and rarely missed first nights, or when a play of one of his many
friends was produced. He loved a game--of cards or otherwise--and I
have seen him at Monte Carlo writhe because his exalted position
robbed him of the pleasure of a "flutter" at _trente-et-quarante_.
He was a real sportsman and a member of the Jockey Club.
I was greatly struck by a tribute the Lord Chief paid to an old
guest, a host and true friend of mine for many years, the late Sir
George Lewis. It was at the close of the {64} Parnell trial, when he
spoke to this effect: "The most remarkable attribute in George Lewis
is not his great knowledge of the law, not his unrivalled skill in
conducting difficult cases, not his wonderful tact, not his genius
for compromise. They are all beaten by his courage."
At a banquet given to Irving on his return from one of his tours in
the United States, I was seated next to Lord Russell, who, half-way
through the dinner, suddenly said to me: "I have to propose Irving's
health. What shall I say?" I replied that no one could answer the
question so well as himself. However, the Chief persisted, with that
well-remembered, imperious manner of his, "Come, come, my friend, you
must have done it often: tell me what I am to say." I recalled an
occasion when I had proposed Irving's health, and said that I spoke
of him as possessing "the strength of a man, the sweetness of a
woman, and the simplicity of a child." Lord Russell turned to me
with the question, "How about the wisdom of a serpent? I could not
have left that out."
[Sidenote: Alverstone, L. C. J.]
Lord Alverstone, so long known as "Dick" Webster, who succeeded
Russell, was Attorney-General, Master of the Rolls, and Lord Chief
Justice, all in the same year. It was as Attorney-General that
Webster dined with {65} me, and I paid a pleasant visit in his
company to the Isle of Wight (which he represented in the House of
Commons) to do him a small service.
I have always understood that he was a great worker: one of the gang,
like Francis Jeune and Rufus Isaacs, who could light a fire and brew
tea at any ghastly hour a.m.
Soon after he became Lord Chief, Alverstone presided at the Annual
Dinner of the Actors' Benevolent Fund. He made an eloquent appeal on
its behalf and generously headed the list of subscriptions. This was
not the only instance of the real interest he took in the drama,
being of great service when the old Covent Garden Theatre Fund came
to an end.
He was no mean athlete, and fond of all sports; also a capital
singer--a conspicuous figure for many years in the choir of the
church in the Kensington High Street.
I have had the privilege to know, but not to act as their host, all
the eminent lawyers who have held the office of Lord Chief Justice of
England since the Cockburn days: Coleridge, Reading, Trevethin and
Hewart.
The late Lord Esher, Master of the Rolls, my wife and I had the
pleasure to know well and to delight in his friendship and
hospitality. My acquaintance began when the Courts were {66} held in
Westminster Hall, and I was foreman of a jury before "Mr. Justice
Brett," in an interesting case, but troublesome to me, as it kept me
from important rehearsals.
In a New Year letter to my wife he addressed her as:
"DEAR FRIEND,--You are a very perplexing person to write to. If I
say 'Dear old friend' it won't do in every sense: because, although
you are an old friend, you are in looks and ways a young woman. If I
say 'Dear little friend,' it is a term of endearment--but you are a
very great person. However, I begin by wishing you both a very happy
year. If it is as prosperous as your goodness deserves I can wish
you in that respect no more. I cannot tell you how I chafed under
not being able to see you in _Money_; but in the mornings I was in
Court, and in the evenings did not venture out! Vile old age!! Lady
Esher went to see you, and told me she had never seen anything more
charming than you. With that I stop. My love to you both. Believe
me always a very true admirer and very truly yours."
Of all the judges I have known I think the imposing presence of Lord
Hannen on the Bench was second to none. His dignity appealed to me
enormously when, through the kindness {67} of the Bar, I attended
some of the sittings of the Parnell Commission. I remember my wife
saying to him at our table, when he was President of the Divorce
Court, that he seemed to her to pass too much of his life in
separating united couples. His answer was that he passed much more
of it in wondering why the couples had ever wished to be joined
together.
[Sidenote: James of Hereford]
I never knew much of Lord James of Hereford, but saw a good deal in
early days of Mr. Henry James, a successful self-made barrister who
had just taken silk, and was on the way to the great position he
reached.
He was one of a little coterie which included Lord Anglesey, ("P."),
Millais, Merewether, Q.C., Hare, "Willie" Mathews, one or two others,
and myself, who played, with great zest, an old-fashioned card
game--four-handed cribbage.
James was made Attorney-General, refused the Lord Chancellorship, and
became a Peer.
I remember his once saying: "Fame has no Present; Popularity no
Future."
One of our early legal friends was Baron Huddleston. When we first
met he was known as "the buck of the Bar," and always pleaded as
Counsel in black kid gloves. We owed to him and "Lady 'Di'" many
happy visits in {68} delightful company to the Grange at Ascot. He
had his vanities, and gloried in being written and spoken of as "The
Last of the Barons."
I was dining with Arnold Morley, at one time Postmaster General,
after Huddleston's funeral, when I "put my foot in it" more painfully
than ever in my life. The little company comprised: John Morley,
Herbert Gardner, afterwards Lord Burghclere, Sir Charles Dilke,
George Lewis, Henry Labouchere, and one other man whose name I
forget. During dinner Lewis said: "Oh! Bancroft, I saw by an
evening paper that you were among Huddleston's friends to-day, tell
us about his cremation; what is it really like?" Without thought I
let myself go and replied that when the coffin disappeared from view
Henry James (Lord James of Hereford) asked Sir Henry Thompson, the
pioneer and President of the new movement, if we could see any more.
Accompanied by Lord Falkland, we entered the inner compartment, so I
described what we there saw, it being remembered that cremation was
then in its infancy, adding that I revolted against the idea of
consigning the remains of a loved one to such a fate. As I spoke my
eyes fell upon Sir Charles Dilke, and I was conscious that his late
wife had been {69} so treated. It did not need the leer on
Labouchere's face to tell me so.
[Sidenote: St. Helier and Holker]
Lord St. Helier, who became President of the Divorce Court, was also
a kind friend of long standing. My wife and I first met him as
Francis Jeune, when he was just foreshadowing his successful career,
at the house of Lady St. Helier, Mrs. John Stanley then, and soon
afterwards we passed them in a carriage on the St. Gothard
Pass--before the days of its wonderful railway--when they were on
their honeymoon. He was a great authority on ritualistic and
ecclesiastical law generally and always a tremendous worker. He had
charming manners and was never ruffled--not even when he committed a
duchess to gaol. We enjoyed their hospitality in London and at
Arlington Manor. I have only one little objection to offer--I cannot
help a feeling of resentment against a judge, or, in fact, any
barrister, having a moustache and beard. It is not fair to the wig.
A dear friend of far-away days was Lord Justice Holker ("Sleepy
Jack"). I knew him first in my old Liverpool apprenticeship when he
was leader of the Northern Circuit and its legal giants. I saw him
once at the Assizes there stop a case for some minutes after
whispering to his clerk, who hurriedly left the court, {70} and
returned with Holker's snuff-box, which had been left in the
robing-room.
Later on he had a place in Yorkshire where he had happy
shooting-parties for his friends, but nothing would induce him to
fire a gun himself.
Another legal friend and welcome guest was Lord Justice Mathew, who
told us a pretty story of his witty fellow-countryman, Father Healy.
A young Englishwoman, who was his companion at a dinner party, asked
him, as there was no mistletoe in Ireland, what the girls and boys
did at Christmas-time without it. "Ah, if it's kissing you mean,"
the old priest answered, "they do it _under the_ rose!"
Mathew had a witty tongue of his own. No doubt, it will be
remembered by his legal friends that at the time Herschell was Lord
Chancellor, Arthur Cohen, a distinguished Q.C., quite looked to be
appointed to a puisne judgeship, which he did not get. When Mathew
heard of Cohen's resentment, he expressed surprise that his learned
friend expected anything else from Herschell but a Passover.
[Sidenote: Serjeant Ballantine]
I made acquaintance in my early professional days with Serjeant
Ballantine, always a pleasant and amusing companion, with a {71}
great love of the theatre. Throughout his life he was very Bohemian
in his tastes and habits. I remember him first at Evans's, a
music-hall of those days, in Covent Garden--it stood where
prize-fights now take place at the National Sporting Club--where
there was a noted choir of boys, and where "Paddy Green," the
manager, squeezed hot potatoes from their jackets with his napkin for
favoured guests.
Ballantine devoted himself entirely to criminal cases. He was a
great cross-examiner, but he found his equal in Serjeant Parry, who
had masterly power over a jury. Another of his rivals was the
distinguished advocate, Henry Hawkins, afterwards Lord Brampton, who
was known to be as rich as Ballantine was poor. In a robing-room on
one occasion Ballantine asked Hawkins what he was going to do with
all his money, adding that when he died he could not take it with
him, and that even if he could he feared it would melt.
Ballantine defended the impostor Arthur Orton, the "Claimant," in the
first Tichborne trial and professed belief in the genuineness of that
rascal. Later he was retained for the defence of the Gaekwar of
Baroda in India. He received for his services the largest fee then
{72} known, but he lost the bulk of it at Monte Carlo on his way home.
When I became acquainted with Frank Lockwood he was a young actor at
a seaside theatre. He did not, in the judgment of his comrades, show
much promise and wisely abandoned the stage as a career. I next met
him as a rising barrister at the house of the Kendals, with whom he
was on terms of close friendship, as he soon became with my wife and
me.
Lockwood was a brilliant caricaturist. His company was always a
delight. I remember an evening when he sat by me at dinner after he
had fought many a hard battle, and I asked if he were offered a
judgeship would he accept it. In a moment he answered, no; he loved
the fight too much. Soon afterwards, however, he had changed his
mind, longed for relief from the struggle and sighed for peace. It
was not to be. His health suddenly broke down, his strength was
failing, and he had to give in.
Frank Lockwood was a popular leader at the Bar, a genial Member in
the House, a perfect host, a welcome guest, a delightful companion, a
staunch friend.
[Sidenote: Montagu Williams]
The career of Montagu Williams was the most varied of any man I have
known. Both {73} his father and his grandfather were barristers.
After he left Eton, Montagu was for a time a schoolmaster; then
fired, I suppose, by the outbreak of the Crimean War, he entered the
Army. After peace was declared he resigned his commission and became
a member of a theatrical touring company with a well-known amateur of
those days, Captain Disney Roebuck. Next, on the advice, I believe,
of his godfather, Montagu Chambers, he resolved to go to the Bar.
During his studies he wrote for the Press, including Dickens's
_Household Words_. He also wrote plays, chiefly in collaboration
with his old friend and school companion at Eton, Frank Burnand. The
best of them was _The Isle of St. Tropez_, a really good drama, in
which Alfred Wigan played.
From the time Montagu was called by the Inner Temple there were few
important criminal cases in which he did not take a part--and very
quickly a prominent one. His great knowledge of every side of life
and quick grasp of things resulted in a large practice, and he
defended more scoundrels than any man of his day. Later on, he was
grievously afflicted by throat mischief, which ended in the saving of
his life at the cost of his voice, through a serious operation; he
could afterwards only speak in a whisper. He was, however, {74}
appointed a London police magistrate, in which work he again
distinguished himself, and soon became known as "the poor man's beak."
It was during the theatrical episode in his varied career that he
came across, and married, Louise, a daughter of two prominent and
respected early Victorian players, Mr. and Mrs. Keeley, whom I
remember seeing act so long ago as 1851, the year of the Great
Exhibition, when Robert Keeley was the partner of Charles Kean at the
old Princess's Theatre.
Louise Williams was gifted with a sweet voice and sang with charm. I
still seem to hear her exquisite rendering of Edgar Allan Poe's
words, which I can trust my memory to recall:
"And neither the angels in Heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee."
I can recall no man who enjoyed more universal popularity than
Douglas Straight; it began at Harrow and followed him throughout his
life. He never allowed his interests to become cramped: they
embraced the law, politics, journalism, sport, the drama and society.
He began as a journalist, was {75} Conservative M.P. for Shrewsbury,
and had a successful career at the Bar, which ended in a judgeship of
the High Court in India.
He had great social gifts, nowhere better proved than by my friend
Pett Ridge, who tells a story of his popularity with the fair sex,
that twelve ladies agreed to give a dinner at a fashionable
restaurant, the novelty on the occasion being that each of them was
to be responsible for one male guest. The whole dozen invited
Douglas!
[Sidenote: "Willie" Mathews]
I lost a close and affectionate friend in Charles Mathews, the Public
Prosecutor, whom I first knew in the sixties, when he was a little
chap at Eton and wore a turn-down collar. My next remembrance of him
is as the "baby" member of the Garrick Club, where, from the date of
his election, he was beloved. In those days "Willie" Mathews was
"devil" to Montagu Williams and working hard in his company and that
of Douglas Straight at the criminal bar, the scene of many triumphs
in his successful career. He was _persona grata_ wherever he went,
and in widely different circles, from Balmoral to Bohemia.
Charles Gill was another old friend. We saw more of him at his
beloved Birchington than in London. He was known in his Kentish home
as "The Mayor"--so christened, I {76} think, by his neighbour, that
modern Colossus who seems to be always striding between New York and
Leicester Square, the successful and erratic Frederick Lonsdale.
Gill was closely associated in early days with Straight and Mathews;
later in his brilliant career there was scarcely a sensational
criminal trial in which he did not play a leading part.
A very wise member of his profession only lately said that were any
friend of his in a difficulty that called for unerring judgment and
delicacy of handling his best advice would be: "Consult Charles Gill."
{77}
V
PAINTING: SCULPTURE: MUSIC
"So famous, so excellent in Art."
[Sidenote: Painting]
It is many years since, as my wife and I were leaving the Savoy
Theatre at the close of an afternoon performance of a Gilbert and
Sullivan opera, we were shocked by a newsboy shouting "Death of Lord
Leighton." We made Frederic Leighton's acquaintance in the
green-room of our theatre. Soon afterwards we dined at his beautiful
house in Kensington. In its neighbourhood there was a nest of his
comrades in art, including Val Prinsep, Luke Fildes and Marcus Stone.
We were friends for years: he did me the honour to propose me at the
Athenæum, but did not live to see me elected. He was a remarkable
and gifted man--an Admirable Crichton--painter, sculptor,
linguist--as well as an eloquent, if a somewhat florid, speaker, and
an admirable man of affairs, besides, as we actors say, having a
perfect appearance for his part. Was it not Thackeray who told him
once that Millais {78} was the only man with a chance against him for
the Presidency of the Royal Academy?
His beautiful art was best illustrated in his early days, I always
thought, by _The Slinger_ and the sculptured figure of an athlete
struggling with a python. I also remember well his life-like
portrait of the famous explorer, Sir Richard Burton.
[Sidenote: Millais]
In many respects a total contrast to Leighton was the successor to
his great office, John Everett Millais. I was fortunate in his
acquaintance at the Garrick Club when I was elected as a member
fifty-six years ago. Millais loved the club and cared but little for
any other.
Although looked upon as a Jerseyman, he chanced to be born at
Southampton, and I remember being told by a man--who was for many
years prompter under our management--that he had seen Millais, as a
very small boy, sprawling upon the stage of the Southampton theatre
and drawing with a piece of chalk things that had form and shape.
I don't know when he first came into fame and astounded the world by
the wonderful children of his brush and brain. Beautiful things teem
through the memory. I see the little creature, on a church bench,
listening to _The First Sermon_; a work of infinite pathos {79}
called _The Blind Girl_; Walter Raleigh on the shingly shore,
clutching his knees and absorbing the yarns of an old sea-dog; the
two nuns digging a grave for a comrade in _The Vale of Rest_; those
well-known masterpieces, _The Princes in the Tower_, _The Black
Brunswicker_ and _The Order of Release_. And then the gallery of
portraits--Tennyson, Newman, Gladstone, Bright and the unfinished
Disraeli. Others also crowd upon remembrance: those of my comrades,
Henry Irving and John Hare--not, in my judgment, among his best
examples,--of Arthur Sullivan--one of the very best,--and the great
surgeon, Henry Thompson, which, like the striking portrait of Mr.
Wertheimer by Sargent, as you look at it, seems that it might speak.
I see also the beautiful portraits of Mrs. Langtry and Mrs. Jopling
Rowe, but, alas! not one of my wife. I offered Millais a large sum
to paint one of her for me, but he declined, for two reasons; he said
that he could not bring himself to accept money from a brother
artist, and that he should fail, as the face would change while his
eyes turned even for a moment to the palette. One word to recall his
masterly landscapes, _Chill October_, and, if I remember their
attractive titles, _The Fringe of the Moor_ and _The Sound of Many
Waters_. Never in any man's work was {80} refinement more closely
merged with art. I see a fine photograph of him daily, if in London,
with an autograph in the corner, briefly accepting an invitation to
dinner in these words: "I'm your man." I looked down upon his
handsome features, as he was fading away from life, and kissed him.
[Sidenote: Poynter]
Edward Poynter succeeded to the President's chair, which had only
been occupied by Millais briefly. It was during his reign that I had
the honour at the Royal Academy Banquet to respond for the Drama: the
toast had only once been proposed before, when Irving replied. It
was a difficult task, and the greatness of the audience impressed me
with my own littleness. Wisely, I am sure, I limited myself to five
minutes only, and venture to give an extract from what I said:
"I was not unmindful that the proposal of this toast at that great
banquet was a mark of respect to the stage which could only make the
stage the more respect itself. I could not speak in that
room--surrounded as I was by the rulers in that fairyland--without
some attempt, however faint, to say that my admiration of the
beautiful art, so splendidly illustrated year by year upon those
walls, was as true as my love for the living pictures we players
tried to paint. Our pictures, alas! {81} died early, for the
greatest actor's work must be a passing triumph; it was not cut in
marble, nor did it live on canvas, but could only owe its fame to
written records and traditions. Vast wealth might keep for us, and
for the ages yet to come, the undying splendour of a Reynolds or a
Millais, but no sum could buy one single echo of the voice of Sarah
Siddons. The drama was the most winning, fascinating, alluring thing
that ever was conceived for the recreation of mankind. As England
could claim to be the parent of the drama in Europe, so could she
claim to be the mother of the greatest dramatist the world had owned,
whose mighty genius left all art in debt that never could be paid,
and whose works alone would make the stage eternal."
The pictures by Poynter which live clearest in my memory are his
_Catapult_ and _Visit to Æsculapius_. Concerning the latter work a
story "went the rounds"--possibly as untrue as many another--that two
beautiful sisters were as flattered by the eminent painter's wish to
make drawings of their heads as they were horrified to find them
reproduced upon bodies of well-known models in the nude.
Poynter painted a portrait of himself for the Uffizi Gallery as
Millais did. There is an {82} admirable copy of this portrait in his
beloved Garrick.
I was never really intimate with Alma Tadema, although I knew him for
many years, beginning with the time when he lived in Regent's Park.
Owing to an explosion of gunpowder on the canal there, if my memory
is accurate, his house was wrecked and he went to live in the Grove
End Road, in a house formerly occupied by Tissot, a French artist,
who had quite a vogue for a time. Tadema translated the house into
"a thing of beauty and a joy for ever," where he entertained a great
artistic company, worthy to be surrounded by the _Roses of
Heliogabalus_.
I owe the following painful and remarkable story to my friend Aston
Webb, lately President of the Royal Academy; it was told to him and
others by Tadema. A young woman, an American, the daughter of
parents of wealth and position, was the cause of great anxiety to her
father and mother, to her intimate friends, and to her doctor, on the
score of health, which puzzled all concerned, and became a mystery
which no one seemed able to unravel. At last the doctor was driven
to advise a year's absence from home and its surroundings by a trip
to Europe, to be spent where and how the girl might wish, in the
companionship of a {83} female friend--she had no sisters, and the
parents could not leave their own country at the time.
[Sidenote: Sargent]
The patient went first to London and enjoyed her stay there. During
it, she conceived a strong wish to be painted by her eminent
fellow-countryman, Sargent, the magician who reveals unknowingly what
have been hidden mysteries. The portrait when finished was highly
thought of and presently despatched to the parents of the sitter,
while she went her way to Switzerland and Italy. The great artist's
work delighted the father and mother. An "at home" was arranged that
their many friends might share their admiration. All of this took
place; among the invited guests being the friendly doctor who had
been so puzzled by the condition of his patient. I will come briefly
to the sad sequel. The doctor gazed at the portrait long and
earnestly: he left the house perturbed and saddened. On the
following day he sought an interview with the father, told him that
Sargent had revealed to him, beyond doubt, what he had failed to
discover himself. Put briefly, the poor girl afterwards died in a
madhouse. When Tadema had finished his story, Abbey, who was also
present, quietly remarked: "All too true. I could tell you the names
of those concerned."
{84}