MY MAIDEN SPEECH
As soon as the 'Varsity football tour was finished, I went home and
Fred Foster came with me. Any exultation I might have been inclined to
show over my blue was completely checked by the way I played on the
tour, and I was very glad when we got away from Wales and the sarcastic
remarks of the Welsh newspapers. As a matter of curiosity it may be
satisfactory to find out what famous Oxford teams of former years think
of the one you happen to be in, but it was exceedingly disagreeable of
the Welsh papers to suggest that we should not like to hear the
opinions of these heroes, and one sporting reporter went out of his way
to be nasty to me. "When I saw Marten at back and remember the
brilliant exponents of the game who have filled his position in
previous Dark Blue fifteens, I really cannot refrain from smiling. But
it is a pity all the same." If I could have got hold of that fellow I
think I might have curtailed the length of his smile, but Foster gave
me a little satisfaction by saying that if a man was ass enough to
write about "exponents of the game," he was probably paid a penny a
line for what he wrote, and had sacrificed me for the sake of
threepence.
We had a very good time during our first "vac." I think that Nina
expected me to come back from Oxford with a very fine equipment of
airs; in fact I know that she did for she told me so, but I was in a
humble mood and gave her no chances to squash me, and she and Fred got
on splendidly together. My first term had taught me that I did not
know in the least what I wanted, which was an upsetting lesson for any
one to learn who had always done what came next without bothering about
the consequences. This result had been brought about by the Warden and
Dennison, the one had in his curious way tried to urge me on, the other
had sickened me of men who rag from morning to night, and I felt
bothered for several days in succession. Then, however, I stopped
worrying myself and regained my normal spirits, to the annoyance of my
father who was at that time inveighing against Russia and the
ritualistic vicar of our parish, and had a lot to say about the thin
end of the wedge. He told me that I must take more interest in
politics, and he made both Fred and me promise that we would speak at
debating societies during our first year.
But when I recollected the discussions I had listened to at our college
debating society I could not remember a single one at which I could
have said anything to the point; how could I know whether "It is better
to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all," or what could
I say about marriage being a failure? There was, indeed, only one man
at St. Cuthbert's who could possibly know anything about marriage, and
he had a wife and three children, but from the appearance of the lady I
do not think that he was likely to give us his honest opinion.
I wrote to Jack Ward but did not get an answer, and when we got back to
Oxford I found that he had been staying with a mining magnate whose
name I could not pronounce. He had been gambling every night, I forget
how much he won in a week, but it is of no consequence as he lost all
of it and a lot more before he had finished. During this term he
became a complete blood, and was constantly dining at wine clubs or
with somebody like Bunny Langham. He joined the Mohocks, and men who
did not know him, and thought that our wine club made far too much
noise and was a nuisance to the college, said that he would get sent
down at the end of his first year for being ploughed in pass
Moderations. I, however, saw a good deal of him at odd times, and the
fact that he absolutely refused to have anything more to do with
Dennison than he could help delighted me. When Jack had no use for any
one he had a very expressive way of letting them know it, and Dennison
at last was so offended that he invaded my rooms one afternoon when I
was changing after footer and couldn't escape from him.
"You don't see much of Ward now, do you?" he began, as he placed
himself upon my bed.
"I see him every day," I answered.
"I can't understand why you care to do it."
"Well, I do care to do it; you are sitting on my socks, do you mind
getting up?"
"You ought to hear what most of the freshers are saying about the side
Ward is putting on, it isn't as if he had any good reason for sticking
on side."
"What do you think is a good reason for sticking on side?" I asked.
"Ward can't do anything; you are a blue already, and I shall probably
get my racquet blue, but of course that's got nothing to do with it."
"Then I shouldn't say anything about it," I answered, and putting on my
coat I went into my sitter.
"Don't be a fool," he said as he followed me, "you stick so
tremendously close to rotten old-fashioned ideas. I am not exactly
committing a crime in not liking a man whom you profess to like."
"I have never professed to like any one in my life if I didn't like
him," I returned, and instead of getting angry with me, he laughed and
sat down in my biggest arm-chair. It was not his habit to have two
quarrels going on at the same time, and when he wished to be amiable
you had to work hard before you removed his smile. We had tea
together, and I did work hard, but he refused to be offended, and told
me that I was far too good a sort to be wrapped up in old prejudices,
which were the laughing-stock of everybody who really thought about
them. Oxford, he said, was the place for a good time and not for
airing ridiculous fads which were all right at school, where there was
nothing else to do but pretend to like a fellow for ever because you
had happened to like him for a few weeks. And he also told me that
being a blue, I ought to take my proper position in the college, and
not to go about with men who were no use whatever.
In return I told him some beautifully plain things, but when a man has
the terrific impudence of Dennison, he makes me too angry to be
coherent. I let him know, however, that I intended to choose my own
friends and that I thought a blue, if he was also a bounder, might do
his college more harm than good. To which he replied that if a man was
a bounder he found it exceedingly difficult to become a blue. When
Dennison went away I rushed off to see Murray, and although he did not
pretend to like Jack, he agreed with me that ten Wards in a college
would not make it as unpleasant a place as one Dennison. After this
attempt to get me on his side against Jack, Dennison left me more or
less alone, but he smiled upon me whenever he saw me, and to Webb,
Lambert and a man called Learoyd, who were at that time his particular
friends, I believe that he described me as a lunatic who might be of
use in the future.
I was very energetic during this term, and at the same time very quiet.
The weather was so bad that astronomical people said that the sun had
got spots upon it or had gone wrong somehow; at any rate we hardly ever
saw it, and we lived in a deluge of rain. The Torpids had to be
postponed, nearly every footer match was scratched, and the people who
had been talking about water-famines for the last two years held their
peace. Oxford seemed to be a most cheerless place, and Collier slept
nearly the whole term. However, I most strenuously did labour, but I
should never have stuck to it had not Murray helped me, and the result
was that after we had been up five weeks I found myself in high favour
with Mr. Gilbert Edwardes.
It is a dreadful thing to please your tutor if you do not happen to
like him, because he asks you to breakfast by way of showing his
pleasure, and at meals I could not put up with Mr. Edwardes. I sat
next him at one breakfast, and he never ate anything except a piece of
dry toast, and he talked about patent foods. I never saw a man who
looked more as if he needed a really big meal of beef and plum-pudding;
but he was an authority on diet, and told me that food if too
nutritious was very bad for the brain. He could not, I thought, have
imagined that our brains were worth much; for I must say that though he
did not eat himself he gave us every chance of doing so, and if we had
been the torpid, who breakfast and dine hugely, he could not have
provided us with more food. Murray, who was one of many at this meal,
seemed to be very interested in what Mr. Edwardes said about diet, and
I told him afterwards that he was an arch-humbug; but it turned out
that he had been bothered all his life--at least he said so--by
indigestion, and that at Wellingham he had lived on some peculiar
biscuit for nearly a fortnight, which recalled to my mind what Ward had
said to me about him.
I played in all the 'Varsity rugger matches which were not scratched,
and we finished up by beating the Wellingham Nomads after a muddy and
desperate struggle. Murray was playing for the Nomads and Foster for
the 'Varsity, and so many Wellingham people came round to Murray's
rooms after the match that I had to hold a kind of overflow meeting in
my rooms, after the manner of political gatherings. Murray was in
great spirits until everybody had gone, and then he said he had got a
most frightful attack of indigestion. So I let him talk it off. It
was curious that I had known him so long without ever having got him on
the subject of health; but he told me that when he came up to Oxford he
made up his mind to forget all about his ailments and eat anything. I
told him that he had better stick to that resolution, because I was
sure that his best way was never even to think about himself, but that
advice was not altogether unselfish. After he had spent a solid
half-hour in telling me what pains he suffered, he seemed so much
better that I was compelled to add that whenever he felt most awfully
bad he had better come and talk to me. I did not say that from conceit
but out of sympathy, and when he laughed I told him that if he thought
it was amusing for me to hear about his pains and spasms he was jolly
well mistaken.
"My father has talked about his liver for the last ten years," I said,
by way of proving that whatever information he gave me about himself
was bound to be stale.
"Then you will have one some day," Murray answered, and I imagined that
he looked at me as if in the future we could have a royal time nursing
our dyspepsia together. But I was not going to be a twin dyspeptic
with anybody.
"I hope I have got one now," I returned, "but I am not going on the
roof to shout about it. Every one ought to keep their liver dark, and
then the vile thing wouldn't be a nuisance to every one else."
He only laughed again. I am afraid he had read a lot of medical books
and knew far too much about the colour of things, but I do really
believe that I did him some good, for apart from seeing him put
extraordinary pieces of paper on his tongue and look very concerned
when they revealed whatever secret they have to reveal, he never talked
intimately to me again about his complaints, and as time went on he
laughed at himself, which was very wholesome of him.
Six weeks of the term had passed before I thought of fulfilling the
promise I made to my father, and when the time drew near for me to
speak at our college debating society, if I meant to do so, I became
extremely nervous. There was only one more meeting of the society
during that term, and the subject for debate was, "The modern novel has
a depressing and decaying influence upon the mind of the British
nation." Lambert, who spoke very fluently and not at all to the point,
was booked to speak first at this debate, and any one who knew him
could see his magnificent style in the way the motion was drawn up. He
revelled in alliteration, and I should think that he preferred subjects
which were more general than particular, for he had on one occasion
come hopelessly to grief at a debate on French politics, and had to
hide his confusion by saying that no one could be expected to take an
interest in a Latin nation, which made some people think that he was
more stupid than he really was.
I resolved to support the modern novel, not because I knew much about
it, but because I did not intend to be on the same side as Lambert, and
I went to the Union and listened to a debate in which two men from
Cambridge spoke and one man from London. Speaking seemed to be easy to
these people, but perhaps the presence of the London man--he was very
distinguished--acted as a check to orators who were not quite sure of
themselves. At any rate the distinguished man made a great impression,
he deplored the spread of taste among the lower classes, and he was
very sad and eloquent about organized excursions which he said
consisted chiefly of meals. To my mind he went on deploring far too
long, for if anybody does remember Rome by what he had for dinner
there, and forgets everything about Venice except his tea, his
temporary absence from England is not exactly a disaster, and the
Italians are glad to have him. Craddock of Balliol, who spoke before
the man from London, was crushed for dealing with the subject in a
frivolous manner, but I was not persuaded that a serious debate about
English Tourists would make them any less humorous or plentiful. That
debate did me good in one way, for I was so angry with this man of
distinction that I wished I could have told him what I thought, and for
three consecutive mornings I addressed an imaginary audience while I
was having my bath. But if my remarks had been made at the Union I am
afraid they would have caused a tumult, they were more suited to the
House of Commons, where, if the worst happens, you have the consolation
of being led out by a dignified official, and can read about your
departure in the newspapers of the following morning. I was so worried
about my speech that I mentioned it to several men, and most of them
said that they would come to the debate, which was the last thing I
wanted them to do. I had, however, to go through with it, so I
consoled myself by the thought that I couldn't be duller than some of
the people whom I had heard speaking at our debates; but when I went
into the common room and found a larger crowd of men there than I had
ever seen at a previous meeting, I wished that I had never come near
the place. Before Lambert spoke we had to go through a lot of private
business, which consisted chiefly of attempts by the college wags to be
funny. Some men cultivate the special form of humour which shines at
private business, but on this occasion all our wags were either absent
or silent, and the President and Secretary of the debating society had
a very peaceful evening.
When Lambert got up to pulverize the modern novel a great many men, who
had only come in for a rag, left the room, but Dennison, Webb and some
others who knew that I intended to speak, remained, and I made up my
mind that they should wait a very long time if they meant to hear me.
There was not a trace of nervousness about Lambert; he shot his cuffs,
stroked his upper lip with one finger, and was really rather a comical
figure, though I should think that every one was not so much amused at
the things he said as at his magnificent manner while saying them, for
he had nothing new to say about the influence of popular fiction. He
referred to authors who draw their inspiration from the Bible in terms
of lordly condescension, and then, changing his manner suddenly, he
spoke of the rise and fall of Stratford-upon-Avon in such mournful
tones that any one who did not know him might have imagined that he was
on the verge of tears.
No speech of his, however, was complete without a peroration, and on
this evening he surpassed himself. "You," he began, "who buy books
without a thought of what you are buying, who are guided in your taste
for fiction by the advertisements and buy a novel with as little care
as you would buy a pair of scissors, who think, if you ever think, and
I have already said that you do not, that because there are fifty
thousand tasteless people in the world there is no reason why you
should not swell that crowd, you are responsible for the decay of the
novel. Traditions are dying, helped to their death by prize
competitions and personal paragraphs, and Oxford is the home of
tradition, for Oxford was invented before Eton. We care no longer for
what is best but for what is most talked about, in our fiction we look
for scandals and not for literature, and unless there is a reaction the
man who can blush will become a curiosity, fit only for exhibition on
the Music Hall stage or in the Zoological Gardens. It is a serious
matter. The Philistines must be met and routed, we know that of old
this was their usual fate, it seems to have been the chief reason for
their existence. For my part I think a day ill-spent in which I have
not read a few pages of Fielding or Thackeray. I have the most kindly
feelings towards Dickens, Jane Austen and George Eliot, and when I am
tired I write little things myself."
He sat down and looked blandly in front of him; if he had been less
pleased with himself he would not have been anything like so amusing.
A senior man called Ransome got up to defend the modern novel, and the
debate at once became serious. In about five minutes Ransome would
have made most men feel crushed and unhappy, but Lambert only spread
out his legs and shut his eyes. Ransome was not only a good speaker
but also one of the cleverest men in the 'Varsity, and he scored time
after time without disturbing Lambert's equanimity. I think that
Lambert's enormous and somnolent bulk must have annoyed Ransome, for he
went on to make an attack which was virulently sarcastic. In his
speech Lambert had been foolish enough to say nothing in favour of
modern novels, he had taken it for granted that all of them were bad,
and Ransome fastening on this accused him of never having heard of
George Meredith and Thomas Hardy, and he finished by appealing to us
not to be guided in our tastes and opinions by a man whose assumptions
were based on tremendous ignorance.
After Ransome had finished Lambert woke up, which was silly of him, but
I must admit that he looked exactly as if he had been roused from a
deep sleep. A number of men spoke, and most of them said something
which I had intended to say, until there was very little of my speech
left which could sound original. As each man sat down, Dennison and
Webb had the impertinence to shout "Marten," but they were always
called to order by the President, who was in no hurry to hear my maiden
effort. Collier, who had not come to hear me from inclination but a
sense of duty, dozed peacefully in a corner, a number of men recorded
their votes and left the room, the President yawned prodigiously, and
the Secretary looked as if he had got a headache. If I intended to
speak before Lambert replied to all the criticisms passed upon him, my
time had come. I got up as quietly as I could, but I was greeted with
so much applause that I felt quite embarrassed. Jack Ward had come in
from dining somewhere, and when he saw Dennison and Webb clapping
because they expected to be amused, he resolved to make more row than
they did. I could not complain of my reception, but why I received it
is not worth discussing. However the mere sight of Dennison made me
determined not to make a fool of myself and I got rid of my first
sentence without a hitch, and then I was all right for some time
because the walls of my bedder had heard my speech very often and I
knew it well. Jack Ward kept on applauding violently, he meant well
but he did it in the most awkward places, and he made me forget one
thing which Foster had provided. Dennison laughed a little, but he had
to wait before he got an opportunity of trying to make me appear
especially ridiculous.
"We read too much and think too little," I said, and this was the
opening of a sentence which had caused me a lot of trouble until Murray
helped me to put it right, but Dennison saw his chance and interrupted
me by saying, "We talk too much and think too little, is what you
mean," which was an exasperating remark when I had very nearly finished
without any bother. So I turned round and told him that I could say
what I liked without asking him. The President shouted "Order," but he
looked too sleepy to care much what happened.
"At any rate I suppose you cribbed it from last week's _Spectator_, and
I know it was 'Talk too much,' because I saw it."
"If Mr. Marten thinks he can improve upon anything taken from the
_Spectator_ he is at perfect liberty to do so," the President said very
sarcastically, and I felt badly scored off.
"It's all very well," I said to him, "but these interruptions have made
me forget where I have got to."
"About the bottom of your second cuff, I should think," Dennison called
out, and I could not stand that libel, so I addressed the rest of my
speech to him. It was, at any rate, fluent, and although the President
tried to stop me I had a merry if short innings before I finished.
Dennison was too much for me, he never lost his temper while I was so
angry that I forget exactly what happened, but when I met the President
in the quad on the following morning and apologized to him, he was kind
enough to say that he hoped I should speak again during the next term,
although as he would be reading hard he was afraid that he would not
have the pleasure of hearing me. He was a curious man, and I could not
help wondering whether he would have wished me to speak if he had not
been too busy to listen, but I did not care to risk asking him that
question.
The Lent Term at Oxford is rather a dull one for men who do not row,
run, or play soccer. In my time golfers were thought dull whether they
played golf or only talked about it. I did run in our college sports
because Collier said I wouldn't, and Collier ran because I said he
couldn't, the result was that we competed in a half-mile handicap in
which he received the munificent start of eighty-five yards, while I
had to worry through the whole distance with the exception of twenty
yards. Collier bet me five shillings that he would defeat me in that
race, and I thought I had found an easy way of making a little money,
but a half-mile is a long distance for two men without much wind, and
when I caught Collier up about two hundred yards from the finish we
agreed to cancel our bet and walk to the pavilion. Collier could not
speak without gasping for a quarter of an hour, and then he expressed
the determination of retiring permanently from the running path.