“TOURS, IDLE TOURS”
The adverse opinion of her old and once-trusted comrade, Mrs. X., in the
matter of “The Delegate” was not the only trial of the kind that Mrs.
Martin had to face. I imagine that few things in her life had given her
as much pleasure as Violet’s success as a writer. She had a very highly
cultured taste, and her literary judgment, builded as it was upon the
rock of the classics, was as sound as it was fastidious. Had a conflict
been pressed between it and maternal pride, I believe the latter would
have been worsted. Fortunately, her critical faculty permitted her to
extend to Martin’s writing the same entire approval that she bestowed
upon her in all other regards. It is usual to make merry over a mother’s
glorying in her young, but there are few things more touching than to
see a brilliant creature, whose own glories are past, renew her youth,
and yet forget it, in the rising sun of a child’s success.
No one expects to be a prophet in his own country, but when Martin and I
first began to write, we have sometimes felt as if a mean might have
been discovered between receiving our books with the trumpets and
shawms, suggested by Sir William Gregory, and treating them as
regrettable slips, over which a cloak of kindly silence was to be flung.
My cousin Nannie and--though in less degree--my mother, were both out
for trumpets, and the silence of their acquaintances (a silence that
Martin and I did not fail to assure them was compassionate) filled them
with wrath that only each other’s sympathy could assuage. (It is, I am
sure, unnecessary to say that each was comfortingly aware that her own
daughter had done all the work. But this did not invalidate the
sympathy.)
The formula touching the superfluity of kneebuckles to the Highlander
was, however, sustaining; and this was fortunate, as each of Martin’s
articles, as they appeared in the _World_, called it into requisition.
If “The Delegate” had staggered the Highlanders, they literally reeled
when “Cheops in Connemara” was offered for their learning by Mrs.
Martin, who had a pathetic hope, never realised, that some day they
might find grace and understanding.
It was of “Cheops” that a lady, who may be called Mrs. Brown, said to my
cousin Nannie,
“Oh, Mrs. Martin, I _loved_ it! It was so _nice_! I couldn’t quite
understand it, though I read it twice over, but I showed it to Mr.
Brown, and _he_ solved the problem!”
Wonderful man, as Martin commented when she wrote the story to me.
It was this same Mr. Brown whose criticism of the “Irish Cousin,” wrung
from him by Mrs. Martin, was so encouraging.
“I found it,” he wrote, “highly imaginative, but not nonsensical,
unusual in a work of legendary character. In fact, it is not bosh!”
The singular spring from the clouds to every day’s most common slang was
typical of good Mr. Brown. He is now beyond the clouds, or, in any case,
is, I am sure, where he will not be offended if I recall one or two of
his pulpit utterances. In my diary at this time I find: “Interesting
sermon. Mr. Brown told us that ‘a sin, though very great, is not as
great as one that exceeds it; but remember that sin can only find
entrance in a heart prepared for it, even as matches strike only on the
box. And oh friends, it is useless to trust in those whose names are
fragrant in Christian society to pull you through.’”
Martin was much attached to Mr. Brown, who was as kind a man, and as
worthy a parson, as ever was great-grandson to Mrs. Malaprop. In a
letter to me she says:
“Last Sunday’s sermon was full of ‘jewels five words long.’ I noticed
first an allusion to Jacob’s perfidy to Esau. ‘Which of us, Beloved,
would not have blushed if we had been in--in--in the shoes in which
Jacob was then living? Or if we had been his mother?’
“There was something in this so suggestive of the tale of the Old Woman,
who with her family, lived in a shoe, that I found my seat in the front
row of the choir inconvenient, more especially when one recollected that
in Jacob’s time sandals were the usual wear. Mr. B. then proceeded to
tell us of ‘The Greek Chap’ who held the gunwale of the boat and ‘when
his right hand was chopped off, held it with his left, and that being
cut off, caught it in his teeth. Then his head was cut off! Think of
him, Beloved, who, when his head was cut off, still with his teeth held
the boat impossible!’
“The last word was doubtless the nearest he could get to ‘immoveable.’
At this two prominent members of the choir laughed, long and
agonisingly, as did many others. I never smiled. Had you been there I
might have been unequal to the strain, but I felt sorry for poor Mr.
Brown, as it was only a slip to say ‘head’ for ‘hand.’ He got through
the rest pretty well, only saying, a little later, that we should not
‘ask the Almighty for mercies to be doled out to us, like a pauper’s
gruel, in half-pints.’ He gave us another striking metaphor, a few
Sundays ago. ‘Dear friends, to what shall I liken the Day of
Resurrection, and the rising of us, miserable sinners, from the grave?
Will it not be like poor, wretched, black chimney-sweeps, sticking their
heads up out of chimneys!’”
Martin’s pitifulness to incapacity, whether mental or physical, could be
almost exasperating sometimes in its wide charity. Failure of any kind
appealed to her generosity. Her consideration and tenderness for the
limitations and disabilities of old age were very wonderful and
beautiful things, and no one ever knew her to triumph over a fallen foe.
For myself, I am of opinion that, with some foes, this is a mistake,
akin to being heroic at a dentist’s. However, the question need not now
be discussed.
That “An Irish Cousin” had satisfied Messrs. Bentley’s expectations was
evidenced by a letter from Mr. R. Bentley in October, 1889, in which he
suggested that we should write a three-volume novel for them, and
offered us £100 down and £125 on the second 500 copies. We were then at
work on a short novel that we had been commissioned to write. This was
“Naboth’s Vineyard,” which, after various adventures, was first
published by Spencer Blackett, in October, 1891. The story had had a
preliminary canter in the _Lady’s Pictorial_ Christmas number as a short
story, which we called “Slide Number 42.” It was sufficiently approved
of to encourage us to fill it up and make a novel of it. As a book it
has had a curious career. We had sold the copyright without reservation,
and presently it was passed on to Mr. Blackett. We next heard of it in
the hands of Griffith and Farran. Then it appeared as a “yellow-back”
[Illustration:
E. Œ. S. CANDY. SHEILA. V. F. M. E. B. C.
]
at 2_s._ Tauchnitz then produced it; finally, not very long ago, a
friend sent us a copy, bound rather like a manual of devotion, with
silver edges to the pages, which she had bought, new, for 4_d._; which
makes one fear that Ahab’s venture had not turned out too well. It was a
story of the Land League, and the actors in it were all of the peasant
class. It was very well reviewed, and was, in fact, treated by the
Olympians, the _Spectator_, the _Saturday Review_, the _Times_, etc.,
with a respect and a seriousness that almost alarmed us. It seemed that
we had been talking prose without knowing it, and we were so gratified
by the discovery that we decided forthwith to abandon all distractions
and plunge solemnly, and with single-hearted industry, into the
construction of the three-volume novel desired by Messrs. Bentley.
This was not, however, as simple a matter as it seemed, and the way was
far from clear. I was doing illustrations for a children’s story (and a
very delightful one), “Clear as the Noonday,” by my cousin, Mrs. James
Penrose, and I was also illustrating an old Irish song of Crimean times,
“The Kerry Recruit,” which has been more attractively brought to the
notice of the public by another cousin, Mr. Harry Plunket Greene. Martin
was still enmeshed in her _World_ articles and in Ross affairs
generally, and though we discussed the “serious novel” intermittently it
did not advance.
Ross was by this time restored to the normal condition of Irish country
houses, comfortable, hospitable, unconventional, an altogether pleasant
place to be in, and with visitors coming and going, it was not as easy
as it had been for the daughter in residence to devote herself to
literature, especially serious literature.
During one of my many visits there, the honourable and unsolicited
office of domestic chaplain had been conferred upon me. Martin has
written that “Hymns and Family Prayers are often receptacles for stale
metaphor and loose phraseology; out of them comes a religion clothed to
suffocation in Sunday clothes and smelling of pew-openers. Tate and
Brady had much to answer for in this respect; some of their verses give
at once the peculiar feeling of stiff neck produced by a dull sermon and
a high pew.”
In this condemnation, however, the family prayers at Ross were not
included. When I knew them they took the form of selections from the
Morning Service, and included the Psalms for the day; nothing more
simple and suitable could be imagined; nevertheless, there were times
when they might, indisputably, have been more honoured in the breach
than in the observance. I have already alluded to my cousin Nannie’s
sense of humour, and its power of overwhelming her in sudden
catastrophe. On some forgotten occasion, one of those _contretemps_
peculiar to the moment of household devotion had taken place, and the
remembrance of this, recurring, as it did, daily, with the opening of
the Prayer-book, rarely failed to render impossible for her a decorous
reading of the prayers. This was the more disastrous, because, like very
many of “The Chief’s” descendants, she specially enjoyed reading aloud.
With much reluctance she deputed her office to Martin, but, unhappily,
some aspect of the affair (which had, it may be admitted, some that were
sufficiently absurd) would tickle the deputy, and prayers at Ross,
which, as I have said, included the Psalms for the day, ended, more than
once, at very short notice. I may say that during my tenure of the
office, although I could not, like Martin, repeat all the Psalms from
memory, I acquitted myself respectably, if quite without distinction.
This, as far as I know, has been achieved by but one reader, who will, I
trust, forgive me if I abandon, for once, the effort to refrain from
mention of existing contemporaries, and quote Martin’s account of her
success.
V. F. M. to E. Œ. S. (Ross, 1890.)
“None of us were able to go to church to-day, the weather being
detestable and Mama’s eyes much inflamed by gout. So we had prayers
at home. Quite early in the morning Mama had strong convulsions at
the very thought, and I compelled her to delegate Katie for the
office of chaplain. Muriel and her English nurse, Hoskins, were
summoned, and before they came Mama stipulated that the Psalms
should be read. Katie consented, on condition that Mama should not
try to read her verse, and after some resistance, Mama gave in. In
came Hoskins, looking the picture of propriety, with a crimson
nose, and Muriel, armed with a Child’s Bible, and Katie made a
start. Will you believe that Mama could not refrain, but nipped in
with the second verse, in a voice of the most majestic gravity. The
fourth verse was her next, and in that I detected effort, and
prepared for the worst. At the sixth came collapse, and a stifled
anguish of laughter. I said in tones of ice,
“‘I’m afraid your eye is hurting you?’
“‘Yes,’ gasped Mama.
“Katie swept on without a stagger, and thus the situation was
saved. I think Hoskins would consider laughter of the kind so
incredible that she would more easily believe that Mama always did
this when her eye hurt her. Katie slew Mama, hip and thigh,
afterwards, as indeed, her magnificent handling of the affair
entitled her to do.”
In spite of our excellent resolutions, the serious novel was again put
on the shelf, and the next work we undertook was a tour on behalf of the
_Lady’s Pictorial_. This was provoked by a guide-book to Connemara,
which was sent to Martin by an English friend. She wrote to me and said,
“E. H. has sent me an intolerably vulgar guide to Connemara, and
suggests that you and I should try and do something to take its place.
It is written as it were in description of a tour made by an ingenuous
family party. ‘Jack,’ very manly; the Young Ladies, very ladylike; a
kind and humorous mother, etc. ‘Jack’ is much the most revolting. The
informant of the party gives many interesting facts about the
disappearance of the Martins from the face of the earth, and deplores
the breaking up of the property ‘_put together by Cromwell’s soldier_’!”
I think it was this culminating offence that decided us to supplement
the information supplied to the ingenuous family. Our examination into
the conditions of Connemara, and our findings on its scenery, hotels,
roads, etc., were not accomplished without considerable effort. In 1890
there was no railway to Clifden, hotels were few and indifferent, means
of communication scant and expensive. We hired a jennet and a
governess-cart, and strayed among the mountains like tinkers, stopping
where we must, taking chances for bed and board. It was uncomfortable
and enjoyable, and I imagine that our account of it, which was published
as a book by Messrs. W. H. Allen, is still consulted by the tourist who
does not require either mental improvement or reliable statistics.
In the autumn of ’91 we went, by arrangement with the _Lady’s
Pictorial_, to Bordeaux, to investigate, and to give our valuable views
upon the vintage in that district. This developed into a very
interesting expedition; we had introductions that opened to us the
gloomy and historic portals of the principal “_Caves_”; we saw claret in
all its stages (some of them horrible); we assisted at a “_Danse de
Vendange_,” a sort of Harvest Home, at which we trod strange measures
with the vintagers, feeling, as we swung and sprang to the squeals of
pipes and fiddles, as though we were in comic opera; we gained a
pleasing insight into the charm of French hospitality, and we
acquired--and this was the tour’s only drawback--a taste for the very
best claret that we have since found unfortunately superfluous.
These articles, also, were republished with the title “In the Vine
Country,” Martin’s suggestion of “From Cork to Claret” being rejected as
too subtle for the public. Such, at least, was the publishers’ opinion,
which is often pessimistic as to the intelligence of the public.
Since I am on the subject of our tours, I may as well deal with them
all. It was in June, 1893, that we rode through Wales, at the behest of
_Black and White_. The articles, with my drawings, were subsequently
published by Messrs. Blackwood, and were entitled “Beggars on
Horseback.” We were a little more than a week on the road, and were
mounted on hireling ponies and hireling saddles (facts that may enlist
the sympathies of those who have a knowledge of such matters). I may
here admit that, in spite of certain obvious advantages of a literary
kind, these amateur-gipsy tours are not altogether as enjoyable as our
accounts of them might lead the artless reader to imagine. They demand
iron endurance, the temper of Mark Tapley, and the Will to Survive of
Robinson Crusoe. I do not say that we possessed these attributes, but we
realised their necessity.
Only once more, and in this same year, 1893, did we adventure on a tour.
This time again on behalf of the _Lady’s Pictorial_, and, at our own
suggestion, to Denmark. We had offered the Editor four alternatives,
Lapland or Denmark, Killarney or Kiel. He chose Denmark, and I have,
ever since 1914, deeply regretted that we did not insist on Kiel.
The artistic and social difficulties in dealing with this class of work
have not, in my experience, been sufficiently set forth. We were
provided with introductions, obtained variously, mainly through our own
friends. We were given, editorially, to understand that the events, be
they what they may, were ever to be treated from the humorous point of
view. “Pleasant” is the word employed, which means pleasant for the
pampered reader, but not necessarily for anyone else.
Well, “pleasant” things, resulting from some of these kind, private
introductions, undoubtedly occurred, but it is a poor return for
full-handed hospitality to swing its bones, as on a gibbet, in a
newspaper. Many have been the priceless occurrences that we have had to
bury in our own bosoms, or, in writing them down, write ourselves down
also as dastards. It is some consolation to be able to say this here and
now. For all I know, there may still be those who consider that Martin
Ross and E. Œ. Somerville treated them, either by omission or
commission, with ingratitude. If so, let me now assure them that they
little know how they were spared.