A NEW REIGN
Sir William was asked by Lord Wolseley to take up the Aldershot command
in the absence of Sir Redvers Buller, who was struggling very
desperately to retrieve our fortunes in the Boer War; so to Aldershot we
went from Devonport, where my husband’s command ran concurrently. How
intensely England had hoped for the turning of the tide when Buller was
given the tremendous task of directing our armies! We forget the horrors
the nation went through in those days because the late War has made us
pass through the same apprehensions multiplied by millions, but there
the fact remains in our history that we nearly suffered a terrible
catastrophe at the time of which I am writing. Buller, on leaving for
the Cape, had said to my husband how fervently he wished he possessed
his gift of imagination, and, indeed, that is a very precious gift to a
commander. This truly awful state of things--our terrible losses, and
the temporary lowering of our military prestige (thank heaven, so
gloriously recovered and enhanced in the World War!)--were the answer to
the repeated assertion made, when we were at the Cape, by those who
ought to have known, that “the Boers won’t fight.” How this used to
enrage my husband, whose “gift of imagination” made him see so clearly
the danger ahead. Well, all this is of the long ago, and, as I have
already noted, it is better to say little now; but the sense of
injustice lives!
[Illustration: A DESPATCH-BEARER, BOER WAR, AND THE HORSE-GUNNERS.]
Buller had a great reception at Aldershot on his return from South
Africa. I never saw a more radiantly happy face on a woman than poor
Lady Audrey’s, who had been in a state of most tense anxiety during her
dear Redvers’ absence. As the train steamed into the station the band
struck up “See the Conquering Hero comes!” The horses of his carriage
were unharnessed, and the triumphal car was drawn by a team of firemen
to Government House. At the entrance gate a group of school children
sang “Home, sweet Home”; my husband hauled down his flag and Buller’s
was run up, and so that episode closed.
We had inhabited a suburban-looking villa on the road to Farnborough
during the absence of Sir Redvers, not wishing to disturb the anxious
watcher at Government House, and very often we saw the Empress, just as
in the old days. She told us the dear Queen was very ill, far worse than
the world was allowed to know. My husband had always said the war would
kill her, for she had taken our losses cruelly to heart, and so it
happened on January 22nd, 1901. The resumed Devonport Diary says:
“A day ever to be marked in English history as a day of mourning. Our
Queen is dead. At dinner S. brought us the news that she passed away at
6.30 this afternoon. We were prepared for it, but it seems like a dream.
To us who have been born and have lived all our lives under her
sovereignty it is difficult to realise that she is gone.
“_January 23rd, 1901._--A dull gloomy day, punctuated by 81 minute guns,
which began booming at noon. All the royal standards and flags hanging
half-mast in the fog, on land and afloat.
“_January 24th._--At noon-day all standards and flags were run up to the
masthead, and a quick thunder of guns proclaimed the accession of Edward
VII. At the end the band on board the guardship _Nile_ struck up ‘God
Save the King.’ The flags will all be lowered again until the day after
Queen Victoria is laid to rest. Edward VII.! How strange it sounds, and
how events and changes are rolling down upon us every hour now. Albert
Edward will be a greater man as Edward VII.
“_February 5th._--The Queen was buried to-day beside her husband at
Frogmore. It is inexpressibly touching to think of them side by side
again. Model wife and mother, how many of your women subjects have
strayed away, of late, from those virtues which you were true to to the
last!
“_February 16th._--There is great indignation amongst us Catholics at
Edward VII. having been called upon to take the oath at the opening of
Parliament which savours so much of the darkest days of ‘No Popery’
bigotry. I think it might have been modified by this time, and the lies
about ‘idolatry’ and the ‘worship’ of the Virgin Mary eliminated. Could
not the King have had strength of mind enough to refuse to insult his
Catholic subjects? I know he must have deeply disliked to pronounce
those words.
“_August 6th._--Again the flags to-day are at half-mast, and so is the
royal standard, and this time, on the men-of-war, it is the German flag!
The Empress Frederick died yesterday.” I never mentioned at the time of
our visit to the Connaughts at Bagshot, when we were first at Aldershot,
a touching incident concerning her. Sir William sat next to her at
dinner, and, _à propos_ of a really fine still-life picture painted by
her, which hung over the dining-room door in the hall, he asked her
whether she still kept up her painting. “No,” she said, “I have cried
myself blind!” What with one Empress crying as though her heart would
break in speaking to him that time at Camden Place and this Empress
telling him she had cried herself blind----! The illness and death of
the Kaiser Frederick must have been a period of great anguish.
During this summer I was very busy with my picture of the “10th Bengal
Lancers at Tent Pegging,” a subject requiring much sunshine study, which
I have already mentioned.
In September, Lord Roberts--“the miniature Field Marshal,” as I call him
in the Diary--came down on inspection, and great were the doings in his
honour. “How will this little figure stand in history? Will’s
well-planned defence against a night attack from the sea came off very
well this dark still night, though the navy were nearly an hour late.
There was too much waiting, but when, at last, the enemy torpedo boats
and destroyers appeared, the whole Sound was bordered with such a zone
of fire that, had it been real war, not a rivet of the invader’s
flotilla would have been left in possession of its hold. ‘Bobs’ must
have been gratified at to-night’s display, which he reviewed from
Stonehouse.
“Our Roberts dinner was of twenty-two covers, and the only women were
Lady Charles Scott, myself and C. A guard of honour was at the front
door, and presented arms as the Field Marshal arrived, the band playing.
He certainly is diminutive. A nice face, soldierlike, and a natural
manner. With him that too jocose Evelyn Wood and others. ‘Bobs,’ of
course, took me in to dinner, and, on my left, Lord Charles Scott took
in C. Will took in Lady Charles. The others--Lord Mount Edgcumbe, H.S.H.
Prince Louis of Battenberg (in command of the _Implacable_), Admiral
Jackson, and so forth--subsided into their places according to
seniority. Every man in blue or red except one rifleman. Soft music
during dinner and two bars of the National Anthem before the still
unfamiliar ‘The King, God bless him!’ at dessert. Will still feels a
little--I don’t know how to express it--of the mental hesitation before
changing ‘the Queen’ which he felt so strongly at first. He was very
truly attached to her. I was back in the drawing-room in good time to
receive the crowd, who came in a continuous flow, all with an expectant
smile, to pay homage to the Lion. I don’t think I forgot anybody’s name
(coached by the A.D.C.) in all those introductions, but that item of my
duties is a thing I dread. I never saw people in such good humour at any
social function before. We certainly _do_ love to honour our soldiers.
But, all the time, things are not going too well with us in the war!
“_September 14th._--Again the flags half-mast! Now it is the ‘Stars and
Stripes.’ Poor President McKinley succumbed to-day to his horrible
wound. The surgeons wouldn’t let him die for a long while, though he
asked them to. They did their best.
“_March 7th, 1902._--And now for the royal visit, the principal occasion
for which is the launching of the great battleship the _Queen_, by Queen
Alexandra. Will was responsible for all matters ashore, as the admiral
was for those afloat. Lady Charles and I had to be on the platform at
North Road to receive Their Majesties, the only other women there being
Lady Morley and the Plymouth Mayor’s daughter, bearing a bouquet for
presentation. The royal train had an engine decorated in front of its
funnel with an enormous gilt crown, and I was pleased, as it
majestically glided into the station, to see that it is possible even in
railway prose to have a little dash of poetry. The band struck up, the
guard of honour presented arms with a clang. First, out sprang lacqueys
carrying bags and wraps who scurried to the royal carriages waiting
outside, and out sprang various admirals and diplomats in hot haste, all
with rather anxious faces veneered with smiles. And then, leisurely, the
ever lovely and self-possessed Queen and her kindly and kingly consort,
wearing, over his full-dress admiral’s uniform, a caped overcoat.
Salutes, bows, curtseys, smiles, handshakes. Will presents the great
silver Key of the Citadel, which Charles II. had made for locking the
Great Gate against the refractory people. Edward VII. touches it and the
General Commanding returns it to the R.A. officer, who has charge of it.
We all kiss the King’s hand as seeing him for the first time to speak to
since his accession. The Queen withdraws her hand quickly before any
officer can salute it in like manner, which looks a little ungracious.
Whilst the General and Admiral are introducing their respective staffs
to the King, the Queen has a little chat with me and asks after my
painting and so forth. She is very fond of that water colour I did for
her album at Dover of a trooper of her ‘own’ 19th Hussars at
tent-pegging. Lady Charles and I did not join in the procession through
the Three Towns to the dockyard, but hastened home to avoid the crowd.
“In the evening we dined with Their Majesties on board the royal yacht
over part of which floating palace C. and I had been conducted in the
morning. Whatever the yacht’s sailing value may be she certainly cuts
out the Kaiser’s _Hohenzollern_ in her internal splendour. When it comes
to washstand tops of onyx and alabaster; and carpets of unfathomable
depth of pile, and hangings in bedrooms of every shade of delicate
colour, ‘toning,’ as the milliners say, with each particular set of
furniture; and the most elaborately beautiful arrangements for lighting
and warming electrically, and so on, and so on--one rather wonders why
so much luxury was piled on luxury in this new yacht which the King, I
am told, does not like on the high seas. Her lines are not as graceful
as those of the old _Victoria and Albert_, and it is said she ‘rolls
awful’!
“Well, to dinner! As we drove up to the yacht, which is moored right
opposite the Port Admiral’s house and is the habitation of the King and
Queen during their sojourn here, we saw her outlined against the pitch
black sky by coloured electric lamps, which was pretty. Equerries,
secretaries and Miss Knollys received us at the top of the gangway, and
the ladies of the Queen soon filed into the ante-chamber (or cabin)
where they and we, the guests, awaited Their Majesties. Full uniform was
ordered for the men, and we ladies were requested to come in ‘high, thin
dresses,’ as, it appears, is the etiquette on board royal yachts. There
were the Admiral and Lady Charles, the Duke and Duchess of Buccleugh,
Lord and Lady St. Germans, Lord Walter Kerr, Lord Mount Edgcumbe (‘the
Hearl,’ as he is known to Plymothians), the Bishop of Exeter, Lady
Lytton and others up to about thirty-six in number. The King, still
dressed as an admiral, and the Queen in a charming black and white
semi-transparent frock, with many ropes of pearls, soon came in, and,
the curtseying over, we filed into the great dining saloon brilliantly
lighted and splendid. The King led in his daughter, Princess Victoria.
Buccleugh led in the Queen, and so on. How unlike the painfully solemn,
whispered dinners of dear old Queen Victoria was this banquet. We
shouted of necessity, as the band played all the time. The King and
Queen seem to me to have acquired an _expanded_ dignity since they have
come to the Throne. Will and I could not do justice to the dinner as it
was Friday, but that didn’t matter. After the sweets the head servant
(what Goliaths in red liveries they all are!) handed the King a _snuff
box_! I was so fascinated by the sight of the descendant of the Georges
engaged in the very Georgian act of taking a pinch that my eyes were
riveted on him. I love history and am always trying to revive the past
in imagination. It is true that ‘a cat may look at a King,’ but then I
am _not_ a cat (at least I hope not). I only trust His Majesty didn’t
mind, but he certainly saw me!
“After dinner we women went down with the Queen to her boudoir, where an
Egyptian-looking servant wearing a _tarboosh_ handed us coffee of
surpassing aroma, and Her Majesty showed us her beloved little Japanese
dog and some of the pretty things about the room. She then asked us to
see her bedroom (which I had already seen that morning) and the little
dog’s basket where he sleeps near her bed. She is still extremely
beautiful. Her figure is youthful and shapely, and all her movements are
queenly. The King had quite a long talk with Will about this dreadful
Boer War which is causing us all so much anxiety, after we went up
again. He then came over to me, and after a few commonplaces he came
nearer and in a confidential tone began about Will. I think he is fond
of him. What he said was kind, and I knew he wanted me to repeat his
sympathetic words to my husband afterwards. He spoke of him as a
‘splendid soldier.’ I know he had in his mind the painful trial Will had
gone through. It was late when Their Majesties bade us good-night.
“_March 8th._--The great day of the launch of H.M.S. _Queen_. I wonder
if the hearts of the sailors beat anxiously to-day at all! A quieter,
more unemotional-looking set of men than those naval bigwigs could
nowhere be seen in the world. But, first of all, there was the
medal-giving at the R.N. Barracks, where Ladies Poore and Charles Scott,
Mrs. Jackson and myself had to receive the King and Queen by the side of
our respective husbands on a raised daïs in the centre of the huge
parade ground. It was very cold, and the Queen told me she envied me my
fur-lined coat. Will said I missed an opportunity of making a pendant to
Sir Walter Raleigh! The function was very long, for the King had to give
a medal to each one of the three hundred bluejackets and marines who
passed before him in single file. At the launching place we all
assembled on a great platform, and there in front of us stood the huge
hull of the battleship, the ram projecting over the little table on
which the Queen was to cut the ropes. That red-painted ram was garlanded
with flowers, and the bottle hung from the garland, completely hidden
under a covering of roses. It contained red Australian wine, a very
sensible change from the French champagne of former times. Down below an
immense crowd of workmen waited, some of them right under the ship, and
all round, in the different stands, were dense masses of people. We were
soon joined by three German naval grandees and two Japanese
_leprechauns_, one an admiral, a toadlike-looking creature in a uniform
entirely copied from ours. Our new allies are not handsome. Then came
the Bishop of Exeter, in robes and cap and with a peaked beard, a living
Holbein in the dress of Cranmer. How could I, a painter, not delight in
that figure? I told a friend that bishop had no business to be alive,
but ought to be a painting by Holbein, on panel. What does she do but
whisk off straight to him and Mrs. Bishop and tell them! Our privileged
group kept swelling with additions of officers in full glory and smart
women in lovely frocks, and bouquets were brought in, and everything was
to me perfectly charming. Monarchy calls much beauty into existence.
Long may it endure!
“At last there was a stir; the monarchs came up the inclined approach
and the band struck up. They took their places facing the ship’s bows,
and Cranmer on panel by Holbein blessed the ship in as nearly a Catholic
way as was possible, with the sign of the cross left out. A subordinate
held his crozier before him. A hymn had previously been sung and a
psalm, followed by the Lord’s Prayer. Then came the ‘christening’
(strange word), a picturesque Pagan ceremony. The Queen brightened up
after the last ‘Amen’ and, nearing the table, reached over to the
flower-decked bottle; then, stepping back, swung it from her against the
monstrous ram, saying, ‘God bless this ship and all that sail in her.’ I
heard a little crack, and only a few red drops trickled down. This
wouldn’t do, for she immediately seized the bottle again and, stepping
well back this time and holding the bottle as high over her head as the
ropes would allow, flung it with such violence that it smashed all to
pieces and the red wine gushed over her hands and sleeves and poured out
its last drops on the table. A great cheer rang out at this, and the
King laughingly seemed to say to her, ‘You did it this time with a
vengeance!’ She flushed up, looking as though she enjoyed the fun. Then
came the great moment of the cutting by the Queen of the little ropes
that held the monster bound as by silken threads. Six good taps with the
mallet, severing the six strands across a ‘turtle back’ in the centre of
the table, and away flew the two ropes down amongst the cheering crowd
of workmen and, automatically, down came the two last supports on either
side of the yet impassive hull. Still impassive--not a hair’s breadth of
movement! A painful pause. Some men below were pumping the hydraulic
apparatus for all they were worth. I kept my eye on the nose of the ram,
gauging it by some object behind. Firm as a rock! At last a tiny
movement, no more than the starting of a snail across a cabbage leaf.
‘She’s off!’ A hurricane of cheers, and with the most admirable and
dignified acceleration of speed the great ship, seeming to come into
life, glided down the slips and, ploughing through the parting and
surging waters, floated off far into the Hamoaze to the strains of ‘Rule
Britannia.’ Queen Alexandra, in her elation, made motions with her arms
as though she was shoving the ship off herself. Scarcely had the
battleship _Queen_ passed into the water than the blocks displaced by
her passage were rolled back, still hot as it were from the friction,
into the position they had occupied before she moved, and the King,
stepping forward, turned a little electric handle at the table, and lo!
the keel plate of the _Edward VII_. slowly moved forward and stopped in
its position on the blocks as the germ of the new battleship. The King,
in a loud voice, proclaimed that the keel plate of the _Edward VII_. was
‘well and truly laid,’ and a great cheer arose and ‘God Save the King,’
and all was over. A new battleship was born.[14] We met Their Majesties
at the Port Admiral’s at tea, and Will dined with them, together with
some of his staff.
“_March 10th_.--Saw Their Majesties off. I wonder if they were getting
tired of seeing always the same set of faces and smiles? I am going to
present C. at Court on the 14th, and my function twin, Lady Charles, is
going there, too, so I shall feel it will be a case of ‘Here we are
again,’ when I meet the royal eye that night. In the evening the news of
Methuen’s defeat and capture by Delarey. To think this horror was going
on the day we received the King and Queen at North Road Station!
“_March 14th_.--The King’s Court was much better arranged than formerly,
as we had only to make two curtseys--nothing more--instead of having to
run the gauntlet of a long row of princes and princesses who were
abreast of Queen Victoria (or her representative), and who used to
inspect one from head to foot. These were now grouped behind the
monarchs, and formed a rich, subdued background to the two regal
figures on their thrones. (What a blessing to the aforesaid princes and
princesses to be spared the necessity of passing all those nervous women
in review, and by daylight, too!) Altogether the music and the generally
more festive character of the function struck one as a great and happy
improvement on the old dispensation. The King and Queen didn’t exactly
say, ‘How do you do again?’ as I appeared, but looked it as I met their
smiling eyes. This is the first Court of the King’s reign.
“_March 27th_.--Cecil Rhodes died yesterday. I am glad I saw him at the
Cape. One morning just at sunrise I and the children were driving to
Mass during the mission and, as we passed over the railway line, we saw
people riding down from ‘Grootschuur.’ The foremost horseman was Cecil
Rhodes, looking very big and with a wide red face. He gave me a
searching look or stare as if trying to make out who I was in the shade
of the carriage hood. So I saw his face well.
“_April 3rd_.--Will and I are invited by the King and Queen to see them
crowned at Westminster. I am to wear ‘court dress with plumes but
without train.’ But what if the nightmare war still is dragging on in
June? The time is getting short! We hear the King is getting anxious.
Lord Wolseley’s trip to the Cape (for his health!) is supposed to have
really to do with bringing about peace. But ‘’ware politics’ for me.
They are not in my line. What a wet blanket would be spread as a pall
over all the purple canopies in Westminster Abbey if war was still
brooding over us all! Imagine news of a new Methuen disaster on the
morning of June 26th!”
On Varnishing Day that spring at the Royal Academy I found that my
tent-pegging picture could not look to greater advantage, but it was in
the last room, where the public looks with “lack-lustre eyes,” being
tired.
On June 21st I left to attend the Coronation of Edward VII., spending
two days at Dick’s monastery at Downside on the way, high up in the
Mendip Hills. I note: “I had a bright little room at the guest house
just outside the precincts. That night the full moon, that emblem of
serenity, rose opposite my window, and I felt as though lifted up above
that world into which I was about to plunge for my participation in the
pomp of the Coronation in a few hours. It is inexpressibly touching to
me to see my son where he is. A hard probation, for the Benedictine test
is long and severe, as indeed the test is, necessarily, throughout the
Religious Orders.
“_June 24th_.--Memorable day! I was passing along Buckingham Palace Road
at 12.30 when I saw a poster: ‘Coronation Postponed’! Groups of people
were buying up the papers. Of course, no one believed the news at first,
and people were rather amusedly perplexed. No one had heard that the
King was ill. On getting to Piccadilly I saw the official posters and
the explanation. An operation just performed! and only yesterday Knollys
telling the world there was ‘not a word of truth in the alarming rumours
of the King’s health.’ I and Mrs. C. went to a dismal afternoon concert
at 2.30 to which we were pledged, and which the promoters were in two
minds about postponing, and we left in the middle to stroll about the
crowded streets and watch the effect of the disastrous news. There was
something very dramatic in the scene in front of the palace--the huge
crowd waiting and watching, the royal standard drooping on the roof
(not half-mast yet?), and the sense of brooding sorrow over the great
building, which held the, perhaps, dying King. What a change in two or
three hours!
“_June 26th_.--This was to have been the Coronation Day. General
dismantling. Those dead laurel wreaths still lying in the gutters are
said to be the same that were used at the funeral of King Humbert. What
a weird thought! The crowds are thinning, but still, at night, they gaze
at the little clumps of illuminations which some people exhibit, as the
King is going on well. ‘_Vivat Rex_’ flares in great brilliancy here and
there. The words have a deeper meaning than usual. May he live!
“_June 27th_.--This was to have been the day of the royal procession.
Where is that rose-colour-lined coach I so looked forward to? Lying idle
in its cover. Every one is moralising. Even the clubmen, Will tells me,
are furbishing up little religious platitudes and texts; many are
curiously superstitious, which is strange.”
On our return home I was very busy in the studio. There was much
galloping and trotting of horses up and down in the Government House
grounds for my studies of movement for my next Academy picture (dealing
with Boer War yeomanry) and others.
“_August 9th_.--King Edward VII. was crowned to-day. At about 12.40 the
guns firing in the Sound and batteries announced that, at last, the
Coronation was consummated. We were asked to the ceremony, but could not
go up this time.”
A little tour in France, with my husband and our two girls, made in
September, 1902, gave us sunny days in Anjou on the Loire. The majestic
rivers of France are her chief attraction for the painter, and to us
English Turner’s charm is inseparably blended with their slowly flowing
waters. We were visitors at a _château_ at Savonnières, near Angers, for
most of the time, and our hosts took care that we should miss none of
the lovely things around their domain. The German “Ocean Greyhounds” of
the Hamburg-Amerika line used to call at Plymouth in those days, huge,
three-funnel monsters which, I think, we have since appropriated, and
one of these, the _Augusta Marie_, bore us off to Cherbourg in all the
pride of her gorgeous saloons, flower-decked tables, band, and
extraordinary bombastic oleographs from allegorical pictures by the
Kaiser William II. As we boarded her the band played “God Save the
King,” the captain receiving Sir William with finished regulation
attention, and hardly had the great twin engines swung the ship into the
Sound to receive her passengers, than with another swing forward, which
made the masts wriggle to their very tops, she was off. It was the
“Marseillaise” as we reached France. That band played us nearly the
whole way over. A really pretty idea, this, of playing the national air
of each country where the ship touched.
It was vintage time at Savonnières, which was a French “Castagnolo,” a
most delightful translation into French of that Italian patriarchal
home. There were stone terraces garlanded with vines bearing--not the
big black grapes of Tuscany, but small yellow ones of surpassing
sugariness. We were in a typical and beautiful bit of France, peaceful,
plenteous, and full of dignity. They lead the simple life here such as I
love, which is not to be found in the big English country houses, as
far as I know. I was truly pleased at the sight of the peasantry at Mass
on the Sunday. The women in particular had that dignity which is so
marked in their class, and the white lace coifs they wore had many
varieties of shape, all most beautiful, and were very _soignées_ and
neatly worn. Not an untidy woman or girl amongst these daughters of the
soil.
I was anxious to see “Angers la Noire,” where we stayed on our way from
Savonnières to Amboise. But the black slate houses which gave it that
name are being turned into white stone ones, and so its grim
characteristic is passing away. Give me character, good or bad;
characterless things are odious. I don’t suppose a more perfect old
Angevin town exists than Amboise. It fulfilled all I required and
expected of it. How Turner understood these towns on the broad, majestic
Loire! He occasionally exaggerated, but his exaggerations were always in
the right direction, emphasising thus the dominant beauties of each
place and their local sentiment. Which recalls the deep charm of the
rivers of France more subtly to the mind, Turner’s series or an album of
photographs? Turner’s mind saw more truly than the camera. The castle of
Amboise is superb and its creamy white stone a glory. Then came Blois,
with a quite different reading of a castle, where plenty of colour and
gilding and Gothic richness gave the character--not so restful to eye
and mind as Amboise. Through both the _châteaux_ we were marshalled
along by a guide. I would sooner learn less of a place, by myself, than
be told all by a tiresome man in a _cicerone’s_ livery. Plenty of
horrors were supplied us at both places, vitiating my otherwise simple
pleasure as a painter in the sight of so much beauty.
We returned to Plymouth Sound on a lovely day, and there our blue
launch, with that bright brass funnel I had so long agitated for, was
awaiting us, and we landed at the steps of Mount Wise as though we had
merely been for a trip to Penlee Point.
I found my picture of the yeomanry cantering through a “spruit” in the
Boer War, “Within Sound of the Guns,” admirably placed this time at
Burlington House, in the spring of 1903. I had greatly improved in tone
by this time. Millais’ remark once upon a time, “She draws better than
any of us, but I wish her _tone_ was better,” had sunk deep.
On July 14th, 1903, the Princess Henry of Battenberg (as the title was
then), with a suite of six, paid us a visit of two days at Government
House, and we had, of course, a big reception, which was inevitable. Our
guest hated the ordeal of all those presentations, being very retiring,
and I sympathised. I heard her murmur to her lady, Miss Bulteel, “I
shall die,” as the first arrival was announced. And there she had to
stand till I and the A.D.C. had finished terrifying her with about 250
people in succession. What a tax royalty has to pay! There was the
laying of a foundation stone, a trip in the launch up the Tamar, and
something to be done each day, but with as many rests as we could
squeeze in for our very _simpatica_ princess. The drive through the
streets of Plymouth showed me what the crowd looks like from royalty’s
point of view as I sat by her side in the carriage. I remarked to her
what bad teeth the people had. “They are nothing to those in the north,”
the poor dear said. How often royalty has to run that gauntlet of an
unlovely and cheering crowd!
I was now to go through the great ordeal of witnessing our dear
Dick’s[15] taking his vows. This was on September 4th, 1903, at Belmont
Minster, Hereford.
On July 10th, 1904, a German squadron of eighteen men-of-war came
thundering into the Sound, and on the 12th we assembled a Garden Party
of about three hundred guests to give the three admirals and their
officers a very proper welcome. Eighteen beautiful ships, but all
untried. I lunched on board the flagship, the _Kaiser Wilhelm II._, on
the previous day, and anything to equal the dandified “get up” of that
war vessel could not be found afloat. Wherever there was an excuse for a
gold Imperial crown, there it was, relieved by the spotless whiteness of
its surroundings. The fair-haired bluejackets were extremely clean and
comely, but struck me as being drilled too much like soldiers, and
wanting the natural manner of our men. The impression on my mind at the
time was that immense care and pains had been taken to show off these
brand-new ships and to rival ours, but that they were not a bit like
their models. The General dined in state on board that evening. Oh! the
veneer of politeness shown to us these days; the bowings, the clicking
of heels, the well-drilled salutes; and all the time we were joking
amongst ourselves about the certainty we had that they were taking
soundings of our great harbour. As usual, they were allowed to do just
as they liked there. It is a tremendous thought to me that I have lived
to hear of the surrender of Germany’s entire navy. How often in those
days we allowed ourselves to imagine a modern _possible_ Trafalgar, but
such a cataclysm as this was outside the bounds of any one’s
imagination.
I devoted a great deal of my time to getting up a “one-man-show,” my
first of many, composed of water colours, and in accomplishing the
Afghan picture I have already mentioned as being so much honoured by the
Hanging Committee at the Academy in the spring of 1904. My husband’s
command of the Western District terminated on January 31st, 1905, and
with it his career in the army, as he had reached the retiring age. The
Liberal Party was very keen on having him as an M.P., representing East
Leeds. I am glad the idea did not materialise. I know what would have
happened. He would have set out full of honest and worthy enthusiasm to
serve the _Patria_. Then, little by little, he would have found what
political life really is, and thrown the thing up in disgust. An old
story. _Non Patria sed Party!_ So utterly outside my own life had
politics been that I had an amused sensation when I saw the
Parliamentary world opening before me, like a gulf!
“_January 31st_, 1905.--Will is to stand for East Leeds. It is all very
sudden. Liberals so eager that he has almost been (courteously) hustled
into the great enterprise. Herbert Gladstone, Campbell-Bannerman and
other leaders have written almost irresistible letters to him, pleading.
When he goes to the election at Leeds he is to be ‘put to no expense
whatever,’ and they are confident of a ‘handsome majority.’ We shall
see! Besides all this he is given a most momentous commission at the War
Office to investigate certain ugly-looking matters connected with the
Boer War stores scandal that require clearing up. I am glad they have
done him the ‘poetical justice’ of selecting him for this.
“_February 13th_.--We went to a very brilliant and (to me) novel
gathering at the Campbell-Bannermans’. All the leaders of the Liberal
Party there, an interesting if not very noble study. All so cordial to
Will. Tremendous crush, but nice when we got down to the more airy tea
room. The snatches of conversation I got in the general hubbub all
sounded somewhat ‘shoppy.’ Winston Churchill, a ruddy young man, with a
roguish twinkle in his eye, Herbert Gladstone and his lovely wife, our
bluff, rosy host and other ‘leaders’ were very interesting, and we met
many friends, all on the ‘congratulate.’ All these M.P.’s seem to relish
their life. I suppose it _has_ a great fascination, this working to get
your side in, as at a football match.”
The general election in course of time swept over England and brought in
the Liberal Party with an overwhelming majority. My husband did not
stand for East Leeds. He had to abandon the idea, as a Catholic, on
account of the religious difficulties connected with the Education Act.
Our life in the glorious west of Ireland, which followed our retirement
from Devonport, has been so fully described by this pen of mine in “From
Sketch-book and Diary” that I give but a slight sketch of it here. Those
were days when one could give one’s whole heart, so to speak, to Erin,
before the dreadful cloud had fallen on her which, as I write, has lent
her her present forbidding gloom. That will pass, please God!
To come straight through from London and its noise and superfluous fuss
and turmoil into the absolute peace and purity of County Mayo in perfect
summer weather was such a relief to mind and body that one felt it as an
emancipation. Health, good sleep, enjoyment of pure air and noble
scenery; kindly, unsophisticated peasantry--all these things were there,
and the flocks and herds and the sea birds. In the midst of all that
appealing poetry, so peculiar to Ireland, I had a funny object lesson of
a prosaic kind at romantic Mulranny, on Clewe Bay. In the little station
I saw a big heap in sackcloth lying on the platform--“_Hog-product from
Chicago_”--and the country able to “cure” the matchless Irish pig! I
went on to get some darning wool in the hamlet--“_Made in England_”--and
all those sheep around us! Outside the shop door a horse had the usual
big nose-bag--_”Made in Austria”!_ All these things, with a little
energy, should have come out of the place itself, surely? I thought to
encourage native industry, when found, by ordering woollen hose at the
convent school. No two stockings of the same pair were of equal length.
The bay was rich in fish, and one day came a little fleet of fishing
boats--_from France!_ There was Ireland to-day in a nutshell. What of
to-morrow? Is this really Ireland’s heavy sleep before the dawn?
I have seen some of the most impressive beauties of our world, but never
have I been more impressed than by the solemn grandeur of the mountain
across Clewe Bay they call Croagh Patrick, as we saw it on the evening
of our arrival at Mulranny. The last flush of the after-glow lingered on
its dark slopes and the red planet Mars flamed above its cone, all this
solemn beauty reflected in the sleeping waters. At Mulranny I spent
nearly all my days making studies of sheep and landscape for the next
picture I sent to the Academy--“A Cistercian Shepherd.” This gave me a
period of the most exquisitely reposeful work. The building up of this
picture was in itself an idyll. But the public didn’t want idylls from
me at all. “Give us soldiers and horses, but pastoral idylls--no!”
People had a slightly reproachful tone in their comments after seeing my
poor pastoral on the Academy walls. Some one said, “How are the mighty
fallen!”
We made our home in the heart of Tipperary, under the Galtee Mountains.
It seemed time for us to seek a dignified repose, “the world forgetting,
by the world forgot,” but we did not succeed in our intention. In 1906
my husband went on a great round of observation through Cape Colony and
the (former) Boer Republics on a literary mission. I and E. went off to
Italy, meanwhile; Rome as our goal. There I had the great pleasure of
the companionship of my sister, and it may be imagined with what
feelings we re-trod the old haunts in and about that city together.
“_April 9th, 1906_.--We had a charming stroll through the Villa d’Este
gardens, where the oldest, hoariest cypresses are to be seen, and
fountains and water conduits of graceful and fantastic shape, wherever
one turns, all gushing with impetuous waters. The architects of these
gardens revelled in their fanciful designs and sported with the
responsive flood. Cascades spout in all directions from the rocks on
which Tivoli is built. We had _déjeuner_ under a pergola at the inn
right over one of these waterfalls, where, far below us, birds flew to
and fro in the mist of the spray. Nature and art have joined in play at
Tivoli. I always have had a healthy dislike of burrowing in tombs and
catacombs. The sepulchral, bat-scented air of such places in Egypt--the
land, of all others, of limpid air and sunshine and dryness--is not in
any way attractive to me, and I greatly dislike diving into the Roman
catacombs out of the sunny Appian Way. On former occasions I went
through them all, so this time I kept above ground. I learnt all that
the catacombs teach in my early years, and am not likely to lose that
tremendous impression.
“_April 10th_.--A true Campagna day, as Italianised as I could make it.
We had a frugal _colazione_ under the pergola of an Appian Way-side inn,
watched by half a dozen hungry cats, that unattractive, wild, malignant
kind of cat peculiar to Italy. The girl who waited on us drew our white
wine in a decanter from what looked like a well in the garden. It had,
apparently, not ‘been cool’d a long age in _that_ deep-delved earth,’
but it did very well. I was perfectly happy. This old-fashioned _al
fresco_ entertainment had the local colour which I look for when I
travel and which is getting rarer year by year. Our Colosseum moonlight
was more weird than ever. At eleven we had our moon. It was a large,
battered, woeful, waning old moon, that looked in at us through the
broken arch. An opportune owl, which had been screeching like a cat in
the shade, flitted across its sloping disc just at the supreme moment.”
To receive Holy Communion at the hands of the Holy Father is a privilege
for which we should be very thankful. It was mine and E.’s on Easter
morning that year, at his private Mass in the Sistine Chapel. There I
saw Pius X. for the first time. Goodness and compassion shine from that
sad and gentle face. It is the general custom to kiss the ‘Fisherman’s
ring’ on the Pope’s hand before receiving, but Pius X. very markedly
prevents this. One can understand! Our audience with the Holy Father
took place on the eve of our departure. There was a never-absent look
with him of what I may call the submissive sense of a too-heavy burden
of responsibility. No photographs convey the right impression of this
Pope. He was very pale, very spiritual, very kind and a little weary;
most gentle and touching in his manner. The World War at its outset
broke that tender heart. I sent him my “Letters from the Holy Land,” for
which I received very urbane thanks from one of the cardinals. I don’t
think the Holy Father knows a single word of English, and I wonder what
he made of it.
As to our tour homeward, taking Florence and Venice on the way, I think
we will take that as read. I revel in the Diary in all the dear old
Italian details, marred only by the change I noticed in Venice as
regards her broken silence. The hurry of modern life has invaded even
the “silent city,” and there is too much electric glare in the lighting
now, at night, for the old enjoyment of her moonlights. It annoyed me to
see the moon looking quite shabby above the incandescent globes on the
Riva.
From Venice to the Dublin Castle season is a big jump. We had an average
of twenty-one balls in six weeks in each of the two seasons 1907--1908.
Little did I think that it would be quite an unmixed pleasure to me to
do _chaperon_ for some five hours at a stretch; but so it turned out. It
all depends what sort of daughter you have on the scene! The Aberdeens
were then in power.
Lady Aberdeen was untiring in her endeavours to trace and combat the
dire disease which seemed to fasten on the Irish in an especial manner.
She went about lecturing to the people with a tuberculosis “caravan.”
She brought it to Cashel, and my husband made the opening speech at her
exhibition there. But her addresses came to nothing. The lungs exhibited
in the “caravan” in spirits of wine appealed in vain. She actually asked
the people that day to go back to their discarded oatmeal “stir-about”!
They prefer their stewed tea and their artificially whitened, so-called
bread, with the resultant loss of their teeth. My experiences at the
different Dublin horse shows were sociable and pleasant. There you see
the finest horses and the most beautiful women in the world, and Dublin
gives you that hospitality which is the most admirable quality in the
Irish nature.
Sir William spent the remaining days of his life in trying, by addresses
to the people in different parts of the country, to quicken their sense
of the necessity for industry, sobriety, and a more serious view of
existence. They did not seem to like it, and he was apparently only
beating the air. I remember one particularly strong appeal he made in
Meath at a huge open-air meeting. I thought to myself that such
warnings, given in his vivid and friendly Irish style, touched with
humour to leaven the severity, would have impressed his hearers. The
applause disappointed me. Well, he did his best to the very last for the
country and the people he loved. He had vainly longed all his life for
Home Rule within the Empire. Was this, then, all that was wanting?
I recall in this connection an episode which was eloquent of the hearty
appreciation of his worth, quite irrespective of politics. At a banquet
given in Dublin to welcome Lord and Lady Granard, after their marriage,
he was called upon to respond for “the Guests.” For fully one minute the
cheers were so persistent when he rose that he had to wait before his
opening words could be heard. The company were nearly all Unionists.
After all the misunderstandings connected with Sir William’s association
with the Boer War and its antecedents had been righted at last, these
words of a distinguished general at Headquarters were spoken: “Butler
stands a head and shoulders above us all.”
The year 1910 is one which in our family remains for ever sacred. My
dear mother died on March 13th.
On June 7th a very brave soldier, who feared none but God, was called to
his reward. Here my Diary stops for nearly a year.[16]