SEEING AND HEARING
SEEING
AND HEARING
BY
GEORGE W. E. RUSSELL
AUTHOR OF "COLLECTIONS AND RECOLLECTIONS," ETC.
LONDON
E. GRANT RICHARDS
1907
TO
WALTER SYDNEY SICHEL
1868-1907
"_Ay, there are some good things in life, that fall not away with
the rest,_
_And of all best things upon earth, I hold that a faithful friend is
the best._"
--OWEN MEREDITH.
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
I. THE CORONATION 1
II. SECRET SOCIETIES 10
III. THE IRISH PEERAGE 17
IV. OMITTED SILHOUETTES 25
V. DOCTORS AND DOCTORING 31
VI. MOURNING 39
VII. WILLS 46
VIII. PENSIONS 54
IX. THE SEASON AS IT WAS 62
X. THE SEASON AS IT IS 69
XI. THE SINS OF SOCIETY 76
XII. OXFORD 83
XIII. SCHOOLS FOR SHEPHERDS 90
XIV. PILGRIMAGES 97
XV. THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS 105
XVI. SCHOOLS AND BOARDING-HOUSES 113
XVII. SQUARES 121
XVIII. SUNDAY IN LONDON 128
XIX. A SUBURBAN SUNDAY 135
XX. WINE AND WATER 143
XXI. DINNER 151
XXII. DINNERS 158
XXIII. LUNCHEON 166
XXIV. TEA 174
XXV. SUPPER 182
XXVI. INNS AND HOTELS 190
XXVII. TRAVEL 198
XXVIII. ACCOMPLISHMENTS 207
XXIX. CIDER 214
XXX. THE GARTER 221
XXXI. SHERIFFS 229
XXXII. PUBLISHERS 237
XXXIII. HANDWRITING 245
XXXIV. AUTOGRAPHS 252
XXXV. MORE AUTOGRAPHS 259
XXXVI. CHRISTMAS 266
XXXVII. NEW YEAR'S DAY 274
XXXVIII. PETS 283
XXXIX. PURPLE AND FINE LINEN 289
XL. PRELACY AND PALACES 297
XLI. HORRORS 304
XLII. SOCIAL CHANGES 312
XLIII. SOCIAL GRACES 319
XLIV. PUBLICITY _v._ RETICENCE 326
XLV. TOWN _v._ COUNTRY 333
XLVI. HOME 341
XLVII. HOSPITALITY 348
XLVIII. OSTENTATION 354
XLIX. PRINCIPLE AND PREJUDICE 360
L. CULTURE 367
LI. RELIGION 374
LII. SUPERSTITION 381
LIII. THE REMNANT 388
I
THE CORONATION
And so the great Act draws near--the "high midsummer pomp" of
Patriotism and Regality and Religion--the "one far-off divine event" to
which the whole social creation has moved since the day was appointed
and the preparations began. A thousand pens will picture the Coronation
as it actually occurs. Writing in advance, I can only contemplate it as
a magnificent ideal, and describe it as it strikes not the eye and ear
but the heart, the imagination, and the historic sense.
First and foremost and above all else, the Coronation is a religious
act. It is imbedded in the very heart of the great Christian service of
the Holy Eucharist. Litany and Introit and Gospel and Creed lead up to
it, and it in turn leads on to _Te Deum_ and Offertory and Consecration
and Communion. But though (or perhaps because) it is thus supremely
and conspicuously religious, the Coronation is national and secular
and historical as well. Other nations do not crown their Sovereigns.
Some have no crowns to give, and others are in doubt about the
rightful recipients; in some, revolutions have shattered the immemorial
landmarks, or the sharp sword of civil war has severed the sacred
thread of succession, or the State itself is a mushroom growth of
yesterday, with no roots and fibres striking deep down to the bedrock
of the national life.
But here in England we crown our kings as we have crowned them for
a thousand years, and our act of crowning is the august symbol of a
nation's story and a people's will. For before ever the ministers of
God approach the altar, before the sacred emblems of sovereignty are
hallowed, before the Christian's Mysteries begin, before the Eternal
Spirit is invoked and the consecrating unction bestowed, the English
people plays its part, and, through the mouth of its chief citizen
asserts its fundamental place in the system of the Kingly Commonwealth.
"Sirs, I here present unto you King Edward, the undoubted King of this
realm; wherefore all you who are come this day to do your homage, are
you willing to do the same?" And, as the King stands up and turns and
shows himself four times to the assembled freemen, they "signify their
willingness and joy by loud and repeated acclamations, all with one
voice crying out, 'God Save King Edward.'"
And here I borrow from one[1] who touches as no other living man can
touch these dramatic solemnities of our national life (for I know he
will consent to the borrowing), and I say that this is as noble as it
is intelligible. "It embodies the splendid liberty with which a free
people asserts its claim to have nothing imposed upon it in the dark,
no tyrannous rule set over it which it has not measured and considered
and acknowledged in the open light of Heaven." And then the whole great
company falls to prayer, and the Archbishop, who has hitherto played
his part as the first citizen of England and the greatest subject of
the Crown, takes up a still higher function, and goes up, vested to
the altar and begins the Service of the Eucharist, and, as a priest,
invokes the supreme sanction of the Eternal. And then the majestic
course of the rite is broken off in the very centre, and, with every
act and feature and ceremony which can most forcibly express the
solemnity of the transaction, the Archbishop demands of the King, in
the face of God and the Church and the people, whether he will promise
to rule England in due obedience to law and with sacred regard to
Justice, Mercy, and Religion. And the King gives his promise, and,
kneeling at the altar, confirms it with an oath upon the Holy Gospel.
[1] H. S. Holland, D.D.
"This free intercourse that passes between Ruler and Ruled is no
child's play, no mere pretty ceremonial; it is the act of men in solemn
earnest pledging their troth the one to the other. The act is broad
and deep and strong as the national life. It embodies the experience of
centuries. It has in it the stern breath of conflict and the anxious
determinations of secured peace. The Great Charter is behind it, and
the memories of Runnymede and Whitehall. It seals a concentrated
purpose. King and people look each other in the face, and speak their
minds out and give their word." And then, and not till then, the
Archbishop will go forward with his hallowing office and perform the
symbolic acts, and pronounce the benediction of the Highest upon the
covenant between King and Commonwealth. He anoints with the sacred
unction and girds with the kingly sword. He delivers the sceptre of
empire and the emblematic orb which, "set under the Cross," reminds the
King "that the whole world is subject to the power and empire of Christ
our Redeemer." And then the crown, of pure gold enriched with gems each
one of which is a history, is set upon the Sovereign's head, and the
Archbishop blesses and the onlookers acclaim.
"Blow, trumpets; all your exultations blow!"
as King Edward VII. takes his seat on the throne of the Confessor and
the Conqueror, of the Plantagenets and the Tudors, and receives by the
mouth of all that is greatest in Church and State the proud homage of a
self-governing people.
And then, once again, the splendid trappings of sovereignty are laid
aside, and the King, uncrowned, kneels down like the lowliest son of
Adam before the Mercy-seat of the Christian covenant, and the great
action of the Eucharist is resumed, and the memories of the Upper
Chamber at Jerusalem are renewed at the altar of Westminster. The Word
is spoken and the Deed is done. A great cloud of prayer and aspiration
and intercession floats up from the vast concourse of assembled
worshippers; and, in the midst of them, the crowned and anointed King,
kneeling by her who must aid him to bear his burden, seeks through the
Divinely-appointed Medium supernatural strength for a more than human
task. From a full heart and with the solemnest intent a united nation
says, "God save King Edward."
* * * * *
The scene is changed from Westminster Abbey to a dining-room in
Belgravia, and the date from Saturday, 9th August, to Sunday, 3rd.
Thirty guests, male and female, are gathered round a too-bountiful
board; and, amidst the rich fumes of mayonnaise and quails and
whitebait and champagne-cup, there rise the mingled voices of the great
"Coronation Chorus."
_Enthusiastic Young Lady._ "I can think of nothing but the Coronation.
Where are you going to see it from?"
_Facetious Young Man._ "Oh! from Hurlingham. That's quite near enough.
The whole thing is such a frightful bore. You know what they say London
is just now. All Board and no Lodging."
_New Peeress._ "I really envy the duchesses. They have such good places
in the front row. I shall be poked away under the gallery quite at the
back. I don't believe I shall see a thing. But, after all, one will be
able to say one has been there."
_Facetious Young Man._ "Oh! you could say that anyhow. It's not good
enough to get up at four in the morning for the sake of saying that.
Charley FitzBattleaxe thinks just the same as I do about it, but of
course, as he's a peer, he's bound to go. He's a bad hand at getting up
early, so he's going to sit up playing bridge all night, and then have
his bath and go straight to the show."
_Stout Peeress._ "Our creation is rather old, so I have got a very good
place, but the chairs are too dreadful. Such stiff backs, and only nine
inches to sit on, and horrid wicker seats which will make marks on our
velvet."
_Thrifty Peeress._ "Well, I really don't know where I shall have my
luncheon. It seems monstrous to have to pay two guineas at the House
of Lords for a sandwich and a glass of claret. The Watermans in Dean's
Yard have most kindly asked me to go to luncheon with them, and it
would be an immense saving. But they are strict teetotallers, and I
feel that, after all those hours in the Abbey, I shall want something
more supporting than lemonade. So I am rather divided. I dread the idea
of a teetotal luncheon, but two guineas for a glass of claret and a
sandwich is rather much."
_Nervous Peeress._ "I am so terrified of being faint in the Abbey. I
am going to take chocolate and meat lozenges in my coronet, and some
brandy and water in my smelling-bottle."
_Chorus_ (confusedly). "Oh no, port wine is the thing. No--rum and
milk. My doctor says whisky. Whisky? Oh no; sal volatile is much the
best, and Plasmon biscuits. Not sandwiches--I hate sandwiches. Cold
chicken. But can we eat in church? Isn't it rather odd? Oh, the Abbey
isn't exactly a church, you know. Isn't it? I should have thought it
was. Well--no--our Vicar tells me that it was never consecrated. How
very curious! At least it was only consecrated by the Angels, not by
the Bishop. Well, of course that makes a difference. Still, I don't
like the idea of eating and drinking in it. So I shall have some pâté
de foie gras and champagne in the carriage, and eat till the very
moment I get to the Abbey, and begin again the very moment I get out."
_Lively Young Lady._ "I'm not afraid of being faint--only of being
bored in that long wait. I shall take something to read while mamma is
stuffing herself with her sandwiches."
_Facetious Young Man._ "What a good idea! Shall you take _Modern
Society_ or the _Pink 'Un_?"
_Grave Young Lady_ (intervening). "Neither, I hope. People seem to
forget that after all it is a religious service. If one must read,
I think 'John Inglesant' or one of Miss Yonge's books would be more
suitable than a newspaper."
_Lively Young Lady._ "Well, really, it is so difficult to think of it
as a religious service. It seems to me more like a play. I saw one
of the rehearsals, and certainly it was as funny as a pantomime. But
still, of course, one wouldn't wish to do anything that was unsuitable;
so I think I shall take a 'Guide-book to the Abbey' and learn all the
history while we are waiting. One hears so much about it just now, and
it seems stupid not to know. I never can remember whether St. Edward
was Edward the Confessor or Edward the Sixth. Do you know?"
_Facetious Young Man._ "Oh, ask me an easier one. Those old jossers
were all pretty much of a muchness. I tell you I'm not taking any. The
whole thing is utterly out of date. Why couldn't he write his name in a
book, or send a crier round with a bell to say he's come to the throne?"
_The Host._ "My dear Freddy Du Cane, I don't agree with you the least.
I am bound to say quite honestly that all my life I have hoped that
I might live to see a Coronation, and I am honestly thankful that I
have got a place. It is all the things that interest me most rolled
into one--Pageant and History and Patriotism and a great Religious
Ceremony. I am a Liberal; therefore I like the Recognition and the
Oath. I am a Ritualist; therefore I like the vestments and the Unction
and the oblation of the Golden Pall. Above all I am an Englishman,
and I like to see my Sovereign take up the duties of sovereignty at
the altar of 'that Royal and National sanctuary which has for so many
centuries enshrined the varied memories of his august ancestors and the
manifold glories of his free and famous kingdom.' Those words are Dean
Stanley's. Do you know his account of the Coronation in his 'Memorials
of Westminster Abbey'? If you will let me, I will show it to you after
luncheon. People ought at least to know what the service is before they
presume to make stupid jokes about it."
CURTAIN.
II
SECRET SOCIETIES
When Lord Scamperdale was angry with Mr. Sponge for riding over his
hounds he called him "a perpendicular Puseyite pig-jobber"; and the
alliteration was felt to emphasize the rebuke. If any Home Ruler is
irritated by Sir Robert Anderson he may relieve his feelings by calling
him a "preaching political policeman," and each word in the title
will be true to life. Sir Robert combines in his single person the
characters of barrister, detective, and theologian. He began life at
the Irish Bar, was for many years head of the Criminal Investigation
Department in London, then became Assistant Commissioner of Police, and
all the while gave what leisure he could spare from tracking dynamiters
and intercepting burglars to the composition of such works as "The
Gospel and its Ministry," "A Handbook of Evangelical Truth," and
"Daniel in the Critic's Den."
A career so diversified was sure to produce some interesting
reminiscences, and the book[2] which Sir Robert has just published
is as full of mystery and adventure, violence and strategy, plot and
counterplot, as the romances which thrilled our youth. In those days
some boys thought soldiering the one life worth living; some, in fancy,
ran away to sea. Some loved tales of Piracy, and were peculiarly at
home in a Smugglers' Cave. Others snatched a fearful joy from ghosts
and bogies. Others enjoyed Brazilian forests and African jungles,
hand-to-hand encounters with gorillas and hair-breadth 'scapes from
watchful tigers. The present writer thought nothing so delightful
as Secret Societies, and would have given his little all to know a
password, a sign, or a secret code. Perhaps this idiosyncrasy was
due to the fact that in the mid 'sixties every paper teemed with
allusions to Fenianism, just then a very active force in the political
world; and to Smith Minus, in the Fourth Form at Harrow, there was
something unspeakably attractive in the thought of being a "Head
Centre," a "Director," or an "Executive Officer of the Irish Republican
Brotherhood," or even in the paler glory of writing the mystic letters
"F.B." or "C.O." after his undistinguished name. It is in his account
of the earlier days of Fenianism that Sir Robert Anderson is so
intensely interesting. He traces it, from its origin in the abortive
rebellion of 1848 and that "Battle of Limerick" which Thackeray sang,
to its formal inauguration in 1860, and its subsequent activities at
home and abroad; and the narrative begins, quite thrillingly, with the
biography of the famous spy Henri le Caron, who played so striking a
part before the Commission on Parnellism and Crime. Those who wish to
learn these incidents in our recent history, or as much of them as at
present can properly be disclosed, must read Sir Robert's book for
themselves. I will not attempt even to epitomize it; and, indeed, I
only mention it because of the "sidelights" which it throws, not on
Home Rule, but on the part which Secret Societies have played in the
fortunes of Modern Europe.
[2] "Sidelights on the Home Rule Movement." By Sir Robert Anderson,
K.C.B., LL.D.
As far as I know, the only Englishman--if Englishman he could properly
be called--who regarded the Secret Societies as formidable realities
was Lord Beaconsfield. As long ago as 1844--long before he had official
experience to guide him--he wrote, with regard to his favourite Sidonia
(in drawing whom he drew himself):--
"The catalogue of his acquaintance in the shape of Greeks, Armenians,
Moors, Secret Jews, Tartars, Gipsies, wandering Poles, and Carbonari
would throw a curious light on those subterranean agencies of which
the world in general knows so little, but which exercise so great an
influence on public events."
Those were the days when Disraeli, a genius whom no one treated
seriously, was uttering his inmost thoughts through the medium of
romances to which fancy contributed at least as much as fact. Then
came twenty years of constant activity in politics--that pursuit which,
as Bacon says, is of all pursuits "the most immersed in matter,"--and,
when next he took up the novelist's pen, he was a much older and more
experienced, though he would scarcely be a wiser, man. In 1870 he
startled the world with "Lothair"; and those who had the hardihood
to fight their way through all the fashionable flummery with which
the book begins found in the second and third volumes a profoundly
interesting contribution to the history of Europe between 1848 and
1868. One of the characters says that "the only strong things in Europe
are the Church and the Secret Societies"; and the book is a vivid
narrative of the struggle for life and death between the Temporal Power
of the Papacy and the insurrectionary movements inspired by Garibaldi.
Every chapter of the book contains a portrait, and every incident is
drawn from something which had come under the author's notice between
1866 and 1869, when he was the leading personage in the Tory Government
and the Fenians were making open and secret war on English rule. He
was describing the men whom he knew and the things which he had seen,
and this fact makes the book so extraordinarily vivid, and won for
it Froude's enthusiastic praise. Every one could recognize Capel and
Manning and Antonelli and Lord Bute, and all their diplomatic and
fashionable allies; it required some knowledge of the insurrectionary
movements to see in "Captain Bruges" a portrait of General Cluseret,
commander-in-chief of every insurgent army in Europe or America, or in
Theodora the noble character of Jessie White-Mario, whose career of
romantic devotion to the cause of Freedom closed only in this year.[3]
[3] 1906.
"Madre Natura" in Italy, Fenianism in America and England, the "Mary
Anne" Societies of France, and the mysterious alliance between all
these subterranean forces, are the themes of "Lothair," and the
State trials of the time throw a good deal of light upon them all.
Even more mysterious, much harder to trace, and infinitely more
enduring were the operations of the Carbonari--- beginning with a
handful of charcoal-burners in the forests of Northern Italy, and
spreading thence, always by woodland ways, to the centre and north of
Europe. They promoted the French revolutions of 1830 and 1848. Even
Louis Napoleon allied himself with them in his earlier machinations
against Louis Philippe and the Republic; and in the Franco-German
War of 1870 they rendered incalculable service to the German troops
by guiding them through the fastnesses of the Ardennes. It is one
of the characteristics of the Secret Societies that they attack the
established order, without, apparently, caring much what that order
represents. Their generals fought against England in Canada and in
Ireland; against the Northern States in America; against Russia in the
Danubian Principalities. It is not to be supposed that in 1870 the
Carbonari had much sympathy with the military absolutism of Prussia;
but Prussia was attacking the French Empire, and that was enough for
the Carbonari.
Of course, as a general rule, the Secret Societies of the Continent
were anti-monarchical and anti-Christian; but he who loves these
mysterious combinations can find plenty to interest him in the history
of organizations which were neither Republican nor Atheistic. Nothing
could be more devotedly monarchical and orthodox than the "Cycle
of the White Rose." This Society, profoundly "secret," was founded
about the year 1727. It had for its object to unite all the Cavalier
and Nonjuring families of North Wales and Cheshire, with a view to
concerted action when next the exiled Stuarts should claim their own.
The headquarters were always at Wynnstay, and the Lady of Wynnstay was
always Patroness. The badge was a White Rose in enamel, and the list
of members was printed in a circle, so that if it should fall into
the hands of Government no one should appear as ringleader or chief.
The Cycle was for some fifty years a real and definite organization
for political ends; but, as years went on and the hopes of the
Jacobites perished, the Cycle degenerated into a mere dining-club,
and it expired in 1850. Its last member was, I believe, the Rev. Sir
Theophilus Puleston, who lived to see the second Jubilee of Queen
Victoria; and the last Lady Patroness died in 1905.
Another Secret Society which once meant practical mischief of no
common kind was that of the Orangemen. Though Orangemen are nowadays
vociferously loyal, their forerunners are grossly misrepresented if it
is not true that, under the Grand-mastership of the Duke of Cumberland,
afterwards King Ernest of Hanover, they organized a treasonable
conspiracy to prevent Queen Victoria from succeeding to the Throne of
her ancestors and to put her uncle in her place. For sidelights on this
rather dark passage of modern history the curious reader is referred to
"Tales of my Father," by "A. M. F.," and to a sensational rendering of
the same story, called "God Save the Queen."
My space is failing, and I must forbear to enlarge on the most familiar
and least terrifying of all "Secret Societies." I hold no brief for the
"Grand Orient of France," even though Pius IX. may once have belonged
to this or a similar organization; but I must profess that English
Freemasons are the most respectable, most jovial, and most benevolent
of mankind; and I trust that they will accept in its true intention
Cardinal Manning's ambiguously worded defence of their craft, "English
Freemasonry is a Goose Club."
III
THE IRISH PEERAGE
Dryasdust is proverbially a bore, and his forms are Protean. Thus there
are the Jacobite Dryasdusts, who affirm that Queen Victoria had no
higher dignity than that of Dowager Princess Albert of Saxe-Coburg,
and deny that any act of sovereignty transacted in this country
has been valid since that dark morning when James II., making the
best of his way to the Old Kent Road, dropped the Great Seal into
the Thames. Then there are the Constitutional Dryasdusts, who deny
the existence of a Cabinet or a Prime Minister, and insist that the
Privy Council is the only Ministerial body known to the law; and the
Ecclesiastical Dryasdusts, who affirm that the Church of England is
really free because the bishops are freely elected by the Chapters of
their respective Cathedrals, acting under licence from a Sovereign
who, having been anointed, is a _Persona Mixta_--part layman, part
ecclesiastic. At the height of the South African War I chanced to meet
an Heraldic Dryasdust, who moaned like a mandrake over the announcement
that the Duke of Norfolk had just set out, with his Yeomanry, for
the scene of action. "You mean," I said, "that a valuable life is
needlessly imperilled?" "Not at all," replied Dryasdust, with a face
as long as a fiddle-case. "A far more important consideration than the
Duke's life is involved. As Earl-Marshal he is supreme commander of
the forces of the Crown when engaged in actual warfare, and the moment
he sets his foot on African soil Lord Roberts becomes subject to his
command. There is no way out of that constitutional necessity, and I
regard the outlook as very serious." And so indeed it would have been,
had Dryasdust been right.
I am led to this train of reflections by the fact that an eminent
genealogist has lately tried to frighten the readers of a Sunday
paper by broaching the theory that all the Acts of Parliament passed
within the last twenty years may have been invalid. He does not commit
himself to the statement that they are invalid, but he insists that
they may be, and he grounds his contention on a clause of the Act of
Union. Concerning this clause he says, following Sir William Anson,
that it requires that "the number of Irish peers, not entitled by
the possession of other peerages to an hereditary seat in the House
of Lords of the United Kingdom, shall never fall below one hundred."
Now it seems that during the last twenty years the number has fallen
below a hundred; therefore the House of Lords has not been properly
constituted, and therefore its part in legislation has been null and
void. It is a startling theory, and like most startling theories, will
probably turn out to be nonsense; but the history of the Irish Peerage,
apart from any consequences which may be deduced from it, is full of
interest, and not wholly free from scandal. The Irish peerage, as it
stands to-day, comprises 175 members; of these, 28 sit in the House of
Lords as Representative Peers, elected for life by their brethren; 82
sit there because they hold English as well as Irish peerages; and the
remainder, being merely Irish peers and not Representatives, do not
sit in the House of Lords, but are eligible for the House of Commons.
In this respect their state is more gracious than that of the Scotch
peers, who cannot be elected to the House of Commons, and therefore,
unless they can get themselves chosen to be Representative Peers of
Scotland, are excluded from Parliament for ever. Still, though a seat
in the House of Lords is a desirable possession, a mere title has its
charms.
It used to be said that when Mr. Smith the banker, who lived in
Whitehall, asked George III. for the _entrée_ of the Horse Guards, the
King replied, "I can't do that; but I wish to make you an Irish Peer."
However, the true version of the story seems to be that which is given
in the "Life of the Marquis of Granby."
"In 1787 the owner of Rutland House desired to increase the private
_entrée_ into Hyde Park to the dimensions of a carriage entrance,
and asked Charles, fourth Duke of Rutland, to support the necessary
application to the King. The Duke, who was then Viceroy of Ireland,
replied, 'You will let me know whether ye application is to be made to
Lord Orford, who is ye Ranger of ye Park, or to ye King himself: in ye
latter case I would write to Lord Sydney att ye same time; if it be
to the King a greater object might be easier accomplished than this
trifle, as I know he is very particular about his Parks; at least he is
so about St. James Park, for he made a man an Irish Peer to keep him
in Good Humour for having refused him permission to drive his carriage
through ye Horse Guards.'"
Lord Palmerston, himself an Irish peer, used to say that an Irish
peerage was the most convenient of all dignities, as it secured
its owner social precedence while it left him free to pursue a
Parliamentary career. At the same time, greatly as he enjoyed his
position, Palmerston never would take the oaths or comply with
the legal formalities necessary to entitle him to vote for the
Irish Representative Peers; and the reason for this refusal was
characteristic alike of an adroit politician and of the unscrupulous
age in which he lived. An Irish peer who has proved his right to
vote for the Representative Peers, is eligible for election as a
Representative, and Palmerston feared that his political opponents,
wishing to get him out of the House of Commons into the comparative
obscurity and impotence of the House of Lords, would elect him a
Representative Peer in spite of himself, and so effectually terminate
his political activities. In the days immediately succeeding Palmerston
a conspicuous ornament of the Irish Peerage was the second Marquis
of Abercorn. He had no need to trouble himself about Representative
arrangements, for he sat in the House of Lords as a peer of Great
Britain, but his hereditary connexion with the North of Ireland,
his great estates there, and the political influence which they
gave him, made him, in a very real sense, an Irish peer. He was
Lord-Lieutenant from 1866 to 1868, and during his viceroyalty Disraeli
(who subsequently drew his portrait in "Lothair") conferred upon him
the rare honour of an Irish dukedom. It was rumoured that he wished, in
consideration of his 80,000 acres in Tyrone and Donegal, to become the
Duke of Ulster, but was reminded that Ulster was a Royal title, borne
already by the Duke of Edinburgh. Be that as it may, he stuck to his
Scotch title, and became Duke of Abercorn. Down to that time the Duke
of Leinster had been the sole Irish duke, and went by the nickname of
"Ireland's Only." To him, as an old friend, the newly created Duke of
Abercorn wrote a mock apology for having invaded his monopoly; but the
Duke of Leinster was equal to the occasion, and wrote back that he was
quite content to be henceforward the Premier Duke of Ireland. When,
six months later, Disraeli was driven out of office, he conferred an
Irish barony on a faithful supporter, Colonel M'Clintock, who was made
Lord Rathdonnell; and it was generally understood that, by arrangement
between the leaders on both sides, no more Irish peerages were to
be created. This understanding held good till Mr. George Curzon,
proceeding to India as Viceroy and contemplating a possible return to
Parliament when his term of office expired, persuaded Lord Salisbury to
make him Lord Curzon of Kedleston in the Peerage of Ireland.
But, after all, the Irish Peerage of to-day is to a great extent the
product of the Irish Union. "There is no crime recorded in history--I
do not except the Massacre of St. Bartholomew--which will compare for a
moment with the means by which the Union was carried." The student of
men and moods, having no clue to guide him, would probably attribute
this outburst to Mr. Gladstone at some period between his first and
second Home Rule Bills; and he would be right. For my own part, I can
scarcely follow the allusion to St. Bartholomew, but beyond doubt the
measures employed by the English Government in order to secure the
Union were both cruel and base. It is the baseness with which we are
just now concerned. In order to carry the Union it was necessary to
persuade the Irish Houses of Lords and Commons, and to capture the
whole machinery of bribery and terrorism which directed the Irish
Parliament. As that blameless publicist Sir T. Erskine May tranquilly
observes, "corrupt interests could only be overcome by corruption." The
policy of out-corrupting the corruptest was pursued with energy and
resolution. Each patron of Irish boroughs who was ready to part with
them received £7500 for each seat. Lord Downshire got £52,000 for seven
seats; Lord Ely £45,000 for six. The total amount paid in compensation
for the surrender of electoral powers was £1,260,000. In addition to
these pecuniary inducements, honours were lavishly distributed as
bribes. Five Irish peers were called to the House of Lords, twenty were
advanced a step in the peerage, and twenty-two new peers were created.
It would be invidious, and perhaps actionable, to attach proper names
to the amazing histories of Corruption by Title which are narrated in
the Private Correspondence of the Viceroy, Lord Cornwallis, and the
published Memoirs of Sir Jonah Barrington. Even that sound loyalist
Mr. Lecky was constrained to admit that "the majority of Irish titles
are historically connected with memories not of honour but of shame."
On the 22nd January 1799 one member of the Irish House of Commons took
his bribe in the brief interval between his speech for, and his vote
against a resolution affirming the right of the Irish nation to an
independent Legislature. Another aspirant to the peerage "made and sang
songs against the Union in 1799, and made and sang songs for it in
1800." He got his deserts. A third secured £30,000 for his surrendered
boroughs, a peerage for himself, and for his brother in Holy Orders an
archbishopric so wealthy that its fortunate owner became a peer, and
subsequently an earl, on his own account. The scandalous tale might
be indefinitely prolonged; but enough has been said to show why it is
difficult to shed tears when these strangely-engendered peerages sink
below the prescribed number of a hundred.
IV
OMITTED SILHOUETTES
Last year[4] I ventured to submit for public inspection a small
collection of Social Silhouettes. From time to time during the last few
months I have received several kind enquiries about Omitted Portraits.
For instance, there is the Undertaker. Perhaps a friend will write:
"Dickens made capital fun out of Mr. Mould and the 'Hollow _Elm_ Tree.'
Couldn't you try your hand at something of the same kind?" Another
writes, perhaps a little bluntly: "Why don't you give us the Barrister?
He must be an awfully easy type to do." A third says, with subtler
tact: "I feel that, since Thackeray left us, yours is the only pen
which can properly handle the Actor"--or the Painter, or the Singer,
or the Bellringer, or the Beadle, as the case may be. Now, to these
enquiries, conceived, as I know them all to be, in the friendliest
spirit, my answer varies a little, according to the type suggested.
With regard to the Barrister, I stated quite early in my series that I
did not propose to deal with him, because he had been drawn repeatedly
by the master-hands of fiction, and because the lapse of years had
wrought so little change in the type that Serjeant Snubbin, and
Fitz-Roy Timmins, and Sir Thomas Underwood, and Mr. Furnival, and Mr.
Chaffanbrass were portraits which needed no retouching. I must, indeed,
admit that the growth of hair upon the chin and upper lip is a marked
departure from type, and that a moustached K.C. is as abnormal a being
as a bearded woman or a three-headed nightingale; but the variation is
purely external, and the true inwardness of the Barrister remains what
it was when Dickens and Thackeray and Trollope drew him. So, again,
with regard to the Family Solicitor; as long as men can study the
methods of Mr. Tulkinghorn (of Lincoln's Inn Fields) and Mr. Putney
Giles (of the same learned quarter) they may leave Mr. Jerome K. Jerome
in undisturbed possession of his stage-lawyer, who "dresses in the
costume of the last generation but seven, never has any office of his
own, and (with the aid of a crimson bag) transacts all his business at
his clients' houses."
[4] 1906.
When I am asked why I do not describe the Painter, my reply is partly
the same. We have got Gaston Phoebus, and Clive Newcome, and Claude
Mellot, and the goodly company of Trilby, and we shall not easily
improve upon those portraits, whether highly finished or merely
sketched. But in this case I have another reason for reticence. I
know a good many painters, who about this time of year bid me to their
studios. I have experienced before now the delicate irritability of the
artistic genius, and I know that a reverential reticence is my safest
course. Conversely, my reason for not describing the Actor is that I
really do not know him well enough. An actor off the stage is about as
exhilarating an object as a theatre by daylight. The brilliancy and the
glamour have departed; the savour of sawdust and orange-peel remains.
Let us render all honour to the histrion when his foot is on his native
boards; but if we are wise we shall eschew in private life the society
of Mr. and Mrs. Vincent Crummles, nor open our door too widely to the
tribe of Costigan and Fotheringay.
The mention of that great actress's name (for did not Emily Costigan,
afterwards Lady Mirabel, figure as "Miss Fotheringay" on the provincial
stage?) reminds me that, according to some of my critics, women
played too rare and too secluded a part in my series of "Typical
Developments." It is only too true, and no one knows as well as the
author the amount of brilliancy and interest which has been forfeited
thereby. But really it is a sacred awe that has made me mute. Even
to-day, as I write, I am smarting under a rebuke recently administered
to me, at a public gathering, by an outraged matron. This lady belongs
to the political section of her tribe; holds man, poor man! in proper
contempt; and clamours on Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman's doorstep for
that suffrage which is to make her truly free. At present she esteems
herself little better than a Squaw, and has been heard to declare, in
moments of expansive eloquence, that she was not created to be the Toy
of Man--a declaration in which her hearers most heartily concurred.
Well, this stern guardian of her sex's rights recently took me to
task in a public place for the levity with which I had criticized a
gathering of political ladies, and my nerve has scarcely rallied from
the sudden onslaught. Had I been more myself I might even yet have
tried my unskilled hand at female portraiture. Perhaps, in the spirit
of that Cambridge professor who calls William II. "quite the nicest
Emperor I know," I might have begun in the most illustrious circles,
and have sketched the stone-laying and bazaar-opening activities of
Royal Princesses. Or, yielding precedence to the Church, I might
have discoursed of Episcopal ladies and have traced the influence
of a tradition received from the beatified Mrs. Proudie. "_We_ had
a very nice Ordination this Trinity," says one lady of this class.
"The Bishop and I were much disappointed by the poor response of the
laity to our appeal," wrote another. When in May 1899 the Archbishops
were playing at a Court for the trial of Ritualism, Episcopal ladies
sat knitting by the judgment-seat, and stared at the incriminated
clergymen, as the _tricoteuses_ of the French Revolution may have
stared at the victims of the guillotine, or as Miss Squeers peered
through the keyhole at the flagellation of Smike. Or again, on a
lowlier rung of the Ecclesiastical ladder, I might have drawn the
Parochial Worker--the woman of waterproof and gingham, the distributor
of tracts, the disciplinarian of the Sunday School, the presiding
spirit of Mothers' Meetings. At a General Election this type of lady
varies her activities--canvasses for the Conservative candidate, and
tells the gaping washerwomen that Mr. Lloyd-George wishes to convert
the Welsh cathedrals into music-halls for the Eisteddfod. Of all
Parochial Workers the highest type is the Deaconess; and not long ago,
in a parish with which I am conversant, the Deaconess and the Curate
used to do their parochial rounds on a double bicycle, to the infinite
amusement of the gutter-children and the serious perturbation of the
severely orthodox. There was a picture worthy of the pen and pencil of
Thackeray, but it faded all too soon into the blurred commonplace of
matrimony.
The Deaconess may be called the Marine of the Church's army, with one
foot on sea and one on shore--only half a Worldling, yet not quite
a Nun. With ladies of the last-named type, my acquaintance has been
prolonged and intimate. Of their excellence and devotion it would be
impertinent to speak; but I may say without offence that some of the
ablest, most agreeable, and most amusing women I have known I have
encountered in the Cloister. But, alas! even into the Cloister the
serpent of political guile will wend his sinuous way; nor could I,
though her friend, commend the action of Sister G---- M---- when, in
order to prevent a patient in a Convalescent Home from voting for a
Radical candidate, she kept his trousers under lock and key till the
poll was over.
"Old age," it has been bitterly said, "when it can no longer set a bad
example, gives good advice;" and when, as sometimes happens, I am asked
to hortate my younger fellow-citizens, one of my most emphatic lessons
is a Reverence for Womanhood, even in its least ideal aspects. This, I
declare to be an essential attribute of the ideal character--of that
manhood, at once beautiful and good, to which the philosophers have
taught us to aspire; and, lest I should seem to be violating my own
oft-repeated precept, I tear myself from a fascinating theme.
V
DOCTORS AND DOCTORING
Sydney Smith, who was fond of quacking his parishioners, and had a poor
opinion of "professional and graduated homicides," observes that "the
Sixth Commandment is suspended by one medical diploma from the North of
England to the South." Personally, I have experienced the attentions
of the Faculty north, south, east, and west, and I began in London.
In my first appearance on this planet I was personally conducted by
a smart gentleman, who came straight from a dinner-party, in a large
white cravat and turquoise studs. Those studs still exist, and have
descended, with the practice, to his grandson. May they beam on births
more propitious than my own.
My knowledge of the first act of life's drama is necessarily
traditional. But, as I approach the second, memory begins to operate. I
seem to remember a black silhouette of a gentleman in an elbow-chair,
with a pigtail and knee-breeches; and this icon was revered as
the likeness of "old Doctor P----." This "old Dr. P.'s" son, "Tom
P----," was a sturdy stripling of seventy odd, who had never used
a stethoscope, and dismissed a rival practitioner who talked about
heart-sounds as "an alarmist." To these succeeded a third generation
of the same drug-stained dynasty, represented to me by a gentleman
in shiny black, who produced a large gold watch when he felt one's
pulse, and said "Hah!" when he looked at one's tongue. These three
generations, for something more than a century, monopolized all the
best practice of Loamshire, were immensely respected, and accumulated a
great deal of money. Echoes of the dialogue between doctor and patient
still haunt the ear of memory:--
_Nervous and Dyspeptic Lady._ "Do you know, Dr. P., I felt so very
uncomfortable after luncheon--quite a sensation of sinking through the
floor. Of course I had some brandy and water--about half and half--at
once, but I feel that I ought to have a little champagne at dinner.
Nothing helps me so much."
DR. P. "Your ladyship is no inconsiderable physician. I was about to
make the same suggestion. But pray be careful that it is a dry wine."
All this was very comfortable and friendly, and tended to promote the
best relations between doctor and patient. I do not recollect that the
doctor was supposed to effect cures; but his presence at a deathbed
created the pleasant sense that all had been done which could be done,
and that the patient was dying with the dignity proper to his station.
It may be remarked, in passing, that the two elder generations did all
their rounds, early and late, summer and winter, on horseback; while
the third subsided into a brougham drawn by a pair of horses afflicted
with stringhalt, and presumably bought cheap on account of that
infirmity.
So much for the men. What was their method? To my infant palate the
oils of castor and cod were as familiar as mother's milk. I dwelt
in a land flowing with rhubarb and magnesia. The lively leech was a
household pet. "Two nocturnes in blue and an arrangement in black," as
the Æsthete said, were of frequent occurrence. But other parts of the
system were more palatable. I seem to have drunk beer from my earliest
infancy. A glass of port wine at eleven, with a teaspoonful of bark in
it, was the recognized tonic, and brandy (which the doctor, who loved
periphrasis, always called "the domestic stimulant") was administered
whenever one looked squeamish, while mulled claret was "exhibited" as a
soporific. The notion of pouring all this stuff down a child's throat
sounds odd to a generation reared on Apollinaris and barley-water, but
it had this one advantage--that when one grew up it was impossible to
make one drunk.
From childhood we pass on to schooldays. Wild horses should not drag
from me the name of the seminary where I was educated, for its medical
arrangements left a good deal to be desired. There were three doctors
in this place, and they shared the care of some six hundred boys. Dr.
A. was certainly very old, and was reputed to be very good, insomuch
that his admirers said that, if they were dying, they should wish
to have Dr. A. with them, as he was better than any clergyman. If,
however, they were so carnally-minded as to wish to recover, they sent
for Dr. B., a bluff gentleman, who told his patients that they were
not half as ill as they thought, and must pull themselves together--a
prescription which, if there was nothing the matter, answered
admirably. The third was a grievous gentleman, who took a dark view of
life, and, sitting by my sick-bed, would inform me of the precarious
condition of a schoolfellow, who, to use his own phrase, was "slipping
through his fingers," and "had no more constitution than a fly."
Regarding this triumvirate in the light of my subsequent experience, I
cannot affect surprise that there were fifteen deaths among the boys
during the five years that I was in the school.
From the anonymous school I proceeded to an anonymous university, where
the medical world was dominated by the bland majesty of Sir Omicron Pie
(the name is Trollope's, but it will serve). Who that ever saw them can
forget that stately bearing, that Jove-like brow, that sublime air of
omniscience and omnipotence? Who that ever heard it, that even flow of
mellifluous eloquence and copious narrative? Who that ever experienced
it, the underlying kindness of heart?
A nervous undergraduate is ushered into the consulting-room, and the
great man advances with a paternal smile.
"Mr. Bumpstead? Ah! I think I was at school with your good father. No?
Then it must have been your uncle. You are very like him. We ran a
neck-and-neck race at the University. I won the Gold Medal, and he was
_proximè_. In those days I little thought of settling down in Oxbridge.
I had destined myself for a London practice; but Sir Thomas Watson--you
have heard of 'Watson's style'? He was the Cicero of Medicine--well,
Watson said, 'No, my dear Pie, it won't do. In ten years you will be at
the head of the profession, and will have made £100,000. But, mark my
words, _the blade will wear out the scabbard_. You are not justified in
risking your life.' I was disappointed, of course. All young men like
the idea of fame. But I saw that Watson was right, and I came here, and
found my life's work. The Medical School was then in a very decayed
condition, and I have made it what it is. Why am I telling you all
this----?"
(_Enter the butler._) "Please, Sir Omicron, you've an appointment at
Battle-axe Castle at four o'clock, and the carriage is at the door."
_Sir O. P._ "Ah! well. I must tell you the rest another day. Let me
see, what was the matter? Palpitation? Let me listen for a moment. It
is as I thought--only a little functional irritability. Lead a sensible
life; avoid excess; cultivate the philosophic temper. Take this
prescription, and come again next week. Thank you, thank you."
Fortified by four years of Sir Omicron's care, I came up to London
somewhere between 1870 and 1880. The practice of the West End was then
divided between three men--Sir A. B., Sir C. D., and Sir E. F.
Sir A. B. was bluff and brutal, fashioned himself on the traditions of
Abernethy, and ruled his patients by sheer terrorism. He had an immense
influence over hysterical women and weak-minded men, and people who
might otherwise have resented his ursine manner were reconciled to it
by the knowledge that he officially inspected the most illustrious
Tongue in the kingdom.
His principal rival was Sir C. D., who ruled by love. "Well, my dear
sir, there is not much the matter. A day or two's hunting will set you
right. You don't ride? Ah! well, it doesn't much matter. A fortnight at
Monte Carlo will do just as well. All you want is change of scene and
plenty of amusement."