OLLA PODRIDA
TWO American managers had made themselves very well known to the Street
of Adventure in the early eighties. It was before the advent of the
mighty Frohman and other engineers of the great combine. The one was
known as “Johnny” Rogers, and the other was W. W. Kelly. The last-named
gentleman must be, I imagine, still to the fore, for during the last
General Election I visited two provincial centres, and saw, peeling from
the walls of each, the mammoth posters of that wonderful Napoleonic
melodrama “A Royal Divorce.” I wonder whether, if the spirit of my old
friend, W. G. Wills, revisited these “glimpses of the moon,” he would
recognize his workmanship and marvel at sight of the crowds it still
attracts.
Kelly was a tall, florid man, flamboyant in manner, and gifted with an
eloquence which was never ungarnished. Rogers was a little man, with a
nice taste in diamonds. The time that he did not spend in the theatre
writing Press notices about his “star” was devoted to running around the
newspaper offices seeking publicity for his lucubrations.
Rogers managed for a little lady called Minnie Palmer, who appeared at
the Strand Theatre in a sort of pinafore-and-golden-curls part. She
continued playing the pinafore _ingénue_ until she was well over forty.
Poor little “Johnny,” who had taught the lady all she knew, was quite
broken-hearted when she left his for another management. Kelly also made
his reputation in London as manager for an actress. This performer was
called Grace Hawthorne. Miss Hawthorne took the Olympic and the
Princess’s, and spent quite a fortune in the attempt to establish the
position of her theatres.
Kelly had a humour of his own, which, if Irish in its origin, was
American in its expression. In the Junior Garrick Club one afternoon
some men were assembled in the hall (the hall-porter, called “Tap,” was a
bit of a bookmaker, and we loyally accepted his ridiculous prices). The
conversation turned on lying, and some of us were relating our
experiences of great liars whom we had known, and quoting examples of
their skill. Kelly entered during the recital with a member whose guest
he was, and listened quietly for a while; then, taking advantage of the
first pause, he said:
“I guess what you fellows know about lyin’ ain’t worth a cent. There are
only three liars in the world . . . is one, _and Rogers is the other
two_.”
When Wilson Barrett produced Mr. Caine’s “Ben My Chree” at the
Princess’s, Kelly had some rights in either the piece or the theatre.
After the first performance, Kelly went round to Barrett’s dressing-room,
and urged the actor to cut down the dialogue before again presenting the
piece. The critics, Kelly assured him, were very much annoyed by the
length of some of the speeches. “Don’t you believe it,” replied Barrett
reassuringly. “To-morrow morning every paper in London will have over a
column of unadulterated praise, and the booking-office will be besieged
by a public mad to buy seats!”
In relating the incident to me, Kelly concluded thus:
“And Wilson Barrett was right. The following morning they brought the
papers up to my bedroom. _Times_, a solid column of sugar-candy;
_Telegraph_, a column and a quarter of molasses, laid on thick; _Post_,
syrup suited for Society. I dressed in a hurry, raced through my
breakfast, ordered a hansom, and told the man to drive like the devil to
the Princess’s Theatre. I was anxious to see the queue waiting to book,
as discerned in the prophetic vision of my actor-managerial confrère.
Never before did the journey from St. John’s Wood to Oxford Street appear
so long. It was just on noon when we passed through Oxford Circus, but
by the time we passed Peter Robinson’s I could see a crowd gathered in
front of the theatre. ‘By Crœsus, Barrett’s right again!’ I said to
myself as I paid the cabby and turned to enter the house; and then the
horrible truth burst upon me. The crowd was entirely composed of Wilson
Barrett’s creditors!”
There was very little _pose_ about the pressman of the jocund days.
There was an editorial _pose_, of course—that was as essential as an
ecclesiastical or as a judicial _pose_—but among the rank and file
nothing of the sort was known, and nothing of the sort would have been
tolerated. Journalists were like so many schoolboys grown up, and
affectations of all kinds were an abomination to them; yet the seed for
some of the artistic make-believe which is now so wide spread was sown in
an earlier and, I venture to think, a more healthy time.
Thus, what a mighty growth of rank vegetation has followed the discovery
by Swinburne of Fitzgerald’s paraphrase of the “Rubaiyat” of Omar
Khayyám! Swinburne’s “find” in Quaritch’s shop was, perhaps, the most
important event that ever took place there. From a commercial point of
view the transaction was naught, for the neglected verses were rescued by
the poet from the “All these at twopence” box of the expert in old
editions. Nor was there anything at all sensational in the circumstance
of one poet lighting upon the undiscovered genius of a brother bard. One
can understand Swinburne’s keen delight and sympathetic appreciation, but
what of the rising flood of slushy adulation which has followed on the
part of men who are without literary discrimination or poetic insight?
The names of eminent members of the Press appear in the lists of those
assembled to do honour to the memory of the Persian voluptuary. This is
a pity, I think. To be in harmony with their object, these celebrations
should be orgies, and as long as they are conducted on any other lines
they should be left to the professors of a vapid dilettantism.
Omar Khayyám had a fine sense of humour, and, scanning mundane affairs
from his retreat in Paradise, he must sometimes shake with laughter as he
regards the class of admirers who assemble and meet together, drinking to
his memory, sending roses to be planted on his grave, and ruffling it for
a night in the character of irresponsible roisterers. There is a touch
of the comic about the situation that just redeems it; otherwise, it were
pitiful. What on earth does old Omar make in that galley? The dominant
note of the diners is that of a stifling modernity. The purveyors of
literary gossip are here, with the prurient and the anæmic, and the few
normal persons who are present are here from a mere desire to gratify
their curiosity or their gregariousness. All are in the attire decreed
by social convention for functions of the sort. Many of them wear
spectacles. When the hour strikes, and the operation of the Licensing
Act compels them to bring their feast to an end, they “taxi” off to their
suburban villas, where they pay rates and elect Borough Councillors.
Here they are “waited up for” by their faithful wives, middle-aged and
highly respectable matrons, to whom, with more or less lucidity, they
relate all they have been doing and saying in honour of a lusty human
animal of primeval instincts, who, had he any “say” in the matter, would
eloquently resent the familiarity which is being taken with his name by
persons with whom he could never have had anything in common.
And this reflection reminds me of an incident related to me by Sala. He
told it of James Hannay. That accomplished writer was a great admirer of
the works of Horace, and on December 8—the poet’s birthday—he gave a
dinner in honour of his favourite author. At these annual assemblies the
majority of the guests were men having a scholarly acquaintance with the
writings of Quintus Horatius Flaccus. On one of these anniversaries it
happened that the scholarly persons were all prevented from attending,
and Hannay found himself surrounded at dinner by friends whose knowledge
of Horace, if anything at all, was of a schoolboy and negligible kind.
It was Hannay’s custom on these occasions to propose one toast—“The
Memory of Horace.” He rose to make his customary address, which he
brought to a conclusion in the following words:
“Would that the great poet were with us now! Here he would tell us of
his Venusian home under the shadow of the Apulian Hills; here he would
explain the recondite personal allusions in his ‘Satires’; here he would
lift the veil from his inner life in quoting passages from the
‘Epistles’; here he would recite, as only he could, his lighter or his
graver ‘Odes,’ happily conscious of the fact that not one person in his
hearing understood a word of the language in which he was speaking!”
And, according to Sala, no one resented the pleasantry. It may be
assumed that Hannay was more exercised about the memory of Horace than he
was about his own. One never hears him quoted now; yet he established a
claim on the memory of posterity far more valid than that of a score of
writers who have become accepted as speaking with authority. His “Satire
and Satirists” proves him to be as fine a master of satire as many of
those with whom he deals. His “Singleton Fontenoy” is full of wit and
humour, and the shrewd wisdom of a thorough man of the world. He wrote
largely in the _Quarterly Review_, was a contributor to _Punch_, and a
regular writer on the Press. There is no English critic to whose pages I
revert with keener satisfaction; but that taste is not general. Hannay,
alas! has written his name in water.
Charles Reade wrote one of the greatest novels produced in the Victorian
era—I refer, of course, to “The Cloister and the Hearth”—and he was
probably one of the greatest personalities of his own time. I knew him
fairly well. Like Robert Buchanan, he was ready to rush into newspaper
correspondence on the slightest provocation, and, having once commenced
operations, he hit out in a way that was perfectly wonderful; yet—again
like poor Buchanan—he was a man with a soft heart and a generous nature.
He would roar through a whole column, hurling at his opponent the most
weird and lurid denunciations, but he bore no malice. He was afflicted
now and then with righteous indignation, but once the steam was let off,
he cooed like a sucking-dove. In the height of his argument he would
coin the most wonderful phrases, for Reade never raged as the heathen
rage. Tom Purnell “had at” the old gentleman in the _Athenæum_, and
Reade was out after his scalp in rather less than no time. His philippic
on this occasion incidentally enriched the English language by the
addition of a word. “Pseudonymuncule” was the epithet which he forged
for the confusion of his opponent.
Reade was a big burly man, with a grey beard, short clipped. Henry Byron
once described him as “Great Briton,” and the phrase was apt enough. A
tumultuous, overwhelming personage was Reade. His advertisements to
“Thief Takers,” offering rewards to those who caught unscrupulous persons
pirating his works, were surely the “maddest, merriest” things ever set
up in type; yet they were quite seriously meant by their author. On the
subject of piracy he was always in deadly earnest. One of his last
contributions to the Press was a series of articles in the _Daily
Telegraph_ on “Ambidextrous Man.” On this subject he waxed as emphatic,
insistent, and eloquent as if the world were arrayed in one great stupid
conspiracy against his contention. As a matter of fact, the world did
not care a farthing about it one way or the other. Perhaps his most
dramatic exhibition of violent indignation was afforded when the
authorities wanted to acquire his house at Albert Gate. Among other
devices to which he resorted in order to bring his persecutors to their
senses was a very characteristic one. He had a huge board affixed to the
forefront of his dwelling, and painted thereon, for all the world to see,
was the legend “NABOTH’S VINEYARD.” One would have imagined that this
would have stricken his enemies with a sense of shame. In that
direction, however, I regret to say, it failed.
When the prize-ring was set up between four walls, and its contests
decided after dinner before a mob of gentlemen in evening dress, its
chief London home was, and is, the National Sporting Club. The National
Sporting Club was not the direct descendant of the prize-ring, but came
to the sons of men by way of the West London Rowing Club, in connection
with which there was a boxing-club supported by such sportsmen as “Pills”
Holloway, “Nobby” Hall, and other gentlemen pugilists. The umpires,
referees, and time-keepers at the National Sporting Club had graduated at
the West London, which had its premises on the tow-path by Putney Bridge.
The chief of these were Mr. “Jack” Angle, Mr. Vyse, and Mr. “Tom”
Anderson, of the Board of Trade. All three were men of dress and of
address—what used to be called “swells,” in fact—and Anderson was always
noted for the wonderful depth of his linen collars; indeed, he may be
said to have set that fashion in collars which a few years since bid fair
to strangle the rising hope of England. Whenever a boxing contest came
off at the National Sporting, the names of these three veterans of the
gloves appeared in the newspapers publishing reports of the “fights.”
When Sir Courtney Boyle became Chief of the Board of Trade, he was
scandalized to find the name of a gentleman holding an important position
in the office appearing publicly in such a degrading connection, and
Anderson was tabled, and informed that if he wished to retain his
position he must abandon all official connection with the “ring.”
Anderson’s resentment may, perhaps, be found expressed in the fact that
shortly afterwards Sir Courtney became known in Whitehall as “Doubtful
Boyle.” On being asked the meaning of the sobriquet, Anderson would
slyly answer: “The chief is so called because he is always in doubt as to
whether godamighty made him or he made godamighty!”
When the National Sporting Club was yet unthought of, and when the
premises they occupy was still Evans’s Hotel, there was a tobacconist’s
shop next door, and behind the shop there was an American bowling-alley.
This was Kilpack’s. It was an old-fashioned shop, and the customers sat
on tobacco-barrels beside the counter. The bowling-alley was not much
frequented when I knew it; but earlier in the nineteenth century it had a
vogue, I understand. It was a capital alley, and I have enjoyed many a
game there with citizens of the United States, who did not, I am bound to
confess, take much stock in the pastime. Behind the counter of the
cigar-shop was a middle-aged man, very genial and reminiscent. The
customers always called him “Kilpack,” and he always “answered” to that
name; but the original Kilpacks had disappeared long before, and this
amiable person—probably a Smith or a Jones—thought it a safe policy to
carry on the old traditions under the old name. Kilpack’s was
“A link within the days to bind
The generations each to each.”
As I see these old landmarks disappear one by one from the face of the
Metropolitan area, I experience a pang of bereavement as at the death of
an old friend. The site upon which the demolished Kilpack’s once stood
is now occupied by the premises of a draper.
I never had much to do with the money-lending fraternity. I tried on one
occasion to borrow fifty of Sam Lewis. I may mention at once that I did
not succeed. But my visit on the occasion to 17, Cork Street established
a friendship between Sam and myself which continued until his death. I
have heard a good many stories about the rapacity of Sam in his
professional capacity. His critics forget to estimate the risks which he
continually took, and when one remembers the sort of men his principal
“clients” were, and the eventual destination of the millions which the
worthy Sam accumulated, it must be admitted that the public has benefited
by the transactions. Had the vast sums of interest which Sam Lewis
hauled in from clients like Ailesbury percolated through other channels,
Society would not have been a halfpenny the better. As it was, the Lewis
millions went in the end to benefit hospitals and other great public
charities. Sam left a lot to be disposed of in this way, leaving the
bulk of his little savings to his wife. That lady did not survive her
husband by many years, and her will added enormously to the benefactions
devised by her husband. In the testamentary acts of both husband and
wife the Christian charities were as liberally treated as were those
distinctively Jewish.
Lewis was a dapper, well-dressed little man, with a bald head and a smile
of winning quality; indeed, all Sam’s qualities were winning qualities.
His offices were on the first-floor of the house next door to the Blue
Posts in Cork Street, and impecunious _flâneurs_ emerging from the
Burlington Arcade were often blessed by a sight of the back of Sam’s head
as he leaned against the window talking to some “forlorn and shipwrecked
brother” intent on discovering the wherewithal on which to “take heart
again.”
Lewis began life as a traveller in real and sham jewellery, to which he
added, as time went on, some little adventures on his own account in the
tally-man arena of British enterprise. The most melancholy young man I
ever saw was his clerk—one Gilbey by name. Whether this young man’s
melancholy was constitutional or was caused by his acquaintance with the
seamy side of Society, or by the monotonous filling up of bills for Sam’s
clients to sign, I never could make out. Sam’s chief jackal was one
Alfred Snelling, whose office was in a little house looking down Savile
Row.
Not often have the betting ring and the tipsters and “the boys” generally
come across so soft a thing as they found in Ernest Benzon, whose
meteoric course lasted just two years. It must be confessed that this
extraordinary young man contrived to fill the public eye during that
period to the exclusion of more useful subjects, and it cost him just a
quarter of a million of money to achieve that splendid notoriety. The
fortune to which Benzon—known during his brief career on the turf as “the
Jubilee Juggins”—succeeded was made by his father, a Birmingham man. The
trade by which it was accumulated was that of constructing
umbrella-frames. That a fortune thus made should have been inherited by
one who was utterly oblivious to the necessity of laying by something for
a rainy day strikes a reflective person as being at once strange and sad.
Benzon did not acquire the sobriquet “Juggins” for nothing. He was the
last man in the world to whom the control of a fortune should have been
committed.
Benzon was absolutely vain, frivolous, and assertive. He fancied himself
no end at things for which he had no very great aptitude. As an instance
of this, I remember quite well how he challenged John Roberts at pyramids
for a sovereign a ball. Of course, Roberts “took him on,” with what
result can be imagined. He had that sort of sickly sentimentality which
may be encountered in the sixpenny gallery of the homes of melodrama—a
sentimentality which can exist in natures incapable of any quite genuine
emotion. Benzon squandered money, and doubtless was robbed of money; but
I have never heard a case in which he spent money on a generous impulse
or with the intention of doing an act of solid benefit to an individual
or to the human race. Yet I accompanied him on one occasion to the
Adelphi Theatre. A melodrama of the ordinary Adelphi sort was being
played, and Benzon became so extremely touched by the sufferings of the
heroine that he began blubbering like a child. Nor can it be said that
the exhibition was explicable on the ground that the “Juggins” was
“crying drunk.”
When Benzon had melted his patrimony of a quarter of a million, he
thought to maintain his notoriety by telling the world how he had managed
to do it. To this motive may be attributed the appearance of a book
attributed to him, and entitled, “How I Lost £250,000 in Two Years.” His
friends now considered that a new and reputable career was opened up to
him; for the work was extremely well written, and the “Jubilee Juggins”
accepted with never-failing geniality the congratulations which were
showered upon him. But even here Benzon was fated to be a disappointment
to his friends. Some months after the book appeared an action was
brought against the publisher by Vero Shaw. From the evidence given
during the hearing it transpired that, save for the two words “Ernest
Benzon” which appeared under his likeness opposite the title-page, not a
scrap of the work had been done by the “Juggins” himself. It was all the
work of Vero Shaw, constructed out of such flimsy materials as could be
gathered from the vapid conversation of the devoted plunger and the diary
of the latter’s tutor.
The last time I saw Benzon he was somewhat less of the butterfly than in
the days of his vanity. He was living on an inalienable income paid
weekly. His salient qualities were selfishness and silliness. He was
what “bookies” used to call “a fly-flat,” and, I may add, more flat than
fly.
Saturday-to-Mondaying became recognized as having a place among British
sports and pastimes some time at the close of the seventies, I think. It
was started, like so many other delightful innovations, by Bohemians.
Having once “caught on,” it was adopted by Society, and in quite recent
years became recognized under the name which it originally and naturally
bore. But though Society has sanctioned—or shall I say sanctified?—the
term, the first public allusion to the beneficent custom was on the stage
of the music-hall, and was made by Miss Marie Lloyd or another. The
stimulating refrain ran: “Oh, will you be my Saturday-to-Monday?”
Charles Wyndham was one of the first of the theatrical profession to
recognize in the Thames Valley a peaceful resort in which, after the
Saturday performance, to rest and study and contrive. It was at a very
critical period in the history of the Criterion, and the ambitious
manager—surely the finest of English comedians—was suffering all the
horrors of insomnia. Affairs were balanced on the edge of a knife, as it
were, at the theatre, and it was doubtful whether the courageous young
manager could hold on or not. His objective in those days was the Swan,
at Thames Ditton, and here for the greater part of Sunday he would shut
himself up in a private room studying manuscript plays, French and
English of their kind. All who knew him then rejoiced when a brilliant
success at last followed his judgment in selection, and the anxiety and
the insomnia simultaneously disappeared. Those who have only known him
in later years as the rich and popular Sir Charles Wyndham will learn
that his success—like all solid and lasting successes—was strenuously
won.
But it was not until a later period that the general weekend migration of
Bohemia to the Thames set in with yearly increasing severity. And those
who followed Wyndham to the river of pleasure did not, you may be quite
sure, follow his example in the matter of arduous study. A good deal of
“shop” was talked, no doubt, at the merry forgatherings of actors in
flannels and actresses in white frocks—actors will pass their time in
heaven talking “shop”—but serious consideration of the business of the
theatre was as a rule taboo. The spirit of the little assemblages of
friends all along the Valley was frankly a holiday spirit; the dominant
note of the Bohemian parties was gaiety. The Saturday-to-Monday
establishments spread themselves from Twickenham—then below locks—to
Datchet. Nowadays the profession may be found encamped higher up the
stream. But there were no motors in the dark days of which I am writing,
and players whose engagements were in or near the Strand were limited to
the river resorts served by the South-Western Railway Company. Whatever
disadvantages may have been incident on this limitation, it had the
advantage of placing the week-enders from the theatres within visiting
distance of each other.
D’Oyly Carte hired a big house at Hampton, close to Tagg’s Island, where
he entertained largely on Sundays. It had a lawn running down to the
river—a lawn on which I have met some very pleasant people, but none as
pleasant and unassuming as Carte himself, or more hospitable and gracious
than his talented wife. Carte evidently regarded the Thames as an ideal
stream by which to live, for he afterwards bought an eyot higher
upstream, and built a house on it.
Higher up the stream, at Sunbury, there was a cheery Bohemian colony
where the fun never flagged. “Cis” Chappel’s cottage by the river was
one of the centres of the settlement. Among his visitors—also of the
colony—were Captain Fred Russell, whose quaint humour and whose fame as a
raconteur were enhanced by a slight stammer, which, instead of marring,
heightened his effects. Alfred Benjamin, of bulldog fame, was free of
this circle, in virtue of having “married on to the stage,” so to speak,
Mrs. Benjamin having been one of the vestals who had kept burning
HoIIingshead’s “sacred lamp of burlesque” at the Gaiety. Other bright
and beautiful women were among Chappel’s visitors, chief among these
being Miss Nellie Farren, who had a residence not far off, and whose
presence and fine flow of animal spirits prevented the possibility of any
dull moments. The Magpie Hotel, with a landing-stage to the river, was a
famous gathering place for the members of the theatrical profession, more
especially on Sunday afternoons. Old Freeman, the landlord, has long
since abandoned Clarke’s ferry for that of Charon. He had the general
appearance of a stage-butler—artificial smirk and all—and he made a nice
fortune by catering for the gay and irresponsible youth who frequented
his establishment.
Still farther upstream was Shepperton. Here of a morning the handsome
Harry B. Conway might be seen leaving his cottage, preceded by the two
noisiest collies ever littered. Conway, surely the best-looking Romeo
who ever played the part, was a connection of the Byron family, and
possessed all the good looks of his famous relative. It is to be feared
that he inherited also some of the other idiosyncrasies of the author of
“Don Juan.” Henry Pottinger Stephens had for some time a house farther
inland from the river. He had hired the place furnished. The grounds
were surrounded by a high wall, the visitor at the gate being scanned
through a grille before admission. The retreat was as private as a
nunnery. Once inside, “Pot’s” visitor would be struck by the excessive
number of copies of the Holy Scriptures which were to be found in the
rooms. It used to amuse “Pot” to stimulate the curiosity of his guests
on this point, and then to explain the mystery by observing that he had
hired the house of Mr. Bagster, the Bible publisher of Paternoster Row.
Above the lock, and on the Chertsey side of the river, Sir Charles Dilke
had built himself the most retired little bungalow on all the river.
Neither from the stream nor from the shore approaches was the house
visible. It seemed to be sunk in osier-beds and embowered in willows.
Theodore Hook I think it was who described the advantage of having a
riverside cottage as consisting in the fact that “in the summer you had
the river at the bottom of your garden, and that in the winter you had
the garden at the bottom of your river.” I should imagine that in the
winter, not only the garden, but the house itself, must sometimes have
been at the bottom of the river in the case of Sir Charles Dilke’s
Chertsey home.
At Staines “Tommy” Brett, a member of the Bar, conspicuous for his
negligence in the matter of dress, had his week-end quarters. He
practised on the Chancery side, and was half mad on the subject of
horse-racing. To hear and see Tommy describe a close finish was one of
the funniest entertainments possible. In his excitement, the little man
would get down to his work, his wrists and elbows playing, his knees
pressed in, his neck craned forward, and his hat pressed to the very back
of his head. Brett was in deadly earnest all the time, while to his
audience the performance appealed as a piece of the most extraordinary
burlesque. Fortunately, Tommy’s knowledge of law was much more sound
than his knowledge of horse-racing. On the other side of the river to
Staines is Egham Hythe, and here Vero Shaw had a pleasant establishment
known as Wapshot Farm. The author of “The Book of the Dog” was here
experimenting in pigeon-breeding, and at Wapshot Farm there was always a
warm welcome to friends on the part of the most cheery of hosts and the
most hospitable of hostesses. Mrs. Shaw was noted on the Staines reach,
and on reaches above and below it, for her success as a Thames angler.
With the advent of the house-boat an era of greater luxuriousness was
inaugurated. At first the house-boat was a floating structure of small
proportions and humble pretensions—the home of some artist or some
devoted lover of the Thames who had become tired of camping out. But the
possibilities of the thing were soon gauged by those to whom money was
not very much of an object. The first of the house-boats on a really
large and luxurious scale was built for Mr. O’Hagan of Hampton by Tom
Tagg. Once the game was started, it went on merrily, and continueth even
unto this day, although the motor has diverted many of the wealthy from a
pastime which, from one point of view at least, must be regarded as
“slow.” Colonel North, the Nitrate King, as they called him in the City,
set up a house-boat on a grand scale. He called her _The Golden
Butterfly_, and on board this gorgeous floating pleasure-house he gave
princely entertainments to the ornaments of the stage and his City
friends. John L. Shine, the actor, had gained the good graces of the
egregious Nitrate King—who, while recklessly hospitable, was hopelessly
vulgar—and he did a lot of the inviting for the florid and red-whiskered
magnate. Where City men of the “Woolpack” type, ladies of the theatre,
unlimited champagne, and a host free of any bigoted regard for the
_convenances_, are the chief elements of a gathering, the fun should have
been fast and furious—as, indeed, it sometimes was.
William Hudson, the wine-merchant, had a house-boat right away from the
more crowded reaches of the Thames. She lay off the Mapledurham meadows,
belonging to the Blount family. Hudson’s boat was called _The Little
Billee_, and he kept moored near by an excellent steam-launch, the
_Martlet_, and a whole flotilla of skiffs, punts, and canoes for the use
of his visitors. In the internal fittings of the _Little Billee_ Hudson
went in not so much for airy grace as for solid comfort. And no man on
all the Thames gave better weekend dinners. He liked to have around him
guests who could talk, and who could talk well. All sorts and conditions
of people met at his board, but one never met there a man who was not
interesting. Travellers, authors, journalists, merchants, Conservative
Members of Parliament, and Irish Nationalist Members of the same august
assembly, I have met at Hudson’s week-end parties on the _Little Billee_.
And if the after-dinner talk was always kept up to the right
conversational pitch, much of the credit was due to the keenness and tact
of a host who delighted in the conversational “give and take” of clever
men.
On the upper and on the lower reaches of the Thames the upper and the
lower reaches of literature—if I may so describe them—were represented.
Thus, at Kelmscott, by Lechlade, Rossetti and Morris were producing
enduring work; while down at Isleworth Mr. Le Queux was reporting at
County Courts and Boards of Guardians for the _Middlesex Chronicle_,
innocent as yet of the many sensational crimes which, in six-shilling
volumes, he has since committed; and at Richmond Mr. Bloundelle Burton
was daily treading on historic ground without so much as contemplating
the historic novel. At Teddington, Blackmore, having abandoned
Devonshire and the novel of the West, was devoting himself to the
pleasurable and profitable pursuit of market gardening. All sorts and
conditions of the cultivators of literature sought the banks of the
Thames; and if Edmund Yates, of the _World_, had a delightful place at
Goring, Purkiss, of the _Police Gazelle_, had a still more luxurious home
at Shepperton.
In the eighties, too, the river began to have a literature of its own.
Of these, _Lock to Lock_ lingers on to this day. The _Thames_ was a more
serious and a more pretentious paper. It was under the editorship of one
of the Mackays—William, I think—and to its powerful and continuous
advocacy the public are indebted for the lock below Richmond, an
improvement which can only be appreciated by those who can remember the
exposed bed of the river between Isleworth and Teddington at the height
of a hot summer. During one such year it was possible to walk across
that part of the river which was supposed to run between Twickenham
foreshore and Eel Pie Island.
To one who comes early under the subtle influence of the Thames there is
no other water which shall ever possess the same attraction. One falls
in love with it, and thereafter can see only its perfections. No stream
has been so celebrated in verse. From Spenser and Drayton to Cowley and
Pope, from Cowley and Pope to Matthew Arnold and Theo Marzials, there
stretches a long list of illustrious versifiers who found inspiration in
the Thames. And if Pope might so exaggerate the objects of his poetic
vision as to behold “. . . the Muses sport on Cooper’s Hill,” the more
modern bard, Mr. Theo Marzials, may be forgiven for metamorphosing the
Twickenham ferryman. The song presents that waterman as a dashing young
Lothario. The unhappy fact is that, at the time when Marzials wrote the
once popular song, the ferryman was a fat, oleaginous old man named
Cooper, with no sentiment of any kind about him save a sentimental
feeling for beer.
Through all my memories of the journalistic life the Thames sings softly.
When I look back, a thousand delightful recollections of its bosom and
its banks inevitably obtrude, even while I try to concentrate on the busy
haunts of men. “Sweete Temmes!”