THE LADDER OF LEARNING
1876-1885
‘Hast thou come with the heart of thy childhood back:
The free, the pure, the kind?
So murmured the trees in my homeward track,
As they played to the mountain wind.
‘Hath thy soul been true to its early love?
Whispered my native streams.
Hath the spirit nurs’d amid hill and grove,
Still revered its first high dream?’
After Mr. Inglis had been Chief Commissioner of Oude, he decided
to retire from his long and arduous service. Had he been given the
Lieutenant-Governorship of the North-West, as was expected by some in
the service, he would probably have accepted it and remained longer in
India. He was not in sympathy with Lord Lytton’s Afghan policy, and
that would naturally alter his desire for further employment.
As with his father before him, his work was highly appreciated
by those he served. Lord Lytton, the Viceroy, in a letter to Lord
Salisbury, then Secretary of State for India, writes, February 1876:--
‘During the short period of my own official tenure I have met with
much valuable assistance from Mr. Inglis, both as a member of my
Legislative Council, and also as officiating Commissioner in Oudh,
more especially as regards the amalgamation of Oudh with the N.W.
Provinces. Of his character and abilities I have formed so high an
opinion that had there been an available vacancy I should have been
glad to secure to my government his continued services.’
Two of Mr. Inglis’ sons had settled in Tasmania, and it was decided to
go there before bringing home the younger members of his family. The
eldest daughter, Mrs. Simson, was now married and settled in Edinburgh,
and the Inglis determined to make their home in that city.
Two years were spent in Hobart settling the two sons on the land. Mrs.
M‘Laren says:--
‘When in Tasmania, Elsie and I went to a very good school. Miss Knott,
the head-mistress, had come out from Cheltenham College for Girls.
Here in the days when such things were practically unknown, Elsie,
backed by Miss Knott, instituted ‘school colours.’ They were very
primitive, not beautiful hatbands, but two inches of blue and white
ribbon sewn on to a safety pin, and worn on the lapel of our coats.
How proud we were of them.’
Mr. Inglis, writing to his daughter in Edinburgh, says of their school
life:--
‘Elsie has done very well, she is in the second class and last week
got up to second in the class.
‘We are all in a whirl having to sort and send off our boxes, some
round the Cape, some to Melbourne, and some to go with us.’
Mrs. Inglis, on board the _Durham_ homeward bound, writes:--
‘Elsie has found occupation for herself in helping to nurse sick
children, and look after turbulent boys who trouble everybody on
board, and a baby of seven months old is an especial favourite with
her. Eva has met with a bosom friend in a little girl named Pearly
Macmillan, without whom she would have collapsed altogether. Our
vessel is not a fast one, but we have been only five instead of six
weeks getting to Suez.’
The family took a house at 70 Bruntsfield Place, and the two girls were
soon at school. Mrs. M‘Laren says:--
‘Elsie and I used to go daily to the Charlotte Square Institution,
which used in those days to be the Edinburgh school for girls. Mr.
Oliphant was headmaster. Father never approved of the Scotch custom
of children walking long distances to school, and we used to be sent
every morning in a cab. The other day, when telling the story of the
S.W.H.’s to a large audience of working women in Edinburgh, one woman
said to me, “My husband is a prood man the day! He tells everybody how
he used to drive Dr. Inglis to school every morning when she was a
girl.”’
Of her school life in Edinburgh, Miss Wright gives these memories:--
‘I remember quite distinctly when the girls of 23 Charlotte Square
were told that two girls from Tasmania were coming to the school,
and a certain feeling of surprise that the said girls were just like
ordinary mortals, though the big, earnest brows and the quaint hair
parted in the middle and done up in plaits fastened up at the back
of the head were certainly not ordinary. Elsie was put in a higher
English class than I was in, and though I knew her, I did not know her
very well.
‘A friend has a story of a question going round the class, she thinks
Clive or Warren Hastings was the subject of the lesson, and the
question was what one would do if a calumny were spread about one.
“Deny it,” one girl answered. “Fight it,” another. Still the teacher
went on asking. “Live it down,” said Elsie. “Right, Miss Inglis.” My
friend writes, “The question I cannot remember, it was the bright
confident smile with the answer, and Mr. Hossack’s delighted wave to
the top of the class that abides in my memory.”
‘I always think a very characteristic story of Elsie is her asking
that the school might have permission to play in Charlotte Square
gardens. In those days no one thought of providing fresh air exercise
for girls except by walks, and tennis was just coming in. Elsie had
the courage (to us schoolgirls it seemed the extraordinary courage)
to confront the three directors of the school and ask if we might be
allowed to play in the gardens of the Square. The three directors
together were to us the most formidable and awe-inspiring body, though
separately they were amiable and estimable men!
‘The answer was we might play in the gardens if the neighbouring
proprietors would give their consent, and the heroic Elsie, with I
think one other girl, actually went round to each house in the Square
and asked consent of the owner.
‘In those days the inhabitants of Charlotte Square were very select
and exclusive indeed, and we all felt it was a brave thing to do.
Elsie gained her point, and the girls played at certain hours in the
Square till a regular playing field was arranged.’
Her sister Eva reports that the first answer of the directors was
enough for the rest of the school. But Elsie, undaunted, interviewed
each of the three directors herself. After every bell in Charlotte
Square had been rung and all interviewed, she returned from this great
expedition triumphant. All had consented, so the damsels interned from
nine to three were given the gardens, and the grim, dull, palisaded
square must have suddenly been made to blossom like the rose. Would
that some follower of Elsie Inglis even now might ring the door bells
and get the gates unlocked to the rising generation. Elsie’s companion
or companions in this first attempt to influence those in authority
have been spoken of as ‘her first unit.’
Elsie was, for a time, joint editor of the _Edina_, a school magazine
of the ordinary type. Her great achievement was in making it pay,
which, it is recorded, no other editor was able to do. There are
various editorial anxieties alluded to in her correspondence with her
father. The memories quoted take us further than school days, but they
find a fitting place here.
‘Our more intimate acquaintance came after Mrs. Inglis’ death and when
Elsie was thinking of and beginning her medical work. In 1888 six of
us girls who had been at the same school started the “Six Sincere
Students Society,” which met in one house. The first year we read and
discussed Emerson’s Essays on “Self-Reliance and Heroism.” I am pretty
sure it was Elsie who suggested those Essays. Also, Helps, and Matthew
Arnold’s _Culture and Anarchy_. I have a note on this “two very hot
discussions as to what Culture means, and if it is sufficiently
powerful to regenerate the world. Culture of the masses and also of
women largely gone into.”
‘This very friendly and happy society lasted on till 1891, when it
was enlarged and became a Debating Society. I find Elsie taking up
such subjects as “That our modern civilisation is a development not a
degeneration.” “That character is formed in a busy life rather than
in solitude.” Papers on Henry Drummond’s _Ascent of Man_, and on the
“Ethics of War.”
‘Always associated with Elsie in those days I think of her father,
and no biography of her will be true which does not emphasise the
beautiful and deep love and sympathy between Elsie and Mr. Inglis. He
used to meet us girls as if we were his intellectual equals, and would
discuss problems and answer our questions with the utmost cordiality
and appreciation of our point of view, and always there was the
feeling of the entire understanding and fellowship between father and
daughter.
‘She was a keen croquet player, and tolerated no frivolity when a
stroke either at croquet or golf were in the balance. She was fond of
long walks with Mr. Inglis, and then by herself, and time never hung
on her hands in holiday time, she was always serene and happy.’
It was decided that Elsie should go to school in Paris in September
1882--a decision not lightly made; and Mr. Inglis writes after her
departure:--
‘I do not think I could have borne to part with you, my darling, did
I not feel the assurance that in doing so we are following the Lord’s
guidance. Your dear mother and I both made it the subject of earnest
prayer, and I feel we have been guided to do what was best for you;
and we shall see this when the weary time is over, and we have got you
back again with us.
‘When I return to Edinburgh, I feel that I shall have no one to find
out my Psalms for me, or to cut my _Spectator_, that we shall have
no more discussions regarding the essays of Mr. Fraser, and no more
anxieties about the forthcoming number of the _Edina_. The nine months
will pass quickly.’
Elsie’s letters from Paris have not been preserved, but the ones
from her father show the alert intelligence and interest in all she
was reporting. Of the events at home and abroad, Mr. Inglis writes
to her of the Suez Canal, the bringing to justice of the Phœnix Park
murderers, the great snowstorm at home, and the Channel Tunnel. Mrs.
Inglis writes with maternal scepticism on some passing events: ‘I
cannot imagine you making the body of your dress. I think there would
not be many carnivals if you had to make the dresses yourselves.’
Mr. Inglis, equally sceptical, has a more satisfactory solution for
dressmaking. ‘I hope you have more than one dinner frock, two or three,
and let them be pretty ones.’ Mrs. Inglis, commenting on Elsie’s
description of Gambetta’s funeral, says: ‘He is a loss to France.
Poor France, she always seems to me like a vessel without a helm
driven about just where the winds take it. She has no sound Christian
principle to guide her. So different from our highly favoured England.’
Mr. Inglis’ letters are full of the courteous consideration for Elsie
and for others which marked all the way of his life, and made him
the man greatly beloved, in whatever sphere he moved. _Punch_ and
the _Spectator_ went from him every week, and he writes: ‘I hope
there was nothing in that number of _Punch_ you gave M. Survelle to
study while you were finishing your breakfast to hurt his feelings
as a Frenchman. _Punch_ has not been very complimentary to them of
late.’ And when Elsie’s sense of humour had been moved by a saying
of her _gouvernante_, Mr. Inglis writes, desirous of a very free
correspondence with home, but--
‘I fear if I send your letter to Eva, at school, that your remark
about Miss ---- proposal to go down to the lower flat of your house,
because the Earl of Anglesea once lived there, may be repeated and
ultimately reach her with exaggerations, as those things always do,
and may cause unpleasant feelings.’
There must have been some exhibition of British independence, and in
dealing with it Mr. Inglis reminds Elsie of a day in India ‘when you
went off for a walk by yourself, and we all thought you were lost, and
all the Thampanies and chaprasies and everybody were searching for you
all over the hill.’ One later episode was not on a hillside, and except
for _les demoiselles_ in Paris, equally harmless.
‘_Jan. 1883._
‘I can quite sympathise with you, my darling, in the annoyance you
feel at not having told Miss Brown of your having walked home part
of the way from Madame M---- last Wednesday. It would have been far
better if you had told her, as you wished to do, what had happened.
Concealment is always wrong, and very often turns what was originally
only a trifle into a serious matter. In this case, I don’t suppose
Miss B. could have said much if you had told her, though she may be
seriously angry if it comes to her knowledge hereafter. If she does
hear of it, you had better tell her that you told me all about it, and
that I advised you, under the circumstances, as you had not told her
at the time, and that as by doing so now you could only get the others
into trouble, not to say anything about it; but keep clear of these
things for the future, my darling.’
When the end came here, in this life, one of her school-fellows wrote:--
‘Elsie has been and is such a world-wide inspiration to all who knew
her. One more can testify to the blessedness of her friendship. Ever
since the Paris days of ’83 her strong loving help was ready in
difficult times, and such wonderfully strengthening comfort in sorrow.’
The Paris education ended in the summer of 1883, and Miss Brown, who
conducted and lived with the seven girls who went out with her from
England, writes after their departure:--
‘I cannot tell you how much I felt when you all disappeared, and how
sad it was to go back to look at your deserted places. I cannot at all
realise that you are now all separated, and that we may never meet
again on earth. May we meet often at the throne of grace, and remember
each other there. It is nice to have a French maid to keep up the
conversations, and if you will read French aloud, even to yourself, it
is of use.’
Paris was, no doubt, an education in itself, but the perennial hope of
fond parents that languages and music are in the air of the continent,
were once again disappointed in Elsie. She was timber-tuned in ear and
tongue, and though she would always say her mind in any vehicle for
thought, the accent and the grammar strayed along truly British lines.
Her eldest niece supplies a note on her music:--
‘She was still a schoolgirl when they returned from Tasmania. At that
time she was learning music at school. I thought her a wonderful
performer on the piano, but afterwards her musical capabilities
became a family joke which no one enjoyed more than herself. She had
two “pieces” which she could play by heart, of the regular arpeggio
drawing-room style, and these always had to be performed at any family
function as one of the standing entertainments.’
Elsie returned from Paris, the days of the schoolgirlhood left behind.
Her character was formed, and she had the sense of latent powers. She
had not been long at home when her mother died of a virulent attack of
scarlet fever, and Mr. Inglis lost the lodestar of his loving nature.
‘From that day Elsie shouldered all father’s burdens, and they two went
on together until his death.’
In her desk, when it was opened, these ‘Resolutions’ were found. They
are written in pencil, and belong to the date when she became the stay
and comfort of her father’s remaining years:--
‘I must give up dreaming,--making stories.
‘I must give up getting cross.
‘I must devote my mind more to the housekeeping.
‘I must be more thorough in everything.
‘I must be truthful.
‘The bottom of the whole evil is the habit of dreaming, which must be
given up. So help me, God.
‘ELSIE INGLIS.’