MARRIAGE
“A Daniel come to judgment! Yea, a Daniel!
O wise young judge, how I do honour thee!”
SHAKESPEARE’S _Merchant of Venice_, Act I, Sc. iv.
CUT off from Parliament for the moment (1886) David Lloyd George spent
no time in vain regrets. He resumed that life of combined public and
private activity which was rapidly becoming his second nature. His
diaries during the following years show that he was now absorbed in his
growing “practice.” But that did not prevent him from continuing his
eager and active interest in public affairs. Then, as ever after, the
two interests developed together.
From this time forward he steadily directed his energies to work on
behalf of his own beloved little nation. Perhaps never did he quite lose
sight of that high ambition to command “listening senates” which had
come to him when he first sat in the Gallery at Westminster and looked
down on the combats of the great parliamentary gladiators. But for the
moment there was urgent work to do nearer to hand; and David Lloyd
George knew the wisdom of Carlyle’s great law of conduct—“Do the Duty
that lies nearest thee.”[21]
So he plunged into the great work for Wales which was already on foot at
his own doors.
In 1886 he joined eagerly in the great Anti-Tithe campaign which was
being carried on throughout North Wales by those remarkable men, Mr.
Thomas Gee and Mr. John Parry. David Lloyd George became the Secretary
of that League in South Carnarvonshire, and he addressed meetings
throughout the district. He accompanied Mr. Gee and Mr. Parry on many of
their most daring raids. He drove long distances in a small governess
cart and addressed meetings in little villages away in remote districts.
It was characteristic of David that he actually provoked and promoted
hostility. He would hold his meetings by preference in the neighbourhood
of the Parish Church or of the National School. He would regard it as
his greatest triumph if he could draw the parson or the curate to come
out and meet him in open warfare. One of the visions of him at this
period handed down is that of a day in June 1887, when he was seen
coatless and in his shirt-sleeves arguing against the curate in the open
green at the village fair of Sarn Melltcyrn. He did not shrink from
passive sympathy with the mild rioting which began to take place at the
tithe sales resulting from the distraints that followed. His whole heart
went out in sympathy to Welsh farmers compelled by law to contribute
from their pocket to what they regarded as an alien Church.
The “Tithe War” gave David Lloyd George that best of training for a
young public speaker—the training of public controversy in the open
air. It made him quick and resourceful. Here was the best possible
whetstone for his natural gift of courage. These speeches made him
already a rising public champion.
This was a new portent for the Welsh farmer—a lawyer who was not in
league with the rich. It flashed as a shining light on the eyes of a
people who had always been used to regard the law as the paid servant of
power and property. It brought more of those farmers flocking to his
office: and once more it brought him forward as the legal friend of the
poor and the oppressed—“the poor man’s lawyer” of Carnarvonshire.
The people gradually learned that here was a man skilled in the law who
was ready on their behalf to face the tyrants of the Bench and to
challenge their power.
In nothing had this power of the Bench been more ruthlessly exercised
than in the matter of fishing. By a curious distortion of public rights,
the rivers of this country have been mainly turned into private
property. While fishing on the open sea is as free as the air,
unlicensed fishing in fresh water in England outside navigable waters is
often accounted a crime.[22]
This law of private property in fresh water fishing has fallen with
peculiar harshness upon a people like the Welsh, who inherit a great
passion for this particular sport. The pressure of the law has been made
worse by the fact that the prohibition is perpetually being extended to
waters where a customary right of fishing has existed.
Here has been a cause of perpetual conflict between the law and the
public—a conflict in which the bias of the law has been mainly against
the public.
Such a case occurred in North Wales in May 1889, when four quarrymen
were prosecuted for fishing in a small mountain quarry lake.[23] The aim
of the prosecution was to bring the lake within the definition of the
word “river” in the Act of Parliament. It soon became quite clear from
the proceedings that the bias of the Court was against the quarrymen.
Mr. Lloyd George rapidly determined to bring this out in the most vivid
manner possible. So when the chairman—a great local potentate and
sportsman—gruffly interrupted his legal argument by saying that the
legal point must be tried in a higher Court, Mr. Lloyd George swiftly
replied:
“Yes, sir, and in a perfectly just and unbiassed Court too.”
The result of this remark was precisely what Mr. Lloyd George expected.
The chairman rather unwisely asked Mr. Lloyd George to what magistrate
he was referring. To this the young advocate immediately replied:
“I refer to you in particular, sir.”
Whereupon the chairman immediately rose with great pomp and dignity and
left the court.
The other magistrates now felt that it laid with them to take some
action. A second magistrate, allied to sport, protested. A third,
noddingly acquainted, declined to proceed with the case: whereupon Mr.
Lloyd George calmly remarked, “I am glad to hear it.” A fourth rose and
left the court. One of the few left asked Mr. Lloyd George for an
apology, whereupon he replied:
“I shall not withdraw anything, because every word I have spoken
is true.”
The result was that all the magistrates left the court, and Mr. Lloyd
George’s purpose was fully achieved.
Here was an incident by no means the result of mere thoughtless
impertinence on the part of a young lawyer. Mr. Lloyd George has always
regarded this as one of the proudest incidents of his life. He is still
of opinion that it came at a critical moment to shake the petty tyranny
of the local Bench, and he still quotes it as a good example of one of
his favourite methods of public action.
A short time afterwards David Lloyd George was the chief actor in
another famous case which showed the people of Wales that the spirit of
British justice, if boldly challenged, was capable of maintaining their
cause. This was a case arising from that incredible ecclesiastical
inhumanity which consisted in attempting to visit ignominy upon a man of
another faith even after he had passed through the gates of death.
Nothing did more to shatter the power of the Established Church of Wales
than the refusal of the parsons to bury the dead of other sects within
the walls of the old parish burial-grounds. Those parish “God’s acres”
had been in the possession of the people before the Reformation, and it
was only by a chance turn of English history that they passed away from
them.
The growth of the great Free Churches resulting from the immense
religious revival of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries
made this an acute matter. The hostility of the Established Church to
this revival led to a new use of the power of exclusion from the
burial-grounds. Terrible memories have centred round that struggle. The
late President of the English Divorce Court, Sir Samuel Evans, once told
me that he had to carry by stealth the coffin of his first wife into his
parish cemetery before he could obtain burial for her in Christian
ground. The Established Church in Wales has had to pay heavily for the
luxury of such adherence to a narrow and inhuman practice.
In 1880 the Welsh members returned to Parliament since the Liberal
Revival of 1868 had succeeded in passing that famous Burial Act which
now enables a British Nonconformist to be buried in a parish
burial-ground according to the rites of his own religion as long as due
notice is given to the parish priest. In most of the parishes in Wales
this Act was accepted by decent parsons as a satisfactory settlement of
a prolonged dispute.
But in the little village of Llanfrothen, at the very foot of Snowdon,
there was a rector whose fanatical religious instinct led him to make
one last daring effort to cheat his parishioners out of their rights of
decent Christian burial. In 1888, an old quarryman died at Llanfrothen.
He left it as his last wish that he should be buried by the side of his
daughter. Now, this daughter had been buried in a piece of land which
had been added to the churchyard as far back as 1864 by a certain Mrs.
Owen of Dolgelly. The new piece of land had been enclosed by a wall
built out of their own money by the parishioners. This “acre” had been
recognised up to that time as part of the burial-ground. But the Rev.
Richard Jones cared nothing for walls and little for precedents. This
“churlish priest” raked up the old records and found that Mrs. Owen had
made no legal conveyance of the land. In 1881, the year after the new
Burial Act had passed into law, he persuaded that good lady to make a
new conveyance, with a trust which confined it to those parishioners who
used the rites of the Church of England.
The new grave had actually been dug for the poor old quarryman to rest
by the side of his daughter. A notice under the new Act was served upon
the rector. Then began the struggle. The rector filled in the grave and
pointed out another spot for the burial of the old quarryman—a spot far
from his daughter, “bleak and sinister,” in the words of Mr. Lloyd
George—a place reserved for shipwrecked sailors and suicides.
It was at that moment in the struggle that the relatives of the
quarryman went to consult young David Lloyd George.
Without any hesitation Mr. Lloyd George advised them to act on their
rights. Following his daring counsel, they entered the graveyard and
reopened the filled-in grave. Then they made a pathetic appeal to the
rector. He still forbade them to act. Then they made a demand on the
rector. He still refused. Meanwhile young David had spent a night in
foraging and rummaging through the church records, and he had discovered
that in 1864 the rector had allowed the public to enclose the piece of
ground without any conditions. He advised the relatives to go on. Let
them, if necessary, break into the churchyard.
They went on. They broke into the churchyard. They borrowed a bier from
the church. They gave the old man a Christian burial by his daughter.
The Calvinist minister spoke the service, and the relatives went home
happier—contented with the feeling that they had buried the old man
where he had wished to lie.
Infuriated by their defiance, the stubborn rector sued the relatives for
damages in Portmadoc County Court. Mr. Lloyd George took up the defence
and asked for a jury. The jury decided that his facts were correct. The
County Court Judge decided against him on the point of law. Fortunately
for Mr. Lloyd George, the Judge made an incorrect record of the jury’s
verdict and refused to correct it. David Lloyd George appealed to the
Divisional Court. He was heard by Lord Chief Justice Coleridge and
Justice Manisty. In the middle of the case Lord Chief Justice Coleridge
discovered the incorrect record by the County Court Judge. Result—fury
of the Lord Chief Justice, anger of the Court, and, finally, a verdict
in favour of the quarryman.
So that poor old quarryman of Llanfrothen was after all laid to rest in
peace in that little burial-ground beneath the mighty precipices of
Snowdon; and the fame of Mr. Lloyd George spread wider and wider
throughout North Wales. It was felt that here at last the people had a
man who had the courage to support them in their struggles against the
powers in high places.
He now began to act as a popular pleader in cases of social injustice
before the Petty Courts of the Principality.
It was during this period of dawning thoughts and powers that David
Lloyd George wooed and won the woman who became his wife. The young man
was at that time a keen-eyed, attractive youth; and the silver tongue
which he was already using in Court and on the platform was also very
social in private life. He was from the beginning a sociable,
conservative man. Dowered with welded gifts of wit and wisdom, he had
already the makings of a good talker. Above all, he had that gift of
sympathy with the views of others which is more popular with women than
with men. So it was that the cottage-born boy of Llanystumdwy, the
promising son of Morvin House, was a prime favourite with the girls of
Criccieth—and with one girl in particular who lived just outside
Criccieth.
For about a mile inland from the sea, on a hundred-acre farm called
Mynydd Ednyfed, there lived a farming family of old lineage and high
standing possessing the proud, historic Welsh name of Owen. They claimed
descent from Owen Glyndwr, and they faced life with that simple Homeric
pride which lends dignity to worthy living. The yeomen farmers of Wales,
like the “statesmen” of the Cumberland Dales, inherit the pride of
landed men; and the Owens were no exception to this rule.
The Owens of Ednyfed had a daughter—Maggie by name—whom they loved
passing well. She was the apple of her father’s eye; and no man who
sought her hand was likely to have an easy time. That, of course, was
likely to make Maggie not less, but more desirable to David Lloyd
George.
Maggie went to chapel at Criccieth, and the young people met in that
simple but thrilling way—when the heart is at its best and highest—as
they went to and from their little chapels. They did not worship
together; for the Owens were Methodists. But love has leapt higher
barriers than that between Baptists and Methodists.
Then there came those entries in the diaries—innocent, human
entries—how David took Maggie home from meetings—how, later on, he
began to go to the farm and talk. Little is said; but we see the old,
old story developing along its ancient trodden paths. The son of the
land is going back to the land for his wooing.
Then came those stones in the path without which the truth of love never
was and never shall be proved. It was after 1885 that the young man
began to go frequently to the farmhouse—solely, of course, to obtain
sound political advice and counsel from a very wise young lady. Fathers
have strange illusions, and at first Mr. Owen thought that David came to
talk to him. Many fathers have often thought the same.
But the day came to Mr. Owen, as it comes to all parents, when the veil
was torn asunder. It became only too obvious that this young man did not
toil out so often to Ednyfed solely in order to enjoy the society of Mr.
Owen—or even of Mrs. Owen.
Then Mr. Owen became less friendly. It is not Polonius only who thought
himself wiser than youth; and in this case Mr. Owen brought Mrs. Owen
over to his side.
Ah! If this young David could look forward to the secure tenancy of a
good solid farmhouse and a rich, broad-acred farm, how different it
would be! But there he was, a struggling limb of the law, scarcely
emerged from articles, given to outrageous public forays, still under
his uncle’s roof! Farmers rarely love lawyers.
Happily the Owen parents had friends and relations, who took a sounder
and longer view. Maggie had one of those friendly aunts who are the best
counsellors of our youth. That good lady now urged Maggie to stick to
the young man. “Mark you,” she would say, “that young man has a great
future. Don’t give him up.” Maggie was perhaps like any other young
girl, at first a little divided and disturbed—distracted between the
calls of love and filial duty. But in the end she did the sound,
straight thing—she stuck to her man and won.
Once the victory was established, and bold heart had won fair lady, then
the parental entrenchments surrendered. The white flag became the flag
of loyalty; and Mr. and Mrs. Owen, once won over, became the devoted
friends and worshippers of their son-in-law up to the close of their
lives. I saw something of them in their home at a later time; and among
all those humble folk who have helped David Lloyd George to achieve,
those two wise elders, Mr. and Mrs. Owen, held no mean or unworthy
place.
The years flew swiftly, and by 1888 it became clear that Maggie’s aunt
was the true prophetess, and that the young Criccieth solicitor was a
coming man. The rumour of him was spreading through the county like the
roar of a “spate” from the hills of Snowdon. What was more important, he
was earning an income. Not even the thrifty, careful farmer of Ednyfed
could doubt any longer.
So with the opening of that year it was decided that the marriage should
take place.
On January 24th, 1888, just after the twenty-fifth birthday of the young
bridegroom,[24] David Lloyd George and Maggie Owen were married. The
wedding took place in a romantic spot, in the little chapel of
Pencaenewydd, an inland Carnarvonshire village, a few miles from
Chwilog. Uncle Lloyd took David over by train on that fateful morning to
Chwilog; there they breakfasted, and walked over to Pencaenewydd. Uncle
Lloyd and the Rev. John Owen performed the simple ceremony; and there
were present only relations and a few friends. But it was recorded in
the _Carnarvon Herald_ that flags were to be seen everywhere in
Criccieth, and in the evening, after the young couple had left for
London, the people defied the drizzling rain with a bonfire and
fireworks. Already the people knew their friend.
Twenty-nine years later (1917) a daughter of these simple spousals was
married with the same simplicity in a little Baptist chapel in London.
Only the welling, pressing crowd outside the chapel showed that the man
who stood by the pulpit giving away his daughter was Prime Minister of
England. One wedding was as simple as the other.
When they returned to Criccieth from their brief honeymoon, Mr. and Mrs.
Lloyd George settled down at first at Mynydd Ednyfed, in the farmhouse
of the Owens, and there they spent a few happy years under her parents’
roof. There the elder children were born.
It was soon clear that the marriage was not going to bring any abatement
of courageous action on the part of the young husband. Mrs. Lloyd George
was not the sort of wife who encourages her husband to uxorious ease.
She was, and always has been, on the side of daring. She faces danger
with a simplicity which is disarming.
One night, for instance, there was to be held at Criccieth a meeting of
the kind known as “Church Defence”; a species of gathering not free from
offence to the people of Wales. David was suffering from a mild attack
of tonsillitis. There seemed every reason why he should not go to the
meeting.
But the people of Carnarvonshire had had to stand a good deal of this
sort of thing; and David’s blood was up. He wanted to go. Would his
young wife mind? She? “Why not go?” she said.
So he went off, closely muffled up by a wife who was tender as well as
brave.
He stepped into the meeting with one definite object. It was his
deliberate intention to stop a practice that was growing into a scandal.
It had become a habit in these gatherings to fend off the eager
questionings of militant Nonconformity by disingenuous postponement. It
is a method well known to the tricksters of public life. “Questions? Oh!
yes, as many as you like! Only it is more convenient to answer them at
the close of the meeting!” Then at the close—“So sorry! But our friend
here has to catch a train—his invaluable time—” We all know this sort
of thing.
But at the opening of this particular meeting—an important meeting, to
be addressed by a very special Church advocate—there arose the young
David Lloyd George, muffled but insistent. Yes, he wanted to ask some
questions. No, he would rather ask them now. In fact, he intended to ask
them now. So he stood, pale to the lips, but unyielding.
The audience, taking courage, began to clap and cheer. “To the
platform!” shouted some one. So David quite deliberately stepped up to
the platform, mounted it, and began to address the meeting.
In vain did the righteous rage. The chairman ordered David down. He held
his ground. Nay, he began to address the people, simply, incisively,
thrillingly. The chairman was forgotten. David had become the speaker of
the hour.
Then a curious thing happened. Warming to the task, David began to take
off his mufflers. He unwound them and cast them aside. His hoarse voice
became clear and ringing. The sick throat was forgotten.
He captured the meeting. The platform was silenced. It was he who made
the speech of the evening; and at the end the enthusiastic Free
Churchmen in the audience took up the young man and carried him from the
hall on their shoulders.
No, certainly, marriage had not pinioned the wings of this young stormy
petrel.
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[21] _Sartor Resartus_, Book II., chapter ix.
[22] In countries like Japan all fishing is free; and public fishing, of
course, can be “preserved” as easily as private.
[23] The lower Nantlle lake.
[24] He was born on January 17th, 1863.