1867 when 
 Mr. Henry Chaplin ^ simultaneously won the Derby 
 with Hermit, who, having brpken a blood-vessel, 
 started at 1000 to 15, and a large sum from his rival, 
 "the young Lochinvar," as. the Daily Telegraph had 
 christened him. Nor had Lord Hastings found in 
 Mr. Henry Padwick as useful a friend as Mr. Disraeli 
 before him had done. The 1868 Epsom meeting is 
 famous in history. The facts, I believe, were these : 
 Lord Hastings had expected to carry off the blue 
 
234 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 ribbon with Lady Elizabeth. But that mare had been 
 done to death as a two-year-old, and was nowhere. He 
 had, however, a second horse for the race, The Earl, 
 which it was believed could have won easily. Mr. 
 Fadwick did not allow The Earl to run. The prize 
 was carried oS by the second favourite, Blue Gown. 
 Whatever the exact circumstances were, the scandal 
 caused by the whole transaction was great. Yet one 
 more glimpse of this unhappy turfite. His grace- 
 ful wife was driving him in her little pony-carriage 
 somewhere near the Ascot course. A hulking book- 
 maker, with a bloated face and familiar manner, 
 came up to him and noted down a wagering trans- 
 action, " Mind, my lord," said the fellow, in 
 brutally offensive tones, " I shall expect this bet to 
 be paid." These facts were no doubt introduced 
 into that early leader which I wrote for the Standard 
 and which proved the precursor of scores of others, 
 since contributed during nearly three decades. 
 
 It was easy to discover Captain Hamber's 
 editorial imperfections when, in the early seventies, 
 his proprietor, Mr. Johnstone, had broken with him, 
 and new powers ruled in Shoe Lane. He had, how- 
 ever, some rare qualifications for the office which he 
 filled during a decade and a half. Educated, after 
 leaving Oxford, at a German University, and also in 
 France, he was a really good linguist, and could 
 
Press and Politics. 233 
 
 conduct idiomatic correspondence with continental 
 publicists or politicians upon critical questions.- Not 
 himself probably without foreign blood, he was 
 favourably regarded by Mr. Disraeli. On the Isis^ 
 his contemporaries had been Mr. Ward Hunt, Mr. 
 Goschen, of his own College, Lord Robert Cecil at 
 Christ Church. The last wrote on foreign policy 
 regularly in the Standard during Hamber's earlier 
 management. The traditions of Lord Salisbury's 
 journalistic excellence lived in Shoe Lane long 
 after he had left the paper. Socially, Hamber was 
 uniformly agreeable, sometimes brilliant. He had a 
 large fund of fresh anecdotes which he told with 
 mordant humour and in which he never repeated 
 himself. He carolled forth French comic songs in 
 a way worthy of " Becky Sharp " herself when " Jos 
 Sedley " surprises her at the musical entertainment 
 au cinquieme with the French students. In a word, 
 Tom Hamber was delightful company, and would 
 have been an ornament to any military mess in the 
 land. His animal spirits and physical courage 
 missed few opportunities of asserting themselves. 
 
 At one time the party leaders at Westminster 
 pressed on Mr. Johnstone, as political Adlatus to 
 Hamber, an official person nominated by them. Early 
 and exclusive news was the inducement offered for 
 abjectly more faithfully reflecting party views. "By 
 
236 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 all means," said Hamber, "let them send you their 
 nominee ; but if he comes near my desk, I shall give 
 him a hint to go down those sta.irs." The man was 
 quite equal, as Mr. Johnstone knew, to the execu- 
 tion of his threat. ■ 
 
 One instance of Tom Hamber's short way 
 with aggressors I myself beheld. He had driven 
 down with Mrs. Hamber to the office, leaving her 
 in the cab for a few minutes to complete his business 
 inside. While he was away, the driver addressed 
 her in tones she did not like. "Tom," she said, 
 when her husband reappeared, " this man has 
 spoken impertinently." " Get down from your perch 
 at once," said the journalist to the Jehu. The man, 
 with a coarse oath, descended. Hamber boxed first 
 one ear, then the other. . When the driver squared 
 up to him the Tory, organ's. militant chief scientifi- 
 cally slipped a right and left into his opponent, 
 polishing him off very neatly. ; So, I have heard 
 from others who saw it, he annihilated an abusive 
 bargee at Henley some three . decades antecedently. 
 
 If intrepidity, and good fellovirship were an editor's 
 essential qualifications, Hamber would have been 
 an ideal man for his post. When, however, a 
 journalist, being centurion-like, " under authority," 
 wishes to exercise power, the condition is that he 
 must keep himself in the background. Captain 
 
Press and Politics. 237 
 
 Hamber permitted his very noticeable personality to 
 be felt and seen to a degree inexpedient for the 
 newspaper under our anonymous system, and there- 
 fore naturally resented by so practical a person as 
 the late James Johnstone. "VVhaitever the overt plea 
 may have been, a day came in the autumn of, I 
 think) 1873, when Mr. Johnstone's man. of. business 
 intimated to Captain Hamber at his Ghiswick house 
 that he was no longer editor of the Standard. 
 
CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 PAPERS WHICH HAVE PASSED. 
 
 The "Reader" as a pival to the "Athensenm." Its 1865 
 editor, T. Bendysshe. His advanced views in Church and 
 State. Supports J. S. Mill for Westminster, and so leaves 
 the Conservative Club, not before he has read all its 
 library. Buys and edits the "Reader." The editor's 
 room ; his tea-kettle and cats. The " Reader's " stafF— 
 Joseph Enight, T. Fornell ; its manager, James Bohn. 
 Futile quest for profitable features; failure of publishers' 
 support. " Johnson's Dictionary " revieved as a new book. 
 The great lexicographer patted on the back. Aggressive 
 agnosticism of "A Suicide's Letters;" an Evangelical 
 printer stops the paper. The "Standard" staff when 
 Hamber left the paper. " Tours de force " in journalism ; 
 Alfred Austin, G. A. Sala. How the " Hour " lived from hand 
 to month. Capital fails ; &?equ4nt whips. Loyal friends. 
 The Evangelical committee, and the cock-fighting editor. 
 
 THE Glow-worm is not the only print, serving as 
 a kind of milestone in my experiences, that 
 has been laid to rest. A weekly organ of literary 
 criticism wherewith, just before the seventies began, 
 I had much pleasantly and profitably for myself to 
 do, the Reader, was one of the many rivals that 
 the Athenceum's success has periodically called into 
 existence. Mr. T. Bendysshe, a Fellow of King's, 
 Cambridge, had settled recently in a lodging close 
 
 238 
 
Papers which have Passed, 239 
 
 to the Conservative Club with some idea of entering 
 political life. His advanced views on all subjects 
 did not quite suit the West End temple of consti- 
 tutional orthodoxy on whose books he had enrolled 
 himself. He brought his offences to a head by 
 voting for John Stuart Mill at the Westminster 
 election. The committee decided he had ceased 
 ipso facto to be a member of the establishment. 
 But before this, "I had," he grimly observed, 
 "read every volume in the library, so that my sub- 
 scription was not quite thrown away." Practical 
 statesmanship ceasing to attract him, Mr. Bendysshe 
 directed his great abilities and encyclopaedic study 
 to literary journalism, and purchased the periodical 
 named above. A not unkindly person, of gentle 
 birth, as well as liberal culture, he succeeded in 
 presenting aggressively destructive views, social, 
 religious, political, in their least alluring guise. A 
 persistent snuff-taker, he scattered the pungent dust 
 over all things and persons within his reach. He 
 suffered from the special mialady of philosophers, 
 as gout is that of statesmen, dyspepsia. In his 
 editorial room, a kettle during the hottest weather 
 ever simmered on the hob to replenish his favourite 
 teapot. One cat lay coiled round his neck ; another 
 playfiilly gambolled over his proof-sheets or bathed 
 its paws in his inkpot. He did, however, much 
 
240 Platform; Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 good work - himself, was the cause of not a little 
 meritono'us industry in 'others J and with more 
 business" tact "might ' have' made his paper an 
 enduring success.- - • - - - 
 
 When I first became attached to the Reader, whose 
 office was in Tavistock' Street/the premises,' I fancy, 
 since occujpied hy Vanity Fair; MvV BeriAyss^ie's 
 staff's ■ chief ■ members were Thomas Purnell- and 
 Joseph Knight, to "fhe latter of whom alone I was 
 iridebted for Ihis new openiiig.*' Various articles upon 
 educational harTdbdoks, that my own experiences 
 as a teacher in some degree qualified me to write, 
 were well received. The Reader's ^nhMsher, James 
 Bohn, was one of the famous' Bohii Brothers, an 
 amiable old gentleman with a silky manner, hot 
 perhaps quite devoid of harmless craft. Subsequently 
 he becameconnected with the Messrs. Virtue in the 
 City R©ad,'and on His introduction, I edited Juvenal 
 and Persius iox schools.' This book was welcomed 
 by mariy head-ma'stefs, among them Dr. Haig Brown, 
 of CharterjHouse, who was good enough to adopt 
 it in "his own school, and lose no opportunity of 
 recommeridirig it. ' ' " i • • 
 
 Th& Reader did not iheet frbm the booksellers 
 the support that it might perhaps have expected. 
 Certain experiences not unhke those in connection 
 with the Glow -norm, of which I have already 
 
Papers which have Passed. 241 
 
 spoken, again fell to my lot. In the endeavours to 
 ascertain whether any special articles would be 
 likely to improve its position with " the trade," 
 I made the acquaintance of, I think, all the pub- 
 lishers in the W.C. district, beginning with my early 
 friend Mr. Alexander Macmillan. Less than was 
 hoped came of this mission. One or two untoward 
 incidents happened to the paper about the same 
 time. In Mr. Bendysshe's absence, a sub-editor, 
 anxious to show his smartness, dealt with a cheap 
 reprint of Johnson's Dictionary on the assumption of 
 its being a new book by an unknown writer. He 
 was particularly severe on the " high falutin " style 
 of its preface, but condescendingly recognised 
 certain elements of promise amid the portentous 
 verbiage, and charitably told the writer that if he 
 would not confuse fine words for great thoughts he 
 might still hope to turn an honest penny with his 
 pen. As if to efface the memory of this ludicrous 
 contretemps, Mr. Bendysshe printed a very heterodox 
 serial from his own pen, entitled, I think, Letters 
 of a Suicide. As the epistles went on they became 
 worse. One of the partners in the firm which printed 
 the paper was a devout Evangelical. Accidentally 
 he caught sight of Mr. Bendysshe's proofs ; at once 
 countermanded the sheet's publication, the result 
 
 being that the paper abruptly stopped. 
 
 i5 
 
242 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Meanwhile, Arthur a Beckett, with the help of a 
 limited capitalist named Hudson, had started the 
 Tomahawk. The gentleman who found the money 
 had himself a literary turn, and when not engaged 
 in financial transactions at his Waterloo Place office 
 often launched ventures of his own. A short man, 
 with ruddy face, curly black hair, manifestly Oriental 
 descent, Mr. Hudson seemed to live in an atmo- 
 sphere of proof-sheets and bill stamps. 
 
 He was a person of prompt initiative. Having 
 one day ascertained the London cabmen to be 
 without direct representation in the press, he at 
 once resolved to supply them with an organ of 
 their own. Calling upon him that evening at his 
 private house, I found him working away alter- 
 nately at pen and ink, paste and scissors. The next 
 day a little sheet, the Whip, was in the hands of 
 several Hansom and four-wheel drivers within the 
 four-mile radius. 
 
 The Tomahawk really occupied a historic position 
 in London journalism. It was to some extent an 
 imitation of the Owl, which under Algernon Borth- 
 wick and Lawrence Oliphant had a little before won 
 social as well as literary distinction. Its news 
 columns, contributed chiefly by clerks and private 
 secretaries in the Public Service, anticipated with 
 their terse announcements the informatory columns 
 
Papers which have Passed. 243 
 
 of the World and Truth; while there was a good 
 deal more of real fun and of real literature in 
 Arthur k Beckett's paper than many of its successors 
 have succeeded in reproducing. Probably the most 
 attractive features in the Tomahawk were, so long as 
 they lasted, the clever cartoons executed by that 
 gifted draughtsman Matt Morgan, then scene 
 painter at Covent Garden, but always inspired by 
 the weirdly original editor. The first picture repre- 
 sented " Beales, M.A. " in Britannia's hands, about 
 to receive a whipping for the Hyde Park Riots. At 
 the last moment Mr. Secretary Walpole surrendered. 
 So the cartoon was given with the hedging legend : 
 " But for Walpole ! " Subsequently there were more 
 highly sensational illustrations. In one of these the 
 Mexican experiment's victim, Maximilian, appeared 
 to Napoleon III. as Banquo's ghost, the epigraph 
 being : " Thou canst not say I did it." In yet 
 another, the same victim of the Imperial policy was 
 the Christian Martyr floating on the water. This 
 was followed by the " Return from the Derby." 
 The drag's driver was the Foul Fiend himself. 
 The events that gave terrible point to the rather 
 melodramatic composition were the Marquis of 
 Hastings' smash in Hermit's deadly year. Among 
 those who wrote regularly for the paper, meeting 
 their editor weekly at his room in Palace Chambers, 
 
 16 * 
 
244 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 St. James', were Frank Marshall, Frederick Clay, 
 Thomas Gibson Bowles, the editor's brother, Albert 
 a Beckett, now a high official at the War Office, 
 and Alfred Thompson. This last gentleman had, 
 together with several others, been one of the 
 A.D.C.'s founders at Cambridge. Later, he had 
 served in a dragoon regiment. Since then, he had 
 improved his natural aptitude for art by systematic 
 study in Paris, and returning to London, had 
 drawn much and effectively for weekly papers, 
 Tom Hood's Fun among them. He had, however, 
 skill with his pen, not less than with his pencil, 
 and had contributed to the Pall Mall Gazette under 
 Greenwood a severe but very careful study of Mr. 
 Bancroft's impersonations of the military swell, 
 then a novelty on the stage. Sooner than seemed 
 necessary, why I have forgotten, the Tomahawk's 
 staff was disbanded. Its ci-devant members went 
 their different ways, some of them into new ven- 
 tures of their own ; all of them, I think, the better 
 for their co-operation under versatile, humorous, 
 quaint, Arthur k Beckett. 
 
 Within a short time the Mask appeared 
 under Alfred Thompson. Its tone was dominantly 
 theatrical, for the stage was just now becoming 
 really popular. Nor need Tenniel himself have 
 disowned a cartoon called, I think, "Strolling 
 
Papers which have Passed. 245 
 
 Players," wherein J. T. Delane and the leading 
 members of the Times' staff were represented as 
 actors dressing for their different parts in Printing 
 House Square. T. G. Bowles, while writing leaders 
 for the Morning Post, started Vanity Fair. Nothing 
 better in their way has been done than "Jehu 
 junior's" sententious summaries of public men and 
 public questions in this, the precursor of all society 
 papers. Nor can the Tomahawk have been a bad 
 school for the pen even of this pungent and re- 
 sourceful gentleman. If, therefore, the disjecta 
 membra of the Tomahawk staff have been since cast 
 to the four winds of heaven, its old editor, as he 
 witnesses the successful perpetuation of the spirit 
 animating his old corps, may complacently murmur 
 to himself : " E'en in their ashes live their wonted 
 fires." Many other prints to - day, especially the 
 Westminster Budget, testify to the preservation of 
 those forces with which the men I am now mention- 
 ing impregnated a certain section of the press. Not 
 even the closer intercourse of late between periodical 
 art and letters on this and on the other side of 
 Dover's Straits would, apart from Arthur k Beckett's 
 and his colleagues' influences, adequately explain 
 the fresh turn given to journalism and illustration 
 blocks. 
 
 When, about 1873, Captain Hamber ceased to 
 
246 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 serve the Standard, his personal friend and office 
 workfellow, D. Morier Evans, went with him. The 
 preparatory knell of this departure may perhaps 
 have been detected in the stoppage of the old 
 Morning Herald, quite at the end of the sixties. 
 From the year when the Standard became a penny 
 morning paper the historic Herald had really ceased 
 to have an independent existence. The news was 
 the same in the penny and in the threepenny 
 journal. The leading articles alone were different, 
 while even those which the editor thought best suited 
 for the staider audience of the threepenny broadsheet 
 did duty afterwards in the penny afternoon print. 
 The ostensible reason for the Herald's discontinuance 
 was the concentration of Shoe Lane talent upon the 
 cheaper and more youthful journal. The Standard 
 staff was, and had for some years been, a very 
 strong one. Alfred Austin had already distinguished 
 himself in poetry by works which still live, grave 
 or gay, satirical or sentimental ; had more recently 
 published in heroic couplets. The Season, as well 
 as My Satire and its Censors. In prose, his very 
 lively, if rather irreverent, letter to the editor 
 of the Saturday Review had delighted many. In 
 this, the proverbially gruff conductor was ironically 
 addressed: "My dear Cook," on the ground that 
 his sensitive and overflowing bon hommie would be 
 
Papers which have Passed. 247 
 
 offended by a more formal style. In a graver tone, 
 Alfred Austin's Poetry of the Period had commanded 
 attention, and challenged criticism from its first 
 appearance in Temple Bar. Good reason was there 
 for Mr. Disraeli publicly to congratulate Austin on 
 his having again demonstrated what Byron had 
 shown before him, — that the prose writer can have 
 no better training than the poet's school. 
 
 Percy Greg, son of William Rathbone Greg, 
 combined some of his father's ability with other 
 characteristics entirely his own. Horace St. John, 
 nearly, or quite, the last surviving member of a 
 journalistic family, retained, amid growing years and 
 failing health, some of his pen's former fun and 
 freshness. George Painter was not without humour 
 in his composition, and was a trustworthy writer 
 upon Church questions, or on the issues raised by 
 denominational teaching in primary schools. H. E. 
 Watts, as editor of the Melbourne Argus, and in the 
 course of world-wide travels, had acquired varied 
 minute, and not inaccurate, knowledge, which he 
 could always focus effectively and express vigor- 
 ously on any subject allotted to him. Here, too, 
 the fact should be emphasised that those views of 
 Colonial policy and Imperial Federation which, 
 after he became Prime Minister, Disraeli espoused, 
 were curiously like the echoes of innumerable 
 
248 Platform, Press, Politics md Play. 
 
 articles written by Watts under Hamber's editor- 
 ship in the Standard. Especially the Imperial 
 Customs' Bond advocated by the statesman at the 
 Crystal Palace banquet on Whit-Monday, 1872, as 
 Colonial self-government's patriotic pre-requisite, 
 had been suggested verbally by this writer in the 
 Shoe Lane journal. Together with Hamber and 
 Watts, I chanced to be present upon this occasion. 
 We were all sitting near the Conservative orator. 
 When he declared in so many words for Imperial 
 Confederation with a Customs' guarantee, Hamber, 
 with natural exultation, said to Watts : " By Jove ! 
 That's our thunder." Disraeli overheard the too 
 audible whisper, smiled, and a minute or two later, 
 as I recollect, beckoned Hamber to come and sit 
 beside him. 
 
 No newspaper ever boasted a more safe-footed 
 publicist than Burton Blyth ; unusually well read in 
 the minutice of the century's domestic politics, as 
 well as a regular student from the continental press 
 and through other indigenous media of foreign 
 politics, especially those of the German States. 
 Finally, for all military questions, the Standard 
 then had at its disposal the gifted and exact pens 
 of the two brothers Brackenbury, Charles and 
 Henry, as well as of Colonel W. W. KnoUys, and 
 occasionally John or Henry Hozier. The staff. 
 
Papers which have Passed. 249 
 
 therefore, on which Alfred Austin had obtained a 
 prominent place was one of more than usual dis- 
 tinction. The writer richly deserved the honour. 
 
 Various tours de force by different journalists 
 have been witnessed during my press pilgrimage. 
 At the time when the first leader I ever wrote 
 appeared in the Daily Telegraph on the dangers of 
 the London streets, early in 1865, George Augustus 
 Sala, with whom at that time I was unacquainted, 
 seldom, I think, supplied daily less than two leaders 
 to Peterborough Court, and probably without trouble 
 could have accomplished much more were it not 
 that the wisely liberal proprietors of that paper, 
 whose literary adviser was then the ideally com- 
 petent Thornton Hunt, have not often applied the 
 spur to the willing horse. Some years later than 
 this, the Boxing Day crowds were discussing three 
 articles in that morning's Daily Telegraph, which 
 some of them seemed nearly to have learnt by heart. 
 These effusions were a leader, moralising on the 
 Saturnalia; a headed article, describing the 26th of 
 December observances witnessed by its writer from 
 Paris to Peru ; an account, critical, illustrative, 
 expository, of the Countess of Guiccioli's Memoirs 
 of Byron, then just out. In all some eight columns 
 were occupied with matter, each line of which was 
 readable, and likely to attract a fresh purchaser. 
 
250 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Every word of this had been penned by Mr. Sala, 
 then an invalid staying with friends at Wandsworth. 
 " It was," he said to a visitor at this retreat who 
 found him on his couch, " my Christmas Day's work 
 after the only Christmas Day dinner the doctor would 
 let me touch, — a mutton chop, and a bowl of bread 
 sauce." Side by side with this courageous feat may 
 be placed one of Alfred Austin's achievements. It 
 was in the long vacation's depths that Mrs. Beecher- 
 Stowe's appalling calumny against the bard whom 
 Heine called " the nineteenth century's greatest 
 elemental force" first saw the light. With Alfred 
 Austin, to read it was to begin to refute it. Within 
 a few hours of the slander's promulgation, the jour- 
 nalist in his Kentish study had completed an answer 
 to the American authoress, showing from internal 
 evidence the moral impossibility of the charge, 
 demonstrating by circumstantial testimony that 
 would have satisfied any jury the practical absence 
 even of a shadow of plausibility for the charge. 
 Next morning the Morning Herald and the Standard 
 gave, I think, ten columns to what was really a 
 masterpiece of forensic, not less than hterary, 
 defence. 
 
 Thomas Hamber may well, therefore, have felt 
 more than a business pang at his sudden separation 
 from his Standard staff. With characteristic pluck. 
 
Papers which have Passed. 251 
 
 he pulled himself up after the bad fall, shook him- 
 self together, and with D. Morier Evans fitted out 
 a new venture upon journalism's vexed sea. The 
 condition of things in Shoe Lane was then one of 
 transition, and the historic newspaper was conducted 
 by its proprietor's commissioners. The presiding 
 power over its politics was the present Sir, then 
 Mr., J. E. Gorst. The titular editor was Mr. James 
 Johnstone the younger, but as in newspapers like 
 other matters, power gravitates to the side of 
 knowledge, the real editors were this gentleman's 
 two advisers, Mr. Burton Blyth, and my old friend 
 Mr. A. P. Sinnett, formerly the Allahabad Pioneer's 
 conductor, and, esoteric Buddhism notwithstanding, 
 a first-rate newspaper hand. 
 
 My own services seemed, under this provisional 
 regime, superfluous in Shoe Lane. When, there- 
 fore, preparations for the Hour, under the Hamber- 
 Evans duumvirate, were complete, I gladly accepted 
 the opening, and with my own pen wrote the first 
 leader which ever appeared in the new print, as 
 well as probably the last, with several hundreds 
 between. The Conservative Day's failure some 
 few years earlier ought perhaps to have deterred 
 the Hour's promoters from their experiment. But 
 the new paper might have supplied a real want, 
 while had it done so, the promised accessions of 
 
252 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 capital which were alone needed would surely not 
 have been wanting. Mr. Johnstone had been for 
 years a close friend of Mansel, who, by '74, had 
 become Dean of St. Paul's. Mr. Johnstone, junior, 
 at Mansel's College, St. John's, had drunk deeply 
 of Laudian orthodoxy alike in Church and State. 
 Evangelical Anglicans complained bitterly of non- 
 representation in the organ to which they naturally 
 turned. The popularity of the Pall Mall Gazette's 
 "Occasional Notes" and short informal studies of 
 current events had warned newspaper managers of 
 the public's weariness with the regulation three- 
 paragraph leader, the conventional "three-decker" 
 of journalism, as it might be called. Only a year 
 before English and Irish Protestantism of the Orange 
 hue had secured the defeat of Mr. Gladstone's Uni- 
 versity Bill in the House of Commons. Ostensibly 
 the Hour was Evangelical Protestantism's organ. 
 In this capacity it was, during the period of the 
 Public Worship Bill, conducted by Hamber with 
 great ability. But suiBcient pains were not taken 
 to secure the platform thus obtained; nor was 
 adequate attention paid to the demands or humours, 
 often, no doubt, unreasonable, of the Hour's 
 Evangelical patrons on both sides of St. George's 
 Channel. 
 
 Again, instead of great, if not exclusive, promi- 
 
Papers which have Passed. 253 
 
 nence being given, as would have been wise, to the 
 short paragraph, the traditional leader, of what I 
 have called the "three-decker" kind, was per- 
 petuated. Even thus, the Hour did not want 
 encouragement or promise. No more genial manager 
 than Mr. Evans ever handed contributor a cheque. 
 But he was a man of over-sanguine temperament. 
 The pecuniary basis on which the paper rested 
 was from the first too narrow. Nor was it easy 
 at a moment's notice to find the fresh supplies 
 wanted to pay the daily printer's bill. Hamber 
 possessed many of the qualities which mark a born 
 leader of men, or half-a-dozen times his printers in 
 the composing room at Clerkenwell where the paper 
 was set up would have stopped short in their work, 
 rent him in pieces, and abruptly discontinued the 
 journal. The editor's personal friends, many of them 
 far from being capitalists, rallied round him loyally, 
 I remember to this day a gallant officer of Indian 
 Horse, who had heard of our difficulties, after a 
 good night at whist in the Junior, driving down 
 in the small hours to the Clerkenwell office and 
 producing a bag of notes and gold for Hamber to 
 pay his men. Other subsidies more substantial 
 were not wanting from time to time. John Bruce 
 Norton, a retired Madras judge, living comfort- 
 ably at Kilburn, placed his banker's balance at 
 
254 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 his friend's disposal. General Cunningham, also an 
 Anglo-Indian of great literarf power, was equally 
 open-handed with purse and pen at this hour of 
 need. Subsequently, the efforts of J. Lowry Whittle 
 commended the Hour to a Scotch capitalist and 
 Protestant champion, Colonel Macdonald. His 
 clerical henchman was a Scotch divine named 
 Badenoch, a typical Piresbyterian clergyman. 
 
 If only as a study of character, the meetings 
 between the Hour's ultra - Evangelical proprietors 
 and not in all cases equally Evangelical staff were 
 highly entertaining. Captain Hamber inherited 
 Wyndham's and other celebrities' tastes for cock- 
 fighting. He sometimes, in his pocket, carried back 
 to his house at Chiswick, game fowls which he had 
 purchased in view of some coming match. The 
 committee managing the paper's finances at this 
 time met in the Council Room of the National 
 Club, Whitehall. On such an occasion one of his 
 belligerent birds escaped from Hamber's person, and 
 strutting across the green-baize table, began to spur 
 at the ruddy nose of the Scotch minister. The 
 game-cock was instantly recaptured by its owner, 
 but the incident, I fear, did not conduce to the 
 newspaper's fortunes. Next to this, a Mr. McDougal, 
 of Bath, financed the paper with a view to opposing 
 and exposing Baron Albert Grant, of Erie and 
 
Papers which have Passed. 255 
 
 Leicester Square fame. When, shortly afterwards, 
 the Hour got into the-, hands of one of the press 
 associations, its days were numbered. Much good 
 work would be found in an excavated file of the 
 defunct sheet. Mr. Spencer Walpole, whose History 
 to-day ranks with Lord Stanhope's, the late Louis 
 J. Jennings, the surviving E. D. J. Wilson, all 
 occasionally contributed to the last rival in Con- 
 servative journalism by which the Standard will 
 probably ever be confronted. 
 
 \ \v 
 
CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 LIONS AND LIONESSES IN THE SIXTIES AND SINCE. 
 
 A notable Royal Academy ppesEi day. First sight of GeoFge 
 Eliot and G. H. Lewes. Adoration giyen to tlie novelist by 
 tlie crowd and by celebrities present. George Eliot's weekly 
 receptions in the N. W. district. Ceremonial homage of com- 
 pany. Mrs. Oliphant, the gaest of Lawrence Lockhart at 
 luncheon. Lady writers in Hew Burlington Street; Mrs. 
 Riddell, Miss Florence Marryat, novelist, and "London 
 Society's" editress. George Bentley's great tact shown in 
 " Life of Lord Westbnry," and dealings with Bethell family. 
 
 TOWARDS the sixties' close or the seventies* 
 beginning, I can recall at the Royal Academy, 
 not the so-called "private vievi^" day, but that 
 which has of late become much what the private 
 view used to be — the first of the critics' or press 
 inspections. In the portion of the room where 
 I chanced to be, the objects of universal and 
 reverent gaze were no chef d'ceuvre by Millais or 
 Leighton ; only a gentleman and lady, neither of them 
 longer young, both, I think, wearing glasses, each 
 showing in their expression something of the facial 
 similarity that years of mutual admiration are said 
 to produce on human features. The lady's counte- 
 
 256 
 
Lions and Lionesses in the Sixties. 257 
 
 nance, like her companion's, was unusually elongated, 
 with the same intellectual brow which he possessed. 
 If, with all respect to an illustrious memory, it may 
 be said, the lady, as she stalked to and fro where the 
 crowd was thinnest, might have reminded one of the 
 Cumsean Sibyl ; while the visage's length almost 
 suggested the head of an Arab steed advanced in 
 years. Royal personages would not have been 
 received with the respect that from the spectacled 
 spinsters, simpering curates, and double eye-glassed 
 savants, of which the company on these occasions is 
 chiefly composed, followed or preceded this remark- 
 able couple, wherever they went. The lady dropped 
 a fragment of paper that may, I imagine, at one time 
 have contained a sandwich. Quick as thought a 
 Cambridge don, smooth shaven, ashen hued, darted 
 forward, snatched up the precious relic, placed it in 
 his pocket-book, pressed it adoringly to that part of 
 his person where his heart may have been. 
 
 At a respectful distance there came behind, a 
 short, sturdy, middle-aged beau, whom long after 
 this I knevy as Robert Browning. The poet stopped 
 short, and in tones of confidential devotion said to 
 a great painter by his side, "She" (meaning the lady) 
 "has the nose of Dante, the miauth of Savonarola, 
 and the mind of Plato." Awe-stricken, the painter 
 reprovingly rejoined, "Hush! She speaks!" Subse- 
 
 17 
 
258 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 quently, through the introduction of the ever-kindly, 
 and since his death universally abused, Edward 
 Pigott, I was to enjoy the opportunity of presentation 
 to Mr. and Mrs. Lewes, as George Eliot and her 
 companion were called. They were living in a little 
 house, not far from poor Pigott's bachelor tenement 
 in the St. John's Wood district, which, at the time 
 now spoken of, was for the most part perhaps more 
 of a Cyprian, less of an artistic, region than it is 
 to-day. The etiquette dominating the premises 
 sacred to her who wrote Adam Bede, and to him 
 who tried to popularise Comte, was overpoweringly 
 severe. The Positivist himself, with an air of 
 worshipping proprietorship, met his guests on the 
 threshold, and with something between a nod and a 
 sigh signified that here a hat might be left, there an 
 umbrella deposited ; or that yonder was a vase for 
 receiving the votive flowers sacred to the goddess, 
 which visitors often brought. Inside the chamber 
 wherein She sat, a space was marked off, behind 
 which the neophytes were not permitted to go. 
 Initiated bystanders informed those resorting for the 
 first time to the shrine, that only after probationary 
 years could the rite of presentation, if ever, arrive. 
 Pigott, the household's "tame cat," had of course 
 long enjoyed this privilege. To a per centage of 
 candidates it never came at all. Though they had 
 
Lions and Lionesses in the Sixties. 259 
 
 seen the Sibyl in her splendour, they were not per- 
 mitted by her possessor to touch her garment's 
 hem. 
 
 Business combined strangely with adoration in 
 these high St. John's Wood functions. Competing 
 publishers from Cornhill, Covent Garden, or the 
 Modern Athens, bluntly, but successfully, insinuated 
 themselves into the pious crowd. Philosophers, too, 
 of the school whose High Priestess she was, there 
 were. Mr. Beesly is likely to have been a not 
 often absent votary. Darwin, before and after his 
 apotheosis, worshipped in the same temple. Mr. 
 Frederick Harrison, as well as the other distinguished 
 remnants of the old Westminster Review, were not 
 often to be missed ; while a little later there might 
 have been within the sacred enclosure, Mr. F. W. 
 Myers, Mr. W. T. Stead, and other equally august 
 pundits of psychical or Telepathic research. But 
 as yet Mr. Myers was only known as a very distin- 
 guished Fellow of Trinity, Cambridge, among his 
 year's best classical scholars ; writer of the most 
 graceful essay on Virgil ever published in England. 
 As for Mr. Oscar Browning, he was simply a very 
 useful Eton master, if he had by this time taken his 
 degree. Mr. John Morley had no doubt long since 
 been admitted to the beatific vision in the St. John's 
 Wood drawing-room ; Mr. Tyndall may have weekly 
 
 17 * 
 
ago Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 worshipped before the same divinity. More than this, 
 it may with some confidence be said that the last 
 named gentleman did not do. It was not his philo- 
 sophic conceptions which affected George Eliot's 
 post-Bedian vocabulary, but her own sympathy with 
 the physical research of her accomplished consort. 
 Tyndall was a year or so younger than the authoress 
 of Romola. Before his authority was established. 
 Miss Evans's later style had been formed. As 
 George Henry Lewes exchanged German mysticism 
 for physical studies, so the lady's diction mingled 
 the laboratory's tropes with its own picturesque and 
 native imagery. By the time the authoress developed 
 these later peculiarities, she was far beyond criticism's 
 power to reclaim or correct. 
 
 Though Dickens was still alive, it would have 
 been flat blasphemy to question her claim to be 
 considered the first of English novelists. Even so 
 sound and shrewd a literary judge as the late 
 Mr. John Blackwood acquiesced in those verbal 
 eccentricities of the novelist which in a less exalted 
 writer he would have denounced as solecisms. 
 Especially, I recollect on one occasion when Danief 
 Deronda appeared, did the great Scotch publisher 
 maintain that the epithet " dynamic " as appUed to 
 a lady's expression of face was not only permissible 
 but transcendantly appropriate. What, therefore. 
 
Lions and Lionesses in the Sixties. 261 
 
 may really surprise one is, less that George Eliot 
 became confirmed in some verbal mannerisms, than 
 that these were not many more than they actually 
 were. Dickens, apropos of his name's recent men- 
 tion, was, it should be said, not only George Eliot's 
 literary admirer, but the first discoverer of her sex 
 and actual identity. The former revealed itself to 
 him in the description of " Hetty Sorrell " at her 
 looking-glass. The latter was thus humorously 
 intimated in a letter which I have seen from his 
 daughter to Edmund Yates: "Papa declares .4 ^am 
 Bede's writer to be either Bradbury or Evans, and he 
 doesn't think it's Bradbury." 
 
 Other mistresses with their pen in the domain of 
 fiction had social vogue, or personal appreciation, 
 before and since the St. John's Wood Eliot-Evans- 
 Lewes cultus. The work done by the gifted lady 
 who wrote The Chronicles of Carlingford, if it has not 
 secured quite the same reverential reception, will 
 probably be read, while George Eliot's works are 
 studied. Mrs. Oliphant condescended to meet ordi- 
 nary mortals as one of their own flesh and blood. 
 When I knew him slightly, the clever writer of Double 
 and Quits, Mine and Thine, etc., Lawrence Lockhart, 
 had chambers in Arlington Street. Here Mrs. 
 Oliphant would sometimes make one of a small 
 luncheon party. It was a relief then to some to find 
 
262 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 themselves, after prostration before the St. John's 
 Wood Sibyl, in the company of one who wished to 
 be no more than a bright, gracious, brave, and intelli- 
 gent woman. Some years were to elapse before I 
 was to make the acquaintance of a lady who, for the 
 variety and finish of her achievements with her pen, 
 had few rivals, and I think no superiors. 
 
 Mrs. Lynn Linton is the true precursor of the 
 period's lady journalists. Under Douglas Cook, she 
 wrote for the Morning Chronicle with the barbed 
 delicacy of her own, with the punctuality and 
 precision of the opposite, sex. No single article 
 in my day ever produced the same effect as the 
 Girl of the Period in the Saturday Review, of which 
 a single publisher reprinted 40,000 copies, while 
 the sixties were running their course. Within a 
 few weeks of its appearance, bonnets, parasols, 
 chignons, every variety of feminine bravery were 
 called after this epoch-making essay. While I write, 
 I hear that Mr. du Maurier's Trilby is proving, 
 in latter-day parlance, a " boon " at that Hub of the 
 universe, Boston. Such a sensation was not less 
 anticipated by Mrs. Linton's paper, than was the 
 "New Woman" herself. Henry Vizetelly, though 
 well stricken in years, was then a dominating, very 
 kindly and helpful figure in Strand or Fleet Street 
 precincts. In less than three months he had started 
 
Lions and Lionesses in the Sixties. 263 
 
 a weekly print on much the same lines as the Realm 
 of to-day, called the Girl of the Period. Additional 
 piquancy was given to the journal's style by the fact 
 that the publishing counter in the Catherine Street 
 office was presided over by a prepossessing young 
 woman, in whom the public was audaciously bidden 
 to detect the fair original described by the Saturday 
 Reviewer. Still Mrs. Linton did not seem to expect 
 more homage than the amenities of polite wont pre- 
 scribed for her sex. A little later, having acquired 
 her local colour from visits to Cornwall, where Daniel 
 Gomme's spirit still haunts the Bodmin moors, as 
 well as from her Paris observations during the Com- 
 mune, she electrified the town with Joshua Davidson. 
 This work had deservedly no less sincere admirers 
 than Miss Evans's Florentine masterpiece. Yet Mrs. 
 Linton never, I think, posed as more than human ; 
 was the frequent, as always the welcome, guest at Dr. 
 and Mrs. Priestley's in Mayfair, or at Mr. and Mrs. 
 G. H. Lewis's in Portland Place. She even con- 
 descended to grace the hospitable board of Sir Bruce 
 Seton in company with her exceedingly clever sister 
 of the pen, Mrs. Hector. 
 
 Another lady novelist who figures during this 
 epoch is Miss de la Ramee, better even yet known by 
 her now, de guerre of " Ouida." This lady, with her 
 excellent mother, had rooms in the Langham Hotel 
 
264 Platformj Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 when I was first honoured with an invitation to her 
 Monday receptions* The card bore the inscription, 
 "Causeries intimes, cigarettes permises." Here, too, 
 there was none of the quasi-religious ceremonial 
 characterising the reunions of the Middlemarch 
 divinity. Nor was the company exclusively literary 
 in its personnel. Arthur d Beckett, then,, as upon 
 many othfer occasions and in many other places, my 
 introducer, adequately represented working journal- 
 ism. Sir Frederick Johnstone imparted to the 
 company by his presence the same flavour of sport 
 and society which animates the hostess's books. 
 Mr. John Delacour supplied another needful element 
 of fashion ; Serjeant Ballantine, whom I have already 
 at length described, who had not yet entered his 
 decadence, passed the cigarettes untouched, but 
 greatly enlivened us all with his causeries of bench 
 and bar, judge and jury, circuit and court. A well- 
 informed litterateur, Mr. Lionel Robinson, appeared 
 to be in the secrets of all the publishers' parlours from 
 Paternoster Row to Piccadilly. A very handsome 
 elderly American, Frank Stone, connected, if I mis- 
 take not, with the well-known Paris bankers, Monro, 
 had seen something of diplomacy, commerce, and 
 society, in many latitudes, nor always confined him- 
 self within the limits of personal experience. Mr. 
 James Molloy must have been another of the Langham 
 
Lions and Lionesses in the Sixties. .265 
 
 habitues. For when the novelist's "at home" was 
 over, I was amiably hurried off to Spanish Place, 
 where Archbishop Manning, not yet a Cardinal, 
 received his faithful disciples long before his official 
 residence at Westminster was built. I had never 
 been in the presence before of a high Roman Catholic 
 -dignitary. Observing the mode was to touch with 
 one's lips the Archiepiscopal digit, I made the lowest 
 reverence as I paid my homage. Alas ! nothing was 
 sacred to my cicerone. As I bent myself double, 
 Arthur k Beckett, in a whisper which the priest must 
 have heard, most unsympathetically said, " Don't 
 grovel any more ! " 
 
 The premises of No. 8 New Burlington Street 
 ■were not only of historic memory, but had in my 
 days the social and literary interest of living 
 actuality. Mr. Richard Bentley was, when I first 
 knew it, still the head of the famous firm. His 
 son, George Bentley, spoken of in those days as 
 "young Mr. George," was that chief of his house 
 who survived vigorously till well into the current 
 nineties. This gentleman combined with his sound 
 judgment, so far as concerns three-volume novels, 
 a real interest in literature, a particular tact .and 
 skill in diagnosing or encouraging authoresses whose 
 domain happened to be fiction. Mrs. Riddell, writer 
 of George Geith, Miss Rhoda Broughton, were only 
 
266 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 some among the clever women whom in his courtly, 
 yet shrewd, way, George Bentley had discovered, 
 even perhaps started on their career. A special 
 instance may be given of this gentleman's combined 
 adroitness and amiability. In 1885, I think, he was 
 announced to publish a Life of Lord Westbury by a 
 Mr. Nash. The great Chancellor's two surviving 
 children, Mr. Slingsby Bethell and Mrs. Adamson 
 Parker, came to me in some trepidation, imploring 
 me to dissuade the New Burlington Street Sosiiis 
 from fulfilling the project ; hinting with some ani- 
 mation at legal injunctions to enforce their wish. 
 Personal intercourse was at once easily established 
 by me between the family and the publisher. In 
 two interviews George Bentley disposed of all their 
 objections, and when he found Mr. Nash to be 
 insufficiently equipped for his task, secured, in 
 addition to the consent, the co-operation of the 
 Bethells. Thanks to Mrs. Adamson Parker's graphic 
 contributions, the volume that was to have been 
 vetoed proved a substantial success. These diplo- 
 matic qualities, perhaps, caused George Bentley tO' 
 be so happy in his management of lady writers. 
 The particular ornament of that class with whom 
 I had to do on his premises was Miss Florence 
 Marryat. This lady had been appointed, in succes- 
 sion to Henry Blackburn, London Society's editor. 
 
Lions and Lionesses in the Sixties. 267 
 
 Blackburn himself, during several years, was a most 
 agreeable chief to work under. His fair successor 
 perpetuated Mr. Blackburn's best traditions. Co- 
 operating with Winchester Clowes, the printer, and 
 the magazine's owner, this lady proved among the 
 best literary women of business whose commands 
 it has ever been my privilege to obey. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 MAGAZINE EDITORS AND WRITERS IN THE 
 SEVENTIES. 
 
 John HaxweH as publisher, of an extinct class; appearance, 
 character. Starts " Belgrairia" under editorship of Mrs. 
 Maxwell, nSe Braddon. The "Belgratria" banquet at the 
 Langham Hotel; company sketched — especially the "Globe" 
 representatives, R. H. Patterson, Mortimer Collins. F. C. 
 Burnand, H. J. Bryon. Edward Spender, Francis Hitchman, 
 of the " Western Horning News." The " London Magazine," 
 edited by Samuel Lucas, of the "Times." Bonamy Price, 
 George Dallas and other writers for it. Miss Glyn, the 
 actress : on the stage and in society. " Fraser's HagaEine " 
 —published by Longmans, edited by J. A. Froude. William 
 Longman in business and in society. J. A. Froude in and out 
 of the editorial chair. Froude's friendship with Gladstone, 
 with Disraeli, and Lord Carnarvon. Undertakes South 
 African mission,— reasons for its not improbable success. 
 
 THIS seems a convenient place to mention cer- 
 tain results flowing from my connection with 
 the deceased Reader. When, on the introduction of 
 that periodical's publisher, James Bohn, I first 
 knew the late John Maxwell, he was living in 
 Mecklenburgh Square, in temporary retirement, 
 ■while domestic affliction was still heavy upon him. 
 One of the early pioneers of cheap publishing, he 
 
 268 
 
Magazine Editors and Wnters. 269 
 
 had more in common with the Bungay, and Bacon 
 of Pendennis than with the elegant Sosii of to-day. 
 Hearty of manner, loud of voice, demonstratively 
 Hibernian at times in his accentuation. He proved 
 to me during many years one of the most satisfac- 
 tory magazine proprietors with whom I have ever 
 done business. I have heard some persons give a 
 less favourable account of him. I do not believe 
 they or anyone had just reason for complaint against 
 John Maxwell. He was not, indeed, a person of 
 superficial polish ; nor did he pretend to take other 
 than the commercial view of magazine "copy." But 
 he knew what it would pay him to put before the 
 public. Towards those who could supply this com- 
 modity he was fairly liberal and entirely loyal. 
 G. A. Sala would, I think, support me in this view 
 of our departed friend. I remember at least that 
 one of Maxwell's commissions to me was to expose 
 in his monthly, Belgravia, the attack made upon 
 Mr. Sala by the late Hain Friswell. John Maxwell's 
 latterday magazine just mentioned was started 
 towards the sixties' close, under the titular editor- 
 ship of Miss Braddon, whom he subsequently 
 married. A " banquet " at the Langham Hotel, 
 with the editress president, inaugurated the periodi- 
 cal. Never was a hospitable publisher in a more 
 congenial element of honest delight. Ladies and 
 
270 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 gentlemen who had long since made their names 
 with their pens, or who awaited the opportunity of 
 doing so; actors, minor poets of various degrees, 
 artists, playwrights, amateur or professional, were 
 in the miscellaneous crowd. 
 
 The two most entertaining contributors to the 
 contemporary stage, Henry J. Byron and Frank C. 
 Burnand, were both there. The former had some- 
 thing of the facial distinction belonging to the poet 
 whose blood flowed in his latterday namesake's 
 veins. Whether in social conversation at the 
 dinner-table, or in speaking his own dramatic 
 dialogue on the stage, he introduced the drollest 
 sayings with the gravest air. While he was uttering 
 them, not a smile's suspicion irradiated his dark 
 eyes and clearly-chiselled features at the very 
 moment he was about to convulse the company 
 with some exceptionally paradoxical pleasantry, or 
 intrepidly preposterous pun. He had not, perhaps, 
 quite the polished man-of-the-world air which has 
 come to Frank Cowley Burnand as the result of an 
 Eton and Cambridge training in earlier days, even 
 more, perhaps, than of his varied and sparkling life 
 in later. 
 
 As might have been expected under John Max- 
 well's shrewd management, London, like provincial, 
 journalism was represented adequately at the Belgra- 
 
Magazine Editors and Writers. 271 
 
 via banquet. G. A. Sala, to whom the host had ever 
 proved a staunch friend, was unavoidably absent. 
 But the Globe furnished two or three of the craft's 
 characteristic representatives. That newspaper had 
 not long since been acquired by a Devonshire man, 
 Charles Wescomb. He was the successful architect 
 of his own fortunes ; an unpolished, honest citizen, 
 favourably known to Sir Stafford Northcote and 
 other Western squires. A little later he bought 
 also the Edinburgh Courant, placing his son in the 
 management, installing James Scot Henderson as 
 successor to Francis Espinasse in the editorial 
 chair. Wescomb himself then managed personally 
 his London property. The Globe's editor was a 
 recognised authority on political economy; a 
 thoroughly capable publicist, R. H. Patterson. His 
 chief brilliant writer was Mortimer Collins, the 
 most picturesque figure who then trod the Strand, 
 as well as a real singer. His bluff, boisterous 
 manner suggested that of a big Newfoundland dog, 
 while he seemed to give as little thought to the 
 whereabouts of his night's lodging or the details of 
 his morning's toilet as one of those shaggily engaging 
 quadrupeds. When his week's work was done, he 
 retired for the Sunday to a little cottage he possessed 
 at Itnowl Hill, near Wargrave. But wherever he 
 went, slept, or dined, or wrote, there Bohemia was 
 
272 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 sure to be with him. His social articles on current; 
 topics were dashed off usually in the smoking- 
 room of the Strand hotel, taking its name from 
 Exeter Hall. No subject came amiss to him;- 
 he could deal with it quite as easily in verse as 
 in prose. 
 
 A Devonshire man, he had once taught in a school 
 near Exeter ; his pen was charged with local colour. 
 Nor did he hymn the summer Thames, with its 
 water-lilies and swans, less prettily than " white- 
 throated maidens" carolling under the Dawlish 
 cliffs, the mist-clad Tors of Dartmoor, or the shining 
 levels of Windermere. He dressed the part of poet 
 as well as he enacted it. No stove-pipe hat confined 
 his black, curly locks. His manly girth was not 
 imprisoned within the frock-coat of Bond Street. 
 A child of nature, he had an infant's or a savage's 
 taste for bright colours. A scarlet ribbon encircled 
 a Byronic shirt-collar, a purple or puce coloured 
 velvet jacket superseded " the customary suit of 
 solemn black." Sweet Anne Page, and such other 
 novels as he wrote, were a riot of sensuous ex- 
 uberance and animal spirits tempered by melodious 
 lyrics, into which the writer, upon any provocation, 
 or on none, perpetually broke forth. His books- 
 deserve to be remembered, though they are, I fear, 
 forgotten. A Letter to Disraeli in Popeian couplets 
 
Magazine Editors and Writers. 273 
 
 is a vigorous and diverting satire upon Household 
 Suffrage's parliamentary results: — 
 
 " Brewers and bankers, men of hideous omen, 
 Enormous fellows with immense abdomen ; 
 Flashy directors with their diamond rings. 
 Such are the sum of our six hundred kings." 
 
 This strange West of England bard's best brochure 
 was an extravaganza suggested by the Aristophanic 
 play, under the title, The British Birds. The de- 
 scriptions of Darwinism, Comtism, Positivism, and 
 their leading apostles were equal to anything written 
 by George Trevelyan during his humorous youth. 
 Amongst men of a bygone generation interested in 
 compositions like those wherein John Hookham 
 Frere and Canning excelled, no better judge existed 
 than Lord Lyons. Infinite was the amusement 
 which this diplomatist took in some of Collins' 
 verses ridiculing the latest neologies : — 
 
 " There was an ape in the days that were earlier : 
 Centuries passed, and his hair became curlier ; 
 Centuries more gave a thumb to his wrist. 
 Then he was Man and a Positivist." 
 
 Mr. Lowe (Lord SherbroOke), an expert in this kind 
 of writing, was not a too partial critic of any one. But 
 even his hard set lips relaxed into a smile when our 
 sometime French Ambassador read these and other 
 lines like them from Mortimer Collins' witty squib. 
 
 18 
 
274 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 The ablest writer or editor out of London con- 
 nected with the press between Tone and Tamar, 
 the late Edward Spender, partner of Mr. Saunders 
 in the Western Morning News, was, with his sub- 
 editor, among the Belgravia banquetters. Published 
 at Plymouth, the Western Morning News "stereos" 
 were sent down daily from the head offices in Hatton 
 Garden. This involved for Spender and his 
 adlatus, Francis Hitchman, attendance at their 
 business premises soon after four o'clock every 
 morning. The work was thus done not only at high 
 pressure, but at the most trying period of the twenty- 
 four hours. Never under such unfavourable circum- 
 stances has neater labour been turned out. Edward 
 Spender, besides being an elegant and incisive 
 writer, had a gift of sub-editorial collection, com- 
 pression, and adaptation, amounting to genius. 
 Largely due to his wide reading, sound taste and 
 quick perception is it that the Western Morning News 
 has presented, during successive decades, so clear 
 and faithful a picture of literary London's daily work 
 and doings. Mr. Saunders I did not know as well 
 as I knew Spender, but Francis Hitchman, like his 
 chief, was my intimate acquaintance, made first 
 at Maxwell's table ; nor were my opportunities of 
 appraising his performances few. A respectable 
 French and Spanish scholar, Hitchman showed his 
 
Magazine Editors and Writers. 275 
 
 general culture by an early article in Belgravia on 
 the French caricaturist Gavarni. Later he was the 
 Manchester Courier's chief writer under the brothers 
 Sowler's proprietorship. Nor were his considerable 
 services to the Conservative party with his pen in 
 Lancashire, as well as London, confined to news- 
 papers. He wrote a trustworthy, comprehensive 
 biography of Disraeli which, published by Chapman 
 and Hall, has perhaps supplied other authors with 
 information on the subject in a degree far exceeding 
 the amount of party recognition extended to the 
 book. 
 
 As for Belgravia itself, C. S. Cheltnam, 
 Leigh Hunt's son-in-law, an industrious pla5^wright, 
 and indefatigable adapter, was Miss Braddon's 
 editorial deputy, with whom my dealings chiefly 
 were; a tall, gaunt gentleman, not in the best of 
 health, who had known no less than most people of 
 literary life's ups and downs. Ashby Sterry, the 
 graceful and industrious society versifier as well as 
 pleasant essayist; Walter Thornbury, writer of 
 several rattling Cavalier war ballads ; Button Cook, 
 whose pen achieved in Hobson's Choice the first, 
 nearly the best, of those one volume novelettes, 
 which have since become so popular, were only a 
 few among other representative guests on a really 
 
 memorable occasion. 
 
 18 * 
 
276 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 At this time, however, periodical literature was 
 only one, and not altogether the most severe, of my 
 occupations. My private pupils, Oxford and other, 
 occupied most of the daytime. I had the satisfac- 
 tion of seeing one candidate for the Indian Civil 
 Service, trained after his Winchester days exclusively 
 by me, placed thirteenth in the successful list. This 
 gentleman's name is Trevor Chichele Plowden, who 
 has since filled the diplomatic office of British Resi- 
 dent at Bagdad. Others who, I think, did equally 
 well were Walter B. Church and J. S. Laurie, the 
 latter of whom, should he ever see this page, will 
 perhaps accept my thanks for a published volume of 
 his own verses which he was good enough to send 
 me. In my educational work, I was occasionally 
 thrown with Bonamy Price, formerly on Bishop 
 Tait's staff at Rugby, afterwards Political Economy 
 Professor at Oxford ; a vivacious gentleman with a 
 knack of highly pungent expression whether in con- 
 versation or in print. In a magazine called, I think, 
 the London, long since defunct, Bonamy Price had 
 written, not later than 1864, a surprisingly able and 
 interesting defence of classical education upon en- 
 tirely new and original lines. His editor on this 
 occasion was Samuel Lucas, an old Times man. One 
 of his chief contributors was George Dallas, also 
 attached to Printing House Square, and author of a 
 
Magazine Editors and Writers. 277 
 
 book on criticism entitled The Gay Science. Dallas, 
 a tall dark handsome person, with a fine forehead 
 and a distinguished air, was said to recall to those 
 who had known him, Sir Walter Scott's son-in-law, 
 Lockhart. However this may be, at Price's house 
 in Princes Gardens, where I sometimes met him, 
 he was by turns proudly reserved, and vivaciously 
 amusing. He had married the stately actress. Miss 
 Glyn. Husband and wife were not often seen in 
 society together, and on such occasions as I found 
 myself in the lady's society I was always Dr. West- 
 land Marston's guest in Regent's Park. She sur- 
 vived, I think, into almost the present decade. To 
 picture her to the memory is to call up an ideal 
 queen of tragedy. With no melting softness visible 
 in her moods, not much of distinctively feminine 
 grace in her manner, but with a majesty of mien, 
 and impressive inflections of voice, which produced 
 in drawing-rooms almost as great an effect as they 
 can have done upon the stage. 
 
 Another renowned actress. Miss Helen Faucit, 
 who also married an eminent man of letters, I have 
 in friendly society seen only at the little bachelor 
 abode of the late Dramatic Censor, Edward F. 
 Smyth-Pigott. That genial son of Somerset owed 
 his original appointment in the Lord Chamberlain's 
 office to Sir Theodore Martin. Of all famous 
 
278 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 writers whom I have encountered, none, I think, 
 can ever have showed to greater advantage than 
 this scholar and poet, whether on occasions of cere- 
 mony or in friendly coteries. Poor Pigott's house 
 was a little cottage in South Bank. The inscription 
 above its front door had been a favourite motto of 
 Bolingbroke's — Nee solitudo nee tumultus. 
 
 It would have been easier to realise the applica- 
 bility of the first substantive had it stood alone, 
 than to perceive the necessity for its qualification 
 by a denial of the second's attribute. Only twenty 
 minutes distant from Regent's Circus, the silence 
 of the spot was unbroken save by the sound of a 
 passing cab. Pigott modestly and pleasantly enter- 
 tained sometimes during the game season a few 
 friends at dinner. The only occasion on which I 
 was bidden to one of these little banquets the fare 
 consisted of pheasants, shot in those Brockley 
 coverts near Weston-super-Mare which had long 
 been owned by the Smyth- Pigott family. The two 
 chief guests were the great actress whom, as Helen 
 Faucit, I had once seen in " Rosalind " at Drury 
 Lane, and her distinguished husband. Lady Martin's 
 conversation has been more than once recalled to 
 me by echoes, as I have fancied, of it in her papers 
 on Shakespeare's heroines, familiar to readers of 
 Blackwood's Magazine. Our host's great knowledge 
 
Magazine Editors and Writersi 279 
 
 of French and other modern literatures, his gift of 
 graceful and pointed expression, were pleasantly 
 known to his friends while he lived, though they 
 have been, like his other good qualities, ignored 
 since he was dead. On the present occasion, 
 addressing himself specially to Martin, Pigott 
 cleverly explained the principles on which he ad- 
 ministered his most invidious office, and especially 
 set forth his views on the place occupied by divorce 
 in Paris and London so far as this institution's 
 different status on the two sides of the Channel 
 affected, in his judgment, national conceptions 
 about sins against the Seventh Commandment. 
 " With respect to French plays, such as Niniche or 
 Frou Frou, my idea," said Pigott, "is, so far as 
 possible, to exterritorialise a London theatre when 
 French plays are given ; to regard the Princess' or 
 the Haymarket as a portion of the Boulevards pro- 
 jected into London, and to adopt, so far as can be 
 done without violently wounding English prejudices, 
 a French standard. But," he explained, " in doing 
 thiSj it is necessary to remember that the roturiers 
 and demireps whom the tourist sees laughing at the 
 risky sentiments and salacious double entendres of a 
 smart Parisian playhouse do not fairly represent 
 the genuine French public. As to my office's neces- 
 sity, those only who have seen its archives can judge" 
 
28o Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 whether the public as a whole is yet ripe for an 
 absolutely free and unlicenced stage. Recollect, one 
 has to deal, not with the tolerably cultivated pit or 
 box occupiers at the West End, or with a gallery 
 chastened by proximity to these polite people, but 
 with cheap 'gaffs' and their peculiar patrons in 
 Whitechapel, Shoreditch, or the industrial capitals 
 of the provinces," 
 
 As he said these words, he produced two East 
 End playbills, with one or two from the Darlington 
 Theatre in Northumberland. Their contents were 
 of the Blueskin, blood-curdling description that 
 Board Schools were perhaps thought to have re- 
 formed out of existence. One of these programmes 
 introduced into an act of a proposed drama the 
 Wainwright murder. A prominent incident in 
 another was the slaughter of Mr. Briggs in the 
 Horley Tunnel by Lefroy. " Popular taste," con- 
 tinued our host, " does not forbid these representa- 
 tions of ' Medea slaying her children.' I have long 
 since seen enough to be quite sure that if the 
 State did not reserve to itself the right of pro- 
 hibiting stage offences against decency, there is 
 no wife mutilation or child strangling, or Divorce 
 Court scandal, which would not be represented 
 histrionically in some part of the Capital or the 
 Kingdom." 
 
Magazine Editors and Writers. 281 
 
 Since Edward Pigott's death, little but rancorous 
 abuse has been poured upon his memory by the very 
 people who were ever ready to profit by his kindliness 
 with respect to theatre admissions during his life. 
 The Daily News, on which Pigott once wrote, credit- 
 ably distinguished itself by some not inappreciative 
 remarks on his career. Two weekly journals, with 
 both of which Pigott formerly had a friendly — ^with 
 the proprieter of one, a socially intimate — relation, 
 almost vied with each other, directly he was dead, 
 in the bitterness of their attacks upon his preroga- 
 tive's exercise, for no other reason, as one might 
 suppose, than that Pigott's enemies were living and 
 potentially useful, while poor Pigott himself was 
 spent. 
 
 That Sir Theodore Martin could translate 
 Goethe not less happily than Horace was no 
 secret to me any more than to others before 
 this meeting at Pigott's table. There was, how- 
 ever, something of novelty's charm in the subtle 
 analysis by him of the exact nature of the influence 
 exercised by Horace upon many later poets of 
 different countries who would not at first seem to 
 be especially amenable to his charm. If the word 
 may be for a moment divested of the secondary 
 meaning with which magazine editors have in- 
 vested it, and restored to its original sense, the 
 
282 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 little dinner whereat it was my privilege to assist 
 beneath this Somerset worthy's roof might really 
 be called a symposium. 
 
 Fraser's Magazine has long since been swallowed 
 up by the smaller periodical bearing the family name 
 issued from the great house of Longmans. Between 
 the sixties and the date of its demise, I was frequently 
 employed upon the more historic periodical during its 
 editorship by J. A. Froude. To my old Bath friend, 
 the Rev. James Pycroft, I was indebted for my 
 introduction to the English historian who survived 
 ds late as 1894. William Longman was at once the 
 most stately and the most charming of the old-world 
 London publishers. Like his elder brother ThomaSj 
 of whom I knew less, he had a manner distinguished 
 without being pompous; a courteous word for all 
 he met ; a hand, like a tongue, ever ready to guide or 
 help the toilers of the pen. In his Hertfordshire 
 house at Berkhampstead he was a country gentle- 
 man of the orthodox kind, entertaining profusely, 
 though with discrimination. Round his dining-table 
 in Hyde Park Square there sat a succession of 
 guests whose names were household words through- 
 out Europe. Nor, during the statesman's later life, 
 had many people so intimate a knowledge of 
 Benjamin Disraeli as the publishers who produced 
 Lothair and all subsequent works by the same hand. 
 
Magazine Editors and Writers. 283 
 
 The first time I was presented to Froude was in his 
 publisher's house. Never afterwards did I see that 
 distinguished man to such advantage as then in gen- 
 eral societyi His manner was less constrained at Mr, 
 Longman's than elsewhere; his wit more gracious, 
 his irony less severe. Froude, I think, being favoured 
 with a highly competent deputy in the late William 
 AUingham, really enjoyed his editorial chair. His 
 method was to discuss personally with his con- 
 tributor any more important subject, to revise the 
 proof sheets very closely, but to make no material 
 alteration without consulting the writer. No one 
 could have met the actual historian without recog- 
 nising the abdicated priest. He seemed always to 
 me the very flower and quintessence of Oxford cul- 
 ture and social refinement. He may in confidential 
 talk have expressed himself with pathetic irony on 
 the decay of religious faith. He avoided every 
 word which could identify him with an aggressive 
 heterodoxy, and would, I am sure, as soon have 
 thought of disparaging the Anglican Church in a 
 company whose national Creed that Church embodied 
 as of attacking the institution of matrimony in a 
 society of wedded couples. 
 
 No one who had not been imbued with the same 
 intellectual influences which formed the mind of 
 Newman, of Church, of Jowett, could have written 
 
284 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 in the style of Froude. Less rattling than Macaulay, 
 with diction not so highly coloured, much more 
 difficult, therefore, to imitate, Froude owed to his 
 earlier training on the Isis a delicate sensibility to 
 subtly picturesque effects, and a skill in producing 
 them at will, which made the English tongue, 
 whether he spoke or wrote it, more like a thing of 
 life than it was when used by his great rival. As 
 Froude wrote, so he talked ; extracting, as it seemed, 
 from each syllable inscribed by his pen, or uttered 
 by his lips, a fresh significance, and a novel music. 
 A pleasing trait in his character and conversation 
 was the admiration with which he would dwell upon 
 the memory of his brother, Hurrell Froude. Long 
 after he had dropped his " Orders," and indeed to 
 the close of his life, he retained his intellectual 
 sympathies with the Tractarian school's founders, 
 and did not care to disguise his distrust of the 
 practical consequences in which extreme Evan- 
 gelicalism's indifference to good works might con- 
 ceivably issue. Patriotism he declared to be the 
 most essential mode of national righteousness. His 
 Oxford experiences had communicated to him an 
 abiding faith that the views of Andrews rather than 
 Simeon were likely to prove the parent of good 
 citizenship. This common legacy of their University 
 training was really the link of amity between Glad- 
 
Magazine Editors and Writers, 285 
 
 stone and Froude. When the atatesman whose 
 sympathy with oppressed nationalities the historian 
 admired spoke disparagingly of the Imperial idea, 
 that central article of Froude's faith, in private as 
 well as in public, Froude plainly told him that 
 henceforth he himself would be found on Disraeli's 
 side. The visits which were once paid to Hawarden 
 were in future transferred to Hughenden. The 
 editor of Eraser's satirical instinct often repelled at 
 first those whom he met ; but no man ever improved 
 so much on acquaintance as this great artist of the 
 prose pen. 
 
 The community of academic sentiment explains 
 also the friendly intimacy between Froude and the 
 late Lord Carnarvon. Nor could the then Colonial 
 Secretary have chosen a better agent than Froude 
 for promoting Imperial Confederation in our African 
 colonies. The scheme failed, not because its 
 English advocate lacked the sweet reasonableness 
 or tact needful for its championship, or the personal 
 prestige which 'could best have enforced its claims; 
 but because local politicians at the Cape settle- 
 ment, and near it, preferred the assurance of 
 notoriety in a colonial vestry to the possibility of 
 distinction in an Imperial Senate. When, there- 
 fore, the measure was introduced at Westminster, 
 the public opinion necessary to propel the project 
 
286 Platform, Press, Politics and Play, 
 
 through the Legislature had not been generated. 
 Thus, through no fault of any individual, least 
 of all Carnarvon's or Froude's, an organic pro- 
 ject of Imperial reform dvdndled into a mere 
 "enabling act." 
 
CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 BEHIND THE SCENES — POLITICAL AND SOCIAL. 
 (1868, &C.) 
 
 The Irish Church Bill criBis, 1868. Personal interviev with 
 Archhighop Tait at Lambeth, while he was engaged in its 
 settlement. The " Times " at this crisis distances all other 
 papers. J. T. Delane as an editor. Bishop Wilberforce, 
 Honckton Hilnes, in a country house. An Episcopal cross- 
 country ride— trisitation and sermon. Honckton Hilnes and 
 the Bishop. The question, the jampot, and admitted egotism. 
 Bishop Wilberforce disappointed about Canterbury. Delane 
 in Seqeant's Inn and in Fleet Street. The " Times " writers; 
 amongst them Abraham Hayward. Hayward's character- 
 istics, Wiltshire birth, family connections, and secret of 
 extraordinary influence. The Broadlands visit. Lord 
 Palmerston on the practice of the Churches. Delane on 
 daily newspaper burdens. 
 
 DURING the summer of '68, the parliamentary 
 crisis in the Irish Church Bill occurred. A 
 fatal collision between the two Houses was immi- 
 nent. Hamber, then the Standard's editor, living in 
 an old house near Kew Gardens, had summoned 
 one or two of his contributors to instruct them as to 
 the line they should take up in tieir articles. The 
 private friendship between the then Archbishop of 
 Canterbury, Dr. Tait, and my father secured me 
 access to the Primate at the turning point in the 
 
 287 
 
288 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 fortunes of the Gladstonian Measure. In Parliament 
 and on platform, Tait's eloquence was not less 
 commanding than his figure was impressive. At 
 his own table, especially to those who, hke my 
 father, had known him almost from youth; to his 
 former pupils or to his old Rugby colleagues, such 
 as Bonamy Price, the Archbishop abounded in 
 charm. To younger men, like myself, he seemed 
 somewhat donnish and constrained, though generally 
 courteous, and upon occasions condescending to 
 humorous talk. But in a successor of Augustine, a 
 very little of very mild fun goes a long way. Dr. 
 Tait's drollery was not pitched often in a higher 
 key than chaplains and the subordinate clergy could 
 best appreciate. On the present occasion when I 
 was admitted to his study at Lambeth, he seemed 
 preternaturally grave, and, of course, diplomatically 
 cautious. That he had seen the Sovereign at 
 Windsor I did not know, but spoke to him as if I 
 had been aware of it, trusting thereby to obtain 
 from him further declarations. His Grace did not 
 quite gratify my expectation, but at length volun- 
 teered a purely personal opinion that the difficulty 
 between the two Houses might be adjusted satis- 
 factorily. Quintilian, he reminded me, had defined 
 gesture as the first, second, and third requisite in 
 oratory. " There are," drily said the Primate, 
 
Behind the Scenes. 289 
 
 "those who think compromise fills a like place in 
 legislation." 
 
 The details of this episode in the Irish Church 
 Bill's history have been given for the first time fully 
 in Dr. Tait's biography published a year or two ago, 
 to which, containing, as this work does, all that, 
 and more than, I contrived to elicit froni His Grace 
 of Canterbury, readers may be referred. Then, as 
 now, the Times, with its accuracy of private in- 
 formation, contrived to distance every competitor in 
 the press ; and on the Monday following the 
 Sabbath when the crisis was most severe, indicated 
 in an inspired article the solution that was about 
 to be effected at the Queen's wish through the 
 Primate's mediation. With the exception of a 
 marriage advertisement, I never penned a line in this 
 great newspaper. 
 
 Staying, however, in a country house about that 
 period within the Bishop of Oxford's diocese, I was, 
 by Dr. Wilberforce, introduced to J. T; Delane, 
 who happened to be of the company. The bishop 
 was then, as always, fond of riding on horseback} 
 though his seat was far from good, and his arms' 
 action by no means graceful. After lunch we had 
 to visit some neighbouring village, where episcopal 
 business awaited him. Our host was the staunchest 
 member of a most loyally ecclesiastical family. The 
 
 19 
 
290 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 venerated Charles Barter, brother of the famous 
 Winchester Warden, a keen lover and first-rate 
 judge of steeds as well. It was on the occasion of 
 this visit that Dr. Wilberforce parried with a skilful 
 epithet a question which Mr. Monckton Milnes, 
 the future Lord Houghton, ought not perhaps to 
 have suggested to a Prelate. "There does not," 
 roundly asserted Mr. Milnes, "live the man who, 
 as a child, resisted the temptation to put his finger 
 into a forbidden jampot. Can your spiritual lordship 
 contradict me from your own experience ? " "I 
 believe," murmured Dr. Wilberforce, thus appealed 
 to, " there was a time when the cook thought me some- 
 thing of an egotist." To-day, however, " S. Oxon." 
 was to show himself as nimble a rider as my cousin, 
 our host, Charles Barter himself. Finding himself 
 rather late for his appointment, and satisfied that 
 the canter was not likely to be a very public one, 
 the genial wearer of the Oxford mitre followed our 
 host as he put his horse at a fence for a short-cut 
 across the country to our destination. Some half 
 an hour later we had reached our goal. At the local 
 vicar's desire, the Bishop made the rounds of the 
 district's workhouse, and in one of the wards 
 delivered a little address to the paupers of both 
 sexes, full alike of felicity and feeling. 
 
 A witty writer for the old Pall Mall Gazette, who 
 
Behind the Scenes. 291 
 
 happened to be with us, cleverly, and I am sure quite 
 unmaliciously, caricatured the good bishop's idio- 
 syncrasies of diction in the following droll terms. 
 The committee of the Pastoral Aid Society was 
 supposed to have written to his lordship, enquiring 
 about the character of an applicant for its official 
 management. This was the supposed reply : 
 
 " If the possession of red hair, some degree of 
 pecuniary embarrassment, and a moral character not 
 wholly devoid of reproach are the qualifications requisite 
 for the post of Secretary to your admirable institution, 
 the Rev. Barney O'Brien may be safely recommended 
 as endowed with all those gifts and graces in an 
 eminent degree. 
 
 " Your faithful brother in Christ, 
 
 S. OXON." 
 
 Dr. Wilberforce's see included also the neighbour- 
 hood of Sunningdale, where my connection by 
 marriage, Charles RafSes Flint, nephew of Sir 
 Stamford Raffles, the Eastern administrator and 
 naturalist, had his Rectory house. Here, too, the 
 popular bishop was a frequent and most appreciative 
 guest, as also was the great editor himself. No one 
 understood Wilberforce better than Delane. When 
 on a private matter I called on the King of Printing 
 House Square at his Serjeant's Inn dwelling while 
 the southern Primacy was vacant, speaking of the 
 
 19 * 
 
292 Platform', Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 episcopal acquaintance we possessed in common, he 
 said, with a curious twinkle in his eye, " I think our 
 friend the Bishop has his gaze keenly fixed on 
 Lambeth just now; but there are many slips betwixt 
 cups and lips." During the years I wrote for 
 Hamber in the Hour, my own editor's sanctum was 
 n^t door to Delane's house in Serjeant's Inn. 
 The Printing House Square magnate always rode 
 in the morning, or more correctly, in the early 
 afternoon. I, therefore, constantly met him return- 
 ing from his Hyde Park equestrian constitutional. 
 When, as usually happened, he was alone, he 
 always stopped me to say a few kindly words. 
 From these casual conversations I had good 
 reason to carry away the impression that, in 
 addition to being the prince of editors, he was an 
 exceedingly good-natured, large-minded man ; with 
 no prejudices, personal or political, and with very 
 little, if not nothing, of the odium journalisticum. H is 
 faculty of gauging and divining the ordinary middle 
 class opinion, of which the Times made itself the 
 organ, approached to genius ; and as is well said of 
 him by one of his oldest friends in a letter now 
 before me, he held in abhorrence the " plunging " 
 which is the mark of the new journalism. No 
 newspaper man of my time went quite so much, or 
 in exactly the same capacity, into the world. 
 
Behind the Scenes. 293 
 
 gathering his honey from every flower, and making 
 himself welcome wherever he went. The late 
 Abraham Hayward, who knew not only Delane, but 
 all Delane's great friends, as few men did, told me a 
 story which will bear repeating, and which illustrates 
 the mistakes that the least fallible of publicists may 
 commit. 
 
 During Lord Palmerston's long period of rule, 
 Hayward and Delane were both, upon one occasion, 
 guests together at Broadlands. " Would you tell us, 
 Lord Palmerston," asked Mr. Delane, " the circum- 
 stances of your resignation in 1853 ? " — this being the 
 year in which Lord Palmerston had left the Cabinet, 
 ostensibly because he disapproved of the Reform Bill, 
 but in reality, as is no secret, because he had got into 
 hot water at Court. " You need not trouble yourself 
 about the circumstances, for," returned the Premier, 
 with momentary oblivion, " I never resigned at all." 
 The editor of the Times, primed with this intelli- 
 gence, returned to his office, and incorporated it in 
 a leading article which appeared next day. At the 
 Athenaeum Club in the afternoon, Has^ward and 
 Delane met. From the leading journal's file the 
 former pointed out how persistently that print had 
 asserted Palmerston's resignation in the year spoken 
 of on the question of the Black Sea fleet. Delane, 
 as Hayward often dramatically told me the story. 
 
294 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 put his hands up to his head and exclaimed, " Great 
 heavens! What it is to have to do with a daily 
 newspaper ! " The real truth is, of course, that 
 Palmerston did resign, and was out of office for just 
 ten days. 
 
 It must have been about the season of this 
 Broadlands visit that Lord Palmerston was the object 
 of a serious expostulation from a lady connected by 
 marriage with his family, on those pleasant ways 
 that, together with his good looks, had won for him 
 the sobriquet of " Cupid." He met the rebuke with 
 a characteristic reply which delighted Has^ward and 
 must amuse all who hear it now. " Such conduct," 
 said the jaunty Premier's monitress, " is immoral, 
 ungentlemanly, and besides can never succeed." 
 To which the gay old lord thus retorted: "As 
 regards its being ungentlemanly, that is a question 
 of taste. As regards religion, the point is one 
 on which the practice of the Churches differs. 
 But as to its being unsuccessful, I assure your 
 ladyship you are totally misinformed, for it never 
 fails." 
 
 Abraham Hayward, to whose kindness I am 
 indebted for much, to whose literary advice I 
 owe still more, had scarcely even excepting Charles 
 Greville, who was before my time, a knowledge 
 of contemporary life behind the political scenes 
 
Behind the Scenes. 295 
 
 unequalled during this century's latter half. He was 
 a little keen-eyed gentleman, with sharp features, 
 and a prominent nose. Hence, probably, the in- 
 accurate statement of an Anglo-American chronicler 
 that Hayward was, as his baptismal name might 
 suggest, of Jewish origin. The fact is, he was of 
 the purest Anglo-Saxon breed. His father, a native 
 of Wiltshire, had married a Miss Abraham, belong- 
 ing to no Mosaic house, but sprung from a renowned 
 Devonshire stock with which the Palks, Fortescues, 
 and other Western clans have before now nearly 
 allied themselves. Abraham Hayward himself was 
 indebted for much of his curious historic knowledge to 
 the able and accomplished father, a highly cultivated 
 Wessex lawyer who directed his early reading. His 
 health prevented his going from Blundell's School, 
 Tiverton, to Oxford. At the Bar he studied and 
 practised not unsuccessfully. In general society he 
 acquired a reputation and influence that were entirely 
 unique. Something he owed to his West of England 
 — especially his maternal — ancestry, as typified by his 
 prsenomen ; but the real architects of his fortune were 
 his rare natural aptitudes and his consummate social 
 tact. He had acquired from his journalistic experiences 
 on the Morning Chronicle first, and as an occasional 
 contributor to the Times afterwards, the habit of 
 responsibly identifying himself in imagination with 
 
296 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 statesmanship's practical business. His comments 
 on political situations were not a publicist's airy 
 commonplaces, but the deliberate explanations of 
 the course which, had he found himself in a like 
 situation, he would personally have adopted. Hence 
 it is that Lord Palmerston, during his whole time, 
 consulted the little Quarterly Reviewer with not less 
 diligent respect than he would have paid to an 
 actual colleague in his own Cabinet. 
 
 Those who did not know much of Hayward himself 
 or of the society he frequented, but who picked up 
 second-hand gossip about both, have absurdly spoken 
 of him as a confirmed diner-out. I can only say this. 
 During several years I saw Hayward at least once a 
 week. At dinner-tables I only met him twice. One of 
 these dinner meetings occurred in a private room at 
 the Garrick, when we were both Sir Henry Drummond 
 Wolffs guests. The other occasion of the sort was 
 at Lord Granville's in Carlton House Terrace, when 
 the company consisted further of the famous surgeon 
 Sir James Paget and the learned Lord Acton. I 
 have, however, often dined at private houses and at 
 clubs where I saw a vacant place which Hayward, it 
 was hoped, would have filled. No greater connoisseur, 
 as his own writings show, of French cookery existed ; 
 but he eschewed the baser imitations of it, which, 
 during later years, vexed his cultivated palate. 
 
Behind the Scenes. 297 
 
 "Cold beef and salad, if you like, and nothing 
 more ; but sound claret and enough of it." 
 These are the words wherein Ha5rward expressed 
 his views on dining to the late Lady Strangford, 
 who timidly invited him to meet Mr. Gladstone and 
 Lord Camoys in the summer of 1878. Socially, 
 Hayward had the same dislike of flippant banality 
 that he had of Gallic dishes from the confectioner's 
 round the corner. He never told a merely funny 
 story, any more than he tried to raise a laugh by a 
 pun. The anecdotically sparkling and elaborately 
 comic conversation in which the late Edmund Yates, 
 like the extant F. C. Burnand, excelled were not to 
 Hayward's taste. When he found himself in such 
 an environment, his tongue was tied. " There is 
 no objection," he once said, f'to a single story 
 during dinner, provided it is kept very short ; but 
 the funny story-tellers of to-day always remind me 
 of Sandford and Merton." 
 
 I was not present at his deathbed, but from one 
 who was, the late A. W. Kinglake, I have heard the 
 circumstances of his end. In the little room above 
 the chemist's shop, No. 9 St. James' Street, where 
 Byron had lodged before, Abraham Hayward 
 breathed his last. " I don't know," were his final 
 words, " what comes after this, but I am sure it is 
 something great ! " 
 
298 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Delane was never seen by me after the seventies 
 began. During the long illness which broke up 
 his powers, the chief, if not the only, visitor upon 
 him in his retirement was the late Lord Carnarvon, 
 who entertained for him a perfectly unselfish regard. 
 Some time before his end was visibly near, Delane 
 had shown to Hayward the note indicating the close 
 of his connection with the Times. The terse missive 
 stated the day had come when it was to the advan- 
 tage of the paper and of Delane himself for him no 
 longer to conduct the great organ ; that his pension 
 would be so many thousands a-year ; his successor, 
 Mr. Chenery, "whose talents," wrote Mr. Walter, 
 "we have all so long admired." Those of the 
 Times' staff in Delane's days whom I have best 
 known have been the present Warden of Merton, 
 Mr. G. C. Brodrick, who did pot always write 
 regularly day by day, Mr. L. J. Jennings, Mr. Robert 
 Lowe (Lord Sherbrooke), who had ceased his con- 
 nection with the paper before my better acquaint- 
 ance with him, the extraordinarily able Leonard 
 Courtney, of whom Delane declared that three 
 hours writing, three hours walking, were required to 
 tone down his exuberant vitality to an ordinary level. 
 
 Sir William Harcourt was never professionally 
 connected with the Times, nor ever received "its 
 shilling." Delane extended, indeed, the hospitality 
 
Behind the Scenes. zggr 
 
 of its columns to him without fee or reward. The 
 letters of "Historicus" were written during the 
 American Civil War, from i860 — 65. The same 
 writer afterwards, under the signature of " H.," con- 
 tributed letters on political subjects, particularly in 
 defence of the Russell and Gladstone Governments 
 in 1866 — 67, during the Reform Bill and the Adullam 
 Cave period. This journalistic connection was so 
 entirely apart from the social acquaintance between 
 Delane and Harcourt that no word passed between 
 them to indicate a knowledge on the part of either 
 that the future Chancellor of the Exchequer had 
 ever sent a line to Printing House Square. One 
 exception ought, perhaps, to be made to the general 
 rule of Mr. Delane' s benevolence. In the pre- 
 Crimean epoch, the leading journal strongly es- 
 poused the cause of Lord Aberdeen, and was 
 notoriously influenced by the distinguished Aber- 
 donian champion, editor of the Edinburgh Review, 
 Registrar of the Privy Council, Mr. Henry Reeve, 
 Delane, then, having taken up the Aberdeen cause, 
 vigorously adhered to it, criticising Lord Palmerston 
 with a severity which might have satisfied Lord John 
 Russell himself. Once, and once only, I was of the 
 same private party at the same time as the great 
 editor and the great proprietor of the newspaper. 
 Mr. Walter seemed, even in his courteous silence. 
 
300 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 to remind Mr. Delane of the work awaiting him. 
 Nor did the latter look quite at his ease before 
 Mr. Walter's carriage was announced and he rose 
 to go. Perhaps the esteem in which the great editor 
 was held by public men on both sides could not be 
 better indicated than by an anecdote which, " if not 
 true," is at least "well found." Conversing on 
 London journaUsm, Lord Beaconsfield put to Lord 
 Granville the question — " What do you really think 
 of Delane ? " Nothing could have been sager than the 
 diplomatic reply : " I think," were Lord Granville's 
 words, "I had better wait for Delane's apotheosis 
 before I answer that question ! " 
 
CHAPTER XX. 
 
 FROM AND ABOUT THE "PRESS GALLERY." 
 
 The Press Qallery and its occupants in tlie House of Commonsi 
 1874. James Macdonell, Justin HcCartliy, F. V. Clayden, 
 and others. The Public Worship Bill : its hitherto unwritten 
 history. Episcopal and irchiepiscopal Yeto. Mr. Gladstone 
 puts his foot down. Sir William Harconrt and Mr. Disraeli. 
 The Canonist of whom no one except Mr. Gladstone had ever 
 heard. Secret History of the 1880 Cabinet's formation. 
 The "Party of Two." Sir Charles Dilke's loyalty to Mr. 
 Chamberlain. Behind the scenes during the 1883 Franchise 
 Bill. Social agency employed to secure a settlement. The 
 political party at a great noble's Western country house. 
 Mr. Gladstone's anxiety to avoid collision between the two 
 Houses : seen by the light of his final declaration later in the 
 House of Commons. 
 
 MY regular attendance as a leader-writer on parlia- 
 mentary debates began about the period of the 
 Public Worship Regulation Bill in 1874. Introduced 
 by Archbishop Tait in the Upper House during 
 Mr. Disraeli's Premiership, the measure at first 
 excited no great attention outside clerical circles. 
 Directly it reached the House of Commons, the 
 whole scene was changed; indifference made way 
 for deep interest and fierce excitement. The seats 
 in the Press Gallery allotted to the writers of lead- 
 ing articles were filled at this time by publicists of un- 
 
 301 
 
302 Platform, Press, Politics and Play, 
 
 usual ability. Chief among these was the late James 
 Macdonell, then, as for many years previously, 
 attached to the Daily Telegraph. I had already known 
 him long and well, but had scarcely been prepared 
 for the remarkable acumen and practical statesman- 
 ship which his casual conversation on subjects 
 before the House disclosed. Subsequently, though not 
 many years before his life's close, James Macdonell 
 joined the Times' staff. When there, his is supposed 
 to have been the mind which suggested, his the pen 
 that wrote, a leader attracting European attention 
 by its appeal to Prince Bismarck, at a critical moment 
 in European politics, to interpose his authority for 
 the preservation of peace. George Hooper, a remark- 
 able adept in all that concerned military strategy, 
 was the Telegraph associate of Macdonell whom I 
 knew best. The Daily News editorial writers were 
 P. W. Clayden, my old friend Justin McCarthy, who 
 had then just made his mark aa a novelist, and 
 sometimes the then editor in Bouverie Street, Frank 
 Hill, who also wrote leaders. During the decade 
 and a half of my Gallery experiences, the authors of 
 the Times' leading articles on debates avoided the 
 Press section of the Chamber, and if present at all, 
 watched the debates from the seats under the 
 Gallery where are ^the private secretaries and other 
 privileged persons. 
 
From and about the "Press Gallery." 303 
 
 The most dramatic incident in the Public 
 Worship Bill discussions was the unexpected 
 rapprochement between Mr. Disraeli and Sir William 
 Harcourt established during it. " Historicus " had 
 come into Parliament with the avowed mission of 
 " smashing Dizzy." Directly, however, he perceived 
 the tide of parliamentary feeling to be favourable to 
 the project for " putting down Ritualism " as the 
 Premier described it, and noticed a revival of the 
 historic jealousy animating the Commons towards 
 the Church, Harcourt changed his tack. Instead of 
 supporting Mr. Gladstone's high Anglican views, he 
 broke away from the statesman whose law officer he 
 had already been, and identified himself with Mr. 
 Disraeli's erastianism. The ex- Premier had perplexed 
 the Chamber with a learned discourse, proving by 
 detailed reference to Canonists of every epoch and 
 of every country, Mr. Disraeli's Measure to be sub- 
 versive of ecclesiastical polity's first principles. 
 
 The House of Commons dislikes nothing more 
 than being taken out of its depth by a superior person. 
 Sir William Harcourt saw his opportunity, came to 
 its relief, though that involved a rhetorical war-dance 
 over Mr. Gladstone himself. He was especially 
 satirical on his old chiefs clerical erudition. "It 
 was," he declared, " so much Greek to the Assembly. 
 As," he continued, "for this Van Espen, I never heard 
 
304 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 of the man, and I don't believe anyone else has heard 
 of him either." Reiterated volleys of amused applause 
 followed this delicate compliment to the Philistinism 
 which had been oifended by Mr. Disraeli's opponent's 
 didactic professorialism. In my previous remarks on 
 the Tory leader's "Apes and Angels" address in the 
 Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford, the warning note of 
 the legislation now forthcoming was shown to have 
 been struck in the declaration that "the House of 
 Commons would not destroy but tighten its hold 
 over the Church." * 
 
 At this time the opportunities of going behind 
 the political scenes which during many years I have 
 enjoyed were just beginning. I became intimately 
 acquainted, at each stage of their progress, with the 
 party, or personal, negotiations that preceded the 
 passing of the Public Worship Bill. They have 
 never yet been recounted accurately. Their signi- 
 ficance and interest are not exhausted by lapse of 
 time; I will, therefore, give them here, with no 
 more of preface or comment than is needed to make 
 the transaction intelligible : When the Measure now 
 spoken of came from the Lords to the Commons, 
 every bishop had a veto on prosecutions under it. 
 An amendment, supported by Disraeli and by the 
 bulk of the Tory party, was introduced and 
 carried, transferring this veto from the bishops to 
 * See page 172. 
 
From and apout the "Press Gallery." 305 
 
 the two Archbishops. Mr. Gladstone opposed the 
 change vehemently. His resistance proving vain, he 
 intimated to the bishops that unless the arresting 
 power were restored to each individual prelate, he 
 would consider himself absolved from all his declara- 
 tions against Disestablishment. The lawn sleeves 
 were fluttered. They hurried back to town, managed 
 to secure the expunging of the Commons' amend- 
 ment, thereby restoring the episcopal veto. The 
 two Primates separated themselves from their 
 suifragans and voted for the Commons' resolution. 
 Lord Salisbury, on the other hand, supported Mr. 
 Gladstone in a pungent speech. Disraeli, like their 
 Graces of Canterbury and York, warmly resented 
 the restoration of the episcopal veto. By-and-by, 
 the Measure returned to the Commons with its 
 original purpose, as to the individual authority of 
 every prelate. Now there was enacted on St. 
 Stephen's floor a scene recalling the meeting in the 
 Roman Amphitheatre between the slave Androcles 
 and the lion from whose foot he had taken the thorn in 
 the African desert. Sir William Harcourt, who had 
 arranged before to pulverise " him they called 
 Dizzy," instead of denouncing or even criticising the 
 Tory Premier, delivered a panegyric upon him at 
 the expense of his own colleagues. But this old 
 Saturday Reviewer reserved his strongest censure for 
 
 20 
 
3o6 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 his erewhile collaborateur on the weekly newspaper, 
 and advised the Prime Minister " to curb the rash 
 and rancorous tongue of a noble colleague in another 
 place." Mr. Disraeli rose to the fly thus astutely 
 cast before him, made his famous attack on his 
 future Foreign Minister, calling him a great master 
 of gibes and flouts and jeers. Eventually more 
 than one communication, through an academic 
 friend they possessed in common, passed between 
 the Government's head, the Opposition's leader, 
 and chosen representatives of the episcopal bench. 
 The terrors of the last were allayed ; the Bill passed 
 into law. As Mr. Gladstone predicted, it has since 
 become scarcely less of a dead letter than the 
 Ecclesiastical Titles Act itself. The Disraelian 
 description of the Premier's partner in the coming 
 " Peace with Honour " campaign created a sen- 
 sation at the time, was probably felt by Mr. 
 Disraeli himself to be a little strong ; for the same 
 evening he pleasantly told Lord Salisbury himself: 
 " I have been attempting a kind of apology for you 
 in the House of Commons, and am afraid it may 
 read rather clumsily." 
 
 The same mediation which had been employed 
 between the opposite leaders with regard to the 
 Public Worship Bill was resorted to again in the 
 case of the County Franchise Bill ten years later. 
 
From and about the "Press Gallery." ,307 
 
 Before that, however, the Tory, but theologically 
 Gladstonian, nobleman, to whom I have just alluded, 
 had greatly conduced to an amicable settlement of 
 the Irish Land Bill's difficulties between Mr. Glad- 
 stone and Lord Salisbury in 1881. At that time, 
 fulfilling my functions as a Standard leader-writer, I 
 saw daily, during the 1881 Irish Land Bill crisis, 
 Mr. W. E. Forster, then Irish Secretary, or others 
 among his more powerful colleagues. The strong 
 Gladstonian Cabinet of that day had been cradled 
 amid internal difficulties. Long before it was 
 formed. Sir Charles Dilke and Mr. Chamberlain had 
 constituted an independent " party of two," leaving 
 the House together at night, sharing each other's 
 confidences, even living at each other's houses. It , 
 was understood between them that neither would 
 enter a Government wherein the other had not a 
 place ; wherein, also, one was not of Cabinet rank. 
 Mr. Chamberlain was at this period Sir Charles 
 Dilke's guest in Sloane Street. While in the month 
 of April the new Administration was in process of 
 manufacture, the Chelsea baronet received the offer 
 of an Under-Secretaryship. His answer was in 
 pursuance of the terms indicated by the Dilke- 
 Chamberlain compact just mentioned. Mr. Glad- ' 
 stone, however, supported, though vainly, in this 
 instance by Mr. Bright, objected to conferring 
 
 20 * 
 
3o8 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Cabinet promotion direct upon one or the other 
 member of this " party of two." Eventually, after 
 many delays and some hitches, the Prime Minister 
 took Sir Charles Dilke's view of the case, acquiesced 
 in Mr. Chamberlain's commandingly representative 
 Radicalism by giving him the Board of Trade 
 portfolio; while, as all the world knows, Mr. 
 Chamberlain's friend was hereafter, as Local Govern- 
 ment Board President, to enter the sacred circle of 
 high officialism. An offer of the Irish Chief Sec- 
 retaryship after Mr. Forster's resignation about the 
 Kilmainham Treaty epoch was also made to Sir 
 Charles Dilke in 1882, and declined. 
 
 This narrative was in effect given from a 
 trusted pen by Mr. W. H. Mudford in the Shoe 
 Lane newspaper at the time. All the original 
 letters and documents confirming my statement's 
 accuracy are before me now. They do, assuredl}', 
 dispose once for all of the statement that in 1880 
 the Birmingham member owed his earliest advance- 
 ment to a signal act of Mr. Gladstone's personal 
 favour. The truth is rather the reverse. Mr. 
 Chamberlain became in the initial instance a 
 "Cabinet Minister because he had succeeded John 
 Bright as Radical champion of the masses ; because, 
 too, the then member for Chelsea, at that time a 
 powerful personage in political quarters, was 
 
From and about the "Press Gallery." 309 
 
 staunchly loyal to his friend. The interest attaching 
 to the 1884 Franchise Bill arrangement is of the 
 same kind as that inherent in the episodes just 
 noticed, and worthy of mention because in this case, 
 as in the other, extraneous agency was employed for 
 the removal of internal difficulties. The real crux 
 of the difference between Mr. Gladstone and Lord 
 Salisbury in 1884 was this : Three years earlier, it 
 should be said, on Lord Beaconsfield's death, Lord 
 Carnarvon, Lord Salisbury's only serious rival, 
 whose eligibility was advocated by Lord Bath, had 
 withdrawn any pretensions to the Tory leader- 
 ship in the Upper House, and had done all which 
 an individual could to establish and prosper the 
 supremacy over the scarlet benches of his school 
 and college friend. Lord Salisbury. So successful 
 were Lord Carnarvon's labours in this direction 
 as to have helped Lord Salisbury towards an 
 ascendancy over the elective legislators not unlike 
 that which the fourteenth Earl of Derby exercised. 
 The Hereditary Chamber's chief was at this date a 
 prime popular, as well as a great parliamentary 
 power. He had let it be known that he would 
 assert this authority to prevent the Franchise Bill 
 passing before he knew what the Redistribution 
 Measure was likely to be. The Tory leader had, 
 however, informed a non-parliamentary friend, 
 
3IO Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 whom he and Mr. Gladstone possessed in common, 
 that if he received any assurance, confidential or 
 otherwise, as to the Redistribution scheme not 
 being revolutionary, he would abstain from opposing 
 the Franchise Measure. 
 
 When the younger Pitt took up Parliamentary 
 Reform he selected a clergyman, the Rev. Marmaduke 
 Wyvill, as the recipient of his confidences on the 
 question. In the case of the '74 Franchise dispute, 
 a well-known social figure engaged actively, if 
 not prominently, in the settlement of a political 
 difficulty. This gentleman, long and intimately 
 known to the Liberal leader, nor unfavourably 
 regarded by the Tory chief, selected a wise moment 
 for volunteering his mediatorial services. After 
 some delay, he obtained a very able letter from 
 an influential peer, a strong Conservative, politi- 
 cally Lord Salisbury's supporter, spiritually Mr. 
 Gladstone's admirer, to the effect that Mr. Gladstone 
 would be perpetrating a false move in deaUng with 
 the Tory party's official leaders. " Rather let him," 
 so runs this communication, "appeal to the Con- 
 servative rank and file over the heads of their 
 leaders. Thus," it was stated, "the way would be 
 paved for compromise ; and even the Conservative 
 chiefs themselves might not find it inconvenient for 
 their hands to be forced or strengthened (whichever 
 
From and about the "Press Gallery." 311 
 
 word should be used) by recourse to their followers." 
 This letter the party peace-maker was permitted to 
 show privately to Mr. Gladstone. The Liberal leader 
 acted on the advice, and that very evening declared 
 in the House of Commons his willingness to take 
 Lord Salisbury into his confidence; Within two 
 hours the Tory chief sent Mr. Balfour with a com- 
 munication to Mr. Gladstone. Then there was a 
 conference, and the whole thing was settled. Lord 
 Randolph Churchill was not, as I have seen asserted^ 
 at all concerned in these arrangements. Nor anyone 
 else except the two chiefs, unless, perhaps, I should 
 mention that the Conservative nobleman invoked by 
 the academic peacemaker had a week earlier invited 
 Mr. Gladstone, Lord Salisbury, Sir Stafford North- 
 cote, and Lord Cranbrook to stay with him at 
 his historic house in a Western county for the 
 purpose of talking the matter over. Mr. Gladstone 
 and Sir Stafford accepted at once. The latter, 
 however, finding Lord Salisbury and Lord Cranbrook 
 had declined, drew back. Mr. Gladstone, therefore, 
 arrived alone. His visit lasted some days. During 
 its course, he assured his host of his anxiety, above 
 all things, to avoid a dissolution on the County 
 Franchise Bill. At the same time, he warned his 
 host that to such a step he would be driven should 
 the Lords reject the measure a second time. " In 
 
312 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 that case," Mr. Gladstone added, " nothing can 
 prevent the main attack being directed against the 
 Hereditary House, much as I desire to avoid it." 
 No one personally or socially acquainted with the 
 strong Conservative vein traversing the ex- Premier 
 can doubt this declaration to be genuine, notwith- 
 standing his farewell utterances in the House of 
 Commons before handing the Premiership over to 
 Lord Rosebery. 
 
CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 SOME SOCIO-POLITICAL EXPERIENCES. 
 
 West of England hosts, in and out of London. Lord Carnarvon's 
 parties at Highclere, and in Bruton Street. Social history of 
 No. 16 Bruton Street. The Vhig tradition of culture shown 
 in Lord and Lady Cork's hospitalities. Lady Dorothy Neirill 
 as guest at Highclere, and as luncheon hostess in her own 
 house, Charles Street, Berkeley Square. The "Fourth 
 Party" at Lady Dorothy's; the second Duke of Wel- 
 lington, Mr. Justin McCarthy, and others. Hr. Chamberlain 
 as host in Princes Qardens and at Highbury. His patriotism 
 before politics; his tendency towards Conservatism pre- 
 dicted by Mr. Disraeli. His worst vices of a landed pro- 
 prietor detected by Sir William Harcourt. Preparations for 
 writing "England: its People, Polity, and Pursuits." The 
 experiences acquired during it. 
 
 AS regards Lbndon society's hospitable functions, 
 alike in capital and country house, the West 
 of England during my time has always been repre- 
 sented favourably. Two prominent hosts on either 
 side have been connected with my native county of 
 Somerset. Its Lord Lieutenant, the Earl of Cork, 
 has perpetuated, with the assistance of his accom- 
 plished wife, the best traditions of Whig hospitality 
 and of Whig culture. The fourth Lord Carnarvon, 
 if not at Pixton, Somerset, yet at his Hampshire 
 seat, Highclere ; in his London establishment, 
 
 313 
 
314 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Bruton Street, did much for consolidating Con- 
 servatism by social cement, as well as refining it by 
 cultivated company and intellectual conversation. 
 In my time Lord Cork contrived his social enter- 
 tainments with the same discrimination that he 
 showed when Master of the Buckhounds in his 
 admissions to the Lawn at Ascot, Among many 
 candidates, there must be some malcontents ; but 
 the functionary of whom I am now speaking reduced 
 just complaints to a minimum. His manner, blending 
 as it does a country gentleman's geniality with a Whig 
 noble's hauteur, can never have given offence, save 
 where presumption had brought upon itself a snub. 
 Mr, Bernal Osborne had no more enthusiastic friend 
 than A, W. Kinglake. Yet that brilliant writer was 
 constrained to admit Lord Cork in his conversa- 
 tional encounters with Osborne only to have spoken 
 sharply when social comfort and decorum really 
 demanded that the chartered libertine of dining- 
 tables should restrain his humorous exuberances. 
 Lord Cork is so far a gentleman of the old school as 
 not to like his furniture and drapery to reek of stale 
 tobacco. The young gentlemen whose extreme 
 smartness constrains them to produce a cigarette 
 before the claret has been removed may have felt 
 imperfectly at ease beneath the roof of this host. 
 But everything which Lord and Lady Cork may 
 
Some Socio-Political Experiences. 315 
 
 have done, or abstained from doing, has had what 
 their taste and judgment deemed sufficient reason 
 of its own. 
 
 The fourth of the Carnarvon peers devoted 
 all the resources of his station to his party's 
 benefit while he was in office, nor withdrew that 
 assistance when he had ceased to be a Conservative 
 Minister. His house in Bruton Street seemed built 
 for the entertainments that he liked to give. 
 Formerly it had been occupied by Lord Granville. 
 A great portion of one side consisted of a conser- 
 vatory. It was on these premises that Mr. Greville, 
 the Clerk of the Council, took up his quarters, and 
 that Lady Granville, alluding to some of the Diarist's 
 sporting visitors, spoke of " Mr. Greville's horrid 
 friends " she always met on the stairs. 
 
 For a long time now No. 16 Bruton Street has 
 ceased to be a political house. After Lord Carnarvon's 
 departure it passed into the hands of Mr. and Mrs. 
 Henry Oppenheim. These, however, perpetuated its 
 hospitable traditions. At this dinner-table it was 
 that the misunderstanding, which for some time had 
 chilled the personal relations between Lord Harting- 
 ton and Lord Randolph Churchill, was removed, 
 and that on the part of these two Unionist parlia- 
 mentarians there began an entente cordiale which 
 ended only with one of the two's untimely death. 
 
3i6 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Beneath this roof, too, the veteran Free Trade 
 champion, Henry Villiers, was, as recently as 1885, 
 discussing with Frederick Greenwood, the changes 
 in our public existence which, during his long 
 pilgrimage, had impressed him most. More widely 
 eclectic entertainments still have been given weekly 
 during the past decade at another Mayfair abode in 
 a neighbouring thoroughfare. 
 
 Throughout the period which, after the first 
 Lady Carnarvon's death, Highclere was without 
 a mistress, Lady Dorothy Nevill, an old friend 
 of the family, the particular confidante of that 
 veritable grande dame, the fourth Countess of 
 Carnarvon, by her presence gave social assistance 
 to the widower in his Hampshire entertainments. 
 Now that the stately relic of a bygone genera- 
 tion, who till recently adorned drawing-rooms, 
 is gone in Maria, Marchioness of Ailesbury, Lady 
 Dorothy Nevill possesses an unrivalled experience 
 of public life and public men in their social as well 
 as political aspects. She was the friend and cor- 
 respondent of Disraeli, as before him she had been 
 the correspondent and the friend of Cobden. The 
 same bright wisdom that amused or instructed Mr. 
 Lowe has trained and captivated Mr. Chamberlain. 
 Domesticated, whenever she could find time to visit 
 there, at Blenheim, this lady, a relative of Sir Henry 
 
Some Socio-Political Experiences. 317 
 
 Drummond Wolff' s, regularly entertained at luncheon 
 not only Sir Henry himself, but his colleague, 
 Sir John, then Mr., Gorst, and their common chief. 
 Lord Randolph Churchill. At the very time when 
 the revolt below the Conservative gangway against 
 Sir Stafford Northcote was most severe, the 
 Devonshire baronet sometimes assisted at these 
 Charles Street hospitalities. He had always recog- 
 nised in his hostess the mistress of a salon who 
 combined a lightness of touch and tact which were 
 French, with an earnestness in party politics which 
 was English. If human skill could have reduced 
 the Churchillian frondeurs to their old allegiance, 
 that end would have been accomplished beneath the 
 roof now spoken of. When similar company was 
 not occupying the Wimpole Street hostess, the 
 Sir Francis Jeune of to-day, and Lady Jeune were 
 likely to be found in Charles Street. Literature was 
 represented here as well as politics. ' 
 
 Two writers during my time have not only by 
 their rare gifts achieved an original kind of excel- 
 lence in prose composition, but by the same 
 qualities have influenced sensibly the current diction 
 of their period. Laurence Oliphant in his Piccadilly 
 set up quite a fresh standard of style, and let in a 
 tide of new ideas. W. H. Mallock repeated that 
 triumph in his New Republic, and like his pre- 
 
3i8 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 decessor set a fresh fashion in prose diction. Of 
 these writers, the younger was a frequent guest at 
 Lady Dorothy's gatherings. Mr, Justin McCarthy, 
 belonging to an older generation, but who in his 
 History of Our Own Times seemed to take a new 
 lease of fame, often found his place beside the chair 
 of the second Duke of Wellington, and secured in 
 the Waterloo hero's son, reproducing so surprisingly 
 as he did the features, without their strength, of his 
 father, a patient and pleased hstener while the 
 historian talked on every subject from English 
 literature's beginning, down to the Union's end. 
 
 Mr. Chamberlain himself, who, at a national 
 crisis, left one party and made another, has long 
 since proved himself not less effective as a host 
 than welcome as a guest. One of the very few 
 occasions on which the late C. S. Parnell dined 
 at an English table was during the expiring 
 seventies in a private room at the " Star and 
 Garter," Richmond, with the Birmingham states- 
 man and his then chief extra-parliamentary ally, 
 Mr. John Morley. Alike in his London house 
 Princes Gardens, and his Birmingham home, High- 
 bury, this magnate of the Midlands has deserved 
 well of his party by his hospitalities. F. C. Burnand, 
 G. E. Buckle, H. W. Lucy, among publicists ; J. A. 
 Froude and John Morley amongst men of letters, 
 
Some Socio-PoUtical Experiences. 319 
 
 were habitually present at these representative 
 gatherings. So, too, in the period before the Irish 
 split, were Mr. A. J. Mundella, Sir William Harcourt, 
 and till the very eve of his death Mr. John Bright, 
 who, though I have met him at many tables, never 
 seemed so thoroughly at ease, and therefore so 
 agreeable, as at the board of his Birmingham 
 colleague. Probably to the accident of birth and 
 family connections is it due that Mr. Chamberlain 
 did not begin life with the political opinions at 
 which he has now arrived. His militant citizenship 
 in the hardware capital has always contained the 
 germ of a patriotism totally opposed to the "peace 
 at any price" school. Mr. Disraeli detected this 
 when, on one of the few occasions the Conser- 
 vative statesman socially met the Radical leader, 
 there fell from the former's lips the oracular 
 utterance : " By the time he is sixty, th at man will 
 be Secretary of State in a Conserv ative Cabinet." 
 The same meaning may have lurked in a playful 
 sally of Sir William Harcourt as a guest at High- 
 bury, when the master of the place with something 
 like pride pointed to the budding branches of some 
 saplings recently planted in the grounds. "Our 
 host must be careful," ran the warning of "His- 
 toricus," " for he is already developing some of a 
 landed proprietor's worst vices." 
 
320 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 During his eariier years in Parliament, Mr. 
 Chamberlain had not fully realised the social charm 
 of the metropoHs. Nor, since he has done so, has 
 his attachment to the associations of the citizens of 
 the town, whose name will always be linked with 
 his own, disappeared. When, some years after the 
 point I have now reached, I was writing a book 
 on our native country, Mr. Chamberlain's Midland 
 home was my starting point. Here it was that 
 I first perceived the metropolis on the " Black 
 Country's" frontier to be characterised by its 
 people's intense attachment to their local corporate 
 life in a degree recalling the pride of citizenship 
 evinced by the mediaeval inhabitants of Italy's great 
 commercial capitals, such as Genoa or Venice. 
 
 If the Birmingham M.P. typified politics, science 
 had a no less worthy representative in Lawson Tait. 
 The adequate exponent of liberal culture was King 
 Edward VI.'s school headmaster, the Rev. A. R. 
 Vardy. The religious principle of the community 
 was faithfully shown, not by any minister of the 
 Established Church, but by Nonconformity's most 
 eminent pillar, the late Dr. R. W. Dale. The just 
 pride of his own congregational co-religionists, this 
 remarkable man was full of interest to the innumer- 
 able Anglicans whom he knew. Picturesque in 
 presence, not less fresh in his table-talk than vigor- 
 
Some Socio-PoUtical Experiences. 321 
 
 ous in his pulpit, Dale suggested at one moment 
 Arthur Stanley, of Westminster, at another " Parson 
 Lot," in Kingsley's novel. No one among Dissenters 
 reciprocated so cordially towards Churchmen the 
 goodwill which among Churchmen Dean Stanley 
 illustrated towards Dissenters. In his sermons, as 
 in his social conversation, Dale was one of the few 
 men whom I have seen to show themselves aware of 
 the growing tendency among Evangelicals to divorce 
 religion from conduct, and to reduce Pauline Chris- 
 tianity to something indistinguishable in practice 
 from Antinomianism. 
 
 Dale, at least, did not fear to insist upon human 
 duties as the essential correlatives and the indis- 
 pensable complements of Divine obligations. He 
 denounced, with a fervour too seldom heard among 
 Evangelical teachers, the idea that a real Christian 
 might be exemplary in the discharge of all heaven- 
 ward duties, and yet take a low view of his earthly 
 responsibilities, be at the same time a model in all 
 devotional acts on Sunday, yet show himself on 
 week-days a careless husband, an unsympathetic 
 father, an indifferent neighbour, an undutiful son. 
 If anyone thinks that these things are truisms, or 
 doubts the danger of the same phenomenon long 
 since witnessed in the Greek Church being repro- 
 duced in the Anglican Communion, and of morality 
 
 21 
 
322 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 being divorced from faith, I would urge him to study 
 professionally, as it was my duty to do for some years, 
 the ideas of his humbler fellow-countrymen shown 
 in their real attitude towards the Churches of our 
 day. Dale did not suppose ministers of any Creed, 
 or honest Christians of any vocation, to be bent upon 
 dishonouring their Faith by flagrant sins against 
 ethical law. But he discerned in many among his 
 Evangelical brethren the union of the most amiable 
 intentions with the most absolute indifference to the 
 amenities or courtesies of life, and to the higher law 
 of secular association. These failures appeared to 
 him to furnish the sole explanation of the attractions 
 which Positivism possesses for the higher-toned 
 philanthropists of our time. 
 
 The preparation for this book on England occu- 
 pied me, with travel and research in all parts of the 
 country, some three years. I inspected personally 
 the management of every great landed property, 
 thanks to the courtesy of owners and agents. I 
 lived among the colliers of Northumberland ; I passed 
 a month with the agricultural labourers in our south- 
 ern and western counties. The epithets of God- 
 fearing, law-abiding Conservative as applied to the 
 English people have lost their point by frequent use, 
 or have degenerated into mere commonplaces of 
 phrase. Mr. Mundella was the first person to indi- 
 
Some Socio-Political Experiences. 333 
 
 cate to me how, beginning from his own constituency 
 of Sheffield, I might verify for myself the living 
 significance of the words, and thus sketch, as I 
 endeavoured to do, the most energising section of 
 the Anglo-Saxon race in its actual existence within 
 the four seas to-day. 
 
 21 
 
CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 PARLIAMENT AND PLATFORM. 
 
 General aspect of House of CommonB' personnel and 
 oratory, 1874-80. Influence of Disraeli and Gladstone in 
 raising the rhetorical standard shown by the excellence of 
 private Uemhers' speeches. Mr. Spencer Walpole, Mr. 
 Beresford Hope, Mr. Newdegate, Hr. Vhalley, Mr. Horsman, 
 Mr. Roebuck. Speeches of the chiefs which impressed me 
 most in and out of Parliament. Mr. Disraeli on the 
 Claimant and Lord Chief Justice Cockbnrn. Mr. Gladstone 
 on militarism and on Mr. Disraeli. Mr. Bright on being 
 "buried like a dog." Mr. Disraeli's great speeches at 
 Manchester and at Glasgow; his method of preparation. 
 Excellence of the "limes'" reports. Surprising variety, 
 polish, and effect of the Glasgow speeches. Louis Philippe 
 and Sir Walter Scott. Mr. Disraeli's quotations. 
 
 THE actual writing of my book on England took 
 me about the same time as the preparation for 
 it had done, and was carried on in such hours as I 
 could snatch from daily attendance on parliamentary 
 debates and leader writing afterwards. Necessarily 
 at this time I was brought into close and constant 
 contact with party leaders and prominent debaters 
 on both sides. In 1874, and' probably throughout 
 the half-dozen years following, the Popular Chamber 
 was still pretty much as I suppose it had been in 
 Sir Robert Peel's days, or of Canning before him. 
 
 324 
 
Parliament and Platform. 325 
 
 Parliamentary speaking was still studied and prac- 
 tised as a fine art, not merely as a civic function. 
 The performances of men like Mr. Gladstone and 
 Mr. Disraeli kept a high standard of excellence 
 before the Assembly whether in Committee or in 
 general debate. In the front rank thfere was more 
 than one private Member approaching Cabinet 
 calibre, whose full and ready knowledge in discus- 
 sion or his actual eloquence was scarcely inferior to 
 his chief's. Mr. Horsman, who for many years had 
 represented Liskeard, may have been somewhat 
 pompous in his manner. His rhetorical effects were 
 genuine and artistic ; when his health was good he 
 never failed to meet hostile attack with stinging 
 retort. He might be ridiculed as a superior person ; 
 but he perpetuated the Chamber's best traditions, 
 was in style and breeding a thorough English gentle- 
 man. Near him there sat with the acid expression 
 of countenance ; with the petulant treble voice, but 
 with the commanding intellectual brow suggestive of 
 stored knowledge and deep thought, A. J. Roebuck, 
 the historic "Tear 'em," of Sheffield. One utterance, 
 and one only of his can I remember from beginning 
 to end. It was a hot Wednesday afternoon ; Mem- 
 bers were gasping for fresh air. Addressing the 
 Speaker, the representative of the cutlers' capital, 
 instead of the rasping attack on Ministers which 
 
326 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 was expected, said, in a meek, small voice : " I rise. 
 Sir, to ask whether you will give orders that one of 
 the windows shall be opened." 
 
 Mr. Newdegate may have appalled the House 
 with his preternatural solemnity, when the Roman 
 Church and any of its institutions, especially 
 convents, were under discussion, but he impressed all 
 who saw or listened to him as embodying not more 
 the prejudices than the earnest good sense and 
 patriotism of other than his own constituents. For 
 in these days men continued to speak in the House 
 as the representatives, not exclusively of those who 
 sent them there, but of their fellow-countrymen at 
 large. Mr. Newdegate it was who iirst suggested 
 that Mr. Chamberlain's natural bent and primary 
 ideas would ultimately dissociate him from Liberal- 
 ism, and range him among Tories. The Warwick- 
 shire Member had been present at a function in the 
 Birmingham Town Hall, when the Mayor conducted 
 the Princess of Wales to her place. He had been 
 so much impressed by the contrast between the 
 magistrate's reputed Republicanism and actual 
 courtiership as to see in him already a potential 
 champion of Throne and Altar not less than of peers 
 arid privilege. Mr. Newdegate, too, it was who drew 
 Mr. Disraeli's attention to the fact, eliciting from the 
 Tory captain the prediction previously mentioned : 
 
Parliament and Platform. 327 
 
 " Before he is sixty, that man will be Secretary of State 
 in a Conservative Cabinet."* While stateliness was 
 the note of Newdegate, a nervous timidity, reminding 
 one of a hunted hare, appeared to pervade the other 
 Protestant champion, poor Mr. Whalley, M.P. for 
 Peterborough, so often tauntingly invited to " sing." 
 The stately and polished Mr. Walpole had ceased 
 to be Home Secretary, but, together with Mr. Beres- 
 ford Hope, still sat for Cambridge University. In 
 mien and manner as well as in voice, an embodiment 
 of what Horace has called "the mild wisdom of 
 Laelius." At all points he contrasted with his 
 colleague, the proprietor of the Saturday Review. 
 Mr. Beresford Hope's sentences, especially on the 
 ecclesiastical matters which really interested him, 
 were frequently stinging and not seldom capitally 
 constructed. But they were delivered with physical 
 as well as intellectual labour. The contortions of 
 the orator recalled the writhings of the Cumaean 
 sibyl. Nor did the benign and facile Walpole differ 
 more from his Cambridge colleague than from another 
 independent Tory Member, the late Mr. Henley, 
 of Oxfordshire. The latter, if Newdegate typified 
 the mitis sapientia Lcelt, did assuredly reproduce the 
 virtus horrida of Cato. Henley was unquestionably 
 the most remarkable among private Members of my 
 time. A face knotted and gnarled like an old oak ; 
 * See page 319. 
 
328 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 a massive ponderous brow, with convolutions such 
 as those one beholds in granite, a deep yet rather 
 humorous voice, a tendency to sententious wisdom 
 relieved and lightened by a playful fancy. These 
 are the characteristics of that Mr. Henley whom 
 I knew; who probably had his predecessor in 
 " Robin " Walpole's political enemy and personal 
 friend, " Downright " Shippon, but who left behind 
 him ["no successors. " Mr. Speaker," I can hear 
 him say now, "sooner than give in to such cant as 
 this, I would lie on my back in a field all day, and 
 cry ' Fudge ! ' " 
 
 The Lord Elcho of that period, still extant as 
 Lord Wemyss, was then a really independent 
 Member, inclined to be malevolently neutral all 
 round. The House possessed few more command- 
 ing figures. A singularly shrewd judge of character, 
 he had a habit in the Chamber and out of it of 
 interpolating caustic remarks sotto voce in general 
 conversation. When he was assisting at a public 
 dinner in his old College, Balliol, referring to a 
 speech wherein Mr. Jowett had ignored the services 
 to the College of his predecessor, Scott, Lord Elcho, 
 in an aside audible several places off, shocked 
 some, pleased others, by saying, with a quiet nod, 
 towards the speaker: "He was never famous for 
 magnanimity," Of the same order as Mr. Henley 
 
Parliament and Platform. 329 
 
 were the late Patrick Boyle Smollett, and the present 
 Lord Alington, then Mr. ("Bunny") Sturt. Smollett 
 inherited from his ancestor, the great "Tobias," 
 "the novelist, not a little of the homely mordant 
 humour with which Humphrey Clinker and Peregrine 
 Pickle are charged. He had especially a gift of terse 
 and telling, though not often complimentary, charac- 
 terisation. An Irish Member, named Maguire, one 
 of a little group which made a point of being rude 
 to Mr. Disraeli, had a rather expressionless counte- 
 nance as well as a very voluble tongue. Smollett 
 openly styled him " a talking potato." The Saturday 
 Review, still under Cook, immortalised and expanded 
 the phrase in an article headed with Smollett's 
 description. The Dorsetshire squire was then, as 
 now, a lover of horses, and especially interested in 
 securing vigorous or at least effective sires for the 
 propagation of stock. Once, moved to eloquence 
 by the frauds which stallion owners perpetrated, 
 stepping out on the middle of the floor, he took the 
 House into his confidence as follows : " When I 
 w;ent, Mr. Speaker, to look at the mares in the 
 paddock, they were no more in the family way than 
 I am myself." As he said these words, he histrioni- 
 cally patted the lower part of his white waistcoat. 
 
 Of the giants in debate, it is difficult to say any- 
 thing new. The speech of Mr. John Bright which 
 
330 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 struck me as uniting in their greatest perfection his 
 characteristic qualities of indignation, pathos, sim- 
 plicity, fervour, expressed in the musical Anglo- 
 Saxon of which he was a master, was that delivered 
 on the Burials Bill in the 1880 Parliament. Mr. 
 Talbot and other high Anglicans had taunted 
 Dissenters with " interring their departed with no 
 more ceremony than dumb beasts." Dwelling on 
 Nonconformists' sepulchral rites generally, the 
 orator anticipated the description of his own funeral, 
 especially the silent mourners by the new-made 
 grave. "Yes, Mr. Speaker," he observed in tones 
 quivering with emotion, " as the honourable gentle- 
 man says, I, too, shall be buried like a dog." As 
 he said these words, I happened to look down 
 from the Gallery on the faces of two Opposition 
 front henchmen, the then Mr. Gathorne Hardy and 
 Sir Stafford Northcote. The orator's appeal had 
 been irresistible. Tears filled the eyes of both. 
 Mr. Hardy, while Member for Oxford University, 
 was, if anyone could ever be so, the chivalrous ideal 
 of. the country party's leader. He was then an 
 impressively handsome man, with eyes that flashed 
 forth scorn upon all mean things or cowardly 
 suggestions. He had, too, a memory quick to 
 illustrate from his miscellaneous reading any incident 
 which occurred during debate. During the Public 
 
Parliament and Platform. 331 
 
 Worship Bill discussions of 1874, a mouse, startled 
 from its hole, ran between the benches. Hardy 
 at once recalled the correct precedent for the 
 apparition. "So," he said, "did a truant cat 
 disturb the proceedings at the Synod of Dort." 
 
 During the time now spoken of, Mr. Gladstone's 
 universal reception in the House was of a curiously 
 mixed character. What struck the spectator most 
 was that while their partizanship withheld applausive 
 demonstrations, their honesty as gentlemen and 
 their English pride in a great member of their body 
 caused old parliamentary hands of his own standing 
 though on hostile benches with unconcealed admira- 
 tion to listen to the Liberal leader whenever he rose, 
 and in the lobby or elsewhere afterwards, to discuss 
 with fond regret old times and the points of an 
 oratory whose secret seemed already lost. In the 
 course of the half-dozen years I listened to him at 
 Westminster almost daily, the two master-pieces of 
 Mr. Gladstone's oratory which I heard were his 
 criticism on the employment of Indian troops in 
 Europe, and his tribute to Mr. Disraeli after his 
 death as Lord Beaconsfield. By an untoward 
 accident, the Liberal leader was at Hawarden when 
 he should have been in the House of Commons. 
 By an error, perhaps of judgment, he absented 
 himself from the funeral in Hughenden churchyard. 
 
332 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 But the tribute to his rival in the House of 
 Commons, if tardy, was a perfect specimen of good 
 taste in that memorial rhetoric, wherein a past 
 generation excelled- Not glossing over his own 
 differences with the dead statesman, Mr. Gladstone 
 acquitted him of all idea of personal malignity 
 towards himself. He admitted his great qualities. 
 " I can," he said, " well understand one of his own 
 admirers applying to the noble lord, as he returned 
 from Berlin, the stately words of Virgil — 
 
 ' A spice ut insignis spoliis Marcellus opimis 
 Ingreditur victorque vivos supereminet omnes,' " 
 
 Not, of course, the greatest, but nearly perhaps 
 the happiest, as well as characteristic, of Mr. 
 Disraeli's speeches has ever seemed to me, and 
 seemed also at the time to many good judges of 
 parliamentary oratory. Mr. Disraeli's vindication 
 of Lord Chief Justice Cockburn, when Dr. Kenealy 
 brought forward his long-threatened "Claimant" 
 motion. This great leader of the House of Com- 
 mons had a light comedy, as well as a high 
 tragedy, manner. He was in the former's happiest 
 vein when he rose to dismiss Arthur Orton's 
 advocate with amused contempt. " We all know," 
 said Disraeli, "the Lord Chief Justice in society, 
 and that he does not enter a lady's drawing- 
 
Parliament and Platform. 333 
 
 room with an air of adamantine gravity." The 
 speaker then recalled an anecdote of Richard 
 Lalor Sheil. "At one of his clubs, I think it 
 was the Athenaeum, solacing himself with a pint 
 of claret and a cutlet after a night's debate, the 
 eloquent Sheil dismissed an intruder on his table 
 with some preposterous statement. The next day 
 the most absurd rumour went round the town, 
 all because Mr. Sheil had said something to ex- 
 tricate himself from the toils of a bore." This 
 1874 House of Commons may perhaps be regarded as 
 the last of an older regime. Mr. Disraeli's greatest 
 extra parliamentary efforts were made in anticipa- 
 tion of this Parliament, wherein, for the first time 
 during his career, he secured a working majority. 
 The entire series at different parts of the country was 
 heard by me. First in order came the " exhausted 
 volcano" speech in the Free Trade Hall, Man- 
 chester, during the spring of 1872. The Conser- 
 vative leader was at this time the guest of Mr. 
 Romaine Callender, When he entered the building 
 that night he walked feebly, as indeed he often seemed 
 to do, and looked almost painfully exhausted. His 
 indefatigable and indispensable private secretary, Mr. 
 Montagu Corry, to-day Lord Rowton, looked nervous 
 while he arranged his chiefs papers, and filled a 
 glass with the regulation toast and water. It was 
 
334 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 not till he reached his description of Mr. Trevelyan 
 as agricultural philanthropist, insisting on a share 
 in Hodge's dinner, that Disraeli at all warmed to 
 his theme. Then in rapid succession, startling as a 
 feu de joie of musketry, came the Sanitas Sanitatum 
 Omnia Sanitas declaration. Next followed the com- 
 parison of the Gladstonian front bench to those 
 phenomena not unusual in South America, where, 
 "though no flame flickers on a single pallid crest, 
 but the situation is yet dangerous, and ever and 
 anon you hear the rumbling of the sea." 
 
 The Glasgow group of addresses followed at not 
 quite a year's interval. To hear all these was the 
 greatest treat ever permitted to me during my 
 professional career. First came the Rectorial 
 prelection to the Glasgow students. Scarlet-gowned, 
 the new Lord Rector addressed a rapt audience of 
 lads, scarlet-gowned also, many of them fresh from 
 the plough or the shop ; all absorbed as they listened 
 to the orator with an attention which, pathetic to 
 witness, visibly impressed the speaker. The great 
 man began with something amusingly like a false 
 start. " It is," so ran his opening words, " an 
 
 extraordinary thing " Here he stopped short, for 
 
 the rain began to trickle through the improvised 
 wooden structure, and spotted his glove. "Whether 
 this or anything else was the remarkable circum- 
 
Parliament and Platform. 335 
 
 stance, no one ever knew, for Mr. Disraeli at once 
 set himself to recast his initial sentence. Speaking 
 of preparatory studies, he compared the Scotch 
 youths to the Ten Thousand Greeks. "Having 
 traversed mountains, threaded defiles, like the 
 soldiers of Xenophon, you behold the sea, the 
 waters being of course the ocean of life." After 
 having waited for subsidence of the applause which 
 this noble exordium provoked, the Lord Rector 
 talked about the spirit of the time and about 
 those who had mastered it. Amongst the latter, 
 he instanced John Knox, Martin Luther, and others. 
 The list also included " the great princes of the 
 House of Tudor," as the Times correctly reported the 
 phrase. Other papers gave the remark as "the great 
 princes of the House of Judah." The mistake was 
 probably caused by the similarity of the sounds for 
 hearers preoccupied with the speaker's nationality. 
 The whole discourse, followed with reverent care, 
 punctuated by passionate outbursts of cheering, 
 drew to its close with two unfamiliar lines from "the 
 most attic of Athenian poets," i.e. from the Ajax of 
 Sophocles. In them the speaker had " found solace 
 amid the trials of existence." Them did he deliver 
 to his hearers to "guard their consciences and to 
 keep their lives." The Times was the only journal 
 which gave correctly the next morning the Greek 
 
336 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 quotation. The lines might be roughly rendered in 
 the following English : — 
 
 " These things, and all things at all times I say : 
 My faith is come straight from the Gods to men. 
 Whoso holds other form of doctrine true ; 
 He has his faith, let me adhere to mine." 
 
 This crude paraphrase, the product of the moment, 
 actually appeared in one London print represented 
 by my acquaintance, Charles Williams. The Hour 
 printed the Greek words in English characters. 
 Shirley Brooks, then editing Punch, was much 
 amused by this compromise, and cleverly bur- 
 lesqued the Disraelian citation in Punch shortly 
 after to the following effect : — 
 
 " This thought once again into language I shape, 
 Belief in myself is my faith and evangel : 
 If any one likes to go for the Ape, 
 He can ; I prefer taking sides with the Angel." 
 
 At Manchester, before this, the Times also had given 
 a more accurate report of the Free Trade Hall 
 harangue than any of its contemporaries ; and one 
 which differed in important respects from less 
 authentic versions. It has been said, incorrectly, 
 that, in virtue of an old arrangement, Mr. Disraeli 
 furnished exclusive and early drafts of his greater 
 utterances to the leading journal. The real ex- 
 
Parliament and Platform. 337 
 
 planation is, that Mr. Neilson, one of the Times' 
 chief reporters, had " taken " Mr. Disraeli from his 
 Aylesbury addresses of a past generation, and did 
 so almost to the close of his life. This accomplished 
 stenographer rendered the great man useful assistance 
 by conversations with him before and after his more 
 special extra-parliamentary utterances. The Tory 
 leader's method of preparing his speeches varied at 
 different periods of his life. Most Etonians will 
 recollect the name, if not the personality, of William 
 Gifford Cookesley. At his house it was that 
 Disraeli acquired the fresh knowledge of Eton life 
 presented in Coningsby. Subsequently his patron 
 gave the Eton master the living of Hammersmith, 
 and got him into the Carlton Club. When in 1846 
 Disraeli was attacking Peel, he often walked with 
 Cookesley across the Park to the House, rehearsing 
 on the way the chief points of the invective he was 
 about to launch at the Tory apostate. Six-and- 
 twenty years later a more tranquil preparatory 
 method was employed. At Manchester in 1872 he 
 passed the day alone before the eventful hour 
 arrived. On the occasion of the Rectorial visit to 
 Glasgow of which I have been speaking, Mr. 
 Disraeli was the guest of Sir William Stirling- 
 Maxwell of Keir. The host, a short square-built 
 gentleman of aristocratic presence, was the greatest 
 
 22 
 
338 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 scholar and antiquarian of his day among the 
 Scottish gentry. He may, perhaps, have assisted 
 in refurbishing Mr. Disraeli's Greek-for the Glasgow 
 occasion. None who were then present are likely 
 to forget the extraordinary polish and brilliancy 
 of the widely opposite effects, each exactly suited 
 for its different occasion, produced in quick suc- 
 cession by Disraeli at the city on the Clyde. 
 In the afternoon following the morning of the 
 academic discourse, the orator harangued the 
 Scotch working men, and amid the plaudits of 
 navvies, mechanics, and artisans, appealed to his 
 hearers to "leave off munching the remainder 
 biscuit of an effete Liberalism." The origin of the 
 phrase excitedi at the time not less questioning than 
 the source of the Greek quotation in tlie morning. 
 Sir WiUiam Maxwell showed the then editor of the 
 Edinburgh Courant, James Mure, that the expression 
 first occurred in Othello. More personally inter- 
 esting, perhaps, than any other utterance on this 
 occasion was his autobiographical vindication of his 
 own position at a Conservative club dinner. One 
 of the society's officials, proposing the evening's 
 toast, by way of complimenting the visitor, read 
 aloud nearly half a chapter from the most inflated 
 portion of Alroy. Disraeli received it with grim 
 silence and apparently unconsciousness. A minute 
 
Parliament and Platform. 339 
 
 or two afterwards, protesting against the revival of 
 his youth's literary extravagances, he recalled in the 
 happiest vein his boyish meeting with " the lord of 
 Abbotsford." Again he passed on to Louis Philippe, 
 sketching him in six sentences exactly as it might 
 have been one of his own creations in the novel, 
 Endymion, which he was then meditating. The 
 sagacious but not successful monarch had ascribed 
 the success of the English public system to the habit 
 of talking politics at dinner. One of the company 
 pricked up his ears at the word, expecting some 
 new declaration of Conservative statesmanship. 
 Mr. Disraeli noticed the anticipation he had 
 excited ; paused for a moment : " Politics — not 
 policy, I said," was his humorous aside, after which 
 he resumed his argument. 
 
 22 
 
CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 THE 1874 AND 1880 ADMINISTRATIONS. 
 
 The DiRSoIntion and General Elections of 1874. Cirenm- 
 Btances of Uf. Gladstone's decision to dissolve. The 
 address written in bed approved by Lord Granville and 
 others. Hr. Disraeli's connter tactics, consultation with 
 Lord Cairns and Imperial appeal. His unannounced pur- 
 pose of baying the Suez Canal shares. The "jingo" fever 
 of 1878. The true genesis of jingo. Social and fashionable 
 popularity of the Turk baclced by the Jew. Extreme un- 
 popularity of Lwd Carnarvon and Lord Derby on their 
 resignation. Street demonstrations. Lord Carnarvon's 
 &ont door forced. State of society at this time. Peace 
 with honour brought back from Berlin. Lord Salisbury 
 and Lord Beaconsfield at the Guildhall. & discordant note 
 roughly silenced. "He's no friends, and it's a safe kick." 
 How the Imperial tide ebbed. Facts and fictions about 
 Lord Beaconsfield. Impres?ive scene at his funeral at 
 Hughenden. Mr. Coningsby Disraeli— Lord Beaconsfleld's 
 last words. 
 
 THE only occasion when I was by way of 
 having any colloquy political or otherwise with 
 Mr. Disraeli was in the January of 1874. His 
 rival's intention to dissolve Parliament had only 
 been known the previous Saturday, and had come 
 as a surprise to many sharers of his confidences. 
 The Conservative leader's speeches in the North, 
 which I have already described, had produced an 
 effect at once visible in the bye-elections throughout 
 
 340 
 
The 1874 and 1880 Administrations. 341 
 
 the country, in the reduction of the Ministerial 
 majority at Westminster, as well as in the consequent 
 loss of popular prestige. But there is the best reason 
 for believing that so recently as the December of '73, 
 no idea of dissolution had shaped itself clearly in 
 the Gladstonian mind. When, however, the Liberal 
 Premier found that after paying the expenses of the 
 Ashantee War there would be a surplus of over 
 ;f 5,000,000, he resolved to propose a grand scheme 
 of local taxation coupled with the abolition of the 
 Income Tax. Only a new Parliament, fresh froirj 
 the constituencies could, be perceived, invest him 
 with the authority required for this programme. 
 Mr. Gladstone was, at the time, suffering from a 
 severe cold, and wrote in bed his manifesto to his 
 constituents. Having done this, he sent for Lord 
 Granville and Mr. Glyn, then Whip. The docu- 
 ment was read by its author to his two visitors, and 
 received their warm approval. In this manner the 
 dissolution took place. 
 
 Directly Mr. Gladstone's address had appeared, 
 Mr. Disraeli telegraphically summoned Lord Cairns, 
 after due consultation with whom the Tory re- 
 joinder to the Liberal pronouncement was issued 
 in the shape of an appeal to the Buckingham- 
 shire electors. Mr. Disraeli had left his house 
 at Grosvenor Gate, which came to him, as part 
 
342 Platform, Press, Politics and Play, 
 
 of his wife's jointure, on Lady Beaconsfield's deaths 
 Many absurd stories of this dwelling's interior have 
 been circulated. I have seen it gravely stated in 
 print that the Tory leader meditated his epigrams 
 in an upper room " whose walls were covered with 
 Russia leather and whose recesses were glorious 
 with roses of Sharon." The truth is, the furniture 
 was simple throughout, while as for the flowers, if a 
 Sharon rose was ever possessed by the author of 
 Tancred, it must have been one which the hero of 
 that novel brought back to his creator from Palestine. 
 Another Disraeli myth extensively propagated con- 
 cerns the Prince of Wales' visit to Hughenden some 
 years later. The Heir Apparent is represented after 
 dinner as requesting that whist tables should be 
 produced, that the game should be played at five- 
 guinea points; while a gentleman of the statesman's 
 household reduced the stakes to a fifth of that 
 sum. His Royal Highness did, it is true, visit the 
 Buckinghamshire Manor-house, but as no cards 
 were produced nothing was said about points — 
 guinea or otherwise. On the present occasion, the 
 memorable Sunday, that is, in Mid- January, 1874, 
 when from the instructions of my editor, Mr. Hamber 
 of the Hour, I presented myself at Thomas' Hotel 
 where Mr. Disraeli was then staying. The great man 
 was too busy to receive me for a protracted interview. 
 
The 1874 and 1880 Administrations. 343 
 
 Some sanguine Liberals may have anticipated a 
 Gladstonian triumph, but the more hard headed on 
 both sides never doubted that the personal appeal 
 of the Liberal leader would be rejected. Especially 
 Sir Charles Dilke, I remember, predicted approxi- 
 mately the Conservative majority's figures. Of one 
 particular fact, by no means unimportant, I did at 
 this time become possessed. Neither in general 
 conversation nor in newspapers had a hint yet been 
 dropped about the purchase of the Suez Canal 
 shares. But before the elections were held Mr. 
 Disraeli had resolved if their issue should place him 
 in power to secure for England the predominant 
 partnership in Ferdinand de Lesseps' mid-sea high- 
 way. 
 
 As I had witnessed in Lancashire and in Scotland 
 Mr. Disraeli's preparations for his great victory of 
 1874; as I saw, and have already narrated, its 
 House of Commons' sequels ; so was I to behold 
 those acts of the parliamentary and popular drama 
 in which Lord Beaconsfield's fortunes reached the 
 zenith of their splendour. Lord Derby and Lord 
 Carnarvon in 1878, when the jingo fever was at its 
 height, left the Cabinet on the question of the 
 English Fleet entering the Dardanelles. During 
 several days yelling crowds hissed and hooted their 
 disapproval outside the houses of the two resigned 
 
344 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Ministers in St. James' Square and Bruton Street 
 respectively. Into the latter, some of the mob 
 actually pushed their way past Lord Carnarvon's 
 front door. The ringleader was making for the 
 library where the master of the house happened 
 to be. A particularly powerful footman intercepted 
 his progress, and a few moments later bundled the 
 intruder into the street amidst the cheers of the 
 mob, now, after their fashion, turned against their 
 foiled comrade. The jingo fever, as it well might 
 be called, towards the close of the seventies, spread 
 itself everywhere in London, high and low, with all 
 the fury of an epidemic. Fashionable Society went 
 mad with its enthusiasm for the gentlemanly Turk. 
 Modish mothers taught their children to make a 
 Moslem salaam to their guests; dressed up their 
 little boys as Bashi Bazouks, and their little girls as 
 Odalisques. All this is now forgotten. The very origin 
 of the term has already become a philological specula- 
 tion. It originated of course in the music-hall verse : — 
 
 " We don't want to fight, but, by jingo, if we do. 
 We 've got the men, we "ve got the ships, we 've got 
 the money too " ; 
 
 or, as one of the more rational patriots in the 
 
 Army and Navy Club smoking room modified the 
 
 final words : — 
 
 "We've got no men, we've got no ships, but we'll 
 be licked all through." 
 
The 1874 *"^ 1880 Administrations. 345 
 
 Lord Derby and Lord Carnarvon were both 
 burned in efiSgy wherever bonfires could be lit. 
 If the Tory leader had seized the Royal Sceptre, 
 a plebiscite of the pavement would have voted 
 to him the Throne. These extraordinary manifes- 
 tations of popular enthusiasm would be explained 
 insufficiently by Lord Beaconsfield's personal popu- 
 larity or by any abstract admiration for the Turk 
 and his ways. Many elements entered into the 
 grotesque amalgam of the then dominating senti- 
 ment. No doubt there still lingered among us the 
 old Palmerstonian prejudices in favour of the 
 Ottoman Empire, together with the legacy of 
 Russian distrust bequeathed by Lord Stratford de 
 Redcliffe and other eminent diplomatists. But the 
 pro-Turkish agitation's real strength lay in the fact 
 that it brought out with new intensity domestic 
 differences and animosities at once ancient and 
 inveterate among us. Mr. Gladstone had secured 
 the moral and religious adhesion of many poli- 
 tical opponents such even as Lord Salisbury and 
 Lord Bath by appealing to their Greek Church 
 sympathies as High Anglicans jealous of Rome. 
 On the other hand, the Positivists under Mr. 
 Frederick Harrison, like the Jews, largely sympa- 
 thised with the Mahommedan, not from any 
 love for Islamism ; but because they saw in the 
 
346 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Turks a counterpoise to a too preponderating 
 Christianity. 
 
 Another formidable factor in the movement was 
 the Jewish influence throughout Europe. That of 
 course was exercised for the benefit of the man who 
 had reflected glory on the Jewish name ; who was 
 now treading in British pohcy's traditional steps — 
 the great Benjamin Disraeli himself. Thus the 
 whole "city," every section of the organisation 
 known as Society ; all the West End clubs ; every 
 music hall throughout the kingdom ; every skittle 
 alley, every pot-house was on the side of the 
 Mussulman. These varied ingredients in the 
 emotional conglomerate united themselves with the 
 forces and interests akin to militarism. The warriors 
 of Pall Mall or Whitehall led the habitues of the 
 Leicester Square and Oxford Street singing and 
 dancing saloons in the demand to plant the Union 
 Jack in regions envied by the Russian; or to do 
 anything which would engage us once more in a 
 deadly grapple with oui' old enemies of the Crimea. 
 
 At a different stage of this commotion the two 
 resigned Ministers rose to make their explanation 
 in the Upper House. That usually impassive 
 assembly was then visibly vibrating to the tempest 
 of angry feeling in Palace Yard outside. Lord 
 Carnarvon was heard amid chilling silence. Lord 
 
The 1874 and 1880 Administrations. 347 
 
 Derby was greeted with the nearest approach to a 
 hiss which patrician breeding would allow. When 
 Lord Salisbury in his bitterest vein poured contempt 
 upon the two self- vindicating peers, his scornful 
 references to the inconvenient revelations of the 
 Cabinet's dark interior, and his comparison of 
 Lord Derby to Titus Oates trying to see how 
 much the public would stand, called forth cheers 
 which struck the Gilded Chamber's roof. It had 
 seemed at one time as if the social cleavage in the 
 Tory ranks coinciding with these differences on 
 foreign policy would have rent the party in twain. 
 The hostess in. a Southern country house, where 
 I happened to be visiting at the time, herself the 
 daughter of a Tory race, but an anti-jingo, made a 
 ■ little address in the drawing-room to her anti- Moslem 
 friends, winding up with the words : " We are all 
 Liberals now ! " No signs, however, were visible of 
 the boast's fulfilment a fortnight afterwards. 
 
 The crowning incident in this militant Con- 
 servatism's most triumphant episode, was to be wit- 
 nessed two years later, when Lord Beaconsfield and 
 Lord Salisbury " brought back peace with honour " 
 from Berlin. I was present at their reception at the 
 Guildhall upon the occasion, and can recall one little 
 circumstance which I have never seen mentioned in 
 any account of the proceedings. Amid an aisle of 
 
348 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 human beings flushed with enthusiasm, hoarse with 
 cheering, the two statesmen advanced and retired 
 through the historic building. One misguided 
 Briton struck a discordant note by ridiculously 
 exclaiming as the two peers passed: "Traitors to 
 the Constitution ! " In another moment the rash 
 citizen had been felled to the ground simultaneously 
 by half-a-dozen patriotic fists. Blood was already 
 streaming from his nostrils, eyes, and ears. As the 
 poor creature was stretched his length upon the 
 ground, a furred Alderman, nobly bent on vindicating 
 the civic honour, murmuring the words, " He's no 
 friends, it's a safe kick," drove his booted foot with 
 all his force successively against the head and 
 stomach of the prostrate anti-jingo. A few minutes 
 later the luckless creature was carted off, maimed 
 and impotent, from the building. A spectator of 
 the little incident could from the passions he 
 observed in play around him, have understood 
 better perhaps than before the frenzied delight 
 caused by the sight of blood to the onlookers in 
 the Roman amphitheatre, or by the writhings of 
 disembowelled horses to the chivalry of Castile in 
 the Spanish bull-ring. 
 
 After this the tide began to ebb ; but during his 
 life's short remainder. Lord Beaconsfield, the 1880 
 Election alone excepted, knew aslittle what national 
 
The 1874 and 1880 Administrations. 349 
 
 unpopularity as what Court dis-favour was like. His 
 death in the spring of next year was an apotheosis. 
 His funeral in Hughenden churchyard was more 
 memorable than most interments in Westminster 
 Abbey. That ceremony took place on a chill, 
 changeful April day. The peafowl on the Hughenden 
 lawn had always been preferred by their master to 
 the primroses. The birds now, with their shrill 
 funereal cries and in their depressed stride over 
 the turf, withheld no sign of grief at the death 
 of their master. Lord Cairns, so long the dead 
 statesman's chief adviser in the Peers, paced solitary 
 up and down the gravel walk soliloquising some- 
 times audibly on the transitoriness of all earthly 
 things ; or joined in subdued talk with Lord Derby, 
 Mr. Gathorne Hardy, Lord Stanhope, and Mr. Cross. 
 The little church, where Lord Beaconsfield was a 
 regular Communicant, stands within the demesne. 
 From the lawn before the house the organ notes, on 
 the occasion now spoken of, could already be heard ; 
 the surpliced clergyman was seen advancing to the 
 gate. The little brook traversing the estate was 
 humorously spoken of by the Lord of the Manor as 
 "that ancient river, the river Kishon." At this 
 moment a gleam of sunshine pierced a dense bank 
 of clouds, lighting up the whole streamlet's course, 
 and finally resting upon the bier on which the 
 
350 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 great man is borne by Hughenden tenants. I have 
 seen interments at Westminster Abbey and in St. 
 Paul's. None of these were so impressive as the 
 obsequies in the Buckinghamshire churchyard. 
 
 Perhaps the most interesting figure among the 
 living was a dark-complexioned youth of about 
 seventeen. Not many years before this he had called 
 at the Prime Minister's in Downing Street, would 
 take no denial, and so secured his admission to 
 Lord Beaconsfield's presence. The visitor was the 
 Premier's nephew, Mr. Ralph Disraeli's son. Pleased 
 by the lad's importunity the distinguished uncle 
 made him his heir, personally superintending his 
 education's completion. This lad was, at the funeral, 
 chief mourner. His composure and dignified modesty 
 attracted much admiration. When the noble and 
 pathetic service had ended most of those present 
 visited the vault where the mighty ashes reposed. 
 The cofiin was covered with primroses, the Queen's 
 wreath of that flower being conspicuous among them. 
 The dead leader's chief followers struggled vainly to 
 repress their emotions. Physicians see too much of 
 death-beds to be readily impressionable; but Dr., 
 now Sir Richard, Quain who attended the patient in 
 his illness, has Celtic blood in his veins, and as with 
 others he stood in the vault, was dissolved in tears. 
 This, then, was the first of those primrose anni- 
 
The 1874 and 1880 Administrations. 351 
 
 versaries which are yet observed. Nor is there any 
 other reason why that vernal blossom should be 
 associated with Beaconsfield's memory save that it 
 was the primrose season when he died. 
 
 Some time before, also, to a friend condoling with 
 him on his defeat at the 1880 Elections, he remarked, 
 that he deserved congratulation rather for that he 
 would now be at leisure to note the spring growths 
 unfolding their petals in his grounds. To much the 
 same effect, before Disraeli, Adolphe Thiers met 
 under similar circumstances his friends' sympathetic 
 regrets. Curiously enough, Disraeli had always 
 admired and studied, sometimes unconsciously 
 imitated, the French statesman's rhetoric. Thus, 
 many years earlier in his remarks on the Duke of 
 Wellington's death, the Conservative leader had 
 appropriated Thiers' fine image personifying his 
 country ever visible before the warrior with a laurel 
 wreath in one hand and a cypress crown in the 
 other. The coincidence passed unnoticed for some 
 time in the English press till it was pointed out by 
 Mr. O'Byrne in the columns of the Globe. Disraeli 
 was so far thoroughly English as to possess in 
 perfection the habit of never worrying over trifles 
 and of meeting reverses with the good temper which 
 English statesmen from North to Melbourne and 
 Palmerston have ever displayed. When in 1880 the 
 
352 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 "light and leading" letter to the Duke of Marl- 
 borough had manifestly failed of its effect, and day 
 after day the constituencies were declaring against 
 him, personal enquiries were of course made con- 
 cerning his health. Laughingly he deprecated this 
 solicitude with the words : " People need not ask 
 after me as if I were a lady who had just had a 
 baby." Most men who, starting from such 
 beginnings, have encountered opposition, at times 
 so personally malignant, would have showed some 
 bitterness, if only in conversation about others. 
 Disraeli never betrayed such a sentiment. He had 
 too much genius, and too much good sense for it. 
 Not devoid of self-love on his literary side, he did 
 indeed abidingly resent the caricature of his style 
 presented to the public many years earlier by 
 Thackeray in Codlingsby ; and in Endymion could 
 not resist the temptation of travestying by the style 
 of " St. Barbe, as author of Topsy Turvy," the 
 great humourist who wrote Vantiy Fair But with 
 this exception Disraeli had no literary enmities. At 
 his own request it was that Charles Dickens had 
 been asked to meet him at Lord Stanhope's dinner- 
 table; while he subsequently described David 
 Copperfield's author as one of the most perfectly 
 charming men he had ever seen. 
 
 The last words of this great man on his death- 
 
The 1874 and 1880 Administrations. 353 
 
 bed have been given not less variously than is the 
 lot of most such utterances. I have it, however, 
 from one who personally witnessed the drama's final 
 act in Curzon Street that the authentic utterance 
 which preceded Disraeli's dissolution was — "I am 
 oppressed ! " 
 
 Since relating in an earlier chapter Mr. Cookesley's 
 experiences of Disraeli's speech preparation in earlier 
 days, I have heard from the statesman's former 
 private secretary, and most intimate friend, that 
 such rehearsals as the Eton master listened to in 
 St. James' Park were not continued in later life by 
 the orator. " Lord Beaconsfield,'' writes to me 
 Lord Rowton, "to the best of my knowledge, 
 deeply reflected on his forthcoming speeches long 
 beforehand, and only put them mentally into verbal 
 shape during a seclusion of two or three hours 
 which he obtained before delivering an address of 
 much importance. I am sure he never used to write 
 so as to rehearse what he meant, to say, in the case 
 of his parliamentary speeches." 
 
 23 
 
CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 king's college, strand, and teaching else- 
 where, IN the early seventies. 
 
 The new order of Oxford nndergraduates in the seventies. 
 King's College, London. Teaching experiences there in 
 Classics and IJogic. Principal Jelf; his gracious manners 
 and great popularity. Succeeded by Dr. Barry of Chelten- 
 ham. The two Principals compared. General experiences 
 of teaching for the Indian Civil Service examinations, and 
 of those called "crammers." T. J. Baty, A. D. Sprange, 
 W. Baptiste Scoones. Iiqustice of the cry against 
 "crammers." 
 
 A GENERATION at Oxford endures little more 
 than three J^ears. Two or three such periods, 
 then, as they are reckoned on the Isis, had passed 
 before, my B.A. as well as my M.A. degree being 
 now taken, my almost weekly visits to the place 
 were discontinued. During these years, I had not 
 only made acquaintance with the youthful married 
 dons who had replaced the sometimes* less youthful 
 bachelors of my own undergraduate days, but had 
 witnessed the rise of an entirely new order of under- 
 graduates also. At Balliol and Trinity, of which, 
 
 * The years of Fellows and tutors, even before the latest 
 reforms, have been conventionally much exaggerated. 
 
 354 
 
King's College, Strand, and Teaching Elsewhere. 355 
 
 from femily accidents, I knew most, all traces of the 
 epoch depicted in Verdant Green had disappeared 
 since my day. The aesthetic era had set in with 
 its modern severity. College rooms were furnished 
 in a style that was a cross between a Pimlico 
 parlour and a Wardour Street repository. The cult 
 of the sunflower and the lotus had replaced the 
 latest neologies as they had also superseded the 
 older text books. The owners of these chambers, 
 before they had passed Moderations, talked, and no 
 doubt wrote, like Saturday Reviewers of established 
 position. Many of them seemed to have an " apart- 
 ment " in Paris, as well of course as a club in Pall 
 Mall. The unsophisticated types of "Charles 
 Larkyns," or " Mr. Bouncer," had disappeared. In 
 their place were little. London clubmen, who con- 
 descended to wear a student's gown. 
 
 At this time, I was lecturing weekly on Logic 
 at King's College. I was also, in the same institu- 
 tion, vicariously discharging for my old friend, my 
 father's Eton and Oxford contemporary. Professor 
 J. G. Lonsdale, the entire duties of the Classical 
 Chair. Many of my pupils were entering at Oxford 
 every term. It was, therefore, part of my duty 
 to maintain an acquaintance with the latest 
 methods of Oxford teaching, changing as those 
 
 methods do almost with the seasons. In the 
 
 23 * 
 
356 Platform, Press,' Politics and Play. 
 
 Final Schools of History and Philosophy I had 
 myself in 1865 been placed in the Second Class. 
 One of my examiners was then Mr. T. Fowler — 
 to-day President of Corpus. Just thirty years after 
 the examination, in June, 1895, I had occasion to 
 write to this gentleman on a private matter. In 
 his courteous reply he mentions his "pleasant 
 recollections of the examination." in 1865, adding, 
 " I well remember my regret that your work, though 
 excellent in many respects, did not quite justify us 
 in placing you in the First Class." I shall, I hope, 
 be pardoned the egotism that, blending with affec- 
 tion for all Oxford things, moves me to give this 
 little extract, as unexpected as it was gratifying, 
 since it came when I should have supposed my 
 small performances in the Schools had passed from 
 all memories save my own. 
 
 The period during which, in the heart of the 
 roaring Strand, I combined teaching with journalism 
 at King's College, was among the pleasantest I have 
 ever passed. On the Isis, I had been examined for 
 Moderations by Dr. Jelf, of Greek grammar fame. 
 In the Strand, the first Principal under whom I 
 served was his venerable father. Principal Jelf 
 had been at Christ Church in the days of Pusey as 
 well as of my uncle, Bickham Escott. He was 
 intimately acquainted with certain branches of my 
 
King's College, Strand, and Teitching Elsewhere. 357 
 
 own numerous and dominantly ecclesiastical family 
 stock. Dr. Jelf was the last specimen of the Oxford 
 academic of the grand manner and of the old school 
 whom, since taking my degree, I had seen. He 
 was regarded by the whole teaching staff, not less 
 than by all the students, with real veneration and 
 living affection. 
 
 He had his successor in Dr. Alfred Barry, subse- 
 quently Bishop of Sydney, and now Rector of St. 
 James', Piccadilly. At Cheltenham Dr. Barry's 
 experience with mixed orders of parents and pupils 
 had been a better preparation for his London work 
 than would have been the headship of an older 
 public school. His tact in dealing with young 
 people was great. With a strong sense of justice, 
 and extraordinary insight into character, he could 
 defy all forms of youthful or parental imposture. 
 It had become a sort of proverb at Cheltenham: 
 "You cannot tell a lie to Barry." An exceedingly 
 successful man, who at Cambridge had taken one of 
 the best degrees in his year. Dr. Barry, like all school- 
 masters, had made enemies, especially among those 
 tutorial assistants whom he may have dismissed. 
 These talked against him perhaps, but no one else 
 •who knew him did so. An usher with a grievance 
 can be particulairly spiteful. The present Archbishop 
 of Canterbury, a Primate assuredly of an ideal aspect 
 
358 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 and dignity, has suffered from an identical cause' 
 ever since his Wellington College days. Dr. Barry 
 did not bring to his office the same perfection of 
 manner which had graced his predecessor ; but 
 consciously he wounded no prejudices, and took 
 immense pains to make his staff feel they might 
 always count on his friendship and advice. 
 
 Curiously complex and varied the personnel of this 
 body was. The little figure of E. H. Plumptre, scholar, 
 theologian, subsequently Dean of Wells, seemed 
 overflowing with vigour and sensibility. Leone Levi, 
 Professor of Commercial Law, was the embodiment 
 of wiry activity as of enthusiasm in his teaching 
 labours. Gustave Masson, a typical Frenchman 
 from the Boulevards, full of vivacity and vigour, 
 was a contrast to the dark-haired Teutonic scholar. 
 Dr. Bucheim, who still teaches German in the same 
 establishment. No change could be greater than 
 that from an Oxford tutor's lecture room, with its 
 inmates ready to resent any excess of zeal on their 
 teacher's part, to the King's College classes, com- 
 posed of lads fresh from the shop, or the lower 
 middle - class home, demonstratively intent on 
 extracting the full measure of information con- 
 tained in every word. One did not, therefore, lack 
 inducements to fulfil one's duty. Nor have I many 
 pleasanter memories than those of my pupils during 
 
King's College, Strand, ani Teaching Elsewhere. 359 
 
 the seventies in the Strand, from some of whom I 
 still hear occasionally. 
 
 The examinations for the Indian Civil Service, 
 for which at this time I prepared innumerable candi- 
 dates, have been modified since in certain essential 
 respects. In the days I am now speaking of the 
 average of successful candidates was a trifle below 
 the mark for an ordinary entrance scholarship at 
 Oxford. Subjects, but not particular periods or 
 special authors, were then prescribed for competitors. 
 The studies that paid best in marks were precisely 
 those for which "cramming" was least possible — 
 e.g., classics, mathematics, mental and moral science. 
 The outcry against crammers and cramming is, 
 I am sure, almost entirely unjust. Speaking from 
 a practical knowledge, gathered in my capacity of 
 teacher at these seats of learning, I can testify 
 that the so-called crammer is simply a gentleman 
 who has a knack of fixing his pupils' attention, 
 stamping knowledge on their memory, or of giving 
 his staff valuable hints how to do so. The Rev. 
 T. J. Baty, at the epoch now spoken of, and his 
 colleague. Sir Philip Perring, were very successful 
 in preparing young men for Woolwich, Sandhurst, 
 and the Line. A. D. Sprange and my now old and 
 highly-valued friend W. Baptiste Scoones, had, like 
 Mr. W. Wren, at a much later period, made the 
 
360 Platform, Press, Politics and Play, 
 
 Indian competition their special business. At Baty's 
 I succeeded Perring. At all the others, Mr. Wren's 
 excepted, I have worked on the teaching staff. I 
 can, therefore, say from experience that there is 
 nothing contraband or unhealthy in the processes 
 here performed, and that the so-called crammer is 
 as legitimate and healthy a product as the Univer- 
 sity coach. 
 
CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 THE NEW JOURNALISM. 
 
 A St. James' Street "&acas" between Lord Carrin^ton and 
 Grenville MuFray. The beginning of the New JournaliBiu. 
 OrenTille Hurray, the "Queen's Messenger"; the "World." 
 Edmund Tates : his special qualifications for the editorship 
 of such a paper. His Mends and adYisers. Posthumous 
 vitality of his paper. Edmund Tates and James Knowles 
 as editors of their epoch. 
 
 WALKING up St. James' Street shortly before 
 dinner-time one evening during the summer 
 of an early seventy, I noticed two gentlemen, as 
 I had first thought, button-holing each other in 
 friendly converse not far from the Conservative 
 Club. Presently the interview developed into what 
 might have been a scuffle or an embrace. I 
 dimly descried a brandishing of a walking-cane by 
 the younger above the elder's head. But because, 
 perhaps, I was too distant I did not observe any 
 actual violence. Nor did I think more about the 
 affair till I heard the following day that Lord 
 Carrington had chastised Mr. Grenville Murray for 
 lampooning him in the Queen's Messenger. This 
 was a very small sheet, with probably no larger a 
 circulation. I only saw one copy of it. The print 
 
 361 
 
362 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 nevertheless was the earliest real precursor of the 
 new journalism. 
 
 Mr. Granville Murray was connected by birth 
 with the ducal house of Buckingham. He had, 
 like many others, served under Charles Dickens 
 on Household Words ; had written there The 
 Roving Englishman, and more recently had made 
 his mark anew by some astonishingly clever sketches 
 of French life and character in the Pall Mall Gazette. 
 Shortly after the West End encounter just men- 
 tioned, Murray fixed himself permanently in Paris. 
 About the same time Edmund Yates returned from 
 his lecturing tour in the United States, not only 
 with the proceeds of his American visit in his 
 pocket, but with the European correspondentship 
 of the New York Herald. The Queen's Messenger's 
 short and startling career, and the experiences of 
 the trans-Atlantic press had given him the idea of a 
 sheet which, reproducing the characteristics of both, 
 should revive also the social essays of Dickens' 
 miscellany. 
 
 Tom Hood's introduction, nearly a decade 
 earlier, had first made me known to Yates. In 
 the autumn of 1874 he briefly explained to me 
 the idea of his journal one week ; bade me set to 
 work immediately. The next time I saw him, a 
 few days later, the first number of the World was 
 
The New Joumalism. 363 
 
 in the hands of the public. Grenville Murray 
 continued for a time Yates' partner in this enter- 
 prise, saw the proofs in Paris, but left the actual 
 editing to the man whose name will always be 
 identified with the paper. Justice has already been 
 done by me to the Owl. But that sheet never had 
 any general circulation, and long before 1874, ^^^ 
 become ancient history. The World, therefore, 
 which, after the Queen's Messenger, has proved the 
 parent of so prolific an offspring, practically had its 
 origin in the inventive audacity of Grenville Murray ; 
 in the native acuteness, and in the social and jour- 
 nalistic experience of Edmund Yates. This latter 
 litterateur had many qualifications apart from his 
 own native aptitudes, and his newspaper training 
 for the editorship of a journal like the World. 
 The histrionic genius and popularity of his two 
 parents had secured him many useful friends in 
 London life as well as a clerkship in the General 
 Post Office. Here he had been trained into 
 official competence and methodical habits by a 
 whole dynasty of departmental chiefs. His know- 
 ledge of several levels of Metropolitan life was not 
 less thorough than that of George Sala himself. 
 He grafted upon this familiarity a considerable 
 acquaintance with various aspects of English life, 
 acquired generally at country houses, such as 
 
364 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Lord Fife's, where he often visited ; but especially 
 in his tours through the United Kingdom when he 
 was superintending the transfer of the telegraph 
 wires to the State. 
 
 In addition to his publicistic facilities and dis- 
 cipline, Edmund Yates possessed a better education 
 than most of his newspaper contemporaries, and far 
 more real culture than many of those who were 
 alternately his parasites and detractors. Educated 
 at the same school as so many of the Wadham 
 Positivists, Highgate, under Dr. Dyne, he had 
 picked up enough Latin and Greek to have taken an 
 Oxford degree without difficulty. At a German 
 University he had gained a thorough knowledge, 
 conversational and literary, of French as well as 
 German. He was always an omnivorous and reten- 
 tive reader. His acquaintance with Tennyson in 
 particular approached to scholarship. His full 
 intellectual development came late in life, and con- 
 tinued, I think, up to his death. His extreme 
 sensibility to new impressions helped him to reflect 
 in his paper even those aspects of existence wherein 
 personally he may not have felt much interest. 
 Above all, he was the keenest man of business with 
 whom in letters I have ever been brought into contact. 
 He was not ungenerous, but like a true native of 
 Edinburgh, where he chanced to have been born, he 
 
The New Jov^vnalism. 365 
 
 insisted on having full commercial value for every 
 shilling expended. His social and domestic environ- 
 ment was also useful to him. He had married a lady 
 of great personal endowments and of admirably 
 sound womanly sense. His own lifelong friends were 
 attached to him with a warmth which attested his 
 personal merits, and always, especially his most 
 intimate comrade, Joseph Charles Parkinson, gave 
 him useful advice. In conversation beneath the 
 editor's hospitable roof, new features for the World, 
 successively suggested themselves. The sound and 
 more instructive articles inspired by workmanlike 
 respect for Dickens' example were combined with 
 papers and paragraphs distinctively characteristic of 
 a later regime. Since then, whatever attracted 
 notice in the World has been copied widely else- 
 where. Here, however, it was for the first time that 
 H. W. Lucy, "From under the Clock," drew the 
 pictures of Parliament men, profiles, white waists 
 coats and all as in their daily habit they were. 
 
 Here, too, before any others, B, H. Becker, or 
 H. Pearce, sketched the domestic life of celebrities 
 and made the late John Bright and many others 
 practically acquainted with the trans-Atlantic habit 
 of being found "at home." Since theii, Mr. H. 
 Labouchere has elaborated in Truth the treatment 
 which in the earliest instance he applied to shams. 
 
366 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 social or financial, in the World. H. W. Lucy's 
 parliamentary sketches have by this time long laid 
 the foundations of a recognised school of parlia- 
 mentary reporting. The " interview," originated by 
 Yates, is, in one shape or another, as indispensable a 
 portion of every weekly journal as the leading article 
 itself is of a daily organ. The World's first editor him- 
 self took little interest in politics. Dickens and others 
 under whom he had learnt his business had a general 
 sympathy with Liberalism. At first this sympathy 
 was independently reflected in the World's columns, 
 but the party never gave its editor the slightest 
 recognition or encouragement. He therefore trans- 
 ferred his attentions to the Conservatives, who 
 received him with open arms. Before he died, he 
 saw nearly all the novelties he had promulgated in 
 his own paper copied upon every side. Since he has 
 been dead, his example's memory has received the 
 flattery of continued and increased imitation. The 
 shrewd and ingenious gentleman who, having by his 
 terse pungent English achieved distinction as a con- 
 tributor, is now a proprietor of substance, and an 
 editor of enterprise, has revolutionised completely 
 the journal which Douglas Cook started by embel- 
 lishing it with the short paragraphs which, from 
 the United States, Yates first domesticated. Other 
 weekly and even daily sheets cannot withstand the 
 
The New Journalism. 367 
 
 attraction of his precedent, and prosper in propor- 
 tion as his footsteps are followed. 
 
 The memory of Edmund Yates may still have 
 detractors, but the man will continue to be a 
 living power while journalism endures. Since the 
 Crimean War, the newspaper had shown a tendency 
 to invade the historic territory of the magazine. 
 Edmund Yates in the weekly, Mr. James Knowles 
 in the monthly, press, carried these reciprocal 
 annexations further than had yet been done. To- 
 day all periodical literature, weekly or monthly^ is 
 penetrated by the dominating influence of these two 
 who, though proposing to themselves different 
 exemplars and animated by opposite ideas, are 
 equally entitled to the description of epoch-makers 
 in their profession. 
 
CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 NEW MEN. 
 
 The new style in the Honse of Conunons as represented 
 specially by Lord Randolph Churchill and Ur. Chamber- 
 lain. Personal comparison of the two. Both types 
 of the newest Metropolitan ciTilisation. The degree in 
 which both reflected the characteristics of their time. 
 
 FROM 1874 to 1880, the House of Commons still 
 preserved many specimens of the older and 
 statelier parliamentary manner and oratory. The 
 latter date opened a new era on both political sides. 
 Mr. Chamberlain had indeed long before this achieved 
 local, and to some extent national, distinction. He 
 had not become a first-rate power at St. Stephen's 
 until the debate which raised a question of military 
 discipline, in the course of which he denounced Lord 
 Hartington as " the late Liberal leader," and secured 
 acceptance for himself as the new Radical chief. 
 Alike in general discussion and in Committee of the 
 whole House, Mr. Chamberlain displayed from the 
 first, in their very highest perfection, all the gifts of 
 the first-rate parliamentary man of business. To 
 him and to his school, speaking was less a fine art 
 than a function of citizenship to be discharged with 
 
 368 
 
New Men, 369 
 
 energy and precision ; so as to reflect the thoughts of 
 an inarticulate multitude organised to efiiciency by 
 his vigilant energy outside St, Stephen's walls. On 
 these points Lord Randolph Churchill soon adopted 
 Mr. Chamberlain's views. Nor in our time have 
 two men ever displayed reciprocally a more power- 
 ful influence or exercised so much of a mutual 
 fascination. It was from the first not less inevitable 
 that the one would soon be identified with Democra- 
 tic Conservatism than it was certain that the other 
 would end as a Tory. Randolph Churchill admired 
 Joseph Chamberlain's autocratic rule alike of the 
 Midland masses and of his own personal entourage. 
 Chamberlain viewed with approval Churchill's per- 
 meation of the Conservative organisation with his 
 own bold idiosyncrasies. The two men were 
 necessarily rivals. Socially they were close acquaint- 
 ances and even friends. 
 
 Than Randolph Churchill, society and politics 
 have witnessed recently no more complex or pro- 
 foundly pathetic figure. He has been compared 
 to Disraeli, to Canning, to Pitt, and to many 
 others. His true prototype was not political at 
 all, but theatrical. The floor of the House of 
 Commons was to him a melodramatic stage. The 
 public personage to whom he possessed most points 
 of likeness was none other than the great French 
 
 24 
 
370 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 actress, Sarah Bernhardt. The same straining after 
 effect; the same essential isolation of spirit, were 
 common to each. Both had genius. Neither knew 
 anything of repose. Eliminate the accident of sex 
 and vocation from the Parisian artiste, so that there 
 is left only the natural temperament. From the 
 elements thus remaining the English Conservative 
 Democrat might almost have been formed. 
 
 If his private papers, above all his innumerable 
 letters to friends, recording impressions of events and 
 individuals, are ever published, their interest will be 
 found of a thoroughly tragic and heart-moving kind. 
 No one ever learnt from bitterer experience the truth 
 of the wise man's maxim : Vanitas vanitatum omnia 
 vanitas. No one having mastered that adage could 
 have so little indemnified himself for the mournful 
 discovery by ignoring as completely as Churchill did 
 the compensation which deeper interests and higher 
 studies, spiritual or intellectual, might have yielded 
 to him as they have done to many others. A true 
 product of his age, Randolph Churchill knew few 
 consolations of philosophy save those supplied by 
 the philosophy of materialism. His brother, the 
 eighth Duke of Marlborough was a man of acute 
 and powerful intellect, educated by considerable 
 mathematical study, and informed by desultory 
 physical research. Such intellectual interests and 
 
New Men. 371 
 
 occupations as Randolph Churchill pursued became 
 scientific also; for though the brothers sometimes 
 had their small family differences, the younger could 
 not help being impressed by the remarkable endow- 
 ments and acquirements of the elder. 
 
 A generation or so earlier Randolph Churchill 
 would have found more of real satisfaction and true 
 solace in the literature which had been the amuse- 
 ment of Canning, the delight of Pitt, and the com- 
 forter of Charles Fox. But after Disraeli's death, the 
 pastimes in vogue with politicians were those of the 
 physicist. C. S. Parnell, Churchill's acquaintance 
 during late years, excelled in experimental chemistry, 
 as he had once been pre-eminent in horsemanship. 
 Lord Salisbury, Churchill's leader, had secured 
 distinction in investigating those adaptations of 
 electricity which fascinated his titular follower. 
 Mr. Chamberlain w&s the creator of municipal 
 Birmingham ; but was too much absorbed in pro- 
 blems of contemporary statesmanship, local or Im- 
 perial, to perpetuate the traditions of that higher 
 and immaterial culture, the illustration of which 
 might have brought a blessing to his friend and 
 rival. Churchill therefore looked to excitement for 
 the satisfaction of his restless impulses. In his 
 vain attempt to find it, the sword, in two score 
 years, out-wore its scabbard. A character which 
 
 24 * 
 
372 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 might have been a very fine one, never arrived at 
 maturity because it had not rightly interpreted 
 its own feverish aspirations. A brilliant careet 
 was maimed because the conditions of success had 
 not been understood properly or recognised practi- 
 cally. One commendable feature Churchill and 
 Chamberlain possessed in common. Nothing is 
 more honourable to the latter than his fidelity to 
 his plain friends of earlier days, especially to the 
 Devonian, Mr. Jesse CoUings, a native of Littleham, 
 Exmouth. Churchill's early followers, Sir John Gorst, 
 Sir H, Wolff, and others, were essential to him during 
 his earlier career. But they in turn owed their 
 subsequent advancement to his then powerful word. 
 The scion of the ducal house did not throw himself 
 with more zest into the new social order, with its 
 amusements, largely copied from French or American 
 habits, than did the Midland parliamentarian ; for 
 the only civilisation for which either cared was that 
 of the London which in the last ten years has 
 superseded the old capital. 
 
CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 FAMOUS FACES OUTSIDE LONDON. 
 
 Holiday trips to Isles within the four seas, ingustas Smith, 
 King of Scilly. R. S. Hawker, H. S. Stokes ; the Laureate in 
 Cornwall. Orkney and Shetland. "Electioneering extra- 
 ordinary " in ultima Thnle. Continental visits. Impressions 
 of Gambetta, of Depretis, Enulio Castelar, and Ismail Pasha. 
 The kingdom of Offenbach on the Nile. Nubar Pasha. 
 Valentine Baker on Egyptian habits, especially going up 
 and down stairs. An intelligent native on the march of 
 civilisation. 
 
 UNTIL the later seventies, I scarcely knew what 
 a holiday, in London or out of it, was like. 
 The one or two exceptions were trips to the 
 islands off the English, or the Scotch, coast, when 
 I visited old friends, or made new acquaintances. 
 Mr. Augustus Smith, Mr. Dorrien-Smith's prede- 
 cessor and relative, was then the king of the Scilly 
 Islands — an absolute monarch within his realm, but 
 a discriminatingly hospitable one. Reports reached 
 him of every stranger landing on any one of the 
 Scilly group. Invitations to stay with the lord para- 
 mount at Tresco Abbey, St. Mary's, were conveyed 
 to most of those whose names happened to be 
 known to Mr. Smith. Many absurd and baseless 
 stories are told of this gentleman's insular despot- 
 
 373 
 
374 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 ism. He was not a man of very delicate sensibili- 
 ties or widely varied intellectual interests. But he 
 thought no trouble too great to fill his house with 
 interesting guests when he had a chance of doing so. 
 His tenants, provided that they conformed unques- 
 tioningly to his rules, never knew what destitution 
 meant. In the early sixties, when I knew him first, 
 his claims to absolutism were pushed rather far ; 
 but he became more liberal and mellow as years 
 rolled on. In the latter seventies, when I saw him 
 last, his feudal pretensions had been renounced, 
 and he asserted no more authority than any other 
 Western squire of good estate. 
 
 Cornwall itself has always within my experience 
 possessed sons or inhabitants of marked originality. 
 Douglas Cook's friend, Mr. Kinsman, was in my 
 time still Rector of Tintagel. In his churchyard 
 rests the great Saturday Review editor, buried in a 
 spot which the sun's rays, however they fall, can 
 ever reach. A little, elaborately refined, fastidiously 
 neat, urbanely spoken gentleman was Douglas Cook's 
 clerical intimate. The force of contrast, rather than 
 similarity, had made the two so mutually intimate. 
 When this accomplished divine, who was also a 
 considerable landowner in the county, was not dis- 
 cussing Cornish antiquities with his guests, his 
 favourite theme was the incessant pains taken by 
 
Famous Faces Outside London. 375 
 
 Cook during his holidays to secure the best bill of 
 fare possible for the next number of the " Saturday." 
 In these days the Rev. R. S. Hawker was 
 Rector at Morwenstow, an ideal place for a divine 
 uniting antiquarian interests and High Anglican 
 ideas as its accomplished incumbent did. The 
 man was a poet first, a divine afterwards. His 
 Cornish song, "And shall Trelawny die?" with 
 its stirring refrain, was suggested to him by a 
 fragment of parchment writing which he chanced 
 upon in an old muniment room. Every inch of 
 his Rectory grounds ; even the rocky niches 
 on the seashore were haunted by associations, 
 sometimes by the visible remains, of the old pre- 
 Reformation worship. I have seen it said that 
 Hawker was received into the Roman Communion 
 during his last short illness. So shrewd a judge 
 and so loyal a friend of the Cornish clergyman as 
 Archdeacon Denison considered there existed good 
 reason for doubting this. Dogmatic divinity of 
 any kind seemed repugnant to this highly poetic 
 Churchman. He had an amusing way of fencing 
 with inconvenient querists on the subject. Some- 
 one had asked him "what his 'views' were." 
 Walking up to his window, looking upon the 
 Atlantic : " If," he replied, " my eyes were strong 
 enough, I should have a perfect view of Labrador ! " 
 
3^6 Platform, Press, Politics and, Play. 
 
 Hawker was not the only poet possessed by 
 Cornwall in these days. The father of my old 
 undergraduate friend^ W. E. Stokes, of Queen's, 
 was the late Henry Sewell Stokes. Cornish by 
 residence and by interests, he had been at a Ports- 
 mouth school with Charles Dickens. Later in life, 
 he had gained the intimacy of Alfred Tennyson. 
 The only time I ever beheld in the flesh the great 
 Laureate must have been when he was visiting 
 Mr. Stokes, then a resident at Truro. Perranporth, 
 something like ten miles distant, was then the 
 Laureate's favourite haunt. The Stokes family 
 often had a lodging here. On one occasion, 
 Tennyson, being of the party, requested to be 
 left a day behind in poetic solitude. When he 
 re-joined his hosts at Truro, he brought with him 
 and read to them the lines called The Deserted 
 House, and beginning : — 
 
 " Life and thought have gone away." 
 
 At this time the author of The Idylls of the King, 
 while sojourning in King Arthur's land, seemed 
 never to be without an Odyssey in his waistcoat 
 pocket. The lovely reach of the Fal between Truro 
 and Tregothnan chiefly delighted him. Here with 
 his cicerone he was inspecting one day the river boats 
 in process of building or repair. The Laureate 
 
Famous Faces Outside London, 377 
 
 improved the occasion by producing his pocket 
 Homer, finding the place where the building of 
 Ulysses' craft is described, and paraphrasing the 
 whole passage in musical English prose for our 
 benefit and delight. Henry Sewell Stokes himself 
 wrote verses, especially his Vale of Lanherne, which 
 have won something more than local popularity, and 
 which, if unknown to the new criticism, were good 
 enough to win the praise of judges so averse from 
 gushing as Carlyle, Froude, not less than Tennyson 
 himself. Mr. Stokes lived to be universally hailed, 
 and not unworthily, as Cornwall's "Grand Old Man." 
 He knew every inch of soil between the Tamar 
 and Michael's Mount ; he had managed the most 
 considerable estates in the county. When he died 
 quite the other day, the whole country-side mourned 
 not only a pleasant citizen, but a local worthy of 
 whom all could recall good, and whose memory no 
 malice assailed. 
 
 I have the best reason myself, purely personal, 
 pleasantly to remember Truro. Among Mr. Stokes' 
 neighbours was a retired Indian officer, a surprisingly 
 handsome specimen of elderly manhood when I first 
 knew him, Colonel Charles Liardet. His ancient 
 family was of Austrian origin. In the last century the 
 head of the race had been made a Count of the Em- 
 pire by Maria Theresa. It was a direct descendant 
 
378 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 of that personage who, being the second daughter 
 of Colonel Liardet, subsequently did me honour, 
 and gave me happiness, by becoming my wife. 
 
 My expeditions to the northern groups of islands 
 within the four seas were more eventful than my 
 journeys due south or west. Long before I had the 
 privilege of Mr. W. Black's acquaintance, or before 
 that novelist had celebrated with his charming pen 
 the Princess of Thule, I traversed the whole Orkney 
 and Shetland archipelago, and so much commended 
 myself to its hospitable natives that in 1867 they 
 invited me to contest the constituency against the 
 sitting Member, Mr. Dundas, the present Lord 
 Zetland's uncle. I did actually make a canvassing 
 tour through the insular electorate,* assisted at some 
 races between Shetland ponies, dined, supped, and 
 breakfasted with the descendants of Magnus Troil 
 and Triptolemus Yellowley ; but after consultation 
 with the local Tory chief, Mr. Balfour, of Shapinsay, 
 Orkney, I did not press my pretensions to the poll. 
 
 When in the early eighties I was first presented 
 to Gambetta, he was then occupied chiefly with 
 Parisian journalism, and living very simply in a 
 little apartment in the Rue Chaussee D'antin. He 
 
 * The then editor of The Scotsman, the late A. Russel, was 
 pleased to rally me in print on this adventure, which he termed 
 " Electioneering Extraordinary in Shetland." 
 
Famous Faces Outside London. 379 
 
 received me in his study costume — a ragged old 
 dressing suit, and was never without a good cigar in 
 his mouth. He showed me, I recollect, the proof 
 of an article which had just come in written on 
 his inspiration in, I suppose, the Republiqtce Francaise. 
 The composition appeared to be a French study 
 of Lord Beaconsfield. Orally commenting on it, 
 my host predicted that the next development of 
 the Conservative chief's Eastern policy would be 
 to acquire a preponderance for England on the 
 banks of the Nile. Afterwards I saw the French 
 Dictator yet twice more. Once when he was in 
 office at the Palais Bourbon. Unchanged in appear- 
 ance and dress since our first meeting, and contrast- 
 ing in his unconventional attire with the remains of 
 Imperial splendour still visible in the furniture and 
 fittings of his official residence. The last occasion I 
 visited him he was again a private citizen living in a 
 little house after the English pattern in the Rue St. 
 Didier Passy, near the Rue de Pompe. This was at 
 least a year or two before Arabi Pasha's rising. But 
 in casual conversation, Gambetta, with the prophetic 
 instinct often accompanying genius, plainly, though 
 with due diplomatic reserve, forecast the series of 
 events which came to an end at Tel-el- Kebir in 1882. 
 About this time, travelling in Spain, I met the 
 great peninsular orator, Emilio Castelar, in the 
 
380 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 midst of a scene which might have been borrowed 
 for the occasion from the theatre. He was standing 
 by a ruined fountain in the centre of the picturesque 
 highway running through the little town of Font- 
 arabie, delivering himself in polished periods and 
 with eloquent gestures of his sentiments on passing 
 events to a small knot of tourists whom he knew. 
 One fresh auditor succeeded another, and within ten 
 minutes the casual group had swelled to a formal 
 audience. Such publicity seemed more than the 
 speaker had counted upon. He walked hurriedly to- 
 wards the neighbouring church door ; stopping short, 
 dismissed the little crowd with something like a bless- 
 ing, and when I last saw him, was standing, rever- 
 ently, if soniewhat histrionically, beside the high altar. 
 Memoirs of the Salisbury- Beaconsfield campaign 
 at Berlin were still fresh when, shortly after this, I 
 paid a holiday visit to the Prussian capital. On the 
 premises of the Prussian House of Lords was, and 
 doubtless is, the white chair wherein the English 
 Premier sat at the Convention summoned for 
 revising the San-Stefano treaty. On all sides one 
 heard anecdotes testifying the degree to which the 
 English statesman had impressed Berlin society and 
 the Berlin crowd. The great financier, the Roths- 
 child of the capital on the Spree, Herr Bleichroder, 
 was then in his prime, hospitably entertaining at his 
 
Famous Faces Outside London. 38];. 
 
 dinner-table and in his Opera box all those who 
 brought, as my New Court friends had enabled me 
 to do, introductions to him. He was a short, square 
 man of pre-eminently Teuton type, with the most 
 determined mouth and the strongest jaw I ever 
 beheld on a human being. I had wished to pene- 
 trate to the great Chancellor at Friedrichsruhe. 
 Bleichroder effectively dissuaded me from the 
 journey. Prince Bismarck, I was told, liked English 
 journalists generally, and of course the editor of the 
 Fortnightly Review, which I then happened to be, in 
 particular. But the great man had a nervous fear 
 of being misunderstood, and therefore declined to 
 admit professional penmen within earshot. 
 
 In Italy, during my only visit to Rome, my 
 adventures as an amateur interviewer were a little 
 less unsuccessful. Signer Depretis was then Prime 
 Minister; living on the same scale as years pre- 
 viously I had seen Gambetta living, before he had 
 arrived at power. The Italian Premier's apartment 
 was a tiny flat on the third floor. His only 
 attendant was an old woman who in the Middle 
 Ages might have been burnt for a witch. He had 
 not, he told me, changed his domicile since, fresh 
 from Lombardy, he had first settled as an advocate 
 in the Eternal City. Like all Italian politicians, he 
 admired Mr. Gladstone. But the two public men 
 
382 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 about whom he seemed most anxious to hear were 
 Mr. Chamberlain and Sir Charles Dilke. In what 
 degree, I know not ; but at some time Jewish blood 
 must have flowed in the veins of Depretis' as of 
 Gambetta's ancestors. Yet he did not enjoy Dis- 
 raeli's good fortune of winning the confidence of 
 his Semitic brethren, who at this time denounced 
 bitterly him and his party, to Depretis' unconcealed 
 chagrin. 
 
 While staying at Rome, Ismail Pasha, the ex- 
 Khedive, called at my hotel, and insisted on my 
 returning to England via Egypt. If Ismail had 
 spoiled the Egyptians, he in his turn was forced 
 by his retainers to submit to the same process. 
 Of all the "Kings in exile" who ever put up at 
 Claridge's, in London, or at the Grand Hotel, in 
 Paris, none was ever so systematically victim- 
 ised by his entourage as this ex-potentate from 
 the Nile. Politically corrupt he may have been. 
 His private kindliness atoned for many public 
 faults. He really seemed to take a pleasure in 
 rendering small services to those who, like myself, 
 could not in any way have been useful to him. I had 
 an amusing instance of the jealousy with which his 
 attendant gentlemen watched the former Khedive's 
 movements and acquaintances. Twice, I think, was 
 he polite enough to look in on me at my hotel. A 
 
Famous Faces Outside London. 383 
 
 day or two later I received an electric message 
 from London entreating me to return at once on 
 private business. Something, I forget what, excited 
 my suspicions. In the course of a post or two I 
 ascertained that the telegram, actually dispatched 
 from England, had been inspired by one of Ismail's 
 suite in Rome. This attendant had conceived the 
 idea that I cherished designs on his employer's 
 pocket, and had, therefore, resolved to get me out 
 of the way. In another epoch and climate I 
 suppose this gentleman might have resorted to the 
 Italian stiletto, or to the Turkish cup of coffee. 
 
 My Egyptian trip was not, however, abandoned, 
 and gave me the chance of seeing Sir Evelyn Baring 
 and Nubar Pasha at work under the Tewfik regime. 
 Cairo may be only a third-rate French town on the 
 Nile, and, as such, different from anything seen by 
 the " father of history." But some characteristics of 
 the people as well as of the land recalled the humor- 
 ously perplexed description given by Herodotus. 
 Equally under dual control, or exclusive British 
 ascendancy, Cairo and the Cairenes suggested 
 one of Offenbach's burlesques. The gossiping 
 old Greek would still notice, as he observed two 
 thousand years ago, that perversity of practice 
 which moved him to say: "The Egyptians do in 
 all things the contrary of what is done by other 
 
384 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 people." On entering my hotel, I saw a wounded 
 figure being carried off on a litter. It belonged 
 to an Egyptian gentleman who, anxious to catch 
 a train, refused the slower staircase descent, and 
 jumped out of the window into the courtyard. 
 " C'est mon habitude ! " the Gallicised son of Nile 
 had gaily exclaimed a minute before, as he rushed 
 past a waiter, and leapt through mid-air from a 
 first-floor window. Poor Valentine Baker at this 
 moment relieved my bewilderment by calling on me, 
 and explaining that in this kingdom of topsy-turvy 
 such abnormal exits by gentlemen in a hurry excited 
 no more surprise than the phantasmagoria of 
 Excellencies and Grand Transparencies, with whose 
 titles, obsequiously mouthed, streets and porticos 
 resounded continuously. Among the other abomina- 
 tions with which Cairo was honeycombed were 
 copper and silver gaming hells. During the fort- 
 night or so I was there, two murders and one suicide 
 arose out of these dens of iniquity. Nubar Pasha, a 
 swarthy, middle-aged Armenian, showed me every 
 courtesy in his English-built house, and hinted that 
 the country would be ripe for English evacuation by 
 the Greek Kalends ; but obliging as he was, he pre- 
 ferred to listen to such news as I could give him 
 about his old friends, Mr. Edward Dicey and Sir 
 Rivers Wilson, rather than deliver his views on the 
 
Famous Faces Outside London. 385 
 
 future of the country of the Pharaohs. A little trip 
 on the Nile in a dahabeah made me acquainted with 
 a gentleman of uncertain race, but boasting himself 
 a " pure Egyptian," cultivating a small farm and 
 speaking both English and French indifferently ill. 
 Intelligently anxious to acquire news on English 
 matters, he put to me questions which involved in 
 reply the use of the words "civilisation," "progress, 
 and "reform." For a moment he seemed to be 
 perplexed, but after a meditative pause brightly 
 added : " Yes ! I know what you mean. The rich 
 against the poor; the prosperous against the 
 wretched ; the strong against the weak, and no pity 
 for anyone." 
 
 25 
 
CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 PEN AND PLAY. 
 
 A. W. Kinglake, of "Eothen" and Crimean fame. His visit to Paris 
 and Versailles as Thiers' gnest, 1871. " II doit etre Sir Dill(e!" 
 Charm of Kinglake's society and conversation; his friend- 
 ships ; his Etonian and other recollections. W. G. Cookesley, 
 of Eton fame, as a visitor at the Garrick Cluh. The last dish 
 of battered crab. Henry Irving, Fronde and Kinglake, 
 as Vest Country worthies. Irving's early appearance 
 in "Hunted Down" at the St. James' Theatre. Predictions 
 by George Eliot and G. H. Lewes of his fntnre greatness. 
 Lewis Wingfield as a type of his day. First meeting with 
 Lord Lytton in the Tannton ballroom. His presence of mind. 
 His chairmanship of the Dickens' dinner. His honse and 
 hospitality at Knebworth. West Somerset revisited. Arch- 
 deacon Denison. Prebendary Stephenson. Henry Irving at 
 his birthplace near Glastonbury. Social and spiritual pro- 
 gress in West Somerset and elsewhere. The author's 
 experiences and hopes. 
 
 WHAT ought to have been an earlier Continental 
 visit than any of those recounted in the 
 previous chapter, was never paid by me at all. 
 A. W. Kinglake, the Crimean War's historian, the 
 creator, in Eothen, of a new literary school, would 
 have had me accompany him to Paris shortly after 
 the Franco-Prussian settlement in 1871. That 
 proved impracticable. I am not, therefore, one of 
 the countless claimants to the honour of having 
 
 386 
 
Pen and Play. 387 
 
 been the first Englishman to enter Paris after the 
 ^iege, — a distinction historically, I believe, belonging 
 to Alfred Austin and the travelled grey which still 
 carries him through the Kentish pastures. Kinglake 
 had long been the most intimate of Thiers' English 
 friends. When visiting Paris, as I have said, after 
 the war, the English writer called upon the French 
 statesman at Versailles. He was at once greeted as 
 an illustrious Englishman in the little town ; but a 
 mistake was made about his identity. The name of 
 the Chelsea M.P. was then familiar to the French 
 public. The street loungers of Versailles would 
 have it that the present visitor was none other than 
 he. 11 doit etre Sir Dilke ! Such was the murmur 
 which, to his great amusement, met Kinglake 
 while he paced the streets on his way to Thiers' 
 dwelling. 
 
 During his later life, Kinglake divided with 
 Froude in literary, and with Henry Irviing in more 
 popular, esteem a foremost reputation as a West 
 Country celebrity. To all who knew him at all 
 intimately, this eminent Tauntonian was the most 
 delightful and instructive of companions. By 
 universal acquaintanceship, by active a.ssociations, 
 by retentive memory, Kinglake was really a link 
 with the past. One famous secret probably perished 
 with him. He had heard from the greati Sir Robert 
 
 25 * 
 
388 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Peel the true explanation of Lady Byron's refusal to 
 live with her husband. He was habitually impor- 
 tuned to impart this knowledge to others. But his 
 fastidious sense of honour made him always refuse 
 to do so on the ground that the information was 
 given to him in confidence, and must therefore be 
 regarded as a secret. Without exception, in appear- 
 ance, manner, in ideas and general breeding, 
 A. W. Kinglake was the most highly finished and 
 chivalrous citizen whom in my days the republic of 
 letters has possessed^ In his last years he became 
 somewhat deaf, but his interest, at once kindly and 
 intellectual, in all' about him ceased only with his 
 life. His anecdotes were not often forthcoming, but 
 when given, they were always first-rate. His affection 
 for Eton, where he had been in Mr. Gladstone's 
 generation, was ever unabated. As a boy he had been 
 concerned personally in a famous episode in which 
 Dr. Keate had sat up all night flogging an entire 
 "division" because its members refused to disclose 
 the name of some offender. With real histrionic 
 humour Kinglake would mimic the rueful look of 
 successive batches of boys replacing their pre- 
 decessors at the place of execution. " It was," he 
 said, "at least a week before Keate could raise his 
 hand with its wonted vigour after this heroic feat of 
 flagellation." 
 
Pen and Play. 389 
 
 Kinglake's intimacy with Hayward, already 
 mentioned, suggested another of Eothen's best 
 reminiscences. The Quarterly Reviewer had become 
 embroiled with the late Lord Ranelagh, who then 
 bore a somewhat equivocal reputation. The litterateur 
 placed himself in Kinglake's hands as his "friend." 
 Ranelagh, on his part, mentioned the name of a 
 Norfolk sportsman named Pack. In fulfilment of 
 his amicable duty, Kinglake called on the East 
 Anglian squire at the Carlton Club. Directly 
 Mr. Pack entered the room, Kinglake saw from his 
 effusive manner and flushed face that his host 
 had drunk too many bottles of the famous Carlton 
 Sillery. In vinously incoherent tones, Mr. Pack 
 began: "Whatever you may say, I always main- 
 tain Ranelagh is a gentleman." Kinglake met this 
 irrelevant remark with, as he used to call it, "a 
 little bit of acting." After Mr. Pack's enunciation 
 of the word " gentleman," he simply said in his 
 iciest tones : " That I am willing to assume ! " The 
 effect of these words and their tone was perfectly 
 magical. Mr. Pack lost his exuberance in a moment — 
 became articulate and calm. " My remark had frozen 
 him sober," were Kinglake's concluding words, as he 
 finished the story. 
 
 At Cambridge, as at Eton, Kinglake had been 
 contemporary with Cookesley, whose name in con- 
 
390 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 nection with Disraeli I have already mentioned. 
 There were times at which the two old gentlemen 
 seemed to reproduce each other's conversational 
 manner. When visiting London, Cookesley's great 
 delight was to inspect the pictures at the Garrick 
 Club. The bent little figure with the hooked nose 
 and a certain air of foxiness strongly recalling his 
 friend Chief Justice Cockburn, might often be seen 
 walking up and down Garrick Street till a chance for 
 admission within the coveted portals occurred. One 
 day it was Montagu Williams who brought in his 
 old Eton master to gaze upon the features of Kitty 
 Clive, with whose canvas Cookesley was in love. 
 On another occasion F. C. Burnand, who had been 
 Cookesley's private pupil, and who was always saluted 
 by him as "your Majesty," in allusion to some part 
 once taken by Burnand in Eton theatricals, played 
 the host to the old gentleman. This remarkable 
 Etonian retained to his death's day the English 
 hatred of the great Napoleon, which had been 
 common during his youth. After meals he often 
 dozed off in his chair. But his slumbers were 
 punctuated with minute-gun exclamations between 
 waking and sleeping of: "Atrocious scoundrel, 
 Napoleon Bonaparte ! " Cookesley's digestion had 
 always been amazingly strong. On his death-bed 
 he had a fancy for buttered crab. With half a 
 
Pen and Play. 391 
 
 pint of stout this dainty was brought him by his 
 brother^ and then the shrewd, hard-headed, kind- 
 hearted old Etonian sank to rest. 
 
 As I had known Kinglake from my earliest child- 
 hood, so I was still a boy when I was first noticed by 
 Lord Lytton, then Sir Edward Bulwer, in the county 
 ballroom, Taunton. He was connected by marriage 
 with the neighbourhood, and gave upon this occa- 
 sion proof of the presence of mind which he had 
 always possessed. The lady with whom he was 
 dancing happened to be a cousin of mine, to-day 
 Mrs. Vincent Stuckey, then Mary Lethbridge. 
 Accidentally a fleecy wrapper which she was wear- 
 ing caught fire. In a moment, without losing his 
 nerve, Bulwer had taken it off the lady, extinguished 
 the flame, and given the charred remnants to a 
 servant. Not till '67 did I again see the accom- 
 plished novelist. He then acted as chairman at a 
 dinner given to Charles Dickens, just starting for 
 the United States. The president, in proposing the 
 guest of the evening's health, made some reference 
 to the sketches of " Lord Frederick Verisopht " and 
 " Sir Mulberry Hawke " in Nicholas Nickleby. With 
 the dramatically indignant energy he loved some- 
 times to assume, Dickens humorously rallied his 
 brother author on the " amazing devil " which had 
 prompted him to revive these attacks on a bygone 
 
392 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 order of aristocrat. That Dickens' life was not pro- 
 longed to see the star of Henry Irving rise is the 
 regret of all who properly appreciate the idiosyncratic 
 genius whether of the author or of the actor. If not 
 the first, still a very early appearance in London of 
 Henry Irving is recalled by me. At the St. James' 
 Theatre, during the later sixties, this son of Somerset 
 enacted a " character part " which suited him admir- 
 ably, the villain of the piece in a little play called 
 Hunted Down. The heroine was played by Miss 
 Herbert. Irving's delineation may, in the light of 
 after events, be regarded as a kind of rehearsal of his 
 "Jingle" and other similar y^/es. This was probably • 
 the only time when George Henry Lewes, the best 
 dramatic critic of his day, and George Eliot, saw 
 Irving on the stage. They were seated in the next 
 box to me. " He will go far," said the gentleman. 
 " He has already gone very far," quietly rejoined the 
 lady, "and in ten or twenty years will be ,at the 
 head of the English stage." The same occasion, 
 1868, witnessed as an afterpiece Mr. W. S. Gilbert's 
 first burlesque. Dr. Dulcamara, containing as it did 
 the germ of those compositions in the same line by- 
 which he has long since become famous. 
 
 Once, and once only, did I visit the author of 
 The Caxtons at his Hertfordshire seat. Fresh im- 
 provements had been made recently in the Kneb- 
 
Pen and Play. 395 
 
 worth grounds, whose artificial perfections seemed 
 a material reflection of their owner's genius. During- 
 the week I was a guest here, no one ever saw Lord 
 Lytton till the after-part of the day. Then he seemed 
 to have done entirely with work. Seated on a low 
 chair or divan in his drawing-room, he puffed 
 elegantly a long Turkish pipe filled with the lightest 
 tobacco, and talked to each of us by turns, the only 
 other guests being the late John Forster and the: 
 surviving J. R. Macquoid, the artist. 
 
 Among the many who have passed away since 
 my own convalescence from illness began, not the 
 least noticeable as well as the most conspicuous and 
 characteristic type of his age is, I think, the late 
 Lewis Wingfield. Actor, artist, author, sculptor, 
 he was by no means a smatterer. His knowledge 
 of historic costume \vas valued by the highest 
 scenic authorities on the stage. The mise-en-scens 
 of his novels representing the social life of two 
 centuries since is correct as well as picturesque. 
 At his house in Kilburn or Bloomsbury he gathered 
 the most representative guests from library, studio, 
 or greenroom. No man of his time reflected more* 
 faithfully the intelligent and sympathetic interest 
 which, within the past two decades, general society 
 has taken in literary or intellectual workers of every 
 kind, as well as in the finished products of their 
 
394 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Jabours. No one was ever more manysided in his 
 affinities ; no one was more loyal to his comrades. 
 Any survey of the last two or three decades of social 
 London would be incomplete unless so strongly 
 defined and amiable type of his time as the accom- 
 plished and kindly Lewis Wingfield, the friend of 
 everyone who trod the stage, who entered a studio, 
 -or penned a paragraph, had a place in it. 
 
 On nearly the latest occasion that I visited 
 Somerset, it was pleasant to find that in the Men- 
 dip district, less familiar to me than the Quantock 
 region, where the genial and pious presence of 
 the accomplished Prebendary Stephensofi, poet, not 
 less than divine, harmonises pleasantly with the 
 redoubtable George Anthony Denison — once called 
 by his brother " St. George without the drag on," 
 and still preserving the energy implied in the name — 
 the achievements of Henry Irving are cherished in 
 his natal place, Keinton, near Glastonbury. The 
 actual dwelling where he first saw the light is now 
 shown with pride. The East, Disraeli has written, 
 never changes. West Somerset has learned some 
 of the secret of a like immutability. But though the 
 region is still as uncompromisingly Tory as when it 
 rejected my uncle, Bickham Escott, because of his 
 Peelite sympathies, there has been witnessed even 
 here an increase of sympathy on the part of Jocal 
 
Pen and Play. 395 
 
 teachers and guides, clerical or secular, with all which 
 tends to promote the spiritual or material welfare of 
 the inhabitants. Those who fostered my own child- 
 hood are mercifully still spared to show to others 
 the same untiring kindness which an older gener- 
 ation obtained from their hands. In other families 
 the views of ^parental and fihal obligations have 
 become not less gentle than they always were with 
 those who nurtured my childhood or trained my 
 Isoyish mind. To my father am I indebted for those 
 aptitudes which have enabled me to perform my 
 daily work ; for those tastes and the knowledge to 
 gratify them which providentially have served to 
 solace a weary period of physical disability. He, at 
 least, has never failed by his daily practice to re- 
 commend to others the religion which is so large a 
 part of his own existence. Others within the sphere 
 of his influence have profited by his example. To 
 the honour and well-being of Christianity, the severer 
 views that in my younger days sometimes obtained 
 ■outside my own family have become obsolete. With 
 improved theory there has come happier practice. 
 Thus, on the Tone as well as on the Avon, the Isis, 
 the Thames, and elsewhere, our national religion, 
 as a guarantee of the national happiness, fills to-day 
 a more august and powerful place than would have 
 been predicted for it in the epoch I can first recall. 
 
396 Platform, Press, Politics and Play. 
 
 Ill-health makes a man take more serious views 
 of life than he may have done before. I have, I 
 hope, profited, as it was doubtless intended I should,, 
 by the prolonged discipline of bodily weakness 
 only noAV gradually passing off. Perhaps, therefore, I 
 may humbly trust that by more than human teaching 
 I am being rendered fitter to assist the movements 
 which I have noticed, and it may be yet to take a 
 part, however small, in contributing instrumentally 
 to that progress both in my native county, as well 
 as among that public from which, during my whole 
 career, I have received treatment so uniformly 
 encouraging and kind. 
 
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 le. GLADYS' PERIL . 
 
 17. 
 
 WHOSE HAND? or, 
 
 The Mystery of No Man's Heatb 
 THAT WINTER NIGHT 
 THE GUILTY RIVER . 
 FATAL SHADOWS 
 THE LOVELY WANG . 
 PATTY'S PARTNER . 
 "V.R." A Comedy of Errors 
 THE PARK LANE MYSTERY 
 FRIEND MAC DONALD . 
 KATHARINE REGINA 
 JAN VERCLOOTZ 
 THE CLIFF MYSTERY 
 AS A BIRD TO THE SNARE 
 TRACKED OUT 
 A SOCIETY CLOWN . 
 
 24. 
 26. 
 26. 
 27. 
 28. 
 29. 
 80. 
 81. 
 
 82. CHECK AND COUNTER-CHECK 
 
 88. THE INNER HOUSE . 
 
 84. A VAGABOND WILL . 
 
 85. PHARAOH'S DAUGHTER . 
 
 . HUGH OONWAT. 
 
 . MAY OBOMMELIN. 
 
 . HUGH CONWAY. 
 
 . Bir E. J. BEED, E.C.B., M.F. 
 
 . Mrs. PBANCES ELLIOT. 
 
 . F. ANSTBY. 
 
 . ALAN DALE. 
 
 . HUGH OONWAT. 
 
 . DANIEL DOBMEB. 
 
 . Mrs. J. COMYNS CABB. 
 
 . GEANT ALLEN. 
 
 . HUGH CONWAY. 
 
 . ANDEEW LANG. 
 
 . J. STBANGE WINTER. 
 
 . Mrs. J. E. PANTON. 
 
 r JOHN COLEMAN and 
 'tJOHN O. CHUTE. 
 
 J W. G. WILLS and 
 .(The Hon. Mrs. GBEENE. 
 . ROBERT BUCHANAN. 
 . WILEIE COLLINS. 
 . Mrs. L. L. LEWIS. 
 . Hon. L. WINGFIBLD. 
 . JEAN MIDDLEMASa 
 . EDWARD ROSE. 
 
 JOSEPH HATTON. 
 . MAX O'BELL. 
 . WALTER BBSANT. 
 . MATTHEW STRONG. 
 . HAMILTON AIDE. 
 . GBETRUDE WARDEN. 
 . ARTHUR A BECKETT. 
 . GEORGE GROSSMITH 
 
 f BRANDER MATTHEWS 
 • t and GEORGE H. JBSSOP. 
 . WALTER BESANT. 
 . W. G. WATERS. 
 . EDGAR LEE. 
 
 Bristol: J. W. Akbowsmith, 11 Quay Street. 
 Lmutmti SniPEiH, MARSHALL, Hamilton Kent ft Co. Limited. 
 
flppomsmith's BMstol Iiibpapy. 
 
 Fcap. 8vo, stiff coverst !/• ; doth, XI6. 
 
 Satwdatf Beoiew speaks of Abbowsmitb's Bristol Libbabt " aa neceBSBur to 
 iDB traTellei aa a rag 1b winter and a dust-coat In summer." 
 
 S7. 
 
 40. 
 41. 
 42. 
 48. 
 44. 
 45. 
 46. 
 47. 
 48. 
 49. 
 50. 
 51. 
 52. 
 
 TROLLOPE'S DILEMMA . 
 JACQUES BONHOMME . 
 THE DOUBTS OF DIVES . 
 FAIR PHYLLIS OF LAVENDER 
 WHARF 
 
 HARD LUCK. . . . 
 
 TWO AND TWO. A Tale of Pour . 
 THE RAJAH AND THE ROSEBUD 
 BEHIND THE KAFES 
 THE DEMONIAC . . . . 
 OUR BOYS & GIRLS AT SCHOOL. 
 THE CORONER'S UNDERSTUDY . 
 A ROMANCE OF THE MOORS 
 THE SHIELD OF LOVE . 
 A SPINSTER'S DIARY 
 THE AVENGING OF HIRAM 
 TRAVELLERS' TALES 
 THE GREAT SHADOW . 
 
 ST. AUBTN. 
 MAX O'BELL. 
 
 WALTBB BBSANT. 
 
 t JAMES OBEENWOOD. 
 
 S3. HARRY FORRESTER, late Blanktli 
 
 ABTHUE A BECKETT. 
 ELIZABETH GLAISTER. 
 WILLIAM SIME. 
 MARY ALBEBT. 
 WALTEE BESANT. 
 HENBT J. BABEEB, B.A. 
 Captam COE. 
 MONA CAIBD. 
 B. L. PABJEON. 
 Mrs. A. PHILLIPS. 
 BENNETT COLL. 
 Edited by E. A. MOBTON. 
 A, CONAN DOXLB. 
 /ANNIE THOMAS (Mrs. 
 
 /A GEM OF CREMONA . 
 \A CHEF D'CEUVRE 
 THE SLAPPING SAL and 
 
 OTHER TALES 
 DECEMBER ROSES 
 THE TRESPASSER .... 
 THE TELEPORON and OTHER 
 
 STORIES 
 
 AT THE SIGN OF THE WICKET . 
 CONSCIENCE MAKES THE 
 
 MARTYR 
 
 AN UNFINISHED MARTYRDOM 
 
 and OTHER STORIES 
 THE INDISCRETION OF THE 
 
 DUCHESS ... 
 
 AN APOSTLE OF FREEDOM 
 ENGLAND V. AUSTRALIA 
 
 THE ADVENTURES OF ARTHUR/ 
 ROBERTS, by Bead, Bail, and Eiver \^ 
 
 \ Pender-Cudlip) 
 
 B. M. VBBE and 
 
 E. BLAIR-OLIPHANT. 
 /A CONAN DOYLE. 
 \VAEIOirS AUTHORS. 
 
 Mrs. CAMPBELL PBABD. 
 
 GILBERT PAEKBE. 
 
 j W. H. STACPOOLE. 
 
 E. B. V. CHEI8TIAN. 
 \s. M. OBAWLBT-BOEVBT. 
 
 I A. ST. JOHN ADCOCK. 
 
 I ANTHONY HOPE. 
 
 EDWIN HUGHES, B.A. 
 J. N. PBNTBLOW. 
 TOLD BY HIMSELF, 
 
 and chronicled by 
 EIOHAED MOBTON. 
 
 SrlMol : J. W. Akkowsmith, 11 Quay Street. 
 London ■■ SIMPKIN, MAESHALL, HAMILION, KENT 4 CO. Limited.