;.' Ill ;!'■:,!!., ,,.,,' -A) j D 1 CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY COLONEL DESPARD AND OTHER STUDIES. By Sir Charles Oman, K. B. B. 230 pp. New York: Long- mans, Green «6 Co. $3.50. IN the volume entitled " Colonel Despard and Other Studies," Sir Charles Oman has gathered eleven essays that were originally written; for English magazines or for the Royal Historical Society. The subjects range from legendary con- ceptions of earthly paradise to the drawing of boundaries in the Treaty of Versailles. . Sir Charles makes all time and space his province, as in- deed he should, and wherever he can find, matter that is of pure story in- terest or of signifcant implication, he, stakes his claim and sets out to cul- tivate the ground. Of -the difficul- ties of the modern historian (why necessarily modern, we do not un- derstand) he has a rather full dis- cussion, whose point appears in this paragraph: The practical man of the world would like to. regard history as a string of facts, and he cannot see why the deductions from these facts should vary according to the temperament and the point of view of the writer who/ manipulates them. Historical facts, . however, cannot be boiled down into a syrup equally grateful and satisfactory to all consumers. The decoction which one man will find to be ex- actly the nourishment required for the maintenance of his spiritual and political equilibrium will be de- clared by another man to be rank poison: The historian . must be prepared to find himself denounced as a purveyor of mischievous men- tal provender. Perhaps he~ may achieve the honor of being equally blamed from both sides, because he has struck some middle line of thought acceptable to neither. The author is quite right in saying that you cannot eliminate the per- sonality, of the historian from his- tory, and that he is bound to write history as he sees it, which may be an entirely different point of view from that of another equally good and honest historian. The honest writer and interpreter of history is he. who frankly -admits that fact and takes it Into account. That is not only true, but desirable, for history would be a dull page if it were a mere tabulation of proved points witnout comment or characteriza- tion. But in the quoted paragraph the choice of figurative ' language was unfortuante, for it implies a point of view which we do not be- lieve was intended. One man's meat is another man's poison, it is true. But what has that to do with it? Are we to believe that he would have us regard history as a concentrated mental food pill that is to be admin- istered as mental health may seem to require? The need of the con- sumer is not in question here. But the qualifications and the limitations of the middleman . are matters not to be forgotten or side-tracked. They are fundamental in interpreting and understanding the story of the past.. The' articles on the Unfortunate Colonel Despard, Arthur Thistle- wood, and Basil of Cappadocia are historical accounts of figures little known to most of us. The first two belong, along with Lord Carteret, to the. brilliant failures of history. If they had not failed, they might-haye turned the course of political history for years. Because they did fail, they are nearly forgotten, but to. those who remember their story, their intrepid pursuit of an end gave their picturesque lives dignity and a kind of heroism. The (ale of Basil of Cappadocia is an early... medieval romance. Basil's tingly begun by a brigand: " Good day, t< old man, " but .owh sake, you " Quite the re' youth, " I want prentice-brigand solitudes." " If bition," said tin may start your taking your ma sentry duty at tl stop on duty for ing which time ; food or. drink, eyes to close in : coraplished, you kill me several li their skins as tes you must go. again." "All th said the disappo • will not do i sort, but as a pi ity I wijj thrash So saying, he sei . fell upon the w he felled with hi knocked over wi when, he had go he gathered thei his arm and. tool man. He threes " feet, saying, ' ' ] pappus, the spoil ands, and . if yo fied, I will give also. " Philopappus Wf and so the dough his conquests un life. Because the sub Sir Charles Oma drawing of bound; teresta. He was < who worked on 1 the Armistice, anc problem is by no today. Cornell University Library D 7.054 1922 Unfortunate Colonel Despard and other st 3 1924 027 757 198 The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924027757198 THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD AND OTHER STUDIES THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD AND OTHER STUDIES BY v SIR CHARLES OMAN, K.B.E. Member of Parliament for the University of Oxford and Chichele Professor of Modern History NEW YORK LONGMANS, GREEN & CO. LONDON: EDWARD ARNOLD & CO. [All rights reserved'] 33*2 9*8 Made and Printed in Great Britain by Butler & Tanner, Frome and L/mdon PREFACE I have from time to time been asked by friends to make more accessible one or other of the eleven essays, or studies, which have now been collected into this volume. I may mention that six of them have appeared as articles in various magazines or reviews, three were addresses given to the Royal Historical Society, one was a lecture given at Cologne to classes from the Rhineland Army of Occupation, the eleventh is an unpublished study written last summer. I have to make grateful acknowledgement of the courtesy of the proprietors of Blackwood's Magazine, The Edinburgh Review, The Nineteenth Century and After, and The Economic Review, all of whom have permitted me to reprint certain papers which I contributed to their periodicals. From Black- wood come the essays on Colonel Despard, Arthur Thistlewood, and theEarthly Paradise; from TheEdinburgh Review,the study of Lord Carteret ; from The Nineteenth Century, the article on the Trials of the Historian ; and from The Economic Review, the note on the Debasement of the English Currency by the Tudors. The Council of the Royal Historical Society also permit me to reproduce the three Presidential Addresses which I made to them in 1918-20 on Rumour in Time of War, the Historical Outlook of the Middle Ages, and the Drawing of Boundaries. Those of the essays which appeared some years back have had to suffer a certain amount of alteration ; the Great War caused much change of historical perspective ; and the article on Henry VIII and his strange dealings with the currency had to be rewritten, in view of the fact that the Chancellor of vi PREFACE the Exchequer of the late Coalition Ministry — first of all modern English statesmen — dared to follow in the steps of the Tudor king, and to present us with shillings exactly like those of 1545 in being composed of 50 per cent, silver and 50 per cent, base metal. C. OMAN. Oxford, November, 1922. CONTENTS PAGE I. The Unfortunate Colonel Despard ... 1 II. Arthur Thistlewood and Cato Street ... 22 III. Rumour in Time of Wab 49 IV. Some Medieval Conceptions of Ancient History . 71 V. A Forgotten Hero : Basil of Cappadocia . . 91 VI. The Crusades 116 VII. Lord Carteret ....... 138 VIII. On the Drawing of Boundaries, a.d. 1919-21 . 162 IX. The Tudors and the Currency, 1526-60 . . 180 X. The Modern Historian and TTth Difficulties . 204 XI. The Earthly Paradise 212 THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD I was one of the very few non-official spectators at the trial of Roger Casement. For long hours I watched the swarthy, sinister, yet not ill-favoured man in the dock, in his neat grey morning suit, following every word of the pleadings with an intent ear and a keen eye. Here, on trial for his life, was a man who had for a quarter of a century been in the service of the sovereign of Great Britain, who had been given high official posts, trusted with grave international inquiries, and honoured with the knight- hood of St. Michael and St. George. Yet he had bitten the hand that had fed him, betrayed the King whose honours he had accepted but two years back, continued to draw his pension when he was abeady intriguing with the public enemy, and stooped to endeavours to seduce poor half-starved soldiers in German prison-camps to break their military oath. It was a vile record, and only explicable to those who have heard his full tale, of which I say nothing. Surely this traitor's case is unparalleled — I found myself thinking — at least since the old Jacobite days, when allegiance sat light on unscrupulous men. For the Irish treason trials from 1797 onwards have nothing like it ; the United Irishmen and the Fenians were not led by renegade British officials of high rank, but by adven- turers like Wolfe Tone, Jacobin enthusiasts like Edward Fitz- gerald, idealists and dreamers like Robert Emmet, village priests and town tradesmen, with a sprinkling of small squireens. And the Dublin rebel chiefs of 1916, who faced the firing party before Casement went to the gallows, were men of the same type as their predecessors. None of them had eaten the King's bread for half a lifetime, or accepted a title and a pension from his hand. And then there came to me in the court, while the defendant's u.cd. l b 2 THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD counsel droned on with his unconvincing arguments, the memory of the one modern case of a man whose record was almost parallel to that of Casement, yet whose story is utterly for- gotten. Histories of the great French War barely mention it, or mention it not at all. I allude to the traitor whom his contemporaries sometimes called " the unfortunate Colonel Despard." A moment's reflection showed the most extra- ordinary similarity between the external aspects of his tale and that of Casement. Both were Irishmen of good family ; both entered the King's service early, and won rank and dis- tinction therein. Both were trusted with high and responsible posts — and both held those posts in the Tropics. Does twenty years in authority spent in Jamaica and British Honduras, or in the Cameroons and Brazil, lead to megalomania, or merely to relaxation of the moral fibre, with men of a certain type ? This much is certain, that both Despard, the petty despot of Belize, and Casement, Consul-General at Rio de Janeiro, came back when their colonial career was over, to engage in wild treason in Europe. Despard, as we shall see, had far more open provocation for his misdoings. But he ended, like Casement, in being convicted for seducing British soldiers from their allegiance, and went to the gallows with some of his dupes. So it may be worth while to tell the tale of Colonel Edward Marcus Despard and his treasons. He was born in Queen's County in 1751, one of the many sons of a typical Irish soldier- family of the old sort. All his five brothers, save the eldest, to whom fell the family estate, held commissions in the army ; and one of them, General John Despard, was a man of mark, who commanded in Cape Breton for eight years, and died honorary colonel of a West India Regiment in 1829. Edward, like most lads destined for the army in those days, started on his military career very early, obtaining an ensigncy in the 50th Regiment in 1766, when he was only fifteen. He served with the 50th for seven years, and got his lieutenancy in 1772, when the corps was stationed in Jamaica. Here they were found at the out- break of the War of American Independence in 1775 ; but the 50th was so much under strength, after three years of tropical diseases, that it could not be sent as a unit to join the army of Howe. The serviceable men were drafted into battalions THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD 8 ordered to the front, and a skeleton cadre only was sent back to England to recruit. With it Despard did not sail. He had been seconded for special duty as an assistant engineer on the staff of the Governor of Jamaica. There can have been few British officers who did such a continuous term of service in the Caribbean Sea as Edward Despard, for between 1772 and 1790 he seems to have been in England only for one visit. Another point to realize, when we try to fix his mentality, is that from the age of twenty-two onward he never served with his battalion. As a junior staff officer he was employed on all manner of small independent jobs, far from any supervising and immediate authority. Entrusted from the age of thirty onward with command, first on a small, and then on a larger scale, where no one could appeal to authority against his arbitrary rule without intolerable delays, he lost any idea of obedience that he may have imbibed during his years of service as a very young ensign and lieutenant. Though stationed in the West Indies during the whole of the Great War with Prance and America, Despard only saw service against the brown militia of the Spanish Main. In 1779 he smelt powder for the first time in one of those nightmare expeditions to which British statesmen, who used small-scale maps of America, frequently condemned a handful of British soldiers. This was the absolutely insane San Juan raid, which would be completely forgotten but for the fact that one of the very few officers who returned from it alive was Captain Horatio Nelson of H.M.S. Hinchinbrooke, later of the Nile and Trafalgar. Lord George Germaine, the Secretary for War, of evil Minden memory, concluded that as Central America was an isthmus, the strip of land, which looked narrow enough on the map of the world, between the mouth of the San Juan river on the Atlantic side and the town of Leon on the Pacific, might be seized and held, and the Spanish empire in America cut in twain. The distance from ocean to ocean was 150 miles as the crow flies, much more by the route which Nelson's expedition was to take. The force employed was absurdly small — 400 regular troops, white and black, from Jamaica, any seamen that could be spared from the crew of Nelson's frigate, a few scores of boatmen 4 THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD from the small British settlement on the Honduras coast. It was vaguely hoped that a multitude of savage auxiliaries could be enlisted from the Mosquito Indians of the Nicaraguan shore. Everything, of course, went wrong ; only a handful of Indians could be collected, the boats and boatmen from the Honduras settlement were three weeks late. The soldiers were beginning to sicken before the flotilla started ; no single soul on the expedition knew how far the San Juan river was navigable. But Nelson's will was there to drive. The little force started up-stream. Ten days they laboured in the sweltering heat, and then found that the river would serve them no more. Many men could no longer march, but the survivors pressed through the jungle for two days, and dis- covered the fort of San Juan, the central guard-post of the isthmus, which lay some miles below the great lake of Nicar- agua. The Spanish governor shut himself up and offered a passive resistance only ; the fort on its rock seemed impreg- nable. Nelson's men were dying like flies, but he persisted ; a gun or two was dragged up from the portage where the boats had been left, and a feeble cannonade opened. Nelson himself and Despard were almost the only officers left fit for service by this time; "almost every gun that was fired was laid by one or other of them." Twenty-three years later, when the former commander of the Hinchinbroohe appeared to give evidence at his sometime comrade's trial, he spoke up most vehemently as to Despard's gallantry and exertions. "We went to the Spanish Main together; we slept many nights together in our clothes upon the ground ; we measured the height of the enemies' wall together ; in all that period no man could have shown more zealous attachment to his Sovereign and his country than he did." After six days' ineffective bombardment the garrison of San Juan capitulated; not from the results of Nelson's gunnery, but because their water supply had been cut off. The capture of the fort did not help the expedition to any further advance— there was nobody left fit to march, and the situation was not helped by the arrival of a few hundred reinforcements sent by the Governor of Jamaica. The rainy season was now come, and men sickened as soon as they THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD 5 arrived. Finally the fever conquered : the relics of the expeditionary force returned to Jamaica. Nelson came back a wreck — it was a wonder that his slight frame had withstood those dreadful months ; he was invalided home, and well-nigh died at Bath. Despard, unluckily for himself, took little harm from the experience. His creditable service was acknowledged by his promotion to a captaincy in the 79th Regiment — not the Highland corps of to-day, but the " Liverpool Blues," a short-lived battalion raised in 1778 and disbanded in 1784. Despard never joined it, or did duty as a regimental officer. If, like Nelson, he had been invalided home in 1788, and transferred to some other sphere of war, far from the West Indies, he might have died a loyal soldier. Next year he was given a very responsible charge. The majority of the British settlers — log-wood cutters for the most part — who plied their trade on the coast of Honduras or on the Mosquito shore, had been forced to retire to the island of Roatan, which lies some ten miles off the mainland. It was a convenient port of call for privateers, and a small garrison was kept there, supplied from Jamaica. Hither Despard was sent with a temporary commission as Lieutenant- Colonel. It is now that we find Despard showing the first signs of the want of sense of discipline which was to be his ruin. On arriving at Cape Gracias a Dios, the angle of the coast from which Honduras slopes away west and Nicaragua south, he found there his superior officer, a Colonel Hodgson, who was theoretically in charge of all the surviving British settle- ments on the Central American coast. Despard's biographer, Bannatyne, passes over what then happened in the most matter-of-fact way, as if it presented no special cause of surprise. " On arriving, he found His Majesty's service likely to be injured by the appointment of Colonel H to chief com- mand. This officer was so obnoxious to the inhabitants that they refused to serve under him, and at the same time presented a unanimous address to Colonel D offering to put themselves under his command. To prevent the colony from being lost to the crown, he accepted their offer, 6 THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD and assumed the command." Hodgson had to depart to Jamaica. His successor — whose rise to authority reminds one of the simple methods in vogue among the buccaneers who haunted this same coast a century before — though technically only Governor of Roatan, assumed charge of the whole region. He justified his lawless action by success ; for he organized an expedition which captured the Spanish fort upon the Rio Negro, the main hostile establishment in the neighbourhood, and with the aid of the Mosquito Indians he dominated the whole shore as far south as the San Juan river. So in 1783, when the Treaty of Versailles was signed, and Great Britain was forced to accept the terms imposed on her by France, Spain and the Americans, she had, thanks to Despard, some pledges left to barter with in Central America. Much had to be given up — the Rio Negro Fort, the Isle of Roatan, and all the trading posts south from Cape Gracias a Dios. But she was left " the Bay of Honduras Settlement," as it was then called, what we now style the colony of British Honduras. Despard was given the delicate and difficult task of adrninistering the colony, with the modest title of " Superintendent of His Majesty's Affairs within the district which, by the late Treaty of Peace, has been allotted to the Log-Cutters upon the Bay of Honduras," and the still more modest salary of £500 a year. He was left in an absolutely autocratic position, without any colleagues or council, and he administered the settlement with no official staff save his admiring secretary and biographer, James Bannatyne. The only appeal from him was primarily to the Governor of Jamaica, and, in a last resort, to the Secretary of State in Whitehall. For seven years Despard ruled British Honduras, in one constant round of disputes and protests. The Spaniards were not his main trouble, though occasionally they made attempts to enforce the exact terms of the treaty of 1783 by violence. The real trouble of the Superintendent came from the British settlers. There were two groups of them always at feud. The one consisted of the 700 original inhabi- tants of the "Bay Settlement," the small log-cutting and trading community which had always been established there. THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD 7 The other was formed by the expelled adventurers from the Mosquito Coast, Roatan, and the other points which had been given up to the Spaniards. Many of them had served in the more or less irregular bands which Despard had led as " Provincials," in the San Juan expedition and the capture of the Rio Negro forts. They were a pugnacious and self-assertive crew, and were the Superintendent's old friends, who had aided him to expel Hodgson. Now, when a group of new settlers falls in among an already existing community of a similar class, which has established rights, trouble is sure to follow. The exiles outnumbered the original colonists — there were 2,000 of them, counting their negro slaves and dependents. There was no doubt ample room in the settlement for everybody ; but the old inhabitants had partitioned off the more eligible tracts, near the rivers and round the settle- ments, into spheres of interest which they had been accus- tomed to exploit. Wherever the Mosquito Coast men ran up their huts and began to fell timber, they were — so they said — warned off as trespassers on the beat of some claimant who had often not been seen near the spot for years. Hence affrays and litigation. And the Superintendent, acting as court of appeal with some accessors selected by himself, always sided with the new settlers. This drove the " original inhabitants " to angry protest, and Despard did not tolerate criticism. Looking through the tedious archives of British Honduras in the Record Office, one soon discovers the way things worked. Mr. James Usher, one of the magistrates, resigns, and justifies himself by an " Address to the Inhabitants " which endj — " Should I advance that the Court of Appeal is illegal, oppressive and unjust, that Trial by Jury is thereby done away, and that decisions made when there is not a full board are entirely the Superintendent's decrees, I shall, I suppose, be prosecuted. If the smiles of power are to be obtained by no other method than cringing, creeping and fawning, let those court them who will ; for from my own knowledge of the Superintendent's former opinion of his present favourites, I do not hesitate to say that now ' the Post of Honour is a 8 THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD private station ! ' " Usher was right in supposing that he would be prosecuted : he was arrested by Despard and charged with publishing " a false, seditious and malicious libel, evidence of a depraved mind and a diabolical disposition." But the Grand Jury of the Colony was full of " old inhabitants " — they were the wealthier part of the community — and " ignored the bill " : I have seen their Ignoramus scrawled across it. Enraged at Usher's escape, Despard on his own authority declared all the police and judicial institutes of the Colony cancelled and abolished. After an interval of autocratic rule he held a poll for a new bench of magistrates, and struck out on technical grounds some of the persons returned. His opponents wrote fierce protests to Jamaica and Whitehall against " the barbarous commanding officer on the Honduras Coast." The desks and waste-paper baskets, both of the Governor of Jamaica and the Secretary of State at Whitehall, grew all too familiar with petitions and appeals, and lengthy replies by the King's Superintendent. Apparently these distant potentates shelved the question again and again: it was a " tale of little meaning though the words were strong ! " But at last a new Secretary arose in Whitehall, Lord Grenville, a stiff and untiring man who, unlike his predecessor, was one of those who read his American dispatches — as had his unfortunate father, George Grenville, in 1765. He came to the conclusion that there must be something wrong in the Bay Settlement, and, without relieving Despard from office, told him to come home, as investigations into his rule were about to be made. The King's Superintendent sailed at once, and reached London in May, 1790. His biographer tells us that he was well provided with documents proving the popularity which he enjoyed with the " vast majority " of the inhabitants of the Colony— i.e. the new settlers— and that he wished for nothing so much as a public inquiry into his whole conduct since first he took command at Roatan in 1781. He was not to get it. Instead he found himself entangled in the meshes of red tape. For two years he was having interviews with under-secretaries, answering interro- gatories, drawing up minutes in defence of particular acts. THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD 9 With constant references to Jamaica and Belize, the matter dragged on interminably. Despard became one of the regular hangers-on in the ante-room of the Secretary of State, always awaiting an ever-deferred decision. It came at last, after two long years, and was most unsatisfactory. He was not to be prosecuted, said Lord Grenville ; indeed, it was hard to see that any valid charges could be formulated against him. But when Despard expressed his intention of returning at once to resume his rule in Honduras, he was informed that the post of King's Superintendent was abolished ; he had reverted to the position of a half-pay colonel, and might apply for other employment. But no employment came his way. Despard was a marked man, as he soon found — noted down (and quite rightly) as quarrelsome and tyrannical. There would be no more colonial jobs for him. His first outburst of anger took the form of sending in to Whitehall interminable bills for money spent, or alleged to be spent, on Government service in the Hon- duras. They were disputed, and never settled. Then came a new mental development in the disappointed ex-autocrat. He suddenly saw that all was rotten in Great Britain, that the Constitution as administered by Mr. Pitt was a solemn sham, that the country was being exploited by a ring of aristocratic jobbers, and that the people must be freed on the new French lines of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity. In short, he joined the steadily dwindling band of enthusiasts whom the historians call the " English Jacobins," the flam- boyant band of admirers of the French Revolution who made so much noise in proportion to their numbers between 1793 and 1798. There is a terrible gap in the domestic history of England still waiting for the writer who shall work out the inner annals of the " Corresponding Society " and the other disloyal associa- tions of the early years of the Revolutionary War. Till it is filled, I fear that the exact place of Despard in the agitation cannot be determined. This, however, is certain, that in 1798 he was one of the small group of traitors in London who were in correspondence both with the Irish rebels and with the French. Their agents, Binns and Allin, were captured, 10 THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD along with the priest O'Quigley and Arthur O'Connor, as they were trying to pass from Kent to the Continent. Des- pard's name appears in connexion with this plot both in Castlereagh's secret correspondence and — what is more damn- ing — in both the deposition of O'Quigley himself and in the autobiography of Wolfe Tone, wherein he is spoken of as the selected leader of the party who were ready to do some- thing in the way of practical insurrection, in order to help the Irish rising of 1798. Naturally, therefore, he was among the limited number of persons who were arrested by Pitt and clapped into prison : the Habeas Corpus Act was sus- pended at the time, and had been for seyeral years. I take it that O'Quigley's and Tone's evidence is good enough to upset the easy Whig tale, which is repeated in many partisan histories, that Despard was an innocent man, who had made himself unpopular with the govenim^b&'eaucracy by clamour- ing for an investigation of his doingsian Honduras, and by his claims for a settlement of his accounts, and that he was put into prison merely to keep him quiet. What is certain is that he was confined without a trial for more than two years, and only released in the winter of 1800-1, when the French War was obviously verging towards its end, and when the dangers of domestic sedition were thought to be dying down, in view of the approaching general peace. The " Corresponding Society " was long dead ; its members, for the most part, had relapsed into simple Whiggery, or had retired to nurse their theories in idle discontent. But the newly released prisoner had lost all power of cool judgment, and was simply set on revenge, in season or out of season. And the fact that he could find no fellow-con- spirators of any note or personal importance did not suffice to warn him of the futility of his enterprise. There were some bread riots during the winter of 1801, and election riots of a sinister sort in the following year, when a Nottingham mob is said to have displayed the red cap of Liberty as its standard. The inchoate mutiny in the fleet at Bantry Bay in December, 1801, though put down at once with a firm hand, seemed to indicate that the evil days of 1797 were not so far off as had been thought. There was enough trouble on THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD 11 foot to encourage a rancorous fanatic such as Despard had now become. " The people are everywhere ripe," he said, " and anxious for the moment of attack, particularly in Leeds, in Sheffield, in Birmingham, and in every capital city of England, and here, in and round London, they are ripe too. I have travelled about twenty miles in the day, and the people, wherever I have been, are ready." His view was that the whole of industrial England was seething with discontent, and that to produce an explosion it was only necessary to start with an armed revolt in London. The blow must be struck at head-quarters, and then the whole realm would flare up. The initial difficulty was the collection of the nucleus of determined men who were to start the rising. It is here that the insane rashness of the scheme emerges. After a year of propaganda Despard had collected as his lieutenants and co-organizers only the very dregs of the old " Corresponding Society," a handful of London tradesmen and artisans of the Jacobin type. Of all of them only one, Emblin, a watchmaker in Chelsea, had been a well-known member of the " Corresponding Society," and had sometimes gone on its errands to sound in vain the official Whigs. For the rest, they were busy, and often apparently very magniloquent, talkers . Many contemporaries — for example, that very Radical Whig, Major Cartwright — and almost every historian who has written during the last hundred years, have declared Despard a lunatic. I am constrained to take a different view. Two governing facts must be remembered, which were obvious to every discontented man in 1801, but have been completely forgotten. The first fact was that every one then alive who had reached the age of thirty could easily remember a moment when London was for three days in the hands of a wild and mischievous mob, which did whatever it pleased in the way of arson and pillage. And this mob had no organization or definite political ends, being called into being by the work of a single crack-brained enthusiast. I refer, of course, to the Gordon Riots of June 2-9, 1780. It was open to any malignant plotter to believe that a similar, but far more formidable, mob could be raised by a man or men who had created a basis of secret societies to work and officer it. 12 THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD But we must also remember that, only three years before Despard started his propaganda, there had been a much more serious phenomenon seen than even the Gordon Riots — a widespread mutiny of the armed forces of the Crown. The Navy had then been the body affected, and all that had happened at the Nore and Spithead was well remembered in London. Nothing had come of that mutiny, partly because the leaders were unknown and incapable men, partly because the sailors were rather strikers agitating for better conditions of service than rebels wishing to overthrow the Constitution of their country. But the Mutiny at the Nore had terrified the whole nation, and rightly, since if the French had put to sea while it was in progress, any sort of disaster might have happened. Then there had been a mild echo of naval mutiny as late as the winter of 1 801-2 in Bantry Bay. Despard thought that he could organize a similar rising in the Army. The conditions of the soldier's life were little, if at all, better in 1800 than those of the sailor's. There were many ill- managed and discontented battalions. Despard thought that he could organize inter-regimental secret societies, which would gradually prepare the way for a sort of military rising comparable to the Mutiny at the Nore. It was to synchronize with a civil rising comparable to the Gordon Riots. There is no doubt that he had hit upon the Bolshevist idea of the " Soviet of Soldiers and Workmen." Personally he seems to have specialized on the First and Third Battalions of the Grenadier Guards, to one of which (and mostly to the Third Battalion) nearly all the numerous soldiers whose names are found in the record of his trial as defendants or as witnesses, • or merely as individuals mentioned in the story, seem to belong. No doubt these battalions appear mainly because they were garrisoned in London, where they were accessible to the members of a conspiracy domiciled in the metropolis. The start was made with men who had good reasons for recklessness. We note in the dock or the witness-box corporals who had twice lost their stripes, men who had been repeatedly flogged, and others who had been deserters and had been recaptured. Granted a nucleus of reckless and discontented men, a kind of systematic proselytism could begin. But THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD 13 the danger to the conspirators was that in feeling about for converts they were certain ere long to hit upon the wrong man — some soldier who had obvious reasons for grumbling, yet who was not prepared to become a rebel. The striking thing is, that of some hundreds of men who must have known with more or less certainty that something sinister was brewing, not one went to delate the plot to his colonel. To betray comrades in that way would have been contrary to all the traditions of the barrack-room. Some of the companies of the Third Grenadiers must have been riddled with sedition. The men were attending in small parties at propagandist meetings held in at least a dozen different obscure taverns in the East End and Southwark. For every individual who became a regular conspirator, swore his oath, and received his ticket, there must have been half a dozen who refused to commit themselves, who drank the beer and gin of the society, and went off with a vague promise that they would think matters over. Probably for most it was merely a superior and rather exciting form of " grousing." There was, however, a small number of discontented and ambitious soldiers who took the matter seriously, and were active agents in the plot. The two whose names occur most frequently were John Wood of the First and John Francis of the Third Battalion of the Grenadiers. The name of one or other of them appears in the evidence of nearly every one of the witnesses at the trial of the conspirators. Both were busy swearing in members of the secret society, and Francis had been nominated a " colonel " in Despard's organiza- tion. The civil branch of the conspiracy was organized in bodies of ten men, each recruited by a " captain " who was respon- sible for their loyalty. Each five captains were responsible to a " colonel," and the " colonels " were grouped locally in divisions, of which we only know that there was one in Southwark, one in Marylebone, one in Spitalfields, and another "from Blackwall and upward," each composed of several " subdivisions " under a colonel. Over all was the Com- mander-in-Chief, Despard himself. The really dangerous element was the military branch — it is said that there were 14 THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD over three hundred of the Third Grenadier Guards, and some thirty or forty of the First Battalion, who had sworn the oath. The majority of the affiliated members never saw Despard, but favoured individuals were privately introduced to him by one of their " colonels ". at some obscure rendezvous, if it was thought that they might be useful. More often orders were issued and meetings convened by one of what was called " the Executive," of which we can only say that John Francis, John Macnamara, an Irishman, a man called Pendrill who was never brought to trial, and one or two more, were members. The secret recognition sign of the society was a card, which contained the oath administered to members on their initiation. It was headed — " Constitution : the Independence of Great Britain and Ireland. The Equaliza- tion of all civil, political and religious rights. An ample provision for the families of heroes who shall fall in the Contest. A liberal reward for distinguished merit." Then came the actual oath — " In the awful presence of Almighty God, I, A B , do voluntarily declare that I will endeavour to the utmost of my power to gain those rights which the Supreme Being, in His infinite bounty, has given to all men : that neither hopes nor fears, rewards nor punishments, shall ever induce me to give any information, directly or indirectly, concerning the business of this or any similar society, so help me God ! " After reading this formula aloud to the initiator the new member kissed the card. The meetings of the fractions of the organization were numerous, garrulous, and well watered with various strong drinks. Those admitted to the august presence of Despard himself were given brandy and water ; at the general gather- ings beer, porter and gin are more frequently mentioned. There is a glimpse of one conference which makes one long for a verbatim report : it is given by one Thomas Blades, a perverted soldier. " On a Sunday night John Francis met me and asked me to go down to the Black Raven. We found there Wood, Wratten, Tyndall, Macnamara, and six or seven Irishmen, all in a state of intoxication — about twelve or thirteen persons in all. The discussion we had then teas THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD 15 concerning forms of government." Imagination fails to picture the details of a debate on high political theory between three mutinous privates of the Guards, three discontented London tradesmen, and seven Irishmen all very drunk ! By the autumn of 1802 the bolder spirits began to clamour for practical deeds. The " Executive " seems to have con- sidered that it was time to move. Despard had hitherto, as it seems, been against immediate action — as well he might be. The Peace of Amiens was toning down political bitter- ness, and spreading false hopes of quiet and prosperity. He had said " there was nothing to be done, he was expecting news and money from France." This curious phrase, if pro- perly reported by the witness — one of the soldier-conspirators — was notable : it is the only sign that Despard was in touch with the Continent. It is quite possible that he may have been sounding the French Government through some of his friends, the exiled Irish rebels, as Robert Emmet was certainly doing at the same time. Whatever may have been the case with regard to hopes of foreign aid, there is no doubt that matters quickened up in the society during August and September. It was deter- mined that there should be a rising in November. At one meeting a soldier-conspirator confessed that " we all drawed our bayonets, and swore that we would have a time fixed for a grand attack on the Tower, before the company broke up." The day chosen was that of the opening of Parliament, November 23. It remained that the details should be settled. On this there was high debate and interminable discussion. The minor people had each his plan, in which he himself was to have the leading part. The most effective project was certainly that for seizing the Tower. The desperate men would rush the arms-racks of the battalion, arm the other malcontents, and carry away the rest of the corps by surprise and terror, for they would be unarmed. This plan must have involved the shooting of the officers, but there is not a word said about that detail in any of the depositions. The Tower was full of munitions of all kinds, and these were to be distributed to the mob which the society thought that it could raise in the East End and the Borough. There 16 THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD was another scheme for a dash at the Bank of England, where were a certain number of muskets — six hundred it is said — stored in the vaults. But it was apparently Despard himself who insisted that an essential part of the insurrec- tion must be the murder of the King. The personality of George III had counted for so much in the suppression of the Gordon Riots twenty-two years before, that it was held that without him the constituted authorities in London would be helpless. Three witnesses at the trial deposed to the exact words that the Colonel used : "I have weighed the matter well, and my heart is callous." The plan was to stop the King's state coach between St. James's Palace and West- minster on the day of the opening of Parliament. He would come out of the back door of the Palace, and the escort of Horse Guards would be waiting for him some way down the Mall. There would be a crowd assembled to watch the show, and the conspirators would mingle with them, and run in upon the coach just as it was starting, and before it had picked up the escort. " Take and shoot two of the horses and the carriage must stop," said Broughton, one of the Colonel's chief confidants. Some one then asked, "But who would execute so dangerous a thing ? " Despard replied, " That he would do it with his own hand." There was then much talk on a less practicable scheme — three or four witnesses depose to it. Wood, of the First Grenadiers, said that his company would be finding the guard over "the Great Gun in the Park " — i.e. the old gun from the Sovereign of the Seas, which stood at the back of the Admiralty till it was replaced in 1803 by the Turkish cannon from Egypt, now on the Parade hard by. He could arrange that he himself and a confidant or two should be sentries at the gun ; they would privily load it and fire it into the Royal coach as it defiled at a foot's-pace in front of the muzzle. We have curious reports of the reception of this scheme. The witness Emblin declared that he said, " Good God ! do you consider how many people will be there that day, and how many lives you will take ? " Broughton answered, " Then, damn them, let them get out of the way. It will play hell with the houses at the Treasury and round about there." Some one objected, THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD 17 " The cannon may be trained too low or high and miss His Majesty." Broughton replied, " Then, damn him, we must run in and manhandle him." All this was in Despard's presence. The evidence agrees that there were to be at least three separate coups de main carried out on November 23. One was to be the murder of the King in the Mall or the Horse Guards Parade, carried out under Despard's superintendence, and followed by a raid on the Houses of Parliament ; the second was to be a mutiny of the Third Grenadiers at the Tower ; the third was to be the seizing of the Bank of England. " If we have the Tower and the Bank we have everything," were Despard's words, according to one witness. He added that the coaches starting for the country must be stopped, and that the "telegraphs" — i.e. the semaphores communi- cating with Dover, Portsmouth and other garrisons — must be destroyed, in order that matters might be finished in London before the news got round the country. Would the scheme ever have worked ? There were desperate men in it, and something might have been done, but one has a suspicion that at the last a great many con- spirators would have found it convenient not to be present at the appointed rendezvous. Possibly the King might have been murdered — conceivably the mutiny at the Tower might have come off ; but it is incredible that any measure of success would have followed. The mob was relied upon as the main weapon, and the mob was unorganized, and the destined leaders belonging to the conspiracy were few and obscure. Not far from London were thousands of troops, at Windsor, Chatham, Colchester, Portsmouth, Canterbury, etc., who do not seem to have been affected by the military plot ; there is very little trace of any attempt to spread the propaganda among them in the depositions of any of the witnesses. It is specially mentioned that none of the regiments of Household Cavalry, though they were quartered in London, were the least affected. There might have been some bloody work in the streets that day, but it seems unlikely that anything more serious would have happened. But the striking-power of Despard's gang was never to u.c.d. c 18 THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD be tested. The reckless way in which possible recruits were sounded, and were often admitted to some of the secrets of the Association, had its inevitable results. For the last four or five months the Government had been in possession of a good deal of information concerning the conspiracy. Besides vague reports as to secret meetings of soldiers and others in various taverns about the Tower, they got in July a definite story. It was told by one Thomas Windsor, a private in the Third Grenadiers, an old soldier of eleven years' standing. This man came to the office of Mr. William Bownass, an army agent, and told him that there was mischief afoot in his battalion, that a secret society had been working in it for some months, and that he himself had just been sworn in as a member, though he had no intention of joining in the mutiny. He had only taken the oath in order to see what was up. As a testimony of the existence of the movement, he produced the oath-card on which he had been sworn. Bownass told him to retain his membership, to keep his ears open, and to report to him from time to time what was brewing. For the last four months of the history of the conspiracy, Windsor was sending in reports from time to time, which went to the Home Office. Till September there was nothing on which Despard and his lieutenants could have been arrested, except the charge of forming a secret society and administering illegal oaths. The Ministers resolved to let the matters come to a head before striking. In October the definite assassina- tion plot cropped up, and it was getting time to act. When it came out that the meeting of Parliament was to give the signal for the revolt, measures were taken to be a week early with the conspirators. The plot was to burst out on Novem- ber 23. Seven days before, a great force of "Bow Street Officers," under Mr. John Stafford, chief clerk of the police office at Union Hall, surrounded a tavern in Lambeth called the Oakley Arms, and there arrested all the members present at one of the meetings of the society. They were about thirty in number, including Despard himself, "the only person there with the appearance of a gentleman." The arrest seems to have been a tame affair. On the entry of the constables the Colonel and his friends were found THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD 19 seated at a long table in the club-room of the inn. " Some of them were for getting up and looked rather alarmed." They were told to keep their seats, that a warrant was out against them, and that they must submit to be searched. Despard was " rather angry and indignant " ; he walked up and down protesting, asked to be shown the warrant, and said that he would not allow a hand to be laid on him. He was searched nevertheless, but no paper of any importance was found ; indeed, the only compromising documents dis- covered that night were five of the printed oath-cards which served as the private tokens of the society. The Grand Jury of Surrey found a true bill against the Colonel and his associates on January 21, and the trial came off on February 7, 1803, at the Sessions House, Newington, before Lord EUenborough, the Lord Chief Justice, Sir Alex- ander Thompson, Sir Simon Leblanc, and Sir Alan Chambre. The prosecution was conducted by Spencer Perceval, then Attorney-General, but destined a few years later to be Prime Minister and to fall by the hand of an assassin. Despard asked that his trial might be conducted apart from that of the rest, and this was granted him. He had as his counsel Serjeant Best, afterwards a judge of the King's Bench, and Mr. Gurney. Four persons who had been in the plot — three soldiers and the watchmaker Emblin — were allowed to turn King's evidence, thereby saving their necks. On these four men's depositions the case against Despard mainly rested ; but five or six more witnesses, mostly soldiers, were produced to prove that they had been sounded by one or other of the chief agents of Despard, and had gathered enough about the object of the plot to make them determined to keep out of it. None of them had " split " upon their comrades till the crash had come. Their stories bore every mark of being given with reluctance. The most damning evidence was concerning a meeting at the Flying Horse Tavern on Novem- ber 12, when the Colonel had laid down the details of the assassination of the King to a select committee, and it was curiously corroborated by the landlady of the inn, who said that, standing in her bar, she had heard in the next room 20 THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD Despard break out in a very loud voice with the words — " I have weighed everything well, and my heart is callous," which were attributed to him by several of the other wit- nesses. Serjeant Best refused to give any explanation of Des- pard's presence at the Oakley Arms on November 16, or of his tavern colloquies during the preceding year. He simply pleaded that the Colonel's early career rendered it unnecessary to go into such things. He produced Lord Nelson as a witness, to prove that Despard had been a loyal and zealous officer in the old American war : but Nelson had not seen him since 1780. Best's junior, Gurney, who followed, took another line. It was easy enough to blacken the characters of the witnesses for the prosecution. They were ruffians, informers acting in collusion, agents provocateurs : the plot was a figment, like the imaginary Popish plot in the reign of Charles II. Lord Ellenborough invited the Colonel himself to make any observations that he thought fit, to supplement the pleading of his counsel. It was expected that he would either deny the existence of any plot, on his honour, or else take the other line — avow himself a Republican and a patriot, and justify his plans by a tirade upon the unconstitutional and corrupt form of government under which his country was suffering. Despard did neither, but simply observed, " My lord, my counsel have acquitted themselves so ably* and so much to my satisfaction, that I have nothing at all to say." In short, he refused to deny that a plot had been formed or that he had a part in it. The jury was only absent for twenty-five minutes, and returned to find the prisoner guilty. They added that they recommended him to mercy because of his former good char- acter and eminent services. This, I think, was less a testi- monial to Despard than a mark of the general enthusiasm of the day in favour of Nelson, who had spoken up so strongly for his old comrade. On the next day but one, twelve of Despard's associates appeared in the dock. The jury convicted nine of the twelve ; the other three were acquitted. The Crown exercised its prerogative of mercy in the cases of three more, for whom THE UNFORTUNATE COLONEL DESPARD 21 the death penalty was commuted for long terms of penal servitude. On Monday, February 21, the Colonel and his six companions — John Francis and John Wood, both of the Grenadier Guards, Thomas Broughton, carpenter, John Macnamara, an old member of the " United Irishmen," James Wratten, and Arthur Graham, artisans, were executed in public, in front of the Surrey County Jail at Newington. Despard showed no signs of weakness or of repentance. He refused to see a clergyman of any denomination, and displayed a sort of stoic composure. On the scaffold he made a short speech, in which he declared that he was no more guilty of the crime of which he was accused — treason — than any of those who were listening to him. By this he obviously meant that to attempt to overthrow the existing regime was not treason, not that he had made no such attempt. For he added that he had spent his life in the service of the nation, and was suffering for his endeavour. The method of the execution was not according to the barbarous formula for high treason — the seven condemned men were merely hanged ; after half an hour they were cut down, and their dead bodies were beheaded — the executioner holding up the head of each with the words, " This is the head of a traitor ! " This was the last occasion but one on which decapitation was used. Thistle- wood's case in 1821 was the only subsequent example. Thus ended a plot undoubtedly real and dangerous, yet as undoubtedly doomed to failure from the first, because its framer had lost all sense of balance and reality. It was the product not of well-reasoned judgment, but of injured vanity and rancorous megalomania. The autocrat of Belize had been ignored by Ministers and flouted by under-secretaries. I cannot but believe that he was out for revenge for his injured self-esteem, not inspired by a Jacobin frenzy for Liberty and Equality to be won by the way of assassination and military mutiny. Of such conspirators one can only say " c5j dndXoiro xai SXktg, 8 tjj roaaffrd ye (fejot." II ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD AND CATO STREET The man who is outside the common humanity of his own generation, who takes the manners, the morals, or the enthusi- asms of one period into another, may be magnificent or sinister, pathetic or grotesque. Sometimes he is all four at once. English history is rich in such eccentric figures, but none is more curious as a character study than Arthur Thistle- wood, the " British Jacobin," who reproduced the cheap humanitarianism, the reckless bloodthirstiness, the bombastic phraseology and the autolatrous megalomania of the Parisian demagogues of 1792 before the eyes of the England of Sir Walter Scott and Miss Austen, and who furnished the young Thackeray with the most gruesome anecdote of his boyhood. In the orthodox Whig tradition, on which nineteenth-century history is generally written, he is lightly passed over, and not without reason. For the acts of the Tory Ministers in the distressful years that followed Waterloo have to be decried wholesale, and the words and deeds of the wild fanatics, who frightened Liverpool and Addington into repression, have therefore to be kept dark — or at least relegated to short and vague paragraphs and footnotes. Arthur Thistlewood, the legitimate spiritual heir of Guy Fawkes, came within a measurable distance of slaying Canning and Wellington before their time. He had made elaborate preparations for parading the head of Castlereagh on a pike along Oxford Street and Holborn, after the slaughter of the whole .Cabinet. Nor does it seem at all impossible that he might have carried out his bloody scheme. Insurrections may be foreseen and nipped in the bud ; on the other hand, assassination is a hard thing to guard against, as witness the fates of Alexander of Russia and Frederick Cavendish, of Abraham Lincoln and Sadi Carnot. The more obscure 22 ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD 23 and the fewer that plotters are, the more hard are they to discover. The very fact that Thistlewood's murderous gang was insignificant in numbers, and composed of unknown men, might have enabled him to carry out his appalling plan. For common prescience could not have availed to avert such an unlikely danger, and no victims could have been more helpless than a party of Ministers off duty, and dining quietly in a private house. But for the want of caution that led the arch-conspirator to broach his designs to two ill-chosen recruits, one of whom was a systematic traitor and the other too much of an honest man, he might have made Grosvenor Square the most tragic name in modern English history. As it was, he only succeeded in conferring a half-forgotten notoriety on Cato Street, Edgware Road. But the mere thought of what he might have accomplished makes the brain reel. Imagine Liverpool and Castlereagh, Wellington and Canning, Eldon and Addington — not to speak of minor figures like Vansittart, " Prosperity " Robinson, and Lord Bathurst — all cut off simultaneously by the assassins' swords and bombs. There would have been incendiarism and riot to follow, but it is certain that the affair would not have ended, as Thistlewood hoped, in a general rising of the lower classes of London, culminating in the successful proclamation of a Republic, with himself as " President of the Provisional Government." Most probably the result would have been the instant repres- sion of the turmoil by military force, followed by a sort of " White Terror." After such an atrocity the Tory Party would have been confirmed in power for a whole generation, and it must have ruled with a revengeful vigour compared to which Addington's and Castlereagh's measures of repres- sion in 1816-20 would have been child's play. There would certainly have been no Reform Bill in 1832. Would there have been an ultimate British Revolution of a very venomous sort some years later ? Assassination breeds repression, and repression breeds revolution. Let us be thankful that Mr. Thistlewood's caution was not equal to his energy, and to his compelling power as a leader of men. He was not young when he first came before the public eye. He was born in 1770, the son of one William Thistle- 24 ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD wood, land agent to the Vyners of Gantby, in Lincolnshire, a considerable county family. His father was well-to-do, and he received a good education : he wrote a fair eighteenth- century style of the turgid sort, occasionally lapsing into bombast — as when he spoke of "the purple stream that circulates through a heart enthusiastically vibrating to every impulse of patriotism and honour." [His own, of course.] But it cannot be denied that he possessed a certain eloquence — as witness his dying words : — " A few hours hence and I shall be no more : but the nightly breeze, which will whistle over the silent grave that shall protect me from its keenness, will bear to your restless pillows the memory of one who lived but for his country, and died when liberty and justice had been driven from her confines by a set of tyrants, whose thirst for blood is only equalled by their activity in plunder. For life, as it respects myself, I care not ; but, while yet I may, I would rescue my memory from the calumny which (I doubt not) will be industriously heaped upon it, when it will be no longer in my power to protect it. My every principle was for the prosperity of my country. The height of my ambition was to bring welfare to my starving fellow-citizens. I keenly felt for their miseries, but when their miseries were laughed at, when because they dared to express those miseries they were cut down by hundreds [an exaggerated allusion to ' Peterloo '], barbarously massacred, and trampled to death, when infants were sabred in their mothers' arms, and the breast from which they drew the tide of life was hacked from the parent's body, then indeed my feelings became too excessive for endurance, and I resolved on vengeance. I resolved that the lives of the instigators of massacre should atone for the souls of murdered innocents." This sounds genuine enough, when spoken on the edge of the grave. But though Thistlewood ended, we cannot doubt, as an honest fanatic, his life was no more of the idealistic or the Spartan type than that of many of the Jacobins whom he so much admired. He was always restless and thriftless. He was trained as a surveyor, but never took to the profession, and remained a burden on his father long after he had reached manhood. By an odd, unexplained chance he happened to be in Paris for some months during the Terror, and what he saw there of the power of the mob and the mob-leader remained fixed in his mind, to bear fruit in later years. But on his return from R-ance he did not (as we might have expected ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD 28 from his later career) dabble in any of the revolutionary agitations of the 'nineties. Quite the reverse — he accepted an ensign's commission in the 1st York Militia, and later (1798) became a lieutenant in the 3rd Lincoln Militia. He is reputed to have been an active officer and a " good drill," but to have been a loose liver, a persistent and unlucky gambler. In 1804 he courted and married a lady a good many years older than himself — a Miss Jane Worsley. She possessed a good income, and he retired from the militia and settled down in Lincoln to live on her money. Unfortunately for him she died less than eighteen months after the marriage, and as her property was settled on her nearest of kin in default of issue, Thistlewood was thrown upon the world almost penniless. The heirs made him a small allowance. Soon after he had to quit Lincoln, on account of unpaid debts of honour. He had continued his gambling when he had not the wherewithal to settle up. After a period spent in low water, he emerged for a moment into renewed prosperity — an uncle died and left him a farm valued at £10,000. He sold it, not for cash down, but for an annuity; after two years the guarantor of the annuity went bankrupt, and his security disappeared. For a second time he sought salvation in matrimony, taking to wife Susan, daughter of Mr. John Wilkinson of Horncastle, a prosperous butcher. She was philosophic enough to accept and rear a son whom Thistle- wood produced — the offspring, not of his first wife, but of an amour. Her dowry served to stock a farm near Horn- castle ; and here, periodically assisted by loans from his father and elder brother, Thistlewood maintained himself more or less for some years. He was not a competent agricul- turist, but prices ran high in the last years of the struggle with Napoleon. Then came the " slump " in corn after the war was over, when the quarter of wheat fell from 80s. to 52s. in a few months. It ruined Thistlewood along with many other fair-weather farmers. Finding that he was losing rather than making money, in consequence of high rent and high taxes, combined with low prices for produce, he got rid of his farm, and came up to London in 1814 with his wife and his son, " not in actual want, but his finances 26 ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD' were at a low ebb." Apparently he had sold his lease for something ; his wife, " a smart, genteel little woman," had still some resources, and both he and she probably contrived to extract occasional doles from their relatives in Lincoln- shire. What was Thistlewood's original scheme of life on arriving in London no man can say. But very shortly after his establishment there he began to appear as an agitator of the extreme Radical sort. He has left no account of the causes of his sudden launch out into politics, beyond vague declamation about his sympathy for the distressed and unen- franchised masses. This will hardly pass as an explanation : his previous life had not been that of a philanthropist. Vain, ambitious, bankrupt for the third or fourth time, soured by perpetual ill-luck that mainly came from his own thriftless- ness, he attributed his present poverty to anything rather than his own fault. London was seething with political dis- content, but it was mostly inarticulate and leaders were wanting. " Orator " Hunt and " Dr." Watson were certainly not abler men than Thistlewood : marking their notoriety, he evidently saw no reason why he should not rise as high. His tongue was ready and eloquent, his vehemence tremendous, his personal influence over other men was clearly exceptional ; his hatred for those who administered England was no doubt real — to them he ascribed his own indigence. He had the ruined gambler's grudge against all who had scraped and saved ; the shopkeepers of London, he once observed, were an aristocracy as pernicious as the Tory majority in Parliament — he should rejoice to see their shops looted and their tills cleared out. But no doubt the governing inspiration in his mind was his memory of the Paris of the Jacobins : he had seen what mobs could do when the fabric of the State was rotten, and he thought — not wrongly— that he himself was singularly gifted for a mob-leader. From 1816 onward he was one of the most prominent figures in that small band of agitators who advocated physical force as the remedy for all ills, and who broke completely away from the Whigs and their constitutional methods. He was heard advocating violence at every open-air meeting, and that his words were not vain declamation was shown by ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD 27 the fact that he headed an armed party at the abortive Spa Fields riot of December 2, 1816, and tried — carrying a tricolour flag and followed by a constantly dwindling crowd that finally melted away to nothing — to break into the Tower. He was tried, along with the younger Watson, for this escapade, but was fortunate enough to be indicted for high treason, not for riot : the jury acquitted them of the weightier charge, because they thought they ought only to have been tried for the lesser offence. Encouraged by his escape Thistle- wood continued to preach violence, till he was at last arrested for having sent the Home Secretary Addington (Lord Sidmouth) a challenge to a duel. For this he suffered a year's imprison- ment in Horsham Gaol [1818-19], but came out from it not cured of his pugnacity or his megalomania, but almost beside himself with long-suppressed rage. This was the summer of the " Manchester Massacre," the untoward affair when the Lancashire Yeomanry rode down a riotous assembly that had met to hear " Orator Hunt," where five people were crushed to death, and many scores more hurt by being trampled upon or cut about with sabres. Thistlewood sat in judgment upon the Ministry, and condemned them all to death, for what was in truth the act of a scared magistrate and a body of amateur soldiers, who had lost their heads when the mob closed around them. He went about London trying in vain to induce the leaders of the Radical Party to authorize an armed insurrection to avenge what he styled High Treason against the People of England. But no one of any weight or importance would listen to the proposal. Thistlewood said that if they were not cowards they were traitors : he believed that if he could get at the Home Secretary's papers in Whitehall he would find that Orator Hunt received a secret pension, and probably Cobbett also, " for all his writings, he had no doubt that he was a spy too." For months the would-be insurgent tramped the streets trying to organize a rising, but with small effect and ever- growing rage. We have a description of him at the time : " Five feet ten inches, with a sallow complexion, long visage, dark hair, a little grey ; dark hazel eyes with very arched 8 ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD yebrows, a wide mouth and a good set of teeth ; he has a car under his right jaw ; he is slenderly built and has the arriage of a military man. He usually wears a long blue oat and blue pantaloons." From another and most unfriendly ource we hear that "his countenance, always forbidding, eemed now to have acquired an additional degree of malig- lancy. When in custody in 1817 for the Spa Fields affair ie was a stout active man with a fearless and determined ast of features. Within the last six months he has under- one a change — his countenance has grown squalid and emaci- ,ted, his dress shabby." He was generally observed walking — almost running — through the streets with eager impetuosity, ds shoes and hat untidy and much worn, as if he were continu- ,lly posting about on some absorbing and interminable errand rhich brooked no delay. And, in truth, the errand existed —all that autumn and winter he was trying, with no great uccess, to collect the nucleus of the revolutionary army with riiich he would sweep the streets and proclaim the Republic A the Mansion House. As the possibility of " straight- orward insurrection" — his own phrase — receded farther uid farther into the clouds, be began to vary his plans with chemes of mere vengeance, the murder of one or more of he leading Ministers — Sidmouth for choice, both as his own )ersonal enemy and as the Home Secretary directly responsible or the " massacre " at Manchester. This was no new idea : t was afterwards remembered that direct incentives to assas- dnation of individuals occurred in several of his speeches is far back as 1817. The statement often made, or hinted it, by Whig writers, to the effect that he only lapsed into nurderous plans under the instigation of the man George Edwards — of whom more hereafter — has no foundation. He ras ready for any bloody design long before he first met Edwards in June, 1819. Thistlewood sounded many scores of Radicals, great and imall, working on, as he tested his man, from general plans )f violence to more definite proposals for the removal of ndividual "tyrants." The large majority drew off at the irst hint at murder. " I may be a great fool, but I was not bolish enough to enter into such a scheme," said one habitue ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD 29 of riotous meetings, when tempted by two of Thietlewood's acolytes. " I did not think they would" ever get any persons to be so mad as to join them." Nevertheless, the plotter did, by infinite pains, succeed in collecting a small band of desperadoes, who did not shrink from the idea of assassination. There were two types among them — a minority were Jacobins of Thistlewood's own type, like the shoemaker Brunt, who acted as his second in command. This man was a prosperous workman, who often made 40s. or 50s. a week, and kept an apprentice ; he was the only one among the gang who ever had money in his pocket, and he readily disbursed it on " the cause." He was a great reader, saturated with the works of Tom Paine and other freethinkers, and had the whole vocabulary of French republicanism at his command. Unlike most of the others, he was neither starving nor of evil reputa- tion. He was as perfect a fanatic as his leader — so, it would appear, were one or two of the other conspirators. But the majority were broken men, on the edge — or over the edge — of starvation, whom Thistlewood had attracted by the idea of a general overthrow of existing society. Most of them, as their counsel pleaded at their trial, were probably thinking more of the plunder of the shops of London than of the pre- liminary murders that were to herald the night of pillage. The most violent of them was a bankrupt butcher, one James Ings, whose square brutal face contrasts curiously with the cadaverous countenances of the rest in the little gallery of portraits that illustrates the contemporary publications of 1820. His ferocious language, and his grotesquely boisterous conduct on the scaffold, were long remembered. Down to 1819 he had a fair record for honesty — not so the remaining members of the gang, who were as choice a set of scoundrels as could be fished from the gutter — Davidson, a plausible cant- ing mulatto, who had earned good money as a cabinet-maker, till he was expelled from a Wesleyan congregationJ;o which he belonged for a series of indecent assaults on Sunday-school girls ; Tidd, a cobbler, whose speciality during the late war had been enlisting into many regiments and absconding with his bounty money ; Robert Adams, an old soldier, whom his own fellow-conspirators described as a professional 30 ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD swindler ; and Dwyer, who is accused of maintaining himself by blackmailing persons of immoral life. Thistlewood was not unaware of their characters — but he had to get his instru- ments where he could find them. Among others he took into his confidence George Edwards, already mentioned, a very clever dissolute fellow, by trade a modeller of statuettes, who had been much about at Radical meetings of late, and dis- tinguished himself by advocating outrages of an ingenious sort. Thistlewood described him as " poor and penniless, without a bed to lie upon or a chair to sit in : straw was his only bed — his only covering a blanket ; and, owing to his bad character and his swindling propensities, he was ever driven off by his landlords." Yet the conspirator eagerly welcomed him as a recruit. He was far more intelligent than most of the gang and full of wiles. This was Thistlewood's first mistake, for Edwards, though not a systematic agent provocateur of the Government, as many alleged at the time of the trial of his comrades, had earned money before by giving secret information to the police, and was ready to earn it again. We have the word of Ca nnin g himself for the fact that George Edwards was not a regular Government spy — he was not in the employment of Bow Street, nor did he receive an allowance. He volunteered information and got a dole occasionally, and he had never received any large sum till he earned blood-money to the tune of £1,000, when the plot was discovered, by betraying the whereabouts of Thistlewood. During the winter of 1819-20 he apparently communicated several times with the police or the Home Office, but could give them no definite information, because the plot had not taken shape. Thistlewood was ripe for murder, but had settled neither his victims nor his exact modus operandi. He continued collecting associates and getting together stores of arms — the last no easy task, because of the insufficiency of his exchequer. But hidden about at the lodgings of various conspirators were some dozens of swords, bayonets, and muskets, an immense number of pike-heads — some made of sharpened files, but quite effective— about 1,200 rounds of ball-cartridge, and a quantity of bombs and grenades. One of these was of specially large size, and calculated to ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD 31 produce a tremendous explosion. There was also a provision of fireballs for incendiary purposes. The plot was taking shape by January, and Thistlewood had fully made up his mind that the preliminary step to a general rising should be the murder of certain Ministers, whether in the street or at their offices, when his plans were put out by the death of the old King George III. This took all official persons to Windsor for some days, and disarranged the routine of business. It was not until February that things had become normal again, and Thistlewood could trace and mark down his intended victims. By this time he had come on an idea which surpassed in completeness and ingenuity all his previous schemes. The members of the Ministry were in the habit, from time to time, of dining together in each other's private houses in rotation at " Cabinet Dinners." The next was to be at the house of the Earl of Harrowby, Lord President of the Council, in Grosvenor Square, on the south side, at the corner of Charles Street, on Wednesday, February 23. Thistlewood would thus find his " tyrants " concentrated in a very accessible spot, with no further guard than Lord Harrowby's butler and footmen. Having armed themselves at some convenient rendezvous, the conspirators were to go to Grosvenor Square in twos and threes, and were to disperse themselves unostentatiously in the neighbourhood of the Lord President's mansion. Thistle- wood, about the time that dinner was half over, was to knock at the door, carrying a red box, such as are used for ministerial correspondence. While he was explaining to the porter that a dispatch of great importance must be handed at once to Lord Castlereagh, other conspirators were to press in to the open door behind him, knock down or kill the servants in the hall, and rush for the dining-room. Bombs were to be thrown upstairs and down, and a select party were to burst into the dining-room and murder the guests. All this is undisputed, and was acknowledged by several of the con- spirators. Details were added by the informers at the trial which may or may not be correct. Thistlewood, so it is said, intended to present himself before the startled Ministers with the words : " My Lords, I have got as good men here as 32 ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD your Manchester Yeomanry — enter citizens and do your duty ! " When the killing was done, the butcher Ings was to cut off the heads of Sidmouth and Castlereagh, and to place them in two bags which he carried for the purpose. When the city should have risen, as Thistlewood hoped that it would, the heads were to be placed on pikes and carried in front of the mob in true Parisian style. It is certain that Ings, on the fatal night, carried two large bags and a butcher's knife — but his defenders suggested that the receptacles may have been for Lord Harrowby's plate rather than for Lord Castle- reagh's head. Who shall decide ? It was hoped that the news of the wholesale slaughter of the Cabinet would cause a general turmoil in the streets. This was to be helped by incendiary fires. One of Thistle- wood's trusted lieutenants, a man called Palin, was furnished with a quantity of fireballs, which he was to throw, or cause to be thrown, into various inflammable places, of which one, we are told, was the hay store of Albany Street Barracks, and another an old house near Furnival's Inn. He had three coadjutors allotted to him, but it is doubtful whether they would have effected much, when the signal should have been given on the fateful night. For Palin, according to the evi- dence of one of his comrades, had primed himself up for the business with liquor, and was quite incoherent and incapable. Another party, headed by a man named Cooke, was to endeav- our to seize the guns of the Light Horse Volunteers at their drill-hall in Gray's Inn Lane, and those of the Honourable Artillery Company. There is no proof that any serious force was ready at Cooke's disposal — apparently Thistlewood had arranged for him to be supported by some Irish labourers living in Gee's Court, St. Giles, with whom he was in communica- tion. But it is evident that his real hope was in the general assistance of the mob, when the news should have got about. If all went well, the main body of the gang, who had been charged with the actual assassination, were to press eastward along Holborn, gathering up Cooke's party with the cannon from Gray's Inn Road, and were to seize the Mansion House. Thistlewood was to install himself there as president of a "Provisional Government," with Ings as secretary. The ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD 33 proclamations which they were to post up and publish were duly prepared. Of what, meanwhile, the Guards and other troops garrisoned in London would have been doing, Thistle- wood does not seem to have taken account. There is no mention of them in the evidence of his accusers or of his defenders — a strange piece of reticence ! On Monday, February 21, Thistlewood hired as his armoury and as the base from which his operations were to start, an empty three-horse stable in Cato Street, Edgware Road. This obscure thoroughfare was little more than a lane or mews — it connected John Street and Queen Street, which both run into the lower end of Edgware Road on the right (or eastern) side. No doubt Thistlewood must have been fascinated with the name of Cato Street, with its suggestions of stern ancient Roman republicanism. But the premises were not imposing — three stalls and a coach-house below, a large loft and two small living-rooms above. They were, how- ever, amply sufficient as an arsenal, and thither the muskets, swords, pikes, and grenades were transferred from their several hiding-places. The first news concerning the final development of Thistle- wood's plan did not come, as might have been expected, from the informer Edwards, though he had given some general warnings, but from Thomas Hyden, a dairyman, who came up in great agitation to Lord Harrowby, as he was riding in Hyde Park on the morning of February 22, and besought him to put off at once his dinner of the next night, or he and his friends would be murdered. This person had been solicited on the previous Sunday to come into the plot by a man called Wilson, one of Thistlewood's minor satellites, and had been told enough to frighten him nearly out of his wits. He tried to catch Lord Castlereagh on the Monday, but failed to get access to him, though he made four calls. Wherefore he waylaid the Lord President next morning, and was more successful. This, according to Lord Harrowby's evidence at the subsequent trial, was the first definite news of Cato Street that came to hand : " We had general information that some plan was in agitation, but knew neither the time nor the particulars." It is quite untrue to say — with some U.O.D. d 34 ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD Whig historians — that the whole matter of the dinner-party was settled with the spy Edwards as a trap for Thistlewood. But it is quite clear that later on the same day on which Hyden confided the matter to Lord Harrowby, Edwards gave similar information to Lord Sidmouth at the Home Office. For the Ministers by that night had private advice that they were to meet, not at Grosvenor Square, but at Fife House. The preparations for the dinner, however, were allowed to go on, nothing being said to Lord Harrowby's servants as to a countermand. Thistlewood's emissaries watched Gros- venor Square all day, and saw nothing to undeceive them. Considering that the main outlines of the plot were in the possession of the Home Office by eleven o'clock on Wednesday morning, it does not seem that the arrangements for the arrest of the conspirators were so well concerted as they should have been. The main responsibility was in the hands of Mr. Richard Birnie, the magistrate at Bow Street : he took with him for the business Ruthven, the chief of his patrol, and eleven others of his men only, armed with short cutlasses and pocket-pistols. He was informed that he should have military support, and relied upon it. But from an exagger- ated idea of the importance of keeping all preparations secret till the last possible hour, no definite information was given before evening to the Colonel commanding the 2nd Battalion of the Coldstream Guards, in the Portman Street Barracks, from which the detachment was to be drawn. At a quarter to eight the picket on duty was suddenly turned out and ordered to march : it was, by the chance of the roster, under Lieutenant Frederick Fitzclarence — one of the numerous natural sons of William Duke of Clarence — who received at the last moment the instruction that his party — a sergeant, a corporal, and twenty-eight privates — were to aid the police in the seizure of armed conspirators in Cato Street, Edgware Road. The soldiers were not in the least acquainted with the task that they were to perform : they supposed that a fire had broken out, and that they were required to guard property from a casual mob. No guide was sent with them, nor was anyone from the police patrol left to pick them up. It was only when their officer halted them at the corner of ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD 35 John Street and Edgware Road, and directed them to fix bayonets, observe the strictest silence, and follow him with caution, that they became aware that something abnormal was in hand. They had just resumed their march and reached the angle of John Street and Cato Street, when they heard, quite clearly, a single shot, followed by a scattering volley, proceed- ing from a building sixty yards up the road. Whereupon they doubled up towards the sound, and came into the midst of the turmoil which had just started. It was, apparently, not long after eight o'clock when Mr. Birnie, the magistrate, gave orders to commence operations without waiting for the soldiers — either because he thought that the muster of his little band of police had been detected by the sentinels of the conspirators, or because the hour was growing so late that Thistlewood might sally out on his errand, before the doors of his refuge were blockaded. In the open street he and his gang would not so easily be arrested as when they were crowded together in the narrow loft above the stables. Accordingly Birnie gave the foolhardy order to his handful of followers to enter the building and seize its inmates, though they were known to be armed and desperate men, and to outnumber the attacking party by two to one. Birnie did not lead the assault himself, but turned over the charge of the forlorn hope to Ruthven, the chief of the patrol. The dozen police broke open the door of the stables, and found themselves confronted by two armed men — David- son, the mulatto, who had a musket across his shoulder, and Ings, the butcher, who had a pistol and a sword and was girt with the belt from which hung the gruesome bags which have already been mentioned. Whether from fear or from mere surprise, neither of the sentinels fired, but one of them shouted up the stairs in a thundering voice, " Look out above ! " Ruthven called to some of his men to seize the sentinels, and charged at the steep stairway with the rest. He himself reached the top, followed by only two officers, Ellis and Smithers — the rest were stumbling up the narrow ascent, which would only take one man abreast. The assailants got a momentary glimpse of the loft crowded by about twenty- three men, some of whom were loading pistols and muskets, 36 ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD others girding on swords and cutlasses. What followed was a matter of ten seconds : taking one step into the loft, Ruthven held out his staff of office and shouted, "We are officers — surrender your arms " ; according to one witness he added, " here's a pretty nest of you." The conspirators instinctively fell back against the walls, all save Thistlewood, who stood in the doorway of one of the small living-rooms at the end of the loft, with a long German fencing-sword poised in an attitude of defence. Ellis, the second patrol- man, who had reached the top of the stair, levelled a pistol at him and cried, " Drop your sword, or I fire ! " The third officer, Smithers, then ran in on Thistlewood, with bare hands, to seize him ; but the conspirator replied with a cool and deadly thrust which ran Smithers through the heart. The point of his weapon went so far that it turned against one of the ribs where it joined the spine. Ellis then fired at Thistlewood and missed him. The first shot set pande- monium loose ; some one cried, " Throw them downstairs," some one else, " Out with the lights." Four or five wild shots were fired upon Ruthven and Ellis, and then all was dark, for the eight candles were overturned, and the gang plunged in a mass at the head of the stairway, to get loose from the trap in which they found themselves. The two surviving patrolmen were knocked head over heels down the steps, and the conspirators poured down after them and fell upon the eight or nine officers who had not yet mounted. There was a clash for a few seconds — about twenty shots were fired, and then the gang broke out successfully, after wounding five of the police — one was shot through the head, but not mortally. As they charged forth they liberated their two sentinels, Ings and Davidson. The whole started to run in the narrow street— right and left. Those who turned to their right, to the smaller exit into Queen Street, got off, including Thistlewood himself, who, as he ran, made a furious stroke at a harmless passer-by, one William Samson, whom he mistook for an enemy trying to intercept him. The man, fortunately for himself, was wearing an unbuttoned greatcoat— the sword caught in the folds and did him no harm. The less lucky portion of the gang, who had swerved ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD 37 to the left, towards John Street, ran into the arms of the Coldstreamers, who were hurrying up at the sound of the firing. These were mostly caught, some of them fighting hard. Tidd, when seized by the sergeant of the picket, fired on him — the ball went up his sleeve and then grazed his temple. Lieutenant Fitzclarence had a scuffle with another, who cut at him with a sword and then wrestled with him, till he was dragged off by two privates. When all the alarms and excursions were over, the Bow Street officers searched the loft, and found there not only the corpse of Smithers, but two miserable wretches who had buried themselves in a heap of shavings and straw in the corner, being too terrified to flee. One of these, a little snub-nosed Irish tailor named Moniment, was the second of the two conspirators who was allowed to turn king's evidence : the other was a starving wastrel named Gilchrist, who had only been brought into the conspiracy that same evening — literally gleaned from the gutter. So ended the skirmish with the capture of only eight of the twenty-five persons who had been present at the meeting — Ings, Wilson, Tidd, Davidson the mulatto, Brad- bourn, Shaw, Gilchrist, and Moniment. On the next day three more important arrests were made, those of Robert Adams, the old guardsman, Brunt, the shoe- maker-politician, and Thistlewood himself. The latter was certainly taken by the treachery of his accomplice Edwards, the spy, for he had never returned to his own abode, but had taken refuge in an obscure lodging-house, 8 White Street, Little Moorfields. No one but Edwards had accompanied him thither, or knew of his hiding-place. He was surprised in bed, with all his clothes on but his coat and boots, sleeping the sleep of exhaustion after his wild night's work. Being, as he thought, safe where he was not known, he had taken no precautions against surprise, and was pounced upon by six Bow Street officers before he could even cast off his blankets. Several other arrests were made that day of persons, some of whom had, and some had not, any real connexion with the plot. The prisoners were in a very evil case. This was a hanging job — if not a hanging, drawing, and quartering job — as they 38 ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD all knew. There would be no chance of getting off lightly, on the plea that their assembly was a foolish escapade with no deadly purpose behind it. That they had been betrayed by some one deep in the affair was evident, for the Cato Street stable had only been hired two days before the affray. The traitor — whoever he might be — would know all about the projected assassination, the fire-raising, the design for seizing the cannon, and the rest. Wherefore the fanatics, such as Thistlewood, Brunt, and Ings, despaired and raged. But the meaner spirits, who had joined in the plot for plunder, began to think of the chance of turning king's evidence and saving their necks. It might well be that the Home Office had not sufficient detailed information to make out a complete case, and would be glad of more. Within a few hours several of the conspirators were sounding their jailers as to the chance of escape by the way of confession. This is generally the case when a gang of political plotters has been captured, as Irish experience shows. After the Phoenix Park murders not only Councillor Carey, but others of the murderers — some say the majority of them — tried to buy their lives by treachery at their comrades' expense. Now the Government had at their disposal for direct evi- dence only Thomas Hyden, who had honestly given infor- mation the moment that the general scope of the plot had beoome clear to him, and who knew no more than outlines, and the odious Edwards — whose part in the affair they would gladly minimize, since the revelation of his long and hypo- critical spying into the projects of Thistlewood would disgust public opinion. He had let the plan develop, had loudly commended it, and had suggested ingenious, if futile, addi- tions. If he could be kept out of court altogether, the pro- secution would be the better for it. Wherefore tacit offers of immunity were made to two of the would-be purveyors of king's evidence — Robert Adams the old soldier and the Irish tailor Moniment. The former had been very early and deep in the conspiracy ; the other knew less, but was a special recruit of Brunt, Thistlewood's chief lieutenant, and could tell all about him. To corroborate the evidence of these two worthies there was an ample amount of out- ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD 39 side witnesses, neighbours who had seen mysterious meetings and secret stores of arms, and people who, like Thomas Hyden, had been solicited in more or less open fashion to take a hand in what (following the phraseology of the South Sea Bubble) we may call "an undertaking of great advantage, to be presently divulged." It was accordingly resolved to keep Edwards in the background, and to rely in the pro- secution on the evidence of Hyden, Adams, and Moniment, supported by the immense quantity of small detailed facts that could be supplied by persons whom chance had brought into contact with the conspirators. After all, it was impos- sible for them to explain away the muskets and swords, the 1,200 rounds of ball-cartridge, and the explosive bombs which had been found in their hands. The easy suggestion that the whole matter was a " massacre," an unprovoked attack by the minions of Bow Street, could hardly stand in face of the fact that the patrolmen had lost one killed and five wounded, not to speak of two soldiers slightly hurt, while none of the prisoners could show more than a few bruises. They made the most of them. Ings complained that he had actually been " collared and beaten about the head with a constable's staff, so that it swelled most dreadfully." For an innocent being armed with a cutlass, a pistol, and a large butcher's knife, this was indeed unmerited brutality. The actual trial of the conspirators took place fifty days after their arrest. The affray in Cato Street had happened at eight on the night of February 23. The inquest on Smithers, with verdict of wilful murder against Arthur Thistlewood, ten more persons named, and " others unknown," had been held on the 25th. On March 2 the prisoners were brought before the Privy Council and examined, with the result that a " Special Commission of Oyer and Terminer " was issued for their trial, both for high treason and for the murder of Smithers and the wounding of certain other persons. On March 27 the Middlesex Grand Jury found true bills for high treason against Thistlewood and ten other prisoners, and for murder against Thistlewood and five more, who had been in the loft where Smithers was killed. Davidson and Ings, the two sentries, who had been below at the time, were 40 ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD not included in this charge, nor were several others of the gang. The names of the two approvers, Adams and Moni- ment, did not appear in either list — a sign that they were to be utilized for King's evidence. On April 15 eleven prisoners appeared at the Sessions House, Old Bailey, for trial. These were Thistlewood, Brunt, Davidson, Ings, Tidd, and six minor figures, Wilson, Harrison, Bradbourn, Strange, Cooper, and Gilchrist. Besides the two informers, two persons who had taken a considerable part in the plot were missing from the dock — Palin, who had been in charge of the incendiary department of the business, and Cooke, who was to have led the party which was told off to seize the cannon in the Gray's Inn Road. They had succeeded in disappearing ; much activity of Bow Street Runners, and the offer of handsome rewards, had failed to produce them, and they never were seen again : probably they had slipped away from London within a few hours of the affray. Of the twenty-five who had met in Cato Street on February 23, some ten or eleven got off undiscovered ; but, so far as the evidence of the two approvers went, they were mostly mere " supers " in the drama. The only one who rouses any interest in the reader of the trial is a person, unknown by name to both Adams and Moniment, " a big man in a long brown overcoat," whom they had never seen before ; he had addressed the gang on the fatal evening. " They were there to serve their country, and if anyone was afraid of his life, he ought to have nothing to do with a con- cern like this — the one thing to beware of was drunkenness, which would be ruinous to a cause like theirs." He was clearly an earnest recruit for the plot, but a late comer, since two men deep in the matter did not know his name. The eleven prisoners were arraigned together. Some little delay was caused by Ings refusing to plead in the usual form that he would be tried " by God and his country." He wanted to substitute " by the laws of Reason " — a fine French touch, though he was no doubt borrowing from Tom Paine, and not from any foreign source. All duly answered " Not guilty," whereupon Lord Justice Abbott announced that Thistlewood was to be tried by himself, and the others in ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD 4: succession. As things fell out, the chief, Ings, and Brum had separate trials : Tidd and Davidson the mulatto agreec to take their fortune together : the remaining six were deall with in a group. The whole chain of five trials was spread over fourteen days, from Saturday, April 15, the morning oi the arraignment, to Friday, April 28, when sentence was delivered to all the accused together. The main psychological interest of the trials consists ir the curious attitude taken by the prisoners as the case againsl them was slowly worked out. A conspirator has it open tc him to plead one of two things — either he is a " martyr,' 1 that is, he acknowledges his intent and glories in it, or he is a " victim," an innocent man who is accused by perjured villains of being concerned in a plot of which he knew nothing; or which never even existed. Each of these poses is excellent in its way, but in strict logic they are incompatible with each other. One cannot be both an unjustly-accused innocent man and also the martyr of a great cause. Revolutionaries on their trial have often failed to see this simple fact, and claim both merits for themselves. At one moment they are the prey of lying and corrupt witnesses, and make appeals to the immutable laws of justice ; at another they slide into a vindication of the crime of which they are accused, and boast of their share in it, as a supreme title to respect from their countrymen. This confusion of poses was very evident both in Thistlewood's own defence and in that of several oi his followers. Instead of endeavouring to prove that the Cato Street meeting was harmless, or the whole plot an inven- tion of the police and the Government, they spent a vast amount of time and energy in discrediting the character of the witnesses brought against them. Adams and Moni- ment were traitors, and a traitor should not be credited— even (apparently) if his allegations are borne out by innumer- able scraps of corroborating evidence from sources which cannot be impugned. But the most telling part of the defence was an attempt to throw all the responsibility for the plot on to the shoulders of the invisible Edwards'. There is good reason to think that this was a policy settled among the accused from the first. Moniment was a miserable little coward, 42 ABTHUK THISTLEWOOD but there seems every probability that he was telling the truth when he said that Thistlewood instructed him to this effect on the day after their arrest, and long before the trial had begun. " I was handcuffed to him : he advised me when I came up to say that I had been brought to Cato Street by Edwards. I asked him how I could say so, when I had never seen such a man as Edwards in all my life " — it was Brunt who enlisted him. " Thistlewood said that was of no consequence. If asked what sort of a man he was, I was to say that he was a little taller than myself, and dressed that night in a brown coat." I fancy that from this hint we can reconstruct the reason why Edwards is always turning up in the statements of the prisoners, even in improbable conjunctions, and why either he or Adams is credited by them with the more startling and atrocious proposals. They even said that Edwards invented the plot himself — which, consider- ing Thistlewood's previous record, is absurd. " He knew all the plans for two months before I was acquainted with them," cried Ings. " I am like a bullock drove into Smith- field market to be sold. I consider myself murdered if this man is not brought forward : I am willing to die on the scaffold if he goes there too. And that man Adams has got out of the halter himself by accusing others falsely : he would hang his God. I would sooner die five hundred deaths than be the means of hanging other men." But the falsehoods attri- buted to Adams, when the accused went into details, turned out not to be misdescriptions of the character of the plot but errors as to the names of people present on different occasions, or as to the number of candles in the loft on February 23, or the attribution of words to one rather than another of the conspirators. But, in fact, all attempts to malign the character of witnesses — which was in several cases bad enough — were useless in face of the mere facts of the affray. The prosecution had the easy answer : "If these men were persons of abominable character, if one is a professional blackmailer, another a notorious swindler, a third ' a villain of the deepest atrocity — his very landlord refuses to give him a character,' how came it that you were, as you acknowledge yourselves, associating ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD 43 with them for weeks and months in the greatest familiarity ? " It was a case of noscitur a sociis. The counsel for the prisoners— there were four of them, Messrs. Adolphus, Curwood, Walford, and Broderick— had an unenviable task because of the way in which their clients persisted in " giving themselves away." Adolphus, the leader for the defence in Thistlewood's case, spent the greater part of his energy in trying to demonstrate that the conspirators could not be guilty of high treason, because their means were insufficient to attack the fabric of the English Monarchy. " It is unworthy of the Government of this country to prosecute as traitors some dozen ragged beggars impatient of extreme poverty. Barracks were to be taken, cannons carried off, Ministers assassinated, the Mansion House occupied, by some fifteen or twenty men— twenty- five was the highest number that is spoken to. He believed that the real object of the party was mere robbery— they might set fire to some houses to obtain plunder in the confusion that might thereby be created These, to be sure, were heinous intentions, but they did not amount tc high treason. The Jury had heard the manner in which some of the prisoners spoke of the shopkeepers of London— it showed their objed was plunder, and the bags produced were made for the purpose of hold ing spoil, not the heads of Cabinet Ministers." All this, though ingenious enough, must have been mosi distasteful to Thistlewood, who objected to being degradec from the position of a patriot chief to that of the head of s gang of burglars. The pains of the barristers were waste( for a client whose exposition of his situation was as follows :— "With respect to the immorality of our project, I will observe tha the assassination of a tyrant has always been deemed a meritoriou action. Brutus and Cassius were lauded to the very skies for slayin Csesar. Indeed, when any man, or set of men, place themselves abov the laws of their country, there is no other means of bringing them t justice but the arm of the private individual. If the laws are not stron enough to prevent them from murdering the community, it become the duty of every member of that community to rid his country of il oppressors. High treason was committed against the people at Mai Chester. If one spark of honour, one spark of patriotism, had sti glimmered in the breasts of Englishmen, they would have risen to man — insurrection had become a public duty. The banner of indi pendence should have floated in the gale that brought the tidings of tl wrongs and sufferings of the Manchester people to the metropolis. Sue 44 ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD was not the case : Albion is still in the chains of slavery — I quit it without regret — my body may be immured beneath the soil whereon I first drew breath. My only sorrow is that this soil should be the theatre for despots, for slaves, for cowards ! " Translated into Brunt's less flowery style, the same senti- ments appear in the following form : — " Lord Castlereagh and Lord Sidmouth had an antipathy for the people, and if he did conspire to murder them, was that high treason ? He readily acknowledged that he had agreed to assassinate the Ministers, but he was no enemy to his country. He was an enemy to a borough- mongering faction, which equally enslaved King and People. He had joined the conspiracy for the public good. They might quarter his body, they might inflict on him any kind of torture, but they could not shake his resolution or subdue his spirit." Ings, an uneducated man, and not a great reader like Brunt, spoke only a few words, but they made the same point. " His Majesty's Ministers conspire together and impose laws to starve me and my family and my fellow-countrymen. And if I was going to assassinate these Ministers, I do not see that it is so bad as starvation. The Yeomen at Manchester had their swords ground — and I had a sword ground too. I do not see any harm in that. I would rather die like a man than live like a slave." Not all the accused spoke up like this. Davidson, the mulatto, mainly harped away on the infamy of Edwards, though he raised a curious constitutional point. In Magna Charta it was provided that if the King violated the terms he had sworn to observe, the barons might rise in arms against him. " Such an act in old times was not considered treason towards the King, however hostile it might be towards his Ministers. But this does not apply to me — I had no intention of joining any scheme whatever, either to put down my King or to murder his Ministers. I have been entrapped by those who, for private purposes of their own, have had my life sworn away." Several others of the less notable conspirators said no more than they had been drawn into the plot by villains, or that all the evidence against them had been perverted. In every case the successive Juries of the five trials brought in verdicts of guilty. It is hard to see how they could have ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD & done otherwise. The sentences of all the conspirators were delivered together by Lord Chief-Justice Abbott. In forn the death penalty was passed on all : but the judge, while rehearsing it, held out hopes that some of the condemned men might look for mercy. Within twenty-four hours il was intimated that only fives — Thistlewood, Brunt, Ings : Davidson, and Tidd— were to die : Harrison, Wilson, Cooper, Strange, and Bradbourn were sentenced to lifelong transpor tation to New South Wales. Gilchrist was respited and afterwards given a pardon — inquiry had proved that he had never met Thistlewood before the night of the affray, thai he was absolutely starving, and had been brought to the fatal meeting by Cooper on the promise of a meal. It was doubtful whether he had ever understood what was in hand. At the last moment the conspirators had absolutely raked the gutters for recruits. The kind of execution by which the five men condemned to death perished was a curious compromise between old and modern forms. They were hung till they were dead, and theii corpses were then beheaded. The idea that decapitation was the proper punishment for high treason still lingered, but sentiment and public opinion had so far changed since the great execu- tions of 1746 that death by the axe was not enforced, and the horrid ritual of quartering was completely abandoned. Colone] Despard and his gang in 1803 had been hanged and then decapitated, as we have already seen. All the prisoners showed great resolution during the three days that they had still to live. Thistlewood, Brunt, Lags, and Tidd refused to see any minister of religion, declaring themselves Deists, and strenuously rejecting the notion that they needed any man's intercession before the Supreme Being. Davidson first sent for a Wesleyan preacher, and afterwards accepted the ministrations of the Ordinary of Newgate. He showed great contrition, received the sacrament, and spent his last hours in almost unceasing bursts of agonized prayer. On the scaffold he displayed as much courage as any of the other four. The execution, which took place on a specially prepared platform of unusual size erected in front of the Old Bailey 46 ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD Sessions House, took place at a quarter to eight on the morn- ing of May 1. The crowd assembled was the largest that London had seen for many years — perhaps the largest that had ever gathered to such a scene, for the metropolis had doubled in size since the Jacobite rebels went to the block in 1746. Executions of highwaymen, murderers, or forgers were common enough, but this was to be something out of the ordinary : " Colonel Despard's job " in 1803, and Belling- ham's hanging in 1812, could not compare with it for notoriety. But the precautions taken by the Government rendered the proceedings orderly enough — there was a large display of constables, and a force of soldiery, horse and foot, was on guard to repress possible rioting. To prevent people from being crushed by the swaying of the multitude, successive barriers of posts, bars, and chains had been put across the open space before the Sessions House and the streets that converged on it. Thus the spectators were cut up into a sort of " water-tight compartments," each block separated from the others. The early comers took their posts over- night, and whiled away the time of waiting by watching the carpenters erect the scaffold by torchlight. It was finished by dawn. At five o'clock in the morning the spaces from which there was a view were completely packed, including the roofs of houses for many hundred yards away in all direc- tions. The reporters of the day remark that it was astounding that no accidents of any importance took place in such a vast crowd. Some people were, of course, taken with fits or fainting ; a line of men clinging to a fight iron railing by St. Sepulchre's Church brought it down by their weight, and fell on the people below them, but no one got more than bruises. The fact was that it is strong emotion — anger or fear — that makes crowds dangerous, and this multitude had come together merely to see a show. " The conduct of the countless thousands assembled," writes an eye- witness, " was peaceable in the extreme. Curiosity seemed powerfully excited, but no political feeling was manifested by any part of the crowd, and they awaited the termination of the dreadful scene in silence. Sometimes a low murmur ran through the multitude as some ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD 47 new incident in the proceedings attracted their attention, but it was a murmur of surprise and interest, which never took the tone of clamorous disapprobation. ' ' At the very last moment of the execution there was a horrid outburst of levity among some of the spectators, which must be described in its due place. At a quarter before eight the prisoners made their appear- ance on the scaffold, led by Thistlewood. The bearing of the chief and of Brunt and Tidd was stern and self-contained : Davidson kept muttering prayers all the time of waiting. But Ings created an unseemly disturbance : he kept singing for some time in a discordant voice one of the Reformers' songs, " Oh, give me death or liberty," till Tidd turned to him and said, " Don't, Ings. There is no use in all this noise ; we can die bravely without being noisy." This only made the wretched butcher colloquial instead of musical. He kept up a fire of loud observations, advising the hangman to " Do it well, pull us tight." He nodded to people in the crowd, observing that " he saw a good many friends about." He shouted to them, " Here I go, James Ings, the enemy of tyrants," and, again, " This is soon going to be the last remains of James Ings."- At the final moment, after turning to Jack Ketch and shouting, " Now, old gentleman, finish me tidily," he looked toward the crowd and, leaning forward, roared out three distinct cheers in a hoarse and broken voice. Thistle- wood ignored him : his only recorded utterance on the scaffold was that he said to Tidd just before the platform fell, " Now we shall soon know the Great Secret." After the trap had worked, the conspirators were left hanging for half an hour. Their bodies were then lifted into their coffins, with the heads hanging over the upper ends. The decapitation followed. A masked man in a blue coat and grey trousers came on to the scaffold and severed each head with a knife, not an axe. 1 When he had dealt with each 1 I received a curious piece of information concerning this knife from the venerable Sir George Higginson only last summer {July, 1922). His father, an officer of the Guards, belonging to the company which was held in reserve inside Newgate, was asked to breakfast with the Governor of the prison after the execution. While they were at table 48 ARTHUR THISTLEWOOD corpse the assistant executioner held up the head by its hair, and proclaimed tp the assembled multitude, " This is the head of a traitor," in the ancient style. The crowd at first disliked the horrid sight : as Thistlewood's head was cut off many averted their eyes and others groaned. They looked with more steadiness at the decapitation of Tidd, Ings, and David- son, some hooting and hissing at the operator. But when the turn of Brunt's corpse came a hateful incident followed. Thackeray related it as the most horrid story that had reached his ears when he was a boy. The masked man, on rising from his stooping position over the coffin, dropped the head, which rolled across the sawdust. Some brute in the crowd cried out, " Yah, butterfingers ! " and a number of others about him burst out into a horse-laugh. It is said that the impression made by this hideous mirth on the rest of the spectators, and the report of it to the authori- ties, was the cause of the abolition of the ceremony of decapita- tion, which has never since been seen in England. Later traitors have always been merely hanged. Probably some general readers remember the Cato Street conspirators mainly because they were the last criminals on whom the ancient ritual of decapitation was carried out. an excited official came in, and had a whispered conversation with the Governor. He soon departed, taking off the large carving-knife from the sideboard : Jack Ketch had forgotten to bring his full equipment of necessary tools ! Ill RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR 1 For the first two years of the Great War part of my wort was in Whitehall, where every morning I took up my blue pencil, as one of the much-cursed tribe of Censors. Those days now seem a long way off : I am not going to talk of the " secrets of the prison house," which indeed have now lost the greater part of their interest. It might be tedious to say what one thought of war-correspondents and war-orators, publicists, journalists, and propagandists, domestic and foreign, enemy and ally, their psychology and their methods. But I made some notes on a subject of general historical interest, which was always coming up during the Great War, though one had thought that the times and conditions were so changed that it would never emerge again as a practical phenomenon worthy of serious notice. I allude to the genesis and development of Rumours, Reports, and Legends of a false or exaggerated sort, during times of military or political crisis. The topic is enormous : two considerable volumes, I believe, have been written of late by a French publicist on " Les fausses nouvelles de la Guerre." My own object is no more than to illustrate the psychology of Rumour, from incidents that occurred during the eventful years 1914-1918. Between history previous to the nineteenth century and that of the last three generations, there is, in this province of research, one essential dividing point — the introduction of the Electric Telegraph, which not only made the trans- mission of true information infinitely more rapid, but also secured the contradiction of false information within a reason- ably short space of time. In the days of the Greeks and Romans, or the Middle Ages, an immense he about events 1 This essay was delivered in its original shape as an address to the ■Koyal Historical Society on February 14, 1918. U.C.D. 49 50 RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR in a remote corner of the world might have free currenc for months : one about events only two or three hundre miles away might remain uncontradicted for many day Even a highly organized system of posts, such as prevaile in the Roman Empire, and in a less degree in the ancier Persian Empire and the thirteenth-century Mongol Empiri worked in a comparatively slow fashion, and in time of trouhl served less usefully than one might have expected, becaus the public was naturally and rightly suspicious of officis communiques. A Persian king or a Roman emperor coul not be expected to give sincere and full information abou palace conspiracies or provincial rebellions, for the benefl of his discontented subjects in distant corners of his realm and the public was well aware of the fact. On the other hanc private letters not given to a Government messenger woul naturally travel slowly, and if wars or civil strife were prevs lent, would not arrive at all, or arrive after unconscionabl delays. Hence Rumour, 4>HMH, the Fama that Virg describes, with her myriad eyes and her myriad tongue) had a scope and a surviving power that seemed absurd to x a few years ago, in the quiet days before the Great War, whe we wrote facile platitudes about the credulity of our predi cessors in the Elder World, at which, in view of certain wil days of the recent war-years, we feel that we must no longt scoff. The old-fashioned rumour was generally " tendencious, i.e. bore witness to a psychological state of expectation ( certain desired or dreaded events, and declared that the had actually taken place. A fine example is the story ( Herodotus about the " divine rumour " which ran round tl Greek confederate fleet at Mycale in 479 B.C., that " on th day the allies have achieved a decisive victory over the Pe sians in Bceotia." It happened to be true — but was no doul merely the reflection of a reasoned expectation of such a victor May we not add as a similar case the story of the sage Ape lonius Tyanseus, who exclaimed one day in the market-pla< of Ephesus that the tyrant Domitian was being at that vei moment assassinated in Rome ? He said he had a visic of the scene, but was it not the realization of a rational expect: RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR 51 bion ? I found a most curious parallel to this story of Apol- kmius in a modern Serbian book. On the day when Prince Michael Obrenovitch was murdered at Belgrade, a certain peasant supposed to be gifted with second sight cried out in bhe market-place of Ujitza, some 100 miles away, that " they are slaying the good prince." When the news of the sad event arrived next day, he was arrested as a possible accomplice of the conspirators, but was released on being found to be a respectable person with no possible connexion with them. The whole tale of Matthew of Kremna may be found at length in Chedomil Mijatovitch's Beminiscences of a Balkan Dip- lomatist, with some documentary evidence subjoined. But $HMH was not infallible either in ancient or in modern iays, as witness such incidents as the false tale that the Turks tad been completely defeated at Kossovo in 1389, which [ed to bells being rung in Notre Dame and congratulatory letters drafted in Italy — and as a very modern case the rumour that Sebastopol had fallen early in September, 1854, which bad achieved such substantial verisimilitude at Vienna that it was telegraphed on officially to London, and led to the Sring of the Park Guns for victory — followed by sad disillu- sionment in a few days, when no confirmation could be got Erom the East. Both of these were incidents that might fery conceivably have occurred in fact, and can best be explained by a mere false prophecy on the part of public opinion, without there having been any dishonest and deliberate ntention on anyone's part. Of course, such fraudulent intent, in rumours deliberately itarted, is not unknown, though I think much rarer than ;he other source of error. Good examples are the story that Sapoleon had perished in the Moscow Retreat, put about )y General Malet as the prenminary of his hair-brained cowp I'etat in November, 1812, which nearly gave him possession )f Paris. This was a political lie. The more sordid form )f the " tendencious " rumour, the Stock Exchange lie, seems o have had its first elaborate specimen some eighteen months ater. In March, 1814, a group of financial operators in London, Fho had speculated on the early collapse of Napoleon's defen- ive fight in Champagne, found themselves about to be ruined 52 RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR on settling day, and worked out a most detailed impostui They sent a bogus Russian officer to land from a smack Dover, with news that the Emperor was defeated and slai while the semaphores were set working to the same effei and a separate party of supposed French officers drove thcou, London with the same news. The speculators were th enabled to sell out without being ruined, but were easi detected by the utilization of the principle of cui bono. W. had profited by the rumour ? Obviously those who had sc out, at once and without hesitation, at its first circulatic and had not waited for the further rise in all stocks whi would undoubtedly have come had the news of the Empero] death been confirmed. The incident is best rememben because the famous naval hero, Lord Cochrane, was convicte whether justly or not, along with his uncle and his uncle partner, as having been concerned in the putting about the ingenious fiction. The case is notable as being both eai and elaborate ; later " stock-exchange flams " might be quot by the dozen, but are by no means so interesting. The sort of false rumours that I have been quoting hither were all concerned with matters of high political or milita import. But the Middle Ages were no less rife in popul fictions which were purely anecdotal, marvellous, or intend to act as moral warnings. Tales of ghosts, devils, or imp< sible natural phenomena, of awful instances of divine jut ment on criminals, heretics, or blasphemers, used to pi freely from mouth to mouth, and sometimes even to j enshrined in a chronicle by some credulous writer gree of anecdotes. For the sort of thing that would nowads appear among the "short paragraphs" of a penny nei paper would in the thirteenth century have appealed to 1 less severe type of chronicler. The parallels of the gigan strawberry or the five-ounce hen's-egg of to-day were su faits divers as an apparition of the devil in Essex, or the sw lowing up by the earth of a woman at Newbury who \ adding appeals to God to rank perjury. If the spot in wh the incident was placed was sufficiently remote from 1 chronicler's abode, the story might get down in black a white. The length of time for which some of these legei RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR 53 passed current is extraordinary. They emerge substan- tially identical in outline, but with locality and name and fete changed, at very long intervals, and in very Afferent parts of Europe. They were still strong in the seventeenth century, and I should not like to say that they altogether died out in the eighteenth. They were the parents of many ballads and chap-books. But to resume the main thread of my thesis. The improve- ment of internal communications, and the spread all over the civilized parts of Europe of a system of public vehicles, stage-coaches, diligences, etc., was a severe blow to the pro- longed life of rumours. So was the introduction of the sema- phore system of long-distance signalling, which enabled Paris to communicate with Strasbourg, or London with Dover in an hour or two. But semaphores were slow in working, so that only very short and important messages could be passed ; and they were also liable to be held up, not only for hours but even for days, in times of fog, mist, or rain, when it became impossible to see one station on the line from the next, so that the working of its lights by night, or its arms by day, could not be verified across the many miles of space which always divided one semaphore from another. The real death-blow to the long currency of rumours was only dealt in the middle years of the nineteenth century by the introduction of the Electric Telegraph, which (unlike the semaphore) was absolutely independent of weather and light ; and was also much more quickly operated. In normal times of peace, and in civilized countries, it enabled news to be circulated or contradicted in a few minutes over many thou- sands of miles. All Europe was ere long bound up in its network, the great expansion being between 1840 and 1850. The first submarine cable to France was laid in 1851, and soon the cable reached all save remote and unprogressive coun- tries like Turkey. In 1854, when the false rumour of the fall of Sebastopol mentioned above was circulated, the only reason for which it was possible at so late a date was that the wires went no farther than Austria, and had not yet been extended across the Danube or to Constantinople. But it was not till twelve years later that long-distance submarine 54 RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR cables were first laid, so that America was still out of touch for anything from ten days to a fortnight. However, after one signal failure in 1857 the permanent Atlantic cable was laid in 1866. Its first notable success, as a transmitter of news outrunning the swiftest steamer, was the arrest of the notorious railway murderer, Miiller, the Crippen of his day, who had thought himself safe when he took ship at Liverpool for New York, but forgot that the newly-laid wire would have warned the American police to be ready for him a fortnight before his liner came in. There was only one limit to the news-circulating and rumour-destroying power of the Electric Telegraph, and that was the Censor in time of war. It soon became obvious that free transmission of military intelligence by war-corres- pondents and others across the wire, into neutral countries, might be most pernicious to the army whose movements were being reported. The cardinal instance of this is said to have occurred in the Franco-German War of 1870, where early news that MacMahon's army was marching from Chalons northward, heading for Sedan, is said to have reached the German head-quarters staff long before it could have been obtained by cavalry reconnaissance or other military methods. A war-correspondent had been allowed to pass some suggestive details practically implying a march in that direction to Brus- sels, from whence German agents telegraphed them to Moltke without delay. Hence came, according to the current story, the disaster of Sedan : for the French would not necessarily have been surrounded and cornered if their adversaries had not received an incredibly early indication of their move. The artificial closing of the telegraphic communication, normal in time of peace, by the censorship of all parties, gave Rumour a new lease of fife in time of war. It was quite impossible before 1914 to guess, how long and vigorous that lease of life might be. Who would have believed that for a whole week Europe would be ignorant of whether Kerensky or the Bolsheviks were in possession of Petrograd, while both had their reasons for not sending out full intelligence ? The result was the setting forth of elaborate circumstantial rumours from Stockholm and Copenhagen concerning the RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR 55 details of the triumph of each side, all of which had many days' currency before the real facts came out. Again, early in February, 1918, it was wholly impossible to make out from the censored telegraphic dispatches of both sides whether the Rada or the Bolsheviks were in possession of Kieff . When rival censors are at work, both having tendencious purposes, and neither any regard for the truth, the golden age of the unofficial rumour has come again. I can just remember the similar phenomenon which pre- vailed during the Franco-German War of 1870-1, when rumours had a mighty vogue. They were generally of an optimistic nature and from French sources. The putters- about of them always pretended to have good news, which the censor was holding back for some occult military reason. The majority of them had reference to the siege of Paris — the garrison had broken out, or one of the German covering armies had been completely defeated. It must of course be remembered that so long as telegraphic news was absolutely dependent on the wire, all besieged cities were out of touch with their friends in the distance, and could only communicate with them by the rather precarious method of balloons carrying messengers, or the still more risky enterprises of disguised individuals, who crept through the hostile lines of circumvallation, and were lucky enough not to be caught on the way. How many heroic feats, like Kavanagh's carrying of the message from Lucknow to Have- lock's camp, through a thousand dangers, have been rendered unnecessary in our own day by the invention of wireless telegraphy ! That once astounding but now familiar device enables a besieged garrison to keep up permanent and regular communication with a relieving force, even though a hostile army and a hundred miles lie between them. This was seen in the Great War both at Przemysl and at General Townshend's defence of Kut, where the fortress was able to give the army outside whatever information it wished — in both cases to no successful effect. But in 1870-1 Paris was absolutely cut off from the French relieving army, though it was no farther off than Orleans. Hence came the numberless rumours, that used from time 56 RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR to time to gladden the heart of provincial France, about successful sorties and breaches in the German line. They could not be contradicted till the next balloon got over the lines of contravallation, and had a currency of many days. Paris, on the other hand, was still more badly placed for receiving news of what was going on outside, and was even more the prey of false tales which there was no means of testing. For to get news into the city was far more difficult than to get them out. As Parisian siege-diaries show, this was the classical epoch of lying rumours in modern times. The last crop of deceptions of this kind, depending on the absolute inaccessibility of a besieged garrison, which I can remember, were those relating to the alleged storming of the Pekin Legations, and the massacre of all their inmates, during the Chinese Boxer rebellion of 1901. Twice circum- stantial tales of a disaster got about, and once they were so detailed, and were uncontradicted for so long, that arrange- ments (as is still remembered) were made for a memorial service at St. Paul's for the alleged victims. The truth only got known just in time to prevent this celebration from taking place. Now that " wireless " enables a besieged garrison to give news of itself down to the last possible moment, such an incident would of course be impossible. The only chance of its repeti- tion would be in small and remote places, unfurnished with the modern appliances, and besieged either by savages, or by an enemy who for his own reasons wished to conceal the news of his success for as long as possible, so as to delude relieving forces. Since the Electric Telegraph has spanned the world, the rumour in times of peace can never flourish with regard to obvious public events — in a very short time it is discovered whether they have or have not happened. But &HMH had still one sphere open — a small and undignified one — she can be busy with personal rumours about individuals more or less prominent. She has taken the shape of mere scandal or slander, where she has as her scope no more than tales about the approaching bankruptcy or moral downfall of Lord A. or Mrs. B. Every one has heard false tales in RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR 57 his day concerning the domestic or financial infelicities of some notable member of society. But this is not the kind of " Rumour " with which I am dealing to-day. Occasionally stories of a circumstantial kind, which happen to be entirely false, get an unfair start, through becoming embodied in an official document which has achieved great publicity, and has circulated freely through a whole country. Examples ancient and modern are numerous. A very well- known specimen is the French naval legend of the Vengeur, which tells how on the " Glorious First of June " that line- of-battle ship, encompassed by many British vessels, refused to surrender, and went down with her tricolour flying and her crew singing the Marseillaise. Barrere invented the tale with all its details, and rehearsed it in the Convention, as a purple patch of consolation to set at the end of a notorious defeat. As a matter of fact there is ample British official documentary evidence to show that the Vengeur surrendered, and that her unwounded officers and crew, and some of the wounded also, were taken off her by British boats before she went down. But, as Barrere knew when he framed his Me, British documentary evidence would not be available to the French people, and his story was certain to get a start of months, and even years, before any contradiction would be forthcoming. So well had he calculated, that the Vengeur has not only got into all the popular French histories, but may still be seen represented in patriotic prints and pictures adorning the walls of provincial caf^s and hotels, a century and a quarter after the supposed martyrdom of the ship. Indeed, it is only in the most specialized and well- documented modern French naval histories that the He is aban- doned. It may still be found in full in the respectable Duruy's two-volume history of France, which was to the last genera- tion of French schoolboys what Green's History of the English People was to their English contemporaries. There was a similar legend afloat in Germany in 1914—16, which had for two years as great a success as Barrere's Vengeur story. It was the tale that, two days before the outbreak of the Great War, on August 1, 1914, French aviators dropped bombs far inside the German frontier in violation of all rules 58 RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR of international law, with the object of destroying railways. This was a mere newspaper invention, circulated by Wolff's Bureau through the length and breadth of Germany ; but it was taken up as a useful weapon by the Berlin authorities. And the story that bombs were dropped near Wesel in the Rhineland, and also at or near Nuremberg, figured both in the Declaration of War served on the Trench Govern- ment, in Chancellor Bethmann Hollweg's speech to the Reich- stag on August 4 justifying German policy, and in the official communiques circulated by the press. With this backing it became firmly established not only in popular legend, but in the dozens of " General Histories of the Great War of 1914," some of them very sumptuous and illustrated, which began to be published beyond the Rhine. Nevertheless, there was no truth in the story whatever : the Nuremberg incident was formally and officially contradicted by the Bavarian general commanding the military district in which that city lies. But as it was only contradicted in 1916, when the stoiy had got well abroad, and only in one or two local newspapers, the lie had had such a start that it became accepted history. As to the Wesel flier, who according to the official communique was actually shot down, and therefore must have been either killed or captured, nobody has ever heard of him again since August 4, 1914, though his name, the character of his machine, and the place of his burial or intern- ment would obviously have been forthcoming at once, if he had ever existed, — since his crime would have been a precious asset in the setting forth of the German justification for war. The French Government issued a formal denial that any French aviator crossed the frontier on that day, and an equally formal declaration that the first casualty in the French flying corps did not occur till more than two days after, long subse- quent to the formal opening of hostilities. The German public did not see French official documents ; and in any summaries of the events just before the outbreak of war which you may find printed in enemy lands during the years 1914-16, the Wesel and Nuremberg incidents continue regularly to crop up. So efficacious is a good start for an official lie, that it may long circulate in full vigour. Scores of years after its RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR 59 issue, only a small number of professional historians in the country concerned with its framing will know its real character, and many of them will not go out of their way to stigmatize it for what it was. These were " tendencious " falsehoods, made or used by responsible official persons for a definite political end. But there are many more instances where a perfectly truthless rumour has been spread abroad by unauthorized and irresponsible persons, till it has achieved a widespread circulation, and has in some cases had considerable results on the envisage- ment of the situation of the moment by a whole people. Gener- ally such stories are believed because they are convenient to those who wish to credit them, as throwing moral blame on enemies, or ministering encouragement to those who feel their need of it, or giving a plausible explanation of a puzzling political problem. To this class of popular legends belong such tales — to take an old instance— as that of the Warming-Pan imposture at the birth of the Old Pretender. We cannot trace it to any definite Whig inventor, but it was a useful lie for the party, and was believed because it was convenient. It penetrated at once not only into mouth-to-mouth circulation, but into pamphlets, popular songs, and even political medals. Many years elapsed before it died out as a useful taunt to administer to Jacobites. It was, we may incidentally remark, the last example in English history of an old type of anti-dynastic rumour, which was intended to throw doubt on the legitimacy of a king or an heir to the throne — earlier and exactly parallel cases had been the Yorkist accusation that Edward Prince of Wales (the boy who fell at Tewkesbury) was not the true son of Henry VI, the much more far-fetched Lancastrian counter- cry that Edward IV was not the child of Richard Duke of York, and the better-known story put about by Richard III officially, that his nephews were illegitimate, because then- father had been secretly betrothed or even married to another lady before he ever saw Elizabeth Woodville, so that his union with her was bigamous. A later example of a groundless lie, which ran far afield and had considerable political results, was the panic during 60 RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR the French Revolution called " La Grande Peur," a wild story of a hypothetical reactionary plot for a general massacre of patriots, which led to the general embodiment of the National Guard and many isolated outrages against royalists, though it had no foundation whatever. Attempts have been made to trace the origin and deliberate spreading abroad of the rumour to the entourage of Philippe Egalite, Duke of Orleans, but with little success. The rumour seems to have had no traceable parentage, but it undoubtedly served the pur- poses of the revolutionary party. In this case we may say that a phase of national psychology was the real explaining cause — the attitude of fear, anger, and suspicion was the parent of the necessary legend to justify its existence. That such rumours are not impossible in our own day, when it might have been thought that the facility of internal methods of communication would have rendered them impos- sible, was sufficiently shown by the story of the " hundred thousand Russian troops from Archangel" which was so universally current for four or five days in the whole of England during the later part of the month of August in 1914. Probably every reader of these pages was more or less the victim of this rumour. I had attached little credit to it till, on the third day of its circulation, I got by one post three letters, one from a friend in South Gloucestershire saying that there were Russians at Avonmouth, only a few miles from him, a second from another friend in the Isle of Wight, saying that he had been watching steamers with Russians on board emerging from Southampton Water, and the third from Oxford, to the effect that numerous troop-trains, laden (as my informant was assured) with Russians, had been passing through Oxford station on the way to Southampton all the previous night. Then, I must confess, my doubts wavered, for all my three correspondents were writing from a very short distance from the places where the Russians were supposed to have been. It was only when days passed, and no credible person would vouch to having had an actual view of our imaginary allies, that one gradually realized that the true parent of the story was the general appreciation in England that reinforcements were badly needed at the front, and a wish RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR 61 that they should appear from somewhere, with a consequent legend that they had actually arrived. In fairness to the public it must be remembered that every one could see good reasons for reinforcing the Western front at that moment, when we were so hard pressed at the end of the Mons retreat. More- over, there was no actual physical impossibility in transporting considerable bodies of men from Archangel to the Northern parts of Great Britain. The public could not know then, as we all know now, that Russia had no large surplus of trained battalions to spare at the moment ; her resources were believed to be unlimited, and available. Moreover, there was just the slightest base of fact for the rumour, as there chanced to be at the moment a considerable body of Russian military and naval staff officers collected at Edinburgh, who were making arrangements for the development of the traffic to and from Archangel with the British staff in Scotland. And also at the same time appreciable numbers of Russian reservists were passing into Liverpool from Canada and the United States, having been summoned to join their colours in Europe. I believe that at the most there were 5,000 or 7,000 of them, and they were, of course, all without uniforms and not moving in military units. How far this slender base of fact was respon- sible for the spread of the rumour I do not pretend to say ; but in the form which the rumour took, there was little relation between the foundation and the superstructure. Yet we should remember that there was nothing absolutely impossible in the story, except the numbers of the arriving allies : for similar movements were in reality carried out in the course of the two following years. On one occasion Oxford station was really full of foreign friends — three train- loads of Italians, Austrian subjects who had been conscripts, had been captured by the Russians, and had volunteered from the Russian prison-camps for service in the Italian Army. They did perform the extraordinary circuit from Galicia, where they had been taken prisoners, through Russia to Archangel, from thence by the Arctic Ocean and the North Sea to Britain, and so by Southampton to France and the Mont Cenis tunnel. And a similar circuitous voyage was performed later, by a body of Austro-Slav enthusiasts, who 62 RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR volunteered from the Russian prison-camps to join the Serbian Army, and came round from Archangel just as did the Italians. The rumour of 1914 was therefore not quite so absurd as some people have styled it. At the same time, I believe that its origin must be sought rather in the psychological needs of Great Britain at the moment than in the small foundations of fact that I have mentioned above. The majority of the people who spread the rumour would have been quite unable to give reasonable grounds for demonstrating that the tale which they were disseminating was physically possible, so far as transport and movement of troops went. The memory of the imaginary Russians in the autumn of 1914 suggests another curious psychological phenomenon of that time, or rather of some few months later — for it was most diffused in the spring of 1915,— the wild tale of the " Mons Angels." This had a vast popularity in April and May : in the form which it took in most cases it has been traced back to a letter in a local magazine from Clifton. The version there given was that on an unspecified day during the Mons retreat German cavalry had got round the left wing of the retiring British Army, and bid fair to take it in flank and roll it up with disastrous consequences, when a whole troop of shining figures was seen interposed between this advanced cavalry and the British flank. " The Germans to our amaze- ment stood like dazed men, did not bring up their guns, nor stirred till we had turned off and escaped by some side-roads." One of the supposed narrators in this magazine added his personal experience — his company was retreating to a posi- tion where it seemed possible that a stand could be made, but before they could reach it the German cavalry were upon them. They turned therefore and formed up, expecting nothing but instant death, when to their wonder they saw between them and the enemy "a whole troop of angels. The German horses swerved round and regularly stampeded. The men were tugging at their bridles, but the poor beasts tore away in every direction from us." The writer of the article in the magazine was traced, and confessed that the story had not come directly from the supposed narrators, with whom she had no personal acquain- RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR 63 tance, not even being certain of their names. It was no more than hearsay. No indication of this had been given in the magazine, where parts of the narrative were couched in the first person, as if taken down from the mouth of an actual witness. There seemed some reason to believe that the whole story had its ultimate source in a work of fiction, a tale called The Archers, published in September, 1914, by Mr. Bernard Machen, in which St. George and a company of supernatural archers were represented as standing between the retiring British and the advancing Germans who were outflanking them. A correspondence concerning this supposed fictional source continued between Mr. Machen and Mr. Harold Begbie in the Evening News of August and September, 1915, and resulted in producing the impression that while Mr. Machen's novel was largely responsible for some of the details of the angel- story, there was a substratum of other origin. That is, there were certain British officers who thought that there was something odd and inexplicable in the way in which the enemy refrained from pressing the flank of the Second Army Corps on the morning after the battle of La Cateau. It is now known that the Germans were dead beat, and had suffered so severely in the battle that they had no power to press hard upon the retreating force, which appreciated the danger of its own position in the acutest way. The troops were tired out, and conscious that they were in no condition to fight another action. Among the numerous letters which cropped up during the controversy in the Evening News, there were two or three which are worth noting. The authors gave their names, and were undoubtedly present on the spot on that day. But their evidence is not about " Angels," but about hallucinatory French cavalry, covering the flank of the retiring corps, which vanished in an inexplicable fashion when the crisis was over. One witness, a colonel, writes [September 14] : — " The brigade to which I belonged was rear-guard to the division, and during the 27th we took up a great many successive positions to cover the retirement of the rest of the division ; by the night we were all absolutely worn out with fatigue, both bodily and mental. No doubt we suffered also to a certain extent from shock, but the retire- 64 RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR ment was continued in excellent order, and I feel sure that our mental faculties were still in good working condition. On the night of the 27th I was riding along in the column with two other officers; we were talking and doing our best to keep from falling asleep on our horses." The narrator then says that he suddenly became aware of a very large body of horsemen in the fields on the flank, moving parallel with the British troops, and covering them. He watched these squadrons for some twenty minutes, and spoke about them to the two officers who were in his company. " So convinced were we that they were real cavalry, that at the next halt one of the officers took out a party to reconnoitre, but could find no one there. The night then grew darker and we saw no more. The same phenomenon was seen by many men in the column — of course we were all dog-tired and overtaxed, but it is extraordinary that the same phenomenon should be witnessed by many different people. I am absolutely convinced that I saw these horsemen, and that they did not exist only in my imagination." The other narrator says : — " We had almost reached the end of the retreat, and after marching a whole day and night, with but one half-hour's rest, we found ourselves on the outskirts of Lagny, just at dawn. As the day broke we could see in front of us large bodies of cavalry, all formed up in squadrons — fine big men on massive chargers. I remember turning to my chums and saying, ' Thank God ! We are not far off Paris now. Look at the French cavalry.' They too saw them quite plainly, but to our surprise on getting closer the horsemen vanished, and gave place to banks of white mist, with clumps of trees and bushes showing dimly through them. When I tell you that hardened old soldiers were march- ing quite mechanically along the road, babbling all sorts of nonsense in sheer delirium, you may well believe that we were in a fit state to take a row of beanstalks for all the saints in the calendar." It will be noted that both witnesses speak of the utter fatigue of the marching column : but the one thinks the hallucinatory cavalry was a misrepresentation of shadows of the night and mist by tired eyes and brains, while the other thinks that there was more than imagination at work, only he will not vouch for what it was. Whatever the right interpretation, there can be no doubt that many men on the exposed British flank, acutely conscious RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR 65 of the danger of an outflanking pursuit, thought that they saw large masses of cavalry covering them, just where they were wanted, for a considerable space of time, and then found that the supposed cavalry had melted away into nothing. Was it a case of the need producing the supposed remedy ? Or may we conjecture that for some time there were real French cavalry on the flank, which withdrew -by some cross- road without being noticed at the moment of their departure ? At any rate, there is scant foundation for a legend of angels, though some definite evidence for what the beholders regarded as a welcome appearance of a non-existent force. The story of the Mons Retreat Angels has undoubted rela- tions in its extreme and fully developed form, after it had been improved by passing through many magazines and news- papers, with an ancient form of legend, — that of the visible supernatural champion who comes to help the army of his race or of his faith in a moment of supreme need. We can trace this back to Herodotus and the ghostly heroes who were seen fighting in the Greek ranks against the Persians. There is a fine example of it in early Roman history, in the story of Castor and Pollux at the battle of Lake Regillus, familiar to every schoolboy from Macaulay's Lays of Ancient Rome. But it is by no means confined to classical days — some of the more respectable chroniclers of the Crusades have a circumstantial account of the apparition of St. George, in shining armour and on a white horse, to lead the exhausted squadron of the Crusaders at the great battle of Antioch in 1098. It is more surprising to find that Santiago, who from a pilgrim-apostle had developed into the military saint of Spanish chivalry, not only manifested himself in several battles with the Moors in the tenth and eleventh centuries, but was seen as late as 1519 rallying the conquistadores of Cortez, when they were in danger of being overwhelmed by the masses of the infuriated Mexicans. But there is a more extraordinary story than this to finish up the tale of supernatural warrior-leaders. My Serbian friends assure me that there is no doubt whatever that in the Balkan War of 1912 many of the Serbian rank and file thought that they saw Marco Kralievitch, the hero of mediaeval Serbia, riding on his white horse in front of the u.c.d. r 66 RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR battalions that stormed the almost impregnable Turkish positions in the fighting that followed the battle of Kumanovo. And it was not mere isolated visionaries who declared that they had followed him, but whole companies and brigades. They saw the white horse ride up impossible slopes, and clambering after him burst through line after line of Turkish trenches. After this, who will think the assertions of the companions of Cortez very remarkable ? A much more commonplace and comprehensible rumour of the recent war is one that was current almost everywhere about the middle of August, 1914, when the news ran that the German High Seas Fleet had come out, and had fought a general action with our own, somewhere in the North Sea. The versions only differed as to the relative losses, our own were always stated to be heavy — the German even heavier. There was no truth whatever in the rumour, which reached as far as Iceland : a friend told me that he had it in full detail at Reikiavik about August 12 — the same day that I was told it myself at Pitlochry. This was, I think, simply the result of a universally current idea that the German Fleet would come out, for the strategical purpose of threatening the British coast, in order to prevent our army from being sent overseas to Belgium. Public opinion was wrong, and misjudged the psychology of the German Admiralty, which was not at that time prepared to stake its fleet-in-being on a very doubtful hazard, to secure an insufficient end. For undoubtedly at that time the all-highest command on the other side of the North Sea thought that our " contemptible little army " would make no difference one way or the other, whether it crossed or did not cross to the continental seat of war. It will be noted that most of these rumours had their chance of life granted to them owing to that artificial hindrance to the free diffusion of information, which does not exist in normal times of peace — the existence of the Censorship. I set aside the Mons Angels and Marco KraUevitoh as belonging to the frankly supernatural ; but the stories of Russian troops in Britain, or of " scraps " on a large scale in the North Sea, could only be circulated for more than a few hours on the hypothesis that there were political or strategic reasons for the Censor's RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR 67 keeping back the information. The reason would be obvious enough in the case of the Russian reinforcements, less easy to discern in that of the alleged naval battle. But the public always credited the Censorship with gratuitous stupidity, and reticence of the most senseless kind, so that it was not impos- sible for the circulator of rumours to gain acceptance for his tale for at least a day or two. He could point out cases, indeed; where reticence had in real truth been protracted for an unconscionable time, as for example the late acknow- ledgment of the loss of a certain well-known battleship early in the war. Every one could guess at plausible reasons for its being held back for a certain time, but it was the prolonga- tion of the time which gave rise to comment. In this case Rumour was (by way of exception) founded on fact : it is one of the few prominent instances of the kind, however, that I can recall. As a rule, the tales, whether optimistic or pessimistic in tone, rested on no solid foundation, and were simply the expression of expectations, well founded or ill founded according to the amount of data at the disposal of the imaginative original starter of the legend. There was a curious example of the kind afoot early in the year 1918, to explain a phenomenon obvious to every one yet inexplicable to the majority. As every one knows there were no air-raids on London between December 16, 1917, and January 28, 1918. By the time that the January full moon had been reached, all sorts of absurd rumours were current as to some new scientific invention having been discovered (I will not give the elaborate descriptions of it which were detailed to me) which would make all further raids impossible. On the 28th came another aerial visitation in the usual style, and the story of the wonder- ful invention fell flat. It was simply an attempt to explain an observed fact, made by imaginative people with no scientific knowledge whatever ; for the details given were impossible, as experts explained to me. This was an absurd optimistic rumour : there have been plenty of mistakes of the opposite kind, rumours of an equally irrational pessimistic cast, which anyone can recall for himself. They were for the most part attempts to account for facts that were worrying persons of 68 RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR a downcast frame of mind, by the invention of the most unpleasant possible explanation that could be devised. In these pages I have been dealing only with Rumour in the strictest sense of the word. There is a whole section of psychological phenomena of an allied sort which I have left untouched of set purpose. This is the section that I may label with the heading of Prophecies. It may not be generally known that there is a small occultist literature in existence with regard to the war of 1914-18 ; in the National War Museum there lie some dozen books printed in all parts of the world — England, France, America, Germany — which recall the predic- tions of Nostradamus, Trithemius, Mother Shipton, or (in a slightly varied form) of the late Dr. Cumming and Madame de Thebes. The latter, I believe, died while the war was actually in progress, not without having uttered some of her usual type of vaticinations. This kind of literature can hardly be called " Rumour," since it is generally printed, and not passed from mouth to mouth, and since it does not pretend to deal with the present but rather with the near future. The few books or leaflets that circulate to-day are the last survivors of a very ancient and prolific race. Prophets who see visions and write them down for the purpose of influencing wars, politics, or it may be morals, have always existed. They run into the lines of the ancient oracles and apocalypses at the one end, and into those of the modern tendencious pamphlet at the other. But I cannot call them Rumours, though they sometimes reflect the current and popular expectations of the multitude. Of course, the file of prophecies would not be complete without one or two pretending to be exhumed from forgotten mediaeval volumes, and others identifying the German Emperor (like so many other hated characters of the past from Nero to Napoleon) with the Beast's little horn in Daniel, and No. 666 in the Book of Revelations. The professional prophets were on the whole very unfortunate in their prognostications concerning the details of the late war. Nor can we wonder at it ; the expecta- tions of much wiser men than the sort of people who compile such stuff were not fulfilled. Who, in England, France, Germany, Russia, or America, would have foreseen in 1914 RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR 69 the exact sequence of military affairs down to the Armistice of November, 1918? The makers of forecasts with no pretence to supernatural knowledge were mostly by way of promising us an end of the struggle in three months, or a year, or two years. And the Germans were equally ill-served by their makers of military prognostications, as witness the six months' sub- marine work that was to bring the British Empire to ruin, according to the views of official and highly placed prophets. With prophecies we may exclude, from the list of things to be dealt with, dreams, portents, and visions, except when they have been much passed round by the public mouth or the printing press, like the Mons Angels, mentioned on an earlier page. Usually they were literary productions, not genuine examples of the credulity of the multitude ; and they had small success for that reason, because the vitality of a rumour depends on the condition that the recipients and circulators of it should believe that they are dealing with a something genuine, and not with a work of fiction. Perhaps one may add that dreamers of dreams and seers of visions share in the curse of Cassandra : they have not as a rule the art of making themselves credible — they are too often obviously set on forwarding some theory or crank of their own, which emerges too clearly, and enables the reader to see that he is in reality confronted with nothing more than a tendencious pamphlet in verse or prose. My subject is one of a rather incoherent character — it is rather like Virgil's Cyclops, a veritable mdkstrum informe ingens. The strict logical arrangement rightly loved by the historical mind is hard to secure, when we deal with such an elusive topic. All that is possible is to collect suggestive deductions from many and various examples of rumour. And if I am asked, in the good mediaeval style, to put a moral at the end of my discourse, in the manner of the delightful authors of the Gesta Romanorum, I am afraid that my moral must be a very old-fashioned one, to wit, that we are the children of our fathers, that we should not jest too much at " mediaeval credulity," and that we should recognize in the rumour- phenomena of our own day the legitimate descendants of those which used to puzzle and amaze our ancestors, whom 70 RUMOUR IN TIME OF WAR we were too often prone to regard with the complacent superi- ority of the omniscient nineteenth century. The Great War has taught us — among other things — a little psychology and a good deal of humility. IV SOME MEDIAEVAL CONCEPTIONS OF ANCIENT HISTORY 1 To attempt to deal in twenty pages with the historical perspective of a thousand years would be an over-ambitious task, if one endeavoured to complete it in too minute and conscientious a .fashion. But the views of our spiritual fore- fathers the Chroniclers of the Middle Ages upon the annals of Ancient Greece and Eome were so peculiar, not to say so preposterous, that they are worth collecting. For in order to understand the spirit of an age, one should have some conception of its outlook on the past. There were political philosophers even in mediaeval days, and the theories of the political philosopher are based on his conceptions of the history of the elder world, and on the deductions which he draws from it. Most chroniclers, it is true, were not so much political philosophers as anecdotal annalists : but many of them were possessed with the same wild ambition for writing Universal Histories that inspired Walter Raleigh in his prison in the Tower of London. And some carried out this ambition, and piled volume on volume with small mercy for their readers. It is worth while to get some general view as to what the elect historical minds of the thirteenth or the fourteenth or the fifteenth centuries thought about the long series of years which counted backward from the birth of Our Lord to the creation of Adam, so conveniently and accurately fixed for 4275 B.C. Professional historians were not over common in the Middle Ages, but it is to their views that we shall confine our atten- tion. As to the conceptions of the unlearned we need not 1 Delivered in its original form as a lecture to the Royal Historical Society on February 10, 1921. 71 72 MEDIEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY trouble ourselves about them — though they have their psycho- logical interest. To the large majority of men the name of Greece suggested very little — not more than that of Egypt or Persia, — and that of Rome not very much. We find it hard to conceive what sort of a person is meant by a " King of Grsecia " when he turns up in some Romance in company with a king of Media or a Soldan of Babylon. As to the name of Rome, it certainly brought up to the man in the street three ideas — firstly, that our father the Pope lived there, in due succession to St. Peter. Secondly, that once upon a time there had been a long series of Roman Emperors, much given to putting the Saints to death in more or less barbarous ways. Thirdly, that the pre-eminence of those ancient heathen rulers of the world had descended to the continental prince now bearing the title of Roman Emperor, in some fashion or other on which the learned alone were entitled to have views. But certainly good Englishmen must deprecate the possible claims of that continental prince to be recognized as suzerain in England, as Duke Humphrey of Gloucester did with such firmness at the landing of the Emperor Sigismund in the year 1416. There was a vague memory in most parts of Christendom that the Romans had once been spread over all the Western world, and had reared those great buildings, monuments, and public works of which traces were scattered everywhere. In many cases the magnitude of them seems to have so much impressed the simple mediaeval mind, that they were believed to have been executed by no mortal hand, but by magic or the powers of evil. Examples of this are the Roman road in Northumberland which came to be called the " Devil's Causeway," and the long rampart which shut off Rhaetia and the Agri Decumates from inner Germany, which Suabians and Bavarians called the " Teufelsmauer." But often the tradition of Roman origin had grown so loose that the great works of the Flavians or the Antonines became ascribed to some native hero, or heroine, or semi-divine character, of the conquering races that followed the old civilization, like the Chaussee de Brunehaute in Belgium, or the Watling Street and Ermyn Street of England. MEDIEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY 73 But we are dealing not so much with Roman memories enshrined in folk-lore and popular tradition, as with those to be found in books — giving the impression which ancient history left upon the educated and literary classes of the thir- teenth, fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The first characteristic which strikes us in the mediaeval author's knowledge of ancient history, is that it was nearly all composed of second-hand information. Of course the original sources for Greek history were practically closed, by the fact that the Western world was almost entirely ignorant of the Greek language down to the fifteenth century. Men like John of Salisbury and Bishop Grossetete may have had a smattering of it. But, as it chanced, the historians seem to have been one and all destitute of the linguistic know- ledge which would have enabled them to go to Herodotus, Thucydides, or Xenophon, if manuscripts of those authors had been forthcoming. All information about classical Greece comes through Roman epitomes of second-rate value. And with regard to Roman history, where language was no bar, it is not too much to say that the Middle Ages had no criterion of the relative importance of sources. Though they might possess Livy and Csesar — Tacitus was little known — they relied far more on compilations and epitomes, such as Orosius (first and foremost), Justin's abbreviation of Trogus Pompeius, or the lives in Cornelius Nepos. These were the staple foundation of those who wrote on ancient history, but they were supplemented by a profusion of anecdotes picked from the most various sources, from the legends of the Saints, Josephus, Aulus Gellius, Valerius Maximus, Augus- tine's De Civitate Dei (which supplied many a story), and in England at least (though not abroad) from Geoffrey of Monmouth's astounding inventions, which by the aid of ill-digested Welsh folk-lore falsified three centuries of real Roman history. Now even from such authorities a historian with a good critical instinct could have written a more or less correct outline of ancient history, more especially of that of Rome, though so many primary sources now available to us were not in his power to discover, and although he had much worth- 74 MEDLEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY less material at hand which we have learned to reject. But unfortunately good critical power was just what the average mediaeval historian lacked. It seems that all written books had equal authority for him, and that he had not the flair to differentiate the good from the bad,— secondary from primary information. Indeed right down into Renaissance times this was one of the weak points of the scholar— as is well realized by all who remember how many of the early printed books are editions of authors whom we now regard as of very third-rate importance. Occasionally I have found even obvious works of ancient fiction quoted by a mediaeval writer, as if they were historical evidence — in the Polychronicon Apuleius' story of the Golden Ass is seriously cited as evidence for the perfection to which in ancient days the art of witch- craft had been carried ! The consequence of this want of discrimination and historical perspective was that tales out of the Mneid were treated as being no less grave history than tales out of Josephus, and that the pseudo-Callisthenes received as much respect as a source for the history of Alexander the Great as did Justin or Orosius. Plutarch and Arrian, not being in Latin but in Greek, were of course not available for the history of the Macedonian conqueror. Any one who looks through a mediaeval history of the world will be struck, first and foremost, by the fact that the his- torians of those days had no dividing line between legend and authentic history. Cadmus was just as real to them as Philip of Macedon ; Romulus as the Emperor Vespasian. The tales of the early gods and heroes did not immediately betray their mythical character to the mediaeval chronicler, as they do to us, by abounding in marvellous tales, in hydras and dragons, Cyclopes and Centaurs and Satyrs, and wolf foster-mothers. Such marvels the man of the fourteenth century was quite ready to digest and reproduce, and put in their due place in classic annals. The reason was that he could produce tales exactly parallel to them from his own legendary period, the Age of the Saints, the first four centuries after Christ. If St. George had slain a dragon, why should not Cadmus have done the same? If Hercules was said to have fallen in with the Satyrs, had not St. Anthony MEDLEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY 75 met and conversed with one in the Theban Desert ? If St. Patrick and St. Hilda had turned noxious reptiles into stone, might not Perseus have done the same to the sea monster when he rescued Andromeda ? Simon Magus had flown through the air by his spells — as we see him pictured in many a predella — till dashed down by the exorcisms of St. Peter. Was it then impossible that Medea, by equally wicked arts, had performed the same feat ? Why should any one dis- believe in harpies and syrens, chimaeras and minotaurs, when (as every one knew) there were one-eyed men in Africa, and gryphons in India, and all kinds of monstrous blends of man and bird and beast in the extreme East of Asia, such as the lively imaginations of the compiler of the Hereford Mappa Mundi and the illustrator of the pseudo-Mandeville have left portrayed for us. The merely marvellous and mon- strous in those days aroused no suspicion in the historian's mind, and was accepted without criticism. There was, however, one side of all the old classical legendary tales which compelled the mediaeval chronicler to exercise in a more or less acute fashion his critical faculty. This was the habitual appearance in ancient tales of the heathen gods and goddesses as distinct and divine person- alities. Of course Christian faith distinctly precluded the acceptance of these divinities as gods — the ten command- ments rule them out. What then was to be done ? The story of Hercules or of Romulus appeared to rest upon just the same authority as that of Alexander the Great or Julius Csesar. Probably then there was some foundation for it, though it had got down to posterity in the wrong shape. Now there were two ways in which the chronicler might discover an explanation that sufficed him as to the real origin of such matters. Firstly it was quite possible that the incidents - occurred much as they had been related, but that the super- natural element in them had been attributed to a wrong cause. For though it was not permitted by the Christian faith to think of Jupiter or Apollo or Venus as gods, there was no objection to regarding them as devils. This view is often to be found in lives of the early saints, where we find stories of temples or statues shattered by a dragon or demon flying 76 MEDLEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY out of them in rage and despair, when conjured by the apostle or martyr who has been challenged by kings or priests to oppose the power of the Christian's God to that of their own local divinity. Many travellers will remember early Italian pictures in which St. Philip is deconsecrating the temple of Mars in this fashion, with a monstrous snake-like devil taking his unwilling departure. But the best story that I know of the kind comes from the life of Gregory Nazianzen. The saint, belated in travelling, took refuge in a dark portico, which at morning light proved to be that of an oracular temple of Apollo. The oracle that day refused to perform at all — the priests discovered that a Christian priest had slept in the shrine, and sent for the saint, to bid him take off the ban which he had unwittingly placed upon the utter- ances of their god. Gregory did not — as we might perhaps have expected — refuse the request, but, after warning them of the wickedness of their practices, wrote a short epistle, and bade them lay it on the tripod. The epistle ran, " Gregory to Satan : you may re-enter." When it was placed on the tripod, the inspiration returned at once to the priests, and the machinery worked as usual. From which we can only conclude that Apollo was Satan, as it would seem : or at any rate that Satan had control of Apollo, as a minor demon. The legend of the " Ring given to Venus " distinctly makes Venus a satellite of the principle of evil, who is seen walking behind the car of the great master of all bad spirits. But I take it that the Venus of the Tannhauser legend is rather an old surviving nature-power of lust and luxury, than a mere instrument of the Christian Satan. An odd variant in the treatment of the classical super- natural by the mediaeval mind is a theory that magicians sometimes personated the heathen gods for their private ends. The most typical instance of such a case is that of Nectanebus, King of Egypt, as he appears not only in the Romance, of Alisannder, but in the sober pages of the chronicler Higden. This monarch was truly learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians ! And before he took to imitating the gods he had performed some extensive magical operations to the detriment of the navy of Artaxerxes Ochus, MEDIEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY 77 King of Persia. Per carmina magica, we are told, et per fig- menta fantastica, he composed waxen images of the whole Persian fleet, which he set afloat in a bowl, and then sank by blowing into the water with a magic pipe of ebony. This proceeding had the effect of raising a storm in the Levant, by which the whole of the Great King's ships were wrecked. What would not modern admiralties give for the secret of this device ! But being finally driven out of Egypt, he unex- pectedly manifested himself at the court of Philip of Macedon, when he suddenly appeared to Queen Olympias amid thunder and lightning, with ram's horns upon his head, assuming the character of Jupiter Ammon, because as an African he had a preference for an African god ! Hence came the universal belief that Ammon had been the parent of Alexander the Great. But there was another way of dealing with the classical divinities which was decidedly more popular. It was much more respectful to an ancient historian to believe that he had been misled by popular exaggeration and rumour, than that he had been deceived by devils or art-magic. This was the method quite familiar to the ancients themselves, and generally associated with the name of Euhemerus, the sceptic of the Cyrenaic school, who in his 'Iega Avayqaqnq reduced all the gods into historical characters, whose doings had been distorted by tradition. I do not suppose that many mediaeval chroniclers knew the name of Euhemerus — but his method was freely used. This produces some grotesque results : in a tabular chronological arrangement which synchronizes biblical and classical history, we find, in the same year as Abraham's descent into Egypt, the note " at this time there appeared near Lake Tritonis a virgin called Tritonis, who was also named Pallas from a giant whom she had slain — she invented the art of wool-weaving, and was therefore hailed as a goddess by the heathen." And so in the same way we find Liber qui et Bacchus flourishing in the time of Ehud, Mercury in that of Gideon, and the death of Hercules — by falling into the fire while in an epileptic fit — in that of Tola the son of Puah. Jupiter appears as a King of Crete, who drove out his father, King Saturnus. 78 MEDIEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY He was a mighty conqueror at large, et qma bdlicosissimus et sceleratissimus fuit, a Grcecis deus est vocatus. In the same way Pluto was a cruel and gloomy king of the Molossians, who used to imprison travellers in an underground dungeon ; and Apollo a celebrated physician and archer. To call a man a son of Jupiter, Mars, or Apollo, merely meant to express in hyperbolical terms the fact that he was a person of great powers, bodily or mental. And thus the whole of the ancient classical legends can be reduced to workaday history ! When, therefore, by a rough calculation of generations the old myths had been fitted into a chronological table, they could be written down as excellent history, parallel to the Old Testament story from Abraham to Eh. After this had been done, it became an easy matter to deduce that it was absurd to make one god pervade the whole period. " How," asks Higden, " can Epaphus have been the son of Jupiter and Io, when the latter was contemporary with Isaac, while Jupiter is primarily connected with Europa, who lived in the time of Joshua, several centuries later ? " Why the connexion of Jupiter with Europa should be more convincing than his connexion with Io, passes my wit to tell : but Higden knew. I may here remark that when dealing with the Trojan legends, Vergil is always followed — with occasional hints from Geoffrey of Monmouth — that great source of errors. The mediaeval version is therefore always grossly unfair to the Greeks — Homer and the great tragedians being of course utterly unknown. So we get a very Trojan version of the whole affair — generally ending with the migration of Brutus, that well-known kinsman of iEneas, to the Britain on which he bestowed his name. When we get out of the time of legends, Greek history becomes a scrappy collection of tales of great men, — the outline from Orosius, the details from third-hand anecdotic people like Cornelius Nepos. Of course Herodotus, Thucy- dides and Xenophon were all unknown as sources. The importance of the Persian wars is vaguely adumbrated, but the ground-knowledge of the period is so faulty that, for example, the author of the Eulogium Historiarum con- sistently calls Leonidas of Thermopylae the King of the MEDIEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY 79 Athenians ! There is a heterogeneous string of tales about tyrants and philosophers, notably Socrates, Diogenes the Cynic, Zaleucus, Plato, and Dionysius of Syracuse, drawn from Aulus Gellius, Valerius or Isidore. But most of these anecdotes do not partake of the marvellous or supernatural, and we think (wrongly !) that we are out of legendary times and touching firm ground of real history. This is a vain delusion : Alexander the Great is yet to come : and with him we are plunged once more into a period of wild tales, as astounding as those about the early gods and heroes. For the strange legends chaotically mixed up with the realities of his eventful life, one source appears to be mainly responsible — the book generally known as Pseudo- Callisthenes. There was, of course, a real Callisthenes [I do not mean an ingenious modern gentleman whose name is familiar to us all in connexion with Oxford Street], an unfortunate philosopher who came to a dreadful end for crossing Alexander when he was in one of his fits of oriental megalomania. But the astonishing work usually known by his name was a collection of folk-tales and anecdotic adven- tures, compiled apparently at the Byzantine Court, and permeated with Persian as well as with Greek influence, which was very popular in the West from the time of the Crusades onward. Most chroniclers borrowed from it freely as a histori- cal source — though in the shape of the Romance of Alisannder it was also current as more or less acknowledged fiction. The King's life is touched with Christian, as opposed to classical, allusions in some parts, e.g. when Alexander reached the Gates of Caucasus [not far from Baku] he found waiting outside them the ten lost tribes of Israel, who requested his permission to return to Palestine. But hearing from the high-priest Jaddua at Jerusalem of the wickedness and idolatry which had caused their exile, he refused them leave to pass, and bricked up the Caucasian Gates with a great wall. The moment he got east from Caucasus, he came into the land of marvels — he received a visit from Thalestris, the Queen of the Amazons, who prevailed upon him to refrain from invading her country. When getting near India, he came on the talking trees sacred to the Sun and Moon, who 80 MEDIEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY prophesied many things to him — among others that he should die if ever he entered Babylon. Further on, he came to the land of the gryphons, and having caught several of the winged monsters, made an unfortunate experiment in aviation, on a car drawn by four of them, which nearly ended his life. Charming pictures of this incident may be found in many illustrated copies of Romance of Alisannder. It is interesting to find that he took with him throughout his campaigns the philosopher Aristotle, as a sort of com- bination of intelligence officer, engineer and magician. The name philosopher had acquired in the Middle Ages a sort of secondary meaning which often amuses us. It was a general idea that philosophers as a class had always been addicted to dabbling in the Black Arts. Any acquaintance with natural phenomena or mechanical devices was in the Middle Ages liable to lead to a suspicion of nigromancy. For astronomy was hardly distinguishable from astrology, spells were supposed to be part of medicine, and any successful application of mathematics or mechanics to daily hie was thought uncanny. So when the mediaeval writer ran across a philosopher in ancient history, he at once suspected him of being a magician. Socrates suffered heavily in reputa- tion because of his little inhibitory daifiovCov — the personi- fied conscience which warned him against dishonourable acts or thoughts. In the chroniclers it became a very concrete familiar spirit : " Socrati comes et instructor fuit daemon quidam," as we are told, and it taught him strange knowledge. He was once sent for by Philip of Maeedon to ascertain the reason why a certain valley of Macedonia was unhealthy, and dis- covered by the advice of his spirit, and some operations with reflecting mirrors, that the cause of it was the pestilential breath of two dragons who dwelt therein. They were killed by a wily trick, and the region became habitable. Alas, that Socrates was not forthcoming when the British Army suffered so heavily in 1917 from the poisonous exhalations of that Macedonian lake Tachinos, which gave it so many thousands of malaria-casualties ! But Aristotle was a much better-known figure than Socrates, and has a whole romantic history to himself, involved with that of Alexander. He is MEDIAEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY 81 said to have been the child of one of those spirits which are called incubi, because of the marvellous powers of his body and mind. As an example of his arts, we read that when Alexander was besieging a certain oriental city, many of his soldiers fell dead without any visible wound. He called together his philosophers to investigate this distressing pheno- menon. Aristotle replied that " they die because on the walls of this city is a basilisc, whose look infects them, and they die suddenly because of the death-dealing power of his eyes." A simple remedy was at once devised by the philosopher, who ordered a very large mirror to be paraded before the walls. The basilisc's curiosity was roused — he looked out into it, and perished at once, slain by the reflection of his own death-dealing glances. And so the city, deprived of its strange protector, fell without further trouble. I am sorry to say that the moral character of the Stagirite suffers sadly in these romances — there is a weird tale of the indigni- ties to which he was subjected by his mistress — of which you may sometimes see a representation in early Renaissance pictures. When Aristotle died he was interred together with his books of magic in a tomb constructed by himself, and guarded by a spell which prevents any one from being able to approach the place. We are, however, assured that in a future age Antichrist will discover a way into the tomb, and by means of the knowledge of the Black Art contained in the books will make himself for a time master of all the world. Alexander the Great perished, poisoned by his generals Antipater and Cassander, who prepared for him a draught of such acid and caustic properties that no metal or earthen- ware cup could hold it, but only a receptacle of horn made from the hoof of a horse. They drugged their master with it at a feast, and his inner parts being burned up, he died immediately. With his end comes a very dry section of ancient history, where the late Roman epitomists direct the narrative, with occasional help from the pages of Josephus and Livy. The only really startling legend that I know of attributed to the period of the decadent Macedonian empire is that of Apollonius, Prince of Tyre, from which was drawn U.C.D. G 82 MEDIEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY the plot of the " Pericles " attributed to Shakespeare. It first appears in the Pantheon, or Universal Chronicle, of Godfrey of Viterbo, and may be found at length in that strange collection of pseudo-historical gleanings, the Gesta Bomanorum. We can now turn to the mediaeval views of Roman his- tory. For the beginnings of the Roman state the mediaeval chronicler had a splendid and most authentic authority — the iEneid, taken very naturally as a versified chronicle of primary importance. But there was much useful informa- tion also to be picked up from the first book of Livy. And it may be noted that the tale of early Rome is often told in strict parallelism with the tale of early Britain, ruled like Rome by kings of undoubted Trojan descent, whose eventful reigns could be excerpted from Geoffrey of Monmouth. In early Roman annals there is by no means that constant and persistent interference of divine personages with the course of events which is to be found in the mythical age of ancient Greece. The supernatural incidents of the ^Eneid — the strife of Juno and Venus and the rest — can be cut out without any injury to its plot. Still gods and marvels do occur : but they could be dealt with after the manner of Euhemerus, e.g. the story of the divine parentage of Romulus and Remus can be simply explained in a fight not very favour- able to Rhea Silvia. Numa's visits to the nymph Egeria are simply consultations with a " wise woman," which were common enough in the Middle Ages — and so forth. Some odd side-issues, however, get into early Roman history from an unexpected source — local folk-lore. There had grown up a whole series of legends concerned with the shattered monuments of ancient Rome, which pilgrims visited, and concerning which cicerones had devised tales so popular that they gradually invaded history. The one concerning Trajan and the unfortunate widow, mentioned by Dante, and some- times illustrated in Renaissance pictures, seems to have origin- ated from the same statue which now adorns the Capitol steps, though in the Middle Ages it stood near the Lateran. This equestrian figure of Marcus Aurelius — an admirable portrait — seems to have had before it in its original sur- MEDLEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY 83 roundings a small kneeling figure, since removed when it was remounted in its present position in the sixteenth century. Now, oddly enough, the statue got wrongly identified, not only with the Emperor Trajan, and also with the Emperor Constantino, but (what is really astounding) with the early republican hero Marcus Curtius, the man who leaped into the supernatural abyss which opened in the Forum. Hence we get two diverging tales. Rome was once besieged by a tyrant, a king of Messina, who had subdued all Italy, not so much by his arms, for he was small in stature, almost a dwarf, but by his skill in Art Magic. For he laid on his enemies a spell. which made them unable to lift a weapon or strike a blow. No man could hurt him. When the city was in these straits, a young man named Marcus Curtius discovered a way out of the difficulty : the spell did not affect animals. Having discovered that the tyrant was wont to go every morning to a secret place apart from his army, to renew his spells, he rode out secretly at dawn, caught the enemy unawares, and trampled him to death under the hoofs of his horse. The Romans in honour of Curtius put up this statue, representing him in the act of riding down the quailing sorcerer. Here it is easy to see that the legend is made to explain the statue : but what is not so easy is to see how it came to be connected with Curtius — save indeed that there are horses in both, the stories. But here comes in the oddest part of the tale — some one rightly identified the statue as that of Marcus Aurelius ; but the only result of this was that in some versions of the story the name of the philosophic emperor is substituted for that of the repub- lican hero, and he is credited with the heroic leap into the burning gulf. The perfectly ludicrous form in which the story has taken shape in that egregious collection of anecdotes, the Gesta Romanorum, is as follows : " In the midst of Rome a chasm opened, which no human efforts could fill. The prophets consulted the oracles, and found that unless some man should voluntarily commit himself to the abyss it would never close. Proclamation was made, inviting a man to sacrifice himself for the general good, but with no effect till a knight named 84 MEDLEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY Marcus Aurelius said : " If you will permit me to live as I please for the space of one year, I will at the end cheerfully surrender myself to the yawning chasm." The Romans assented with joy, and Aurelius indulged for that year in every wish of his heart. Then remounting his noble steed he rode furiously into the gulf, which immediately closed over him." I should much like to know what would have been the real Marcus Aurelius' conception of a pleasant "year off." Of one thing I am sure, — it would have much surprised any mediaeval knight or annalist. But to return to early Roman history. When we read of the sack of Rome by the Gauls, we are rather surprised to find that they were not Gauls at all, but Britons. Their leader, Brennus, was ignorantly supposed a Gaul by the Italians, merely because he came over the Alps. He was really a British prince, the brother of King Belinus, who is best known to the mediaeval chronicler from his having left his name to Billingsgate, in London. Expelled for rebel- lion by his brother, Brennus and his band wandered through the West, picking up recruits here and there, and finally ended by sacking Rome and setting up " Cisalpine Gaul " as a British colony. It was rather unfriendly of him to attack the Romans — since he and they descended from two Trojan cousins — JSneas, and Brutus the conqueror of Britain. Owing to the impudence of Geoffrey of Monmouth, the father of all this British pseudo-history, we regularly find the uncouth names of fictitious kings of the house of Brutus the Trojan cropping up in the chronology of universal his- tory for some 900 years before Christ, among the kings of Judah and the consuls of the Roman Republic. The wars of Ahab with Benhadad of Syria are agreably sandwiched in among the woes of King Lear ; Xerxes and Aristides were not far from contemporaries of Molmutius Dunwallo, Britain's first legislator, and King Lud (who has left his name to Lud- gate Circus and Ludgate Hill) might have paid a visit to Sulla, if his inspirations had taken him on the same path as the adventurous Brennus. Later on, the Biblical tradition, and excerpts from Josephus, impinge in many places on Roman history. MEDIAEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY 85 Pompey the Great, we are assured, lost his good fortune on the day when he persisted in entering the Holy of Holies at Jerusalem, despite of the protests of the High Priest. But Csesar was, of course, a much more eligible subject for mythical adornments. Was there not even a " Romance of Julius Csesar " ? All the portents which attended his career are carefully recorded — including the gigantic phan- tasm which opposed him as he crossed the Rubicon. But perhaps the oddest is a statement that after his death, though he had been killed by more than twenty dagger-thrusts, his body did not show the mark of one single wound. As Cicero was a contemporary of Csesar, I may mention that his name Tullius was confused with that of Tullus Hostilius, fourth king of Rome, so it is recorded of him by Higden that he was a Volscian by birth, who was wholly illiterate in his youth, and tended the flocks of the Roman people on lonely hills. Beside his dealing with the conspiracy of Cataline, and certain sarcastic epigrams, which have drifted down from early epitomists, the most interesting thing that I can find about him is that he had a wonderful power of penman- ship, and wrote the whole of the Iliad in such small compass that the manuscript could go into the shell of a walnut ! * With the coming of the Roman Empire we get into a very peculiar atmosphere. The all-important problem that pre- sented itself to many mediaeval minds — for example to that of Dante — was whether Julius Csesar was to be considered the first legitimate Emperor of Rome, the starter of the great series of names which theoretically ran down to Frederick of Hohenstaufen and Henry of Luxemburg, and which was surrounded with a halo of time-honoured glory — or whether he was not a military usurper who had destroyed an ancient constitutional republic. Dante evidently opted for the former view, as a consistent Ghibelline : since he placed Brutus and Cassius as traitors in that innermost and hottest corner of his Inferno, the mouth of Satan himself. But 1 Is this tale suggested by the Shorthand system J" Tironian Notes "), of -which Cicero was the first to make use ? 86 MEDIEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY there was a strong tendency of the other kind in the air — some regarded Brutus and Cassius as tyrannicides and vindi- cators of liberty, and Caesar as an ambitious person who met a deserved fate. It had been the view of the Roman senate — and became again the view of mediaeval republican Italy, where emperors and tyrants were the foes of civic liberty, and civic patriotism was the ideal. In the reign of Augustus Our Lord was born, and in consequence we have from his time onward a new series of sources which were at the disposition of the mediaeval chronicler — the Apocryphal Gospels and the Lives of the Saints. From these come a series of anecdotic episodes, which, when absorbed into the general flow of the Roman annals, produce some amazing variants on received history. Augustus, as several famous Italian pictures show us, received a visit from the last authentic Sibyl, who showed him the Virgin and Child in a vision. At the same time a magic statue that was to stand till the Lord of all the World was born, fell to pieces, and a miraculous fountain of oil sprang from the earth on the Janiculum. The emperor did not live long enough after to see the development of the divine career of which such early information was thus vouchsafed to him. And we need not modify our views as to his character or reign from the new lights vouchsafed to us. Rut when we approach Tiberius, we must cast away all our preconceived ideas drawn from Tacitus and Suetonius. He was the wisest and justest monarch that Rome ever saw, according to the Gospel of Nicodemus, a primary authority for his reign : but he was afflicted with a sore disease, scrofula or leprosy. Now when Pontius Pilate had permitted Our Lord to be put to death, he was stricken with fear and remorse, and sent an account of the whole matter to the emperor, together with the seamless coat of Christ. Tiberius was much affected by the letter, but no sooner had he handled the Holy Coat than his disease left him. Recognizing the miracle, he at once acknowledged the divinity of Our Lord, and sought to place his statue among those of the gods in the Pantheon. This was strenuously resisted by the senate, whose obstinacy so provoked the emperor, that " in senatum MEDLEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY 87 saevissime grassatus est." x He slew many recalcitrant mag- nates — in revenge for this the later Pagan writers have vilely maligned him, and represent him as drunken, profligate and cruel. His end followed not long after — one night as he walked by the temple of Isis on the river's bank, he fell in, or perhaps was pushed in by conspirators. This, we read to our astonishment, is the incident from which the river Tiber got its name. We are not informed what was its earlier appellation — nor how Livy and Cicero, both accessible authori- ties, persisted in calling it Tiberis before Tiberius was born. Though the chronology may seem strange, and the parentage surprising, Vespasian, we are assured, was a prince of Galatia during the reign of Tiberius. His early experi- ences with regard to Christianity supply a curious parallel to those of his sovereign. One of the early apostolic teachers preached at his court : he was converted and baptized. Now Vespasian had from his infancy been troubled with a dreadful, even a loathsome, affliction. " Quoddam genus vermium naso insitum ah infantia gerebat, quae vespae sunt dictae. Et inde a vespis dictus est Vespasianus." Now when Vespasian had been baptized, suddenly all these vespae fell from his nose and died. Determined to show his thankful- ness for the miracle, and fired with horror at the story of the Passion and Crucifixion, he sought Rome, and obtained from Tiberius Csesar permission to destroy the Jews and the wicked city of Jerusalem. It was granted : and for many years he was getting together an army for this purpose — apparently all through the reigns of Caligula, Claudius, and Nero — a slow mobilization of over thirty years ! Finally he approached Jerusalem with a copious host, and wreaked on the Jews vengeance for their crime. He had hardly com- pleted his task when messengers arrived from Rome to salute him as emperor — the wicked Nero being dead. Lest you should think of Vespasian as merely the enthusiastic leader of an early Pogrom, I must present him to you in another aspect. The Gesta Romanorum endows him with the character and legend of Minos. He is said to have been exces- sively unreasonable as to the marriage of his daughter, who 1 Slight traces of this story occur as early as Orosius ! 88 MEDLEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY bore not the very Roman name of Aglae, and was wont to turn all suitors for her hand into a labyrinth, where after fruit- less wanderings they were devoured, not however by a mino- taur but by a lion. His daughter took pity on a certain attract- ive knight, and gave him an endless clue of silk, which saved him from the intricacies of the labyrinth. But the way in which this first-century representative of Theseus gets the better of the lion is charmingly mediaeval. He prepared, we are told, a very large ball of the very stickiest glue, and when the lion rushed on him, popped it into the monster's yawning jaws. The creature gave one munch, and immedi- ately found his mouth hermetically sealed. The knight then easily disposed of him, and made his way out of the labyrinth by means of the clue. I might go on for some time giving further examples of the way in which the most time-honoured folk-tales of the general stock are fitted on to well-known Roman emperors — Trajan, Hadrian, Aurelius, Constantine — or in which their characters have been transformed, in order to fit in to some episodes from the lives of the Saints. But I will not go on to tell you how " Domitian was a very just and merciful prince," or how Philip (the murderer of Gordian III) was the first Christian emperor — a very early tale, for St. John Chrysostom says that he carried out a penance imposed on him by Babylas, bishop of Antioch, — or how Maximian " was a very gentle and peaceful emperor " : on the other hand Julian the Apostate, for whom mediaeval chroniclers con- ceived that nothing was too bad, is in one history made to enact the whole appalling career of (Edipus. Suffice it to say that all through the centuries before the Renaissance, in the days when no criterion of historical values existed, and all sources were regarded as about equally credible, the reading of the Roman annals in any universal history presents to the student the most unrivalled opportunities for getting new, startling, and wholly unreliable side-lights on the men- tality and adventures of his oldest Roman friends. I some- times hope that it may be granted to me, in some improbable moment of leisure, to write a general narrative of the first three centuries of our Era, in which no authentic sources MEDIEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY 89 whatever shall be employed, and the Gesta Romanorum and Geoffrey of Monmouth shall form my most precious authorities. Without going into Imperial scandals on the one side, or hagiography on the other, I may conclude this disserta- tion by one short note on the greatest figure of Roman history — neither an emperor nor a saint, but simply " Magister Vergilius," poet and necromancer. Why the author of the iEneid and the Georgics should have become such a dominant figure alike in history and fiction it is hard to discern — but he not only accompanies Dante in his awful visit to the other world, but pervades many lighter tales in a less majestic capacity. Some think that the profound respect for him as the one great surviving poet from the classical tradition, caused him to be invested with supernatural honours, much as Homer was deified in ancient Greece. Sometimes he is next door to a Christian saint, and by an ingenious perversion of well-known passages in his works foresees the Christian not the Augustan Golden Age, and sings not of the young Marcellus but the Messiah. Serious modern commenta- tors have maintained that he took a glimpse into the Jewish scriptures. More often he becomes supernatural indeed, but not saintly ; he is a first-class necromancer — " a dealer in magic and spells, in ever-filled purses, in blessings and curses, in prophecies, witches and knells." The names of his mother and grandfather, Maia and Maius, were corrupted into Maga and Magus, so that he could be said to have been reared by ancestors skilled in the Black Art. The incantation scene described in the eighth Eclogue was supposed to imply an over-great knowledge of incantations in the poet himself. But whatever was the origin of the belief, it led to the most marvellous stories, which introduce Vergil as a mighty mechani- cian and enchanter, superior, perhaps, even to Aristotle him- self. He made an invisible wall of compressed air to surround his garden which kept out trespassers without their being able to understand why they could not get through. He also could rear a bridge of air to carry him wherever he chose to go. Naples, we are told, being troubled with a plague of water-leeches, Vergil fashioned a golden leech, which being thrown into the water proceeded to deliver the city from its 90 MEDIEVAL VIEWS ON HISTORY pest, by devouring all the natural ones. He fashioned for Augustus a set of images called " Salvatio Romse." They consisted of representations of all the provinces of the Roman Empire, each bearing a bell in its hand. They were endued with such mystic power that when any region was planning rebellion, the image personifying it commenced to ring its bell, and did not stop doing so till the emperor had taken notice of it. Thus Augustus was enabled to direct timely measures for the repression of any sedition before it had time to come to a head. This suggests a primitive adumbration of the idea of wireless telegraphy. But more surprising still is it to find that Vergil also made for the Emperor Titus — he must have been a centenarian by this time — a still more useful machine — an image that, by the mysterious powers with which it was endowed, communicated to the emperor all offences committed in the city in secret. The illustrative anecdote which follows shows that it revealed even such a trifling breach of the law as working on a public holiday. So great was the consequent unpopularity of the machine among habitual offenders, that Titus had to place a guard of soldiers over it, to prevent it from being broken at night. How convenient it would be if England could be endowed by some modern Vergil with an automatic and infallible secret police information department ! Vergil working in the reign of Titus is surprising — but how much more is it to find in the Eulogium Historiarum under the year-date 548, and in the Pontificate of Silverius II, the note " Hoc Anno Virgilius Neapoli sepultus est, cum libro suo." He must have survived, then, for some six centuries, and like Aristotle before him, and Michael Scott after, was buried with his book of spells — which have been sought by many but never found. Truly there was a time when history could not be called a dull science, nor its votaries styled pedants lacking in imagination ! V A FORGOTTEN HERO : BASIL OP CAPPADOCIA " Let us now discourse of the illustrious Basil Digenes Akritas, the rose of Cappadocia, the most handsome and valiant of all the warriors of his day, who subdued the castles of rebels and the cities of infidels till his fame extended over all lands as far as Euphrates. Cease, vain singers, to chant the old lying tales about Hector and Achilles. Remember that Alexander the Macedonian conquered the world by the power of his mighty brain and the manifest help of God, but in personal strength and courage was no greater than other men. Above all sing no more of Philo- pappus and Cinnamus and the much-praised Joannikius — bold outlaws all, I grant, yet boasters who magnified their own exploits. But the feats of arms of Basil the Warden of the Marches are genuine and well-attested, and let no man refuse his credence to them." So sang the eleventh-century bard concerning his hero, the champion of a great empire that was about to fall, the protector and patron of a Christian land that was to pass a few years later into the hand of the all-destroying Turk. For three generations after Basil's death the old Byzantine boundary, which had stood firm against the shocks of five hundred years of constant war, gave way at last. The infidel broke in, and there was an end of the Cappadocia that the poet knew, with its towering castles, its palaces of marble and mosaic, its golden churches, and its ancient and turbulent feudal aristocracy. We cannot even identify the towers and passes, the streams and villages round which the tale of Basil's life-work is centred. When next a Chris- tian army toiled over those uplands — it was the way-worn marching column of the First Crusade — Cappadocia was a land of ruins, scantily peopled by the migratory hordes of 91 92 BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA the Seljouks. A local civilization had vanished, of which the lay of Basil the Brave gives the only remaining detailed picture. That a Byzantine frontier-baron might be a hero of romance is still a somewhat unfamiliar idea. The very word Byzantine has a flavour of decadence and contempt about it. The tale of the Eastern Empire still bears the slur which the malignant Gibbon laid upon it, and its states- men and soldiers are still conceived as Walter Scott drew them in his Count Robert of Paris. Specialists only read the monumental works of Finlay or of Schlumberger, and realize that the men who beat off Persian and Saracen, Slav and Bulgarian and Russian, for generation after generation, were not wholly effete or wholly vile. Basil Digenes Akritas was in nowise a Byzantine noble of the type which Gibbon loved to paint. He did not sit at Constantinople employed in palace intrigues and slavish courtiership, and working by hook or by crook to win some grotesque title, such as Grand Drungiary, or Protospathiarius, or Logothete of the Post. He never visited Constantinople indeed at all so far as we know, and was purely provincial and military in his tastes — a hard-working and hard-fighting Warden of the Marches, whose individuality, for one reason or another, so much impressed his contemporaries that the memory of him was preserved not only in the ten-canto epic which bears his name, but in proverbs and folk-songs, of which some fragments remain. Two centuries after Basil's death, the poet Theodore Prodromus could find no better compliment for the knightly emperor Manuel I, than to call him " the seoond Akritas," and in another passage sighed in vain for a blow from the iron mace of the departed hero to sweep away the luxury and self-indulgence of his own day. Yet, putting poetry and folk-tales aside, we know uncom- monly little of the real Basil Akritas. He can be compared with absolute accuracy to the typical paladin of the Court of Charlemagne. Roland, the hero of romance, has quite driven from men's memory the true " Rhotlandus comes limitis Britannici " who fell at Roncesvalles. And similarly Basil, the queller of Amazons and the slayer of dragons, BASIL OP CAPPADOCIA 93 has eclipsed the tangible Digenes Akritas, the Warden of the Cappadocian March, and one of the trusted generals of the Emperor Nicephorus Phocas. Before we pass on to the Basil of Romance, we may as well dismiss the real soldier of the Eastern front, who is a much less interesting figure than his glorified epic shadow. From the eighth century to the eleventh the house of Ducas was without dispute the oldest and noblest in Cappadocia. It claimed to descend from a Roman " dux," a comrade and kinsman of Constantine the Great. The genealogy is more than doubtful for its first three hundred years, but from the eighth century onward there is no doubt that it gave many good generals to the Byzantine army. And in the eleventh two emperors, who gloried in the family name, sat on the throne of Constantinople. The local greatness of the clan of Ducas, and its ambitions, made it a mark for the hatred of several of the princes, sprung from other and less noble houses, who ruled the East-Roman realm, and especially those of the Macedonian dynasty who reigned in the tenth and eleventh centuries. Leo VI, mostly unjustly called Leo the Wise, and his favourite Samonas so harried Andronicus Ducas, the head of his house in 908, that he threw up his allegiance to the empire, and retired with his family and his retainers into the heights of Taurus, there to dwell as an outlaw. While he, his sons, and his men-at- arms were absent from their camp, it was surprised by the Emir Mousour, one of the Wardens of the Caliph's western borders. Among the prisoners whom the Saracen captured was Arete Ducas, the only daughter of Andronicus. From the union of parents who first met in this rough fashion, the Moslem chief and the captive Christian lady, sprang Basil the Brave, whom after-generations called " Digenes," the man of two races, because Arab and Christian blood flowed mixed in his veins. Now Mousour was not all Arab — indeed, his father had been a Christian and a fanatic. The last chief of those strange Puritan heretics, the Paulicians, who gave the Byzantine Empire so much trouble in the ninth century, had been a certain Chrysocheir, a desperate rebel, who, when his sec- 94 BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA taries were driven out of Anatolia, had taken refuge with the Saracen enemy. The Emir Omar of Malatia had not only harboured the exile, but given him one of his daughters in marriage. Chrysocheir was killed not long afterwards in a reckless foray, leaving an infant son, whom his mother brought up as a Moslem and named after her brother, Mousour, Emir of Tarsus. He became a famous warrior and served his Arab uncle and grandfather as the captain of three thousand light horse. For some years he had been the plague of the Cappadocian border, and his name was cursed as far away as Iconium and Amorium : but he was known as a generous and high-minded enemy. The sack of the upland camp of the outlawed house of Ducas was the turning-point in the history of this young adventurer. When the captive Arete was brought before him it was a case of "love at first sight." He offered her no violence, treated her with chivalrous respect, and when her brothers came to seek and ransom her, made them the astounding offer that he would cast away his turban and receive baptism if they would give him their sister's hand in lawful marriage. Apparently the spiritual yoke of Islam sat lightly upon him, and he had not forgotten that he was the son of a Christian and an East-Roman father — though that father had been a heretic and a rebel. The offer was too good to refuse — the Emir was welcomed, he carried out his promise, was baptized by the name of John, and took his wife's family name of Ducas. When, after the death of Leo VI in 912 and the civil strife which followed, the Regent-Emperor Romanus Lecapenus came into power, and the survivors of the exiled Cappadocian nobles were restored to their lands and honour, the Emir was received into grace along with them, and granted a fief on the border, which he now had to defend against his former co-religionists. Where- upon the family bard sagely remarked that Love is a power inexplicable and immeasurable. " It rescued a captive, it stopped a raiding army on its march, it persuaded a hero to deny his faith and break his career : and all the world marvelled that one fair damsel by charm and sweetness had wrecked the most famous of all the war-bands of Syria." BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA 95 Of the marriage of John-Mousour and the daughter of Andronicus Ducas, Basil " Digenes " was the only offspring, though the pair who had first met under such unpromising con- ditions enjoyed a prosperous wedded life of more than thirty years and lived to see their son become a man of mark. He was, like all his ancestors on both sides, a desperate fighter, and was made at an early age Warden of one of the " Akritic Themes" — i.e. frontier marches in the curious Byzantine phraseology. From holding this office and discharging its duties with unparalelled vigour and success, Basil got his honourable nickname of "the Akritas," the Man of the Marches par excellence. His military career was distin- guished, though from the scanty mentions of him in the chronicles we should never have guessed that it had that romantic side which struck the imagination of his neigh- bours and retainers. He was present with his contingent at the long siege of Edessa in 942, and succeeded the cele- brated John Kurkuas as commander-in-chief on the Eastern frontier in the same year. He fell into disfavour under the reign of that narrow-minded pedant, Constantine Porphyro- genitus, but was restored to favour under Romanus II, and ruled once more his Cappadocian border-province down to the time of Nicephorus Phocas, who treated him with great confidence and distinction. Somewhere about the year 965 he died, still in vigorous middle age, but having most certainly seen more summers than the scant thirty -three which the author of the Epic allots to him. Though married many years back to a distant relative, a lady of the much- ramified clan of Ducas, he left no issue. So much for the Basil Digenes Akritas of history. Let us now turn to the Basil of Romance. His tale is told by an anonymous bard of the early eleventh century, who wrote before Cappadocia had fallen into the hands of the invading Turk — i.e. before 1071 and the battle of Manzikert. He was probably a dependent of some branch of the house of Ducas, since he displays a competent knowledge of its genealogy, and a great pride in the exploits of its elder generations. He was a man of some education, for he quotes Homer as freely as the Bible, and alludes not only to heroes known 96 BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA from popular folk-tales, such as Alexander the Great, but to minor characters of classical antiquity such as Bellerophon and Olope. Other allusions and comparisons show us that he was also acquainted with a cycle of tales of Byzantine adventure which have not come down to us, though they must have been popular in the eleventh century, the legends of the outlaws of Taurus, whose exploits he continually disparages. Had some other local bard been singing of them of late, and was the admirer of Basil set on snubbing a rival ? But the author of " Digenes," though obviously a man of some knowledge and culture, was no historian — he thought that Chosroes, the great sixth-century King of Persia, had been a Moslem : "He was the first of the sons of Hagar who overran Anatolia and came to besiege Constantinople, and Omar, the great Sultan was the second." He mixed up the two emperors, Romanus I and Romanus II, though they lived not more than a century before his own time. He makes famous relatives of Basil come to bless his early exploits, who had really perished while the hero must have been in his cradle. And he thought that Carvas (or Caroes as he calls him), the great Paulician rebel-chief, had been a Saracen, and not a heretical Christian. But these are trifles — the poet was clearly above rather than below average contemporary culture. He wrote, however, not in pseudo- classical Greek, like contemporary chroniclers, poets, and divines at Constantinople, but in the spoken dialect, or " vul- gar " Greek, of the eleventh century. Of that tongue his work is apparently the oldest serious document that has survived. The metre of the poem is what is called " politi- cal " verse, lines of fifteen syllables, with a stress laid on the odd numbers, the 3rd, 5th, 7th, etc. As a typical screed of it we may quote the exordium to Canto VII, wherein the bard sets forth the eternal theme that " in the spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love " — very much in the style of Locksley Hall. T6v fiaaiUa twv prjvaiv vlg ftovfafieh] Myeiv ; Md'Cog ijiaatAevoev elg &raj>Ta? xotiq pfjvaq, K6a/io; «n5r<5s cpaid^dzazoQ dndarjs yjjs ivxxdvei, IldvTcov qnrt&v 6 6 vq>, ha eldo/iev a/upco, but also two lines from the gnomic poets, concerning cares concealed. And, in another passage, there is, what seems much more surprising, an echo from Pindar, besides several more lines from Homer. Scriptural quotations are far more numerous, and pervade the whole poem — in one passage the Emir, Basil's father, recites the Apostles Creed, very accurately rendered into a metrical version, for the confu- tation of his Saracenic kinsfolk. Altogether Basil is drawn for us as a figure very different from the rough Western heroes of his century, and much more like a young Italian noble of the Renaissance. The picture of him, as he rides forth in early youth in the train 100 BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA of his father, certainly recalls the young knights who figure on Florentine frescoes and cassones. "This marvellous youth had fair curly hair, large eyes, a complexion like the rose, dark eyebrows and a broad chest. He wore over his light shirt a scarlet tunic with golden clasp and buttons, and its collar was embroidered with a pattern of pearls. His buskins were gilt, his spurs jewelled. He rode upon a white mare, whose trappings were ornamented with little bells of gold, which tinkled pleasantly : she had a saddle-cloth of green and rose silk, and her reins were of gold thread plaited. She was skittish and playful, but Akritas had a firm seat and made her obey his will : as he cantered along he looked like a rose tossing on its stalk. In his hand he held a long Arab lance, of green steel inlaid with golden lettering. In the midst of his father's suite he shone like the sun among the stars." The first exploits of Basil on which the poet dilates were in sporting expeditions in the Taurus. Though only twelve years old, at his first hunt he faced a bear and brained it with a sledge-hammer blow of his fist on the forehead. He then ran down a roe on foot and slew it with his bare hands. Presently a lioness came across the path. " This is a beast that requires the sword," cried his uncle ; " you must not think that you can rend her as you did the roe." Basil nodded assent, drew his weapon, and when the lioness made her spring at him, he stepped lightly aside and clove her head right down to the neck-bone. Whereupon the hunts- men were struck with awe, and they cried, "Holy Virgin, Mother of God ! We witness feats that make us tremble. This boy is no child of our world, he is a gift sent from God to chastise outlaws and brigands, and he will be their terror all the days of his life." It was indeed as a queller of the famous "Apelatai" of Taurus that Basil made his first mark. The whole border was overrun with them, and his father's duty as Warden of the passes was unending and incomplete. When he reached the age of eighteen he resolved to take up the task of outlaw-hunting, stimulated, it is said, by seeing the dead carcass of a lion which Joannikius, one of the most famous BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA 101 chiefs, had strangled (like Hercules) with his bare hands. " My eyes," he said, " must look on the champions who can accomplish such exploits." So he set out, leaving his suite behind, on foot with no arms save a javelin and the iron mace which was his favourite weapon. High in the mountains he came upon the water- carrier of the outlaws, filling his skins at a spring, and asked him where his comrades lay. " What does such a handsome boy want with outlaws ? " said the man. But Basil replied that he wanted to become an outlaw himself. So the water-bearer guided him to the head-quarters of brigandage (t<5 tyoragxeiov), a strange and fearsome lair. There lay the old outlaw chief, Philopappus, on a bed piled high with the skins of beasts ; his guard were around him. Basil gave him polite greeting, and wished him good day. " Good day to you also," answered the old man, " but I trust, for your own sake, that you are not a spy." " Quite the reverse," said the youth ; " I want to become an appren- tice-brigand with you in these solitudes." " If that is your ambition," said the old man, "you may start your appren- ticeship by taking your mace and going on sentry duty at the pass. You will stop on duty for fifteen days, during which you must take no food or drink, nor allow your eyes to close in sleep. That accomplished, you must go out and kill me several lions, and bring me their skins as testimony ; and then you must go on sentry duty again." "All that is much too tedious," said the disappointed youth ; "I will not do anything of the sort, but as a proof of my capacity I will thrash you all round." So saying he seized his mace and fell upon the whole gang ; some he felled with his fists, others he knocked over with his mace, and when he had got them all down he gathered their weapons under his arm and took them to the old man. He threw the bundle at his feet saying, "Receive, Philopappus, the spoils of all your brigands, and if you are not satisfied, I will give you a thrashing also." The chief did not show fight, and Basil went down the glen, hunted up his escort, and went home rather disappointed with his experi- ences. But the outlaws had received a nasty shock, and 102 BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA looked forward to the future with considerable dismay. The next, or fifth, canto of the poem is by far the most interesting of the whole series, being nothing less than the first existing version of a notable love story which runs through all European romance, and is known in this island in the shape of the " Douglas Tragedy " in the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, and the " Childe of Elle " in Bishop Percy's Beliques. Like the latter, and unlike the former, it has a happy ending ; but its close kinship to both may be judged from the short precis which follows. In a neighbouring province of Anatolia there was a governor, who came, like Basil, from the great house of Ducas : he had three warlike sons and one fair daughter named Eudocia. The fame of her beauty was spread over the whole of Roman Asia. One day, Akritas had followed the hunt for many miles over hill and dale, and got beyond his own bounds. His train had been left far behind, and he had lost his way. Presently he came on a magnificent castle, and recognized that this must be the abode of General Ducas and the fair Eudocia. Riding under its wall he sang with a loud voice a merry stave': " When a young knight has heard of the charms of a lady, and passes by her home without trying to cast eyes upon her, I reckon that he is a dull fellow who deserves no happiness in this world." The retainers who hung about the gate marvelled at his audacity, but mar- velled still more at the melody of his voice, which surpassed the song of the Sirens. The lady Eudocia was sitting in her chamber high up in the castle, and heard the lay. She went to her window and gazed down on the young man. She could not take her eyes off him, and whispered to her nurse : " Lean down, my nurse, and look at this handsome youth." The nurse obeyed, and answered her mistress: " Certainly, my lady, this is the suitor on whom your father might look with pleasure, for he has no equal in the whole world." And Eudocia continued to stand at her window and to gaze upon him. But he, feigning not to see her, began to question the retainers at the gate. "Is not this the palace of the great General, where dwells the damsel whose beauty has been the death of many noble knights ? " BASIL OP CAPPADOCIA 103 Now, Ducas himself had heard the singing, and had mixed with the group at the gate. Not declaring himself, he spoke out of the throng ; " Son, know that many young knights, seduced by the beauty of this lady, have tried to carry her off. But her worthy father, knowing of such designs, guards her well : he has laid snares for such criminals : some he has beheaded, of some he has merely put out the eyes." Now, Basil guessed that this was the General himself, but feigned to think that he was speaking to some retainer. "Do not suppose, sir, that I am one who comes with dis- honourable intentions. But snares, I may say, have no terror for me. Would it please you to convey to the General my compliments, and to ask of him whether he would accept me as a son-in-law. I would serve him as a son should, if he would look upon me as does a father." When Ducas heard these words he answered stiffly, " You have already conveyed your request to the General, and he has not the least intention of granting it." Hearing this, Basil had no fear, but he spurred his horse, rode close under the damsel's window, and cried with a loud voice, " Lady, let me know if I have pleased you ; if you could think of being my wife send me some token, and make me happy and fortunate. But if your desires are set else- where, I have no wish to harm you." And so saying he rode away, before her father's retainers could interfere. Now, the Lady Eudocia had no doubts, and leaned to the side of acquiescence. She called her nurse and said : " Go down and seek out this young squire, and say to him, ' God knows that I like you well ; but I know not your name or race. But if, as I think, you are Basil Akritas, you are noble and my kinsman. The General, my father, will set his guards everywhere, for he knows you and your reckless courage. Run not into any peril for my sake, for my father is ruthless, and would not spare your life.' " These words the nurse bore to Basil ; but how, the bard forgets to say. Did the good old lady seek for him in the hills — which seems unlikely — or did she send some "little foot page," as in the " Childe of Elle " to hunt for him at his own father's castle ? Anyhow, the message got through, 104 BASIL OP CAPPADOOIA and the young adventurer once more came under the wall, and the damsel to her window. "Lean down," he said, "light of my life, that I may see your beauty, and that your love may descend into my heart. For I am young, as you see, and love has never before touched me. I hardly know what it may be. But if a desire for me has taken your soul, fair maid, then know that though your father and all your kin were swords and arrows they should not keep us apart." And Eudocia replied, " Go in peace, but come again, and do not forget me." Now here, unfortunately, we come to a short lacuna in the poem. We know that Basil rode home, that he dined with his mother, and that she could see that he had some weighty matter on his mind, which he would not disclose. We know that next evening he called for his big black war- horse and rode out armed, with his sword and mace at his saddle-bow, and his lyre slung across his shoulder, praying that the sun would set quickly and the moon shine bright on the roads, for a noble damsel was waiting for him. But, then, a page is missing from our sole manuscript — and whether Basil entered the castle of Ducas by a ladder of ropes, like Lord William or the Childe of Elle, or whether he burst open the great gate with his mace and slew the guards, we cannot tell. The gap ends — and we find him with the lady on his pillion galloping at dawn over rough mountain roads, with General Ducas, his three warlike sons, and all his men- at-arms in hot pursuit. What follows is pure "Douglas Tragedy." The pursuers draw so near that it is useless to fly farther. Basil halts at a narrow pass, sets down the lady by a great stone, and murmurs, "Now, light of my eyes, see if you have a hus- band who can fight for you." To which she only answered, " Spare my brothers in the fray." When the enemy rushed in upon him he charged straight down the road, clove the first man-at-arms in two with one blow, and overthrew one after another those who followed. "He was swift as a hawk pouncing on partridges ; he swooped down and they were stricken." But three horsemen drew to the side of the road and pushed past him, making for the damsel standing BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA 105 by the great stone. Basil swerved and cut in between : recognizing them as the lady's brothers he threw himself upon them and felled each with a blow of his mace, so nicely calculated that it threw them stunned out of their saddles, but inflicted no deadly wound. The surviving men-at-arms fled. Then arrived the General, whose age had prevented him from keeping up with the rest of the party. Weeping and groaning he saw his three sons on the ground among their slaughtered followers, and Basil standing unharmed in front of his daughter. But the knight came forward with clasped hands, like a" suppliant, and spoke him fair : " Lord and master, bless us, your daughter and myself, and give us no hard words. Your retainers are rude and rustic fighters — they have no skill. I have given them a lesson which they will not forget. Grieve not too much, you have gained a trusty son-in-law ; search round the world and you will not find a better. He is not base-born, nor is he a coward, and if you will but set him some task, you may judge of his fidelity from the way in which he discharges it." The General made no further ado. " God has settled the affair," he said, "and given me a gallant son-in-law." And he proceeded to announce his intention of presenting his daughter with a competent dowry — twenty quintals of gold bezants, a wide estate, three hundred slaves — including fourteen cooks — and a tiara with other precious jewellery. Basil would have none of it. "I take your daughter for her- self, not for the land or money — give all that to her brothers. Her beauty may be her dowry ; I only ask you to accompany us to my father's castle and bless our union." The General refused to come — it shamed him to appear without his train and bridal gifts. In addition, he had three wounded sons requiring first-aid — not to speak of some mangled retainers. It was hardly to be expected that he would leave them — so Basil rode homeward with Eudocia behind him, driving in front six good war-horses belonging to the sons and re- tainers of the General. The lady, we are told, ventured to observe to her lover that she was coming to her new home in a somewhat casual and impromptu fashion : brides 106 BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA are generally accompanied by their parents and relations, attended by their maids and men, and wear their best array. To which Basil replied that she need not fret — no one would blame her or him, if they turned up all alone, dusty and wayworn : the circumstances were exceptional. On the enthusiastic reception of the pair at the castle of the Emir I have no space to linger. The bard gloats over the music and feasting, the presents showered on Eudocia by her new relatives, and the subsequent arrival of her father with a miscellaneous assortment of gifts. It included twelve palfreys, twelve Abasgian falcons, twelve hunting leopards, twelve ladies' maids, twelve chambermaids, twelve brocaded robes of state, a red and gold travelling pavilion of silk, two icons representing the two Saints Theodore set with rubies and amethysts, and what we are told pleased bis daughter most — a tame Hon. The lady's taste was odd ! In addition he insisted on leaving behind him a large sum of money and the title deeds of a handsome estate. The marriage festival lasted three months, during which the Emir entertained General Ducas, his whole family, and his suite. By this time one would have imagined that they had seen enough of each other, and that the provinces which each was supposed to administer must have been in a some- what neglected condition. This would, indeed, seem to follow from the fact that, the moment that the General turned homeward, Basil had to depart to the frontiers with his men-at-arms in order to repress brigandage. " He made his raids along the passes, he wounded many outlaws, and sent many to Hades. And then the provinces of the ortho- dox Romans could get peace, since they had him as their patron, guardian, helper, and champion against all enemies, after days of so much bloodshed." We are bound to confess that Basil, though the most uxorious of spouses, must have been a very trying partner in life to the fair Eudocia, owing to his settled habit of " honeymooning " in inappropriate and dangerous surround- ings. Every summer, when Saracens and outlaws had been duly dealt with, he was wont to take his wife up into the mountains for a prolonged tour. He hated having troops of BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA 107 retainers about him, spying out all his ways ; so he arranged that a tent was pitched for him in a shady place, while those of his escort and his wife's maids were placed far away, out of earshot and almost out of eyeshot. When he wanted servants, he had a system by which he put up outside his tent as many lanterns by night or coloured signals by day as he required attendants. Presumably a red lantern meant a call for the chief groom, a blue one for the first ladies' maid, and so forth. He grew horribly touchy at any violation of this rule ; and we are told that his chief cook, having once presented himself unasked, received such a box on the ears that his eyeballs flew out of their orbits " and the poor man remained disabled for the rest of his life." Now, there is considerable risk involved in encamping some hundreds of yards away from one's suite, when the surrounding hills are intermittently liable to visits not only from outlaws but from lions, dragons, and devils of the waste. The summer outings of the fair Eudocia must have been trying things, not to be looked forward to with any great pleasure ; — even though the scenery was charming, with camping-places on flower-strewn turf, surrounded by tufted shady trees, and with a crystal spring rising before the tent door, and nightingales singing in all the thickets around. Here are some incidents recorded by the bard. One hot afternoon Basil slept in his tent, but Eudocia, feeling rest- less, slipped out to the beautiful spring at the bottom of the glade and began to dabble and dip in the clear water. Unfortunately, the glade was the domain of a forest- devil, who presented himself in the shape of a beautiful youth, greeted the lady, and soon began to offer amorous advances. " Hands off, you brute," cried Eudocia, " I am not to be touched, and if I scream my lover is asleep close by, and it were well that you had never been born if he catches you." But forest- devils are reckless creatures — he cast his arms around the lady and she screamed for help. Basil awoke with a start, seized his sword, and was at the spring in a moment — "it seemed as if his feet had wings." The devil flung Eudocia aside and turned to fight, displaying no longer a human form but that of a three-headed dragon, with a 108 BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA long forked tail, vomiting flame from his nostrils. " When he snorted it was like thunder, and the neighbouring trees shook." Undaunted by this startling transformation, Basil fell upon the monster, and after a short combat decapitated it thrice. When his retainers, startled by the noise, came running up from below, he had only to tell them to drag away the creature and throw it over the next cliff. This would seem to have been sufficient distraction for one afternoon. But we are told that when Basil, still feeling an " exposition of slumber " upon him, had retired to his couch and dismissed his suite, a lion emerged and began to prowl around the tent. Eudocia had to rouse her husband again. This time he took his mace, sallied out against the beast, and slew it with one stroke on the head, which left its hide intact, though its skull was smashed. Again the attendants had to be called up, given the lion to deal with, and sent away. Eudocia now observed that two such adventures in one afternoon had upset her nerves, and she wished that her husband would give her a little music as a sedative, "Play me a tune on your lyre, and raise my spirit, for the fear of these monsters has given me a feeling of depression." Basil, now well awake, complied with pleasure, and presently Eudocia began to sing of love to the accompaniment of his harping. Unfortunately, the recent disturbance — presumably the snorting of the dragon in particular — had attracted to the glade a band of outlaws, "three hundred fine young men, all in armour." They listened to the music, crept gently in toward the tent, and when the concert was over gave it a round of applause, and closed in on the musician and the singer. Their chief had the impudence to command Akritas to give up the lady or be slain on the spot. Their numbers were so great that Eudocia in despair cast her veil around her face, and cried to her husband that this was the end of all things. " But the hero was now thoroughly angry : he snatched up his mace and his shield, and flew undaunted into the midst of the band. They struck at him but to no effect, while whenever his mace descended a brigand breathed BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA 109 his last." So many fell that the rest soon fled, with Akritas in hot pursuit slaying the hindmost, " He caught them up with ease, for he could always outrun a galloping horse — as he himself asserted" (says the bard), "not speaking in vanity, but wishing to show what gifts the Creator gives to certain favoured mortals." When he returned to the tent his wife kissed his hand, bathed him with rose water, and gave him a good drink — which was certainly well earned. Altogether, an afternoon with Basil Digenes certainly sur- passed in interest even "an average day in the life of Peter Pan." We have several cantos occupied with brigand-hunting, in which Basil dealt with outlaws wholesale and retail — sometimes in single combat with a noted chief, sometimes one to three or four, and sometimes in most incredible melees with many scores of ruffians at a time, like that described above. Affrays with Saracens were rather less numerous than those with Christian " Apelatai," but there is one Saracen episode which introduces a canto which deals with a curious and unedifying problem — quite out of harmony with the simple psychology of the rest of the poem. One night Basil was sitting with a few of his most confidential friends : the talk fell on love, desirable and undesirable, and presently he was moved to tell them a deplorable tale to show how the lust of the eyes might lead astray even a God-fearing man who supposed himself to have an ideal of honour, and had no possible excuse for his conduct. It was a story which he had better have left untold. You will remember, he said, the time when Mousa, that audacious highwayman, was the plague of the frontier, before I got it into order. I was out after him with my escort, when we chanced on him and his band pursuing a young man mounted on a mare and leading another horse by the bridle. Just as I came on the scene, Mousa caught up the fugitive and rolled him out of his saddle by a blow between the shoulders : he would have been dead in another moment if I had not arrived. Well, we killed Mousa and delivered his victim. He was a Roman, the son, as he said, of that unfortunate General Antiochus who had been slain with all 110 BASIL OP CAPPADOCIA his brigade three years back, in a raid against Aplorabdis [Abdurrhadi ?] Emir of Mejafarkin in Mesopotamia. He had been taken captive in the disaster, had been a prisoner in a dungeon ever since, and had lately escaped. There was a large sum of Arabic gold in the saddle-bags of his two horses and some jewels also. I handed him over to my men to take back to Chalcogourna, from which we had set out. But I myself took a cast into the desert by way of recon- naissance. I had ridden many miles and seen nothing, when I began to feel extremely thirsty. In the distance I noted a single palm tree standing amid scrub — this gave promise of water, so I pushed for it. There was a spring sure enough ; as I dismounted I heard the noise of lamen- tation and saw a young woman sitting on a stone by the water weeping grievously. She was by her dress a Saracen, richly arrayed and of great beauty, but pale and distraught. For a moment I took her for a ghost or spirit ; her first words were odd — she cried to me, "Has love brought you also, for your destruction, into the deserts of Syria ? Come, drink of the water and hear my deplorable tale." I tied up my horse, leant my lance against the tree, took a draught from the spring, and asked the Saracen who she was, and why I found her alone in the midst of a desert. She replied that she was the daughter of the Emir of Mejafarkin, " you will have heard of him — he is the greatest of all Emirs." To her sorrow she had fallen in love with a Roman captive, long detained in her father's dungeon : he said that he was the son of an illustrious general. By working on her father she got him released from his chains, and made him free of the castle. He swore that he had conceived for her a love as great as her own, and that his only desire was to get her over the border, and marry her honourably within the bounds of the Empire. To make this possible she had gone so far as to get herself baptized in secret by an orthodox priest. That spring the Emir and his army went out for a long campaign : her mother chanced at the same time to be stricken with a fever, and there was no surveillance over her. So having collected her jewels and taken a large sum of money from her father's treasury, she eloped with the young BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA 111 Antiochus. They had extraordinary luck, escaped all pur- suit, travelled unmolested several days, and had got within a long ride of the imperial frontier, when they rested for two nights in this desert oasis. On the third morning the unfortunate girl was wakened by the sound of horses' feet, and sitting up, was horrified to see her lover riding off on his own mare and leading away her palfrey by the bridle. She called after him to stop, and ran some way in pursuit, bid- ding him to remember his promise and their embraces. But he spurred his mare and disappeared, without once looking back. Returning to their camping-place she discovered that he had carried off all the gold and jewels, though he had left their food and other gear behind. She had been deserted in the most callous fashion, without a horse, in a desert place, to become the prey either of lions or of some roving bandit. "My punishment is even greater than my crime : to go back to my father means certain death ; and I have lost my false lover, for whom I abandoned every- thing. Give me your sword and let me kill myself, and so inflict a merited justice on a wrongdoer." Thereupon the poor girl tore her hair and smote her breast. I had, said Akritas, the greatest possible difficulty in pre- venting her from doing herself some violence. I tried to console her with some shade of hope, and said that at least I thought that I had caught her fugitive lover that morning, and that if she retained any liking for him I would make him marry her, that being possible because she had aban- doned " the disgraceful creed of the Ethiopians." This cheered her a little : I took her up upon the croup of my war-horse, and we started to ride toward Chalcogourna. For what followed I have no excuse to make. She was a most attractive girl — her arms were around me all that after- noon — her breath upon my shoulder, her words in my ear. Satan is present everywhere, and my conscience was slack that day. Desire entered into me by all my senses. We camped that night by the wayside, and that camping defiled my journey. The old enemy, the Prince of Darkness, the adversary of mortal men, caused me to forget God, and the vengeance on sin that will come at the Day of Judgment, 112 BASIL OP CAPPADOCIA when all secret crimes shall be revealed in the presence of the angels and of the whole human race. Next morning brought shame and repentance. Arriving at Chalcogourna, we found the young son of Antiochus in the custody of my escort with all his treasure. I had to do something — what was to become of the girl ? I am no polygamist and am sincerely attached to my wife. The only solution I found was to call up the youth, tell him that his desertion of the Emir's daughter had been abomin- able, and that he had to marry her. I threatened him with my vengeance if he should misuse her or neglect her, and I made over to them the great sum of gold and jewels which had come from Mejafarkin. I said nothing of what had happened by the way — nor, naturally, did the lady. And a few days after I went home, weighed down with a sinful conscience, feeling a heavy burden of remorse, and raging at myself for my lawless lapse. When I met my unsuspecting wife I felt loathsome to myself : I had inflicted on her the worst of all wrongs. So ends the Canto. The only attenuating circumstance that I can see for this particularly mean crime is, that Basil was a good deal more ashamed of himself than most heroes of romance who in similar circumstances dallied by the way. It is a curious piece of Byzantine psychology. Passing over much more brigand-hunting, it may be worth while to speak of the castle which Akritas built for himself overlooking the upper course of the Euphrates. The gate- house was twenty-four cubits high and adorned with gilded reliefs, the outer ward was four stories high and decorated with stones of various colours set in patterns. Within there was an inner ward, twenty-two cubits high, with bronze reliefs and inlaid with precious marbles. The upper stories were gilded and the roof was of mosaic work. The state chambers of the inner ward had windows surrounded by friezes of a pattern of vine branches with gilded bunches of grapes. There was a keep set in it which rose to an in- credible height. From its battlements one might survey all Syria, as far as Babylon. In this keep, approached by a newel staircase, was the private hall of Basil, with a BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA 113 vaulted ceiling ornamented with marble and pearls, around a central boss composed of a large transparent white stone, in which there was a light which shone brilliantly at night and was visible for miles around. The chamber was square, like the keep, and its walls were covered with mosaics giving the history of all the famous champions of the world — on the one side scriptural subjects, the exploits of Samson and of David, of Joshua the son of Nun, and of Moses, and the story of Queen Candace. On the other were secular sub- jects — the Anger of Achilles, Bellerophon slaying the Chimsera, the defeat of King Darius, and all the other exploits of the versatile and courageous Alexander of Macedon, and much more. In the court of the castle was a fountain which threw its waters to a surprising height, by means of an ingenious mechanism invented by Basil himself. There was also a flower-garden and a vineyard, and a chapel dedicated to St. Theodore, which had an altar of silver and holy vessels of gold. " Let none of my hearers doubt of all this because of the enormous cost of building such a castle. For princes and satraps sent to, Basil great presents from afar, and all the nobles of the empire gave him gifts in testimony of their gratitude for his exploits. The Emperor himself often en- riched him with donatives. And no man — Roman or Saracen, Persian or Tarsiot — who frequented the passes, ventured to cross without his passport. Provided with the seal of Akritas any merchant could travel without fear, for the outlaws had the greatest dread of him." Basil dwelt in prosperity all the days of his life, and his only source of chagrin was that his much-loved wife bore him no heirs, " for childlessness is a great grief to all men." His end was not, like that of many heroes of romance, a sudden disaster of blood and ruin. He was still in the full vigour of his age when he was stricken with a wasting disease, for which the best physicians of the empire could find no remedy. According to the bard he had not exceeded the age of thirty-three — but history would seem to show that he must have been over fifty. For he was born while the U.C.D. I 114 BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA Ducas family were in insurrection, and some time before Romanus Lecapenus restored the exiled Cappadocian nobles, i.e. between the outlawry of Andronicus Ducas in 908 and the pacification of 919. He died during the reign of Nicephorus Phocas, who did not come to the throne till 963, and not in its earliest years. If Basil was old enough in 944 to be put in command of the army of the East, he is more likely to have been born in 912 than in 919. Whatever his age, he died in his bed, and his wife Eudocia did not survive him, for they were buried together. The tenth canto, which tells of their end, is mutilated — only some sixty lines of its commencement survive. But its title-heading runs : " This tenth book of Akritas tells of his death, and how his beloved wife died also, and of the lamentation of the whole world for them, and of the honour- able and worthy funeral which was made for him and his spouse." The scrap of the tenth canto which survives only gives us the verdict of the physicians, and the commence- ment of the last adieu which Basil addresses to Eudocia, reminding her of the romantic commencement of their union and speaking of their untiring devotion to each other. It breaks off in the middle. We may presume that the lady died of a broken heart upon his breathless body, like so many heroines of romance. For we need not take into considera- tion a horrid folk-song of a later age, which says, while speaking of the bodily power of Akritas, that he was so strong that when, in his dying agony, he gave his wife a last embrace he crushed her to death. This, along with many other exaggerations and absurdities found in the folk- tales concerning Akritas, is quite out of keeping with the poem of the eleventh century, which reflects Byzantine culture rather than wild folk-lore. It may be noted that it is singu- larly exempt from that sort of supernatural and preternatural incidents in which early romances generally abound. The only exception is the story of the wood-devil, who appeared first as a beautiful youth and then as a dragon, in Canto VII. The rest of the story is but a glorified transcript of the life of a warden of the Cappadocian frontier march in the middle of the tenth century. It may show some faults BASIL OF CAPPADOCIA 115 of taste in the bard, and certain " longueurs " of description and repetition, but it certainly gives us a far higher view of the spirit of the East-Roman feudal noblesse than can be got from any other surviving document. VI THE CRUSADES Ever since recorded history begins, and probably for untold centuries before, a never-ending strife between the East and the West has been in progress, and the tide of con- quest and invasion has been mounting eastward or west- ward, only to reach its high-water mark, stand still for a moment, and then commence slowly or quickly to retire. The writers of the old classical world of antiquity saw this clearly enough. Herodotus, the father of all European his- torians, began his famous book with a tale of legendary raids and counter-raids between Europe and Asia, and traced down from them the great war of Greek and Persian which had formed the all-engrossing interest of his own youth. Different nations have led the attack in different ages : the Greek, the Roman, the Prankish Crusader, last of all the British, on the one side : the Persian, the Saracen, the Tartar, and the Ottoman Turk on the other. Three or four times Europe has seemed to submerge Western Asia, and to plant herself down there so firmly that the lands of the debatable zone seemed incorporated for ever with the Western world. Alexander the Great, and after him the Romans, made so thorough a conquest of Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt, and planted there so deeply the laws and language of the West, that it seemed for long centuries incredible that these regions should ever slip back again into Orientalism. On the other hand the Persians, in the old days before the Christian era, the Saracens of Mohammed in the Dark Ages, the Tartars of the house of Genghiz Khan in the central Middle Ages, the Ottoman Turk in modern times, cut great cantles out of Europe and added them to the East. For six hundred years Southern Spain was an Oriental land, 116 THE CRUSADES 117 looking to Mecca and Bagdad for its culture and its creed, not to Rome and the nearer West. For more than four and a half centuries Constantinople and the lands behind it were in similar case : it seems that they may be so left for a few years more — thanks to the internal jealousies of Christendom, which now, as during the last whole century, have been retarding the inevitable, and still at this moment leave the Sultan — though his baggage has twice been packed — sitting by the Golden Horn. We are prone to look upon the Crusades as a unique phenomenon, because of the predominantly religious character of the impulse which in the eleventh and twelfth centuries hurled the legions of the Christian West upon Palestine and Syria and Egypt. A few generations ago historians who regarded themselves as citizens of the world, and presumed to look down on the affairs of men from some point of view of philosophic cosmopolitanism, taught that the Crusades were irrational outbreaks of blind fanaticism, leading to endless loss of life and waste of wealth for no adequate end. They did not see that the great movement was but one of the most stirring and picturesque episodes of the unending struggle between East and West. The antagonism between Europe and Asia was but taking a new shape, and that this shape was for the moment religious was not the fault of the West — the first move of that kind had been made on the side of Asia. The Arabs whom Mohammed's preaching had roused from their deserts, and flung upon the Asiatic and African provinces of the Roman Empire, or the Gothic King- dom of Spain, had gone forth conquering and to conquer with a purely religious war-cry, " God is God, and Mohammed is his prophet : the nations of the world must accept the Koran, the tribute, or the sword." After more than four centuries of subjection to the Mohammedan danger, the nations of the West now roused themselves for the due retaliation, and an impulse, fanatical in shape as that which had moved the Saracens in the seventh century, now launched the mailed chivalry of Western Europe against the East, and produced the great counter-stroke which made Jerusalem, Antioch, and Edessa for a time the capital of Christian states. 118 THE CRUSADES It was one more back sweep of the pendulum, which had been swinging to and fro ever since the days of Darius and Alexander the Great. The rate at which the pendulum should swing forward to East or West, the causes of the coming of each wave of new conquerors, the race which might lead the van in each invasion, could never be foreseen by the wisest of prophets. But the process was always going on ; in 1090 it was high time that one of the backward sweeps toward the East should begin — as it was high time in 1918 that the most recent of them all, and that in which Britain was for the first time the leader of the movement, should take its course. When will the next westward sweep come ? And who will lead it ? Can we imagine a formidable com- bination between Russian Bolshevism and the Pan- Islamic movement ? Or are we to dream of the " Yellow Peril," the marshalling of the countless millions of China under some military organization such as that of which modern Japan has given the example ? I cannot say. But I have little doubt that the pendulum will continue to oscillate. Any history book, however slight and short, will give you the formal causes of the first Crusade — it will tell you how the Seljouk Turks were thundering at the gates of Con- stantinople, and causing the Eastern Emperor, Alexius Com- nenus, to utter constant cries for help to the Christian nations of inner Europe. You will read how the Turkish governors of Jerusalem had been maltreating the pilgrims who (through so many dangers and difficulties) were always making their way from the Rhine and the Seine to worship at the Holy Sepulchre and the manger of Bethlehem. You will be told how Peter the Hermit wandered north and south denouncing the cruelties of the Infidel, how Pope Urban II summoned the bishops and princes of the West to the Council of Cler- mont in 1095, and how when he called upon them to punish the Turk and the Saracen, and to recover the Holy Places, the whole crowd started up crying with one voice, " Dieu le veult " — it is the will of God. You know how duke and count, baron and knight, man-at-arms and peasant stepped forward in unending file to receive from the Pope's own hands THE CRUSADES 119 the cross which the armed pilgrims were to display as their special badge, and which gave to their bands the name of " Crusaders," and to their enterprise the style of " Crusade." But this is only the outward and picturesque aspect of the movement. It had many other aspects — less spiritual and less inspiring, but not less important. It was not the fact that in 1095 Christendom was in worse straits than at any earlier crisis, and that an expedition to drive away the Turk from Palestine was the only way of salvation. Twice before, at least, the aspect of affairs for Christian Europe had looked much worse. Constantinople had been actually beleaguered by the Moslems in 673 and 717, yet no help had then come from the West. Pilgrims had often been mal- treated before, yet Christendom had not marched en masse to revenge their sufferings. The new factor in the world in 1095 was not the special cruelty or threatening power of the Seljouk Turks — whose Sultanate indeed was at this precise moment breaking up into fractions, and ceasing to be a danger — but the fitness of the West for opening an active campaign against Orientalism. Europe was in 1095 in better trim for launching a great expedition against the Infidel than she had been at any moment since the break-up of the old Roman Empire. For the first time for many ages she was in a con- dition to turn her main attention to the struggle with the East. For the preceding three centuries Christendom had been engaged in beating off three deadly enemies, whose attacks had come all at once. The Vikings from the Scandinavian north had ravaged England, Ireland, Prance, and Northern Germany, breaking up survivals of old civilization, upsetting dynasties, and sweeping away landmarks. Prom the East at the same time, or a little later, had come the wild Hungarian horse-bowmen, the plague which swept along the Danube to ravage South Germany and Northern Italy. Andr thirdly there had been the Mohammedan enemy, still formidable and active, though the caliphate had broken up, and though the attack was delivered not by one great power but by many separate adventurers, Saracen, Moor, and Turk, who worked 120 THE CRUSADES by land in Asia Minor and Spain, by sea in Sicily and Crete, even in South Italy and for one short period in Provence. There had once been a day in the tenth century when Saracen raiders from Fraxinet on the Riviera met and fought with Hungarian raiders from the Danube, in the very heart of Switzerland, at Orbe in Canton Vaud. It looked as if the defence of Christendom had been pierced through on both sides. Beset by all three invaders at once, Europe had only just held her own for several generations. But the work of Leo the Isaurian, of Alfred of Wessex, and Henry of Saxony, of Otto the Great, and Nicephorus Phocas had no|; really been in vain. By 1095 Christendom had saved herself ; the two internal enemies, the Viking and the Hungarian, had not been conquered or exterminated, but they had been first beaten off, and then absorbed into the fellowship of Europe, by conversion and the acceptance of Christian culture. And the worst attacks of the third enemy, the Mohammedan, whose religion made him incapable of being absorbed as the Dane or Magyar had been, had been definitely checked on all the long front of his attack, from end to end of the Mediterranean, save at the extreme eastern point. He had long lost all hope of mastering Christian Spain : he had recently been evicted from all the islands from which he threatened Central Europe — Sardinia, Sicily, Crete, Cyprus, were all Christian once again. Only in Byzantine Asia Minor had a recent breach been made, by that disastrous battle of Man- zikert in 1071, which gave to the Seljouk Turks Angora and Iconium permanently, and even Nicsea and an outlook on to the Bosphorus for a few years. But this last thrust of the newest Mohammedan enemy of Christendom was to be an- swered by such a counter-stroke as Europe had never delivered since Pompey the Great went out to conquer the kings of Asia in the first century before Christ, some eleven hundred years before. There are two ways from Western Europe to the Levant, one by sea and one by land. For the last three hundred years one of them had been dangerous and the other absolutely blocked. The natural road from France or Germany to Constantinople and Asia Minor lies down the Danube and THE CRUSADES 121 across Hungary. But since the end of the sixth century the plain of the central Danube had been in the hands of wild pagan tribes, the enemies of Christendom and civilization. First came the Avars, then the still more formidable Magyars, the scourge of Central Europe. The passage from Germany to Constantinople was absolutely stopped for more than three centuries. We must pause for a moment, to realize the difference that was made in the geographical situation by the conversion of the Magyars to Christianity under St. Stephen, in the early years of the eleventh century. The land-road was opened again ; for the first time for ages it had become possible to cross the continent of Europe, and reach the East without leaving friendly Christian territory. As long as the land-road had been impracticable, the only other way of getting from Western Europe to the Levant had been, of course, by sea. From the ports of Italy the voyage ought not to have been difficult. But for the last two hundred years it had been very perilous, as long as the Mohammedans had naval supremacy in the central Mediter- ranean. While they held Sicily and Sardinia, and even for a time Crete and lodgments in Southern Italy, their countless swarms of piratical vessels made commerce and pilgrimage alike impossible. The Byzantine emperors were, till the eleventh century, the only Christian princes who possessed a war-fleet, and in despite of it they were driven out of their last hold on Sicily, which, when it was (after fifty years of interval) won back for Christendom, was recovered, not by the East-B/omans, but by a new power. In the early eleventh century the Byzantine fleet was keeping the iEgean and some- times the Adriatic practicable for commerce, but it had failed to hold the central Mediterranean. So things remained on the side of the sea till the second quarter of the eleventh century, when naval enterprise began to be seen for the first time in the West. The Italians were at last beginning to take to the water and build war-fleets. First Venice in North-Eastern Italy, then Pisa and Genoa in North-Western, developed into maritime powers, and began to oppose and finally to drive away the Mohammedan 122 THE CRUSADES pirates of Sardinia, Sicily, and the Moorish coast. As late as 1011 the last great Mohammedan naval expedition sacked Pisa — but only a very few years after Pisa and Genoa took the offensive and recovered Sardinia from the Infidel. A generation later arose the last, and for a time the most for- midable, of the Italian naval powers, that established by the Norman adventurers (close kinsmen to the conquerors of Hastings) in Naples and Southern Italy. In a long series of campaigns between 1060 and 1091 they finally drove out the Moors from Sicily. Then all the Italian naval powers com- bined to hunt down the Barbary pirates, and by 1095 and the start of the first Crusade, the central Mediterranean was, what it had not been for many ages, once more a Christian lake. The enemy was pursued into Africa, and beaten off the seas. Safe transit from West to East was at last possible. Clearly then, by the year 1095, there had been estab- lished a wholly new posture of affairs in Europe. It was possible to go from France or Germany or Italy to the Levant with safety, both by land and by water. It was this con- juncture which made the first Crusade a possibility, almost a necessity. For already Europe had taken the offensive against the Mohammedan enemy in the western and central waters of the Mediterranean, and was only wanting a start and an impulse to induce her to invade the eastern waters also. The new naval powers, both the three republics and the Norman Princes of Naples and Sicily, were militant and ambitious. The thrust of the Seljouk Turks at Constantinople and their maltreatment of the western Pilgrims in Palestine were sufficient provocative causes. These acts of hostility, which early generations would have had to pass over, because they would have been unable to deal with them, could be resented with effect by the Europe of 1095. That they were punished, not merely by isolated expeditions of the Italian maritime powers in search of new fields of commercial activity, but by a sudden outburst of energy which affected most of the further nations of Christendom, was largely due to the statesmanship of the Papacy. It was from the first true that " the Crusades THE CRUSADES 123 were the foreign policy of the Popes." It was Urban II, who, instead of stirring up merely Genoa and Venice and the Normans of Sicily, crossed the Alps and preached the Crusade to all Europe. The Papacy, no doubt, had its own ends to serve in its great contest with the Emperors of the West ; it obtained an immense moral advantage by placing itself at the head of a movement whose inspiration could not but be approved by all Christendom. The Crusades showed the Papacy as a great international power, acting everywhere on the subjects of every king, whether the tem- poral ruler approved or not. And the ideal set forth was one which made the personal ambitions of emperors and kings, for themselves or their dynasties, appear local, selfish, and mischievous. It is a noteworthy fact that to the first of these great expeditions there went forth no sovereign prince — neither the Emperor, nor the King of France, nor the King of England (imagine William Rufus on a crusade !), nor the King of Hungary, but that the subjects of each of these monarchs, from great dukes and counts like Robert of Normandy, or Robert of Planders, or Godfrey of Bouillon, or Raymond of Toulouse, down to simple burghers and peasants, started by thousands for the East, at the papal fiat, and with the papal blessing. Looking at the fundamental causes which flung the armed pilgrims of the West by tens of thousands against the East, both by the sea route and by the land route, with the inten- tion of taking the Holy Places from the Moslem, we can distinguish three impulses — the one religious, the second political, the third arising from naval enterprise. The three ideals were hopelessly intermixed — many crusaders were inspired only by one of them — more perhaps by two — some (such are the complexities of human psychology) by all three at once. No doubt some of the princes and great multitudes of the minor pilgrims who went forth to Palestine did so on a genuine religious impulse — the same that had been taking a few eager souls eastward to the Holy Places at intervals during the whole of the Dark Ages, when the enterprise had been so far more difficult. It was certainly neither political ambition 124 THE CRUSADES nor commercial enterprise that led individuals, many of whom were advanced in age, and powerful and wealthy in their own lands, to desert their homes for years, and risk death or captivity in the unknown East. In some Crusaders, no doubt, simple piety was mixed with the spirit of adventure : feudal Europe loved fighting for fighting's sake, as its tourna- ments showed : and the desire to chastise the pilgrim-per- secuting infidel, or to worship at the primitive shrines of the Christian faith, might be none the less genuine because of the alluring fact that hard knocks would certainly have to be given and taken in the process. But along with the genuine pilgrims there went others whose aims were less idealistic. From the point of view of the Italian republics and the Normans of Sicily, the Crusade was undoubtedly a great venture for naval domination and commercial exploitation in the Levant. Venice and Genoa threw themselves vigorously into the enterprise ; they spoke, like their allies, of the delivery of the Holy Places, but their action shows that they were mainly set on getting control of the great sea-routes to the East. When Syria was con- quered, the Italians greedily grabbed every port, to the detri- ment of the newly crowned King of Jerusalem, and spent enormous pains in diverting to Jaffa and Acre, to Beyrout and Laodicea, the Persian and Indian commerce that had been wont to go overland to Constantinople. They would not allow the feudal princes of Palestine and Syria to get any real control of their own harbours, or to tax the imports and exports that passed through them. It was this self- seeking of the Italians that ultimately proved no small factor in the ruin of the short-lived Kingdom of Jerusalem. But there were not only religious enthusiasts and com- mercial monopolists among the Crusaders. The third element was the military adventurers, who were in search of fiefs and castles in the wealthy East, — the cadets and landless younger sons of all the noble houses of the feudal West, with those restless or impoverished landowners who were dis- contented with their home conditions. It was these land- seeking soldiers of fortune who built up the Frankish com- munity in Syria, such as it was. The religious pilgrims THE CRUSADES 125 went home, such of them as had not perished : the mer- chants settled down in some seaport, and ultimately went home also if their venture had succeeded. The free-lances stayed out in the East for good, seized some fief, small or great, and fought against the Moslem to retain it or to enlarge it, for all the days of their life. Adventurers never ceased drifting eastward to the " Holy War " till, in the thirteenth century, it became evident that the game was up, and that it was more promising as a career to become a captain of mer- cenaries, or a professional rebel at home, than to go out to be slain by Turk or Saracen on the Holy Soil. All the three aims of the Crusaders were attained, but at the cost of enormous waste of life and energy, due to two main causes — indiscipline and ignorance. The first Crusade, as all know, was nearly wrecked because the great invading horde was led by no single leader of an eminence sufficiently great to command the obedience of his fellows. The crowd of dukes and counts, vassals of different suzerains, were too proud to obey one of their equals. The host was really directed by an unruly council of war, in which every magnate urged his own plan, and finally some strategical compromise was adopted which pleased nobody. Orders were not obeyed — he who chose went off on a side-expedition, or melted away from the banner. It is wonderful that the first Crusaders ever reached Palestine, or took Jerusalem. More than once they were on the verge of ruin, owing to their stupid indis- cipline : only their indomitable courage finally pulled them through. But geographical ignorance was almost as fatal a draw- back as want of discipline. The moment that they left Constantinople they were wandering about " in worlds not realized " — any sort of misdirection was possible in days when all East of the Bosphorus was in the land of marvels and legends, whose darkness was only lit up by casual oral information gathered from stray merchants, pilgrims, or prisoners. Even in the Balkan Peninsula the Crusaders made strange errors — one army of South French origin actually marched from Trieste to Constantinople, through the stony mountains of Dalmatia, Montenegro, and Albania, because 126 THE CRUSADES they thought it would be a " short cut," as compared with the obvious route through Hungary : half of them died before they reached the Bosphorus. There was a more disastrous incident still in 1101, when a whole expedition, disregarding the advice of the Byzantine Emperor, who tried to put them right, strove to march on Bagdad via Armenia, by a non-existent route. Most of them left their bones in Kurdistan. To be fair, however, to the general intelligence of the Crusaders, we must acknowledge that it was always the landsmen, — the French and Germans in the first two Crusades, the Germans alone in the third, who took the difficult and circuitous route across the Balkan Peninsula and Asia Minor. Even on the first Crusade many of the Italians arrived by water, and when the naval control in the Levant had once fallen into Christian hands, it became normal to use the sea-route, as did Richard Cceur de Lion and Philip Augustus in the third Crusade, and many before them, not to speak of St. Louis in the last great venture of the thirteenth century. Two juxtaposed facts had much to do with the success of the first Crusade, and the comparative failure of all that followed. The one fact we have already noted — that after the final expulsion of the Moors from Sicily in 1091 the Mediterranean now offered safe sailing for all Christian fleets. The second and simultaneous fact was the break- up of the great Moslem State which had been a few years before dominating all the nearer East. The power of the Seljouk Turks, which had in 1080 been still a single sultanate, which extended all over Asia Minor, Syria, Mesopotamia, and Persia had just fallen apart by civil war into a dozen jarring fragments. The last heirs of the great Seljouk monarch in Persia were no longer obeyed by the minor sultan in Asia Minor, or by the petty emirs who had just made themselves independent at Antioch, Aleppo, Damascus, Mardin, and else- where. And a power hostile to all the Turkish race, the Fatimite sultan of Egypt, had just conquered Palestine. Jerusalem in 1097 was held no longer by those Seljouks who had recently been maltreating the Christian pilgrims, but by an Egyptian governor and garrison. Fighting against THE CRUSADES 127 jealous and divided enemies, the Crusaders only just suc- ceeded in conquering Antioch and Edessa, Jerusalem and Tripoli. Opposed by a single monarch wielding the resources of the whole of Syria, Mesopotamia and Persia, they would certainly have failed, and would never have seen the Holy Sepulchre, or established the short-lived Latin Principalities of the Levant. The best proof of this is that the gradual reunion of the group of Mohammedan petty states into a single great monarchy was the ruin of the Crusading venture. There was a bare half-century during which those great fighters the Baldwins and Amaurys increased their borders and held their own. But at last a Mesopotamian prince named Zenghi united the states on each side of the Euphrates, and in 1144 attacked and destroyed the most outlying Christian prin- cipality, the county of Edessa. The last chance for the survival of the invaders came five years later, when the King of Jerusalem, aided by the depleted armies of the Second Crusade, laid siege to Damascus in 1149 — this was the high- water mark of the Crusading wave. If the Franks had taken Damascus, and cut through completely to the Syrian desert, the Mohammedan North and the Mohammedan South — Mesopotamia and Egypt — would have been completely severed. But the siege of Damascus did not succeed, through dissension between the Syrian barons and the Western pilgrims, and the stroke failed. Eive years later the Emir Nur-ed-din, son of Zenghi, conquered his neighbour of Damascus, and became master of Southern as well as Northern Syria. His state was getting too powerful to be resisted by the little Kingdom of Jerusalem. In 1171 the end became inevitable when Nur-ed-din annexed Egypt — his generals having made an end of the last Fatimite Caliph. The enormous new sultanate which embraced Mesopotamia, Syria, and Egypt was too strong to be resisted, especially when its strength was wielded by Nur-ed-din's great successor, the famous usurper Saladin (1172-1192). He crushed the Franks by numbers combined with good generalship, at the fatal battle of Tiberias in 1187, and took Jerusalem a few months after. 128 THE CRUSADES The overpowering strength of the great Mohammedan state thus created was the dominating cause of the failure of the Crusades. Minor causes there were in plenty — -(1) the feudal organization which made the intrusive Christian states of Syria, not a single military monarchy, but an ill- compacted group of quarrelsome feudatories. (2) The want of a loyal and homogeneous lower class to serve as a safe basis for society — the tillers of the soil were either discon- tented Mohammedan fellaheen, or Syrian Christians, who hated the Western Church only less than they hated Islam. The army of the King of Jerusalem counted many barons and knights, but never enough foot soldiery — the material for it was wanting. Only in time of very dire need would the Italian burghers of the seaport towns turn out in arms. (3) The King was always poor, because the greedy Italian maritime powers had only joined in setting him up on con- dition that they should have a monopoly of all commerce. The lively trade which sprang up profited the Venetian Genoese or Pisan factories, not the King's exchequer. The titular sovereign had only his small feudal revenue on which to depend — not a customs revenue or the power to tallage his burghers, on which other princes could count. (4) Geography too was against the survival of the Crusading states. If the Franks in their first rush had occupied all Syria from the sea to the Arabian desert, the Kingdom of Jerusalem would have had a defensible boundary. But Aleppo and Damascus were never won, and the Crusading states remained a narrow coast slip, all frontier, and all equally exposed to the enemy. Islam was never cut in two — the route from the Euphrates to Egypt via Damascus, Ma'an, and Akabah was always open to the enemy, and the doom of the Crusaders came precisely from the fact that Syria and Egypt were finally joined under a single great monarch, who was altogether too strong to be resisted. That the fall of Jerusalem in 1187 was not immediately followed by the expulsion of the Franks from the Levant was due to that much misrepresented enterprise, the Third Crusade. It is generally spoken of as a complete failure, because it failed to recover the Holy Places. But this is THE CRUSADES 129 to do Richard Coeur de Lion scant justice. He met Saladin at the height of his power, when he had subdued all Palestine save a few harbour towns, faced him, and recovered Acre, then the greatest port of Syria, in spite of all the efforts of a great relieving army. He finally beat the Sultan in pitched battle at Arsouf, a famous spot again in 1918, for it is the precise point at which General Allenby broke through the Turkish lines, and started that wonderful turning move- ment which won all Palestine in a week, and ended in the surrender of 100,000 Ottoman troops. It is true that Coeur de Lion failed to recover Jerusalem, owing to the mean fashion in which he was betrayed by bis jealous allies. But it was no small feat to force Saladin to a treaty which left all the coast, with its harbours and its castles, to Christendom, if Jerusalem and the highlands of the inland had to be abandoned as irrecoverable. The best proof of Richard's success is that what he had won back was held by the Franks for nearly a cen- tury more. At the same time it must be confessed that the surviving remnant of the Kingdom of Jerusalem — it was now more truly the Kingdom of Acre and Tyre — continued to exist for so long mainly as a result of lucky chance. The great Saladin died not long after the treaty of peace of 1192, and his empire, which had extended from the Tigris to the Cataracts of the Nile, broke up for a time, being parted between his brother and his sons. This delayed the final ruin of the states of Christian Syria for a space, for it is pos- sible to make a long fight against enemies who have jealousies and divided interests. But the Kingdom of Jerusalem was, during its last ninety years of life, entirely destitute of any power to recover itself. Nothing but the ports being left, the maintenance of the state practically depended on the Italian commercial powers, who were deeply interested in keeping their profitable factories safe, but had no reason to take thought for the recovery of the inland. That would have been of no use to themselves, though it might profit the Syrian baronage and the titular king. Hence a passive defence of the harbours, and truce, and trade if possible, with the Mohammedan powers, were their natural policy. tj.c.d. K 130 THE CRUSADES There was still in the earlier thirteenth century some chance that succour might come from outside, to reinforce the decadent Christian power in Syria. The Crusading spirit was not yet entirely dead, and the Papacy still continued its consistent policy of encouraging Eastern expeditions with the old aims. But the leaders of the so-called Fourth Crusade disappointed all Christendom. Instead of rein- forcing Palestine, they allowed themselves to be led astray by the selfish and intriguing Venetians, went off to the Bos- phorus instead of to Syria, and, like pirates, seized, plundered and occupied Christian Constantinople in 1204. This was one of the greatest crimes of history — perhaps the greatest ever committed under the name of religion — and no excuse can be made for the greedy Venetians, who lured off the princes of the West on a side-issue, profitable to Venice alone, but ruinous to the general defences of Christendom. For one of its side-effects was to let the Seljouk Turks once more into Western Asia Minor, from which they had been driven away by the First Crusade a century back. There were yet several crusades to come before the Papacy and the Christian West finally gave up the idea of the recovery of the Holy Places. The Fifth Crusade of 1218 is interesting as a strategical variant on all the earlier expeditions. It was launched not against Palestine, but against Egypt, on a hypothesis which was strategically sound, that a blow struck there, at the narrow middle-point of the Mohammedan world, would be decisive of the fate of the whole East. For Syria and Africa are linked only by the narrow isthmus of Suez, and he who could occupy the Nile Delta would cut the power of Islam in two. But the blow was tactically mis- directed, since campaigning amid the canals and marshes of Lower Egypt was unsuited for an army composed of feudal men-at-arms, who needed broad plains and pitched battles to display their efficiency. The only way to tackle Egypt by an invasion from the sea, is to land either west of the Delta-Marshes at Alexandria, as Napoleon did in 1798, or east of them, as did Lord Wolseley in 1882, and to avoid the marsh dangers, by refusing to be entangled in them. The enterprise of 1218, though it secured a base at Damietta, THE CRUSADES 131 flickered out among topographical difficulties. Yet precisely the same mistake was repeated a generation later, when the enthusiastic St. Louis led the great French host of 1249-50 to perish miserably in a blow at Cairo aimed through the inextricable network of the dykes and canals of the Delta. His army, thrown ashore at Acre, might certainly have accom- plished much in Syria ; if he had landed at Alexandria, clear of the water-courses, he might have got forward a long way, if he could have solved the problem of transport. But' striking at Damietta, like his predecessors of the Fifth Crusade,' he involved himself in the swamps and water-ways, failed in his thrust, was himself finally besieged in his advanced camp, and forced to surrender with the wreck of his host. It was only after his ransom, and release from Egyptian captivity, that St. Louis went to Palestine, and spent more than two years in endeavouring to restore concord among the Christians, and in strengthening and repairing their long line of harbour-fortresses. But he came without the great army that he had wasted in Egypt, and, therefore, his efforts were of little avail. Yet so long as the Mohammedan powers remained divided, the Christian coast-power in Syria survived. Once for a few years the Emperor Frederic II, by taking part in a civil war between the Eyubite princes, recovered Jerusalem by treaty (1229), but only the city and the pilgrims' way thereto from Jaffa. It was a peace-arrangement which ceased when the next war came, and a Turkish army in the pay of the Egyptian sultan stormed Jerusalem in 1244 — the last time, I believe, that it was taken by fighting till 1917. But this rather illusory occupation of Jerusalem for twelve years had no military or political meaning : it was a diplomatic rather than a strategical achievement ; safe access to the ceded city had not been secured, and at the first renewal of war it was bound to fall back to the Sultan, whose territory surrounded it on every side. If it be asked how it came to pass that the Frankish holding in Syria survived for forty years after King Louis' fiasco in Egypt in 1250, the answer must, I suppose, be that if aid practically ceased to come in from the West (though 132 THE CRUSADES one must not forget petty succours like that which the English prince, Edward Longshanks, brought in 1270), yet for some years after 1250 the Mohammedan central power was in trouble. The last Eyubite sultan of Egypt and Syria did not survive the year in which St. Louis was defeated and taken prisoner. He perished in a mutiny of his mercenary troops, the famous Mamelukes, just after his victory. The rebels made an end of his family in Egypt, but not for the moment in Syria, where many towns held out for the old dynasty, but fell to internal strife as to the succession : and it was some little time before all the old lands of Saladin's empire were united again under Sultan Eibek, the first of the so-called Mameluke dynasty. The reign of this short-lived prince was disturbed by the threat of a great invasion, not of Christians from the West but of Mongols — a new name for us — from the East. This vast horde which Genghiz Khan had set rolling westward from the borders of China was impending as a common danger over the Mohammedan East and the Christian East. It was the first serious threat from Asia that Europe had seen for 200 years. But it was also a threat to Moslem civilization : after sweeping over and devastating Persia, the Mongol Khan Hulagu captured Bag- dad in 1258, slew (or rather starved) the last Caliph, and reduced the ancient capital of the Mohammedan world to a ruin. The Mongols then flooded forward into Syria and took Aleppo : unless • beaten they would next make for Damascus and Egypt. The Mamelukes stood fiercely to defend the sultanate they had recently mastered, and after two years of hard fighting finally achieved a decisive victory over the Mongol Khan in 1260. It was only when they had saved themselves from this danger that they turned at last to the systematic extermination of the Franks of the Syrian coast-land. The process took about a quarter of a century, for the Christian harbour cities were strong, the Italian commercial states had every reason for keeping them safe, and the military orders of the Temple and the Hospital provided a solid nucleus of fighting power, though the old FranMsh baronage of Palestine had dwindled away to nothing. The process therefore was slow, if sure. Bibars, THE CRUSADES 133 the fourth and perhaps the greatest of the Mameluke sultans, captured Antioch, the largest city still in Christian hands, in 1268, and Jaffa, the southernmost Christian port, in the same year. From thenceforward the dwindling coast-slip was doomed, and in 1289 Tripoli and in 1291 Acre, the vital point of all commerce, was taken by the successor of Bibars. Aban- doning the last few sea-castles, the Pranks gave up the game, and retired by sea to the West. The episode of the attempt by Europe to master the Levant had come to a disastrous end. No European army set foot in the disputed lands of Western Asia again till 1798, when Bonaparte's extraordinary and reckless attack on Egypt brought him for a moment into Syria, there to be checked before Acre by the indefatigable Sydney Smith, rather than by the local Mohammedan power. But Bonaparte's raid from the first was an insane tour de force. How could he create an Eastern Empire with 30,000 men, when he was not sure of his sea-communication with France, his only base ? Nelson's victory of the Nile had stultified his enterprise ere ever he set foot on Syrian soil. It was not the Mameluke conquerors of the last Frankish strongholds of Syria who were to be the real gainers by the extinction of the Crusading states, nor were they ever destined to follow up their success by important offensive action against Christendom. During the 230 years for which their power was destined to survive, they accomplished no more than the conquest of the small Armenian kingdom in Cilicia, and some unsuccessful raids on the island-realm of Cyprus. The destruction of the Christian states of the Latin East was rather a necessary prehminary to the last great Moslem attack on Europe by quite another power — the Ottoman Turks. I count this the last great swing of the pendulum westward, not reckoning the awful but transient inroad of the Mongols, which indeed had taken place fifty years before the end of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. The year of terror for Western Europe had been 1241-42 when the immense horde of Batu Khan, after sweeping all over Southern Russia and sacking Kief, had entered Poland, beaten its dukes and their East- German neighbours at Liegnitz, and then thrown itself upon Hungary. The Hungarian kingdom seemed absolutely annihi- 134 THE CRUSADES lated at the battle of the Sajo, " ubi fere extinguitur mihtia totius regni Hungariae," and the Mongols actually pressed down into Dalmatia, and saw the waters of the Adriatic. But they vanished as quickly as they came, and after one winter of acute panic, which spread as far as Italy and England, Christendom breathed again. Hungary and Poland emerged from the deluge battered but safe, and it was only in unlucky Russia, for which Latin Europe had little concern, that the effects of the Mongol inroad lasted for generations — perhaps spiritually even down to to-day. For Russian barbarism is a survival in some sense from the destructive action of the eastern savages of the thirteenth century. But the Ottoman Turks, not the Mongols, were the peril to Europe in the centuries that followed the fall of the King- dom of Jerusalem. As long as Christendom had held a great outwork in the Levant, and the heart of the Mohammedan world was always liable to be assailed by a new Crusade, the solid advance of the East against the West was not pos- sible. But the Crusaders of 1204 had knocked to pieces the old Byzantine Empire, the former guardian of the gate against eastern adventurers, and had set up nothing to replace it. After 1291 there was no Christian military power left on guard towards the frontiers of Islam. The Frankish princi- palities of the nearer East — Cyprus, Athens, Achaia — were miserably weak. The restored Byzantine Empire of the wretched Paleologi was no stronger. The Knights Hospitallers of Rhodes were but a handful of adventurers isolated in a precarious outpost. There was nothing left to resist the Ottoman Turks of Asia Minor, who after small beginnings which date back to the thirteenth century, began to assail Christen- dom in the fourteenth, and crossed over into Europe — where their remnant still remains encamped — in 1354. By one of the unlucky coincidences of history the one power which seemed likely to replace Byzantium as the guardian of the Balkans — the Serbian empire of the great Czar Stephen Durhan, broke up on the death of that prince precisely at the moment of the Ottoman landing in the Gallipoli peninsula. Then came the nemesis of the commercial republics of Italy, for whose sole profit the Crusades seemed to have THE CRUSADES 135 been fought out to an unsuccessful end. For, though the lands of the Levant had been lost, control over the sea and its trade was still retained by them after 1291. The fall of Acre had not ruined Venice or Genoa, who (accepting the situation) made financial compromises with the Mame- luke conqueror, and by commercial treaties, kept open the trade routes of the East (mainly now through Alexandria), for another two centuries and more, so long as the Mameluke dynasties endured. But when the Ottoman Turks, whose growing power and persistent hostility to Christendom the Italians deliberately ignored in their blind commercialism, finally built a navy, and captured the long-defended Con- stantinople in 1453, the face of the world was changed. Venice and Genoa had very deliberately refused to send any adequate help to save Constantinople — the Venetian fleet had actually run up to the Bosphorus, just before the siege, taken on board the greater part of the Venetian colony there, and gone off for good. The nemesis came hi a few years. Mahomet II set himself to create a great naval power, and to cut off all the threads of Western commerce. Before he was dead he had effectually blocked the way to the Black Sea, and had practically mastered the iEgean. Christian vessels could get no further than Crete, Rhodes, and Cyprus. Venice fought hard now, when it was too late ; but her Golden Age was gone for good. Forty years later Selim the Terrible conquered Syria and Egypt, and blocked the sole surviving avenue of Western and Eastern trade, by destroying the Mameluke Sultanate, and capturing Alexandria in 1517. The Turk, in his day of triumph, was altogether fanatical, and anti-commercial ; he wished to have no dealings with the West save with the sword. That which followed — the great sixteenth-century assault of the Ottoman Empire on Central and Southern Europe, culminating at the siege of Vienna in 1529 — is another story, too long to be told in these few pages. I take the tale of East and West no further than the time when Venice and Genoa, stripped of their ancient sea-supremacy, no longer "holding the gorgeous East in fee," nor living the wealthy exuberant life that they had enjoyed for the last three centuries, at last paid the 36 THE CRUSADES )enalty of commercial ruin for their failure to back up the christian powers of the East, and were left to moulder, ' stranded shells of former greatness," by the Mediterranean shore. Who could have foreseen in 1291 or in 1453 or in 1517 ;hat the next conquest of Egypt and Syria from the West irould be carried out by an invader as remote and improbable is — let us say — the Mongols were in 1098, when Frank and Turk and Saracen first contended for the guardianship of bhe Holy Places ? I do not, of course, allude to Bonaparte's fiasco of 1798-99, made with inadequate means and without a 3afe line of communication with his base. He merely pointed out the way, and demonstrated the weakness of the decaying Ottoman Empire. The reconquest of Palestine and Syria was to be accomplished by a British army. There was one well-known Englishman in the first Crusade — the worthy but unlucky Edgar Atheling. It would be interesting to know what he would have thought of the prophecy — if it had been made to him — that the armies of a descendant of his sister, Queen Margaret of Scotland, would one day, without any appreciable help from any other Christian power, sweep the Turk out of Syria in one majestic campaign. The enemy was still to be the Turk — if Ottoman and not Seljouk, yet still the same tough fighter in war, and hopeless maladminis- trator and waster of culture in time of peace. Palestine has not changed much since 1099 — the dry limestone uplands, the waterless ravines, the thin-spread population, the blazing sun of summer, the pestilent torrents of the short rainy season, were the same in 1918 as the Crusading chronicler describes them as being in his day. But how changed the character of the combatants — the Crusaders' complaint was always that he lacked light cavalry — we swamped Palestine with Australian mounted infantry and Indian lancers, and cut off and surrounded the last Turkish army by the most beautiful cavalry manoeuvre in recorded military history, which began with the " second battle of Arsouf " and ended in the capture of Damascus and Aleppo in an incredibly short term of days. In 1099 the Turk was essentially a fighter on horseback— a mounted archer : in 1918 he had become an obstinate sticker THE CRUSADES 137 to trenches, with no adequate cavalry arm at all ! But I must not dwell on the last Eastward swing of the pendulum. The story of AUenby's Syrian campaign deserves something more than casual comment. VII LORD CARTERET A few years ago one of our popular historians gave fair expression to the feeling of the English reading public, when he labelled the political history of the period which lies between the death of Queen Anne and the Seven Years' War as " remark- able for its distressing commonness and flatness both in men and in affairs." Amid the obscurity of its first half nothing is visible but the burly figure of Walpole ; when the great minister has been displaced, it is only to usher in the tedious struggle of the Whig factions for office — the great battle of the kites and crows, whose details are inex- pressibly wearisome to every one save that strangely con- stituted being the professed parliamentary historian. Happily we have learnt of late that the history of England is something more than the history of parliaments and ministries and congresses, or we should be tempted to surrender the greater part of the reigns of the first two Georges to the annalist and the antiquary. John Lord Carteret was a statesman of brilliant parts, whose misfortune it was to live in that dullest of times. He was a young man just entering public fife when Queen Anne died, and a gout-ridden invalid of sixty-six when Boscawen's cannon in the Gulf of St. Lawrence announced the rupture of the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle. This fact goes far towards explaining the oblivion into which a man of such mark has fallen, but other causes are not far to seek. Carteret's whole life was a brilliant failure : the best years of it were spent in futile opposition to Walpole ; and when at last he had succeeded in seizing the reins of power, he was ignominiously thwarted, and ere long overthrown, by his own disloyal colleagues. The policy which he strove to carry out was in its essence the same which afterwards brought 138 LORD CARTERET 139 fame and popularity to the elder Pitt. But Carteret failed in his endeavour to apply it, and has been forgotten : Pitt, who obtained the free hand which the elder statesman could never gain, succeeded, and has won the credit of being the sole inventor and exponent of such views. Beside his practical achievements Carteret's ingenious but fruitless schemes are thrown completely into the shade. If the two men are ever mentioned together, it is only when historians detail the truculent abuse which Pitt in his free-lance days heaped upon the " desperate rhodomontading minister " who in 1744 advocated the same foreign policy which was to be the glory of 1758. In an age of political pamphlets, memoirs, and diaries, Carteret steadfastly kept the printer idle. The numerous unpublished dispatches from his hand show that he possessed a clear and forcible style : the few private letters which have survived are sufficient — in spite of Lord Shelburne's verdict that Carteret " could never write a common letter well " — to prove that his reputation for incisive humour was not undeserved. Every contemporary writer agrees that he was a ripe scholar and a marvellous linguist, that he held his own with Swift in the contest of wits, and spent long evenings in thrashing out the metres of Terence with Bentley. He was reckoned by his friends the best, and by his enemies the second best, speaker in the House of Lords, and the few happy phrases of his oratory that have come down to us fully bear out their verdict. But all our admiration for him must be at second hand : it is from the impression that he left on others, not from that which we ourselves receive, that our notion of his character must be drawn. He has left no literary memorial of any kind whatsoever behind him. That his parliamentary speeches should have perished is nothing strange : they have but shared the fate of those of every other statesman of the days when reporting was a crime. But that a man of such pronounced literary tastes should never have written a line outside his necessary public and private correspondence is nothing less than astonishing. If he did not join Pulteney in penning political pamphlets we might have expected to find him dabbling like Chesterfield 140 LORD CARTERET in miscellaneous essay writing, or wooing the Muses in happier numbers than Pitt, or solacing the weariness of long years spent in Opposition by writing memoirs. Not a single work, however, issued from his hand. The curious inquirer who consults the headings "Carteret" or "Granville" in one of our great public libraries will find nothing under them but one wretched political squib dedicated to Carteret in 1722 by an anonymous Whig pamphleteer. His own con- temporaries expected more of him : in 1737 it was noised abroad that he was writing a " History of his own time," and society speculated on the judgments he would pass on its more prominent members. There seems, however, to have been no truth in the report : if projected, the work was never begun. But in spite of his literary inactivity, and of the singular carelessness which he always displayed as to his own post- humous reputation, we should not have expected that his countrymen would " succeed in altogether forgetting their considerable Carteret," as Carlyle phrased it. He had always been a friend and patron of literary men, not merely of poets and scholars but of historians, such as Harte, the author of the Life of Gustavus Adolphus. Probably we may say of him, as of many another statesman, that he lived too long for his own reputation. Had he died in 1746, men would have said that the most striking personality in English politics had been removed : by 1763 his rise and fall, his talents and ambition, were already on the way to be forgotten. The verdicts of modern historians on him have been shallow and unjust. One writer speaks of him as " presenting a fearful example of a highly cultivated intellect and a great capacity for business totally ruined and obscured by the pernicious habit of drinking to which he was a slave," another as " a man of genius but of irregular life, capricious and sudden in all his actions." With the story of his career before us, we can see at a glance how futile are the cheap Tacitean paradoxes of the majority of our nineteenth-century writers, who seem to have taken the most fantastic statements of Hervey and Horace Walpole as sober and accurate narration of fact where Carteret was concerned. Even Mr. Lecky's LORD CARTERET 141 judicious estimate of the man must be to a certain extent modified, much more so Macaulay's characteristic epigrams. As to the attractive side of Carteret's character we need only say that he had every faculty that could attract admira- tion and win the love of friends. There is no reason to requote the opinions which Macaulay collected, from Chatham and Chesterfield, Horace Walpole, Swift, and Johnson— all men with whom Carteret had come into hostile collision — as to his abilities as a statesman. Perhaps we may mention as a less hackneyed piece of evidence the remark of Speaker Onslow, another old enemy of Carteret's, that " it was not his aim to aggrandise himself : he was all for glory, even to the enthusi- asm of it, and that made him more scrupulous in the means he used for his greatness." That he was perfectly incorrupt in money matters, and was a heavy loser while he held office under the Crown, is acknowledged by all. But personal integrity of that kind can be ascribed to Bolingbroke, to Newcastle, even to Wal- pole himself. The virtue in which Carteret stands unrivalled is his utter detestation for the abuses of patronage. No unworthy relative or dependent ever owed a place to his recom- mendation : he drove off his nearest friends and most necessary political allies, when once they began to talk to him of posts and pensions. The well-known story told by Lord Chief Justice Willes is a sufficient illustration : — "Sir R. Walpole promised me to make my friend Clive one of the King's Counsel : but too late t When Lord Granville [Carteret's later title] came to the height of his power, I one day said to him, ' My lord, you are going to the king ; do ask him to make poor (live one of his Counsel.' He turned and replied, ' What is it to me who is a judge or a bishop ? It is my business to make kings and emperors, and to maintain the balance of Europe.' I replied, ' Then those who want to be bishops or judges will apply to those who will submit to make it their business. ' ' ' To turn to the other side, there is but one serious charge made against him — that he was addicted to port wine. We do not wish to give any exaggerated importance to the charge ; the modern historians who have pitched upon inebriety as the most prominent feature in Carteret's private character have gone ludicrously wrong. But it is impossible to ignore 142 LORD CARTERET the consensus of opinion in contemporary writers. It is not enemies alone who say that Carteret loved his bottle too well ; his friends admit it — even his own son-in-law euphemistically calls him a bon-vivant. That the public voice named his tenure of office " the Drunken Administra- tion " may go for little ; but we cannot fail to see that many of the best of his sayings breathe a post-prandial atmosphere. Lord Shelburne himself prefaces one of them by the obser- vation that before a Cabinet Council his illustrious relative " had generally dined." It is equally impossible to mistake the tastes of the man who said that he liked to have Steele and Addison together for an evening, the one for the start, the other for the finish ; " for, by the time that Steele had drunk himself down, Addison had drunk himself up." We cannot misconceive the meaning of the fits of gout to which Carteret was a martyr in his later years ; there can be no doubt that, like many another statesman, he was suffering from the effects of the Methuen Treaty. There is no proof that drink ever obscured Carteret's intellect, or that he ever sank to making a public exhibition of its effects, as not only the younger Pitt but at least one more recent premier is accused of doing. But in a hard-drinking age he earned a special reputa- tion for loving his port overmuch, and we cannot ignore the consequences to his character, and to the estimation in which he was held. The charge, even when admitted, is not a very heavy one ; it leaves us perfectly free to hold that he was not merely magnanimous in his own large eighteenth-century way, but worthy* of liking and esteem to a degree which none of his contemporaries, save Pitt alone, could attain. A statesman of that day against whom nothing can be brought but a too copious thirst and a few rather unworthy political intrigues, entered into in the heat of a ministerial crisis, may pass as a man of approved virtue. In a prolonged panegyric on Carteret we need not indulge : the strength and the weakness of that remarkable man are best realized by glancing at the strange vicissitudes of his career — a career whose early promise and performance were extraordinary; whose middle part was blighted by long exclusion from office under the jealous rule of Walpole ; whose LORD CARTERET 143 final act began with such brilliant success only to end tamely in defeat at the hands of the meanest and most contemptible of enemies. The Carterets are an ancient and honourable family in Jersey, but till Stuart times their reputation was bounded by the limits of that pleasant but not too spacious island. The one notable story in their earlier annals is a legend of the defeat of Du Guesclin by Reginald de Carteret and his eight sons, and of their consequent knighting by King Edward III ; but on this tale sceptics have cast their doubts. The real importance of the house dates only from Sir George Carteret, a zealous Royalist who held Jersey for Charles II down to the month of December, 1651, long after the " Crown- ing Mercy " had driven the last royal garrisons in Great Britain to despair and surrender. On his restoration Charles for once contrived to remember the services of a faithful adherent. Sir George received places and pensions, and when his heir was slain in early manhood at the battle of Solebay, the king endeavoured to recompense the loyalty of the family by grant- ing a peerage to the old man's grandson and namesake. This George, first Baron Carteret, was cut off like his father before he had time to make a name in the world. He died at the age of twenty-six, leaving two infant sons by his wife Lady Grace Granville, who was to survive him for a full half -century. She was a granddaughter of Sir Bevil Grenville, the hero of Stratton and Lansdowne fights. John, the famous statesman, was the elder of the sons of the first peer : he was five, and his brother Philip only three, when their father died in 1695. Both the boys were sent to Westminster School. Philip stayed there till the unusually late age of eighteen, was accidentally drowned in the Thames, and was mourned in excellent sapphics by his head master, Dr. Friend. John left the school at fifteen, but had already made a reputation as an unusually clever boy. He seems to have always retained a great affection for Westminster. The young peer was made a " Busby Trustee " before he came of age, and frequented the Plays and other festivities of St. Peter's School long after he had become a pillar of the State. Of Carteret's Oxford life some suggestive facts are to be found 144 LORD CARTERET in Hearne's Diaries. He matriculated at Christ Church on January 15, 1706, being then somewhat under sixteen years of age, and had the privilege of paying £2, where his companions contributed 2s. 6d., to the University Chest. He resided four years, but never chose to take his degree, 1 although it might have been obtained easily enough by the favour of the Chancellor, without the completion of the necessary exercises, as were those of most other noble graduates of that day. But Carteret never ceased to be an undergraduate till an honorary D.C.L. was conferred on him at the Encaenia of 1756. He studied Civil Law to such effect that, fifty years after he had left the university, he was able to use his knowledge in that branch of learning to confute Lord Chancellor Hard- wicke on his own ground. However, he did not design to make himself a mere Civilian : his studies ranged over the whole field of classical and modern literature. He was a con- stant reader in the Bodleian, and to that fact we owe our first description of him. Heame, the famous Jacobite sub-librarian, notes him in 1709 as " juvenis ingenii acutissimi, morum suavissimorum, et in primse classis scriptoribus, cum Grsecis turn Latinis, supra annos versatus. In Mde Christi, studiis deditus, vitam agit." On one occasion he took Hearne to his rooms in Christ Church, and showed him with pride some early printed editions of Livy which he had collected. A little later we find him subscribing to Dr. Barnes's "Homer," a very characteristic touch, for the Iliad was always his favourite book, and he actually died with Sarpedon's speech to Glaucus upon his lips. The world in after years accused him of having learnt his drinking habits at the university, and it is curious to find that on one occasion Hearne had been holding a sit- ting with " that great proficient in Greek and all polite learn- ing, my Lord Carteret of Ch. Ch.," whereat they drank Dr. and Mrs. Barnes's healths two or three times over each, not without other hbations, we may presume. 1 By a ridiculous blunder biographical dictionaries invariably state that Carteret was made an honorary D.C.L. on April 26, 1706, three months after his matriculation. He has been confounded with his uncle John Lord Granville. LORD CARTERET 145 All this sounds like the beginnings of the lif e of a mere student and bibliophile, but in 1710 Carteret broke with Oxford and her placid delights. He came up to London, and within a few months had married Frances Worsley, daughter of Sir Robert Worsley. The united age of bride and bridegroom did not quite reach thirty-seven, and the courtship was short and sudden : but all accounts agree that the marriage was a most happy one. In that dissolute age Carteret was con- spicuous for his conjugal fidelity, and not even the most scandalous of his enemies ever reflected on his morals. A few months after his marriage Carteret came of age and took his seat in the House of Lords. He does not seem at first to have definitely attached himself to either of the great parties. The Tories were at that moment in the ascendant, and as his father had been a Tory and his uncle was at this very time Secretary at War in Harley's government, it might have been expected that he himself would incline to that side. Indeed, the fact that he had at Oxford been intimate with Hearne, a man to whom all Whigs were as poison, would lead us to think that his Whig proclivities must have been very slight. Of the first four years of his parliamentary career, we can only discover that as late as the winter of 1713-14 Peter Wentworth (perhaps the most intrepid speller of our Augustan age) calls " Lord Carterwright " a " straggling peer " who returned sometimes to vote with the Court party. 1 We cannot say that Carteret definitely declared for the Whigs by voting against the ministerial resolution that " the Pro- testant Succession was in no danger " ; several undoubted Tories, such as the Earls of Abingdon, Jersey, and Anglesey, joined him in so doing. A better test of his conversion to Whig principles is the fact that in the May of the same year he voted against the Schism Act, which was supported by Anglesey and the other " Hanoverian Tory " peers. From that moment his politics were never doubtful. Three months after the Schism Act had passed Queen 1 Wentworth Papers, p. 367. Wentworth's spelling is wild beyond conception. He calls Walpole "Wallpoole," and Kensington "Kin- senton," habitually. U.C.D. 146 LORD CARTERET Anne died, and the Whig Party entered on that long tenure of office which was to endure for all but a complete half- century. Carteret had, as it turned out, chosen his side wisely. Before the new king was crowned he was appointed a Lord of the Bedchamber, and a few months later he was made Lord-Lieutenant of Devonshire, though his property and influence did not He in that county. Probably Whig magnates were rare in the Jacobite West, and a man of ability was required to manage a shire where a French landing was always possible. While the rebellion of 1715 was in pro- gress Carteret was vigilantly moving about, " improving the thoughts of the neighbouring gentry, and discountenancing the seeds of faction that have been sown in these parts," as he phrased it himself. But his powers were not destined to be tried by any outbreak. Devonshire made no move- ment, and the months of danger passed safely by. We have now reached the point at which Carteret became a notable figure in politics. When once he has taken office and his public correspondence becomes available, the meagre and fragmentary record of his career grows fuller and clearer. Up to this moment there was no tangible proof of Carteret's abilities. Evidently his contemporaries believed in him, but their belief had not as yet been justified by any notable achieve- ment. There was no doubt that he was a good Whig, that he possessed a pretty wit, and that, though somewhat of a scholar and a student, he had a considerable political ambi- tion. But many a young man starts in life with all these attributes and never makes his mark. Carteret was now about to be tested by the logic of facts, and to show that his friends' confidence was not misplaced. On the hopelessly dull and uninteresting details of the quarrel between the Whigs who followed Walpole, and the Whigs who followed Sunderland or Stanhope in the earlier years of George I, there is no reason to enlarge. Suffice it to say that Carteret cast in his lot with Sunderland, and by so doing determined the whole of his own career, for he thereby earned Walpole's undying enmity, and that enmity was to keep Mm out of office for the best years of his life. A happy turn for the easy acquisition of languages, a good address, and LORD CARTERET 147 a talent for picking up miscellaneous information, marked Carteret out as a possible diplomatist. Sunderland deter- mined to make trial of him in a position of considerable import- ance, and sent him out as Ambassador Extraordinary to Sweden. His Swedish dispatches are most interesting, and a perusal of them is enough by itself to give a fair idea of Carteret's character. We are struck at once with the happy combina- tion of foresight and of capacity for sudden action, of readi- ness and of persistence, which they display, above all with their sustained hopefulness and buoyancy of spirit in the midst of countless checks and hindrances. Six months before Carteret landed at Gothenborg a traitorous pistol-shot from the rear had laid Charles XII dead in the trenches of Fredrikshald on November 30, 1718. His sister Ulrika Eleonora succeeded to a disputed crown, an empty exchequer, a factious Diet, and four foreign wars. Seldom has a country reached a more forlorn condition than Sweden at that moment : the empire which Gustavus Adolphus had built up was crumbling to pieces from sheer want of men and money to maintain a war with all its neighbours at once. The Danes were invading the western provinces from their base in Norway, the Russian fleet was harrying the shores of Upland and Sudermania, the King of Prussia had just conquered Pomerania and Riigen ; lastly, George of England, intent on revenge for Charles XII's support of the Pretender, and seeing a fair chance of adding to his beloved electoral territories, had stretched out his hand for the duchies of Bremen and Verden. The interests which Carteret — starting at the age of twenty-eight on his first diplomatic campaign— had to reconcile seemed hopelessly at variance. England did not wish to see Sweden too much weakened, yet the King of England was bent on gaining land from her for his own private domain. Russia, Prussia, and Denmark were resolved to get all that they could extort from their exhausted enemy, while the unruly Swedish Diet refused to hear reason till the conqueror was at their very gates. "They do not as yet feel all their wounds," wrote Carteret ; " they are still warm. The late king put a spirit and a courage and left 148 LORD CARTERET a motion in this nation which is not yet expired, though it abates daily and must soon cease." The reconciliation of all parties concerned and the happy conclusion of four several peaces were probably the cleverest achievement of the whole of Carteret's career. He persuaded the Swedish Government to begin by buying off the enmity of his own master with the required territorial cessions, on condition that England should grant her friendly mediation with the other powers. Then, bringing up the British fleet into the Baltic, he overawed the Russian and the Dane into withdrawal. This was the boldest of strokes, for he had neither permission nor intention to use the fleet for actual warlike operations, and could only reckon on the moral effect of its presence. But he had gauged the situation, and believed that a mere demonstration would be enough. Nor was he disappointed. The appearance of Admiral Norris and his seventy-fours was the signal for the disappearance of Tsar Peter and his marauding squadron. The Danes con- sented to an armistice, the King of Prussia proved open to negotiations, and signs of peace began to appear on the horizon. " I don't care for bold strokes," wrote Carteret, " but I have lived by nothing else since I came here. ... No public m in ister was ever for a month together upon so bad or so dangerous a situation as I have been. The common people looked upon me as the author of their misery while no succour came. . . . However, I still went on in the same strain, and have worked through with success, so that at present no ambassador was ever upon a better footing in a country than I am." Ere long Frederick William came to terms, obtaining the cession of Stettin and its district on the payment of two million florins. A curious instance of the king's economy came out in the course of the negotiation. He stipulated that the wagons and horses which brought the Prussian money should be precisely paid for. "So minute a particular," wrote Carteret, " has hardly ever been inserted before in a treaty to be made between two crowns." When Denmark also had been satisfied by a comparatively small cession of territory and a sum of 600,000 dollars, Car- teret's popularity rose to its zenith. The Queen of Sweden LORD CARTERET 149 loaded him with praises, the ministers were constant in then- attendance on him, the Diet expressed its thanks. When he visited Copenhagen he was much surprised to find that in Denmark also he was regarded with high approval, as the terminator of the war. Frederick IV on receiving him commenced with the happy speech : " Milord, comme par votre entremise j'ai fait la paix, et qu'a cette heure mes armes me sont inutiles, permettez-moi que je vous fasse present de mon epee," handing him at the same time a sword valued at 20,000 crowns, specially made for the occasion. After Carteret had quitted the north, but entirely in con- sequence of the success of his previous negotiations, the Tsar was induced to make the peace of Nystadt, which restored Finland to Sweden, though it stripped her of her possessions to the south and south-east of the gulf of the same name. Thus the work of pacification was completed. The bold and skilful diplomacy which had given peace to Europe was less appreciated in England than in any other country. The Government, indeed, was satisfied, but it is doubtful whether the general public had any conception of the matter, beyond the notion that Carteret had used the power of England in order to enable King George to add a strip of Swedish territory to his hated electorate. On the man himself the effect was most marked : it gave him a jovial self-reliance and a cheerful confidence in his own " bold strokes " which were for the future the most prominent features in his character. He had picked up a knowledge not only of Swedish but of German during his eighteen months of sojourn at Stockholm, and had thoroughly mastered the politics of all the northern powers. Consequently it was not unnatural that he should believe that the foreign rela- tions of his country were by far the most important things with which the ministry was charged, and that he should be profoundly convinced that skilful diplomacy could accomplish all things — even the impossible. It can easily be guessed how these ideas clashed with the theories of Walpole, with whom he was soon to be brought into the closest contact. The two men and their notions of England's true policy were abso- lutely and entirely incompatible. 150 LORD CARTERET During the last months of Carteret's stay in Sweden the great South Sea crash had occurred. He arrived in England just in time to find his patron Sunderland tottering to his fall, and Walpole preparing to resume his place in the ministry. When the new government was formed, the last trace of the outgoing premier's influence was the appointment of Carteret as "Secretary of State for the Southern Depart- ment." This gave him the control of our foreign relations with France, Spain, Italy, and Turkey. The "Secretary for the North," who had charge- of Scandinavia, Russia, and Germany, was his future bane, the Duke of Newcastle. Car- teret held this post for exactly three years, with very con- siderable credit to his own powers as an administrator and diplomatist, but with gradually decreasing influence in the ministry. The truth was that Walpole had made up his mind to get rid of him by fair means or foul. He disliked him as an unwelcome legacy from Sunderland, but he abso- lutely dreaded him as a possible rival in the favour of the king ; we may add that on grounds of general principle he objected to having any man of more than average ability serving under him in the Cabinet. George I, as every one knows, was fond of interfering in every branch of European politics. Walpole, to whom all foreign languages were as sealed books, was almost incredibly ignorant of the common- places of diplomacy. He lived, therefore, in a constant state of nightmare, picturing to himself Carteret obtaining the king's full confidence by conversing with him in the mysterious German tongue on the affairs of the Continent. Nor was he entirely in the wrong : George certainly displayed some partiality for the young Secretary of State, and even took him over to enjoy the delights of Hanover. This brought matters to a crisis ; for six months there was open war, and then the king was induced to dismiss Carteret from his post. During the period of stress the falling minister was endeavour- ing to save himself by his personal credit with the king and his entourage. He won the favour of the Duchess of Kendal by undertaking to settle certain private matters about which she was treating with Cardinal Dubois, and afterwards with Orleans' favourite Noce\ By this backstairs influence he LORD CARTERET 151 was for a moment maintained ; but when Walpole had set his mind on a thing, the power of the king or the king's mistress was a broken reed on which to rely. In March, 1724, Carteret lost his secretaryship, and his fall was hardly softened by the fact that he was in the next month presented with the extremely undesirable post of Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, more to keep him out of London than to solace him for his removal from the Cabinet. Indeed there were many who thought that Walpole sent him over the Channel merely that he might wreck his career in that unhappy island, the grave of great reputations. With Carteret's removal to Ireland his public correspond- ence almost entirely fails us, and becomes incomplete and fragmentary. The controversy about Wood's halfpence was assuming dangerous proportions at the moment of his appoint- ment, and it was probably Walpole's plan to make him the scapegoat in the matter, if any such were required. Swift and the new Lord-Lieutenant had been slightly acquainted before, and had no unkindly recollection of each other. But any less adroit and genial personage than Carteret must have found himself committed to war with the fiery Dean before a month was over. The sound and fury of the Drapier's Letters are now forgotten, but the ruler who dealt with them without losing his head must have been a man of imperturbable temper. Though not personally attacked, he could not but resent the barefaced sedition which, in his own words, " struck at the dependency of Ireland on the throne of Great Britain." Nevertheless, he succeeded in keeping off any actual collision. One good story is told of the curious relations between Swift and Carteret, at the time when a proclamation was out against the more than suspected author of the Drapier's Letters, and yet the two men were continually meeting on friendly terms in private life. The Dean, making a call at the Castle, was kept some time waiting in the anteroom, for the Lord-Lieu- tenant was engaged. Growing impatient he sent in a card with two lines scribbled on it : — ' My very good Lord, 'tis a very hard task For a man to wait here who has nothing to ask." 152 LORD CARTERET Carteret sent out an answer at once in the happy lines : — " My very good Dean, there are few who come here But have something to ask, or something to few." When Wood's execrated patent was finally withdrawn, the discredit of the defeat did not fall on the Lord-Lieutenant. He had so carefully confined himself to a cautious and wary carrying out of orders expressly given in England, that no one could say that he was personally compromised in the smallest degree. Of the last five years of Carteret's stay in Ireland there is not very much to tell. Swift wrote that " I confess that he had a genteeler manner of binding the chains of this kingdom than most of his predecessors." Nobody who has read Mr. Lecky's chapters on Ireland in his Eighteenth Century can fail to catch the allusion. Though personally mild and genial, Carteret was charged with, the carrying out of a most detest- able policy. During his tenure of office the exclusion of all Irishmen from promotion became more marked than ever. The times were bad, trade continually decreased, yet Walpole was always loading the Irish pension-list with all the jobs that were too flagrant to be carried out in England. The Lord-Lieutenancy must have been no pleasant post for a man who, whatever his faults, had a good heart and an unfeigned dislike to the evils of misused patronage. In 1730 Carteret returned from his exile, and, resuming the place in the House of Lords from which he had so long been absent, plunged at once into vehement opposition to Walpole's government. For twelve weary years that opposition continued, and it was not till nine of those twelve had elapsed that ultimate success appeared in the least probable. We may fairly say that Carteret wasted on fruitless parliamentary wrangling, and still more fruitless attempts to win the favour of the king and queen, those years of his life when brain and nerves were at their best and strongest. His administrative talents found no better scope than the endeavour to organize a party which always turned out to be in the minority. His skilful diplomacy had to be exercised in futile attempts to gain personal interviews with the queen, or even with those LORD CARTERET 153 who were about the queen's person. He leagued himself with Pulteney and Chesterfield, and Argyll, but neither the racy political writing of the first, nor the sonorous eloquence of the second, nor the parliamentary influence of the third availed him aught against Walpole's skilfully managed money- bags. He turned to the Tories : he stimulated the vehemence of Pitt and Lyttelton and the other " Boy-patriots," but his heterogeneous forces were only mustered in order to suffer defeat. The man who at twenty-eight had settled the affairs of Europe was apparently a stranded wreck at fifty. Constant failure is said to leave men either soured or indif- ferent. Carteret had too buoyant a spirit to sink into gloom and despair; nor did his twelve years' apprenticeship to adversity cause him to quit political life. After leading a furious assault on Walpole and suffering the usual defeat he would retire in complete good humour to his books and his bottle and wait for the chance of another fight. But there can be little doubt that his long exclusion from office injured his character by sapping his sense of responsibility. There were not unfrequent occasions when his conduct sank into mere factiousness, and this was remembered against him when he himself came at last into power. It is easy to under- stand the irritation of the knot of men of genius whose careers were spoilt merely because Walpole could not tolerate ability in his subordinates. But the penalty which they had to pay for their unceasing onslaughts on the great minister was to acquire a reputation for levity, and for loving opposition for opposition's sake. On the question of the Spanish war, however, we are not disposed to join the common cry of those who denounce Carteret and Pulteney for having driven Walpole into an unjust and unnecessary conflict with an unoffending neighbour. All such accusations are out of place since the long-hidden terms of the first " Family Compact " of 1733 can be studied by the historian. Whether Robert Jenkins, whose name has been so ridiculously imposed on the war, ever lost his ear or not makes no difference to us. We know that the house of Bourbon had bound itself in close alliance to impose its will on Europe. We know that England was expressly 154 LORD CARTERET named as a possible enemy, and that Spain undertook, long before any offence had been given, and while the most pacific of English ministers was in office, to endeavour to ruin England's trade. The molestation which our merchants suffered on the Spanish Main and in the South Seas was part of a deliber- ate plan to transfer our commercial advantages to France. Not merely, then, in the interest of the balance of power in Europe, threatened by the preponderance of the Bourbons, but in the defence of our own rights, we were perfectly justified in taking up the sword. Carteret, more versed in foreign politics than any other Englishman of his day, thoroughly understood the state of affairs, and very rightly decided in favour of war. Driven to fight against his will, and fighting with an equal want of skill and of luck, Walpole at last lost his hold on the House of Commons. Defeated on January 28, 1742, on the paltry question of the Chippenham election petition, the great minister resigned. At last the conjuncture for which twenty able men had been scheming and working for the last dozen years had come to pass. The victory was won ; it only remained to be seen who would carry off the spoils. Pulteney was the first to whom the opportunity was offered ; but, with a sudden and incomprehensible fear of the situation which he had so long been scheming to bring about, that statesman refused to accept office. Carteret was the next whose name was suggested to the King, and he proved more amenable than might have been expected to the royal behest. There were two courses open to him. He might stipulate for the entire exclusion of Walpole's party from the new Cabinet, and build it up by employing all the sections of the motley majority which had won the victory of January 28, combining the Hanoverian Tories with the various sections of discontented Whigs. Or he might, with his own immediate following, join the more moderate members of the late ministry, and get the benefit of their enormous parliamentary influence. The former course was the more honest and the more difficult : to endeavour to combine Chesterfield and Argyll, Pitt and Cotton, would be undoubtedly hard. The second was the LORD CARTERET 155 easier, but the less honourable : the men who had been denoun- cing Walpole's policy had no right to ally themselves with Walpole's lieutenants. In an evil hour, however, Carteret chose the worse alternative j he joined the new ministry in which Newcastle, Henry Pelham, Hardwicke, Wilmington, and Harrington, all of whom had served under Walpole, were allowed to find places. Wilmington was even given the nominal position of prime minister, though every one understood that he was and would be a mere cipher. On the other hand, Chesterfield, the " Patriots," and the Tories were excluded. This was the worst day's work that Carteret ever did for himself: he made the treacherous Pelhams his colleagues, and sent Pitt and Chesterfield into opposition. Within two years the Pelhams had intrigued him out of office, and the opposition had made him the best-hated man in England by their incendiary harangues. But it would be wrong to see in the causes of his fall nothing but the intrigues of New- castle and the harangues of Pitt. There can be no doubt, that the foibles of Carteret had quite as much to do with his disgrace as the machinations of his enemies. He was by nature and training better fitted for a diplomatist than a responsible minister. He hated the drudgery of parlia- mentary management, and despised the corrupt means which it then required. His mind was so set on carrying out his broad schemes of foreign policy that he could find no time to explain and justify them before Parliament and public opinion. Moreover, as Onslow observed, " he was all for glory." Car- teret, indeed, had no vulgar ambition ; we should be wrong if we classed him with the Newcastles or Henry Foxes of the day, as a man who engaged in politics from selfish love of power or desire for mere advancement. His ideal was, to use his own words — flippant in expression but sincere in thought — "to knock the heads of all the kings of Europe together, and jumble something out of it that may be of service to England." But in addition there can be no doubt that he took a keen personal pleasure in his diplomatic schemes. He loved to score a political success, but if success was impos- sible it gave him almost as much pleasure to fail after a well- 156 LORD CARTERET fought struggle. The stir and bustle of the statesman's life, the skilful fencing of diplomatic interviews, the handling of the threads of national policy which ramified to every court in Europe, were very dear to him. He had one of those buoyant spirits on which responsibility sits lightly ; his cheerful and easy self-confidence saw its way through every difficulty, and his ready wit had an answer for every objection. Newcastle, finding a happy phrase for once in his life, said that " Carteret was one of the men who never doubted." The saying was true enough: his judgment was so quick, and his knowledge in every branch of practical affairs so wide, that he never had to stop to ponder long over a line of action. One course always presented itself to his mind as obvious, the rest were dismissed without a further thought. In practical politics this faculty of rapid decision was by no means an unmixed advantage to Carteret. So clear was his mental vision that he was impatient with those whose perception was slow, and hardly condescended to explain his ideas to their duller intelligence. To mediocrities who could just see far enough to realize the difficulties of a ques- tion, the imperious decisiveness of his answers seemed to spring from mere unreflecting rashness. The favourite name for him in Opposition pamphlets was " Jack Headlong." His dislike to plunge into wearisome explanations and dis- cussion was most of all displayed when continental affairs were in question. Here he claimed a free hand ; when he had accompanied the King to Germany, he proceeded to enter into treaties and agreements to right and left, with- out giving any notice to his colleagues at home until the matters were settled. We can now see that his schemes were feasible, and his general plan of operations favourable to England. But while he was in fact walking at his ease through the labyrinthine mazes of German politics, those who had not the clue saw in him a blind leader of the blind, staggering at haphazard among snares and pitfalls, and drag- ging the nation to destruction after him. Unable to penetrate his designs, owing to the gross ignorance of continental affairs which reigned in England, they professed to come to one LORD CARTERET 157 or he was betraying the interests of his country to the Mano verian partialities of the king. „ a ; na + a Seldom have more unjust charges been brought against a statesman. His "madness" was precise y what jas after- wards regarded as Pitt's inspiration-the idea that the power of the House of Bourbon might be bled to death m Germany. While his colleagues and rivals were thinking of petty expedi- tions against Dunkirk or Cartagena, Carteret had realized that such pin-pricks could have no effect on the general course of the war. He wished to wear down the enemy by confederate armies on the Scheldt, the Rhine, and the Alps, and trusted that England would open her purse to subsidize them. But men who had not a tithe of his knowledge of the Continent thought otherwise; they found his scheme visionary and presumptuous, because the proof of its feasibility rested on data which were unknown to them. So his colleagues deserted him, while his enemies laid every folly and baseness to his charge. Pitt, unconscious of his own future, denounced "the execrable minister who seemed to have drunk of the potion which poets have described as causing men to forget their country." Chesterfield described him as one whose only object in life was to pour English guineas into the hands of foreigners, in order that the king might win some petty Hanoverian object. English public opinion seems to have realized very little of Carteret's scheme for a simultaneous attack on France by all the Powers of Central Europe. When it was reported that at a public banquet he had drunk to the " Restoration of Alsace and Lorraine to the Empire," the news went round that the English subsidies were to be spent in helping Austria to carry on a war of mere ambition and aggression. No one would see that every army that Prance had to put in motion for the East meant the diversion of a considerable portion of her resources from the defence of her naval power and colonies. The true and happy phrase that " Canada must be conquered on the plains of Germany " had not yet been invented ; the man who was one day to formulate it was at that moment thundering on Carteret's devoted head for daring to sub- 158 LORD CARTERET sidize the few thousand Hanoverian troops who had joined the British army on the Main. This fatal Hanoverian question, the one point in foreign politics which every Englishman thought that he understood, was to be Carteret's ruin. It does not seem to have been in the least true that he played into the king's hands. If we had to hire auxiliaries, the battalions of the Electorate could be trusted far more than those of any other power. The stories of their cowardice and indiscipline which Pitt and Chesterfield spread abroad were malevolent inventions, destitute of any real foundation. Whenever Hanoverian troops served alongside of British, from Fontenoy to Welling- ton's Peninsular battles, they always did well. But it was safe to abuse Hanover : and by dint of repeated assertions that Carteret had sold his country, the opposition persuaded public opinion that there was something in the charge. Then came the chance of the Pelhams. They wanted to get rid of their headstrong colleague, who sent them from the heart of Germany imperious dispatches whose meaning they were unable to fathom, and left them the duty of wring- ing money for his subsidies out of a recalcitrant Parliament. Newcastle did not understand foreign politics, but he did understand the way to manage the baser part of the two Houses. By November, 1744, he and his brother had then- plans ready. On the first day of the month the Duke handed to King George a memorial signed not only by the majority of the ministry, but by the whole of the Whig opposition, which denounced Carteret, his conduct, and his policy. The King was unwilling to lose a minister whose knowledge of German affairs had been so useful, and whose views tallied to a large extent with his own ; but he was not the fanatical admirer of his Secretary of State which men had supposed him to be. By the 24th he had discovered that any ministry of which Carteret formed a part would be in a hopeless minority in both Houses of Parliament, and on that day he yielded to the Pelhams. Nearly twenty years of life were before the fallen minister, who had now reached the age of fifty-four. But they were never to see him again at the head of affairs. For one moment LORD CARTERET 159 in the winter of 1745-6, while the Jacobite rebellion was in full vigour, it seemed that he might be called back to power. But Pulteney, on whose aid he had been relying, deserted him in the moment of trial. That "Weathercock" — as Shelburne remarked — "always spoilt everything." The Pel- ham influence proved too strong, even at the moment when Newcastle and his brother had mismanaged affairs, both at home and abroad, to an extent which made Walpole's failures of 1739—42 look like brilliant successes. After being Secretary of State for precisely four days, Carteret — now become Earl Granville by the death of his aged mother — had to give place to his old enemies. He relapsed into opposition with his customary good humour, and employed himself in the study of his favourite Greek authors and the nursing of the gout which was fast growing upon him. By 1752 the last incident of his chequered career took place. The wheel of fortune brought round his turn when it was too late : he was now not much better than an invalid, though his mind and brain were clear enough. In that year the men who had turned him out of office so meanly came to him to invite him once more to join them. To every one's surprise he consented : non eadem est cetas, non mens, was the observer's comment, but this did not cover the whole truth. Carteret had been from the first wholly destitute of resentment, even to the verge of faultiness. It was not so much the active faculty of pardoning his enemies which he possessed, as the negative quality of being unable to hate them when they wronged him, the defect that Aristotle once called Aogyrjola. When they looked to see him angry and depressed, they found him regarding events with the eyes of a disinterested spectator of a humorous cast of mind. "Once, when terribly abused by Lord Aylesford in the House of Peers, he warted till the oration was over, and then, turning to those who were sitting by him, said with a cheerful unconcern, not at all affected or put on, but quite natural, ' Poor Aylesford is really angry ! ' " Now the English public likes a good hater. It has its doubts about the sincerity of a statesman who contents himself with showing that his opponents are illogical or ill- informed, and prefers to hear him charge them with wilful 160 LORD CARTERET misdoing. Nothing is easier than to accuse Carteret of levity and want of principle for taking office in 1752. But it is rather to his conviction that he could be of service to England that his conduct must be referred. Seldom had one statesman played off on another meaner tricks than Newcastle and Pelham had used against Carteret. But in the day of their humiliation he consented to serve with them, in order that his knowledge of foreign affairs might be useful to the country. At the first Cabinet Council which he attended, he came cheerfully among his old detractors with the remark, " Well, my lords, here is the common enemy returned." For twelve years — till his death in 1763 — he was uninterruptedly Lord President of the Council. It is satisfactory to know that he was ere long reconciled to Pitt, who, recanting all his previous abuse, became his friend, and carried out the policy which its original inventor was now too old and broken to execute. "In the upper departments of government Carteret had no equal," said Pitt ; " to his instruction I owe whatever I am." It must have solaced the old min is ter in the long years when, " bent almost double, worn to a skeleton, and with the use of his legs quite gone," he still followed the course of affairs with an eager eye, to watch the working out of his own schemes in the Seven Years' War. He lived to see the Peace of Paris signed, and declared it just and reasonable. The last scene of his life is described in Wood's Essay on the Genius of Homer. " I found him," says Wood, " so languid that I proposed postponing my business (the reading over to him of the preliminary articles of the Peace of Paris) for another time. But he insisted that I should stay, saying it could not prolong his life to neglect his duty, and repeating the following passage out of Sarpedon's speech, he dwelled with par- ticular emphasis on the third line, which recalled to his mind the distinguished part he had taken in publio affairs :— r Q ninov, el n&> y&Q 7t6ke/tov Ttegl tovde qwydvres alel Sij (lihkoi/tev dy^Qm r' aBavdrw xe eaaead', oihe xev aUxdg ivl ngt&xom /taxoliirp oflxe xe ak axiUoi/ii pdxrjv §s xvdidveigav; vvv 8' {Simrji; y&Q xrjges iyeoxaaiv Oavdxoio fivgtai, &s ofot &m qwyelv §qoxov ovd' indlv^ai) h/iev. LORD CARTERET 161 His lordship repeated the last word several times with a calm and determined resignation ; and after a serious pause of some minutes, he desired to hear the treaty read, to which he listened with great atten- tion, and recovered spirits enough to declare the approbation of a dying statesman (I use his own words) ' on the most glorious war and the most honourable peace this nation ever saw.' " Two days later the old man was dead. C.C.D. VIII ON THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES AD. 1919-21 Since modern history began there has never been a year in which the boundaries of Europe were altered in such a drastic fashion as in the twelvemonth of 1919-20, when the series of treaties which were negotiated at Versailles broke up the work of three centuries of diplomacy. The changes made at the Congress of Vienna in 1814-15 used to be con- sidered as broad and sweeping ; very important modifications were made at Aix-Ia-Chapelle, and at Utrecht, and at the Westphalian Conferences which ended the Thirty Years' War. But these may all be reckoned trifling compared with the astounding work of 1919-20, when the whole of Central and Eastern Europe seemed to be thrown on the table, like a child's puzzle-map, to be reconstructed with new and unfamiliar combinations of shapes and colours by unpractised hands. And this was accompanied not only by countless changes of proprietorship in the whole non- European part of the Western Hemisphere, but by alterations in the balance of world power, whose consequences we are but beginning to understand. Nor is this all — there were changes in the moral outlook of mankind, changes in social economy, changes in conception of law and international obligation. The brain reels when it tries to visualize as a whole the consequences of the Great War of 1914-18. Whole volumes have already been written on single aspects of the new situation. But it is with only one problem that I am endeavouring to deal. What are the lines on which the boundaries of states should be drawn ? — for all will acknow- ledge that there are right and wrong ways of drawing them. It was my duty in 1918-19 to be very busy with the old historical frontiers and political maps of the eighteenth and 162 THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES 163 nineteenth centuries, on which reports and comments had to be drawn up. Hence came the impulse, perhaps a rather presumptuous one, to set forth some general deductions on topics which were puzzling the keenest brains of Europe and America. Let us at any rate see what were the methods of the past, and endeavour to learn from them something that may be of use in dealing with the problems of the future. What were the guiding principles of the statesmen of the Elder Europe, when they stood at the end of a victorious war, with the map laid out before them ? I think that we may discern four separate lines of thought, on each of which there is much to say. The first is mere " annexationism," land-hunger gratifying itself by the simple impulse of taking all that can be safely taken, as the victor's right. The second is the principle of " compensations," so dear to the diplomatists of the eighteenth century, which amounted to the general rule that if one state had received an increase of territory, or other advantages, its neighbours — or at least its allies — were entitled to similar augmentation. The third theory was that of " natural frontiers," which started on the plausible assertion that state boundaries ought to follow marked lines of geographical demarcation. The fourth — which often in practice got mixed with the third — was the doctrine of " necessary strategic frontiers," under which the victor pleads that, for his future safety against the possible revenge of the vanquished, he must take over fortresses, ports or strips of territory, to which he has no other claim, moral, geographical, or ethno- logical. This often becomes in practical application as shame- less as the first impulse of mere " annexationism." Let us consider these four points of view in succession, remembering that there were traces of every one of them in the various claims which one state or another set forth in its plea for consideration, at the time of the making of the new map of Europe in 1919-20. Mere "land hunger," the victor's claim to take all that he chooses, on no mere pretence of " balance of power," or "strategic necessity," or "natural geographical frontiers," or " racial affinities," or the " protection of oppressed 164 THE DRAWING OP BOUNDARIES nationalities," is the most ancient and most blatant principle of all. One had supposed that this " good old rule and simple plan," which inspired Nebuchadnezzar or Alexander the Great, was dead since the days of Napoleon's shameless annexations of Rome and Tuscany, Holland and Hamburg, Dalmatia and Catalonia, and all the other unconsidered scraps on which he laid hands without any real claim save that of the sword. The later annexations of the nineteenth century were generally cloaked under one or the other of the less truculent pleas. And the Congress of Vienna when it handed over unwilling populations to alien masters, had the decency to talk of old dynastic claims when it put the Austrian in Milan or restored the Bourbons to Naples, or of the " balance of power " when it perpetuated that already committed crime the partition of Poland. Napoleon III harped on geography and racial affinities when he took over Nice and Savoy from King Victor Emmanuel. So did Bismarck when he stripped France of Alsace — though for the even more iniquitous annexation of Lorraine, or rather of its Metz corner, Germany — or its military statesmen — had to plead the " strategic necessity " justification. When we reflect that these unscrupulous personages thought themselves forced by the spirit of the times to formulate pleas less offensive than the mere right of the sword, it was a distinct moral set-back to find in 1919-20 claims cropping up that had not the decency to cloak themselves under strategical, geographical, or ethnological disguises, and which spoke openly of dividing up the goods of the vanquished. I read plenty of pamphlets and newspaper articles at the time of the Versailles Conference, nearly all non-British I am glad to say — which might have been written by Machiavelli or Napoleon. Fortunately, the greater part of these ambitions have been frustrated, but there are one or two corners in more than one of the recently-signed treaties which have the old twang about them. The greatest sufferers have been the shrunken Austrian and Hungarian Republics of to-day. Nor has very much been said during the recent years about the second old-fashioned plea, with which the eighteenth-cen- tury diplomatist used to work when treaties were on hand— -that THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES 165 which put forth the so-called " Balance of Power" as its ideal, and talked of the " compensations " which one member of an alliance owed to the others. This useful and iniquitous word " compensations " presupposes that there are always available lands or sources of wealth that can be cut or pared like cheeses, without any moral hindrance. In practice it always meant the mangling or even the extinction of small (or misgoverned and powerless) neighbours for the benefit of the strong. It may sometimes be the case that small states have continued to exist for no very obvious reason — they may not represent a national unit, or even a convenient geographical unit. They may have been called into existence by a lawyer-like partition of a heritage, or have been created to serve as an appanage or an endowment for some forgotten person or dynasty. Such is Luxemburg to-day ; such were Parma or Lucca the day before yesterday. Nevertheless the principle that states destitute of any obvious raison d'etre may be swallowed by their greater neighbours, without any reference to their own desires or local patriotism, is not only immoral, but fraught with ruin for the devourer in the end. The example of the Hapsburg empire of Austria is the best warning — built up laboriously by many generations of marriages, exchanges and conquests, out of heterogeneous and unwilling elements, it finally flew to pieces in a moment in November, 1918, because the union had not been with the consent of the united nationalities, but imposed upon them, contrary to their will. I have nothing to say against voluntary unions, aggre- gations by mutual consent, whether of units of the same racial group — like the states that went to make the United Italy of 1860 — or of units heterogeneous in blood and language, but with closely united geographical or political connexion, like the Cantons of Switzerland, or the Walloon and Flemish halves of Belgium. Such unions no man will condemn. It is the free consent and the will to hold together that matters, not race, or language, or religion — as witness Switzerland. But where the wish to cohere and to coalesce does not exist, the treaty-maker draws his boundaries in vain, however much he may talk of race and language, of manifest geo- 166 THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES graphical destiny, or of commercial ties and unity of culture. Why could Norway never be united to Sweden ? All these compelling causes were in operation to bind them together ; nevertheless after nearly a century of involuntary union they flew apart — simply because the wish to unite never existed ; reason might dictate union, but national sympathy and antipathy is not guided by reason. The only cases in which annexations on the " compensation " principle have not been obviously deleterious to the annexer, sooner or later, may be found in cases where the people of the land transferred had no particular preference for their former status, or loyalty to it, and no particular objection to the power which was taking them over. When there are two or more states in the same large national group which are competing with each other, it may be a matter of com- parative indifference to the inhabitants of a city or a county whether they are inside the boundary of one or the other. This was a common feature in the middle ages, before national states had grown up. In fourteenth or fifteenth century Italy a citizen of Brescia or Verona would undoubtedly have preferred independence in a minute city-republic. But if this was impossible, as sad experience showed, it did not so much matter to him whether he became a subject of the Duke of Milan or of the Doge of Venice. Or similarly a few centuries later, an inhabitant of Arras or Douai or Lille felt no enduring resentment when he was taken out of the dead non-national aggregation that was called the Spanish Nether- lands, and put inside the limits of the Kingdom of France. He owed no reasoned loyalty to Philip IV or Charles II of Spain, and took no interest in those distant and unseen person- ages. He was certainly not worse governed after the change of masters ; he fell in among old neighbours of the same language, religion, and culture. The generation born after the annexation became good Frenchmen, and had no desire to be anything else. A more surprising instance was the contemporary union of Alsace to France, when an annexation (or series of annexations) carried out by the high hand and with no plea of justice, turned out a success, because the Alsatians had in the seventeenth century no loyalty to a non- THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES 167 existent Germany. The idea of United Germany did not then exist : the land was divided into hostile camps which hated each other more than they hated the foreigner. The Alsatians actually gained by ceasing to be outlying subjects of the distant Hapsburgs, or denizens of small and powerless principalities and municipalities, and so far recognized the gain that within far less than a century they had become French in sympathy, and fought more loyally than many old French departments for the Republic of 1792, and the Empire that followed. All this, we may note, was in days before the modern con- ception of nationality had -developed in many parts of Europe. The difference that was made by the development of that conception was shown by the fact that the Alsatians of 1871 could never be made into Germans again by the re- annexation to Germany carried out by Bismarck, though their ancestors had been made into Frenchmen easily enough two hundred years before. And this was despite of the fact that geography, language, and ancient history were all in favour of the union with Germany, and against the union with France. Yet after fifty years of forcible re-absorption into the modern Bismarckian Empire, the spirit of Alsace remained thoroughly French ; only the German immigrants forcibly planted in on top of the indigenous population were favourable to the restoration of the political situation that had existed throughout the Middle Ages. The explanation simply was that national feeling did not exist in 1670, but had become perfectly well developed by 1870. But cases like those of French Flanders, or Alsace, where the lands annexed by the Bourbons in the seventeenth century became thoroughly incorporated with the annexing state, because they had no loyalty to the state from which they were taken, were exceptional. Where national feeling, and active dislike to the conqueror, actually did exist, at the moment of the annexation, it was not one century or two that could reconcile the conquered to the change. The classical case, of course, is Poland, where the principle of " compensations," the cutting up of an old racial unit by its neighbours for their common profit, was carried out to 168 THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES its most shameless extreme. All those three neighbours, Russia, Prussia and Austria, are very properly expiating their crime a hundred and twenty years after. They sinned against the cardinal law of nationality in their greed ; they bought unwilling and resentful subjects, who could never be recon- ciled, and who tore themselves loose at the first opportunity. Who would have dared in 1900 to say that such an oppor- tunity would ever come ? Poland looked so helpless — her spoilers were so all-powerful ! But now we have a Poland in resurrection, with free access to the Baltic, and boundaries corresponding to those of the real Polish nationality (not, of course, to the artificial Polish empire of the seventeenth or eighteenth centuries), a state which if only it can learn its lesson and keep free of the old Polish curse of faction, should serve as a barrier against the German Drang nach Osten on the one side, and keep anarchic Russia from advancing into Central Europe on the other. It is strange, and inspiring as an example of retributive justice,to see the fate of eighteenth- century Poland revenged on all the three neighbours who plundered her in 1792 and 1795 on the plea of " compensations." They are now what she was then, writhing in faction and civil tumult, breaking up into fractions, a miserable spectacle. All the morals and sermons that used to be read to the old Polish oligarchy of the eighteenth century, may be rehearsed now with complete justice by Polish preachers to the three robber-states who accomplished the crimes of 1772, 1793 and 1795. Let us hope that the preachers may also apply the moral at home. New Poland sometimes shows that she is the legitimate issue of old Poland, by displaying the old Polish failings. The word " compensations " was, fortunately, not sounded as a dominating note during the discussions of 1919. But we may run upon the idea not unfrequently in the writings of foreign publicists, and in the speeches of foreign statesmen. There is, for example, a strong belief on the Continent that Great Britain came through the war with less suffering and more profit than her alhes. Her part in the victory is deliber- ately undervalued, her contribution in men's fives mis-stated, her colonial and commercial gains absurdly overvalued. THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES 169 I have seen in French and Italian newspapers astonishing statements concerning the freedom of Britain from all taxation, and the universal prosperity in her cities. Hence the deduction that, to compensate for this alleged gain on her part, her allies must be allowed to repudiate their debts to her — and not only so, but be given leave to seek further territorial compensations from the vanquished enemy, on one excuse and another. The French claim to the whole Rhineland, the Italian claim to deprive the Jugo-Slavs of their Dalmatian seaports, have both been supported on occasion by the plea that nations that have suffered greatly must not come off less well from the settlement than an ally who has gained much and suffered nothing. That such " compensations " imply the forcible enslaving of unwilling aliens is passed over as a necessary consequence of victory, and as the right of the conqueror. Looking to another quarter, I should not be indisposed to recognize the trace of some theory of " com- pensations " in the details of the cutting short of the borders of Hungary for the benefit of the three powers of the " Little Entente." It certainly looks as if concessions to one of the newly-created national kingdoms had been carefully balanced by concessions Jo the other two. But, as I said before, the word " compensations " has not been heard so frequently during the last few years as the two phrases which I have set down as representing the third and the fourth theories of boundary-building, which were all too popular in the eighteenth and the nineteenth centuries. I mean the phrases " natural frontiers " and " strategical necessity " ; both of these were unhappily prominent in the discussions of 1919. Now, as to " natural frontiers " it seems at first sight quite plausible to lay down the rule that state boundaries ought to follow marked lines of geographical demarcation, and to argue that each of two neighbouring nations will be benefited by an agreement to draw their frontier along a great natural obstacle, a lofty watershed of mountains, a very broad river, or a chain of lakes and marshes. But there are three fatal objections to the general application of this attractive theory. The first is that there are many broad regions in Europe and elsewhere, where commanding 170 THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES natural boundaries do not exist — as, for example, between Prance and Belgium, Poland and Germany, or Poland and Russia. This, of course, might be put aside as a mere formal objection. The defender of the theory might say, "we cannot use them where they do not exist, but at least let us use them where they do exist." In reply I must urge that even where such marked physical features are to be found, it may prove unwise or immoral to use them. For, to begin with, two rival powers develop the most divergent views as to what are their " natural boundaries " ? All through the nineteenth century French political geographers hankered after the idea that the Rhine is the obvious natural limit of France eastward, as it was in Julius Caesar's Gaul. But to Germans it was equally obvious that watersheds are more correct "natural boundaries" than rivers, and therefore that the Vosges and the Ardennes are the proper westward frontier of Germany. Many German geographers went a step further, and claimed that the whole plainland of Holland and Flanders was only a westward extension of the great level flat of Northern Germany, and ought to be incorporated in the same political unit. Less familiar but equally virulent disputes existed between Serbian and Bulgarian and Greek, in the Balkan Peninsula. Bulgarians maintained that because the inner lands of Thrace were distinctly Bulgarian, it was their bounden duty to extend themselves to the obvious geographical limit of those lands — the sea coast — although there was absolutely no Bulgarian population along the water's edge, but only Greeks and Turks. Another example is the claim of Italy to the line of the Brenner Pass and the crest of the main chain of the Alps, because there lies the watershed between the rivers which flow south to the Po and the Adriatic, and those which flow north to the Danube. It is, I think, one of the most unhappy incidents in the whole of the Treaty-making of 1919 that this claim was conceded, with the result that 300,000 German-speaking Tyrolese on the Upper Adige and the Eisach have been turned against their will into Italian subjects, so that a "Tyrolia irredenta " has been created, quite as large as the " Italia irredenta " whose existence was such a legitimate grievance THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES 171 to Italy during the days of the Hapsburg Empire. To-day on " geographical first principles " the valley of Andreas Hofer, the great Tyrolese patriot, the home of all Tyrolese national sentiment, has become Italian soil ! And this enslaving of 300,000 German-speaking Tyrolese has been allowed by the other allied powers, despite of their professed adherence to the principle of " seK-determination," which was carefully and honourably applied in other regions of Europe, such as Sleswig, Upper Silesia, or the regencies of Allenstein and Marienwerder, where the population was allowed every facility for choosing its own nationality. Against the whole principle of " natural boundaries " it may, perhaps, be sufficient to quote one crucial instance where the strict use of it would obviously produce results to which even the most insane advocate of this mischievous theory could hardly give his approval. I allude, of course, to that interesting anomaly Switzerland, which, on the theory of "natural frontiers," ought most certainly to be divided up between France, Italy, and Germany. For no one can dispute that Canton Ticino, along the river of that same name, is south of the watershed of the Alps, and belongs to the basin of the Po, and therefore to Italy. While Cantons Vaud, Valais and Geneva are equally obvious as the upper reaches of that essentially French river the Rhone, which descending from them runs for hundreds of miles through the heart of Southern France. And the remaining larger half of Switzerland, to the north and east, being drained by rivers falling into the Rhine (or in one small corner into the Inn) should I suppose be allotted to Germany and the new Austrian Republic. When we add that Canton Ticino speaks Italian and was in the Middle Ages part of the Duchy of Milan, that Geneva, Vaud and Valais speak French and belonged to the kingdom of Burgundy, and that Zurich, Basle, Lucerne, Schaffhausen and all Northern Switzerland speak German and were part of the essentially German Duchy of Suabia, it must be obvious that in the eyes of the geo- graphical purist, the real believer in " natural boundaries," Switzerland ought to be cut up to-morrow, trisected, and handed over piecemeal to its proper owners. Yet I think 172 THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES that even the most insane and fanatical exponent of the " natural boundaries " theory would shrink from proposing this infamy. If so, and if we once admit that the theory cannot always be applied, I fail to see why its principles should have any more validity if applied to the German- speaking parts of Tyrol, to the Balkan Peninsula, the Jugo-Slav regions adjacent to Trieste and Fiume, or the Rhineland. The talk about natural boundaries is often a mask for chauvinism and land-hunger. The case is still worse with the fourth theory of boundaries, that which employs the phrase " strategic necessity." There is a close resemblance between this and the theory of " natural frontiers." The only difference between them is that in the one case chauvinism or land-hunger has concealed itself under the cloak of inevitable geography, while in the other it casts aside the cloak, and emerges naked and unashamed, and simply sets forth the will of the stronger to take what is convenient for him from a vanquished enemy. For it is invariably the victor who talks of strategic necessity, and pretends to dread the future revenge of the vanquished. So did Napoleon in his day, so did the German General Staff in 1871, when they insisted on adding Metz, a great fortress but an absolutely French city, for whose annexation no decent historical or racial excuse could be given, to the already earmarked Alsace, for whose reunion with Germany much more plausible justification could be made. But the most striking exposition of this immoral theory that I have ever seen is contained in Italian contemporary pamphlets and speeches, of which I have come upon many, which set forth quite openly the claim that the 700,000 Jugo-Slavs of Dalmatia ought to be annexed to Italy, because the eastern side of that peninsula is singularly destitute of ports and there is practically none from Venice to Brindisi — while Dalmatia has countless harbours which might in a possible future war between Italy and the newly-established Jugo-Slav state, be dangerous lairs of submarines, and bases for raiding squadrons. The plea of " strategic necessity," always a mark of chauvinism and greed, has become even more unconvincing than of old since the late war. For recent military experience THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES 173 has shown that so far are strategical lines, as drawn by the military geographer, from being the only positions that can be held, that almost any line, drawn across the map in despite of natural obstacles, can be held by a good army that knows its job, and has plenty of barbed wire and big guns. The most impossible lines, which seemed to defy all military rules, have been repeatedly held against the most formidable attacks — such were our own Ypres salient, held for years, the German salient at St. Mihiel, east of Verdun, or the line along the Piave on which the Italians stopped the Austrian advance after their disaster at Caporetto — which said disaster incidentally proved that a line of the most formidable strategic excellence, such as all specialists would approve, cannot necessarily be held under all conditions. The moral factor in strategy is more important than any geography, and much prized lines of defence studded with strong fortresses may prove broken reeds in the moment of need, like Namur or Antwerp, or useless to affect the general trend of a war like the great group of Russian strongholds round Warsaw, in 1915. They have often in past years been mere army-traps to ruin their holders, like Magdeburg in 1806, or Metz in 1870, or Plevna in 1877. Wherefore I hold that more than ever to-day " strategical necessity " should be marked down as an immoral plea, the cloak of unscrupulous lust for annexation. But to come to the last lap of my argument — the critic may perhaps observe that if we have stigmatized boundaries by " compensation," and " natural frontiers," and " strategical " boundaries as one and all immoral and objectionable, we are driven back on to the sole principle of the will of the inhabitants of a district, what President Wilson called " self- differentiation," as our guiding principle. And this principle, the critic will say, and with perfect truth, is hard to apply in some cases, and absolutely incapable of application in others. This must be frankly conceded if we wish to be honest. Though in Western Europe there are few regions where it is impossible to draw a just and satisfactory frontier, the same is not the case in Eastern Europe, or many parts of Western Asia. There are terrible problems for an " honest broker " on all 174 THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES the frontiers of Poland, in what was once Hungary, in the Baltic lands, most of all perhaps in the Balkan Peninsula and in Transcaucasia. We find regions like the Banat, or Macedonia, or South Thrace, in which it may be said that no race has the complete numerical superiority which entitles it to decide on the fate of a district, in which it lives mixed up with not one but perhaps two, or even three, alien nationalities. And we find regions, such as some parts of Eastern Galicia, and of Upper Silesia, and of Sleswig, where the balance of races is so nice that we ask ourselves whether the vote of 51 per cent, of the people must absolutely and entirely override that of 49 per cent. Or, again, we may find tracts where national feeling is so doubtful or undeveloped that it would seem that the people themselves hardly know what they want, as in many parts of the Ukraine, and in the not far distant White Russia. Often districts with a local majority of one race are cut off by considerable intervening tracts, of alien blood and sympathy, from the nearest large patch of their own nationality ; this is very much the case in Transylvania, in some parts of Macedonia, and on the borders of Poland and of East Prussia. Now it is clear that no sane drawer of state-boundaries could sanction the creation of a permanent political settlement which should make the map of Eastern Europe resemble an enlarged edition of the county of Cromarty on the map of Scotland, by which national states should be divided into several isolated enclaves or patches, not cohering, but separated from each other by long distances. What is the remedy ? We cannot in the twentieth century call for a new Senacherib or Nebuchadnezzar, who should deport all small outlying groups of population, and replant them in districts more geographically convenient. Something of the sort might conceivably be done on a small scale, by bargain and consent between the two states concerned, each undertaking to find land for its kinsmen on the acres from which aliens have been removed. Even so, every deported farmer would grumble that he had lost by the exchange — for such is human nature. But on a large scale, where old national traditions are con- cerned, and the people who are to be transferred possess a THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES 175 history and a national consciousness, this can hardly be done — it seems to sin against fundamental human rights. Though to be sure there have been cases seen quite lately where racial minorities, left behind after a change of sovereignty, have been seen to migrate in order to " follow the old flag," as happened more or less with the Turkish minority in Thessaly, after that region had been made over to Greece in 1878, and with many ardently Francophil Alsatians in 1871, after the annexation of Alsace to Germany. The converse, by the way, seems to be happening in Alsace now, since many irre- concilable German settlers in that country are retiring to their place of origin. But such movements cannot be relied upon to settle our difficulty ; more often the local tie is too strong, and the persons affected stay behind — and grumble not unnaturally. The best solution that can be suggested for such problems is a not wholly satisfactory one. This is the grant of liberal local privileges to alien enclaves of population, which must yet be made to understand that they have no racial autonomy as against the nation to which they have had to be assigned because it encircles them on all sides. I mean such privileges as the concession of the official use of their own language, alongside with that of the language of the state, and full protection for their schools, churches and other cultural necessities. These are the kind of rights which we have granted to the Dutch of Cape Colony, to use a familiar instance. The difficulty is that the administration of such privileges in practical detail generally leads to friction. The state is normally accused of being unsympathetic and arbitrary ; the privileged minority is accused of being captious, provo- cative, and irrationally suspicious. And generally there is considerable truth in each of the countercharges. The case becomes especially difficult when there exists at a short distance from the discontented enclave of population, a national state to which this outlying patch belongs by culture and sympathy. Then the malcontents always receive moral aid and support from outside against their own Government, as the Alsatians till the Great War used to receive from France, or the Italians of Trieste from Italy, or the Greeks 176 THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES in Turkey from Greece. It is hard to see a complete remedy for this ; a state entrusted with the Government of alien minorities should possess an almost superhuman capacity for patience and justice, which (while men are men) it is difficult to expect. There is one larger and more heroic solution for such a problem, the ideal which may be seen in Switzerland, and to a certain extent in the Dominion of Canada and the Union of South Africa — that is in the organization into a composite federal state of the whole group of diverse races, whose close juxtaposition and geographical interpenetration causes the difficulty. For, of course, the lot of people dwelling in one of these racial " pockets " or enclaves would be quite different if the state with which they are incorporated is not a wholly alien one, but a composite unit, in which their own outlying countrymen, a few score miles away, form part of the governing body. Take, for example, the Balkan Peninsula — the most puzzling perhaps of all the problems before us. The wisest heads in that quarter of the world have already thought of this solution ; the idea was at the bottom of that " Balkanic League," of which M. Venizelos was long the prophet and exponent. Local minorities, he taught, might learn to tolerate their position, if the supreme governing power was one in which their co-nationals elsewhere, who were local majorities in their own corner, had an important part. The idea of the League was undoubtedly a good way out of the difficulty— a very good idea indeed in 1913. But is this solution possible to-day, in the case of peoples who during the Great War have been engaged in bitter strife with each other ? In 1915-18 the Bulgarians, in alliance with Austria, the hereditary enemy of Serbia, and Turkey, the hereditary enemy of Greece, committed atrocities on a very large scale among the Greek and Serbian populations which had fallen for a time under their sway. Indeed we are not doing them injustice if we say that they aotually attempted to exterminate the Greek and Serbian elements in Macedonia by fire and sword. Can it be expected that within any short period of years the injured nationalities, who have now come to their own, owing THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES 177 to the general victory of the Allies, will consent to take Bulgarians into complete and equal partnership, and give them their aliquot share in the organization and administration of a general Balkan League ? It is interesting to see that the Bulgarians have now begun to talk on this topic, and to place all blame for their own crimes and misdoings on their dethroned monarch Ferdinand and his political satellites. But the question is now not what Bulgarians may think, but what are the views of the Serbian and Greek peoples. They would be more than human if they were to see much attraction in the idea of being partially governed by the representatives of a nation which is not only an old enemy, but has during the last few years displayed the extreme of chauvinism and barbarity. It is probable that the happy idea of the Balkan League must remain an aspiration for the future, when hatreds have had time to cool, rather than a practicable scheme to be applied in the immediate present. It is a case of " wait and see." The idea of federalization applied in this corner of Eastern Europe may lead us up to the idea of its application in other regions. There are clear opportunities for its use among the minor states ©n the Baltic — Finland, Esthonia, Latvya, Lithuania— or again in the minor states beyond Caucasus, Georgia and her lesser neighbours, when once they shall have got loose from the Bolshevik domination. Yet in each case there seem to be local jealousies and suspicions hindering what seems the best road to safety and survival — perhaps the only road, in view of dangers from without to states none of which are by themselves of any great strength. But the moral seems to be that if localism and particularism be so dangerous to minor states, the only remedy lies in extending the idea of federalism so widely, that it ceases to be a mere attempt to combine close neighbours in an unwilling union, and becomes something much larger. I allude, of course, to the great scheme on which so much is being spoken and written at present — the idea to which in its widest form the name of the " League of Nations " has been given. So many writers and speakers have given so many different shapes to that attractive ideal, that he would U.O.D. N 178 THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES be a bold man who would venture a definite pronouhcenn upon any shape that it ought to take. Critics have poinl out the practical difficulties that must attend its incepti its organization and its practical working. The difficult are obvious. On what principle would the seats in the gove: ing council of the world be allotted ? Can states with an e record like Germany, Bulgaria, or Mexico be admitted once to take their part therein ? What would be t organization and composition of the international arm force which must be the ultimate executor of the mandal of the omnipotent central board? Granting that such force is created, adequate and competent to discharge t purpose for which it is raised, what are to be the methods punishment for disobedient and vanquished dissidents ? One may suggest dozens of such questions, all plausil and hitting on real difficulties and dangers. The discussic of them might be interminable— as recent experience in t! United States of America seems to show. Yet I am optimi enough to believe that " where there is a will there is a way and that no small part of the problem is solved when i find that all over the world there is a general and reason approbation of the main ideal of the " League of Nations Plausible as are the criticisms that are put forth against the important thing is to note that they are criticisms n blank denials of the ideal. Few or none among the criti dare to repudiate the whole scheme ; they carp at detai because they dare not deny the moral justice or reason of t ideal itself. And this is a great gain : the aspiration bei once set travelling round the world, time is its ally. ^ must be patient, and allow the propaganda to make its ot way, without hurrying it on, or allowing ourselves to discouraged by temporary checks and hindrances. For n own part, I believe that as the world realizes more and mo what the horrors of the next great war would be, every or save a Bolshevik, must see that such a war ought never be allowed to come about. It may seem, perhaps, a truism a piece of banal optimism to say, in these troublous timt that if an ideal is the right one, it will conquer in the en But believing in that ideal as I do, I am content to lea THE DRAWING OF BOUNDARIES 179 the problem to be pondered over by each individual in his own heart. I do no more than repeat the words of Gamaliel of old. The ancient Jewish teacher said, when the first Christian doctrine was laid before him, " If this counsel be of men it will perish ; but if it be of God, beware lest ye be found fighting against God." IX THE TUDORS AND THE CURRENCY, 1526-60 It used, till February 18, 1920, to be the special boast and glory of the English currency that for more than a thou- sand years i]t has maintained its original weight and purity in a far higher degree than any of its neighbours. Until Mr. Austin Chamberlain in a moment of panic debased our silver money by a 50 per cent, alloy of base metal, only one severe shock has been given to the credit of the English coinage for about a thousand years. Save in this one single case, the currency has been spared by even the worst, the weakest, and the most unfortunate of our rulers. In the clash of the Norman Conquest, in the evil days of King John, in the long thriftless administration of Henry HI, in the anarchy of the Wars of the Roses, in the sharpest stress of the Great Rebellion, no ruler of England ever laid hands on the coin of the realm to alloy its purity. It is true that in the attrition of the ages the first of English coins, the venerable silver penny, has sunk to about one-third of its original weight, though it retained its original quality. Offa, its first creator, struck it to the standard of 22 grains ; King George's silver Maundy penny of 1920 weighs 7£ grains. But this shrinkage had been due not to deliberate dishonesty in any series of kings or ministers, but to the variations of the ratio between gold and silver in the last five centuries, since the day when Edward III first added gold money to the currency of the realm. When Edward III, or Henry IV, or Edward IV, from time to time reduced the size of their silver pieces, they did it to bring under-valued silver money into its proper relation to their gold coins, not in order to fill their own pockets. For from the year 1344 to the year 1816 England was cursed with a bimetallic system of currency, and felt 180 THE TUDORS AND THE CURRENCY 181 acutely every variation in the ratio of the red and the white metal. Whenever silver rose in value the Government set things right for the moment, by reducing the weight of the silver money. In the course of time another crisis arose, and then came a further reduction. This process only ceased with the final introduction of a single gold standard in the days of our own grandfathers. In no single period, save in the years 1543-51, was this cutting down of the weight of silver in the penny or the shilling a dishonest and deliberately immoral act on the part of the Govern- ment. Foreign currencies were not so fortunate. In no other country of Europe has the original coin-standard shrunk so little as in England. In the year 800 the English penny of King Offa and the denarius of Charles the Great, current in France, Germany, and Italy, were the same in all respects ; for Offa's coin was a deliberate copy of that of Charles, so that the word denarius, the proper name of the Frankish coin, was always used as the Latin equivalent of our own penny. Hence comes the d. printed at the head of our pence- column in the reckonings of to-day. The English penny, as we have already said, has decreased to one-third of its former self in the last thousand years. But the fall of the denarius of the continent has been far more humiliating. The Carlovingian denarius was the parent of the French denier, the German pfennig, the Italian danaro. Now, the denier in France had by the end of the eighteenth cen- tury shrunk into one-twelfth of the sou, which was itself one-twentieth of the livre, a coin practically equivalent to the modern franc. A denier of Louis XV was therefore only worth about one-seventieth of a denarius of Charlemagne. Similarly, in Germany on the eve of the Great War of 1914, the pfennig was one-hundredth part of the silver mark, a coin of about 85 grains. It started at about 22 grains of silver ; but would in 1914 (if so small a piece could have been struck) have been of about the weight of -85 of one grain. All other European money standards show similar results. It may seem absurd to link together in a common con- 182 THE TUDORS AND THE CURRENCY damnation, as the only two debasers of the English silver currency, Henry VIII and Mr. Austin Chamberlain. The svelte and austere figure of the modern statesman does not contrast more strongly with the Tudor king's sinister grossness than do their mentality and their morality. Nevertheless it remains true that the only two occasions when the English coinage was deliberately mishandled and abused, grew abomin- able and became unsightly, were in the reign of Henry VIII and in the Chancellorship of Mr. Austin Chamberlain. It is with the offences of the former that we have to treat in this paper. When that prince ascended the throne, the English coinage was in an eminently satisfactory condition. With all his faults Henry VII had been a thrifty and economical administrator, the kingdom was unusually prosperous under his rule, and the growth of monetary transactions is shown by the fact that — first of all English sovereigns — he was able to coin large gold and silver money. The shilling, pre- viously mere money of account, was by Henry of Richmond produced as a fine piece weighing 144 grains, and bearing on its obverse the King's head, the first true portrait ever seen on English money. Similarly the double-rial, or 20a.- piece, which was soon afterwards to be called the " sovereign," appeared in the year 1489. Thus Henry VII simplified all calculations by giving to his nation the tangible pieces of money which corresponded to the names in use. How hard it must have been to count up large sums of money into pounds and shillings, when the coins in hand were angels of 6s. 8d., and groats of 4d. with their fractions, we find it difficult to realize. To break with tradition and give a tan- gible shape to the old names was an unqualified boon. L we ask the causes of Henry's innovation, we must content ourselves with a general answer that the growth of monetarj transactions, to the prejudice of payments in kind, musl continually have been increasing: that although prices hac remained practically stationary for an unprecedentedly lonj period, yet the quantity of business was growing, and tha therefore people who were continually expending shilling felt the inconvenience of having to pay everything in groats e.g. if anyone had to pay a 5«. bill, how much more tim THE TUDORS AND THE CURRENCY 183 and trouble would he take in counting out 15 groats than 5 shillings ! Similarly, in dealing with a large sum of pounds, there was enormous convenience in counting out 100 sovereigns rather than 300 angels. It is well worth our while to detect in Henry VII's coin- age the working of the artistic spirit of the Renaissance as well as that of the growth of trade. Ever since Edward III the aspect of English money had remained the same ; the conventional full-faced king's head, with its wooden mediaeval smile, was repeated for king after king without variation : Edward III might be an old and bearded man, Richard II a young boy, but the same stereotyped head was repeated from the coin of the former on to that of the latter. Simi- larly, the noble still retained its king standing with drawn sword in his tub-like little sailing boat, the " ship " of which the Flemings (making a pun which holds good in our language as well as in theirs) said that it should be exchanged for a sheep, since England's naval power was declining while its wool trade was ever growing larger. Henry broke with these time-honoured conventionalities ; he placed on the shilling an excellent portrait of himself with a side-face, quite unlike the mediaeval full-face, and showing the awakening of England to real, as opposed to conventional, art. So, too, on his sover- eign appeared a full-length figure of himself seated in state on his royal throne beneath his royal canopy — a handsome type, showing more traces of medisevalism than the portrait head on the shilling, but wanting the attribute of stiffness which it would have shown a hundred years earlier. Henry died in 1509, leaving behind him a treasure which contemporary chroniclers estimated at three or even four millions sterling, but which Bacon calculates at only £1,800,000. This last, however, was an enormous sum enough, when we consider the value of money at that date. It was not to remain much longer laid up in the cellars of Richmond Palace. On the side of political economy hoarding may be bad, but from the point of view of the English nation the use which Henry VIII made of his father's treasure was far more disastrous than the most exaggerated form of hoard- ing could have been. 184 THE TUDORS AND THE CURRENCY England had now for nearly sixty years remained aloof from the confusion of Continental politics. First the Wars of the Roses, then the wise policy of non-intervention pur- sued by Henry VII, had kept her from being sucked into the whirlpool. Both, Edward IV, indeed, and Henry himself, had appeared with armies on French soil, but their invasions were momentary and episodic; they brought money to England rather than spent it, for each of them allowed him- self to be bribed into a prompt departure, and made no real attempt to enforce the old claims to the French crown which had cost so much blood and treasure during the Hundred Years' War. The period of non-intervention was now at an end, and with it was to depart the long spell of internal prosperity which England had enjoyed in the fifteenth century. Few historical facts are more extraordinary than the stationary condition of English life during the period which was now drawing to a close. From the Black Death to the be ginning of Henry VTII's interference in foreign politics the price of living appears, if we may trust Thorold Rogers's figures, to have remained almost unchanged. The part of the nation which worked and saved was steadily maintaining its prosperity. Not even the great French war — a war, indeed, fought on French ground and to a great extent with French money — could stop the growth of England. The long struggle of York and Lancaster seems to us who look back on it to have been a period of horror — yet " nobody seemed one penny the worse," save the barons and their retainers, who made their way to some convenient heath or hill-side, and there slaughtered each other by the thousand. The nation sat at its ease in plenty and contentment, and though the rival factions slew each other before its judg- ment seat, cared for none of these things, like Gallio of old. I need hardly repeat the well-known fact that the struggle was waged with less general rapine and ravaging than any mediaeval civil war of which we have knowledge. Except the harrying of the towns along the line of the Great North Road by Queen Margaret's northern moss-troopers in the winter of 1460-1, there is hardly an instance of wanton THE TUDORS AND THE CURRENCY 185 destruction of life or property that can be quoted. 1 The middle and lower classes refused to take sides in the quarrel, and submitted to each victorious party in turn, so that the storm practically passed over their heads. The years 1455-85 were a time of growing wealth, expanding commerce, increased civilization. When tried by that excellent test of prosperity, the amount of church-building which they show, compared with the generation before and the genera- tion after, they account for an astonishing number of the large, well-lighted, perpendicular churches which are the glory of Cotswold and East Anglia. The struggle, indeed, had no visible influence for evil on the country's prosperity ; perhaps it may even have worked indirectly for good ; the carnage of Towton and Barnet must have had a considerable effect in thinning that superfluous mass of " unemployed " — the discharged professional mercenaries bred by the long French War, whose descendants were a hundred years later to become the " sturdy and valiant beggars " of the reigns of Henry VIII and Edward VI. Our digression has, perhaps, extended too far ; let us return to the sixteenth century. Henry VIII was no sooner established on the throne than he set to work to throw away his father's accumulated wealth, in the pursuit of that intan- gible and chimerical prize, the Balance of Power. To en- deavour to establish any abiding status in a Europe whose direction was in the hands of such dishonest politicians as Louis XII and Maximilian of Austria, or Francis I and Charles V, was a pursuit as hopeless as the brain of man ever con- ceived. If Henry had owned the philosopher's stone, and possessed the patience of Job, he could not have been success- ful. The trimmer may find a pleasure in making his power felt as he swings from side to side, but he will never earn either honest attachment or respect. All through the thirty years' duel of Francis and Charles, the power of England was courted by the party which for the moment felt itself weaker ; but when the balance began to incline the other 1 1 can only remember the Earl of Devon's sack of Exeter and the Earl of Wilts' plunder of Hungerford in 1459. 186 THE TUDORS AND THE CURRENCY way, Henry would find himself deserted by his friend of the moment, who felt that he had been supported merely because the balance of power required that he should not be reduced to too low a condition. England would then ally herself with her enemy of yesterday, and the whole process repeated itself again. In this endless alternation of wars Henry was enabled to spend two such hoards as had never before been in the hands of an English king— his father's savings and the plunder of the monasteries. When once Henry VII's accumulations were gone, and the long course of foreign wars entered upon, it became a mere matter of time to calculate in how many years Henry would be driven to desperate expedients to recruit his exchequer. From 1515 to 1523 he lived from hand to mouth on the proceeds of forced loans and benevo- lences. In the parliament of the latter year Wolsey calculated that to provide for the French war then in progress, it would be necessary to raise £800,000, by taking the fifth of every man's goods and land, to be paid in four years— a demand of unparalleled magnitude, as the king had already got two shillings in the pound by way of loan. Instead of his 20 per cent, tax, the Cardinal obtained only a grant of 5 per cent, for two years, and Henry's financial difficulties con- tinued to increase. The regime of benevolences commenced again, and the king was glad to get money in any manner devisable. In 1526 the coinage was for the first time in his reign made the subject of his experiments, though on a small scale compared to the gain which he afterwards made of it. On July 25 in that year a writ was issued : " To Thomas, Cardinal Archbishop of York, Legate a Latere of the See Apostolic, Primate of England, and Chancellor of the same," commanding him to carry into effect the king's desire for reducing his money, " and to determine its rate, value, fine- ness, lay, standard and print, as should by him and the Council be thought requisite." This lowering of the standard — unlike all the later experiments of Henry VHI — was not a deliberate attempt to debase the coinage of the realm for the king's benefit. It was only one of a hundred vain endea- THE TUDORS AND THE CURRENCY 187 vours to remedy a change in the ratio between gold and silver, by lessening the sterling contents of the coins of the metal which was at the moment appreciating. The causes given for the present lowering of the gold currency were the usual ones : there was an efflux of gold money from England, because, as the commissioners alleged, the English coins were so much better in quality than those of foreign princes " that they were taken abroad and melted in France and Flanders, the price of gold therein being rated so high that the money of the realm was transported thither by merchants, as well denizens as aliens." " Now the king had made requisition to several foreign princes for the reformation of their coins without effect. Also, he had commanded statutes against the export of money to be put in execution, yet nevertheless it was still secretly exported. Therefore, that gold and coin might remain and be plenteously brought into the kingdom, His Majesty deemed it necessary to make all money current within the realm to be of like price as it was valued at in foreign countries." The way His Majesty set to work on this laudable design was by proclaiming that in future the sovereign should be worth 22s. 6d, the half- sovereign lis. 3d., and the angel 7s. 6d. — instead of 20s., 10s., and 6s. 8d. respectively ; whereby every holder of coin found himself 12 per cent, richer, but every creditor, though receiving the same nominal amount, would receive only eight-ninths as much bullion. It is hardly necessary to remind ourselves that Henry was in the debtor class, not in the creditor class, at the time. Leaving his father's and his own early pieces to circulate at the very inconvenient rate newly affixed to them, Henry set to work to coin gold and silver at the 12 per cent, reduction : a " George noble " to pass for 6s. 8d., though it contained gold to the value of 5s. ll^d. alone of the old standard ; a gold crown, nominally 5s., but at the old value equal to 4s. 5%d. ; and silver shillings, which would equal 10§d. It is only fair to concede in Henry's justification that the difficulty of exchange which he pleaded as his excuse did really exist. Hall and Holinshed remind us that in the English coinage six angels, which weighed exactly an 188 THE TUDORS AND THE CURRENCY ounce, were exchangable for 40s., or 12 ounces of silver coin. But in Flanders, Zealand, and Brabant the Govern- ment would give silver coin to the weight of forty-four shillings, or 14| ounces of silver bullion, for the amount of gold con- tained in six English angels. It was therefore profitable to take English gold abroad, sell it for silver bullion, and bring that bullion back into England to be coined at the mint. Henry's fault lay in trying to be a bimetallist, to make both his gold and his silver coins worth their exact amount ; he could not see that the relative value of the two was continually changing, and that, unless he was pre- pared to alter their weight and fineness every few months, the equilibrium of gold and silver could not be kept up. There were several devices which he could have used with better effect from his own point of view : — (1) He might have left the silver coins at their old size and purity, and enhanced the nominal value of his gold coins, or " cried them up," as the phrase then was. (2) He might have left the names of his gold coins the same, but have put less gold into each, while leaving the silver unchanged. (3) He might have left the gold unchanged, but put more grains of silver into each of his shillings and groats. But all these would have been mere palliatives. It would have been too much to expect that Henry would take the only real remedial step — viz. to forbid all contracts in silver, refuse it when tendered for any sum over £1 or £2, and decline, if necessary, to coin it at the mint when presented in incon- venient quantities. As a matter of fact, by shifting the weight both of gold and silver, he established a momentary equilibrium in the exchange of gold and silver with Flanders, but committed himself to further difficulties in the near future. Henry further showed his ignorance of economical prin- ciples by " forbidding any person to raise the price of any wares and merchandise under colour of the money being enhanced." This practically meant that every one should take 12J per cent, less for that which he had to sell than he would have taken in 1523. THE TUDORS AND THE CURRENCY 189 Wolsey, having charge of the coinage of which we have been speaking, caused such of the groats as were struck at York to be stamped, by way of mint mark, with his cardinal's hat, a fact which was remembered against him when the articles of 1529 were exhibited. These charged him as fol- lows : " The said Lord Cardinal of his further pompous and presumptuous mind hath enterprised to join and imprint the Cardinal's hat under Your Majesty's arms in your coin of groats at your city of York, which like deed hath not as yet been seen to have been done by any subject within your realm before this time." This, however, even Henry's judges could not venture to wrest into an offence against any exist- ing law, as it was proved that many of those who had pre- viously been responsible for local mints had stamped their family badges, and notably the bishops of Durham their episcopal crosier, on the coins issued in their districts. Henry's depreciated coinage was followed by an immediate rise in the price of most staple commodities, in spite of his absurd ordinance to the contrary. The quarter of wheat averaged 6s. 5|