Produced by James Tenison
THE ROMANCE OF A PRO-CONSUL
BEING THE PERSONAL LIFE AND MEMOIRS OF THE RIGHT HON.
SIR GEORGE GREY, K.C.B.
BY JAMES MILNE
AUTHOR OF "THE EPISTLES OF ATKINS"
"MY SUMMER IN LONDON," ETC.
THOMAS NELSON & SONS
LONDON, EDINBURGH, DUBLIN AND NEW YORK
A WORD TO THE READER
When Sir George Grey died, twelve years ago, he left a message as well as
a name to the English-speaking people. It was that their future rested in
the Federal Idea of communion and government. He saw, vision-like, the
form of this new age arise, because changed needs called it. As Pro-
Consul he laboured for it unceasingly in our over-sea Commonwealths, and
South Africa has most lately given answer. Now, at a historic turning in
British Institutions, we hear of "Federal Home-Rule," and that may be a
signpost to far travel along the road which Sir George Grey "blazed."
Certainly it sends us to the spacious life and high thoughts of the
"Father of Federation," whom Time in its just goodness will also call
the Walter Raleigh of the Victorians. Hence this people's edition of a
book wherein, "he, being dead, yet speaketh."
JAMES MILNE.
LONDON, March 1911.
A guide to Sir George Grey's career as soldier, explorer,
administrator, statesman, thinker, and dreamer.
1812 Born at Lisbon April 14, during the Peninsular War.
1829 Gazetted from Sandhurst to the 83rd Regiment Foot, and served to
a captaincy.
1837 Sailed from Plymouth June 20, on the ship 'Beagle,' as leader of a
Government expedition to explore North-West Australia. Engaged in
this work, and as Resident at King George's Sound, until 1840.
1841 Named to the Governorship of South Australia, aged 29; held it
until 1845, and during that period rescued the Colony from a state
of chaos, getting it on the high road to prosperity.
1845 Appointed Governor of New Zealand, when the first Maori War was
raging. Established peace and authority, and continued in office
until 1854. Refused to proclaim the constitution first designed by
the British Government and Parliament for New Zealand, and was
given power to draw up another.
1854 First Governorship of Cape Colony, to 1859. Two dramatic events of
it were the rising of the Kaffirs, at the call of a girl regarded
as a Messiah; and the deflection to India, where the Mutiny had
broken out, of the troops on their way to Lord Elgin in China.
1859 Re-called from the Cape, because the Government at home
disapproved of his action in endeavouring to federate South
Africa. Reinstated, but with orders to drop his federation
plans; and remained at Cape Town until 1861.
1861 Second Governorship of New Zealand, to 1867. Second Maori War.
1868 Active in English public life to 1890; and in Australasian affairs
from 1870 to 1894.
1877 Was Premier of New Zealand to 1879 so achieving the unique
distinction of ruling, in that capacity, a country of which he had
twice been Governor.
1898 Died London, September 19. Buried in St. Paul's Cathedral,
September 26.
CONTENTS
I, PERSONAL AND PARTICULAR
II. HOME IS THE WARRIOR
The return to England, 1894, with incidents of the Queen, the Earl of
Rosebery, and James Anthony Froude; a memory of Lord Robert Cecil, and
some notes on London.
III. YOUTH THE BIOGRAPHER
Or how the child was father to the man. Olive Schreiner's greeting; an
orangestall eloquent; a flight from school; a surpassing encounter at
South Kensington; and a glimpse of Archbishop Whately.
IV. SAXON AND CELT
A young soldier in the Old Ireland of the Thirties; varying scenes of
Irish life and character; and stories of Dean Swift, Daniel O'Connell,
and Sir Hussey Vivian.
V. SOUTHWARD HO!
The call to the New World; musings of the voyage and the sea; and, by
contrast, the London perils of Thomas Carlyle and Babbage, Sir Charles
Lyell's spear-head being also mentioned.
VI. MAN AND NATURE ABORIGINAL
A battle with the blacks, wherein, unhappily, their leader fell, the
white chief being seriously wounded; and later, a valiant march across
the blistered Australian country.
VII. PLANTING THE BRITON
First principles of nation making; a harvest in South Australia; the
witchcraft of Turner's wig; the vanity of riches; keeping the Anglo-Saxon
ring; strange human documents; and a reference to Sir John Franklin.
VIII. PICTURES IN BLACK AND WHITE
Food, as man's leading motive; curing a witch doctor; a problem of Kaffir
women's ornaments; elevating the native; a Tasmanian study; a new Sabine
story; the Aborigine and his surroundings; lastly, McFarland's elopement.
IX. OVER-LORD OF OVER-SEAS
Lamech's slogan and the task of stilling it in New Zealand; with, arising
therefrom, martial chronicles of Hongi, Heke, and Kawiti, Maori chiefs,
and of the taking of the 'Bat's Nest' stronghold.
X. 'TWIXT NIGHT AND MORN
An Easter scene and earlier; on tramp with Selwyn; the kidnapping of
Rauparaha; Rangihaeta cajoled into road making; how the Maoris rubbed
noses; and the boycott as peace-maker.
XI. THE THRILL OF GOVERNING
Knight and esquires; a secret of empire; the tragedy of the naval
lieutenant; Patoune's fallen-out tooth; to the hills for New Zealand's
constitution; playing 'cock-fight'; and repulsing the Ngatipoa.
XII. IN THE QUEEN'S NAME
Showing the management of another danger spot of the realm, to which
picture there come in, details of the winning of the African natives to
the Queen, a comedy of witchcraft and widows, and a German Legion
difficulty.
XIII. OCEANA AND A PROPHETESS
From the plight of Sir John Herschel in London, to the stir made in South
Africa by Nongkause, a Kaffir girl turned Messiah; and between pages
Sandilli, Moselekatsi, Bishop Colenso, and Bishop Wilberforce.
XIV. A SAVIOUR OF INDIA
The activities of a hunter, prelude to a narrative of how a British
military force, under orders for one theatre of war, was boldly diverted
to another; incidentally the bearding of Moshesh; and a queer Pax
Britannica.
XV. AYE DREAMING AND DOING
The effort to federate South Africa; the gathering in of the Pacific,
involving visits to New Caledonia and Norfolk Island; the Irish girl as
empire builder; a meeting with Macaulay; and Prince Alfred at the Cape.
XVI THE FAR-FLUNG BATTLE-LINE
Two Kings of Maoriland, Te-Whero-Whero and Tawhiao; Sir John Gorst and
the newspaper battle, 'Lonely Sparrow on the House-Top' v. 'Giant Eagle
Flying Aloft'; the storming of Wereroa Pa; and an escape from an ambush.
XVII. FOR ENGLAND'S SAKE
Keeping the painter from being cut; an election contest at Newark; a
visit from Mr. Mundella; the pacifying of the tribes; and finally the
golden legend of Hine-Moa the Maori maiden.
XVIII. A FATHER OF FEDERATION
A word on Mr. Gladstone, and many words on Anglo-Saxon federation, the
ideas underlying it, elements making for it, and the benefits which would
follow in its train.
XIX. WAITING TO GO
Backward and forward, being farther memories, one telling of a tryst with
Dean Stanley; then, an exposition of simple faith and the romance of
death, as leading to the Hereafter.
THE ROMANCE OF A PRO-CONSUL
I PERSONAL AND PARTICULAR
'Perhaps there is something in old age that likes to have a young mind
clinging to it.' Sir George Grey was speaking of the famous people he had
known in his youth long, long before. He struck an inner note of nature
which is surely equally valid the other way? Whenever I think of the
remark, I am inclined to discover one reason why I came to know Sir
George so well.
I met him, as I have met other characters of English story in our own
day. You go into these great waters, seeking that all who care may know.
You cry across them, answer comes back or it does not, and there endeth
the lesson, until the next time.
It was different with Sir George Grey. He hauled me straight in-board,
saying, 'Now, call upon me often, and we'll talk mankind over. Going by
myself, no two people can meet without being a means of instruction to
each other, to say nothing else. You are where the swing of events must
be felt, and I am in the back-water of retirement. It may entertain us
both, to study new subjects under old lights.'
Thus flew many an hour, and many an evening, and the memory of them is
green and grateful to me. Here was an incident, there a reflection, and
always it was Sir George Grey intimate, whether in a frame large or
small. It is the rivulets, babbling to the big stream, that really tell
its tale, for without them it would not be; and so with the river of
life. Beside me, a scarred veteran looked back upon himself, hailing some
venture from the mist of years. Again, it might be an event on the wing;
or the future, and him bending eagerly forward into its sunshine.
We wrote things, he inspiring, I setting down, and by and by I exclaimed:
'Why, I am getting, to be quite a depository of your memories and ideas.'
At that he smiled, 'And who, do you fancy, would thank you for them?'
Thus a portrait of Sir George grew with me, and I was for stroking it
down somehow. 'Oh well,' quoth he, 'let's try and gather together what
may be fresh, or suggestive, in my experiences, and yours be the blame.
Whatever you do must have a certain spirit of action--you know what I
mean!--or nobody will look at it. You'll need to whisk along.'
In Froude's phrase, the life of Sir George Grey had been a romance, and
that was the road which caught me. No wonder, for it was a broad road, in
the sense that his whole being was a romance. He saw things beneath a
radiant light, and he saw many which to others would have been invisible.
Nor, was his grasp of them less accurate, because he strained his eye
most earnestly for what was most beautiful. The romantic element in his
outlook gave colour, vividness, meaning to the unconsidered trifles--in
fine, you had a chronicle and a seer.
On the one hand, then, I sought for the texts with a likely stir in them;
on the other for those of personality, streaked by affairs. The
references were consulted, or Sir George's own words of old delved among;
and from his discourse there sprang a regular series of notes. 'It's a
kind of task,' he remarked once, 'that might easily enough lend itself to
vain-glory. We must avoid that.'
If there is anything that could so be read, I alone am the sinner; for
with his memories there go my interpretation and appreciation of him.
What should I do but write of Sir George Grey as I beheld him, of his
career as one captured by it? His nature, like every rich nature, had
folds, but I only knew their warmth. With that, I step round the mountain
side.
II HOME IS THE WARRIOR
Things call to each other after the great silence has fallen, scenes come
together, and that is how it seems here.
A ship, bound on a far voyage, lay in Plymouth waters the day that the
Queen succeeded to the throne. It was laden with an expedition for the
new wonderland of the Australias, whither it duly sailed. As leader, the
expedition had a young lieutenant of the 83rd Foot Regiment, George
Grey.
On a spring afternoon, fifty-seven years later, there landed at the same
port, from a New Zealand liner, an aged man who received marked
attention. He was as a gnarled oak of the wide-ranged British forest, and
the younger trees bent in salute to him. It was Sir George Grey, returned
finally to the Motherland, which had sent him forth to build nations.
He had gone in a tubby wooden craft, the winds his carrier, across oceans
that were pathless, except to the venturer. He returned by steam, through
seas which it had tamed to the churn and rumble of the screw. What
thought in the contrasting pictures of the world! The two Englands might
have met each other in the street, and passed, strangers.
'From the windows of my hotel at Plymouth,' Sir George recalled, 'I
watched the citizens proclaim the young Queen. Who among them could have
imagined the glorious reign hers was to be? It was to surpass in bounty
of achievement all foretelling.'
Now, he would meet, for the last time, the Sovereign who, like himself,
had tended the rise of Oceana. This was at Windsor, to which he had
summons soon after he reached England. He had been exalted a member of
the Privy Council, and must be sworn in by the Queen. The tribute was
cheerful to him, since the very nature of it set seal upon his services
to the Empire. The longing for some word of England's remembrance had
assuredly been in his heart, which had often been left desolate. It was
all rapture to England, like a child's to its mother.
'For mere honours themselves,' was his broad attitude thereon, 'I
entertain no special regard. A title to one's name, a red ribbon, or
something else, what are they but baubles, unless there is more? What
more? Why, they hand down a record of the public work that a person may
have endeavoured to perform. In that respect they should have esteem,
being the recognition of efforts to serve Queen and people.
'Nothing could be more unfortunate than that a country should neglect
services rendered to it. The loss is its own, because, apart from justice
to the individual, his example is not kept alive to encourage others
coming after. In so far, then, as that reasoning may apply to myself--not
very far, perhaps--I do sincerely value any honours I have received. Not
otherwise; and it is easy to understand that a distinction, granted
without adequate cause, might exercise a really pernicious effect upon
the tone of a nation.'
While Sir George awaited the Queen's commands at Windsor, she sent him
them. He was not to go on his knees, a usual part of the ceremony of
swearing in a Privy Councillor. She had remembered, with a woman's
feeling, that here was a patriarch, nimble no longer.
The meeting between Queen and servant was stately, in that they were the
two people who linked most intimately Great and Greater Britain. To them
Oceana was a living, sentient thing, not merely a glorious name and
expanse. It had squalled in their ears. They could go back to the
beginnings, could witness the whole panorama of the Colonies unroll
itself. They stood for the history of a high endeavour, which had been
nobly crowned. Oft, there had been weary clouds across the sky, not
seldom heavy darkness. But the sun was kept shining, and finally all had
become light. Oceana was grown up, and she gathered the four corners of
her robe into that Windsor audience chamber.
Of the Queen's order Sir George had the simple deliverance, 'It showed
how careful Her Majesty is to manifest a strong consideration for all
those who come in contact with her, a most taking quality in a
Sovereign.' Yet, for the first time in his life, he was to disobey that
Sovereign. Nothing, not even her protest of 'No, no,' could stop him from
getting down on his knees, as if he had been a younger subject. The
infirmities were conquered by his desire to pay to the Queen that
reverence and loyalty which had always been hers. The bonds of age were
burst, although his quaint complaint about himself that very evening was,
'You know I want a minute or two to get in motion.'
Despite bowed shoulders and rusty joints, he still had something of the
lithe, strenuous carriage of his youth. In his dignity of manner, there
almost seemed to you a glimpse of the gallant age when forbears had gone
whistling to the headsman. He was of a line which counted in English
history, which among its women had a Lady Jane Grey. His mother, with the
mother's wistful love and pride, had traced that line for him. He was not
deeply moved, unless by the romance and the tragedy that gathered about
it.
But the aristocrat abode in the democrat, nature's doing. He was of the
people in being whole-souled for them; he was not by them. Verily, he had
been through the winters in their interest. The ripe harvest was in his
hair, which had become thin above a face, rugged with intellect; over a
broad, decisive brow, strewn with furrows. It was a head of uncommon
shape, with bumps and a poise, indicating at once the idealist and the
man of action. There it spoke truly, for Sir George was both; the two
were one in him.
The chief secret of his personality seemed to rest in his eyes, and it
was in them you met the dreamer of dreams. 'So I was often called,' he
would mention, 'and the answer is to hand. Many of the dreams which I
dreamt have been realised; that knowledge has been permitted me. Whether
it is any comfort I'm not sure, because, after all, my dreams are not
nearly exhausted.
'Dreaming dreams! I trust that Englishmen will never cease to do that,
for otherwise we should be falling away from ourselves. To dream is to
have faith, and faith is strength, whether in the individual or in the
nation. Sentiment! Yes, only sentiment must remain, probably, the
greatest of human forces governing the world.'
The store, reflected in Sir George's eyes, was what gave him his control
over men. In those depths, blue as a summer sky, were many lights, which
caught Robert Louis Stevenson and were comprehended of him. The return
observation was, 'I never met anybody with such a bright, at moments
almost weird, genius-gifted eye, as that of Stevenson.' Sir George could
fire imagination in the most ordinary mortal, carrying him off into
enchanted realms. He sailed to strange skies, a knight-errant of a star,
and he could tow the masses with him. He lifted them out of themselves,
and put a label on their vague yearnings. They had imagination, the
instinct upward, and were grateful to have it discovered.
The poetry of Sir George's nature flavoured his language, alike in manner
of delivery and turn of phrase. It had a quaint old-world style; it fell
slowly, in a low, soothing voice. He might have spent his, days in the
cloister, rather than in the din of hammering up hearths for the Anglo-
Saxon. Perhaps it was that he had talked so long to the hills of Oceana,
catching their simplicity and music. You were reminded of the measured
English of an old and lovable book, just as you grew used to read in his
face what he was to say, before the words had begun to flow. Never was
there a face more quick to reflect the mind, more pliable to humour, more
luminous at some stirring idea or deed, more indignant at the bare notion
of a wrong inflicted, softer at the call of sympathy.
Sir George had travelled to Windsor with the Earl of Rosebery, then Prime
Minister, and that was an agreeable memory. Being asked what
characteristics he noted as most prominent in the Premier, he replied:
'Oh, his extraordinary readiness at seeing the humorous side of anything,
his almost boyish love of fun. He seems to have a power of dismissing the
weight of public affairs, of diverting himself with the playfulness of
youth.' Sir George was living in Park Place, St. James's, and on
returning from Windsor the Premier drove him there. His rooms were at
Number 7, and here the street ended in a sharp incline, with somebody's
yard beyond.
Sir George suggested that the coachman should stop, and let him down at a
point where the horses could readily turn. 'Not at all,' Lord Rosebery
insisted, 'I'll drive you to the door and we'll manage to turn somehow.'
A trifle anxious, Sir George waited on his door-step to see how this was
to be done.
'Quick of eye,' he related, 'the coachman discerned the possibilities of
the yard at the top of the incline. Accordingly, he whipped into it,
wheeled round, and trotted gently away past me. There sat the Premier in
the carriage, waving his hat in a triumph, the fun of which quite
infected me.'
Sir George appreciated kindly attentions the more, in that he was himself
a king in courtesy, with his heart ever on the latch. He estimated the
side of Lord Rosebery's character, thus manifested, to be among the best
ornaments he could have. 'It seems clear to me,' were his words, 'that he
is a man of sincerity and simple nobility, one who wishes with all his
heart to do what he can for his fellow men.' That was Sir George's test
of all public effort, as it had been what he applied to himself. There
could be none higher.
Mere weight of years could not quench the ardour and hope which had
always burned so brightly in Sir George Grey. As well expect him to
forget that chivalrous manner of his, bewitcher of the veriest stranger.
He would, find his tall hat, search out his staunch umbrella, and convoy
the visitor forth, when the hour of parting had arrived. Nothing less
would suffice him, and as to his company, it was a delight for ever.
Another veteran might have been lonely with a younger generation knocking
at the door, indeed in full possession. He was not; he strode in the van
with the youngest.
Yet he felt, perhaps, the void time had wrought in the circle of his
friends. He held the fort silently, while the long scythe cut another
swathe very near him. He heard that his friend, James Anthony Froude, who
had been lying ill in Devonshire, was steadily losing strength.
'I have made inquiries about him, poor fellow,' he murmured, 'but now I
must telegraph for the latest particulars. He and I are old companions,
and I have liking and admiration for him. When he visited me at my island
of Kawau, off the New Zealand coast, we had a capital while together. He
wanted to ask me, if I approved the manner in which he had written
Carlyle's life, a subject that brought him a good deal of criticism. My
reply was that I believed Carlyle would have wished to be presented just
as he was; not a half picture, but complete, for that would ultimately
make him appear all the greater.'
Somewhat before his illness, Froude published a book, and the London
daily paper which Sir George Grey took in, had a handsome review of it.
'I'll send the cutting to Froude,' he declared; 'it will do him good to
know that his latest writings are thoroughly appreciated.' Within a few
days, he had news from Devonshire that Froude had been able to have part
of the article read to him, and that he was gratified by it. Sir George
was happy at his little service having carried so well, and mentioned a
larger one which Froude had wished to render him.
'Hardly was I in England this time,' the history of it ran, 'than I had a
letter from Froude, intimating how glad he would be to put my name
forward for that high distinction, the Oxford honorary degree. This gave
me a grand chance to rally him, since I was already in possession of the
honours of Oxford and Cambridge. Those of the former I received after my
first administration of New Zealand, those of the latter when I was re-
called from South Africa. At Oxford, the students, with riotous zest,
sang the "King of the Cannibal Isles," which, more or less, I had been.
Froude had forgotten all that, but he agreed that no man could hope to
have such a treat twice in a lifetime.'
It would have been curious if Sir George, a maker of British Parliaments,
had not found his way to their cradle at Westminster. He had himself been
a candidate for membership, but the House of Commons was only to know him
as a visitor. 'Why,' he said, 'I met Adderley, now in the Lords, who once
wanted to impeach me. Perhaps I deserved to be impeached--I don't
remember!--but anyhow we had a very agreeable chat about old days.' Sir
George, as a Privy Councillor, had been escorted to the steps of the
throne in the House of Lords. There he met again the Marquis of
Salisbury, who, as Lord Robert Cecil, had stood up for him, years and
years before, in the Commons, even to the extent of criticising the
English of Bulwer Lytton's despatches. When he went to Australasia, to
fortify his health and study the New World, he was the guest, for a
period, of Sir George in New Zealand.
'Some of his friends,' said the latter, 'were great friends of mine; for
example, Beresford Hope, who founded the "Saturday Review," and Cook, who
edited it. Lord Robert was tall and slight, and, when he came to New
Zealand, not at all strong. While he was with me, he saw a good deal of
the manner in which a Colony was conducted, and of the relationships
between it and the Mother Country. He would read the despatches that I
wrote and received, and generally made a study which may have proved
useful to him in his subsequent career.
'As I recollect Lord Robert Cecil in New Zealand, he was not more fond of
exercise than Lord Salisbury appears to be to-day, always being studious.
He did not care to take long walks, but once I persuaded him, with
another young Englishman, to go and see the beautiful Wairarapa Valley.
They walked there and back, and on the last evening, while returning,
were caught in a terrific rain-storm. They sought the shelter of some
rocks, contrived to make a fire, and over it dried their shirts.'
Nothing afforded Sir George more genial occupation than a talk about
books or politics, the latter always on the lofty ground to which,
somehow, he could at once lift them. He had a knack of taking a question
and shaking it on to your lap. You had it, as you never quite had it
before, and to your fascinated ear the version seemed the only possible
one. The secret was that Sir George laid hold of the kernel of a subject,
and worked outwards--an expositor, not a controversialist. When evening
waned he would turn to Epictetus, and then to a well-thumbed New
Testament. It was the hour of meditation.
'I have studied the New Testament in various languages,' he said, 'thus
getting more insight of it than I could have got through a single
language. Never, during my early exploring work, was I without my New
Testament to comfort and sustain me. The Sermon on the Mount is the great
charter of mankind, its teachings the highest wisdom for all times and
all climes. It and other pieces, which I might select, are of exceeding
beauty and full of guidance and counsel. They inculcate in the human
heart a love of one's fellows, irrespective of colour.'
He read that teaching into the happier London which greeted him, after an
absence of more than twenty-five years. At last, the museums and art
galleries were really open to the people, who thronged them, drinking in
knowledge. He noted the children playing in the parks, and they were
better dressed, the parks themselves better kept. You can judge a nation
by the state of its children's boots, and these had fewer holes. The poor
London had, and ever would have, but she was not the callous mother of
other years. She felt for those who were down.
Sir George would ride by 'bus, except, indeed, when in pursuit of some
volume for that beloved library at Auckland. Then, nothing would satisfy
his eagerness but hot foot and back with the trophy, scanning its pages
in his scholar's joy. But a-top the 'bus was the working man, homeward
bound, and he was getting more out of life. Manhood was in him, he
evidently had at last a free, firm seat in the saddle of which Providence
had always held the stirrup.
The feeling of human brotherhood was wider, deeper, the benefits
springing therefrom apparent all round. Penny fares were bringing classes
into contact with each other, who were formerly as far divided as if they
had lived in different planets. The London policeman's upheld hand, was
an eloquent speech on the sacred meaning of law to a free people. Youth
helped age to a seat in a public vehicle, and the bricklayer quenched the
fire of his pipe because the smoke annoyed a lady sitting behind him.
Sir George would have built a bricklayer's statue on the best site that
London could provide. Not that he was fond of statues, unless they
happened likewise to be art; but that such a one would have carried its
meaning. There was already a statue of himself at Cape Town, and his
Auckland admirers had a scheme for another.
'No doubt they'll take care it does you justice,' he was joked.
'Well, I don't know,' he answered, a smile puckering his face, 'but
perhaps they should wait until I'm gone. They might want to pull it down
again, if I did not behave all right. Now, that would hurt my feelings.'
III YOUTH THE BIOGRAPHER
One to whom the beyond is near, who has the kindled vision, probably best
sees the life he has lived, in the beginnings--child, boy, and youth.
There are no smudges on that mirror.
The stage of being which we call childhood had an endless charm for Sir
George Grey, and often that drew him back to his own early years. The
little child, a bundle of prattling innocence, still on the banks of the
world's highway, like a daisy nodding into the flying stream, was in his
sight almost a divinity. Here was the most beautiful, the most perfect
manifestation of the Creator; an atmosphere where the wisest felt
themselves the babes.
'You are the one Englishman living,' Olive Schreiner, when in England,
wrote to Sir George before calling upon him, 'of whom I should like to
say that I had shaken his hand.'
But it would not, she continued, be the first time they had met, for,
during his rule of Cape Colony, he had visited the mission station where
her parents dwelt. She thought this was while Prince Alfred was on his
tour in South Africa; anyhow, when she was an infant, a few months old,
ailing, hardly expected to live. The Governor took her in his arms,
saying, as her mother related to her, 'Poor little baby! is it so ill?'
'When the other children teased me,'--Olive Schreiner had her triumph
from the incident--'I could say to them, "Ah, but you were not held in
the arms of Sir George Grey;" and that was safe to bring about an
increased respect on their part towards me.'
Taking his walks in Kensington Gardens, Sir George would make friendships
among the small people whose nursery coaches are there the swell of a
thoroughfare. On the second occasion of meeting he might be expected,
with a fine show of mystery, to produce a toy from his pocket. 'It's so
easy,' he remarked, 'to convert these gardens into a fairy-land for some
child whose name you only know because the nurse told it you.' Then, a
favourite would not be met one day, or the next, and Sir George would
feel a blank in his walk.
At his own fireside, a girlie with rosy, dimpled cheeks, straightway made
him her subject, by the simple trust with which she took his out-
stretched hand, cuddled on to his knee, and sat enthroned. She confirmed
a victory, that he regarded as all his, in a most faithful treatment of
tea-cakes, protesting at every mouthful, 'Oh, no, I sha'n't be ill; I
_won't_ be ill!'
It had been the same when Sir George was among the Aborigines of
Australia, for the children promptly made friends with him. The grown
natives, never having seen a white before, had sense to be scared. Their
bairns merely had intuition, and it took them to Sir George's side,
which, again, brought in the parents.
Studying a portrait of his own father he mused: 'The child that has never
known both parents, must be conscious of having missed part of its
inheritance in the world.' He had been thus robbed, a few days before his
birth, by the slaughter at Badajoz, where Colonel Grey fell, a gallant
soldier, scarce past thirty.
To a problem which the youngest child carries lightly, Sir George had
given much thought, namely, 'Of what does human life consist? what are
its elements?' Thereon he had the deliverance:
'Quite early in my own life, I formed the opinion that we had neglected
to consider an element of existence; that besides the solids and the
fluids there was ether. It seemed to me that ether played a very
important part, alike in the creation and the maintenance of life. That
was the everlasting ingredient, the something which never perished, but
went on and on, the soul in the body of flesh and blood. Brought into
contact with various eminent men, I was happily able to discuss such
vital questions with them.'
Sir George's mother first set him thinking, and he had a recollection of
learning the Lord's Prayer from her. Indeed, his earliest mental problem
arose from the opening words, 'Our Father, which art in Heaven.'
'I took the "which art in" to be all one word, and puzzled over its
possible meaning. The circumstance was a light to the obstacles that
beset a child's mind, and a lamp to parents in training that mind. Never
was there a mother more fitted than mine, for the glorious
responsibilities of motherhood. Very highly educated, she added Latin to
her other accomplishments, in order that she might teach the language to
me. She had married a second time, and my step-father, a wise and large-
hearted man, one of the best men I have ever known, also bestowed much
care on my upbringing.'
As a little fellow he had lived a good deal in London with relations, a
family of whom had a house near Hyde Park. He could call up, from the
farthest caverns of his memory, a Sunday forenoon on which he was carried
off to church, because there was nobody at home, except the servants, to
look after him.
'What West End church it may have been I cannot tell,' Sir George said,
'but I imagine the one the household usually attended. The other detail
that a fire burned in our pew, did impress itself definitely upon my
mind. I was at least big enough to lift a poker, and what must I do but
seize that instrument, and set to scraping the fire, to the confusion of
those with me. Perhaps the idea of a fire in a church pew may be deemed
curious at this date, so much later. But why not? It was really a great
boon to those worshippers whom delicacy of health might otherwise have
kept at home. For, of course, there was then no better means of warming a
church.
'The house of another London relative was in Lombard Street, looking on
to Old Change Alley, and there, likewise, I was a pet. A store of books
filled one of the rooms, and it was my delight, having already learned to
read, to pick out diverting volumes. There were accounts of the travels
of Captain Cook and other explorers, and these quite caught my fancy. I
felt I should like to travel, when I grew up, and this glimmering idea
was advanced by the contemplation of a fruit stall that did business in
Change Alley. I marvelled from whence came the oranges and bananas, and I
whispered to myself, "I'll go where they grow."
Some afternoon, Sir George journeyed down to Lombard Street, in order to
revisit his ancient shrine. He returned triumphant with the news, 'Would
you believe it? I have found many of those old books just where they
were, so very long ago. Dear me! the discovery almost took my breath
away, and a sort of lump was in my throat.' And the orange stall? Aye,
even it lingered; at least there was still a stall in Change Alley.
London had not rolled over it.
The romance of war descended to Sir George Grey on his mother's side, as
well as from his father. She was daughter to a military officer, whose
exploit at the siege of Gibraltar she recited to her boy. It was that of
a derring-do soldier.
He happened to be on leave, from his duties at the fortress, when the
famous siege began. He hurried to the neighbourhood, laid hold of a
boat, and actually rowed through the Spanish fleet. The British garrison
gave him a tremendous reception, and the officers marked his feat by the
gift of a gold snuff-box. He was thrice welcome: for himself, for the
coolness with which he had broken the blockade, and for the news he
brought from the outside.
The precious snuff-box descended to Sir George Grey, an heirloom that
suggested an adventure of his own. He was sent to a school at Guildford
in Surrey, and he ran away from it. He found the teaching all towards the
classics, making for Oxford or Cambridge, and afterwards for a learned
profession. His real nature, as modelled chiefly by his mother, was in
the direction of public service, with, he hoped, some stir in it. The
escape from the school he always related, as if the pages of Robert Louis
Stevenson were open in his hand at the flight of Alan Breck among the
heather.
'I was determined to get home and tell my folks what I wanted to do.
Moreover, the walled playgrounds, the being shut in from nature, the
walking in line at exercise--these things were insupportable to me. It
was like keeping a boy's spirit and imagination in prison, instead of
allowing them free communion with the world around. Farther, I was angry
at boys having been put over me, for their knowledge of classics, who
were perfectly ignorant of the higher branches of knowledge at which I
had been working. "Clever but idle" was usually the character I got at
school. They didn't understand me, for I studied one subject while they
wanted to test me by others.
'Well, accompanied by a boy friend, I climbed over the wall of the school
at Guildford, and made for home. My step-father's place was at Bodiam,
about twelve miles from Hastings, and between Bodiam and my London
relatives I had lived before going to Guildford. But at this time, if my
memory does not mislead me, the family were at Eastbourne. In that case
my destination would have been Eastbourne, and I know the route taken was
by Brighton. We had left as darkness was falling, and I'm afraid we
hadn't much money for the journey. That scarcely mattered, however, since
we were walking, therefore having no outlay unless for food. We slept a
night under the cliffs at Brighton, and I don't doubt we slept very
soundly. Boys do, anywhere. People were kind to us, and when asked, we
made no secret of the fact that we were fleeing from school.
'It had been arranged, between my companion and myself, that I should
take him into our house. At Eastbourne, which we reached sorely tired,
our insurgent spirits somewhat calmed, we had quite a lively reception.
There appeared to be, on the part of the younger members of the family, a
fear lest we should be instantly executed. Nothing so dreadful happened.
The other boy was put into communication with his friends, and I had a
long holiday. By and by, under the charge of a friend, I returned to
Guildford to make explanation and excuse. That done, I went visiting more
relations at Cheltenham--I had a lot altogether, you see!--and there I
was brought under the influence of Whately, later the renowned Archbishop
of Dublin.'
The boyish spirit kept alive in Sir George, and in that respect he had a
surpassing encounter. He spent holiday hours in the Natural History
Museum at South Kensington, near which he resided after leaving St.
James's. There was hardly an animal, or bird, that he could not instruct
you upon; but his delight was to watch the streams of happy visitors. As
he sat thus of an afternoon, half a dozen boys gathered round a specimen
from animal-land placed near by.
Boys have few doubts, but these lads had theirs as to the identity of the
beast. They noticed Sir George, and a delegate approached him with the
request, 'Please, sir, can you tell us the name of this creature?' He
turned in the direction indicated, and found, strangely enough, that the
specimen was one which he had sent home from the far south, during his
naturalist's work there. He named it, and the lad followed up, 'Where did
it come from?'; getting the answer.
Next, 'Who killed it?' A pucker gathered upon Sir George's face, and he
hesitated, arguing with himself, 'If I tell them, they'll think me an
impostor, and even discount the information I have given them.'
But the inquisitor waited, and Sir George could do no better than
'Frankly, you know, I believe I killed it myself.'
'Here, you fellows!' the merry voice rang out; 'he says he killed the
beast! Did you ever?'
The other boys left the animal to stare at what they felt to be a greater
curiosity.
'Oh, yes,' Sir George addressed them, as they formed a half-circle before
him, 'what I have told you is quite true. But if you will listen, I'll
relate the whole story, and then you can decide for yourselves.'
He began the tale, the amused incredulity of the boys quickly vanished,
and he never had a more attentive audience. When he had finished, his
auditors raised their hats and caps with a hearty and convinced 'Thank
you, sir.'
He gravely saluted them, as was his custom towards young and old, high
and low, and then he fell a-dreaming. He was out walking in the pleasant
English woods with Whately, learning from him the manner in which the
ancient Britons lived, and how they dug for pig-nuts; or Whately rubbed
dry sticks against each other, the primeval manner of making fire. More,
he concentrated, with a glass, the rays of the sun upon a handful of dry
twigs, which at the bidding went ablaze. Still another picture!
'While I was at Cheltenham, Whately was courting a connexion of mine, who
later became his wife. She put me through my tasks, and Whately would
help her in that, I sitting between them. Did ever a boy at his lessons
occupy a seat of such influence? I suppose I could have commanded my own
terms in reference to them, and perhaps I did. They were most pleasant
for all concerned. My education altogether, as a boy, was not very
systematic, but it was broad and useful.'
Finally to Sandhurst, where Sir George did so well that the authorities
had quite a special word for him; and where one of the teachers, a
Scotsman, gave him Bacon to read.
With his military studies he combined others, working even to elucidate
the Surrey remains of the Romans, whose glamour as rulers hit him.
IV SAXON AND CELT
Ireland, which has sent so many of her own sons across the sea, was to
exercise a real influence upon the going of Sir George Grey.
He was, perhaps, in a special degree, kindly of thought and act towards
Irishmen, fancying that as a race they had suffered, and liking their
humour, buoyant against all odds. Several Irish political prisoners were
released, after serving long sentences, and Sir George read an account,
given by one of them, of the gaol experiences. Herein, complaint was
made--of the distress caused by the flash-flash of the turn-key's
lantern, into the cells, all through the night. He went his rounds, and
as he came to a cell door he flared his lantern inward by its little
opening, making sure of the inmate. It was to the mind and nerves, what a
red-hot wire would have been, driven into the body.
Next morning Sir George said, 'I could not sleep for thinking of that
light, jab-jabbing the poor fellow in his cell. Nay, it appeared to be in
my own bedroom, searching for my face and challenging me, "Are you there?
Ha, ha, are you there?" What an eerie torture, to a slumbering soul, in
that recurrent flame from the prison darkness! The thing stings and
shocks me.'
It gnawed. His heart was full, and perhaps also his mind with the idea,
'Is it ours to impale the soul as well as the body of a fellow-creature?
Surely that is reserved for a higher tribunal!'
The up-come of Ireland would provoke a story affecting Sir George Grey in
a family sense. An ancestor, Ram by name, of his step-father had figured
in a somewhat sudden meeting with Dean Swift. This was Sir George's
telling of it:
Dean Swift, in a modest phaeton, happened to be jogging past Gorey, the
residence of Ram. At that moment, out of the gate drove the more imposing
carriage of the latter, and there was a collision. The Dean and his
phaeton were thrown into the ditch, but neither, by good luck, suffered
hurt. Instead of uttering words, which even the cloth might not have
suppressed in some, the witty Dean shot these lines at Ram's apologetic
confusion:
Here's Ireland's pride and England's glory
Upset by the great Ram of Gorey.
The Ireland, to which Sir George's military duties introduced him, might
have driven laughter from all but Irishmen. Turmoil and discontent
gripped the land; naked want was among the people.
The green island smiled winsomely in the Atlantic, only to belie itself
as an abode of happiness. Its plaintive atmosphere wisped round Sir
George Grey, as a mist enwraps two walkers on a Scottish hill-side,
sending them silent. He was young, sensitive, sympathetic, and
environment moulded him, as already it had done in the larger island,
also with its suffering masses. Sir George had extracts of memory which
afforded a vivid idea of Ireland in the early Thirties.
'I was'--he picked out this incident--'a guest at a dinner where I heard
the toast "The Protestant King and confusion to Roman Catholicism." Just
reflect on what that meant! Think of the injustice, the intolerance, the
lack of ordinary human feeling thus put into a sentiment! A Roman
Catholic gentleman was present, and, knowing what was coming, he good-
naturedly rose and left the room, observing that he would join the
ladies. Yes, that was an Irish gentleman!
'Again, my heart was wrung at what I witnessed, while in command of a
party of soldiers, under orders to protect a tithe-collecting expedition.
To me it appeared wrong, shameful, un-Christian, that money for a Church
which preached the love of God and His Son towards mankind, should be
wrung from the people by armed soldiers. More, it seemed to me nothing
less than blasphemy, a mockery of all true religion, and I thought it
terrible to have to bear a part in the business.'
Yet, as ever among Celts, these shadows had edges of the lightsome. The
tithe-gatherers would be out to distrain in a particular parish, and find
loads of the humble chattels, which they meant to seize, already carted
over the boundary into the next parish. That, Sir George explained, was a
familiar trick to play upon the tithe-gatherer, who could not budge
beyond the phrasing of his warrant. It was a beating of the parish
bounds, such as he could not always be prepared for. The peasants would
stand in sanctuary, with quick, mocking tongues, pointing the finger of
scorn. It was trying work for the soldiers of the people, since they had
to forget that relationship.
On such an affair Sir George, then a subaltern, made a report to his
commanding officer, and it went wider than routine. He offered a frank
account of the events attending the tithe-collecting, including the
attitude of the peasantry, and the lessons that occurred to himself.
These, the commanding officer did not desire, and he returned the report
to the writer, desiring it to be made formal. 'Sir,' was the subaltern's
reply, 'I have stated just what happened, and I should wish, with your
permission, to abide by my report.' He awaited results with a mixed
interest, but the farther history of that temerarious despatch he never
learned. It may, or may not, have reached all concerned.
Of the Irish race Sir George conceived the warmest opinion, holding them
to be the owners of many virtues. Especially they were brotherly of
nature, truly generous of heart, and chivalrous of action. He had one
proof of the last quality in a curious falling-in with some Mayo
smugglers. What better evidence of the innate chivalry of a race, than to
find them instinctively expect it in a stranger?
'There were,' he narrated, 'very stringent regulations in Ireland, in
regard to the illicit distilling of spirits. It was another disagreeable
duty for soldiers that they had to accompany revenue officers in the
search for stills. Now, I was very fond of shooting, and when the
opportunity arose I would start off with my gun. The country folk might
always be applied to for information as to the spots most likely to
furnish a shot. They were perfect hosts to the Saxon as an individual,
though otherwise to the Saxon engine of government.
'Being abroad one day with my gun, I noticed a group of peasants at work
in a field. Anxious for their counsel towards a bag, I jumped the wall
into the field where they were. What was my astonishment to discover that
I was in the midst of an illicit still! You can imagine my position! I,
an officer holding the King's commission, had, as a private person,
become aware of an offence against the law. My worry was so keen, over
the awkward relationship in which I stood towards the party, that I
expressed it.
'"It is," I said, "frequently my duty to protect preventive men, and if
that duty were ever to bring me this way, you would feel that I had
informed upon you." "No, no," was the answer in chorus, "you only protect
the excise men, that forming part of your duty; you are not an informer
but a protector, and we know you won't tell." They were good enough to
emphasise this vote of confidence with an invitation that I should try
their poteen. Naturally I declined, but in a manner, I hope, calculated
not to wound their feelings.'