and cultured of English antiquaries, was once describing the procedure
observed on the rare occasion of a "Free Conference" between the Houses
of Parliament. "The Lords," he said, "sit with their hats on their
heads. The Commons stand, uncovered, at the Bar; and the carpet is
spread not on the floor but on the table, illustrating the phrase 'on
the _tapis_.' Those are the things which make life really worth living."
I cannot profess to equal Mr. Shirley in culture, but I yield to no man
in enthusiasm for antiquarian rites. Like Burke, I "piously believe
in the mysterious virtue of wax and parchment." With Mr. Gladstone, I
say that "the principle which gives us ritual in Religion gives us the
ceremonial of Courts, the costume of judges, the uniform of regiments,
all the language of heraldry and symbol, all the hierarchy of rank and
title."
My antiquarian enthusiasm for the Garter must not be allowed to brush
aside the more obvious topic of the Sheriffs. That just now[10] is a
topic which, as the French say, palpitates with actuality. November
is the Sheriffs' month; in it they bloom like chrysanthemums--doomed,
alas! to as brief a splendour. The Sheriffs of London and
Middlesex--those glorious satellites who revolve round the Lord Mayor
of London as the Cardinals round the Pope--are already installed. Their
state carriages of dazzling hue, and their liveries stiff with gold
bullion, have flung their radiance (as the late Mr. J. R. Green would
have said) over the fog and filth of our autumnal climate.
"Who asketh why the Beautiful was made?
A wan cloud drifting o'er the waste of blue,
The thistledown that floats along the glade,
The lilac blooms of April--fair to view,
And naught but fair are these; and such I ween are you.
Yes, ye are beautiful. The young street boys
Joy in your beauty----"
But I am becoming rhapsodical, and with less excuse than "C. S. C.,"
whose poetic fire was kindled by the sight of the Beadles in the
Burlington Arcade.
[10] November 1896.
On Monday the 12th of November, being the morrow of St. Martin, the
Chancellor of the Exchequer, in clothing of wrought gold and figured
silk, attending the ghost of what was once the Court of Exchequer,
nominates three gentlemen of good estate to serve the office of High
Sheriff for each of the counties of England. Be it remarked in passing
that the robe of black and gold which the Chancellor wears on this
occasion is that which Mr. Gladstone's statue in the Strand represents,
and which, as a matter of fact, he wore at the opening of the Law
Courts in December 1882, when, to the astonishment of the unlearned, he
walked in procession among the Judges.
Early in the new year--on "the morrow of the Purification" to wit--the
Lord President of the Council submits the names of the nominated
Sheriffs, duly engrossed on parchment, to the King, who then, with a
silver bodkin, "pricks" the name of the gentleman who in each county
seems the fittest of the three for the august and perilous office of
High Sheriff.
I love to handle great things greatly; so I have refreshed my memory
with the constitutional lore of this high theme. The etymology of
"Sheriff" I find to be (on the indisputable authority of Dr. Dryasdust)
"Scirgeréfa--the 'Reeve' or Fiscal Officer of a Shire." In the Saxon
twilight of our national history this Reeve, not yet developed into
Sheriff, ranked next in his county to the Bishop and the Ealdorman,
or Earl. In those days of rudimentary self-government, the Reeve was
elected by popular vote, but Edward II., who seems to have been a
bureaucrat before his time, abolished the form of election except as
regards the cities, and from his time onwards the High Sheriff of a
county has been a nominated officer. Until the days of the Tudors,
the High Sheriff wielded great and miscellaneous powers. He was the
military head of the county. He commanded the "Posse Comitatus," in
which at his bidding every male over fifteen was forced to serve;
and he was, in all matters of civil and criminal jurisdiction, the
executant and minister of the law.
_Quomodo ceciderunt fortes!_ Henry VIII. at one fell swoop terminated
the Sheriff's military power and made the new-fangled Lord-Lieutenant
commander of the local forces; and successive Acts of Parliament have,
by increasing the powers of courts and magistracies, reduced the civil
power of the Sheriff to a dismal shadow of its former greatness. Still,
in the person of his unromantic representative, the "Bound Bailiff,"
he watches the execution of civil process in the case of those who, to
use a picturesque phrase, have "outrun the constable"; still, with all
the pantomimic pomp of coach and footmen, trumpeters and javelin-men,
he conducts the Judges of Assize to and from the court; and still he
must be present in court when the capital sentence is pronounced. I
believe I am right in stating that there is no such document as a
"Death-warrant" known to English jurisprudence. The only warrant for
the execution of a felon is the verbal sentence of the Judge pronounced
in open court; and, as the High Sheriff is responsible for the due
execution of that sentence, he must be present when it is pronounced,
in order that he may know, by the evidence of his own eyes, that the
person brought out for execution is the person on whom the sentence was
pronounced. It is probable that many of my readers recollect the first
Lord Tollemache, a man who combined singular gifts of physical strength
with a delicate humanitarianism. He had been High Sheriff of Cheshire
in very early life, and, till he was elevated to the Peerage, it was
possible that his turn might come round again. Contemplating this
contingency, he said that if he were again charged with the execution
of a capital sentence, he should, on his own authority, offer the
condemned man a dose of chloroform, so that, if he chose, he might go
unconscious to his doom.
The duties connected with the capital sentence are, of course,
infinitely the most trying of those which befall a High Sheriff; but
even in other respects his lot is not an unmixed pleasure. If he is a
poor man, the expense of conducting the Assizes with proper dignity
is considerable. A sensitive man does not like to hear invidious
comparisons between his carriages, horses, and liveries, and those
of his predecessor in office. He winces under the imputation of an
unworthy economy; and, if his equipage was conspicuously unequal to
the occasion, the Judges have been known to express their displeasure
by sarcasms, protests, and even fines. The fining power of a Judge
on circuit is a mysterious prerogative. I have no notion whether it
is restrained by statutory limitations, by what process the fine is
enforced, or into whose pocket it finds its way. Some years ago the
High Sheriff of Surrey published a placard at the Guildford Assizes
setting forth that the public were excluded from the court by the
Judge's order and in defiance of law, and warning his subordinate
officers against giving effect to the order for exclusion. The Judge
pronounced the placard "a painfully contumacious contempt of the
Court," and fined the High Sheriff £500. My memory does not recall,
and the records do not state, whether the mulcted officer paid up or
climbed down.
If the High Sheriff has a friend or kinsman in Holy Orders, the Assizes
afford an excellent opportunity of bringing him to public notice in the
capacity of Sheriff's Chaplain; for the Chaplain preaches before the
Judges at the opening of the Assize, and, if he is ambitious of fame,
he can generally contrive to make something of the occasion. But few
Chaplains, I should think, have emulated the courage of Sydney Smith,
who at the York Assizes in 1824 rebuked the besetting sins of Bench and
Bar in two remarkably vigorous sermons on these suggestive themes--"The
Judge that smites contrary to the Law" and "The Lawyer that tempted
Christ."
Broadly, I suppose it may be said that the people who really enjoy
being High Sheriffs are not those who, by virtue of long hereditary
connexion with the soil, are to the manner born; but rather those who
by commercial industry have accumulated capital, and have invested it
in land with a view to founding a family. To such, the hospitalities
paid and the deference received, the quaint splendour of the Assize,
and the undisputed precedence over the gentlemen of the County, are
joys not lightly to be esteemed. When Lothair was arranging the
splendid ceremonial for his famous Coming of Age, he said to the
Duchess, "There is no doubt that, in the County, the High Sheriff takes
precedence of every one, even of the Lord-Lieutenant; but how about
his wife? I believe there is some tremendous question about the lady's
precedence. We ought to have written to the Heralds' College." The
Duchess graciously gave Mrs. High Sheriff the benefit of the doubt,
and the ceremonies went forward without a hitch. On the night of the
great banquet Lothair looked round, and then, "in an audible voice,
and with a stateliness becoming such an incident, called upon the High
Sheriff to lead the Duchess to the table. Although that eminent man had
been thinking of nothing else for days, and during the last half-hour
had felt as a man feels, and can only feel, who knows that some public
function is momentarily about to fall to his perilous discharge, he was
taken quite aback, changed colour, and lost his head. But Lothair's
band, who were waiting at the door of the apartment to precede the
procession to the hall, striking up at this moment "The Roast Beef
of Old England," reanimated his heart, and, following Lothair and
preceding all the other guests down the gallery and through many
chambers, he experienced the proudest moment in a life of struggle,
ingenuity, vicissitude, and success."
XXXII
PUBLISHERS
There is a passage in Selden's "Table-Talk" which, if I recollect it
aright, may be paraphrased in some such form as this: The Lion, reeking
of slaughter, met his neighbour the Sheep, and, after exchanging
the time of day with her, asked her if his breath smelt of blood.
She replied "Yes," whereupon he snapped off her head for a fool.
Immediately afterwards he met the Jackal, to whom he addressed the same
question. The Jackal answered "No," and the Lion tore him in pieces for
a flatterer. Last of all he met the Fox, and asked the question a third
time. The Fox replied that he had a cold in his head, and could smell
nothing. _Moral_: "Wise men say little in dangerous times." The bearing
of this aphorism on my present subject is sufficiently obvious; the
"times"--not _Times_--are "dangerous" alike for authors and publishers,
and "wise men" will "say little" about current controversies, lest they
should have their heads snapped off by Mr. Lucas and Mr. Graves, or be
torn in pieces by Mr. Moberley Bell.
Thus warned, I turn my thoughts to Publishers as they have existed in
the past, and more particularly to their relations with the authors
whose works they have given to the world. How happy those relations
may be, when maintained with tact and temper on both sides, is well
illustrated by an anecdote of that indefatigable penwoman, "the
gorgeous Lady Blessington." Thinking herself injured by some delay
on the part of her publishers, Messrs. Sanders & Otley, she sent her
son-in-law, the irrepressible Count D'Orsay, to remonstrate. The Count
was received by a dignified gentleman in a stiff white cravat, whom
he proceeded to assail with the most vigorous invective, until the
cravated gentleman could stand it no longer and roundly declared that
he would sacrifice Lady Blessington's patronage sooner than subject
himself to personal insult. "Personal?" exclaimed the lively Count.
"There's nothing personal in my remarks. If you're Sanders, then d----
Otley; if you're Otley, then d---- Sanders."
It is to be feared that a similar imprecation has often formed itself
in the heart, though it may not have issued from the lips, of a baulked
and disillusioned author. Though notoriously the most long-suffering
of a patient race, the present writer has before now felt inclined to
borrow the vigorous invective of Count D'Orsay. Some six months before
American copyright was, after long negotiation, secured for English
authors, Messrs. Popgood and Groolly (I borrow the names from Sir Frank
Burnand) arranged with me for the publication of a modest work. It was
quite ready for publication, but the experienced publishers pointed
out the desirability of keeping it back till the new law of copyright
came into force, for there was a rich harvest to be reaped in America;
and all the American profits, after, say, five thousand copies were
sold, were to be mine alone. A year later I received a cheque, 18s.
6d., which, I imagine, bore the same relation to the American profits
as Mrs. Crupp's "one cold kidney on a cheese-plate" bore to the remains
of David Copperfield's feast. On enquiry I was soothingly informed by
Popgood and Groolly that the exact number of copies sold in America was
5005, and that the cheque represented (as per agreement) the royalty
on the copies sold, over and above the first five thousand. That the
publishers should have so accurately estimated the American sale seemed
to me a remarkable instance of commercial foresight.
Not much more amiable are the feelings of the author towards the
publisher who declines his wares; and I have always felt that
Washington Irving must have had a keen and legitimate satisfaction in
prefixing to his immensely popular "Sketch-Book" the flummery in which
old John Murray wrapped up his refusal of the manuscript:--
"I entreat you to believe that I feel truly obliged by your kind
intentions towards me, and that I entertain the most unfeigned respect
for your most tasteful talents. If it would not suit me to engage in
the publication of your present work, it is only because I do not see
that scope in the nature of it which would enable me to make those
satisfactory accounts between us which I really feel no satisfaction in
engaging."
Now, surely, as Justice Shallow says, good phrases are, and ever were,
very commendable. While Murray dealt in good phrases, his rival Longman
expressed himself through the more tangible medium of good cheques.
He was the London publisher, and apparently the financier, of the
_Edinburgh Review_, and, according to Sydney Smith's testimony, his
fiscal system was simplicity itself. "I used to send in a bill in these
words, 'Messrs. Longman & Co. to the Rev. Sydney Smith. To a very wise
and witty article on such a subject; so many sheets, at forty-five
guineas a sheet,' and the money always came." Here is another passage
from the financial dealings of the same great house, which during the
last fifty years has caused many a penman's mouth to water. On the
7th of March 1856 Macaulay wrote in his diary: "Longman came, with a
very pleasant announcement. He and his partners find that they are
overflowing with money, and think that they cannot invest it better
than by advancing to me, on the usual terms of course, part of what
will be due to me in December. We agreed that they shall pay twenty
thousand pounds into Williams's Bank next week. What a sum to be gained
by one edition of a book! I may say, gained in one day. But that was
harvest-day. The work had been near seven years in hand."
After that glorious instance, all tales of profit from books seem flat
and insignificant. As a rule, we have to reckon our makings on a far
more modest scale. "Sir," said an enthusiastic lady to Mr. Zangwill,
"I admire 'The Children of the Ghetto' so much that I have read it
eight times." "Madam," replied Mr. Zangwill, "I would rather you had
bought eight copies." Even so, with our exiguous profit on eight copies
duly sold, our state is more gracious than that of more deserving men.
Here is a touching vignette from a book of travels, which was popular
in my youth: "At _table d'hôte_ there is a charming old gentleman who
has translated Æschylus and Euripides into English verse; he has been
complimented by the greatest scholars of the day, and his publishers
have just sent him in his bill for printing, and a letter to know what
the deuce they shall do with the first thousand."
Such are the joys of publishing at one's own risk. Hardly more
exhilarating is the experience of knocking at all the doors in
Paternoster Row, or Albemarle Street, or Waterloo Place, and imploring
the stony-hearted publisher to purchase one's modest wares. Old John
Murray's soothing formula about "most tasteful talents" has been
reproduced, with suitable variations, from that time to this. No one
experienced it oftener than the late Mr. Shorthouse, whose one good
book--"John Inglesant"--made the rounds of the Trade, until at length
Messrs. Macmillan recognized its strange power. In their hands, as
every one knows, the book prospered exceedingly, and the publishers
who had rejected it were consumed by remorse. In this connexion my
friend Mr. James Payn used to tell a story which outweighs a great
many acrid witticisms about "Barabbas was a Publisher" and Napoleon's
one meritorious action in hanging a Bookseller. Payn was "reader"
to Smith and Elder, and in that capacity declined the manuscript of
"John Inglesant." Some years afterwards this fact was stated in print,
together with an estimate of what his error had cost his firm. Payn,
who was the last man to sit down patiently under a calumny, told the
late Mr. George Smith that he felt bound in self-respect to contradict
a story so derogatory to his literary judgment. "If I were you,"
replied Mr. Smith, "I wouldn't do that, for, as a matter of fact,
you did reject the manuscript, and we have lost what Macmillans have
gained. I never told you, because I knew it would annoy you; and I only
tell you now to prevent you from contradicting 'an ower true tale.'"
Payn used to say that, in all the annals of business, considerate
forbearance had never been better exemplified. Against this story
of his failure to perceive merit Payn was wont to set his discovery
of Mr. Anstey Guthrie. The manuscript of "Vice Versa," bearing the
unknown name of "F. Anstey," came in ordinary course into his hands. He
glanced at the first page, turned over, read to the end, and then ran
into Mr. Smith's room saying, "We've got the funniest thing that has
been written since Dickens's 'Christmas Carol.'" And the public gave
unequivocal evidence that it concurred in the verdict.
Let a "smooth tale of love" close these reminiscences of Publishers.
Some forty years ago, when all young and ardent spirits had caught the
sacred fire of Italian freedom from Garibaldi and Swinburne and Mrs.
Browning, a young lady, nurtured in the straitest of Tory homes, was
inspired--it is hardly too strong a word--to write a book of ballads
in which the heroes and the deeds of the Italian Revolution were
glorified. She knew full well that, if she were detected, her father
would have a stroke and her mother would lock her up in the spare
bedroom. So, in sending her manuscript to a publisher, she passed
herself off as a man. Her vigorous and vehement style, her strong grasp
of the political situation, and her enjoyment of battle and bloodshed,
contributed to the illusion; her poems were published anonymously;
other volumes followed; and for several years the publisher addressed
his contributor as "Esquire." At length it chanced that both publisher
and poetess were staying, unknown to each other, at the same seaside
place. Her letter, written from--let us say--Brighton, reached him
at Brighton; so, instead of answering by post, he went to the hotel
and asked for Mr. Talbot, or whatever great Tory name you prefer. The
porter said, "There is no Mr. Talbot staying here. There is a Miss
Talbot, and she may be able to give you some information." So Miss
Talbot was produced; the secret of the authorship was disclosed; and
the negotiations took an entirely new turn, which ended in making the
poetess the publisher's wife.
XXXIII
HANDWRITING
When "The Book of Snobs" was appearing week by week in _Punch_,
Thackeray derived constant aid from suggestive correspondents. "'Why
only attack the aristocratic Snobs?' says one estimable gentleman. 'Are
not the snobbish Snobs to have their turn?' 'Pitch into the University
Snobs!' writes an indignant correspondent (who spells _elegant_ with
two _l_'s)."
Similarly, if I may compare small things with great, I am happy in the
possession of an unknown friend who, from time to time, supplies me
with references to current topics which he thinks suitable to my gentle
methods of criticism. My friend (unlike Thackeray's correspondent) can
spell _elegant_, and much longer words too, with faultless accuracy,
and is altogether, as I judge, a person of much culture. It is this
circumstance, I suppose (for he has no earthly connexion with the
Army), which makes him feel so keenly about a cutting from a newspaper
which he has just sent us:--
"In a report just issued by the War Office on the result of
examinations for promotion many officers are said to be handicapped
by their bad handwriting. Some show of 'want of intelligence, small
power of expression, poor penmanship--in fact, appear to suffer from
defective education.'
"On the other hand, the work of non-commissioned officers shows
intelligence and power of concise expression, while penmanship is good.
"But the percentage of failures among the officers shows a large
decrease--from 22 per cent. in November 1904 to 13 per cent. in May
last. The improvement is particularly noticeable among lieutenants. It
is apparent, says the report, that a serious effort is being made by
the commissioned ranks to master all the text-books and other aids to
efficiency."
"This," says my correspondent, "is a shameful disclosure. Cannot you
say something about it in print?" Inclining naturally to the more
favourable view of my fellow-creatures, I prefer to reflect, not on the
"poor penmanship" and "defective education" of my military friends,
but on their manly efforts after self-improvement. There is something
at once pathetic and edifying in the picture of these worthy men, each
of whom has probably cost his father £200 a year for education ever
since he was ten years old, making their "serious effort to master the
text-books and other aids to efficiency," in the humble hope that their
writing may some day rival that of the non-commissioned officers.
It was not ever thus. These laudable, though lowly, endeavours after
Culture are of recent growth in the British Army. Fifty years ago, if
we may trust contemporary evidence, the Uneducated Subaltern developed,
by a natural process, into the Uneducated General.
"I have always," said Thackeray in 1846, "admired that dispensation
of rank in our country which sets up a budding Cornet, who is shaving
for a beard (and who was flogged only last week because he could
not spell), to command great whiskered warriors who have faced all
dangers of climate and battle." _Because he could not spell._ The
same infirmity accompanied the Cornet into the higher grades of
his profession--witness Captain Rawdon Crawley's memorandum of his
available effects: "My double-barril by Manton, say 40 guineas; my
duelling pistols in rosewood case (same which I shot Captain Marker)
£20." And, even when the Cornet had blossomed into a General, his
education was still far from complete: "A man can't help being a fool,
be he ever so old, and Sir George Tufto is a greater ass at sixty-eight
than he was when he entered the army at fifteen. He never read a book
in his life, and, with his purple, old, gouty fingers, still writes a
schoolboy hand."
But do Soldiers write a worse hand than other people? I rather doubt
it, and certain I am that several of my friends, highly placed in
Church and politics and law, would do very well to apply themselves for
a season to those "text-books and other aids to efficiency" by which
the zealous Subaltern seeks to complete his "defective education."