Liverpool is about six miles long by about three broad, the area being

13,236 acres. It has a population of 686,332 within boundaries less than

half the size of Berlin or Paris. But it comprised only 5,210 acres in

1895. In that year, feeling cramped, Liverpool annexed an area of 8,026

acres. Of the total area, there is comprised 772-1/2 acres of parks and

gardens.

[Illustration: PEKING COMPARED WITH LONDON.]

Peking, as we may see, is a walled city of oblong shape, and contains a

total area of about thirty square miles. The two chief divisions are

known as the Tartar city and the outer or Chinese city. The population

is now about 1,000,000. Writing twenty years ago Sir Robert Douglas

thought that a population of a mere million was "out of all proportion

to the immense area enclosed within its walls. This disparity," he

continued, "is partly accounted for by the fact that large spaces,

notably in the Chinese city, are not built over, and that the grounds

surrounding the Imperial Palace private residences are very extensive."

What would he have said of Chicago, New York, Budapest, or, indeed, of

any modern capital "expanded"? To us, at the beginning of the twentieth

century, a million inhabitants seems a very respectable population

indeed for a city of only thirty square miles, and in this respect we

can no longer sneer or be astonished at the "peculiarities" of Oriental

cities.

[Illustration: BOSTON COMPARED WITH LONDON.]

Boston is one of the older and more conservative American cities which

have lately been seized by the expansion fever, and now proudly refers

to its "Greater Boston." But this is as yet only a term, and the new

Boston metropolitan district, embracing all the area within a circle of

ten miles from the State House, is hardly yet a distinct municipality.

It will doubtless soon come about, and in that case twenty-two towns and

cities will be taken to the bosom of "the Hub," and the total population

will be close upon a million and a quarter. At present the area of the

city is over thirty-seven square miles (24,000 acres), or just the size

of Chicago a decade ago, of which 2,308 acres are common open spaces and

126 acres ponds and rivers, in addition to numerous squares, gardens,

and playgrounds. The length of the city is eight miles and its greatest

breadth about seven miles.

[Illustration: COMPARED WITH LONDON.--THE SOLID BLACK AREA REPRESENTS

THE ACTUAL BUILDINGS OF CHICAGO; THE GREY AREA COMPLETING

THE ADMINISTERED CITY.]

Exactly one hundred years ago the American Government built Fort

Dearborn, on Lake Michigan. In 1831 there was a village of one hundred

people on the site; to-day the city of Chicago has spread out (rather

too generously, its rival municipalities think) until it comprises

190-1/2 square miles and a population of 1,698,575. But only some

seventy square miles of this area is improved, and less than fifty miles

built upon. As there are also 2,232 acres of parks and open spaces,

Chicago cannot be said to be overcrowded; especially when one remembers

the great height of most of the buildings in the business quarter.

Chicago's expansion, in truth, follows the lines laid down by the early

Western boom "cities," which were prairie wilderness one week, were

surveyed the next, had a population of twelve, one man to the square

mile, and applied for a charter the week following, and elected a Mayor

and Corporation. The next week the boom was over and a mere shanty

remained to mark the site of Boomopolis.

[Illustration: NEW YORK COMPARED WITH LONDON, THE SOLID BLACK AREA

REPRESENTING THE ACTUAL BUILDINGS, THE GREY AREA

COMPLETING THE ADMINISTERED CITY.]

Before 1898 the city of New York lay partly on Manhattan Island, a long

and narrow strip of land at the head of New York Bay, thirteen miles

long and twenty-two square miles in area, and partly, although to a very

trifling extent so far as population was concerned, north of the Harlem

River, and on several small islands in the bay and East River. The total

area was forty-two square miles, within which was a population of

1,515,301 souls. But in the aforementioned year the great arms of the

city flung themselves out and gathered to its bosom so many of the

outlying parts and people as to bring the total area of Greater New York

up to 307 square miles, and the population to 3,437,202. It must be

confessed that much of this huge municipal territory has been rather

irrelevantly brought in--especially Staten Island (area 57.19 square

miles), which is separated from New York proper by the width of the bay.

But, on the other hand, other and nearer towns, such as Jersey City and

Hoboken, were excluded, for the reason that they were in another State.

Within Greater New York are included 6,766 acres of parks and open

spaces, which is but little more than half that of London; yet the

proportion of unoccupied land not under the control of the city is, of

course, many times as great. The actual agglomeration of buildings in

Greater New York--excluding Staten Island--covers barely 51,000 acres,

or eighty square miles, as is shown in the diagram. Less than 5,000

acres is built upon in Staten Island.

_Some Novel Banquets._

BY THEODORE ADAMS.

The art of him who prepares the banquet has reached, in these latter

days, a distinction of novelty which might reasonably make the

gastronomer of fifty years ago hold up his knife and fork in wonder. It

is a novelty born of the desire for change. No longer does the

dinner-giver merely prepare, with the aid of his costly _chef_, the menu

for his guests and the viands on it. He--or, more properly, she, because

of the present prominence of the fair hostess--tries not only to set a

pretty table with flowers and cutlery of gold. The giver of dinners is

ever thinking of that which will make the banquet memorable to the

guest, and, in some cases, even wonders what the Press will say about

it. This means to lie awake at night, and in such nightly vigils many

wondrous things have been evolved.

Thus we have come to hear of banquets under conditions that make the

imagination reel, and arouse speculation as to what the dinner of the

twenty-first century will be like. When thirty-two people sat about on

horseback a year ago, in a temporary stable, eating from dishes handed

to them by waiters dressed as grooms, it seemed as if the top notch of

_bizarrerie_ had been reached. But, as the German says, _noch nicht_.

[Illustration: A HORSEBACK DINNER IN A HOTEL BALLROOM, THE TABLES

BEING CARRIED IN FRONT OF THE SADDLES.

_From a Photo. by Byron._]

This remarkable horseback dinner was given in the great ballroom at

Sherry's by Mr. C. K. G. Billings, of New York, and, as it was intended

to celebrate the construction of a new stable, the rumour went round

that the banquet would be held in the structure itself. The guests,

however, met at Sherry's, and were escorted to a small banquet room,

where a long table, in the form of an ellipse, was lavishly banked with

flowers. The centre space was occupied by a stuffed horse, which cast

his glass eyes curiously upon the assembly as the oysters and caviare

were served. So convinced were the guests that this was the real and

much-talked-about equestrian dinner that their surprise was great when

they were asked to follow their host into an adjoining room.

"Here," according to the report of one who was at this famous banquet,

"there had taken place an amazing transformation, for the decoration,

the waxed floors, and everything of the world of indoors had been

obliterated. A space sixty-five by eighty-five feet in the centre of the

room had been enclosed by scenery. The guests were in a land of winding

roadways, of brooks which coursed through green meadows, and of giant

elms. There were cottages, vine-covered, and at the edge of a country

estate was a porter's lodge. Far away stretched fields of grain. Over

all was the blaze of a summer sun, for above in a vault of blue were

strung electric lights. On all sides was the country, and in the middle

of the room, rising in a pyramid, were geraniums, daisies, and roses,

all blooming as if in the air of June. Above them a palm formed the apex

of a pyramid thirty feet at the base. The floor was covered with long,

velvety grass. Around the centrepiece were arranged thirty-one horses

waiting for their riders. Mr. Billings's mount stood near the door,

gazing into the geranium bed. How the steeds got up to the ballroom is

no mystery in these days of large lifts, and they were well-trained

horses, who cared not for lights and unusual conditions. Each guest

found his mount by means of a horseshoe-shaped card attached to the

saddle of the horse, just as he had been guided to his seat at the

preliminary banquet by means of the bits of Bristol-board at each

cover."

Between every two horses there was placed a carpet-covered block, from

which the diners swung into their saddles, where, from little tables

placed upon the pommels, they ate their splendid dinner. The horses

showed little nervousness. Their trappings were yellow and gold, making

pretty contrast with the costumes of the servants, who wore trousers of

white buckskin, scarlet coats, and boots with yellow tops. Towards the

end of the feast the horses were treated with a consideration due to

their efforts, for a turkey-red fence surrounding the floral pyramid was

discovered by the guests to contain feeding-troughs in which had been

placed a plentiful quantity of superior oats. After dinner the horses

were taken from the room by the grooms, small tables and chairs were

brought in, and the guests sat down to an after-dinner chat as if in a

beautiful garden.

[Illustration: A DINNER OF THE NEW YORK EQUESTRIAN CLUB, THE TABLE

REPRESENTING A HORSE'S HEAD.

_From a Photo. by Byron._]

The horse has figured in a less ambitious, though perhaps quite as

attractive, manner at the dinners of the Equestrian Club, which meets in

New York during the winter once a month. For one of these banquets was

arranged a rural scene with trees, shrubs, and beautiful beds of tulips

and hyacinths, the whole floor being covered with stage grass. The table

represented a horse's head, chairs being placed around the neck, while

the head proper of the horse was a mass of flowers, with eyes, nose, and

mouth displayed by means of ornamental and many-coloured flowers. The

bridle, particularly, stood out strongly in brilliant red. The menu was

formed in the shape of a horse's head, with a small bit and bridle made

of leather and steel attached to it.

[Illustration: A DINNER INSIDE AN EASTER EGG.

_From a Photo. by Byron._]

The use of effective scenery at such functions is growing more common.

Perhaps the most effective use to which it was ever put was at the Proal

banquet of April, 1903, when thirty-five ladies dined within a monster

Easter egg. The egg itself towered to the top of Sherry's ballroom and

extended almost to the outer walls. Outside the egg was represented a

farm on which chickens, ducks, geese, rabbits, pigs, lambs, and

guinea-pigs disported to the life--for they were really live. The

ballroom had been turned into a fine landscape, with scenes representing

fields and pastures, with flowing brooks near by, and farmhouses,

windmills, and hayricks in the distance. One or two mirrors reflected

parts of this landscape, which had been arranged to express that longing

for "green fields and pastures new" which comes to all who live a city

life when spring appears.

In every respect the farm was true to life. A farmer with blue overalls

and smock passed in front of the guests, followed by a flock of geese.

Pigs ran between his legs, and the spring lamb frisked upon the green.

Rabbits munched their carrots until, timid at the sight of strange

people, they hid themselves in the straw which lay about. Around were

scattered the implements of labour, as if the farmers had just left

their work. There were scythes, mowing-machines, milk-pails, and

milking-stools to be seen. Every detail, in fact, had been thought of

necessary to make the illusion complete, and the guests--all of whom had

been kept in ignorance until they came into the room--were justly

astonished at the sight.

The egg itself, with its shell of white, was geometrically perfect, and

brought to mind the famous tale of Sindbad and the gigantic roc. The

shell was fashioned with light timber bands bent to the required shape,

and the supports were covered with green, all making a delightful

arbour-like effect. The table was oval in form, hollowed in the centre,

within which were floral decorations representing the white and yellow

of an egg. Daffodils and jonquils were used for the yolk, while lilies,

candytuft, and other white flowers were freely used. The air was filled

with fragrance from these blooms. Mrs. Proal sat at the head of the

ornamental table, with her guests around the oval. Music was provided by

a band of negro musicians, who, seating themselves on wooden benches

outside the dining-room, sang plantation melodies. The waiters were

dressed as farm-labourers in gaily coloured shirts and smocks, with

wisps of straw upon their heads. Fortunate, indeed, were the thirty-five

women who took part at this unique banquet, for the farm and its giant

egg had come into existence only for a single day, to be destroyed when

luncheon was ended and its use was over.

[Illustration: THE GUESTS OF THE KETTLE CLUB DINNER WITH THE KETTLE IN

WHICH THEY DINED.

_From a Photo. by Byron._]

We already begin to see in these dinners the existence of a new form of

humour. This is shown even better in the so-called "babies' dinner"

given at Sherry's by a Philadelphia organization called the Kettle Club.

This club, composed of gentlemen who summer in the Adirondack Mountains,

and who eat their forest meals round a vast and fragrant kettle,

recently decided to admit five new members, or "babies." The only

condition of candidacy was that the "babies" should show due

appreciation of the honour conferred upon them. The result was a banquet

such as had never been held before. To it were invited the older members

of the club. The ballroom resembled a forest glade. Round the walls were

painted forests with real trees in the foreground, to one of which was

hitched a hunting-horse. The scenic effects included a dark blue cloth

which represented a sky, with a moon in the distance and twinkling

stars. In the centre of the room rested on a tall mound a huge kettle,

twenty-five feet high and twenty-eight feet in diameter, with a door at

one side reached by a rustic stairway. There was a circular table within

the kettle, around which sat the guests, each with a wine "cooler" at

his side.

In the centre of the table, perfectly dark when dinner began, was a bed

of tall flowers on the floor, nine feet below. Suddenly, when this hole

was lighted, was revealed a magnificent display of orchids, with a vine

of pale purple flowers. Below sat a negro with a banjo, who sang and

played throughout the evening for the pleasure of the guests. The menu

card showed a picture of the kettle, into which five babies were

climbing, the faces of these being those of the five new members, each

with a teething ring, a nursing bottle, and a rattle. Souvenirs of the

occasion were given to the guests in the form of small kettles, each

with the name of the guest and the club motto, "Take the Kettle,"

painted on the side. This same inscription appeared on the structure in

which the banquet took place, as shown in our illustration. Here we may

note the part which the backcloth played at this noteworthy function.

[Illustration: THE OLD GUARDS' "MOCK-MENU" DINNER.

_From a Photo. by Byron._]

Another novel dinner was that given by a well-known New Yorker, Colonel

O'Brien, to the Old Guard of Delmonico's, known to fame as the guard

that "dines but never surrenders." For this affair two menus had been

provided, one as a joke, the other for consumption. The mock bill of

fare contained a list of dishes which _might_ have been provided. For

example, under the heading of oysters were the words "half shell," which

the waiters solemnly set before the assembled gentlemen, minus the

bivalves. These being removed made way for the next item, which, being

"cream of celery" and presumably a soup, was found to be small tubes of

celery with cold cream inside. Through all the regular courses the joke

was carried, with amusing success, the joint being spring lamb with

"string," or French, beans. What was the astonishment of the guests to

find served for this course a woolly toy lamb on a spring, which

squeaked when pressed, and wore dried beans on a string around its neck!

The humour of the dinner came with the continued surprise at the

ingenuity shown by the preparer of the feast, and it can be truly said

that each item tickled the guests immensely. With the woolly lambs this

band of gastronomers were especially pleased, and it was at the moment

when these ridiculous toys were handed round to the well-proportioned

diners that our photograph was secured.

[Illustration: THE "LYRE DINNER," THE TABLE BEING

IN THE FORM OF A LYRE.

_From a Photo. by Byron._]

A few years ago Mr. Sherry himself was returning with the _impresario_,

Maurice Grau, from Europe, and as the result of a wager upon the ship's

"run" Mr. Grau was given a splendid dinner. It is now known in

gastronomic history as the "lyre dinner," for the table was arranged in

the form of an enormous lyre. Long gilded ropes covered with pretty

vines represented the strings, while, to carry out the idea of the

instrument, there was a golden cloth on the inner side of the table.

Into this were woven mauve orchids, with electric lights sparkling under

the green leaves, thus bringing out sufficient brilliancy to please the

guests and not to affect their eyesight. Between each two seats of the

table was a wine "cooler," sunk into the wood in such a way that the

neck only of each champagne bottle showed above the edge. The banquet

was attended by those best known to music in New York, and its

brilliancy has probably never been surpassed.

_A Doubtful Case._

BY MRS. EGERTON EASTWICK (PLEYDELL NORTH).

When, in the year 189-, a weakness of the throat prevented me from

preaching for a time, I had considerable difficulty in persuading Allan

Fortescue to take my place in the pulpit.

He had been amongst us rather more than two years; and although an

ordained priest in the Church of England, and a man of considerable

ability, was without preferment, and, apparently, content to remain so.

How came it, I often wondered, that he stayed on in our quiet village,

with no apparent interest or occupation in life beyond his garden and

his books?

Nor, when he at length consented to my proposal and preached his first

sermon in Stony Lea, was my perplexity lessened. His diction was that of

a classical scholar, but his words were also the outpouring of a

sensitive, warm-hearted man; I could have fancied that in these

impersonal utterances he sought compensation for years of enforced

silence and isolation.

He had attracted me from the first. Manly, genial, but strangely

reserved, Sir Lewin Maxwell and myself were, I believe, the only

visitors who had gained admittance to his cottage.

When I so far induced him to change his habits as to help me with my

weekly sermons Sir Lewin Maxwell was abroad. He had left Stony Lea for

the Riviera in November, and now, early in May, the fact of his marriage

had just been announced. No particulars, however, concerning the bride

had reached us, and the appearance of the newly-married couple at the

Hall was looked for with much interest and curiosity. They did not come

until June, and then, by the express desire of Sir Lewin, were met by no

demonstration of any kind; indeed, no one, I believe, except the steward

and myself knew the exact date or hour at which they were to be

expected.

On the Sunday following their arrival, therefore, glances were turned

with some eagerness towards the Hall pew, but it was occupied only by a

stout, elderly lady, who could not assuredly be Sir Lewin's

newly-married wife.

No sooner, on that day, had Allan Fortescue in due course mounted the

pulpit than I became aware of something amiss. From my position in the

chancel I could not see his face, but the pause which preceded his

announcement of a text was just long enough to cause uneasiness, and his

voice, when at length he broke the silence, was harsh and unnatural,

although, when once fairly started, he spoke with even more than his

usual fervour.

When I reached the sacristy after the service Fortescue had already

left, and as I was preparing to follow him I was accosted by the lady

whom I had seen in the squire's pew.

[Illustration: "SHE TURNED TO ME AND INQUIRED WHETHER I WAS

AWARE OF THE TRUE CHARACTER OF THE MAN."]

My visitor's comely, good-tempered face was flushed with heat and

nervous indignation. After abruptly closing the sacristy door upon the

two of us she turned to me and inquired whether I was aware of the true

character of the man I had admitted to my pulpit, adding that it was

with the greatest difficulty she had refrained from walking out of the

church.

Somewhat startled, I asked for further explanation, whereupon she gave

me, at considerable length, the particulars I will here try to relate as

concisely as possible.

It seemed that about five years previously Allan Fortescue had been

engaged as resident tutor to Mrs. Llewellyn's only son, and in that

capacity had accompanied the family to Llidisfarn, a solitary,

old-fashioned place in Wales. The house was occupied for the greater

part of the year by a gardener and his wife as caretakers; but during

the residence of their mistress these people retired to their own

cottage. Mrs. Llewellyn brought with her two old and faithful

servants--both women. Her party further included her niece and ward,

Edith Graham, now Sir Lewin Maxwell's wife. The evening of her arrival

Mrs. Llewellyn retired early to her room and to bed. The latter was an

antiquated four-poster; the canopy had been removed for the sake of air,

but the curtains remained, and on the night in question, the weather

being boisterous and the room draughty, had been drawn so as to have

only a small opening at the foot. Before retiring Mrs. Llewellyn had

taken from her travelling-bag an ebony and silver casket which contained

some valuable diamonds. She had intended placing the casket in an iron

safe near the head of the bed, but had found the lock rusty from disuse;

consequently, being exceedingly tired, and believing there could be no

fear of burglars in this quiet and remote place, she left the casket on

the dressing-table.

The dressing-table faced the door of the room, and to cross from one to

the other it was necessary to pass the foot of the bed.

[Illustration: "A FIGURE CARRYING A SMALL READING-LAMP PASSED

THE APERTURE."]

In the dead of the night Mrs. Llewellyn awoke, feeling sure that someone

was stirring in the room, and, as she became more fully conscious, saw

on the ceiling above her a dim reflection of light. Almost at the same

moment a figure carrying a small reading-lamp passed the aperture

between the curtains at the foot of the bed, going towards the door, and

she recognised, to her amazement, the tutor, Allan Fortescue. She

described herself as being too surprised and terrified to call out; it

seemed but a moment before the door was closed and she was in darkness

and alone. Then she struck a light, sprang from the bed, and went to the

dressing-table. The ebony casket was gone. Even then she gave no alarm.

Except her son and Allan Fortescue, only women were in the house; and

she reflected that it would be safer and wiser to wait until the

morning. That the thief should dispose of the diamonds during the night

was virtually impossible. Also the circumstances were otherwise

peculiar. Allan Fortescue was at that time the avowed admirer of Miss

Graham, and for her sake an open scandal was, if possible, to be

avoided.

The following morning, however, after hours of sleepless anxiety, Mrs.

Llewellyn summoned the tutor to the study, made her accusation, and

demanded the return of her property.

He did not attempt either to explain or deny his presence in her room

during the night, but appeared to treat the idea of theft as a ludicrous

jest, and stoutly maintained that the jewels were not in his possession.

During the altercation which followed Miss Graham entered, and Fortescue

at once explained the situation.

Apparently to his surprise, Miss Graham took the affair very seriously,

and seemed to feel that the evidence against him was overwhelming. She

pleaded, however, so piteously that for her sake he might be spared from

public disgrace that Mrs. Llewellyn finally consented to allow him to

leave the house, upon the understanding that he should seek no further

intercourse with any member of the family, and that he should never

again undertake the duties either of a clergyman or a tutor. Under these

circumstances he at last seemed to realize the seriousness of his

position; he went away that morning, maintaining towards the end an

obstinate silence. The most rigorous search, made at his own request,

among his possessions failed to reveal the diamonds, which, indeed, had

never since been heard of.

I also gathered that, although made fully aware of the penalty to be

incurred by any breach of the conditions named, he had steadily refused

to bind himself as to his future.

That afternoon, as soon as I was at leisure, I walked down to Allan

Fortescue's cottage.

Shocked and distressed as I was at the story, I felt many points in it

needed clearing up, and was inwardly assured that, if he would, he had

the power to explain the whole matter satisfactorily.

He opened the door himself.

"I know," he said, abruptly, before I could speak, "why you have come.

Mrs. Llewellyn was with you this morning; I saw her rustling up towards

the sacristy. Don't let charity bring you any farther."

I signed to him to let me come in.

"We can't talk on the doorstep," I said. "Of course, it is all a

mistake."

He let me come to the study; then, as he closed the door behind me, he

said:--

"There is no mistake. I was there--in her room that night. She saw me."

"You were not there to take the diamonds," I persisted.

"I was not there to steal the diamonds; I will own so much."

"In that case, who did steal them, if stolen they were? No pains should

have been spared at the time to discover the actual thief. Even now it

might not be too late, if you would only account for your presence in

the room."

"The actual thief----" He began restlessly to pace the floor. "What if I

were to say that I took the diamonds--with my own hands?"

"I should answer that you must have been in some way unconscious of your

actions."

My confidence seemed to touch him; he looked at me, and for a moment I

hoped I was to gain some enlightenment; then he said, slowly:--

"I was never in my life more completely master of myself. And now there

must be an end of my confessions."

I saw that to question him further would be useless, and shortly

afterwards took my leave. As we parted he grasped my extended hand.

"I owe you an apology," he said, "for having brought this annoyance upon

you, and I don't know how to thank you for your patience with me."

A few days later an invitation reached me to dine at the Hall. Any

intercourse between Allan Fortescue and Sir Lewin Maxwell had inevitably

ceased. Sir Lewin, not unnaturally, accepted Mrs. Llewellyn's view of

the case, but he did not quarrel with me for taking my own line, and

young Lady Maxwell seemed almost grateful for my belief in the possible

innocence of her old lover. She was a most charming woman, with an

habitually sweet and gracious manner, rendered only more attractive, I

at first thought, by a variableness of mood which brought suggestion of

possible storms.

An accomplished musician, her talent made a link between us. Often,

indeed, during the earlier part of our intercourse she became associated

in my mind with the harmonies of Beethoven, whose creations she rendered

with remarkable skill and feeling. Later, however, I noticed an increase

of nervous restlessness, an expression in her eyes as of some haunting,

eager desire, little in keeping with the works of the master, which,

however full of variety, are to my mind always instinct with a great

satisfaction and repose.

For some time I was inclined to attribute these signs of disturbance to

the neighbourhood of Allan Fortescue, and to think that he would have

done well to leave the village. But, so far as I could see, he

studiously avoided all chance of encounter with any of the Hall party;

and, without definite reason, I had not the heart to suggest that he

should become once more a wanderer.

In this way some few months passed without noticeable event. Sir Lewin,

I thought, at times looked careworn and more aged than the passage of

months would justify, but he seemed, if possible, more entirely devoted

to his wife than in the earlier days of their marriage. Then, one Monday

afternoon early in April, as I was riding homewards from visiting an

outlying district, a curious thing happened.

My way led me through Oxley Dell, a piece of road bordered on each side

by Sir Lewin's woods, through which to the right a bridle-path leads by

a short cut to Stony Lea. The path and immediate neighbourhood are but

little frequented, owing to an old story of a murder and a subsequent

ghost.

[Illustration: "A WOMAN SUDDENLY APPEARED FROM AMONG THE TREES."]

As I neared the Dell I saw Allan Fortescue tramping along the road in

front of me, but before I could overtake him he turned aside into the

bridle-path. There I presently followed, and had him once more in view,

when a woman suddenly appeared from among the trees and accosted him.

Allan raised his hat, and the two walked on together; the meeting had

the air of an appointment.

Having no wish to play the spy I turned my pony's head, but I was ill at

ease. The tall, graceful figure of the woman, enveloped though it was in

a long rain-coat, had been ominously familiar, and as I jogged slowly

homewards I resolved that I would call that evening on Allan and have

the matter out with him.

I found him in better spirits than usual, but when I explained my errand

he seemed somewhat disconcerted.

"Ah! you saw us," he said, and bent to knock the ashes from his pipe;

then added, "You are sure, I suppose, of the identity of the lady?"

"As sure as it is possible to be without having seen her face to face."

"Still, you might be utterly mistaken. Would it not be better, for the

sake of--the lady chiefly concerned in your mind--to give her the

benefit of the doubt?"

His eyes met mine fully, I answered question with question.

"Do you think you are dealing fairly with me? Strictly speaking, perhaps

this is no affair of mine, and yet----"

"And yet you have been extraordinarily good to me, and deserve that I

should be open with you. I can only ask you to trust me a little

farther; to believe that the meeting you witnessed to-day cannot

possibly injure the lady you are thinking of except through your

interference, and that it was as far removed from being of a sentimental

nature as though I had met my grandmother."

The Friday following this interview I received a visit from the squire;

he looked ill and harassed.

"I am vexed," he said, "about Edith. She went to town for a day's

shopping on Wednesday and has not returned. She was to lunch with Mrs.

Llewellyn and come back for dinner. She has frequently made these little

excursions of late. In the evening, however, I got a telegram to say she

was detained by the dressmaker, and yesterday morning a letter to the

same effect. This morning I had no letter, but half an hour ago I met

General Anson--he had just arrived by the three o'clock train. He told

me that he had seen Edith having lunch at Franconi's with Fortescue.

They did not see him--his table was behind theirs--but as he left the

room he passed close to them and heard Fortescue say, 'To-night, then,

without fail, by the seven-thirty.' 'So,' the old man went on, 'I

suppose Lady Maxwell comes down to-night, and Mr. Fortescue is to escort

her. I thought there was a coolness--that he was under a cloud.' I

laughed, and told him it was a case of mistaken identity."

"And Fortescue?"

"He went to London yesterday; I happen to know that."

I must here mention that Stony Lea, although but a small village in

Kent, has a good train service, and is but an hour's run from town. I

looked at my watch. It was barely four o'clock. "Why not," I said, "go

up to town by the four-forty-five, and travel down yourself with Lady

Maxwell when she is prepared to come? You could be in Belgrave Road

before six o'clock."

"Will you come with me?" he asked.

I consented; and by 6.30 we were in Belgrave Road.

Mrs. Llewellyn's house had an empty, uninhabited air, and the servant

who came to the door said his mistress had been out of town for a few

days. Lady Maxwell had been staying there during the week. She had

driven out in the morning and not returned until four o'clock; then,

after a cup of tea, she had gone out again, walking; she had said she

was leaving town that evening, and would return about half-past six in a

cab for various parcels that were awaiting her.

"Quite so," Sir Lewin said; "she is travelling down with me. I will wait

for her here," and he walked straight into the drawing-room, whither I

followed him. The room opened into the hall. Presently a hansom drove

up; Lady Maxwell got out and entered the house with a latch-key. Sir

Lewin moved towards the door of the room as though intending to meet

her, when the arrival of another cab made him pause and look round. Lady

Maxwell ran lightly upstairs; the door was ajar and I heard the

swish-swish of her skirts. The second cab was a four-wheeler; Fortescue

descended from it, and the electric bell of the front door tingled

persistently in the silence of the house. Then we heard him asking for

Lady Maxwell, and almost before the servant could reply Sir Lewin was on

the doorstep. Fearful of what might ensue I followed him from the room;

I saw him touch Fortescue on the shoulder, and Allan's start of surprise

and, apparently, dismay; then the two men entered the hall together.

"Now," said Sir Lewin, "kindly explain your presence here and your

business with my wife."

Allan's answer was unexpected.

"I think," he said, quietly, "I will leave that to Lady Maxwell

herself."

They had spoken so far in low tones and with outward calm; now Sir Lewin

muttered angrily some words which I could not hear, and raised his arm.

[Illustration: "SIR LEWIN MUTTERED ANGRILY SOME WORDS WHICH I

COULD NOT HEAR, AND RAISED HIS ARM."]

I stepped forward.

"Come into the drawing-room," I said hurriedly in his ear. "Don't make a

public scene."

He shook me off, but at that moment another and more importunate voice

intervened.

"My dear Lewin, you here? How exceedingly fortunate! Now we need not

rush for that seven-thirty train; you and dear Edith can stay to

dinner."

There was a darkening of the doorway, a rustle of garments, and Mrs.

Llewellyn advanced with outstretched hands.

Sir Lewin stared in blank amazement. Allan smiled.

"I was in the cab," went on the lady, "waiting for Edith. Mr. Fortescue

kindly drove with me from the station, and I had intended to travel down

with her, trusting, my dear Lewin, to your hospitality to put me up for

the night. I am so sorry I have been unable to return before, to be with

the dear child all the time."

She had talked us all to the drawing-room door.

"I still quite fail to see," began Sir Lewin, stiffly, "how Mr.

Fortescue----"

"I will explain," said Lady Maxwell. She had come down the stairs

unheard, and now advanced towards us. Her face was as white as the gown

she wore, her eyes looked wild and startled. "Come with me," she added

to Sir Lewin, and led the way to a small back room. He followed her

without a word.

"Pay the cab," said Mrs. Llewellyn, cheerfully, to the servant, "and

bring all those packages in. Sir Lewin and Lady Maxwell will remain to

dinner. Mr. Greyling and Mr. Fortescue, please come in, and let me offer

you some refreshment."

She moved towards the dining-room and, the door being safely closed,

fell gasping into a chair. There was wine upon the side-board; Allan

poured some into a glass and brought it to her. She sighed heavily as

she took it. "How all this is to end, Heaven only knows!"

"I think," said Allan, "there is nothing further for me to do. If you

will allow me I will bid you good-night."

She looked at him curiously, the wineglass half-way to her lips.

"Can you," she said, "trust your vindication to us?"

"Entirely. It has come to be the last thing I think about," he answered,

sadly; "and, if she may in any degree be spared, I beg that it may be

the very last thing in your mind also."

A few minutes later Allan and I left the house. We dined in town and

travelled back to Stony Lea together; but he offered me no explanation

of the events of the afternoon, and I respected his silence.

Nearly a week passed before I heard anything further about the matter.

Then, one morning, Sir Lewin called upon me; he and Lady Maxwell had

returned only the previous night from town. He made no reference to the

circumstances of our last meeting, but asked me to come to the Hall that

afternoon, as his wife was far from well, and anxious to see me.

I went accordingly and found her alone, lying upon a couch in her

morning-room and looking sadly, terribly changed.

"I have asked you to come," she said, when I had taken a seat beside

her, "because I want to tell you the truth about Allan Fortescue; he has

suffered all these years through my fault, and I must make what

reparation I can before----It was I who really had the diamonds; I

wanted them, and I employed him to bring me the casket; he did this

quite innocently, as you will hear, not knowing what it contained. I had

seen it on the dressing-table when I went to say good-night to my aunt

just after she had gone to bed--about nine o'clock; but I was equally

afraid either to take it then or to return to the room in the dark later

on. Yet the chance seemed too good to be lost; I had never seen the

casket left exposed before; it was always kept under lock and key. On my

way downstairs I met Allan Fortescue, and we went together to the

drawing-room. As we sat chatting by the fire, the plan I afterwards

carried out occurred to me. The talk turned upon ghosts, and he said he

should much like to meet one. Then I told him, truly, that one room in

the house was said to be haunted by the spirit of a lady who had died

there mysteriously on her return from a ball at which she had promised

her lover to elope with him. I explained that nothing had been disturbed

since the morning she was found there, dead in her chair before the

mirror; but instead of the room to which the story really attached I

described the one I had just left, and dared him to visit it after

midnight. He said he had no fear, but I added that I should not believe

in his courage unless he brought me as a proof a small ebony casket

which had always stood upon the dressing-table. He laughed and said he

would do even that, and I promised to meet him in the conservatory the

following morning before breakfast to receive it and hear his

experiences. He was quite strange to the house and did not know how any

of the bedrooms were occupied except his own and his pupil's, which were

in another wing. In the morning he handed me the casket as arranged. You

know the rest; you see he was helpless in my hands."

"Do you mean to tell me," I asked, "that you wrecked a man's life for a

few jewels?"

[Illustration: "'DON'T JUDGE ME TOO HARDLY,' SHE SAID, PITEOUSLY."]

"Don't judge me too hardly," she said, piteously. "I was in terrible

straits. I had been staying with some of my father's relations in town,

and had learned much of a side of life concerning which Aunt Mary knew

practically nothing. I owed a great deal of money, and was afraid to

tell her about it. When I had the diamonds I was able to put off the

most threatening of my creditors with promises of payment, and, later,

one of my cousins helped me to dispose of the stones. I told him they

were some jewels of my mother's which had just been made over to me.

Aunt Mary would hold no intercourse with my father's family, so I had no

fear of awkward explanations. When I was twenty-one I came in for a

little money, all that was left of my mother's fortune, and I gave Aunt

Mary some fresh jewels. You see, I had inherited certain tendencies from

my father--perhaps in the beginning there was some excuse for me; you

will understand when I say that he died from a hurt received in a

gambling quarrel when I was about twelve years old. The house and all he

possessed were sold to pay his debts, and Aunt Mary took charge of me.

It was a great change. To me at all events my father had been good

always, and I loved him dearly.

"As to Allan Fortescue, when he found how I had tricked him he was

furious, but I managed to see him alone and persuaded him to accept the

situation. You see, I had contrived things so that his speaking would

have been of very little use unless I had chosen to confess--only his

word against mine. Of course, I was dreadfully upset when I found that

Aunt Mary had seen him. That was just what I had not counted upon; but I

couldn't go back then and give up the jewels--I couldn't. I promised him

that, if he would keep silence, I would never be reckless and

extravagant or wicked again; and for a long time I kept my word. But

life was dreadfully dull, and the thought of what I had done made me

wretched; if Allan had been prosecuted I don't think I could have borne

it--I must have spoken out. As it was, I became subject to dreadful fits

of depression, and I think Aunt Mary was very glad to get me safely

married, as she called it. For a time, then, I was very happy; for I

loved Lewin dearly, and I tried to forget. Then, finding Allan here,

seeing the wreck I had made of his life, brought back to me all my

trouble. I began to crave again for excitement of any sort. Lewin

thought I was ill, and at first used to give me champagne as a tonic.

"When we were in town last year I got back into the old set, from a

different standpoint, and with more money at command----"

Once more she stopped, but I would not again interrupt her; I felt that

the whole sad story must be finished now.

"I don't know," she continued, presently, "how Allan Fortescue

discovered what was going on, but he did. One day I received a

communication from him--I can't call it a letter--telling me that he

knew the sort of life I was leading, and that unless I kept my promise

to him he would speak and tell Lewin the truth even now. He knew and

could prove where I had sold the diamonds. In reply to that I induced

him to meet me in the Oxley Woods, and persuaded him to give me a little

more time. I promised to tell Lewin that very night about my debts.

Instead, I went to London. I really meant to start afresh; but I thought

I could raise some money and get fairly straight without saying anything

to my husband. I--I stayed longer than I meant. Allan came to look for

me. He followed me to the places where he thought I was likely to be--he

must have kept a watch upon me for some time past--but our meeting at

last was accidental. I was really at my wits' end, and I went into

Franconi's with Allan to talk things over. We saw General Anson leave

the place, and I think that made Allan decide there must be no more

concealment; also, I suppose he felt it was useless to trust me any

longer. He went straight from me to Aunt Mary and fetched her. She knew

that he must be speaking the truth. I had promised to go home that night

anyhow; but I don't know what I might have done if I had been left to

myself. Then you and Lewin appeared----It is better as it is--I should

never have had the strength, the courage--I am so sorry--so sorry--for

Lewin--for myself--for Allan--for my little child that is coming----"

She turned her face to the wall, and I saw her slight frame shiver with

voiceless, choking tears.

There is little more to tell. Lady Maxwell lived only a few months after

she had made this confession. Her child survived--a son--and there are

three men who watch over that boy with perhaps exaggerated solicitude

and love--his father, Allan Fortescue, and myself.

Will he reward our care? I think so. He has his mother's face and charm,

but in character he takes after Sir Lewin. Allan Fortescue has remained

in the village as my curate. I trust he may never leave me, and that the

bishop may see fit hereafter to appoint him vicar in my stead; I am

growing old.

_Illustrated Interviews._

No. LXXXI.--DR. EDWARD ELGAR.

BY RUDOLPH DE CORDOVA.

[Illustration:

_From a Photo. by_] DR. EDWARD ELGAR. [_George Newnes, Ltd._]

"If ever this votary of the muse of song looked from the hills of his

present home at Malvern, from the cradle of English poetry, the scene of

the vision of Piers Plowman, and from the British camp, with its

legendary memories of his own 'Caractacus,' and in the light of the

rising sun sees the towers of Tewkesbury and Gloucester and Worcester,

he might recall in that view the earlier stages of his career, and

confess with modest pride, like the bard in the 'Odyssey':--

Self-taught I sing; 'tis Heaven, and Heaven alone,

Inspires my song with music all its own."

[Illustration:

_From a Photo. by_] DR. ELGAR'S HOUSE AT MALVERN. [_George Newnes

Ltd._]

It was in November, 1900, that these words were spoken by the Orator

when the University of Cambridge honoured itself by conferring the

honorary degree of Doctor of Music on Dr. Elgar, whom one of the most

distinguished German writers on music declared to be "the most brilliant

champion of the National School of Composition which is beginning to

bloom in England."

The encomiums which Germany--the acknowledged leader of the world in

music--has showered on Dr. Elgar have at length been reflected in

England, which has awakened to the fact that to him at least that much

misapplied word "genius" belongs by right divine. That awakening was

marked by the three days' festival in the middle of March, when Covent

Garden Opera House reverted to an old custom and for two glorious nights

became the home of oratorio, with a concert on the third night. That

festival is unique in the history of music, for it is the first time an

English composer has been so honoured.

However gratifying the applause of the public may be to the worker in

any art, his greatest pleasure must properly come from his

fellow-workers, who know the difficulties which have to be surmounted

before the desired effect can be produced.

"Was not Herr Steinbach, the conductor of the Meiningen Orchestra, among

the others who said that you have something different from anybody else

in the tone of your orchestra?" I asked Dr. Elgar, as we sat in his

study at Malvern, with a great expanse of country visible through the

wide windows.

[Illustration:

_From a Photo. by_] DR. ELGAR'S STUDY. [_George Newnes, Ltd._]

"I believe so," he replied; "and that remark has been one from which I

have naturally derived great pleasure.

"You know," said Dr. Elgar, as he settled down to talk for the purpose

of this interview, in accordance with a long-standing promise made in

what he came to regard as an unguarded moment--"you know, since you

compel me to begin at the beginning, that I 'began' in Broadheath, a

little village three miles from Worcester, in which city my father was

organist of St. George's Catholic Church, a post he held for

thirty-seven years. I was a very little boy indeed when I began to show

some aptitude for music and used to extemporize on the piano. When I was

quite small I received a few lessons on the piano. The organ-loft then

attracted me, and from the time I was about seven or eight I used to go

and sit by my father and watch him play. After a time I began to try to

play myself. At first the only thing I succeeded in producing was noise,

but gradually, out of the chaos, harmony began to evolve itself. In

those days, too, an English opera company used to visit the old

Worcester Theatre, and I was taken into the orchestra, which consisted

of only eight or ten performers, and so heard old operas like 'Norma,'

'Traviata,' 'Trovatore,' and, above all, 'Don Giovanni.'

[Illustration: DR. EDWARD ELGAR.

_From a Photo. by E. T. Holding._]

"My general education was not neglected. I went to Littleton House

School until I was about fifteen. At the same time I saw and learnt a

great deal about music from the stream of music that passed through my

father's establishment.

"My hope was that I should be able to get a musical education, and I

worked hard at German on the chance that I should go to Leipsic, but my

father discovered that he could not afford to send me away, and anything

in that direction seemed to be at an end. Then a friend, a solicitor,

suggested that I should go to him for a year and see how I liked the

law. I went for a year, but came to the conclusion that the law was not

for me, and I determined to return to music. There appeared to be an

opening for a violinist in Worcester, and as it occurred to me that it

would be a good thing to try to take advantage of the opening, I had

been teaching myself to play the violin. Then I began to teach on my own

account, and spent such leisure as I had in writing music. It was music

of a sort--bad, very bad--but my juvenile efforts are, I hope,

destroyed.

"Although I was teaching the violin I wanted to improve my playing, so I

began to save up in order to go to London to get some lessons from Herr

Pollitzer. On one occasion I was working the first violin part of the

Haydn quartet. There was a rest, and I suddenly began to play the 'cello

part. Pollitzer looked up. 'You know the whole thing?' he said.

"'Of course,' I replied.

"He looked up, curiously. 'Do you compose, yourself?' he asked.

"'I try,' I replied again.

"'Show me something of yours,' he said.

"I did so, with the result that he gave me an introduction to Mr., now

Sir, August Manns, who, later on, played many of my things at the daily

concerts at the Crystal Palace.

"When I resolved to become a musician and found that the exigencies of

life would prevent me from getting any tuition, the only thing to do was

to teach myself. I read everything, played everything, and heard

everything I possibly could. As I have told you, I used to play the

organ and the violin. I attended as many of the cathedral services as I

could to hear the anthems, and to get to know what they were, so as to

become thoroughly acquainted with the English Church style. The putting

of the fine new organ into the cathedral at Worcester was a great event,

and brought many organists to play there at various times. I went to

hear them all. The services at the cathedral were over later on Sunday

than those at the Catholic church, and as soon as the voluntary was

finished at the church I used to rush over to the cathedral to hear the

concluding voluntary. Eventually I succeeded my father as organist at

St. George's. We lived at that time in the parish of St. Helen's, in

which is the mother church of Worcester, which had a peal of eight

bells. The Curfew used always to be rung in those days at eight o'clock

in the evening, and I believe it is still rung. I made friends with the

sexton and used to ring the Curfew, and afterwards strike the day of the

month. My enthusiasm was so great that I used to prolong the ringing

from three minutes to ten minutes, until the people in the neighbourhood

complained, when I had to reduce the time. On Sunday the bells were

supposed to go for half an hour before service, from half-past ten to

eleven. The performance was divided into certain parts. With a friend, I

used to 'raise' and 'fall' the bell for ten minutes, chime a smaller

bell for ten minutes or so, and at five minutes to eleven I would fly

off to play the organ at the Catholic church.

[Illustration: AN EARLY PORTRAIT OF DR. ELGAR.

_From a Photograph._]

"You ask me to go into greater details about my musical education. I am

constantly receiving letters on this point from all over the world, for

it is well known that I am self-taught in the matter of harmony,

counterpoint, form, and, in short, the whole of the 'mystery' of music,

and people want to know what books I used. To-day there are all sorts of

books to make the study of harmony and orchestration pleasant. In my

young days they were repellent. But I read them and I still exist."

If only cold type could suggest the humour with which those words were

spoken!

"The first was Catel, and that was followed by Cherubini. The first real

sort of friendly leading I had, however, was from 'Mozart's

Thorough-bass School.' There was something in that to go upon--something

human. It is a small book--a collection of papers beautifully and

clearly expressed--which he wrote on harmony for the niece of a friend

of his. I still treasure the old volume. Ouseley and Macfarren followed,

but the articles which have since helped me the most are those of Sir

Hubert Parry in 'Grove's Dictionary.'"

"How did these various authorities mix?" I interrupted.

"They didn't mix," was Dr. Elgar's reply, "and it appears it is

necessary for anyone who has to be self-taught to read everything

and--pick out the best. That, I suppose, is the difficulty--to pick out

the best. How to forget the rubbish and remember the good I can't tell

you, but perhaps that is where his brains must come in.

"It would be affectation were I to pretend that my work is not

recognised as modern, and I hate affectation, yet it would probably

surprise you to know the amount of work I did in studying musical form.

Only those can safely disregard form who ignore it with a full knowledge

and do not evade it through ignorance.

"Mozart is the musician from whom everyone should learn form. I once

ruled a score for the same instruments and with the same number of bars

as Mozart's G Minor Symphony, and in that framework I wrote a symphony,

following as far as possible the same outline in the themes and the same

modulation. I did this on my own initiative, as I was groping in the

dark after light, but looking back after thirty years I don't know any

discipline from which I learned so much.

"So you insist on my telling you some more of my early struggles and my

early work? I was interested in many other things besides music, and I

had the good fortune to be thrown among an unsorted collection of old

books. There were books of all kinds, and all distinguished by the

characteristic that they were for the most part incomplete. I busied

myself for days and weeks arranging them. I picked out the theological

books, of which there were a good many, and put them on one side. Then I

made a place for the Elizabethan dramatists, the chronicles including

Baker's and Hollinshed's, besides a tolerable collection of old poets

and translations of Voltaire, and all sorts of things up to the

eighteenth century. Then I began to read. I used to get up at four or

five o'clock in the summer and read--every available opportunity found

me reading. I read till dark. I finished by reading every one of these

books--including the theology. The result of that reading has been that

people tell me I know more of life up to the eighteenth century than I

do of my own time, and it is probably true.

"In studying scores the first which came into my hands were the

Beethoven symphonies. Anyone can have them now, but they were difficult

for a boy to get in Worcester thirty years ago. I, however, managed to

get two or three, and I remember distinctly the day I was able to buy

the Pastoral Symphony. I stuffed my pockets with bread and cheese and

went out into the fields to study it. That was what I always did. Even

when I began to teach, when a new score came into my hands I went off

for a long day with it out of doors, and when my unfortunate--or

fortunate?--pupils went for their lessons I was not at home to give

them.

"By the way, talking about scores, it will probably surprise you to know

that I never possessed a score of Wagner until one was given to me in

1900.

[Illustration: DR. ELGAR AS A MEMBER OF HIS QUINTET, FOR WHICH

HE WROTE THE MUSIC.

_From a Photo. by Bennett._]

"In the early days of which I have been speaking five of us established

a wind quintet. We had two flutes, an oboe, a clarionet, and a bassoon,

which last I played for some time, and afterwards relinquished it for

the 'cello. There was no music at all to suit our peculiar requirements,

as in the ideal wind quintet a horn should find a place and not a second

flute, so I used to write the music. We met on Sunday afternoons, and it

was an understood thing that we should have a new piece every week. The

sermons in our church used to take at least half an hour, and I spent

the time composing the thing for the afternoon. It was great experience

for me, as you may imagine, and the books are all extant, so some of

that music still exists. We played occasionally for friends, and I

remember one moonlight night stopping in front of a house to put the

bassoon together. I held it up to see if it was straight before

tightening it. As I did so, someone rushed out of the house, grabbed me

by the arms, and shouted, 'It will be five shillings if you do.' He

thought I had a gun in my hand.

"The old Worcester Glee Club had been established as long ago as 1809

for the performance of old glees, with an occasional instrumental night.

At these last I first played second fiddle and afterwards became leader,

as, after a time, I used to do the accompanying. It was an enjoyable and

artistic gathering, and the programmes were principally drawn from the

splendid English compositions for men's voices. The younger generation

seemed to prefer ordinary part-songs, and ballads also were introduced,

and the tone of the thing changed. I am not sure if the club is still in

existence.

"It was in 1877 that I first went to take lessons of Pollitzer. He

suggested that I should stay in London and devote myself to violin

playing, but I had become enamoured of a country life, and would not

give up the prospect of a certain living by playing and teaching in

Worcester on the chance of only a possible success which I might make as

a soloist in London.

"The thing which brought me before a larger public as a composer was the

production of several things of mine at Birmingham by Mr. W. C.

Stockley, to whom my music was introduced by Dr. Wareing, himself a

composer, and still resident in Birmingham. At that time I was a member

of Mr. Stockley's orchestra--first violin."

In this connection it is interesting to break Dr. Elgar's narrative to

tell an anecdote which Mr. Stockley relates. When he decided to do

something of Dr. Elgar's, he asked him if he would like to conduct it.

"Certainly not," Dr. Elgar replied; "I am a member of the orchestra and

I am going to stick in the orchestra. I am not recognised as a composer,

and the fact that you are going to do something of mine gives me no

title to a place anywhere else." The piece was a success and the

audience called for Dr. Elgar, who came down from among the fiddles,

made his bow, and then went back to his place.

[Illustration: REDUCED FACSIMILE OF A PAGE OF THE FULL SCORE OF

"THE DREAM OF GERONTIUS."]

To resume. "Don't suppose, however," Dr. Elgar said, "that after that

recognition as a composer things were easy for me. The directors of the

old Promenade Concerts at Covent Garden Theatre were good enough to

write that they thought sufficiently of my things to devote a morning to

rehearsing them. I went on the appointed day to London to conduct the

rehearsal. When I arrived it was explained to me that a few songs had to

be taken before I could begin. Before the songs were finished Sir Arthur

Sullivan unexpectedly arrived, bringing with him a selection from one of

his operas. It was the only chance he had of going through it with the

orchestra, so they determined to take advantage of the opportunity. He

consumed all my time in rehearsing this, and when he had finished the

director came out and said to me, 'There will be no chance of your going

through your music to-day.' I went back to Worcester to my teaching, and

that was the last of my chance of an appearance at the Promenade

Concerts.

"Years after I met Sullivan, one of the most amiable and genial souls

that ever lived. When we were introduced he said, 'I don't think we have

met before.' 'Not exactly,' I replied, 'but very near it,' and I told

him the circumstance. 'But, my dear boy, I hadn't the slightest idea of

it,' he exclaimed, in his enthusiastic manner. 'Why on earth didn't you

come and tell me? I'd have rehearsed it myself for you.' They were not

idle words. He would have done it, just as he said. He never forgot the

episode till the end of his life.

"Two similar occurrences took place at the Crystal Palace: rehearsals

were planned which never came off, so I was no nearer to getting a

hearing for big orchestral works.

"Mr. Hugh Blair, then the organist of Worcester Cathedral, saw some of

the cantata, 'The Black Knight,' and said: 'If you will finish it I will

produce it at Worcester.' I finished it, and it was produced by the

Worcester Festival Choir. This cantata then came under the notice of Dr.

Swinnerton Heap, to whom I owe my introduction to the musical festivals

as a writer of choral works. He had known me for a good many years as a

violinist, but it had never occurred to him to talk to me about my

composing, and he knew nothing of it.

"It was through Dr. Heap that I was asked to write a cantata for the

Staffordshire Musical Festival, and, shortly after, the committee asked

me to provide an oratorio for the Worcester Festival. They were 'The

Light of Life,' performed in Worcester Cathedral, and 'King Olaf,' at

Hanley.

"Since then it has been a record of the production of one composition

after another until we come to 'The Apostles,' and my new overture 'In

the South,' produced at Covent Garden; the one great event that

particularly stands out is the production of the 'Variations' by Dr.

Richter, to whom I was then a complete stranger.

"For a long time I had had the idea of writing 'The Apostles' in pretty

much the form in which I hope it will eventually appear. As you know,

there have been oratorios on many points of Jewish and Christian

history, but none had shown how Christianity has risen. I take the men

who were in touch with Christ, the Apostles in fact, and show them to be

ordinary mortals rather than superhuman men, as they are generally

represented in art. I was always particularly impressed with

Archbishop Whately's conception of Judas, who, as he wrote, 'had no

design to betray his Master to death, but to have been as confident of

the will of Jesus to deliver Himself from His enemies by a miracle as He

must have been certain of His power to do so, and accordingly to have

designed to force Him to make such a display of His superhuman powers as

would have induced all the Jews--and, indeed, the Romans too--to

acknowledge Him King.'

"In carrying out this plan I made the book myself, taking out lines from

different parts of the Bible which exactly express my conception. How it

was done the following chorus will show you, for you will notice that

the references to the text are printed in the margin:--

The Lord hath chosen them to stand before Him, to serve

Him.--_II. Chron._ 29, 11.

He hath chosen the weak to confound the mighty.--_I. Cor._ 1,

27.

He will direct their work in truth.--_Isa._ 61, 8.

Behold, God exalteth by His power: who teacheth like Him?--_Job_

36, 22.

The meek will He guide in judgment, and the meek will He teach

His way.--_Ps._ 25, 9.

He will direct their work in truth.--_Isa._ 61, 8.

For out of Zion shall go forth the law.--_Isa._ 2, 3.

"You will notice that occasionally, as in the third extract, I have used

the words in their meaning that appears on the surface, and not in the

real meaning of the sentence which may be found in any commentary. To

keep the diction exactly the same I have not gone outside the Scripture

except in one sentence from the Talmud in the case of the watchers on

the Temple roof.

"It was part of my original scheme to continue 'The Apostles' by a

second work carrying on the establishment of the Church among the

Gentiles. This, too, is to be followed by a third oratorio, in which the

fruit of the whole--that is to say, the end of the world and the

Judgment--is to be exemplified. I, however, faltered at that idea, and I

suggested to the directors of the Birmingham Festival to add merely a

short third part to the two into which the already published work, 'The

Apostles,' is divided. But I found that to be unsatisfactory, and I have

decided to revert to my original lines. There will, therefore, be two

other oratorios."

This definite pronouncement of Dr. Elgar's cannot fail to evoke the

warmest anticipations on the part of the music loving world.

It is worth noting here that shortly after "The Dream of Gerontius" was

produced at the Birmingham Festival, in 1900, Herr Julius Buths, the

famous conductor of Duesseldorf, was so struck with it that he determined

to produce it in Germany and himself translated the libretto. So great a

success was this performance that "The Dream," which one of the most

celebrated German musical critics has declared to be "the greatest

composition of the last hundred years, with the exception of the

'Requiem' of Brahms," was repeated at the Lower Rhine Festival, a thing

hitherto unheard of in the annals of English music, and at the Lower

Rhine Festival on Whit-Sunday "The Apostles" is to be given.

Dr. Elgar has a delightful and most acute sense of humour, so that I was

sure I should not be misunderstood if I ventured to ask a question about

his "musical crimes."

He smiled. "But which of my musical crimes do you mean? From the point

of view of one person or another I understand all my music has been a

crime," he replied, lightly. Then he added, "Oh, you mean 'The

Cockaigne,' 'The Coronation Ode,' and 'The Imperial March' especially.

Yes, I believe there are a good many people who have objected to them.

But I like to look on the composer's vocation as the old troubadours or

bards did. In those days it was no disgrace to a man to be turned on to

step in front of an army and inspire the people with a song. For my own

part, I know that there are a lot of people who like to celebrate events

with music. To these people I have given tunes. Is that wrong? Why

should I write a fugue or something which won't appeal to anyone, when

the people yearn for things which can stir them--"

"Such as 'Pomp and Circumstance,'" I interpolated.

"Ah, I don't know anything about that," replied Dr. Elgar, "but I do

know we are a nation with great military proclivities, and I did not see

why the ordinary quick march should not be treated on a large scale in

the way that the waltz, the old-fashioned slow march, and even the polka

have been treated by the great composers; yet all marches on the

symphonic scale are so slow that people can't march to them. I have some

of the soldier instinct in me, and so I have written two marches of

which, so far from being ashamed, I am proud. 'Pomp and Circumstance,'

by the way, is merely the generic name for what is a set of six marches.

Two, as you know, have already appeared, and the others will come later.

One of them is to be a Soldier's Funeral March.

[Illustration: REDUCED FACSIMILE OF MS. OF "POMP AND CIRCUMSTANCE."]

"As for 'The Imperial March,' which was written for Queen Victoria's

Diamond Jubilee of 1897, it would, perhaps, interest you to know that

only on January 22nd last it was given in St. George's Chapel, Berlin,

at the unveiling of the memorials of Queen Victoria and the Empress

Frederick, and Dr. G. R. Sinclair, of Hereford Cathedral, played it on

the organ.

[Illustration:

_From a Photo. by_] GOLF ON MALVERN COMMON. [_Foulsham & Banfield._]

"How and when do I do my music? I can tell you very easily. I come into

my study at nine o'clock in the morning and I work till a quarter to

one. I don't do any inventing then, for that comes anywhere and

everywhere. It may be when I am walking, golfing, or cycling, or the

ideas may come in the evening, and then I sit up until any hour in order

to get them down. The morning is devoted to revising and orchestration,

of which I have as much to do as I can manage. As soon as lunch is over

I go out for exercise and return about four or later, after which I

sometimes do two hours' work before dinner. A country life I find

absolutely essential to me, and here the conditions are exactly what I

require. As you see," and Dr. Elgar moved over to the large window which

takes up the whole of one side of his study, "I get a wonderful view of

the surrounding country. I can see across Worcestershire, to Edgehill,

the Cathedral of Worcester, the Abbeys of Pershore and Tewkesbury, and

even the smoke from round Birmingham. It is delightfully quiet, and yet

in contrast with it there is a constant stream of communication with the

outside world in the shape of cables from America and Australia, and

letters innumerable from all over the world."

In the house itself there are not many evidences of Dr. Elgar's

productions, but prominent in a corner of the drawing-room is the laurel

wreath presented to him at Duesseldorf when "The Dream" was first

produced. The leaves are brown to-day, but the scarlet ribbon is as

bright as the memory of the music in the enraptured ears of those who

have heard it. In his study are two prized possessions, the one a

tankard made by some members of the Festival Choir at Hanley at the time

of the production of "King Olaf." The inscription, taken from one of the

choruses, is, appropriately, a Bacchanalian one:--

The ale was strong;

King Olaf feasted late and long.

--_Longfellow_.

Next to this is a cup, also specially designed by Mr. Noke, of Hanley,

to commemorate the performance of "The Dream." On one side is a portrait

of Cardinal Newman and on the other a portrait of Dr. Elgar, with the

following inscription from the work itself:--

Learn that the flame of the everlasting love

Doth burn ere it transform.

_Off the Track in London._

BY GEORGE R. SIMS.

II.--IN THE ROYAL BOROUGH OF KENSINGTON.

The sun shines brightly on the gay Kensington thoroughfare in which I

meet my artist _confrere_ and prepare to wander off the track in a

district which is held to be the wealthiest in the Empire.

It is a winter morning, but the sky is blue, the air is balmy, and the

flood of sunlight gives a Rivieran aspect to the stately mansions and

pleasant villas that we pass on our way to the point at which we are to

turn off and make our plunge into one of the strangest districts of

London, a district of which its rich neighbours have no knowledge,

although it lies at their doors.

A walk of a few minutes and we have left wealth and fashion behind us;

the gay shops have vanished, the well-dressed people have disappeared as

if by magic. The mansions and the villas have given place to the long

streets of grey, weather-beaten, two and three story houses, in which

the local industry writes itself large in white letters.

Here we are in Notting Dale and in the heart of Laundry-Land. In every

house in street after street the blinds of the ground floor are down as

though someone lay dead within. But if you look from the opposite side

of the street you will see that in every room above the blinds lines are

stretched from wall to wall, and from these lines wrung out details of

the washing-tub are hanging. If you cross to the dilapidated railings of

the sorry little patch that was once a front garden and peer into the

basement you will see that laundry work is in full swing. The blinds of

the ground-floor rooms are probably drawn because the hand laundresses

do not like to be criticised too closely by the neighbours, who are also

their business rivals.

The street is typical of a dozen others. You may see again and again

that broken-down little front garden, with its stunted trees, strewn

rubbish, and the little wooden, lop-sided railing that looks as though

it no longer thought the patch it once guarded worth standing up for. On

the window-sill of the top floor of a score of houses you may see a

lonely, empty flower-pot that looks more like a handy missile in an

emergency than an adjunct of window gardening. The rain-sodden,

blackened stucco meets you at every turn, and when you have counted the

twentieth cat sitting on a sill or a doorstep washing its shirt to snowy

whiteness you begin to wonder why the local influence has not made

itself more widely felt. Everybody inside the houses is washing for

other people, everything is conducted with scrupulous cleanliness and

under official inspection, but there are plenty of streets adjacent to

Laundry-Land in which only the cats make themselves conspicuously clean.

A little farther away towards Latimer Road are the great steam laundries

employing a small army of young women, who at the dinner hour will turn

out and make every street in the Dale a forest of white aprons.

But all the streets of Laundry-Land are not given up to useful industry.

A portion of the district is so notorious as a guilt garden that it has

been called the London Avernus. It is packed with common lodging-houses,

a large number of them for women, and it has streets of evil reputation

in which almost every window is broken and stuffed with rags. The

Borough Council has now in hand a splendid rehousing scheme which will

vastly improve the district, but we must take it as we find it to-day.

We turn out of the sunlight, and entering a narrow doorway descend into

the basement of a typical lodging-house. The house is known locally as

the "Golden Gates," a name bestowed upon it in a spirit of badinage by a

client with a sense of humour.

The kitchen is crowded with women, young and old. Some are sitting on

the benches around the wall, one or two are making a late breakfast; an

old woman is cooking something at the red coke fire.

As a rule there is little conversation in a lodging-house in the morning

hours. I have been constantly struck by the note of moodiness, not to

say sullenness, which hangs over the company during the hours of

daylight. The men are, as a rule, more communicative than the women.

Women of the class that drift to the doss-house are not inclined to

exchange confidences with their neighbours.

But the kitchen of the Golden Gates as we enter it has one talkative

occupant. As soon as our eyes get accustomed to the gloom, which is only

relieved by a ray of light filtering through a small, dust-covered

window, we notice that a tall woman in faded finery and an astrachan

hat, and with some traces of refinement in features and bearing, is

standing in the centre and chaffing the others. One or two smile at her

jokes, but the majority are wholly indifferent, wearing that air of

sullen aloofness which is peculiarly characteristic of a woman's

lodging-house.

I have not intruded on the privacy of the ladies of the Golden Gates

without a show of justification. To enable my companion to make a sketch

of the scene, I have resorted to an expedient which permits me to make

certain inquiries of a semi-official nature, and to attract the

attention of the guests while my _confrere_ is at work. If they were

aware that they were being sketched it is quite likely that there would

be trouble, and my comrade might find himself in as unpleasant a fix as

did a photographer who once went with me to the Chinese quarter in

Limehouse, for "Living London," and attempted to take the proprietor of

an opium den and some of his clients. The photographer emerged

unscathed, but the camera required a considerable amount of repair.

Fortunately I have an inquiry to make which puts my audience in sympathy

with me, and my _confrere_ is supposed to be making notes of the

information supplied as to the last movements of a woman who had used

the house for some time and had mysteriously disappeared.

During the whole time the lady in the dingy astrachan keeps up a running

fire of chaff, which materially assists us.

[Illustration: "THE LADY IN THE DINGY ASTRACHAN KEEPS UP A

RUNNING FIRE OF CHAFF."]

She welcomes us to the "Hotel de Fourpence," and says, though it isn't

exactly the Carlton, it is quite comfortable when you get used to it.

She interlards her bantering remarks with French words, and we come to

the conclusion that she is a governess who has drifted down.

It is no uncommon thing to find men and women of education in the lowest

lodging-houses of London. I have found a clergyman in one of the worst

dens of Flower and Dean Street. In one of the Dale lodging-houses there

is a woman whose father had his town house and his country house and his

villa in the South of France.

This woman in the astrachan hat is a striking contrast to her

surroundings. Most of the other inmates are of the usual type--women who

have drifted down from honest industry to vagabondage, or have been born

to it.

Returning through the Golden Gates into the sunshine, we make our way to

Jetsam Street. That is not its real name, but the one I have given it.

This is a street of black and battered doors, of damaged railings, and

of broken windows. On the doorsteps here and there stand groups of

slatternly, unkempt women. From the windows above a tousled head

occasionally appears. Many of the houses here are common lodging-houses;

but some of them are in the hands of the house-farmers, who let them out

in furnished rooms at a shilling a day. We enter a room which is

unoccupied and take stock of the furniture. It consists of a bed, two

chairs, and the wreckage of a dirty deal table.

In this room a man and his wife and children are accommodated at night,

but the shilling paid only entitles the family to remain there until ten

in the morning.

At that hour they are turned out and their tenancy ceases. If they wish

to renew it they can do so in the evening, but not before.

These people, who are paying six shillings a week, or seven shillings

where Sunday is not a free day, for a single room, have to spend the day

in the streets. Many of them make their way to the public parks and

sleep on the seats or on the grass. Some of them beg, some of them hawk

trumpery articles. They are probably paying eighteen pounds a year for a

wretched room, and yet in the house-farmer's hands they are homeless

every day in the week.

Jetsam Street is flooded with golden sunshine as we pass through it, but

the sunshine has not made the inhabitants light-hearted. Half-way down

the street a man and a woman are fighting. The man is delivering a

series of kicks in the style of La Savate at the woman, who is defiant

and nimble and defends herself with her jacket, which she has taken off

and uses both as a guard and as a weapon.

[Illustration: "ONE OR TWO WOMEN STANDING ON THE DOORSTEPS

WATCH THE PROCEEDINGS."

One or two women standing on the doorsteps watch the proceedings, but

apparently without interest. An old woman proceeding to the public-house

for beer turns her head for a moment and then passes on her way. A

little boy in rags passes the fighting couple and takes no notice

whatever. It is an ordinary incident, and has no special attraction for

the neighbours.

Presently the man succeeds in planting a blow that sends the woman down.

She is up again in a moment and faces him, prepared to continue the

contest. But he thinks he has scored a point and is satisfied.

"Now I'll go to the workhouse," he says.

"And the best place for you," answers the woman.

The man thrusts his hands in his pockets and slouches off. The woman

puts on her jacket and strolls away. If we were to investigate the

circumstances that have led up to the fight, we should find that we had

been assisting at a Notting Dale version of the story of Carmen, Don

Jose, and Escamillo, only Carmen in this case is a laundry girl, Don

Jose is an idle ruffian, and Escamillo is another, only of a bolder

type.

In Notting Dale the women are the principal wage-earners, and the

district is infested with a contemptible set of men, who are loafers or

worse. It is a common thing in the Dale for a man to boast that he is

going to marry a laundry girl and do nothing for the rest of his life.

It seems difficult to realize that such a scene and such a street can

exist within a stone's throw of a quarter crowded with the wealth and

fashion of the capital. But wherever you step off the beaten track in

London a hundred surprises await you.

I do not wonder at the fight in Jetsam Street which fails to rouse the

lookers-on from their midday lethargy, for I am an old traveller in this

strange land. But I must confess that it gives me a little shock when at

the end of the street I come upon a man in the last stage of consumption

sitting propped up with pillows in an arm-chair on the doorstep.

[Illustration: "BROUGHT OUT TO SIT A LITTLE WHILE IN THE SUNSHINE."]

He has been brought out to sit a little while in the sunshine. The poor

fellow has, I ascertain, taken his discharge from the infirmary a few

days previously. He wants to die at home--at home in Jetsam Street!

The picture I have had so far to draw is a painful one and a squalid

one. But it is typical of the neighbourhood, and could not be omitted if

in these travels off the track I am to give a faithful account of the

London that is so little known even to Londoners.

Let us hasten through the sordid streets, looking up at the blue skies

and ignoring the squalid houses, and make our way to a more romantic

spot.

"The Potteries!" How odd this description of a portion of Kensington

sounds, yet the district we are now in is known by this name, and yonder

is what remains of the kiln.

Here in the Potteries the spell of the old romance still lingers, for

this is the district of the gipsies. In front of it is the pleasant

recreation-ground, Avondale Park, which the County Council has made

beautiful for the children of the Dale, and just round the corner is

hidden a space where, year after year, the gipsies came with their vans

and encamped for the winter. And close at hand are cottages and gardens,

to which ducks and geese give quite a rural appearance.

[Illustration: "THERE ARE ONE OR TWO VANS LEFT TO MARK THE SPOT."]

The gipsies are not here this winter, but there are one or two vans left

to mark the spot where, until quite recently, the sons and daughters of

Egypt pitched their "tans" in the heart of fashionable Kensington. Some

of them, yielding to the force of such modern ideas as the sanitary

inspector and the School Board officer, have given up the fight for

existence in a dwelling-van and have gone to live under a roof like the

gorgios, though a gipsy of the true Romany blood believes that nothing

but ill-luck will attend the Romany chal or the Romany chi who lives in

a house.

To-day the children of the gipsies are, many of them, in the Notting

Dale Board School and the fathers and mothers are in the lodging-houses.

One of the wanderers, who in the old times used to pitch on the vacant

ground of the Potteries, so far fell into Gentile ways as to take a

lodging-house and run it himself. He and his wife became noted

characters in the Dale, and when he died a little time ago the gipsies

came from far and near and gave him a genuine Romany funeral, with all

the ancient rites and ceremonies of the great Pali tribe who wandered

out of India long centuries ago and gave the word "pal" to our language

to signify brother.

Though the gipsy camp has departed and the ground will know it no more,

the surroundings are still suggestive of the old days. Hard by a

dwelling-van left, like the rose of the poet, blooming alone is the shed

of a chair-caner, a handsome, prosperous-looking man, who is working in

the open and singing at his congenial task. The battered carts, the old

chains, the broken wheels, the pigeon lofts, and the wooden sheds

standing on a patch of waste ground remind you of the pictures you were

given to copy at school when you were in the drawing-class. If there had

only been a mill handy the resemblance would have been complete, but the

chimney of the old kiln dominates the scene and takes the mill's place.

Here the note of Jetsam Street has disappeared. All around are

respectable working-class dwellings and stableyards. A little farther up

is a double row of cottages with a paved way between them that seem to

have been lifted bodily out of a Yorkshire mill town and dropped with

their quaint out-houses on to the confines of Kensington. When you come

upon Thresher's Place you rub your eyes and wonder if it is possible

that five minutes' walk will bring you out on Campden Hill.

In the mews round about the Potteries are the remnants of the Italian

colony that drifted here some years ago, when Little Italy in

Clerkenwell began to be encroached upon by the modern builder. The

majority have now drifted farther afield, to Fulham and Hammersmith.

But there are still a fair number of the children of the Sunny South in

the Dale. You may see the organs in the early morning being polished up

outside the houses, and if you go into the yards you may discover the

ice-barrows packed away in the coach-houses, waiting for the

disappearance of the baked-chestnut season and the coming of summer.

Here, in a large coach-house in a mews, is a proprietor of ice-cream

barrows hard at work repainting his stock in gorgeous colours. Brilliant

streaks of red and green light up the dreary place where the signor is

working. When we look in upon his artistic proceedings he is filling his

studio with melody. He is singing an air from "Il Trovatore" in his

native Italian, and at the same time painting an Italian girl in her

national costume on the panel of an ice-barrow.

A little farther down the mews we climb the crazy staircase that leads

to the loft, and find a middle-aged widow occupying it with five

children.

We have arrived at an awkward moment, for the widow is in tearful

converse with the Industrial Schools officer.

One of the children has been caught the previous night begging. Children

are not allowed to beg in the streets to-day, and if it is found that

the parents send them out or have not sufficient control over them to

keep them in the little offenders can be taken before a magistrate and

sent to an industrial school, to be trained for more reputable

occupations in life.

The widow declares that the boy was not sent out by her, and weeps

copiously while she relates her story. She has five children and no

money. I don't think the officer is very much impressed. I am afraid he

knows more about the widow and the begging boy than he cares to reveal

in the presence of strangers. He gives the woman a kindly warning, and

leaves her with the intimation that if any more of her children are

caught begging she will be invited to pay a visit to the magistrate.

The Industrial Schools officer has a busy time in the Dale, for there

are many young children living in vicious and criminal surroundings, and

it is his task to remove them at the first opportunity, in order that

they may have a chance in life. The work the industrial schools are

accomplishing is invaluable. Under the Act a careful guardianship can be

exercised by the State until the rescued boy or girl has reached the age

of eighteen. There is no coming out of the industrial schools and

returning to the evil surroundings now. But the task of the officer who

has to see that the lads and lasses do not, after their school days are

up, return to their evil associates is not a light one. He has

occasionally to exercise the ingenuity of a Sherlock Holmes in order to

get on the track of "one of his young people" who has mysteriously

disappeared from the place that has been found for him or her.

Not long ago a young girl who had been sent to Canada, and was supposed

to be doing well there, was discovered dressed in boy's clothes back

again in the Dale with her uncle and aunt, who were undesirable

companions for her. The girl had in some way managed to get her

passage-money and come home, and had hoped, disguised as a young man, to

escape the vigilance of the Industrial Schools officer.

Through a couple of streets and we are back in common lodging-house

land. There is one long street in which the houses are registered from

end to end. Some of them look like shops with the shutters up, others

like private houses that have come down in the world. But every room is

packed with as many beds as the law permits, and the common kitchen is

reached by the area steps.

At one of the houses along this street a man and a woman are standing at

the door. The woman has only one arm and one eye, the man has no arms.

But they are a highly popular couple, and a good many of the

lodging-houses in the street belong to them. The lady is said to be

quite equal to quieting any disturbance among the lodgers with her one

hand, and the man displays the most remarkable skill, suffering

apparently little inconvenience from his loss. When you have seen him

take his pipe out of his mouth with the empty sleeve of his jacket you

will understand how he is able, with his wife's assistance, to keep his

rough _clientele_ well in hand, and to compel their respect.

There is one feature of Notting Dale which strikes you forcibly if you

go into a local crowd engaged in a heated argument, and that is the

preponderance of the rural accent; for this is a district in which the

evil of rural immigration has written itself large. Thousands of honest

country folks crowd up year after year to the great city that they

believe to be paved with gold. Of those who come in by the Great Western

a large percentage drift to the Dale, failing to find room in the

districts around the terminus; and in the Dale a process of moral

deterioration goes on which is a tragedy.

The husband fails to find the work he expected would be ready to his

hand in busy London. The little savings are soon gone; the man and his

wife are driven to the common lodging-house, or, if there are children

with them, to the furnished room. The wife perhaps goes to the laundry

work. The husband's enforced idleness often ends in his becoming a

confirmed loafer, contented to live on what his wife can earn. There is

in Notting Dale a large working population living cleanly by honest

industry, but the country folk who have been unfortunate at the

commencement of the struggle for life in London cannot avail themselves

of the cleaner accommodation and the better environment. They are forced

into the area which is given over to the vicious and the criminal, and

they gradually sink to the level of their neighbours.

Many a tale of heroic struggle against evil surroundings do the women

tell who come before the School Board officials to explain the

non-attendance of their children. Sometimes it is the man who has had

the moral strength to resist, and with tears in his eyes will tell of

the healthy, country-bred wife who came with him one day from the

far-away village full of hope, but who has yielded to the awful

environment, deserted his home, and left his children to fall into evil

companionship.

There is no sadder chapter in the story of London than that of the

light-hearted country folk who come to it full of courage and hope, and

gradually sink down under the evil influence of a slum to which their

poverty has driven them, until they themselves are as criminal and as

vicious as their neighbours.

For them little can be done, though now and again the brave men and

women who are working in the good cause succeed in rescuing them, even

though they have fallen to the lowest depths of the abyss.

But for the next generation the hope is greater. High above one of the

most notorious streets in the Dale tower the great buildings in which

the children are gathered together and educated and taught the

principles of right doing.

This is the thought that comes to me as, fresh from our pilgrimage of

pain, we stand in the big playground and watch the little ones filing

out in the sunshine to go to their homes. Some of them are well clad,

the children of honest, hard-working folk who love them and care for

them. But many are going back to miserable dens where there is neither

love nor care, where there is no respect for the laws of God or man.

[Illustration: "MANY ARE GOING BACK TO MISERABLE DENS."]

They cannot all be saved from the evil environment that awaits them, but

they come day after day to the schools, and there they fall under an

influence which, if they are not inherently bad, will stand them in good

stead through all their lives.

We watch the little ones as with the light-heartedness of childhood they

trip away, some to the meal which loving hands have prepared for them,

others to crowd and clamour at the doors of the mission-house, where the

free meal stands between them and the hunger pain, and then we turn into

a street that bore formerly so ill a name that the authorities changed

it, to remove the stigma of the address from the few decent people in

it.

In five minutes we are once more on the beaten track and in the heart of

Royal and aristocratic Kensington.

[Illustration: DIALSTONE LANE

BY W.W.JACOBS]

Copyright, 1904, by W. W. Jacobs, in the United States of

America.