The Honourable Arthur, Salemina, and I took a stroll in Hyde Park one
Sunday afternoon, not for the purpose of joining the fashionable throng
of 'pretty people' at Stanhope Gate, but to mingle with the common herd
in its special precincts,--precincts not set apart, indeed, by any
legal formula, but by a natural law of classification which seems to be
inherent in the universe. It was a curious and motley crowd--a little
dull, perhaps, but orderly, well-behaved, and self-respecting, with
here and there part of the flotsam and jetsam of a great city, a ragged,
sodden, hopeless wretch wending his way about with the rest, thankful
for any diversion.
Under the trees, each in the centre of his group, large or small
according to his magnetism and eloquence, stood the park 'shouter,'
airing his special grievance, playing his special part, preaching his
special creed, pleading his special cause,--anything, probably, for
the sake of shouting. We were plainly dressed, and did not attract
observation as we joined the outside circle of one of these groups after
another. It was as interesting to watch the listeners as the speakers.
I wished I might paint the sea of faces, eager, anxious, stolid,
attentive, happy, and unhappy: histories written on many of them; others
blank, unmarked by any thought or aspiration. I stole a sidelong look at
the Honourable Arthur. He is an Englishman first, and a man afterwards
(I prefer it the other way), but he does not realise it; he thinks he is
just like all other good fellows, although he is mistaken. He and Willie
Beresford speak the same language, but they are as different as Malay
and Eskimo. He is an extreme type, but he is very likeable and very
well worth looking at, with his long coat, his silk hat, and the white
Malmaison in his buttonhole. He is always so radiantly, fascinatingly
clean, the Honourable Arthur, simple, frank, direct, sensible, and he
bores me almost to tears.
The first orator was edifying his hearers with an explanation of the
drama of The Corsican Brothers, and his eloquence, unlike that of the
other speakers, was largely inspired by the hope of pennies. It was a
novel idea, and his interpretation was rendered very amusing to us
by the wholly original Yorkshire accent which he gave to the French
personages and places in the play.
An Irishman in black clerical garb held the next group together. He was
in some trouble, owing to a pig-headed and quarrelsome Scotchman in the
front rank, who objected to each statement that fell from his lips, thus
interfering seriously with the effect of his peroration. If the Irishman
had been more convincing, I suppose the crowd would have silenced the
scoffer, for these little matters of discipline are always attended to
by the audience; but the Scotchman's points were too well taken; he
was so trenchant, in fact, at times, that a voice would cry, 'Coom up,
Sandy, an' 'ave it all your own w'y, boy!' The discussion continued
as long as we were within hearing distance, for the Irishman, though
amiable and ignorant, was firm, the 'unconquered Scot' was on his native
heath of argument, and the listeners were willing to give them both a
hearing.
Under the next tree a fluent Cockney lad of sixteen or eighteen years
was declaiming his bitter experiences with the Salvation Army. He had
been sheltered in one of its beds which was not to his taste, and it had
found employment for him which he had to walk twenty-two miles to get,
and which was not to his liking when he did get it. A meeting of
the Salvation Army at a little distance rendered his speech more
interesting, as its points were repeated and denied as fast as made.
Of course there were religious groups and temperance groups, and groups
devoted to the tearing down or raising up of most things except the
Government; for on that day there were no Anarchist or Socialist
shouters, as is ordinarily the case.
As we strolled down one of the broad roads under the shade of the noble
trees, we saw the sun setting in a red-gold haze; a glory of vivid
colour made indescribably tender and opalescent by the kind of luminous
mist that veils it; a wholly English sunset, and an altogether lovely
one. And quite away from the other knots of people, there leaned against
a bit of wire fence a poor old man surrounded by half a dozen children
and one tired woman with a nursing baby. He had a tattered book, which
seemed to be the story of the Gospels, and his little flock sat on the
greensward at his feet as he read. It may be that he, too, had been a
shouter in his lustier manhood, and had held a larger audience together
by the power of his belief; but now he was helpless to attract any but
the children. Whether it was the pathos of his white hairs, his garb of
shreds and patches, or the mild benignity of his eye that moved me, I
know not, but among all the Sunday shouters in Hyde Park it seemed to me
that that quavering voice of the past spoke with the truest note.