THE MAYFAIR SET 
 
 VI 
 MRS. ALBERT GRUNDY 
 
THE MAYFAIR SET. 
 
 i. The Autobiography of a Boy, by G. S. 
 STREET, with Title-page designed by 
 C. W. FURSE. s/// Edition. 
 
 2. The Joneses and the Asterisks, a Story 
 in Monologue, by GERALD CAMPBELL, 
 with six illustrations and a Title-page 
 by F. H. TOWN SEND. [zd Edition. 
 
 3. Select Conversations with an Uncle 
 (now extinct), by H. G. WELLS, with 
 a Title-page by F. H. TOWNSEND. 
 
 4. For Plain Women Only, by GEORGE 
 FLEMING, with Title-page by PATTEN 
 WILSON. 
 
 5. The Feasts of Autolycus, the Diary of 
 a Greedy Woman, edited by ELIZABETH 
 ROBINS PENNELL. 
 
 6. Mrs Albert Grundy, Observations in 
 Philistia, by HAROLD FREDERIC. 
 
 (OTHER VOLUMES IN PREPARATION.) 
 
BWTGF 
 
 THMBBIflM-CO 
 
 MPCCCXCVl- 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1896, 
 BY THE MERRIAM COMPANY. 
 
7*7 
 
 PRESENTING IN OUTLINE THE COM 
 FORTABLE AND WELL-REGU 
 LATED PARADOX OVER WHICH 
 SHE PRESIDES, AND SHOWING 
 ITS MENTAL ELEVATION. 
 
I SUPPOSE about the name there is 
 
 no doubt. For sixty years we have \ 
 followed that gifted gadabout and 
 gossip, Heine, and called it Philistia. 
 And yet, when one thinks of it, there 
 may have been a mistake after all. 
 Artemus Ward used to say that he had 
 been able, with effort, to comprehend 
 how it was possible to measure the dis 
 tance between the stars, and even the 
 dimensions and candle-power, so to 
 speak, of those heavenly bodies ; what 
 beat him was how astronomers had 
 ever found out their names. So I find 
 myself wondering whether Philistia 
 really is the right name for the land 
 where She must be obeyed. 
 
8 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 If so, it is only a little more the re 
 gion of mysterious paradox and tricksy 
 metamorphosis. We think of it al 
 ways and from all time as given over 
 to Her rule. We feel in our bones 
 that there was a troglodyte Mrs. 
 Grundy; we imagine to ourselves a 
 British matron contemporary with the 
 cave bear and the woolly elephant. 
 But her very antiquity only makes it 
 more puzzling. 
 
 There is an old gentleman who al 
 ways tries to prove to me that the 
 French are really Germans, that the 
 Germans are all Slavs, and that the 
 Russians are strictly Tartars: that is 
 to say, that in keeping count of the 
 early races as they swarmed Westward 
 we somehow skipped one, and have 
 been wrong ever since. There must 
 
Observations in Philistia 9 
 
 be some such explanation of how the 
 domain which She sways came to be 
 called Philistia. 
 
 I say this, because the old Philistia 
 was tremendously masculine. It was 
 the/ Jews who struck the feminine note. 
 They used to swagger no end when they 
 won a victory, and utilise it to the 
 utmost limit of merciless savagery; 
 but when it came their turn to be 
 thrashed they filled the very heavens 
 with complaining clamour. We got no 
 hint that the Philistines ever failed to 
 take their medicine like men. 
 
 Consider those splendid later Phil 
 istines, the Norsemen. In all their 
 martial literature there is no sugges 
 tion of a whine. They loved fighting 
 for its own sake ; next to braining their 
 foes, they admired being themselves 
 
io Mrs. Albert Grnndy 
 
 hewn into sections. They never 
 blamed their gods when they had the 
 worst of it. They never insisted that 
 they were always right and their 
 enemies invariably wrong. They 
 cared nothing about all that. They 
 demanded only fun. It was their 
 victims, the Prankish and Irish monks, 
 who shed women s tears and besought 
 Providence to play favourites. 
 
 And here is the paradox. The chil 
 dren of these Berserker loins are be 
 come the minions of Mrs. Grundy. 
 By some magic she has enshrined Re 
 spectability in their temples. In one 
 division of her empire she makes Mr. 
 Helmer drink tea; in another she sets 
 everybody reading the Buchholz Family ; 
 in her chosen island home her husband 
 on the sunniest Sundays carries an 
 
Observations in Philistia 1 1 
 
 umbrella instead of a walking-stick. 
 Fancy the wild delirium of delight 
 with which the old Philistines would 
 have raided her homestead, chopping 
 down her Robert Elsmeres, impaling 
 her Horsleys, and making the skies 
 lurid with the flames of her semi-de 
 tached villa! Yet we call her place ^ 
 Philistia! 
 
 I know the villa very well. It is 
 quite near to the South Kensington 
 Museum. The title " Fernbank" is 
 painted on the gate-posts. How well- 
 ordered and comfortable does life be 
 yond those posts remain ! Here are no 
 headaches in the morning. Here 
 white-capped domestics move with neat 
 alertness along the avenues of gentle 
 routine, looking neither to the police 
 man on the right nor fiery-jacketed 
 
12 Mrs. Albert Grimdy 
 
 Thomas Atkins on the left. Here my 
 friend Mr. Albert Grundy invariably 
 comes home by the Underground to 
 dinner. Here his three daughters 
 girls of a type with a diminishing upper 
 lip, with sharper chins and greater 
 length of limb than of old lead deeply 
 washed existences, playing at tennis, 
 smiling in flushed silence at visit 
 ors, feeding contentedly upon Mudie s 
 stores, the while their mamma spreads 
 the matrimonial net about the piano or 
 makes tours of inspection among her 
 outlying mantraps on the lawn. Here 
 simpers the innocuous curate; here 
 Uncle Dudley, who has seen life in 
 Australia and the Far West, watches 
 the bulbs and prunes the roses, and, I 
 should think, yawns often to himself; 
 here Lady Willoughby Wallaby s card 
 
Observations in Philistia 13 
 
 diffuses refinement from the summit of 
 the card-basket in the hall. 
 
 To this happy home there came but 
 last week or was it the week before 
 a parcel of books. There were four 
 complete novels in twelve volumes - 
 fruits of that thoughtful arrangement 
 by which the fair reader in Philistia is 
 given three distinct opportunities tc 
 decide whether she will read the story 
 through or not. Mrs. Albert is a busy^ 
 woman, burdened with manifold re 
 sponsibilities to Church and State, to 
 organised charities, to popularised 
 music, to art-work guilds and the 
 Amalgamated Association of Clear 
 Starchers, not to mention a weather- 
 eye kept at all times upon all unmarried 
 males : but she still finds time to open 
 all these packets of new books herself. 
 
14 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 On this occasion she gave to her eldest, 
 Ermyntrude, the first volume of a 
 
 novel by Mrs. . It doesn t matter 
 
 what fell to the share of the younger 
 Amy and Floribel. For herself she 
 reserved the three volumes of the latest 
 
 work of Mr. . 
 
 She tells me now that words simply 
 can not express her thankfulness for 
 having done so. It seems the selec 
 tion was not entirely accidental. She 
 was attracted, she admits, by the 
 charmingly dainty binding of the vol 
 umes, but she was also moved by an 
 instinct, half maternal prescience, half 
 literary recollection. She thought she 
 remembered having seen the name of 
 this man-writer before. Where? It 
 came to her like a flash, she says. 
 Only a while ago he had a book called 
 
Observations in Philistia 15 
 
 A Bunch of Patrician Ladies or some 
 thing of that sort, which she almost 
 made up her mind not to let the girls 
 read at all, but at last, with some mis 
 givings, permitted them to skim hastily, 
 because, though the morals were rocky 
 perhaps that wasn t her word the 
 society was very good. But this new 
 book of his had not even that saving 
 feature. Respectable people were only 
 incidentally mentioned in it. Really 
 it was quite too low. The chief figure 
 was a farm-girl who for the most part 
 skimmed milk or cut swedes in a field, 
 and at other times behaved in a man 
 ner positively unmentionable. Mrs. 
 Albert told me she had locked the vol 
 umes up, after only partially perusing 
 them. I might be sure her daughters 
 never laid eyes on them. They had 
 
1 6 Mrs. Albert Grnndy 
 
 gone back to the library, with a note 
 expressing surprise that such immoral 
 books should be sent into any Christian 
 family. What made the matter worse, 
 she went on, was that Ermyntrude read 
 in some paper, at a friend s house, that 
 this man, whoever he may be, was the 
 greatest of English novelists, and that 
 this particular book of his was a tragic 
 work of the noblest and loftiest order, 
 which dignified the language. She 
 was sure she didn t know what Eng 
 land was coming to, when reporters 
 were allowed to put things like that in 
 the papers. Fortunately she took in 
 TJie Daily Tarradiddle, which one could 
 always rely upon for sound views, and 
 which gave this unspeakable book pre 
 cisely the contemptuous little notice it 
 deserved. 
 
Observations in PJiilistia 17 
 
 It was a relief, however and here 
 the good matron visibly brightened up 
 to think that really wholesome and 
 improving novels were still produced. 
 
 There was that novel by Mrs. . 
 
 Had I read it? Oh, I must lose no time ! 
 Perhaps it was not altogether so en 
 chanting as that first immortal work of 
 hers, which had almost, one might say, 
 founded a new religion. True, one of 
 the girls in it worked altar-cloths for 
 a church, and occasionally the other 
 characters broke out into religious con 
 versation ; but there were no clergy 
 men to speak of, and the charm of the 
 other s ecclesiastical mysticism was 
 lacking. "To be frank, the first and 
 last volumes were just a bit slow. But 
 oh! the lovely second volume! A 
 young Englishman and his sister go to 
 
1 8 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 Paris. They stumble right at the start 
 into the most delightful, picturesque, 
 artistic set. Think of it : Henri Reg- 
 nault is personally introduced, and de 
 livers himself of extended remarks " 
 
 " I met an old friend of Regnault s 
 at the Club the other day," I interposed, 
 "who complained bitterly of that. He 
 said it was insufferable impudence to 
 bring him in at all, and still worse to 
 make him talk such blather as is put 
 into his mouth." 
 
 Mrs. Albert sniffed at this Club friend 
 and went on. That Paris part of the 
 book seemed to her to just palpitate 
 with life. It was Paris to the very 
 letter gay, intellectual, sparkling, 
 and oh ! so free ! The young English 
 man at once set up a romantic establish 
 ment in the heart of Fontainebleau 
 
Observations in Philistia 19 
 
 Forest with a French painter-girl. His 
 sister was almost as promptly debauched 
 by an elderly French sculptor. But 
 you never lost sight of the fact that the 
 author was teaching a valiiable moral 
 lesson by all this. Indeed, that whole 
 part of the book was called " Storm and 
 Stress." And all the while you saw, 
 too, how innately superior the na- 1 
 tional character of the young English 
 man was to that of the French people 
 about him. One knew that in good 
 time he would have a moral awakening, 
 and return to England, marry, settle 
 down, and make money in his business. 
 Side by side with this you saw the 
 entire hopelessness of any spiritual re 
 generation in the French painter-girl 
 or any of her artistic set. And this was 
 shown with such delicate art it was so 
 
2O Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 perfect, a picture of the moral contrast 
 between the two nations that the girls 
 saw it at once. 
 
 "Then the girls," I put in "that is 
 to say, you didn t lock this book up?" 
 
 Mrs. Albert lifted her eyebrows at 
 me. " How do you mean?" she asked. 
 " Do you know who the author is ? The 
 idea! Why, the papers print whole 
 columns about anything she writes. 
 Every day you may see paragraphs 
 about the mere prospect of books she 
 hasn t even begun yet. I suppose such 
 blatant publicity must be very distress 
 ing to her, but the public simply insist 
 upon it. The Daily Tarradiddle devoted 
 an entire leader to this particular book. 
 I assure you, all my friends are talking 
 of nothing else many of them people, 
 too, whom you would not suspect of any 
 
Observations in PJiilistia 21 
 
 literary tastes whatever, and who never 
 read novels as a rule. But they don t 
 regard this as a novel. They think of 
 it I quote Lady Willoughby Wallaby s 
 exact words as an exposition of those 
 Christian principles which make our 
 England what it is." 
 
SETTING FORTH THE UNTOWARD 
 CIRCUMSTANCES UNDER WHICH 
 THE RIGHT TALE WAS UN 
 FOLDED IN THE WRONG COM 
 PANY. 
 
\ II UCH has been written about that 
 
 variety of "cab-wit" which oc- - 
 curs to a man on his way home from 
 dinner: the brilliant sallies he might 
 have made, the smart retorts which 
 would so bravely have reversed the 
 balance of laughter had they only come 
 in time. We are less frank about the 
 other sort. No one dwells in type upon 
 the manner in which we marshal our 
 old jokes and arrange our epigrams as 
 we drive along to the house of feasting. 
 No doubt the practice of getting up 
 table-talk is going out. The three-\ 
 bottle men took it to the grave with 
 them, along with the snuff-box, and the 
 
 toupee, and the feather-bed, and other 
 25 
 
26 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 amenities of the Regency. There 
 never was but one diner-out in the 
 London of my knowledge who was at 
 pains to prepare his conversations, each 
 for its special occasion and audience, 
 and he, poor man, broke down under 
 the strain and disappeared from view. 
 The others are too lazy, too indifferent, 
 too cocksure of themselves, to go to all 
 this bother. The old courtly sense of 
 responsibility to the host is perished 
 from among them. But none the less, 
 the least dutiful and diligent of all 
 their number does ask himself ques 
 tions as the whirling rubber tyres bear 
 him onward, and the cab-mirror shows 
 him the face of a man to whom people 
 ought to listen. 
 
 The question I asked myself, as I 
 drove past the flaring shop windows of 
 
Observations in Philistia 27 
 
 Old Brompton Road the other evening, 
 was whether the Grundys would prob 
 ably like my story of Nate Salsbury and 
 the Citizen of South Bend, Indiana. A 
 good deal depended upon the decision. 
 It was a story which had greatly solidi 
 fied my position in other hospitable 
 quarters ; it could be brought in apropos 
 of almost anything, or for that matter 
 of quite nothing at all; it had never 
 been printed, so far as I know, in any 
 of those American comic papers which 
 supply alike the dining-rooms of May- 
 fair and the editorial offices of Fleet 
 Street with such humor as they come 
 into possession of; and I enjoyed tell 
 ing it. On the other hand, the Grundys 
 were old friends of mine, who would 
 never suspect that they had missed 
 anything if I preserved silence on the 
 
28 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 subject of South Bend, and who would 
 go on asking me to dinner whether I 
 told new tales or not; moreover, their 
 r attitude toward fresh jokes was always 
 a precarious quantity, and I had an 
 uneasy feeling that if I told my story 
 to them and it failed to come off, so to 
 speak, I should never have the same 
 confidence in it again. When I had 
 entered the drawing-room of Fernbank, 
 shaken hands with Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 and Ermyntrude, and stolen a little 
 glance about the circle as I walked over 
 to the fireplace, it had become clear 
 that the story was not to be told. Be 
 side the half-dozen of the family, in 
 cluding the curate, there was a tall 
 young man with a very high collar, 
 shoulders that sloped down like a 
 Rhine-wine bottle, and a stern expres- 
 
Observations in Philistia 29 
 
 sion of countenance. Uncle Dudley 
 whispered to me, as we held our hands 
 over the asbestos, that he was a literary 
 party, and the son of old Sir Watkyn 
 Hump, who was a director in one of 
 Albert s companies. The other guests 
 were a stout and motherly lady in a cap 
 and a purplish smile, and a darkling 
 young woman with a black velvet rib 
 bon around her thin neck, and a look 
 of wearied indifference upon her face. 
 This effect of utter boredom did not 
 visibly diminish upon my being pre 
 sented to Miss Wallaby. 
 
 I have an extremely well-turned little 
 brace of sentences with which to convey 
 the intelligence to a young lady that 
 the honor of taking her down to dinner 
 has fallen upon me sentences which 
 combine professions of admiring pleas- 
 
30 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 ure with just a grateful dash of respect 
 ful playfulness; they brought no new 
 light into Miss Wallaby s somewhat 
 scornful pince-nez. Decidedly I would 
 not tell my South Bend story that night ! 
 But all the same I did. What led up 
 to it I hardly know. It was at the 
 ptarmigan stage, I remember or was 
 it a capercailzie? and young Mr. 
 Hump had commented upon the great 
 joy of living in England, where one 
 could enjoy delicious game all the year 
 round, instead of in a country like 
 America, where the inhabitants notori 
 ously had nothing but fried salt pork 
 to eat for many months at a time. 
 Perhaps it was not worth while, but I 
 ventured the correcting remark that 
 there was no season of the year when 
 one couldn t have eighteen edible 
 
Observations in PJiilistia 31 
 
 varieties of wild birds in America for 
 every one that England has ever heard 
 of. Mr. Hump preened his chin about 
 on the summit of his collar and smiled 
 with superior incredulity. The others 
 looked grave. Mrs. Grundy whispered 
 to me warningly , over her left shoulder, 
 that Mr. Hump had made America his 
 special subject, and wrote most vigor 
 ous and comminatory articles about it 
 almost every week. I was painfully 
 conscious that Miss Wallaby s cold 
 right shoulder had been still further 
 withdrawn from me. 
 
 Well, it was at this grotesquely in 
 auspicious moment that I told my story. 
 It is easy enough now to see that it was 
 sheer folly, madness if you like, to do 
 so. I was only too bitterly conscious 
 of that when I reviewed the events of 
 
32 Mrs. Albert Grnndy 
 
 the evening in my homeward cab. It 
 was apropos of nothing under the wide 
 sky. But at the moment, I suppose, I 
 hoped that it would relieve the situa 
 tion. In one sense it did. 
 
 Baldly summarised, this is the tale. 
 Years ago the admirable Nate Sals- 
 bury was on a "one-night-stand" tour 
 with his bright little company of come 
 dians through the least urban districts 
 of Indiana, and came upon South Bend, 
 which is an important centre of the 
 wagon-making industry, but is not 
 precisely a focussing point of dramatic 
 traditions and culture. In the vesti 
 bule of the small theatre that evening 
 there paced up and down a tall, middle- 
 aged, weasel-backed citizen, his hands 
 plunged deep in his pockets, doubt and 
 irresolution written all over his face. 
 
Observations in Philistia 33 
 
 As others paid their money and passed 
 in he would watch them with obvious 
 longing ; then he would go and study 
 once more the attractive coloured bill of 
 the Company, with its bevy of pretty 
 girls in skirts just short enough to dis 
 close most enticing little ankles ; then 
 once more he would resume his per 
 plexed walk to and fro. At last he 
 made up his mind, and approached 
 Salsbury with diffidence. "Mister," 
 he said, " air you the boss of this show?" 
 " What can I do for you?" asked Nate. 
 " Well no offence meant but can I 
 that is to say will it be all right to 
 bring a lady to your show?" "That, 
 sir, depends!" responded the manager 
 firmly. "Well," the citizen went on, 
 " what I was gittin at is this can I be 
 perfectly safe in bringin my wife here?" 
 
34 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 "Sir," said Salsbury with dignity, and 
 an eye trained to abstain from twink 
 ling, " it is no portion of my business 
 to inquire whether she is your wife or 
 not, but if she comes in here she s got 
 to behave herself!" 
 
 A solitary note of laughter fell upon 
 the air when I had told this story, and 
 on the instant Uncle Dudley, perceiv 
 ing that he had made a mistake, dropped 
 his napkin, and came up from fishing 
 for it on the floor red-faced and dumb. 
 All else was deadly silence. 
 
 "I I suppose they really weren t 
 married at all?" said the curate, after 
 a chilling pause. 
 
 " Marriage, I regret to say, means 
 next to nothing in most parts of 
 America," remarked Mr. Hump, judi 
 cially. "The most sacred ties are 
 
Observations in Philistia 35 
 
 there habitually made the subject of 
 ribald jests. I have been assured by 
 a person who spent nearly three weeks 
 in the United States some years since 
 that it is an extremely rare experience 
 to meet an adult American who has not 
 been divorced at least once. This fact 
 made a vivid impression on my mind 
 at the time, and I ahem! have 
 written frequently upon it since." 
 
 " I suppose the trouble arises from 
 their all living in hotels having no 
 home life whatever," said Mrs Albert, 
 with a kindly air of coming to my 
 rescue. 
 
 " Who on earth told you that?" I be 
 gan, but was cut short. 
 
 "I confess," broke in Miss Wallaby, 
 with frosty distinctness of tone and 
 enunciation, " that the assumption upon 
 
36 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 which the incident just related is based 
 x the assumption that the la woman 
 referred to would probably misconduct 
 herself in a place of public resort- 
 seems to me startlingly characteristic 
 of the country of which it is narrated. 
 It has been truly said that the most 
 valuable test of a country s actual, as 
 
 , distinct from its assumed, worth, is the 
 / 
 respect it pays to its women. Both at 
 
 Cheltenham and at Newnham the idea 
 is steadily inculcated I might say in 
 sisted upon as of paramount importance 
 that the nation s real civilization rests 
 upon the measure, not alone of chival 
 rous deference, but of esteem and con 
 fidence which my sex, by its devotion 
 to duty, and its intellectual sympathy 
 with broad aims and lofty purposes, is 
 able to inspire and command." 
 
Observations in Philistia 37 
 
 "But I assure you," I protested 
 feebly, "the story I told was a joke." 
 
 "There are some subjects," inter 
 posed Lady Willoughby Wallaby, the 
 fixed smile lighting up with an angry, 
 winter-sunset glow her inflamed coun 
 tenance " there are some subjects on 
 which it is best not to joke." 
 
 As she spoke she wagged a mitted 
 thumb at her hostess, and on the in 
 stant the ladies rose. Mr. Hump hast 
 ened round to hold the door open as 
 they filed out, their heads high in air, 
 their skirts rustling indignantly over 
 the threshold. Then he followed 
 them, closing the door with decision 
 behind him. 
 
 "Gad, Albert," said Uncle Dudley, 
 reaching over for the port, "I don t 
 wonder that the pick of our young fel- 
 
38 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 lows go in for marrying American 
 girls." 
 
 " Pass it along !" remarked the father 
 of Mrs. Albert s three daughters, in a 
 \ voice of confirmed dejection. 
 
ANNOTATING SUNDRY POINTS OF 
 CONTACT FOUND TO EXIST BE 
 TWEEN THE LADY AND CON 
 TEMPORARY ART. 
 
SCENE. Just inside the door of a studio. 
 TIME. Last Sunday in March, 5 p.m. 
 
 ist CITIZENESS. O, thank you so much ! 
 
 2nd do. So good of you to come ! 
 
 ist do. I so dote upon art! 
 
 2nd do. So kind of you to say so ! 
 
 ist do. Thank you so much for asking us! 
 
 2nd do. Delighted, I m sure Thank 
 you for coming ! 
 
 ist CITIZENESS. Not at all ! Thank you for 
 for thanking me for Well good-\*yQ. (Exit 
 with family group.} 
 
 HUSBAND OF 2nd CITIZENESS (with gloom}. 
 And who might those thankful bounders be? 
 
 2nd CITIZENESS (wearily}. O, don t ask me! 
 /don t know ! From Addison Road waj , I should 
 think. 
 
 ist CITIZENESS (outside}. Well! If that thing 
 gets into the Academy ! 
 
 FAMILY GROUP. Did you notice the ridiculous 
 way her hair was done ? Did you ever taste such 
 tea in your life? How yellow Mrs. General 
 Wragg is getting to look in the daylight. Yes- 
 there s our four-wheeler. (Exeunt omnes.} 
 
 40 
 
""pHE above is not intended for pres 
 entation upon any stage not 
 even that of the Independent Theatre. 
 It has been cast into the dramatic 
 mould merely for convenience sake. 
 It embodies what I chiefly remember 
 about Picture Sunday. 
 
 It has come to be my annual duty a 
 peculiarly hardy, not to say temerari 
 ous, annual to convoy Mrs. Albert 
 Grundy and her party about sections of 
 Chelsea and Brompton on the earlier of 
 the two Show Sabbaths. I drifted into 
 this function through having once 
 shared an attic with a young painter, 
 whose colleagues used to come to bor 
 row florins of him whenever one of his 
 41 
 
42 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 pictures disappeared from any shop 
 window, and so incidentally formed 
 my acquaintance. My claim nowadays 
 upon their recollection is really very 
 slight. I just know them well enough 
 to manage the last Sunday in March : 
 even that might be awkward if they 
 were not such good-natured fellows. 
 
 But it would be difficult to persuade 
 Mrs. Albert of this. That good lady is 
 wont, when the playfully benignant 
 mood is upon her, to describe me as her 
 connecting link with Bohemia. She 
 [irobably would be puzzled to explain 
 her meaning; I certainly should. But 
 if she were provided with affidavits 
 setting forth the whole truth viz., 
 that my entire income is derived from 
 an inherited part-interest in an artificial- 
 ice machine; that there are two clergy- 
 
Observations in Philistia 43 
 
 men on the committee of my only club ; 
 that I am free from debt; and that I 
 play duets on the piano with my sister 
 still would she cling to the belief that 
 I am a young man with an extremely 
 gay, rakish side, who could make thrill 
 ing revelations of Bohemia if I would. 
 Of course, I am never questioned on 
 the subject , but I can see that it is a 
 point upon which the faith of Fern- 
 bank is firmly grounded. Often Mrs. 
 Albert s conversation cuts figure-eights 
 on very thin ice when we are alone, as 
 if just to show me that she knows. ^ 
 More than once I have discovered 
 Ermyntrude looking furtively at me, 
 as the wistful shepherd-boy on the 
 plains of Dura might have gazed at the 
 distant haze overhanging bold, un 
 speakable Babylon. I rarely visit the 
 
44 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 house but Uncle Dudley winks at me. 
 However, nothing is ever asked me 
 about the dreadful things with which 
 they suppose me to be upon intimate 
 terms. 
 
 It seemed for a long time, on Sun 
 day, as if an easy escape had been 
 arranged for me by Providence. At 
 two o clock, the hour appointed for our 
 crusade, a heavy fog overhung every 
 thing. Looking out from the drawing- 
 room windows, only the very nearest 
 of the neatly trimmed firs on the lawn 
 were to be distinguished. The street 
 beyond was utter blackness. 
 
 At three o clock the ladies took off 
 their bonnets. It was really too bad. 
 Uncle Dudley, strolling in from his nap 
 in the library, suggested that with a 
 lantern we might visit some of the near 
 
Observations in Philistia 45 
 
 studios: "not necessarily for publica 
 tion, but as a guarantee of good faith." 
 Mrs. Albert turned a look of tearful 
 vexation upon him, before which he 
 fled. 
 
 "There s this consolation," she re 
 marked presently, holding me with an 
 unwavering eye : " if we are to be de 
 frauded out of our expedition to-day, 
 that will furnish all the more reason 
 why you should take us next Sunday 
 the Sunday. You have often talked of 
 having us see the Academicians at home 
 but we ve never been." 
 
 " I remember that there has been talk 
 about it," I said; "but hardly that the 
 talk was mine. Truth is, I don t know 
 a single Academician, even by sight." 
 
 It was clear that they did not believe 
 me. Mrs. Albert continued: "Lady 
 
46 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 Wallaby expressed surprise, only last 
 evening, that we should consent to go 
 about among the outsiders. She and 
 her daughter never do." 
 
 " Outsiders !" I was tempted into say 
 ing. " Why, they can paint the head 
 off the Academy!" 
 
 Miss Timby-Hucks simpered out 
 right. " You do say such droll things !" 
 she remarked, somewhat obscurely. 
 " Mamma always declares that you re 
 mind her of the Sydney Bulletin" 
 
 " Whom do you take to the Academy 
 Show Sunday? or perhaps I oughtn t 
 to ask," came from Ermyntrude. 
 
 "No, we have no right to inquire," 
 said Mrs. Albert ; and I turned to the 
 window and the enshrouded lawn once 
 more. 
 
 All at once the fog lifted. The bon- 
 
Observations in PJdlistia 47 
 
 nets were produced again. Nearly 
 three hours of daylight remained to us. 
 Tidings that the horse was too lame 
 to be taken out only staggered Mrs. 
 Albert for the briefest fraction of time. 
 There were still four-wheelers in 
 Gilead. Besides, if the driver hap 
 pened to be sober, he would know the 
 streets so much better than their stupid 
 coachman. This would be of advan 
 tage, because time was so limited. We 
 should have to just run in, say " How- 
 d ye-do," take a flying look round, and 
 scamper out again, Mrs. Albert said. 
 By firmly adhering to this rule, she 
 estimated that we might do sixteen or 
 seventeen studios. 
 
 Heaven alone knows how many we 
 did "do." Nor have I any clear recol 
 lections of what we saw. A confused 
 
48 Mrs. Albert Grnndy 
 
 vision remains to me of long hall-ways 
 lined with frames and packing-cases; 
 half -an -acre, more or less, of painted 
 canvas, out of which only here and 
 there a pair of bright eyes, a glowing 
 field of poppies, or the sheen from a 
 satin gown, fixed itself disconnectedly 
 on the memory ; hordes and hordes of 
 tall young women helping themselves 
 to tea and cakes; and always the 
 pathetic figure of the artist s wife, or 
 sister, tired to very death, standing by 
 the door with a wearied smile on her 
 lips, and the polite falsehood, " So good 
 of you to come!" on her tongue. I 
 wondered, I remember, if she never 
 forgot herself and said instead, " So 
 kind of you to go!" But under Mrs. 
 Albert s system there was no time to 
 wait and see. 
 
Observations in Philistia 49 
 
 Once, indeed, we dallied over our 
 task. Mrs. Albert encountered a lady 
 from Wormwood Scrubs of her ac 
 quaintance, who was indiscreet enough 
 to mention that she had been asked to 
 stop here for supper. The news spread 
 through the petticoated portion of my 
 group as by magic. Miss Timby- 
 Hucks came over and asked me, so 
 audibly that the artist-host had to blush 
 and turn away, if I didn t think it 
 would be a deliciously romantic experi 
 ence to sup in one of these lofty studios, 
 with the gaslight on the armor, and the 
 great, solemnly silent pictures looking 
 down upon us as we ate. Mrs. Albert 
 lingered for some time looking at this 
 artist s work with her head on one side, 
 and eyes filled with rapt, dreamy en 
 joyment but nothing came of it. 
 
5O Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 It was after we had been back in 
 Fernbank for an hour or more oui 
 own cold repast nearly over that Mrs. 
 Albert thought of something. She laid 
 down her fork with a gesture of an 
 noyance. " It has just occurred to me, " 
 she said ; " we never went to that Mr. 
 Whistler s, whose pictures are on ex 
 hibition in Bond Street. Everybody s 
 talking about him, and I did so want 
 not to miss his studio." 
 
 "I don t think he has a Show Sun 
 day," I said. "I never heard of it, if 
 he has." 
 
 " O no, it is only these last few weeks 
 that anybody has heard of him," Mrs. 
 Albert replied. "I read the first an 
 nouncement about his beautiful pictures 
 in The Daily Tarradiddlc only the other 
 day." 
 
Observations in Philistia 5 I 
 
 "Whistler? Whistler?" put in 
 Uncle Dudley. " Why, surely he s not 
 new. Why I remember he was 
 mixed up in a law-suit, wasn t it, years 
 ago?" 
 
 "O no, Dudley," responded Mrs. 
 Albert; " I was under that same im 
 pression, till Lady Wallaby set me 
 right. It seems that was another man 
 altogether some foreign adventurer 
 who pretended to be able to paint and 
 imposed upon people don t you recall 
 how The Tarradiddle exposed him? 
 and Mr. Burnt-Jones had him arrested, 
 or something O, quite a dreadful per 
 son. But this Mr. Whistler is an Eng 
 lishman. I read in The Illustrated 
 London News that he represented 
 modern British Art. That alone 
 would make it quite clear it was a dif- 
 
52 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 ferent man. I did so want to see him ! 
 
 
 
 Lady Wallaby tells me she has heard 
 he is extremely amusing in his conver 
 sation and quite presentable manners, 
 too." 
 
 " Why don t you ask him to dinner?" 
 said Mr. Albert Grundy. "If he s 
 amusing it s more than most of the 
 men you drum up are." 
 
 " You seem to think everybody can be 
 asked to dinner, Albert," the lady of 
 the house replied. " Artists don t dine 
 unless they are in the Academy, of 
 course. Tea, yes or perhaps supper; 
 but one doesn t ask people to meet 
 them at dinner. It s like actors and 
 and non-commissioned officers." 
 
AFFORDING A NOVEL AND SUB 
 DUED SCIENTIFIC LIGHT, BY 
 WHICH DIVERS VENERABLE 
 PROBLEMS MAY BE OBSERVED 
 AFRESH. 
 
"IT is my opinion," said Uncle Dud 
 ley, stretching out his slippered 
 feet, and thrusting his thumbs into the 
 
 armholes of his waistcoat "it is my 
 
 Lr 
 
 opinion that women are different from 
 men." 
 
 "Several commentators have ad 
 vanced this view," I replied. "For 
 example, it has been noted that the 
 gentle sex cross a muddy street on their 
 heels, whereas we skip over on our 
 toes." 
 
 "That is interesting if true," re 
 sponded Uncle Dudley. "What I 
 mean is that all this talk about the 
 human race is humbug. There are 
 two human races ! And they are get- ^ 
 
 55 
 
56 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 ting wider apart every few minutes, 
 too!" 
 
 " Have you mentioned this to any 
 one?" I asked. 
 
 Uncle Dudley went on developing his 
 theme. " I dare say that for millions 
 of years after the re-separation of the 
 sexes this difference was too slight to 
 be noticed at all. The cave man, for 
 
 /instance the fellow who went around 
 hunting the Ichthyosaurus with a brick 
 tied on the end of an elm club, and 
 spent the whole winter underground 
 sucking the old bones, and then whit 
 tling them up into Runic buttons for 
 
 v the South Kensington Museum: I sup 
 pose, now, that his wife and sister-in- 
 law, say, didn t strike him as being 
 specially different from himself ex 
 cept, of course, in that they only got 
 
Observations in Philistia 57 
 
 plain bones and gristle and so on to 
 eat, whereas all the marrow and gen 
 eral smooth-sailing in meats went his 
 way. You can t imagine him saying 
 to himself: These female people here 
 are not of my race at all. They are of 
 another species. They are in reality 
 as much my natural enemies as that 
 long - toed, red - headed, brachycepha- 
 lous tramp living in the gum-tree down 
 by the swamp, who makes offensive 
 gestures as I ride past on my tame 
 Ursus speloeus now, can you?" 
 
 I frankly shook my head. "No, 
 I don t seem to be able to imagine 
 that. It would be almost as hard as to 
 guess off-hand where, when, and how 
 you caught this remarkable scientific 
 spasm." 
 
 Uncle Dudley smiled. He rose, and 
 
58 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 walked with leisurely lightness up and 
 down in front of the chimney-piece, 
 still with his palms spread like little 
 misplaced wings before his armpits. 
 He smiled again. Then he stopped on 
 the hearth-rug and looked down ami 
 ably upon me. 
 
 "Well what d ye think? There s 
 something in it, eh?" 
 
 "My dear fellow," I began, "what 
 puzzles me is " 
 
 "O, I don t mean to say that I ve 
 worked it all out," put in Uncle Dud 
 ley reassuringly. " Why, I get puz 
 zled myself, every once in a while. 
 But I m on the right track, my boy; 
 and, as they say in Adelaide, I m 
 going to hang to it like a pup to a 
 root." 
 
 " How long have you been this way?" 
 
Observations in Philistia 59 
 
 I asked, with an affectation of sym 
 pathy. 
 
 Uncle Dudley answered with shining 
 eyes. "Why, if you ll believe me, it 
 seems now as if I d had the germs of 
 the idea in my mind ever since I came 
 back to England, and began living here 
 at Fernbank. But the thing dawned 
 upon me that is to say, took shape in 
 my head less than a fortnight ago. I 
 all came about through being up here 
 one evening with nothing to read, and 
 my toe worse than usual, and Mrs. Al 
 bert having been out of sorts all 
 through dinner. Somehow, I felt all 
 at once that I d got to read scientific 
 works, I couldn t resist it. I was like 
 Joan of Arc when the cows and sheep 
 took partners for a quadrille. I heard 
 voices Darwin s and and Benjamin 
 
60 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 Franklin s and lots of others. I 
 hobbled downstairs to the library, and 
 I brought up a whole armful of the 
 books that Mrs. Albert bought when 
 she expected Lady Wallaby was going 
 to be able to get her an invitation to at 
 tend the Hon. Mrs. Coon-Alwyn s Bio 
 logical Conversaziones. Look there! 
 What do you say to that for ten days 
 work ? And had to cut every leaf, into 
 the bargain ! 
 
 I gazed with respect at the consider 
 able row of books he indicated : books 
 for the most part bound in the scarlet 
 of the International Series or the ma 
 roon of Contemporary Science, but con 
 taining also brown covers, and even 
 green " sport" varieties. 
 
 "Well, and what is it all about?" I 
 asked. "Why have you read these 
 
Observations in Philistia 61 
 
 things? Why not the reports of the. 
 Commission on Agricultural Depres 
 sion, or Lewis Morris poems, or even " 
 but my imagination faltered and broke. 
 
 "It was instinct, my boy," returned 
 Uncle Dudley, with impressive confi 
 dence. " There had been a thought 
 a great idea growing and swelling in 
 my head ever since I had been living 
 in this house. But I couldn t tell what 
 it was. As you might say, it was 
 wrapped up in a cocoon, like the larvae 
 of the lepidoptera ahem ! and some 
 thing was needed to bring it out." 
 
 " When I was here last you were try 
 ing Hollands with quinine bitters," I 
 remarked casually. 
 
 "Don t fool!" Uncle Dudley admon 
 ished me. "I m dead in earnest. As 
 I said, it was pure instinct that led me 
 
62 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 to these books. They have made 
 everything clear. I only wanted their 
 help to get the husk off my discovery, 
 and hoist it on my back, as it were, 
 and bring it out here in the daylight. 
 And so now you know what I m get 
 ting at when I say: Women are differ 
 ent from Men." 
 
 "That is the discovery, then?" I 
 inquired. 
 
 Uncle Dudley nodded several times. 
 
 Then he went on, with emphasised 
 slowness : " I have lived here now for 
 four years, seeing my sister-in-law 
 every day, watching Ermyntrude grow 
 up to womanhood and the little girls 
 peg along behind her, and meeting the 
 female friends who come here to see 
 them and, sir, I tell you, they re not 
 alone a different sex: they re a differ- 
 
Observations in Philistia 63 
 
 ent animal altogether ! Take my word 
 for it, they re a species by themselves." 
 
 " Miss Timby-Hucks is certainly very 
 much by herself," I remarked. 
 
 My friend smiled. " And not alto 
 gether her own fault either," he com 
 mented. " But, speaking of science, 
 it s remarkable how, when you once 
 get a firm grip on a big, central, main- 
 guy fact, all the little facts come in of 
 their own accord to support it. Now, 
 there s that young simpleton you met 
 here at dinner a while ago : I mean Eu 
 stace Hump. Do you know that both 
 Ermyntrude and the Timby - Hucks, 
 and even Miss Wallaby, think that that 
 chap is a perfect ideal of masculine wit 
 and beauty? You and I would hesitate 
 about using him to wad a horse-pistol 
 with: but there isn t one of those girls 
 
64 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 that wouldn t leap with joy if he began 
 proposing to her; and as for their 
 mothers, why, the old ladies watch him 
 as a kingfisher eyes a tadpole?^? 
 
 "Your similes are exciting," I said; 
 " but what do they go to show?" 
 
 "My dear fellow, science can show 
 anything. I haven t gone all through 
 it yet, but I tell you, it s wonderful! 
 Take this, for instance" he reached 
 for a green book on the mantel, and 
 turned over the leaves " now listen 
 to this. The book is written by a man 
 named Wallace nice, shrewd-looking 
 old party by his picture, you can see 
 and this is what he says on page 285 : 
 Some peahens preferred an old pied 
 peacock ; a Canada goose paired with a 
 Bernicle gander; a male widgeon was 
 preferred by a pintail duck to its own 
 
Observations in Philistia 65 
 
 species ; a hen canary preferred a male 
 greenfinch to either linnet, goldfinch, 
 siskin, or chaffinch. Now, do you see 
 that? The moment my eyes first 
 lighted on that, I said to myself : * Now 
 I understand about the girls and Eu 
 stace Hump. Isn t it clear to you?" 
 
 "Absolutely," I assented. "You 
 ought to read a paper at the Royal 
 Aquarium before the Balloon Society, 
 I mean." 
 
 "And then look at this," Uncle Dud 
 ley went on, with animation. "Now, 
 you and I would ask ourselves what on 
 earth such a gawky, spindling, poor- 
 witted youngster as that thought he 
 was doing among women, anyhow. 
 But you turn over the page, and here 
 you have it: /Goat-suckers, geese, car 
 rion vultures, and many other birds of 
 
66 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 plain plumage have been observed to 
 dance, spread their wings or tails, and 
 perform strange love-antics. Doesn t 
 that fasten Hump to the wall like a 
 beetle on a pin, eh?" 
 
 " But I am not sure that I entirely 
 follow its application to your original 
 point," I suggested. 
 
 " About women, you mean ? My boy, 
 in science everything applies. The 
 woods are full of applications. But 
 seriously, women arc different. As I 
 said, in the barbarism at the back of 
 beyond this divergence started. With 
 the beginning of what we call civiliza 
 tion, it became more and more marked. 
 The progress of the separation in 
 creases nowadays by square-root or 
 whatever you call it. The sexes are 
 wider apart to-day than ever. They 
 
Observations in Philistia 67 
 
 like each other less ; they quarrel more. 
 You can see that in the Divorce Courts, 
 in the diminished proportion of early 
 marriages, in the increasing evidences 
 of domestic infelicity all about one." 
 
 I could not refrain from expressing 
 the fear that all this boded ill for the 
 perpetuity of the human race. 
 
 Uncle Dudley is a light-hearted man. 
 He was not depressed by the apprehen 
 sions to which I had given utterance. 
 Instead he hummed pleasantly to him 
 self as he put Wallace back on the 
 shelf. He began chuckling as a mo 
 ment later he bethought himself to fill 
 our glasses afresh. 
 
 "Did I ever tell you my cat story?" 
 he asked cheerily, testing the knob to 
 see that the door was shut. "Once a 
 little boy came in to his father and 
 
68 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 said: Pa, we won t be troubled any 
 more with those cats howling about on 
 our roof at night. I ve just been look 
 ing out of the upstairs window, and 
 they re all out there fighting and 
 screaming and tearing each other to 
 pieces. There won t be one of them 
 alive by morning! Then the father 
 replied :<My son, you imagine a vain 
 thing. When increasing years shall 
 have furnished your mind with a more 
 copious store of knowledge, you will 
 grasp the fact that all this commotion 
 and dire disturbance which you report 
 to me only signifies more cats." 
 
 At this juncture the servant came in 
 with the soda-water. We talked no 
 more of science that evening. 
 
TOUCHING THE EXPERIMENTAL 
 GRAFT OF A UTILITARIAN SPIRIT 
 UPON THE ESTHETIC INSTINCT 
 IN OUR SISTERS. 
 
I HAD strolled about the galleries of 
 Burlington House for a couple of 
 hours on Press Day, looking a little 
 at pictures here and there, but for the 
 most part contemplating with admira 
 tion the zeal and good faith of the 
 ladies and gentlemen who stopped, 
 note-book in hand, before every frame: 
 when some one behind me gave a 
 friendly tug at my sleeve. I turned, to 
 find myself confronted by a person I 
 seemed not to know a small young wo 
 man in an alpine hat and a veil which 
 masked everything about her face ex 
 cept its dentigerous smile. Even as I 
 looked I was conscious of regret that, 
 
 if acquaintances were to be made for 
 
 71 
 
72 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 me in this spontaneous fashion, des 
 tiny had not selected instead a certain 
 tall, slender, dark young lady, clad all 
 in black and cocks plumes, whom I 
 had been watching at her work of 
 note-taking in room after room, with 
 growing interest. Then, peering more 
 closely through the veil, I discovered 
 that I was being accosted by Miss 
 Timby-Hucks. 
 
 "You didn t know me!" she said, 
 with a vivacious half-giggle, as we 
 shook hands; "and you re not specially 
 pleased to see me; and you re asking 
 yourself, What on earth is she doing 
 here? Now, don t deny it!" 
 
 "Well, you know," I made awkward 
 response " of course Press day 
 
 " Ah, but I belong to the Press," said 
 Miss Timby-Hucks. 
 
Observations in Philistia 73 
 
 " Happy Press! And since when?" 
 
 " O, it s nearly a fortnight now. And 
 most interesting I find the work. You 
 know, for a long time now I ve been so 
 restless, so anxious to find some open 
 ing to a real career, where I might be 
 my genuine self, and be an active part 
 of the great whirling stream of exist 
 ence, and concentrate my mind upon 
 the actualities of life don t you your 
 self think it will be just the thing for 
 me?" 
 
 "Undoubtedly," I replied without 
 hesitation. "And do you find focus 
 ing yourself on the actualities ah 
 remunerative?" 
 
 "Well," Miss Timby-Hucks ex 
 plained, " nothing of mine has been 
 printed yet, you see, so that I don t 
 know as to that. But I am assured it 
 
74 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 will be all right. You see, I m very in 
 timate with a cousin of Mrs. Umpel- 
 baum, who is the wife of the proprietor 
 of Maida Vale, and in that way it came 
 about. Lady-reporters never have any 
 chance, I am told, unless they have 
 friends in the proprietor s family, or 
 know the editor extremely well. It all 
 goes by favour, like like 
 
 " Like the dearest of all the actuali 
 ties," I put in. "But how is it they 
 don t print your stuff?" 
 
 " I haven t written any, as yet. The 
 difficulty was to find a subject," Miss 
 Timby-Hucks rejoined. " O that awful 
 subject ! I thought and thought and 
 thought till my head was fit to burst. 
 I went to see Mrs. Umpelbaum her 
 self, and asked her to suggest some 
 thing. You know she writes a great 
 
Observations in Philistia 75 
 
 deal for the paper herself. She said 
 they hadn t had any Reminiscences of 
 Carlyle now for some weeks; but after 
 wards she agreed with me that would 
 not be quite the thing for one to begin 
 with. She couldn t suggest anything 
 else, except that I should have a chat 
 with my dressmaker. Very often in 
 that way, she said, lady-reporters get 
 the most entertaining revelations of gos 
 sip in high life. But it happened that 
 just then it was not not exactly con 
 venient for me to call upon my dress 
 maker; and so that suggestion came to 
 nothing, too." 
 
 " I had no idea lady-journalism was 
 so difficult," I remarked, with sym 
 pathy. 
 
 " O indeed, yes !" Miss Timby-Hucks 
 went on. "One can t expect to be en 
 
76 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 rapport, as we journalists say, with So 
 ciety, without spending a great deal of 
 money. There is one lady-reporter, 
 Mrs. Umpelbaum told me, who has 
 made quite a leading position for her 
 self, solely through hair-dressers and 
 American dentists. But I don t mind 
 admitting that that would involve more 
 of an outlay than I could afford, just at 
 the moment." 
 
 "So you never got a subject?" I 
 asked. 
 
 "Yes; finally I did. I was over at 
 the Grundys, telling my troubles, and 
 Uncle Dudley you know, being so 
 much with the girls, I always call him 
 that Uncle Dudley said that the fash 
 ionable thing now was interviews, and 
 that lady-journalists did this better than 
 gentlemen-reporters because they had 
 
Observations in Philistia 77 
 
 more nerve. By that I suppose he 
 meant a more delicate nervous organi 
 zation, quicker to grasp and absorb fine 
 shades of character. But that hardly 
 helped me, because whom was I to in 
 terview, and about what? 
 
 That was the question! But Uncle 
 Dudley thought a moment, and was 
 ready with a suggestion. Everything 
 depended, he said, upon making a 
 right start. I must pick out a person 
 ality and a theme at once non-conten 
 tious and invested with popular inter 
 est. His idea was that I should begin by 
 interviewing Mr. T. M. Healy on The 
 Decline of the Deep-Sea Mock-Turtle 
 Fisheries on the West Coast of Ireland. 
 If I could get Mr. Healy to talk frankly 
 on this subject, he felt sure that I should 
 chain public attention at a bound." 
 
78 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 "Superb!" I cried. "And did you 
 do it?" 
 
 " No," Miss Timby-Hucks confessed ; 
 " I went to the House and sent in my 
 card, but it was another Irish Member 
 who came out to see me I think his 
 name was Mulhooly. He was very 
 polite, and explained that since some 
 recent sad event in some of the Com 
 mittee Rooms, fifteen I think its num 
 ber was, it was the rule of his party 
 that, when a lady sent in a card to one 
 Member, some other Member answered 
 it. It prevented confusion, he said, 
 and was not in antagonism to the ex 
 pressed views of the Church." 
 
 "Talking of nothing," I said, lead 
 ing the way over to a divan, on which 
 we seated ourselves: "you seem to 
 have finally secured a subject. I as- 
 
Observations in Philistia * 79 
 
 sume you are doing the Academy for 
 Maida Vale" 
 
 "Yes," replied Miss Timby-Hucks 
 with gentle firmness ; " you might say 
 I have done it. I have been here since 
 the very minute the doors opened, and 
 I ve gone twelve times round. I wish I 
 could have seen you earlier. I should 
 so like to have had your opinion of the 
 various works as we passed." 
 
 "It is better not," I commented. 
 "There are ladies present." 
 
 The lady-reporter looked at me for a 
 furtive instant dubiously. Then she 
 smiled a little under her veil. "You 
 do say such odd things!" she remarked. 
 " I am glad to see that a great many 
 ladies are present. It shows how we 
 are securing our proper recognition in 
 journalism. I believe there are actu- 
 
8o Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 ally more of us here than there are 
 gentlemen-reporters I should say gen 
 tlemen-critics. And it is the same in 
 art, too. You can see I ve counted 
 them up in my catalogue here there 
 are this year two hundred and forty- 
 four lady - artists exhibiting in this 
 Academy three hundred and forty-six 
 works of art. Think of that ! Fifty of 
 them are described as Mrs., and there 
 are one hundred and ninety-four who 
 are unmarried." 
 
 "Think of that!" I retorted. 
 
 "And there are among them," Miss 
 Timby-Hucks went on, " one Marchion 
 ess, one Countess, one Baroness, and 
 one plain Lady. I am going to begin 
 my article with this. I think it will 
 be interesting, don t you?" 
 
 "I d be careful not to particularise 
 
Observations in Philistia 81 
 
 about the plain Lady," I suggested. 
 "That might be too interesting." 
 
 She was overfull of her subject to 
 smile. "No, I mean," she said, "as 
 showing how the ranks of British Art 
 are being filled from the very highest 
 classes, and are appealing more and 
 more to the female intellect. I don t 
 believe it will occur to any one else to 
 count up in the catalogue. So that will 
 be original with me to enlighten my <.. 
 sex as to the glorious part they play in 
 this year s Academy." 
 
 " But have you seen their pic 
 tures?" I asked, repressing an involun 
 tary groan. 
 
 "Every one!" replied Miss Timby 
 Hucks. "They are all good. There , 
 isn t what I should call a bad one 
 that is, a Frenchy or immoral one 
 
 6 
 
82 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 among them. I shall say that, too, in 
 my criticism ; but of course I shall have 
 to word it carefully, because I fancy 
 Mr. Umpelbaum is a foreigner of some 
 sort and you know they re all so sen 
 sitive about the superiority of British 
 Art." 
 
 "It is their nature; they can t help 
 it," I pointed out. "They try their 
 best, however, to master these un 
 worthy emotions. Sometimes, indeed, 
 their dissimulation reaches a really high 
 plane of endeavour." 
 
 "They have nothing at all on the 
 Continent like our Royal Academy, 
 I am told," said Miss Timby-Hucks. 
 "That isn t generally known, is it? I 
 had thought of saying it." 
 
 "It will be a safe statement," I as 
 sured her. "You might go further, 
 
Observations in Philistia 83 
 
 and assert that no other country at any 
 stage of its history has had anything 
 like the Royal Academy. It is the 
 unique blossom of British civilisation." 
 Miss Timby-Hucks seemed to like 
 the phrase, and made a note of it on 
 the back of her catalogue. "Yes," she 
 continued, " I thought of making my 
 criticism general, dealing with things 
 like that. But I ve got some awfully 
 interesting figures to put in. For ex 
 ample, there are sixty-eight Academi 
 cians and Associates exhibiting: they 
 have one hundred and thirty-five oil 
 paintings, sixteen water - colour or 
 black-and-white drawings, eight archi 
 tectural designs, and twenty -three 
 pieces of sculpture a total of one hun 
 dred and eighty-two works of art, or 
 two and sixty-seven hundredths each. 
 
84 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 I got at that by dividing the total num 
 ber of works by the total number of 
 Academicians. Do you think any one 
 else will be likely to print that first in 
 a daily paper? Mrs. Umplebaum told 
 me that Maida Vale made a special 
 point of new facts. I don t think I 
 shall say much about the pictures 
 themselves. What is there to say about 
 pictures by the Academicians? As I 
 told mamma this morning, they 
 wouldn t be Academicians if they 
 \lidn t paint good pictures, would they? 
 and good pictures speak for them 
 selves. Of course, I shall describe the 
 subjects of Sir Frederic s pictures by 
 the way, what is a Hesperides? and 
 some of the others: I ll get you to pick 
 out for me a few leading names. But 
 I shall make my main point the splen- 
 
Observations in Philistia 85 
 
 did advance of lady-artists I heard - l 
 some one say in the other room there d 
 never been half so many before and 
 the elevating effect this has upon 
 British Art. In fact, mightn t I say 
 that is what makes British Art what it 
 is to-day?" 
 
 " It is one of the reasons, undoubt 
 edly," I assented, as I rose. "There 
 are others, however." 
 
 "Yes, I know," said Miss Timby- 
 Hucks : " the diffusion of Christian 
 principles amongst^ us, our high na 
 tional morality, and the sanctity of the 
 English home. Mrs. Albert said only 
 last night that these lay at the very 
 foundation of British art." 
 
 " Mrs. Albert is a woman of discern 
 ment," I said, making a gesture of 
 farewell. 
 
86 Mrs. Albert Grnndy 
 
 But Miss Timby-Hucks on the in 
 stant thought of something. Her eyes 
 glistened, her two upper front teeth 
 gleamed. "O, it s just occurred to 
 me!" she exclaimed, moving nearer to 
 my side and speaking in confidential 
 excitement. " I know now how that 
 lady-reporter manages with the hair 
 dressers and dentists. She doesn t pay 
 them money at all. She mentions 
 their names in the papers instead. 
 How dull of me not to have thought of 
 that before! Why yes I will! I ll 
 put my dressmaker among the Private 
 View celebrities!" 
 
 One likes to be civil to people who 
 are obviously going to succeed in the 
 world. I forthwith took Miss Timby- 
 Hucks out to luncheon. 
 
RELATING TO VARIOUS PHENOM 
 ENA ATTENDING THE PROGRESS 
 OF THE SEX ALONG LINES OF 
 THE GREATEST RESISTANCE. 
 
JVAY own idea," said Uncle Dudley, 
 " is that women ought to be con 
 fined to barracks during elections, just 
 the same as soldiers." 
 
 " I was quite prepared to find you en 
 tertaining views of that character," re 
 marked Miss Wallaby, with virginal A . 
 severity. " Men who have wandered 
 about the less advanced parts of the 
 earth, and spent long periods of time 
 in contact with inferior civilisations, 
 quite generally do feel that way. Life 
 in the Colonies, and in similar rude 
 and remote regions, does produce that 
 effect upon the masculine mind. But 
 here in England, the nerve-centre of 
 the English-speaking race, the point of 
 
go Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 concentration from which radiate all 
 the impulses of refinement and culture 
 that distinguish our generation, men 
 are coming to see these matters in a 
 different light. They no longer refuse 
 to listen to the overwhelming argu 
 ments in favour of entire feminine 
 equality 
 
 "Oh, I admit tJiat at once," broke in 
 Uncle Dudley. " But do women now- 
 /adays believe in equality among them 
 selves? In my youth they used to de 
 vote pretty well all their energies to 
 showing how much superior they were 
 xo other women." 
 
 "I spoke of the masculine attitude," 
 said Miss Wallaby, coldly. "Viewed 
 intelligently, the gradations and classi 
 fications which w r e maintain among 
 ourselves, at the cost of such infinite 
 
Observations in Philistia 91 
 
 trouble and personal self-sacrifice, are 
 the very foundation upon which rests 
 the superstructure of British Society." 
 
 "I admit that, too," Uncle Dudley 
 hastened to put in. " Really, we are 
 getting on very nicely." 
 
 Miss Wallaby ignored the interrup 
 tion altogether. "The point is," she 
 went on, f that the male mind in Eng 
 land is coming with characteristic 
 slowness, no doubt, but still coming 
 to recognize the necessity of securing 
 the very fullest and most complete 
 participation of my sex in public affairs./ 
 As the diffusion of enlightenment pro 
 gresses, men will more and more 
 abandon the coarse and egoistic stand 
 ards of their days of domination by 
 brute force, and turn instead to the 
 ideals of purity and sweetness which 
 
92 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 Woman in Politics typifies. It has 
 been observed that one may pick out 
 the future rulers of England in each 
 coming generation by scanning the 
 honor-lists of Oxford and Cambridge. 
 How happy a day it will be for Eng 
 land, and civilisation, when this is said 
 of Girton and Newnham as well!" 
 
 " I spent a summer in the State of 
 Maine once, some years ago," said 
 Uncle Dudley. "That s the State, 
 you know, where they ve had a Pro 
 hibition law now for nearly forty years. 
 The excess of females over males is 
 larger there, I believe, than it is any 
 where else in the world owing to the 
 fact that all the young men who are 
 worth their salt emigrate to some other 
 State as soon as they ve saved up 
 enough for a railway-ticket. The men 
 
Observations in Philistia 93 
 
 that you do see lounging around there, 
 in the small villages, are all minding 
 the baby, or sitting on the door-steps 
 shelling peas, or out in the backyard, 
 with their mouths full of clothes-pins, 
 hanging up sheets and pillow-cases on 
 the line to dry. The women there 
 take a very active part in politics and 
 every census shows that Maine s popu 
 lation has diminished. Ship-building 
 has almost ceased, farms are being 
 abandoned yearly, the State is mort 
 gaged up to its eyebrows, and you get 
 nothing but fried clams and huckle 
 berry-pie for breakfast but, of course, 
 I suppose there is a good deal of purity 
 and sweetness." 
 
 Miss Wallaby rose and walked away 
 from us ; the black velvet riband around 
 her neck, the glint of gas-light on her 
 
94 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 eye-glass, the wearied haughtiness on 
 her swarthy, high-nosed face, seemed 
 to unite in saying to us that we were 
 very poor creatures indeed. 
 
 "She s been down to the Retired 
 Licensed Victuallers Division of Sur 
 rey, you know," exclaimed Uncle Dud 
 ley, " making speeches in favor of the 
 sitting Member, old Sir Watkyn 
 Hump." 
 
 "Ah, that accounts for the milk in 
 the cocoanut," I remarked. 
 
 "Well, no," my friend mused aloud. 
 " I fancy young- Hump accounts for that. 
 See she s gone and cut him out from 
 under the Timby-Hucks s guns." 
 
 It was at one of Mrs. Albert Grundy s 
 evenings at home, and Uncle Dudley 
 and I now had possession of a quiet 
 corner to ourselves. From this pleas- 
 
Observations in Philistia 95 
 
 ant vantage-ground we indolently sur 
 veyed the throng surrounding Mrs. 
 Albert at the piano end of the room, 
 and stretching off through the open 
 double doors into the adjoining cham 
 ber a throng of dazzling arms and 
 shoulders, of light-hued satins and 
 fluffy stuffs, of waving feathers, and 
 splendid piles of braided hair, and 
 mostly comely faces wreathed in politic 
 smiles. Here and there the mass of 
 pinks and whites and creams was 
 broken abruptly by a black coat with a 
 hat under its sleeve. Dudley and I 
 idly commented upon the fact that al 
 most all these coats belonged to under 
 sized elderly men, generally with 
 spectacles and a grey beard, and we 
 noted with placid interest that as they 
 came in announced in stentorian 
 
96 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 tones as Mr. and Mrs. So-and-so their 
 wives as a rule were several inches 
 taller and many, many years younger 
 than themselves. 
 
 Then it was entertaining, too, to 
 watch Mrs. Albert shake hands with 
 these new-comers. She knew just at 
 what angle each preferred that cere 
 mony, keeping her knuckles well down 
 in welcoming the more sophisticated 
 and up-to-date people from about 
 Cromwell Road and the Park, but ele 
 vating them breast-high to greet those 
 from around Brompton way, and hoist 
 ing them quite up to the chin-level 
 with the guests from beyond Earl s 
 Court, who were still in the toils of last 
 year s fashions. 
 
 "Smart woman, that sister of mine!" 
 said Uncle Dudley. "See the way 
 
Observations in Philistia 97 
 
 she s manoeuvred her shoulder around 
 in front of the Timby-Hucks s nose, so 
 as to head her off from getting in and 
 being introduced to the Hon. Mrs. 
 Coon-Alwyn. And hello ! by George, 
 she s won! there s the Dowager Coun 
 tess of Thames-Ditton coming in! 
 You ll never know the anguish, my 
 boy, that was caused by the uncertainty 
 whether she could come or not. Emily 
 hasn t been able to eat these past four 
 days, expecting every moment the 
 knock of the postman bringing her 
 ladyship s refusal to come. The only 
 thing that enabled her to keep up, she 
 said, was fixing her mind resolutely 
 on the fact that the aristocracy are no 
 toriously impolite about answering in 
 vitations. But now, happy woman 
 her cup is fairly running over. This 
 
98 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 is a great night for Fernbank. And 
 look! hanged if that girl isn t trying 
 to edge her way in there, too! See 
 how prettily Emily managed that? 
 Oh, Timby-Hucks! Timby-Hucks! 
 you ve put your foot in it this time. 
 You ll never figure on the free-list for 
 ^this show again." 
 
 Misfortune indeed claimed Miss 
 Timby-Hucks for its very own. Mrs. 
 Albert had twice adroitly interposed 
 her well-rounded shoulders between 
 that enterprising young woman and 
 social eminence the second time with 
 quite obvious determination of purpose. 
 And there, too, behind the door, young 
 Mr. Hump bent his sloping shoulders 
 and cliff-like collar humbly over Miss 
 Wallaby s chair, listening with all his 
 considerable ears to her selected mon- 
 
Observations in Philistia 99 
 
 ologues. Ah, the vanity of human 
 aspirations ! 
 
 Casting an heroic glance over the 
 field of defeat, Miss Timby-Hucks s 
 eye lighted upon our corner, and on 
 the instant her upper front teeth 
 gleamed in a smile of relief. At all 
 events, we were left and she came 
 towards us with a decisive step. 
 
 "I ve hardly seen you since the 
 Academy," she said in her sprightly 
 way to me, after we had all shaken 
 hands, and she had seated herself be 
 tween us on the sofa. 
 
 "And how did your article come 
 out?" I asked politely. 
 
 "Oh, it never came out at all," she 
 replied. " It seems it got left over too 
 long. The editor said it was owing to 
 the pressure of interesting monkey- 
 
ioo Mrs. Albert G ninety 
 
 language matter upon his columns; 
 but / believe it was just because I m a 
 lady journalist, and so does the cousin 
 of Mrs. Umpelbaum, the proprietor s 
 wife. It must have been that; be 
 cause, long after the editor gave this 
 excuse, there were the daily papers 
 still printing their criticisms, * Eleventh 
 Notice of the Royal Academy, The 
 Spring Exhibitions Fourteenth Arti 
 cle, and so on. I taxed him with it 
 told him I heard they had some still 
 left, that they were going to begin 
 printing again after the elections were 
 over but he said it was different with 
 dailies. All they needed were adver 
 tisements and market reports, and 
 police news, and telegrams about the 
 Macedonian frontier, and they could 
 print art criticisms and book reviews 
 
Observations in Philistia 101 
 
 whole years after they should have ap 
 peared, because nobody ever read them 
 when they were printed but weeklies 
 had to be absolutely up to date." 
 
 "Evil luck does pursue you!" I said 
 compassionately. " So you haven t got 
 into print at all?" 
 
 " O, I m not a bit cast down," replied 
 Miss Timby-Hucks, with jaunty con 
 fidence. " There s no such word as 
 fail in my book. The way to succeed 
 is just to keep pegging away. I know 
 of one lady-journalist who went every 
 day for nine weeks to interview the 
 Countess of Wimps about her second 
 son s having been warned off New 
 market Heath. Every day she was re 
 fused admittance once she got into 
 the hall and was put out by a brutal 
 footman but it never unnerved her. 
 
IO2 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 Each morning she went again. And 
 she would have succeeded by this time, 
 probably only the Countess suddenly 
 left England to spend the summer in 
 Egypt." 
 
 "Yes, Wady Haifa has its advan 
 tages, even in July," said Uncle Dud 
 ley. " It is warm, and there are in 
 sects, but one is allowed by law to kill 
 them in Egypt." 
 
ILLUSTRATING THE OPERATION OF 
 VEGETABLES AND FEMININE 
 DUPLICITY UPON THE CON 
 CEPTS OF MATERNAL RESPON 
 SIBILITY. 
 
T FELT that I was on sufficiently in 
 timate terms with Mrs. Albert 
 Grundy to tell her that she was not 
 looking well. She gave a weary little 
 sigh and said she knew it. 
 
 Indeed, poor lady, it was apparent 
 enough. She has taken of late to 
 wearing her hair drawn up from her 
 forehead over a roll the effect of 
 mouse-tints at which Nature is begin 
 ning to hint, being frankly helped out 
 by powder. Everybody about Fern- 
 bank recognises that in some way this 
 reform has altered the whole state of 
 affairs. The very servant who comes 
 to the door, or who brings in the tea- 
 things, seems to carry herself in a dif- 
 105 
 
io6 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 ferent manner since the change has 
 been made. Of course, it is by no 
 means a new fashion, but it was not 
 until the Dowager Countess of Thames- 
 Ditton brought it in person to Fernbank 
 that Mrs. Albert could be quite sure of 
 its entire suitability. Up to that time 
 it had seemed to her a style rather 
 adapted to lady lecturers and the wives 
 of men who write: and though Mrs. 
 Albert has the very highest regard for 
 literature quite dotes on it, as she 
 says she is somewhat inclined to sniff 
 at its wives. 
 
 We all feel that the change adds 
 character to Mrs. Albert s face or 
 rather exhibits now that true manag 
 ing and resourceful temper, which 
 was formerly obscured and weakened 
 by a fringe. But the new arrangement 
 
Observations in Philistia 107 
 
 has the defects of its qualities. It does 
 not lend itself to tricks. The counte 
 nance beneath it does not easily dis 
 semble anxiety or mask fatigue. And 
 both were written broadly over Mrs. 
 Albert s fine face. "Yes," she said, 
 "I know it." 
 
 The consoling suggestion that soon 
 the necessity of giving home-dinners 
 to the directors in her husband s com 
 panies would have ended, and that then 
 a few weeks out of London, away some 
 where in the air of the mountains or 
 the sea, would bring back all her wonted 
 strength and spirits, did no good. 
 She shook her head and sighed again. 
 
 "No, she said, "it isn t physical. 
 That is to say, it is physical, but the 
 cause is mental. It is over- worry." 
 
 "Of all people on earth you ! " I re- 
 
io8 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 plied reproachfully. " Why think of it 
 a husband who is the dream of docile 
 propriety, a competency broadening 
 each year into a fortune, a home like 
 this, such servants, such appointments, 
 such a circle of admiring friends and 
 then your daughters ! Why, to be the 
 mother of such a girl as Ermyn- 
 trude 
 
 " Precisely," interrupted Mrs. Albert. 
 " To be the mother of such a girl, as 
 you say. Little you know what it 
 really means! But, no I know what 
 you were going to say -please don t! it 
 is too sad a subject." 
 
 I could do nothing but feebly strive 
 to look my surprise. To think of sad 
 ness connected with tall, handsome, 
 good-hearted Ermie, was impossible. 
 
 "You think I am exaggerating, I 
 
Observations in Philistia 109 
 
 know," Mrs. Albert went on. "Ah, 
 you do not know!" 
 
 "Nothing could be more evident," I 
 replied, "than that I don t know. I 
 can t even imagine what on earth you 
 are driving at." 
 
 Mrs. Albert paused for a moment, 
 and pushed the toe of her wee slipper 
 meditatively back and forth on the 
 figure of the carpet. 
 
 "Yes, I will tell you," she said at 
 last. " You are such an old friend of 
 the family that you are almost one of 
 us. And besides, you are always sym 
 pathetic so different from Dudley. 
 Well, the point is this. You know the 
 young man Sir Watkyn s son Mr. 
 Eustace Hump." 
 
 " I have met him here," I assented. 
 
 " Well, I doubt if you will meet him 
 
IIO Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 here any more," Mrs. Albert said im 
 pressively. 
 
 " The deprivation shall not drive me 
 to despair or drink," I assured her. 
 " I will watch over myself." 
 
 " I dare say you did not care much 
 / 
 
 for him," said Mrs. Albert. "I know 
 
 Dudley didn t. But, all the same, he 
 was eligible. He is an only son, and 
 his father is a Baronet an hereditary 
 I/ title and they are rolling in wealth. 
 And Eustace himself, when you get to 
 know him, has some very admirable 
 qualities. You know he writes ! " 
 
 "I have heard him say so," I re 
 sponded, perhaps not over graciously. 
 
 " O, regularly, for a number of weekly 
 papers. It is understood that quite 
 frequently he gets paid not of course 
 that that matters to him but his asso- 
 
Observations in Philistia 1 1 1 
 
 ciations are distinctly literary. I have 
 always felt that with his tastes and 
 connections his wife granting of 
 course that she was the right kind of 
 woman might at last set up a real 
 literary salon in London. We have 
 wanted one so long, you know." 
 
 "Have we?" I murmured listlessly, 
 striving all the while to guess what 
 relation all this bore to the question of 
 Ermyntrude. I built up in my mind a 
 hostile picture of the odious Hump, 
 with his shoulders sloping off like a 
 German wine-bottle, his lean neck 
 battlemented in high starched walls of 
 linen, and his foolish conceited face 
 and leaped hopefully to the conclusion 
 that Ermyntrude had rejected him. I 
 could not keep the notion to myself. 
 
 " Well has she sent him about his 
 
112 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 business?" I asked, making ready to 
 beam with delight. 
 
 "No," said Mrs. Albert, ruefully. 
 " It never got to that, so far as I can 
 gather but at all events it is all over. 
 I expect every morning now to read 
 the announcement in the Morning Post 
 that a marriage has been arranged be 
 tween him and and Miss Wallaby!" 
 
 I sat upright, and felt myself smil 
 ing. " What ! the girl with the black 
 ribbon round her neck?" I asked com 
 fortably. 
 
 " It would be more appropriate 
 round her heart," remarked Mrs. 
 Albert, with bitterness in her tone. 
 "Why, do you know? her mother, for 
 all that she s Lady Wallaby, hasn t an 
 h in her whole composition." 
 
 " Well, neither has old Sir Watkyn 
 
Observations in Philistia 1 1 3 
 
 Hump," I rejoined pleasantly. "So 
 it s a fair exchange." 
 
 "Ah, but he can afford it," put in 
 Mrs. Albert. "But the Wallabys 
 well, I can only say that I had a right 
 to look for different treatment at their 
 hands. How, do you suppose, they 
 would ever have been asked to the 
 Hon. Mrs. Coon- Alwyn s garden-party, 
 or met Lady Thames-Ditton, or been 
 put in society generally, if I had not 
 taken an interest in them ? Why, that 
 girl s father, old Sir Willoughby Wal 
 laby, was never anything but chief of 
 police, or something like that, out in 
 some Australian convict settlement. I 
 have heard he was knighted by mistake, 
 but of course my lips are sealed." 
 
 " I suppose they really have behaved 
 badly," I said, half interrogatively. 
 
 8 
 
114 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 "Badly!" echoed the wrathful 
 mother. " I will leave you to judge. 
 It was done here, quite under rny own 
 roof. You know Miss Wallaby volun 
 teered her services, and went down 
 into the Retired Licensed Victuallers 
 Division of Surrey to electioneer for 
 Sir Watkyn. Do you know, I never 
 suspected anything. And then Miss 
 Timby-Hucks, she went down also, but 
 they rather cold-shouldered her, and 
 she came back, and she told me things, 
 and still I wouldn t believe it. Well 
 then three weeks ago my Evening 
 At Home you were here the Walla- 
 bys came as large as life, and that 
 scheming young person manoeuvred 
 about until she got herself alone with 
 Eustace and my Ermyntrude, and then 
 she told her a scene she had witnessed 
 
Observations in Philistia 1 1 5 
 
 during her recent election experiences. 
 There was a meeting for Sir Watkyn at 
 some place, I can t recall the name, 
 and there were a good many of the 
 other side there, and they hooted and 
 shouted, and raised disturbance, until 
 at last there was one speaker they 
 would not hear at all. All this that 
 girl told Ermyntrude seriously, and as 
 if she were overflowing with indigna 
 tion. And then she came to the part 
 where the speaker stood his ground and 
 tried to make himself heard, and the 
 crowd yelled louder than ever, and still 
 he doggedly persisted and then some 
 one threw a large vegetable marrow, 
 soft and very ripe, and it hit that 
 speaker just under the ear, and burst 
 all over him!" 
 
 "Ha-ha-ha!" I ejaculated. "The 
 
Ii6 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 vegetable marrow in politics is new 
 full of delightful possibilities and seeds 
 wonder it has never been thought of 
 v before." 
 
 "Yes," said Mrs. Albert, with a sigh. 
 " Ermyntrude also thought it was funny. 
 She has a very keen sense of humor- 
 quite too keen. She laughed, too!" 
 
 "And why not?" I asked. 
 
 "Why not?" demanded Mrs. Al 
 bert, with shining eyes. " Because the 
 story had been told just to trap her 
 into laughing because because the 
 speaker upon whom that unhappy 
 vegetable marrow exploded was 
 Eustace Hump ! " 
 
CONTAINING THOUGHTS UPON THE 
 GREAT UNKNOWN, TO WHICH 
 ARE ADDED SPECULATIONS UPON 
 HER HEREAFTER. 
 
TT is not often that I find the time to 
 take part in Mrs. Albert Grundy s 
 Thursdays the third and fifth Thurs 
 days of each month, from 4 to 6.30 P.M. 
 but on a certain afternoon pleasant 
 weather and the sense of long-accrued 
 responsibility drew me to Fernbank. 
 
 It was really very nice, after one got 
 there. Perhaps it would have been less 
 satisfactory had escape from the draw 
 ing-room been a more difficult matter. 
 Inside that formal chamber, with its 
 blinds down-drawn to shield the carpet 
 from the sun, the respectable air hung 
 somewhat heavily about the assembled 
 matronhood of Brompton and the 
 
 Kensingtons. The units in this 
 119 
 
I2O Mrs. Albert Gnmdy 
 
 gathering changed from time to time 
 for Mrs. Albert s circle is a large and 
 growing one but the effect of the sum 
 remained much the same. The elderly 
 ladies talked about the amiability and 
 kindliness of the Duchess of Teck ; and 
 argued the Continental relationships of 
 the Duchesses of Connaught and Albany 
 first into an apparently hopeless tangle 
 of burgs and hausens and zollerns and 
 swcigs, then triumphantly out again into 
 the bright daylight of well-ordered and 
 pellucid genealogy. The younger 
 wives spoke in subdued voices of more 
 juvenile Princesses on the lower steps 
 of the throne, with occasional short- 
 winged flights across the North Sea in 
 imaginative search of a suitable bride 
 for the then unwedded Duke of York, 
 if an importation should be found to be 
 
Observations in Philistia 12 1 
 
 necessary about which opinions might 
 in all loyalty differ. The few young 
 girls who sat dutifully here beside their 
 mammas or married sisters talked of 
 nothing at all, but smiled confusedly 
 and looked away whenever another s 
 glance caught theirs and, I dare say, 
 thought with decent humility upon 
 Marchionesses. 
 
 But outside, on the garden-lawn at the 
 rear of the house, the Almanack de Gotha 
 threw no shadow, and the pungent 
 scent of jasmine and lilies drove the 
 leathery odor of Debrett from the soft 
 summer air. The gentle London haze 
 made Whistlers and Maitlands of the 
 walls and roof-lines and chimney-pots 
 beyond. The pretty girls of Fernbank / 
 held court here on the velvet grass, 
 with groups of attendant maidens from 
 
122 Mrs. Albert G rundy 
 
 sympathetic Myrtle Lodges and Cedar- 
 crofts and Chestnut Villas selected 
 homesteads stretching all the way to 
 remote West Kensington. They said 
 there was no one left in London. 
 Why, as I sat apart in the shade of the 
 ivy overhanging the garden path, and 
 watched this out-door panorama of the 
 Grundys friendships, it seemed as if I 
 had never comprehended before how 
 many girls there really were in the 
 world. 
 
 And how sweet it was to look upon 
 these damsels, with their dainty sailor s 
 hats of straw, their cheeks of Devon 
 cream and damask, their tall and 
 shapely forms, their profiles of fault 
 less classical delicacy! What if, in 
 time, they too must sit inside, by pre 
 ference, and babble of royalties and the 
 
Observations in Philistia 123 
 
 peerage, and politely uncover those two 
 aggressive incisors of genteel maturity 
 when they were asked to have a third 
 cup of tea? That stage, praise heaven, 
 should be many years removed. We 
 will have no memento mori bones or 
 tusks out here in the sunlit garden 
 but only tennis balls, and the inspir 
 ing chalk-bands on the sward, and the 
 noble grace of English girlhood, erect 
 and joyous in the open air. 
 
 Much as I delighted in this spectacle, 
 it forced upon me as well a certain 
 vague sense of depression. These lofty 
 and lovely creatures were strangers to 
 me. I do not mean that their names 
 were unknown to me, or that I had not 
 exchanged civil words with many of 
 them, or that I might not be presented 
 to, and affably received by, them all. 
 
124 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 The feeling was, rather, that if it were 
 possible for me to marry them all, we 
 still to the end of our days would re 
 main strangers. I should never know 
 t- what to say to them ; still less should I 
 ever be able to guess what they were 
 thinking. 
 
 The tallest and most impressive of 
 all the bevy the handsome girl in the 
 pale brown frock with the shirt-front 
 and jacketed blouse, who stands lean 
 ing with folded hands upon her racket 
 like an indolent Diana why, I punted 
 her about the whole reach from Sun- 
 bury to Walton during the better part 
 of a week, only last summer, not to 
 mention sitting beside her at dinner 
 every evening on the houseboat. We 
 were so much together, in truth, that 
 my friends round about, as I came to 
 
Observations in Philistia 125 
 
 know afterwards, canvassed among 
 themselves the prospect of our arrang 
 ing never to separate. Yet I feel that 
 I do not know this girl. We are 
 friends, yes ; but we are not acquainted 
 with each other. 
 
 More than once perhaps a dozeri\ 
 times in driving through the busier 
 of London streets, my fancy has been 
 caught by this thing : a hansom whirl 
 ing smartly by, the dark hood of which 
 frames a woman s face young, wistful, 
 ivory-hued. It is like the flash ex 
 posure of a kodak this bald instant of 
 time in which I see this face, and com 
 prehend that its gaze has met mine, 
 and has burned into my memory a 
 lightning picture of something I should 
 not recognise if I saw it again, and 
 cannot at all reproduce to myself, and 
 
126 Mrs. Albert Grnndy 
 
 probably would not like if I could, yet 
 which leaves me with the feeling that 
 I am richer than I was before. In 
 that fractional throb of space there has 
 been snatched an unrehearsed and un 
 prejudiced contact of human souls 
 projected from one void momentarily 
 to be swept forward into another ; and 
 though not the Judgment Day itself 
 shall bring these two together again, 
 v they know each other. 
 
 Now that I look again at the goddess 
 in the pale brown gown, these un- 
 labelled faces of the flitting hansoms 
 seem by comparison those of familiar 
 companions and intimates. 
 
 I get no sense of human communion 
 from that serene and regular counte 
 nance, with its exquisite nose, its short 
 upper-lip and glint of pearls along the 
 
Observations in Pkilistia 127 
 
 bowed line of the mouth, its correctly 
 arched brows and wide-open, impassive 
 blue eyes. I can see it with prophetic 
 admiration out-queening all the others 
 at Henley, or at Goodwood, or on the 
 great staircase of Buckingham Palace. 
 I can imagine it at Monte Carlo, flushed 
 a little at the sight of retreating gold; 
 or at the head of a great noble s table, 
 coldly poised above satin throat and 
 shoulders, and stirring no muscle under 
 the free whisperings of His Excellency 
 to the right. I can conceive it in the 
 Divorce Court, bearing with metallic 
 equanimity the rude scrutiny of a 
 thousand unlicensed eyes. But my 
 fancy wavers and fails at the task of 
 picturing that face at my own fireside, 
 with the light of the home-hearth ,< 
 painting the fulness of Jaer rounded 
 
128 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 chin, and reflecting back from her 
 glance, as we talk of men and books 
 and things, the frank gladness of real 
 comradeship. 
 
 But tchut ! I have no fireside, and 
 the comrades I like best are playing 
 half-crown whist at the club ; and these 
 are all nice girls hearty, healthful, 
 handsome girls, who can walk, run, 
 dance, swim, scull, skate, ride as no 
 others have known or dared to do since 
 the glacial wave of Christianity de 
 populated the glades and dells of 
 Olympus. They will mate after their 
 kind, and in its own good time along 
 will come a new generation of straight, 
 strong-limbed, thin-lipped, pink-and- 
 white girls, and of tow-headed, deep- 
 chested lads, their brothers boys who 
 will bully their way through Rugby 
 
Observations in Philistia 129 
 
 and Harrow, misspell and misappre 
 hend their way into the Army, the 
 Navy, and the Civil Service, and 
 spread themselves over the habitable 
 globe, to rule, through sheer inability 
 to understand, such Baboos and Mata- 
 bele and mere Irishry as Imperial des 
 tiny delivers over to them. 
 
 The vision is not wholly joyous, as 
 it with diffidence projects itself be 
 yond, into that further space where 
 new strange other generations walk 
 the girls still taller, and more coldly 
 tubbed, the boys astride a yet more 
 temerarious saddle of dull dominion. 
 Reluctant prophecy discerns beneath 
 their considerable feet the bruised frag 
 ments of many antique trifles the 
 bric-a-brac of an extinct sentimental 
 fraction that had a sense of humor and 
 
 9 
 
130 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 could spell and, to please mamma, the 
 fig-leaves have quite overspread and 
 hidden the statues in their garden. 
 But power is there, and empire ; they 
 still more serenely loom above the little 
 foreign folks who cook, and sing to 
 harps and fiddles, and paint for their 
 amusement; such as it is under their 
 shaping, they possess the earth. 
 
 So, as the sun goes down in the 
 Hammersmith heavens, I take off my 
 hat, and salute the potential mothers 
 of the New Rome. 
 
GLANCING AT SOME MODERN AS 
 PECTS OF MASTER JOHN GUT- 
 ENBERG S INGENIOUS BUT OVER 
 RATED INVENTION. 
 
IT was very pleasant thus to meet 
 * Uncle Dudley in the Strand. Only 
 here and there is one who can bear that 
 test. Whole legions of our friends, 
 decent and deeply reputable people, 
 fall altogether out of the picture, so to 
 speak, on this ancient yet robust thor 
 oughfare. They do very well indeed 
 in Chelsea or Highgate or the Pern- 
 bridge country, where they are at 
 home : there the surroundings fit them 
 to a nicety; there they produce upon 
 one only amiable, or at the least, nat 
 ural, impressions. But to encounter 
 them in the Strand is to be shocked by 
 the blank incongruity of things. It is 
 
 not alone that they give the effect of 
 133 
 
134 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 being lost of wandering helplessly in 
 unfamiliar places. They offend your 
 perceptions by revealing limitations 
 and shortcomings which might other 
 wise have been hidden to the end of 
 time. You see suddenly that they are 
 j not such good fellows, after all. Their 
 spiritual complexions are made up for 
 the dim light which pervades the out 
 skirts of the four-mile radius and go 
 to pieces in the jocund radiance of the 
 Strand. It is flat presumption on their 
 part to be ambling about where the 
 ghosts of Goldsmith and Johnson walk, 
 where Prior and Fielding and our Dick 
 Steele have passed. Instinctively you 
 go by, looking the other way. 
 
 It was quite different with Uncle 
 Dudley. You saw at once that he be 
 longed to the Strand, as wholly as any 
 
Observations in Pliilistia 135 
 
 of our scorned and scornful sisters on 
 its corners, competing with true insular 
 doggedness against German cheeks 
 and raddled accents ; as fully as any of 
 its indigenous loafers, hereditary in 
 their riverside haunts from Tudor 
 times, with their sophisticated joy in 
 drink and dirt,^heir large self-confi 
 dence grinning through rags and sooty 
 grime. - 1 It seemed as if I had always 
 associated Uncle Dudley with the 
 Strand. 
 
 He was standing in contemplation 
 before a brave window, wherein Ameri 
 can cheese, Danish butter, Norwegian 
 fish, Belgian eggs, German sausages, 
 Hungarian bacon, French vegetables, 
 Australian apples, and Algerian fruits 
 celebrate the catholicity of the modern 
 British diet. He turned when I touched 
 
136 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 his shoulder, and drew my arm through 
 his. 
 
 "Sir," said Uncle Dudley, "let us 
 take a walk along the Strand to the 
 Law Courts, where I conceive that the 
 tide of human existence gets the worst 
 of it with unequalled regularity and 
 dispatch." 
 
 On his way he told me that his gout 
 had quite vanished, owing to his fore 
 sight in collecting a large store of the 
 best medical advice, and then thought 
 fully and with pains disregarding it all. 
 He demonstrated to me at two halting 
 places that his convalescence was com 
 patible with rich and strong drinks. 
 He disclosed to me, as we sauntered 
 eastward, his purpose in straying thus 
 far afield. 
 
 "You know Mrs. Albert is really a 
 
Observations in Philistia 137 
 
 kindly soul," he said. " It isn t in her 
 
 
 
 to keep angry. You remember how 
 sternly she swore that she and Fern- 
 bank had seen the last of Miss Timby- 
 Hucks. It only lasted five weeks and 
 now, bless me if the girl isn t more at 
 home on our backs than ever. She s 
 shunted herself off, now, into a new 
 branch of journalism it seems that 
 there are a good many branches in 
 these days." 
 
 " It has been noticed," I assented. 
 
 "She doesn t write any more," he 
 explained, "that is, for the papers. 
 She goes instead to the Museum or 
 somewhere, and reads carefully every 
 daily and weekly journal, I believe, in 
 England. Her business is to pick out 
 possible libels in them and to furnish 
 her employers, a certain firm of solici- 
 
138 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 tors, with a daily list of these. They 
 communicate with the aggrieved peo 
 ple, notifying them that they are 
 aggrieved, which they very likely 
 would not otherwise have known, and 
 the result is, of course, a very fine and 
 spirited crop of litigation." 
 
 " Then that accounts for all the re 
 cent 
 
 " Perhaps not quite all," put in Uncle 
 Dudley. "But the Timby-Hucks is 
 both energetic and vigilant, and she 
 tells me she is doing splendidly. She 
 is very enthusiastic about it, naturally. 
 She says that while the money is, of 
 course, an object, her real satisfaction 
 is in the humanitarian aspects of her 
 work." 
 
 " I am not sure that I follow," I said 
 doubtingly. 
 
Observations in Philistia 139 
 
 "No, I didn t altogether myself at 
 the start," said Uncle Dudley, "but as 
 she explains it, it is very simple. You 
 see business is in a bad way in London 
 worse, they say, than usual. The 
 number of unemployed is something 
 dreadful to think of, so I am told by 
 those who have thought of it. , There 
 are many thousands of people with no 
 food, no fire, no clothes to speak of. 
 Most people are discouraged about this. 
 They can t see how the thing can be 
 improved. But Miss Timby-Hucks has 
 a very ingenious idea. Why, she asks, 
 do not all the Unemployed sue all the 
 newspapers for libel? Do you catch 
 the notion?" 
 
 "By George!" I exclaimed, "that is 
 a bold, comprehensive thought!" 
 
 "Yes, isn t it?" cried Uncle Dudley. 
 
140 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 " I am immensely attracted by it. For 
 one thing, it is so secure, so certain! 
 Broadly speaking, there are no risks at 
 all. I suppose there has never yet 
 been a case, no matter what its so-called 
 merits, in which the English news 
 paper hasn t been cast in damages of 
 some sort. Nobody is too humble or 
 too shady to get a verdict against an 
 editor or newspaper proprietor. Miss 
 Timby-Hucks relates several most 
 touching instances where the wolf was 
 actually at the door, the children shoe 
 less and hungry, the mother prostrated 
 by drink, rain coming through the roof 
 and so on and everything has been 
 changed to peace and contentment by 
 the happy thought of bringing a libel 
 suit. The father now wears a smile 
 and a white waistcoat ; the drains have 
 
Observations in Philistia 141 
 
 been repaired; the little children, 
 nicely washed and combed, kick each 
 other s shins with brand new boots, 
 and sing cheerfully beneath a worsted- 
 work motto of God bless our Home! 
 I find myself much affected by the 
 thought." 
 
 "You had always a tender heart," I 
 responded. "I suppose there would 
 be no trouble about the Judges^" 
 
 "Not the least in the world," said 
 Uncle Dudley, with confidence. " Of 
 course the Bench would have to be 
 greatly enlarged, but there need be no 
 fear on that score. There is a mysteri 
 ous but beneficent rule, my boy, which 
 you can always count upon in this mak 
 ing of judges-^-no matter how hail-fel 
 low-well-met an eminent lawyer may 
 be, no matter how intimate his connec- 
 
142 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 tion with newspapers, how large his 
 indebtedness to them for his career the 
 moment he gets on the Bench he 
 catches the full, fine, old-crusted judi 
 cial spirit towards the Press. The scales 
 fall with a bang from his eyes, and he 
 sees the editor and newspaper pro 
 prietor as they really are designing 
 criminals, mercenary reprobates, social 
 pests to be lectured and bullied and 
 put down. O, you may rely on the 
 Judges! They are as safe as a new 
 Liberal peer is to vote Tory." 
 
 "But the power of the Press ?" I 
 urged. " If the newspapers combine 
 in protest, and 
 
 "You talk at random!" said Uncle 
 Dudley almost austerely. " I should 
 say the most certain, the most abso 
 lutely reliable, element in the whole 
 
Observations in Philistia 143 
 
 case is the fact that newspapers do not k 
 combine. Whenever one editor gets 
 hit, all the others grin. One journal is 
 mulcted in heavy damages: the rest 
 have all a difficulty in dissembling 
 their delight. You read in natural 
 history that kites are given to falling 
 upon one of their kind which gets 
 wounded or decrepit, and picking out 
 its eyes. Well, kites are also made of 
 newspapers." 
 
 "And juries?" I began to ask. 
 
 "Here we are," remarked Uncle 
 Dudley, turning in toward the guarded 
 portals of the great hall. 
 
 " I have a friend among the attend 
 ants here, a thoughtful and discerning 
 man. I will learn from him where we 
 may look for the spiciest case. He 
 takes a lively interest in the flaying of 
 
144 Mrs. Albert Grnndy 
 
 editors. I believe he was once a 
 printer. He will tell us where the axe 
 gleams most savagely to-day: where 
 we shall get the most journalistic 
 blood for our money. You were speak 
 ing of juries. Just take a look at one of 
 them if you are not afraid of spoiling 
 your luncheon and you will see that 
 they speak for themselves. They re 
 gard all newspapers as public enemies 
 particularly when the betting tips 
 have been more misleading than usual. 
 They stand by their kind. They give 
 the poor man a chance without hesita 
 tion, without fail. They are here to 
 avenge the discovery of movable types, 
 and they do it. Come with me, and 
 witness the disembowelling of a daily, 
 the hamstringing of a sub-editor a 
 publisher felled by the hand of the Law 
 
Observations in Philistia 145 
 
 like a bullock. Since the bear-pits of 
 Bankside were closed there has been 
 no such sport." 
 
 Unhappily, it turned out that none 
 of the Judges had come down to the 
 Courts that day. There was a threat 
 of east wind in the air. " You see, if 
 they don t live to a certain age they 
 get no pensions, and their heirs turn a 
 key in the lock on the old gentlemen 
 in weather like this/ explained Uncle 
 Dudley, turning disappointedly away. 
 
 10 
 
DETAILING CERTAIN PRUDENTIAL 
 MEASURES TAKEN DURING THE 
 PANIC INCIDENT TO A LATE 
 THREATENED INVASION. 
 
" I HOPE," said Mrs. Albert, "that I 
 am as free to admit my errors in 
 judgment as another. Evidently there 
 has been a mistake in this matter, and 
 it is equally obvious that I am the one 
 who must have made it. I did not need 
 to have this pointed out to me, Dudley. 
 What I looked to you for was advice, 
 counsel, sympathy. You seem not to 
 realize at all how important this is to 
 me. A false step now may ruin every 
 thing and you simply sit there and 
 grin!" 
 
 "My dear sister," replied Uncle 
 Dudley, smoothing his face, "the 
 
 smile was involuntary. It shall not 
 149 
 
150 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 recur. I was only thinking of Albert s 
 enthusiasm for the 
 
 "Yes, I know!" put in Mrs. Al 
 bert; "for that girl with the zouave 
 jacket- 
 
 " And the scarlet petticoat," prompted 
 Uncle Dudley. 
 
 " And the crinoline," said the lady. 
 
 " O, he did not insist upon that. I 
 recall his exact words. Whether this 
 under-garment, he said, be made of 
 some stiff material like horsehair, or 
 by means of steel hoops, is a mere 
 question of detail. No, Albert ex 
 pressly kept an open mind on that 
 point." 
 
 "I agree with you," remarked Mrs. 
 Albert coldly, " to the extent that he 
 certainly does keep his mind on it. He 
 has now reverted to the subject, I 
 
Observations in Philistia 1 5 I 
 
 should think, at least twenty times. I 
 am not so blind as you may imagine. 
 I notice that that Mr. Labouchere also 
 keeps on referring, every week, to an 
 other girl in her zouave jacket, whom 
 he remembers with equal fondness, ap 
 parently." 
 
 "Yes," put in Uncle Dudley, "those 
 words about the stiff material like 
 horsehair were in Trutli. I dare say 
 Albert simply read them there, and 
 just unconsciously repeated them. We 
 often do inadvertent, unthinking things 
 of that sort." 
 
 Mrs. Albert shook her head. " It is 
 nothing to me, of course," she said, 
 "but I cannot help feeling that the 
 middle-aged father of a family might 
 concentrate his thoughts upon some 
 thing nobler, something higher, than 
 
1 52 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 the recollection of the charms of a red 
 petticoat, thirty years ago. That is so 
 characteristic of men. They cannot 
 discuss a question broadly 
 
 "Think not?" queried Uncle Dud 
 ley, with interest. " You should listen 
 at the keyhole sometime, after you 
 have led the ladies out from dinner." 
 
 " I mean personally, in a general 
 way. They always particularise. 
 Albert, for example, allows all his 
 views on this very important question 
 to be coloured by the fact that when he 
 was a young man he admired some 
 girl in a short red Balmoral petticoat. 
 Whenever conversation touches upon 
 any phase of the whole subject of 
 costume, out he comes with his tire 
 some adulation of that particular gar 
 ment. Of course, I ask no questions 
 
Observations in Philistia 153 
 
 I should prefer not to be informed I 
 try not even to draw inferences but I 
 notice that Ermyntrude is beginning to 
 observe the persistency with which her 
 
 father " 
 
 "My good Emily," urged Uncle 
 Dudley, consolingly, "far back in the 
 Sixties we all liked that girl; we 
 couldn t help ourselves she was the 
 only girl there was. And we think of 
 her fondly still we old fellows be 
 cause for us she was also the last there 
 was! When she went out, lo and be 
 hold ! we too had gone out, not to come 
 back any more. When Albert and I 
 babble about a scarlet petticoat, it is 
 only as a symbol of our own far-away 
 youth. O delicious vision ! the bright, 
 bright red, the skirt that came droop 
 ing down over it, not hiding too much 
 
154 Mrs. Albert G^indy 
 
 that pretty little foot and ankle, the 
 dear zouave jacket moulding itself so 
 delicately to the persuasive encircling 
 arm " 
 
 " Dudley ! I really must recall you to 
 yourself," said Mrs. Albert. "We 
 were speaking of quite another matter. 
 I am in a very serious dilemma. First 
 of all, as I explained to you, to please 
 the Hon. Mrs. Coon-Alwyn I became 
 one of the Vice-Presidents of the 
 Friendly Divided Skirt Association. 
 You know how useful she can be, in 
 helping to bring Ermyntrude out suc 
 cessfully. And of course everybody 
 knew that, even if we did have them 
 made, we should never wear them. 
 That was quite out of the question." 
 
 "And then?" asked Uncle Dudley. 
 
 "Well, then, let me see yes, next 
 
Observations in Philistia 155 
 
 came the Neo- Dress- Improver League. 
 I never understood what the object 
 was, precisely; it was a kind of seces 
 sion from the other, led by the Countess 
 
 / 
 of Wimps, and I needn t tell you that 
 
 she is of the utmost importance to us, 
 and there was simply nothing for me to 
 do but to become a Lady Patroness of 
 that. You were in extremely nice com 
 pany there were seven or eight ladies 
 of title among the Patronesses, our 
 names all printed together in beauti 
 ful little gilt letters and you really 
 weren t committed to anything that I > 
 could make out. No that was all right. 
 I should do the same thing again, 
 under the circumstances. No, the 
 trouble came with the Amalgamated 
 Anti-Crinoline Confederacy. That was 
 where I was too hasty, I think." 
 
156 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 "That s the thing with the protesting 
 post-cards, isn t it?" inquired Uncle 
 Dudley. 
 
 " That very feature of it alone ought 
 to have warned me," Mrs. Albert an 
 swered with despondency. " My own 
 better sense should have told me that 
 post-cards were incompatible with 
 selectness. But you see, the invita 
 tions were sent out by the authoress of 
 The Street-Sprinkler s Secret, and that 
 gave me the impression that it was to 
 be literary to represent Culture and 
 the Arts, you know ; and that appealed 
 to me, of course, very strongly." 
 
 " I have always feared that your lit 
 erary impulses would run away with 
 you," Uncle Dudley declared gravely. 
 
 "It is my weak side; I don t deny 
 it," replied his sister. "Where letters 
 
Observations in Philistia 157 
 
 and authorship, and that sort of thing, 
 you know, are concerned, it is my na 
 ture to be sympathetic. And besides, 
 the Dowager Lady Thames- Ditton was 
 very pronounced in favor of the move 
 ment, and I couldnt fly in the face of 
 that, could I? I must say, though, 
 that I had my misgivings almost from 
 the first. Miss Wallaby told the Rev. 
 Mr. Grayt-Scott that a lady she knew 
 had looked over quite a peck or more of 
 the post-cards which came in one day, 
 and they were nine-tenths of them 
 from Earl s Court." 
 
 "Yes," remarked Uncle Dudley, "I 
 think I have heard that the post-card 
 reaches its most luxuriant state of liter 
 ary usefulness in that locality. It was 
 from that point that they tried to rush 
 the Laureateship, you know." 
 
158 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 " Well, you can imagine how I felt 
 when I heard it. It is all well enough 
 to be literary nobody realises that 
 more than I do and it is all very well 
 to be loyal of course ! But one draws 
 the line at Earl s Court at least, that 
 part of it. I say frankly that it serves 
 me right. I should have known better. 
 One thing I cannot be too thankful for 
 Ermyntrude did not send a post-card. 
 Some blessed instinct prompted me to 
 tell her there was no hurry about it 
 that I did not like to see young girls 
 too forward in such matters. And 
 now why who knows Dudley ! I 
 have an idea! Ermie shall join the 
 Crinoline Defence League!" 
 
 " I see the family will hedge on the 
 crinoline issue. Capital!" 
 
 " You know, after all, we may have 
 
Observations in Philistia 159 
 
 to wear them. It s quite as likely as 
 not. The old Duchess of West Ham 
 is President of the League, and she is 
 very influential in the highest quarters. 
 Her Grace, I understand, is somewhat 
 bandy, but she has always maintained 
 the strictest Christian respectability, 
 and her action in this matter will count y 
 for a great deal. Just think, if she 
 should happen to take a fancy to 
 Ermyntrude ! That Miss Wallaby has 
 thrust herself forward till she is actu 
 ally a member of the Council, and she 
 is going to deliver an address on The 
 Effect of Modesty on National Morals/ 
 She told our curate that at one of the 
 meetings of the Council she came 
 within an ace of being introduced to 
 the Duchess herself. Now surely, if 
 she can accomplish all this, Ermie ought 
 
160 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 to be able to do still more. Tell me, 
 Dudley, what do you think?" 
 
 "I think," replied Uncle Dudley 
 musingly, " I think that the scarlet 
 petticoat, with the zouave jack- 
 Mrs. Albert interrupted him with 
 sternness. "Don t you see," she de 
 manded, " that if it docs come, the dear 
 girl will share in the credit of bringing 
 it in, and if it doesn t come, I shall 
 have the advantage of having helped 
 to stave off. Whichever side wins, 
 there we are." 
 
 Uncle Dudley rose, and looked 
 thoughtfully out upon the fog, and 
 stroked his large white moustache in 
 slow meditation. " Yes undoubtedly, 
 he said at last, " there we are." 
 
DEALING WITH THE DECEPTIONS 
 OF NATURE, AND THE FREEDOM 
 FROM ILLUSION INHERENT IN 
 THE UNNATURAL. 
 
"T^HERE was once a woman obvi 
 ously a thoughtful woman who 
 remarked that she had noticed that if 
 she managed to live till Friday, she 
 invariably survived the rest of the 
 week. I did not myself know this 
 philosopher, who is preserved to his 
 tory in one of Roscoe Conkling s 
 speeches, but her discovery always 
 recurs to me about this time of year, 
 when February begins to disclose those 
 first freshening glimpses of sunlight 
 and blue skies to bleared, fog-smudged 
 and shivering London. Aha I if we 
 have won thus far, if we have contrived 
 to get to February, then we shall surely 
 
 see the Spring. At least the one has 
 163 
 
164 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 heretofore involved the other and 
 there is confident promise in the smile 
 of a noon-day once more able to cast a 
 shadow, albeit the teeth of the east 
 wind gleam close behind that smile. 
 
 It was a day for a walk no set and 
 joyous rural tramp, indeed, with pipe 
 and wallet, and a helpful spring under 
 foot in the clean hard roadway, and an 
 honest, well-balanced stick for the bell- 
 ringing gentry who shall come at you 
 on wheels from behind but just an 
 orderly, contemplative urban ramble, 
 brisk enough for warmth, but with no 
 hurry, and above all no destination. 
 And it was a day, moreover, for letting 
 one s fellow-creatures pass along with 
 scant notice a winter-ridden, shuffling, 
 mud-stained company these, conscious 
 of being not at all worth examination 
 
Observations in Philistia 165 
 
 and for giving eye instead to the 
 house-fronts in the sunshine, and radi 
 ant chimney-pots and tiles above them, 
 and the signs of blessed, unaccustomed 
 blue still further up. There was, it is 
 true, an undeniable disproportion be 
 tween the inner look of these things, 
 and this gladness of the heart because 
 of them. Glancing more closely, one 
 could see that they were not taking the 
 sun seriously, and, for their own part, 
 were expecting more fogs next week. 
 And farther westward, when stucco, 
 brick, and stone gave way to park-land, 
 it was apparent at sight that the trees 
 were flatly incredulous. 
 
 They say that in Ireland, where the 
 mildness of climate has in the past 
 prompted many experiments with ex 
 otic growths, the trees not really in- 
 
1 66 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 digenous to the island never learn 
 sense, but year after year are gulled 
 by this February fraud into gushing 
 expansively forth with sap and tender 
 shoots, only to be gripped and shrivelled 
 by the icy after-hand of March. The 
 native tree, however, knows this trick 
 of old, and greets the sham Spring 
 with a distinctive, though well-but- 
 toned-up wink. In Kensington Park 
 region one couldn t be sure that the 
 trees really saw the joke. It is not, on 
 the whole, a humorous neighbourhood. 
 But at all events they were not to be 
 fooled into premature buds and sprouts 
 and kindred signs of silliness. Every 
 stiffly exclusive drab trunk rising be 
 fore you, every section of the brown 
 lacework of twigs up above, seemed to 
 offer a warning advertisement : " No 
 
Observations in Philistia 167 
 
 connection with the sunshine over the 
 way!" 
 
 Happily the flower-beds exhibited 
 more sympathy. Up through the 
 mould brave little snowdrops had 
 pushed their pretty heads, and the 
 crocuses, though with their veined 
 outer cloaks of sulphur, mauve, and 
 other tints still wrapped tight about 
 them, wore almost a swaggering air to 
 show how wholly they felt at home. 
 Emboldened by this bravado, less con 
 fident fellows were peeping forth, 
 though in such faltering fashion that 
 one could scarcely tell which was squill, 
 which narcissus or loitering jonquil. 
 Still, it was good to see them. They 
 too were glad that they had lived till 
 February, because after that comes the 
 Spring. 
 
1 68 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 And it was better still, as I turned to 
 stroll on, to behold coming toward me 
 down the path, with little swinging step, 
 and shapely head well up in air, none 
 other than our Ermyntrude. 
 
 I say "our" because it is really 
 absurd to think of it it seems only a 
 few months ago since she was a sprawl 
 ing torn-boy sort of a little girl, who 
 sat on my knee and listened with her 
 mouth open to my reminiscences of 
 personal encounters with unicorns and 
 the behemoth of Holy Writ. She must 
 be now by George! she is not a 
 minute under two-and-twenty. And 
 that means hdlas ! it undoubtedly 
 means that I am getting to be an old 
 boy indeed. At Christmas-tide I re 
 call it now Mrs. Albert spoke of me 
 as the oldest friend of the family. It 
 
Observations in Philistia 169 
 
 sounded kindly at the time, and I had 
 a special pleasure in the smile Ermyn- 
 trude wore as she, with the others, 
 lifted her glass towards me. I won t 
 say what vagrant thoughts and ambi 
 tions that smile did not raise in my 
 mind and, lo! they were toasting me 
 as an amiable elderly friend of the 
 Fernbank household. No wonder I 
 am glad to have lived till February ! 
 
 Ermyntrude had a roll of music in 
 her hands. There was a charming 
 glow on her cheeks, and a healthy, 
 happy, sparkle in her eyes. She stopped 
 short before me, with a little exclama 
 tion of not displeased surprise ! 
 
 " Why, how nice to run upon you like 
 this," she said, in high spirits. "We 
 thought you must have gone off to the 
 Riviera or Algiers or somewhere for 
 
1 70 Mrs. Albert Grnndy 
 
 your cold, you know. Mamma was 
 speaking of you only yesterday hop 
 ing that you were taking care of your 
 self/ 
 
 "Had I a cold?" I asked absently. 
 The air had grown chillier. We walked 
 along together, and she let me carry the 
 music. 
 
 "O you haven t heard," she ex 
 claimed suddenly, " such news as I 
 have for you! You couldn t ever 
 guess!" 
 
 " Is it something about crinoline?" I 
 queried. "Your mother was telling 
 me 
 
 " Rubbish !" said Ermyntrude gaily. 
 " I m engaged!" 
 
 The wind had really got round into 
 the East, and I fastened my coat at the 
 collar. " I am sure" I remarked at last 
 
Observations in Philistia 171 
 
 " I m sure I congratulate the happy 
 young man. Do I know him?" 
 
 "I hardly think so," she replied. 
 "You see, it s it s what you might 
 call rather sudden. We haven t known 
 him ourselves very long that is, inti 
 mately. You may have heard his name 
 the Honorable Knobbeleigh Jones/ 
 It s a very old family, though the title 
 
 is somewhat new. His father is Lord 
 
 K 
 SkillydufT, you know." 
 
 "The shipping man?" I said wearily. 
 
 " Yes. He and papa are together on 
 some board or other. That is how we 
 came to know them. Papa says he 
 never saw such business ability and 
 sterling worth combined in one man 
 before I m speaking of the father, you 
 know. He began life in quite a small 
 way, with just a few ships that he 
 
172 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 rented, or something like that. Then 
 there was a war on some coast in Africa 
 or Australia it begins with an A, I 
 know oh, is there a place called 
 Asliantee? yes, that s it and he got 
 the contract to take out four shiploads 
 of hay to our troops it would be for 
 their horses, wouldn t it?" 
 
 "Yes: the asses connected with the 
 military branch are needed at home 
 or at least are kept there." 
 
 " Well, after he started, he got orders 
 to stop at some place and wait for other 
 orders. He did so, and he waited four 
 years and eight months. Those orders 
 never came. The hay all rotted, of 
 course : the ships almost moulded away. 
 I dare say some of the crew died of old 
 age but Mr. Jones never stirred from 
 his post. Finally, some English official 
 
Mrs. Albert Grundy 173 
 
 came on him by accident quite! and 
 so he was recalled. Papa says very few 
 men would have shown such tenacity 
 of purpose and grasp of the situation. 
 Mamma says his fidelity to duty was 
 magnificent." 
 
 "Magnificent yes," I commented; 
 "but it wasn t war." 
 
 "Oh, bless you! there was no war 
 then" explained Ermyntrude. "The 
 war had been ended for years. And 
 all that while the pay for shipping that 
 hay had been going on, so that the 
 Government owed him I think it was 
 45,000. Of course he got more con 
 tracts, and then he was made a baro 
 net, and could build his own ships; 
 and now he is a lord, and papa says 
 the War Office would be quite helpless 
 without him." 
 
174 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 "And the son," I asked; "what does 
 he do?" 
 
 "Why, nothing, of course!" said 
 Ermyntrude, lifting her pretty brows a 
 little in surprise. " He is the eldest 
 son." 
 
 "I didn t know but he might have 
 gone in for the Army, or Parliament, 
 or something," I explained weakly: 
 "just to occupy his mind." 
 
 She smiled to herself somewhat 
 grimly, I thought. "No," she said, 
 assuming a serious face, "he says doing 
 things is all rot, if you aren t obliged 
 to do them. Of course, he goes in for 
 hunting and shooting and all that, and 
 he has a houseboat and a yacht, and 
 one year he was in the All-Slumpshire 
 eleven, but that was too much bother. 
 He hates bother." 
 
Observations in Philistia 175 
 
 We had come out upon the street 
 now, and walked for a little in si 
 lence. 
 
 "Ermie," I said at last, "you mustn t 
 be annoyed with me this is one of my 
 sentimental days, and you know as an 
 old friend of the family I ve a certain 
 right of free speech but this doesn t 
 seem to me quite good enough. A girl 
 like you beautiful and clever and ac 
 complished, knowing your way about 
 among books, and with tastes above the 
 ruck there ought to be a better out 
 look for you than this! I know that 
 type of young man and he isn t in your 
 street at all. Come now!" I went on, 
 gathering courage, " look me in the face 
 if you can, and tell me that you hon 
 estly love this young man, or that you 
 really respect his father, or that you 
 
176 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 candidly expect to be happy. I defy 
 you to do it!" 
 
 I was wrong. Ermyntrude did look 
 me in the face, squarely and without 
 hesitation. She halted for the moment 
 to do so, and her gaze, though not un 
 kindly, was full of serious frankness. 
 
 "There is one thing I do expect," 
 she said calmly. " I expect to get away 
 from Fernbank." 
 
SUGGESTING CONSIDERATIONS POS 
 SIBLY HERETOFORE OVER 
 LOOKED BY COMMENTATORS 
 UPON THE LAWS OF PROPERTY. 
 
 12 
 
" X/OU will find Dudley up in what 
 he calls his library," said Mrs. 
 Albert in the hallway. "I m so sorry 
 I must go out but he ll be glad to see 
 you. And let me entreat you, don t 
 give him any encouragement!" 
 
 "What!" cried I, "encourage Uncle 
 Dudley? Oh never, never!" 
 
 "No, just be firm with him," Mrs. 
 Albert went on. "Say that it mustn t 
 be thought of for a moment. And oh 
 by the way it s as well to warn 
 you: don t ask him what he did it for! 
 It seems that every one asks him that 
 and he gets quite enraged about it 
 now, when that particular question is 
 
 put. As like as not he d throw some- 
 179 
 
i8o Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 thing at you." She spoke earnestly, 
 in low, impressive tones. 
 
 " Wild horses should not drag it from 
 me," I pledged myself. "I will not 
 encourage him : I will not enrage him ; 
 I swear not to ask him what he did it 
 for. But if you don t mind could I, 
 so to speak, bear the shock of learning 
 what it is that he has done?" 
 
 "You haven t heard?" Mrs. Albert 
 asked, glancing up at me, with an as 
 tonished face, as I stood on the stairs. 
 When I shook my head, she put out 
 her hand to the latch, and opened the 
 door, as if to heighten the dramatic 
 suspense. Then she turned and looked 
 me in the eye with solemn intentness. 
 "What has he done!" she echoed in a 
 hollow voice: "You go upstairs and 
 see!" 
 
Observations in Philistia 181 
 
 The door closed behind her, and I 
 made my way noiselessly, two steps at 
 a time, to the floor above. Some vague 
 sense of disaster seemed to brood over 
 the silent, half -lighted stairway and 
 the deserted landing. I knocked at 
 Uncle Dudley s door almost prepared 
 to find my signal unanswered. But no, 
 his voice came back, cheerily enough, 
 and I entered the room. 
 
 " Oh, it s you !" said my friend, rising 
 from his chair. "Glad to see you," 
 and we shook hands. Standing thus, 
 I found myself staring into his face 
 with a rude and prolonged fixity of 
 gaze, under which he first smiled a 
 strange, unwholesome sort of smile 
 then flushed a little, then scowled and 
 averted his glance. 
 
 " Great heavens !" I exclaimed at last. 
 
1 82 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 " Why, man alive, what on earth pos 
 sessed you to " 
 
 "Come now!" broke in Uncle Dud 
 ley, with peremptory sternness. 
 "Chuck it!" 
 
 "Yes I know" I stammered halt 
 ingly along " I promised I wouldn t 
 ask you but 
 
 " But the original simian instincts 
 triumph over your resolutions, eh?" 
 said my friend crustily. "Yes, I 
 know. I ve had pretty nearly a week 
 of it now. That question has been 
 asked me, I estimate, somewhere about 
 six hundred and seventy-eight times 
 since last Thursday. It s only fair to 
 you to tell you that I have registered a 
 vow to hit the next man who asks me 
 that fool of a question What did you 
 do it for? straight under his left ear. 
 
Observations in Philistia 183 
 
 I probably saved your life by inter 
 rupting you." 
 
 Though the words were fierce, there 
 was a marked return of geniality in the 
 tone. I took the liberty of putting a 
 hand over Uncle Dudley s shoulder, 
 and marching him across to the window. 
 
 "Let s have a good look at you," I 
 said. 
 
 " I did it myself ; I did it with my 
 little hatchet ; I did it because I wanted 
 to; I had a right to do it; I should 
 
 do it again if the fit struck me " 
 
 Thus, with mock gravity, Uncle Dud 
 ley ran on as I scrutinised his coun 
 tenance in the strong light. "And 
 furthermore," he added, "I don t care 
 one single hurrah in Hades whether 
 you like it or not." 
 
 "I think on the whole," I mused 
 
1 84 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 aloud " yes, I think I rather do like it 
 now that I accustom myself to it." 
 
 Uncle Dudley s face brightened on 
 the instant. "Do you really?" he ex 
 claimed, and beamed upon me. In 
 spite of his professed indifference to 
 my opinion, it was obvious that I had 
 pleased him. 
 
 "Sit down," he said "there are the 
 matches behind you hope these aren t 
 too green for you. Yes, my boy, I 
 created quite a flutter in the hen-yard, 
 I can tell you. Did my sister tell you? 
 she nearly fainted, and little Amy 
 burst out boo-hooing as if she d lost her 
 last friend. When you come to think 
 of it, old man, it s really too ridicu 
 lous, you know." 
 
 " It certainly has its grotesque as 
 pects," I admitted. 
 
Observations in Philistia 185 
 
 Uncle Dudley looked up sharply, as 
 if suspecting some ironical meaning in 
 my words. "You really do think it s 
 an improvement?" he asked, with a 
 doubtful note in his voice. 
 
 "Of course, it makes a tremendous 
 change," I said diplomatically, "and 
 the novelty tends perhaps to confuse 
 judgment, but I must confess the re 
 sult is is, well, very interesting." 
 
 My friend did not look wholly 
 satisfied. " It shows what stupid peo 
 ple we are," he went on in a dogmatic 
 way. "Why, the way they ve gone 
 on, you d think I had no property 
 rights in the thing at all that I was 
 merely a trustee for it bound to give 
 an account to every Tom-Dick-and- 
 Harry who came along and had noth 
 ing better to occupy his mind with. 
 
1 86 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 And then that eternal, vacuous, wool 
 len-brained What did you do it for? 
 Oh, that s got to be too sickening for 
 words ! And the confounded familiar 
 ity of the whole thing! Why, hang 
 me, if even the little Jew cigar dealer 
 on the corner didn t feel entitled to 
 pass what he took to be some friendly 
 remarks on the subject. Vy, he 
 said, if I could say vidout vlattery, 
 vot a haddsobe jeddlebad you ver, and 
 vy did you do dot by yourself? It 
 gets on a man s nerves, you know, 
 things like that." 
 
 "But hasn t any one liked the 
 change?" I asked. 
 
 Uncle Dudley sighed. "That s the 
 worst of it," he said dubiously. " Only 
 two men have said they liked it and 
 it happens that they are both persons 
 
Observations in Philistia 187 
 
 of conspicuously weak intellect. That s 
 rather up against me, isn t it? But on 
 the other hand, you know, people who 
 are silliest about everything else always 
 get credit for knowing the most about 
 art and beauty and all that. Perhaps 
 in such a case as this, I dare say their 
 judgment might be better than all the 
 others. And after all, what do /care? 
 That s the point I make: that it s my 
 business and nobody else s. If a man 
 hasn t got a copyright in his own per 
 sonal appearance, why there is no such 
 thing as property. But instead of rec 
 ognising this, any fellow feels free to 
 come up and say: You look like an 
 unfrocked priest/ or Hullo! another 
 burglar out of work? and he s quite 
 surprised if you fail to show that you re 
 pleased with the genial brilliancy of 
 
1 88 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 his remarks. I don t suppose there is 
 any other single thing which the hu 
 man race lapses into such rude and 
 insolent meddlesomeness over as it 
 does over this." 
 
 "It is pathetic," I admitted " but 
 but it ll soon grow again." 
 
 Uncle Dudley laughed a bitter laugh. 
 "By Jove," he cried, "I ve more than 
 half a mind not to let it. It would 
 serve em right if I didn t. Why, do 
 you know you d hardly believe it! 
 My sister had a dinner party on here 
 for Saturday night, and after I d I d 
 done it she cancelled the invitations 
 some excuse about a family loss a 
 bereavement, my boy. Well, you 
 know, treatment of that sort puts a 
 man on his mettle. I m entitled to 
 resent it. And besides you know 
 
Observations in Philistia 189 
 
 of course it does make a great change 
 
 but somehow I fancy that when you 
 
 get used to it come now the straight 
 
 griffin, as they say what do you think ?" 
 
 "I m on oath not to encourage you," 
 
 I made answer. 
 
 "There you have it!" cried Uncle 
 Dudley : " the old tyrannical conspiracy 
 against the unusual, the individual, the 
 true ! Let nobody dare to be himself ! 
 Let us have uniformity, if all else 
 perishes. The frames must be alike in 
 the Royal Academy, that s the great 
 thing; the pictures don t matter so 
 much. You see our women-folk now, 
 this very month, getting ready to case 
 themselves in ugly hoops which they 
 hate, at the bidding of they know not 
 whom, because, if they did not, the 
 hideous possibility of one woman being 
 
190 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 different from another woman would 
 darken the land. A man is not to be 
 permitted the pitiful privilege of seeing 
 his own mouth, not even once in fifteen 
 years, simply because it temporarily 
 inconveniences the multitude in their 
 notions as to how he is in the habit of 
 looking! What rubbish it is!" 
 
 " It is rubbish," I assented " and you 
 are talking it. Your sister who fainted, 
 your niece who wept, your friends who 
 averted their gaze in anguish, the 
 hordes of casual jackasses who asked 
 why you did it, the kindly little Jew 
 cigar man who broke forth in lamen 
 tations these are the world s jury. 
 They have convicted you sorrowfully 
 but firmly. You yourself, for all your 
 bravado, realise the heinousness of 
 your crime. You are secretly ashamed, 
 
Observations in Philistia 191 
 
 remorseful, penitent. I answer for 
 you you will never do it again." 
 
 "And yet it isn t such a bad mouth, 
 either," mused Uncle Dudley, with a 
 lingering glance at the mirror over the 
 mantel. "There is humour, delicacy s 
 of perception, affection, gentleness 
 ever so many nice qualities about it 
 which were all hidden up before. 
 The world ought to welcome the reve 
 lation and it throws stones instead. 
 Ah well! pass the matches let us 
 yield gracefully to the inevitable! It 
 shall grow again." 
 
 "Mrs. Albert will be so glad," I re 
 marked. 
 
NARRATING THE FAILURE OF A 
 LOYAL ATTEMPT TO CIRCUM 
 VENT ADVERSITY BY MEANS OF 
 MODERN APPLIANCES. 
 
"IF his name was Jabez, why weren t 
 we told so, I d like to know?" de 
 manded Mrs. Albert of me, with a mo 
 mentary flash in her weary glance. 
 " What right had the papers to go on 
 calling him J. Spencer, year after year, 
 while he was deluding the innocent, 
 and fattening upon the bodies of his 
 dupes? To be sure, now that the mask 
 is off, and he has fled, they speak of 
 him always as Jabez. Why didn t they 
 do it it before, while honest peeple 
 might still have been warned? But 
 no they never did and now it s too 
 late too late !" 
 
 The poor lady s voice broke pathetic 
 ally upon this reiterated plaint. She 
 bowed her head, and as I looked with 
 
196 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 pained sympathy upon the drooping 
 angle of her proud face, I could see the 
 shadows about her lips quiver. 
 
 A sad tale indeed it was, to which I 
 had been listening here in a lonesome 
 corner of the cloistral, dim-lit solitude 
 \ of the big drawing-room at Fernbank. 
 It was not a new story. Kensington 
 has known it by heart for a generation. 
 Bloomsbury learned it earlier, and be 
 fore that it was familiar in Soho away 
 off in the old days when the ruffling 
 gentry of Golden Square fought for the 
 chance of buying ingenious John Law s 
 South Sea scrip. And even then, the 
 experience was an ancient and half- 
 forgotten memory of Bishopsgate and 
 the Minories. It was the old, old trag- 
 edy of broken fortunes. 
 
 Mrs. Albert was clear that it began 
 
Observations in Philistia 197 
 
 with the Liberator troubles. I had my 
 own notion that Mr. Albert Grundy 
 was skating on thin ice before the col 
 lapse of the building societies came. 
 However that may be, there was no 
 doubt whatever that the cumulative 
 Australian disasters had finished the 
 business. There were melancholy de 
 tails in her recital which I lack the 
 courage to dwell upon. The horse and 
 brougham were gone; the lease of 
 Fernbank itself was offered for sale, 
 with possession before Michaelmas, if 
 desired; Ermyntrude s engagement 
 was as good as off. 
 
 "It won t be a bankruptcy," said 
 Mrs. Albert, lifting her face and reso 
 lutely winking the moisture from her 
 lashes. " We shall escape that but 
 for the moment at least I must abandon 
 
198 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 my position in society. Dudley is over 
 to-day looking- at a small place in 
 Highgate, although Albert thinks he 
 would prefer Sydenham. My own 
 feeling is that some locality from which 
 you could arrive by King s Cross or St. 
 Pancras would be best. One never 
 meets anybody one knows there. 
 Then, when matters adjust themselves 
 again, as of course they will, we could 
 return here to this neighbourhood, at 
 least and just mention casually having 
 been out at our country place on the 
 children s account, of course. And 
 Floribel is delicate, you know." 
 
 "Oh well, then," I said, trying to 
 put buoyance into my tone, "it isn t so 
 bad after all. And you feel Albert 
 feels quite hopeful about things com 
 ing right again?" 
 
Observations in Philistia 199 
 
 My friend s answering nod of affir 
 mation had a certain qualifying dubiety 
 about it. "Yes, we re hopeful, she 
 said. " But a fortnight ago, I felt 
 positively sanguine. Nobody evei 
 worked harder than I did to deserve 
 success, anyway. I only failed through 
 gross treachery and that, too, at the 
 hands of the very people of whom I 
 could never, never have believed it. 
 When you find the aristocracy openly 
 actuated by mercenary motives, as I 
 have done this past month, it almost 
 makes you ask what the British nation 
 is coming to!" 
 
 "Dear me!" I exclaimed, "is it as 
 bad as that?" 
 
 "You shall judge for yourself," said 
 Mrs. Albert gravely. "You know 
 that I organised quite early in the 
 
20O Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 Spring the Loyal Ladies Namesake 
 Committee of Kensington. I do not 
 boast in saying that I really organised 
 it, quite from its beginnings. The idea 
 was mine ; practically all the labor was 
 mine. But when one is toiling to re 
 alise a great ideal like that, one fre 
 quently loses sight of small details. I 
 ought to have known better but I took 
 v a. serpent to my bosom. I was weak 
 enough to associate with me in the en 
 terprise that monument of duplicity 
 and interested motives the Hon. Mrs. 
 Coon-Alwyn. Why, she hadn t so 
 much as an initial letter to entitle her 
 
 to belong " 
 
 " I am not sure that I follow you," I 
 put in. * Ladies Namesake Commit 
 tee initial letter I don t seem to 
 grasp the idea." 
 
Observations in Philistia 201 
 
 "It s perfectly simple," explained 
 Mrs. Albert. "The idea was that all 
 the ladies our set, you know whose 
 name was May should combine in 
 subscribing for a present." 
 
 "But your name is Emily," I urged, 
 thoughtlessly. 
 
 " Oh, we weren t exactly literal about 
 it," said Mrs. Albert; "we couldn t be, 
 you know. It would have shut out 
 some of our very best people. But I 
 came very near the standard, indeed. 
 My second name is Madge. You take 
 the first two letters of that, and the *y 
 from Emily, and there you have it. Oh, 
 I assure you, very few came even as 
 near it as that and as I said to Dudley 
 at the time, if you think of it, even her 
 name isn t really May. It s only a 
 popular contraction. But that Hon. 
 
2O2 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 Mrs. Coon-Alwyn, she had no actual 
 right whatever to belong. Her names 
 are Hester Winifred Edith. She hasn t 
 even one letter right!" 
 
 "Ah, that was indeed treachery!" I 
 ejaculated. 
 
 " Oh, no, that was not what I referred 
 to," Mrs. Albert set me right. "Of 
 course I was aware of her names. I 
 had seen them in the Peerage for 
 years. It was what she did after her 
 entrance that covers her with infamy. 
 But I will narrate the events in their 
 order. First, we collected 1,100. Of 
 course, our own contribution was not 
 large, but Ermyntrude and I hunted the 
 various church registers don t speak 
 of it, but even the Nonconformist ones 
 we went through and we got a tre 
 mendous number of Christian names 
 
Observations in Philistia 203 
 
 more or less what was desired, and our 
 circulars were sent to every one, far and 
 near. As I said, we raised quite 
 1,100. Then there came the ques 
 tion of the gift." 
 
 Mrs. Albert uttered this last sen 
 tence with such deliberate solemnity 
 that I bowed to show my consciousness 
 of its importance. 
 
 "Yes, "she went on, "the selection 
 of the gift. Now I had in mind a 
 most appropriate and useful present. 
 Have you heard of the Oboid Oil En 
 gine? No? Well, it is an American 
 invention, and has been brought over 
 here by an American, who has bought 
 the European rights from the inventor. 
 He is in the next building to Albert, 
 in the City, and they meet almost 
 every day at luncheon, and have struck 
 
2O4 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 up quite a friendship. He has connec 
 tions which might be of the utmost im 
 portance to Albert, and if Albert could 
 
 only have been of service to him in 
 i 
 
 introducing this engine, there is liter 
 ally no telling what might not have 
 come of it. Albert does not say that a 
 partnership would have resulted, but I 
 can read it in his face." 
 
 " But would an oil engine have been 
 V 
 under the circumstances you know 
 
 what I mean " I began. 
 
 "Oh, most suitable!" responded Mrs. 
 Albert with conviction. " It is really, 
 it seems, a very surprising piece of 
 machinery. After it s once bought, 
 the cheapness of running it is simply 
 absurd. It does all sorts of things at 
 no expense worth mentioning any 
 thing you want it to do. It appears 
 
Observations in Philistia 205 
 
 that if it had been invented at that 
 time, the pyramids in Egypt could 
 have been built by it for something 
 like 130 per cent, less than their cost 
 is estimated to have been or some 
 thing like that. Oh, it is quite extra 
 ordinary, I assure you. Albert says 
 he could stand and watch it working 
 for hours especially if he had an in 
 terest in the company." 
 
 "But I hadn t heard that there were 
 any new pyramid plans on just now 
 although, when I think of it, Shaw- 
 Lefevre did have some Westminster 
 Abbey project which " 
 
 " No, no ! " interrupted Mrs. Albert. 
 "One of the engine s greatest uses is - 
 in agriculture. It does everything 
 threshes, garners, mows, milks or no, 
 not that, but almost everything. No 
 
206 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 self-respecting farmer, they say, dreams 
 of being without one that is, of course, 
 if he knows about it. You can see 
 what it would have meant, if one had 
 been thus publicly introduced on the 
 princely farm at Sandringham. All 
 England would have rung with de 
 mands for the Oboid and Albert feels 
 sure that the American man would 
 have been grateful and and then 
 perhaps we need never have left Fern- 
 bank at all." 
 
 My poor friend shook her head 
 mournfully at the thought. 
 
 "And the Hon. Mrs. Coon-Alwyn?" 
 I asked. 
 
 The fire came back into Mrs. Al 
 bert s eye. "That woman," she said, 
 with bitter calmness, "was positively 
 not ashamed to intrude her own mer- 
 
Observations in Philistia 207 
 
 cenary and self-seeking designs upon 
 this loyal and purely patriotic associa 
 tion. Why, she did it almost openly. 
 She intrigued behind my back with 
 whole streetsful of people that one 
 would hardly know on ordinary occa 
 sions, paid them calls in a carriage got 
 up for the occasion with a bright new 
 coat of arms, made friends with them, 
 promised them heaven only knows 
 what, and actually secured nineteen 
 votes to my three for the purchase of 
 a mouldy old piece of tapestry some 
 thing about Richard III. and Oliver , 
 Cromwell meeting on the battlefield, I 
 think the subject is which belonged 
 to her husband s family. Of course, 
 my lips are sealed, but I have been 
 told that at Christie s it would hardly 
 have fetched 100. I say nothing 
 
208 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 myself, but I can t prevent people 
 drawing certain deductions, can I? 
 And when I reflect also that her two 
 most active supporters in this nefari 
 ous business were Lady Thames-Ditton 
 whose financial difficulties are noto 
 rious and the Countess of Wimps 
 whose tradespeople well, we won t go 
 into that it does force one to ask 
 whether the fabric of British society is 
 not being undermined at its very top. 
 In this very day s paper I read that 
 the Hon. Mrs. Coon-Alwyn has hired 
 a yacht, and will spend the summer in 
 Norwegian waters while we we 
 
 The door opened, and we made out 
 through the half-light the comfortable 
 figure of Uncle Dudley. He was mop 
 ping his brow, and breathed heavily 
 from his long walk as he advanced. 
 
Observations in Philistia 209 
 
 "Well?" Mrs. Albert asked, in a 
 saddened and subdued tone, " Did you 
 see the place?" 
 
 "There are five bedrooms on the 
 two upper floors," he made answer, 
 "but there s no bath-room, and the 
 bus doesn t come within four streets of 
 the house." 
 14 
 
INTRODUCING SCENES FROM A 
 FOREIGN COUNTRY, AND ALSO 
 CONVEYING WELCOME INTELLI 
 GENCE, TOGETHER WITH SOME 
 INSTRUCTION. 
 
I T was at a little village perched well 
 up on one of the carriage-roads as 
 cending the Brocken, a fortnight or so 
 ago, that I received a wire from Uncle 
 Dudley. It was kind of him to think 
 of it all the more as he had good 
 news to tell. " Family lighted square 
 on their feet," was what the message 
 said, and I was glad to gather from 
 this that the Grundys had weathered 
 their misfortunes, and that Mrs. Albert 
 was herself again. 
 
 The thought was full of charm. It 
 seemed as if I had never realised be 
 fore how fond I was of these good peo 
 ple. In sober fact, I dare say that I 
 
 had not dwelt much upon their woes 
 213 
 
214 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 during my holiday. But now, with 
 this affectionately thoughtful telegram 
 addressing me as their oldest friend, 
 the one whom they wished to be the 
 first to share the joy of their rescued 
 state, it was easy enough to make my 
 self believe that my whole vacation 
 had been darkened with brooding over 
 their unhappiness. 
 
 It had not occurred to me before, but 
 that was undoubtedly why I had not 
 liked the Harz so much this year as 
 usual. Now that I thought of it, walk 
 ing down the birch-lined footpath to 
 ward the hamlet and the telegraph 
 office, the place seemed to have gone 
 off a good deal. In other seasons, be 
 fore the spectre of cholera flooded its 
 sylvan retreats with an invading horde 
 of Hamburgers, the Harzwald had 
 
Observations in Philistia 215 
 
 been my favourite resort. I had grown 
 to love its fir-clad slopes, its shadowed 
 glens, its atmosphere of prehistoric 
 myth and legend, as if I were part and 
 product of them all. Its people, too, 
 had come much nearer to my breast 
 than any other Germans ever could. I 
 had enjoyed being with them just be 
 cause they were what the local school 
 master disdainfully declared them to 
 be Erdzertrummerungsprozeszunbekann- 
 tevolk that is to say, people entirely 
 ignorant of the scientific theories about 
 geological upheavals and volcanic for 
 mations, and so able cheerfully to put 
 their trust in the goblins who reared 
 these strange boulders in fantastic piles 
 on every hill top, and to hear with 
 good faith the shouts of the witches as 
 they bounded over the Hexentanzplatz. 
 
2i6 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 Last year it had seemed even worth 
 the added discomfort of the swarming 
 Hamburgers to be again in this whole 
 some, sweet-aired primitive place. 
 
 But this year I saw now clearly as 
 I looked over Uncle Dudley s message 
 once more it had not been so pleas 
 ant. The hotel boy Fritzchen, whom 
 I had watched year after year with the 
 warmth of a fatherly well-wisher 
 smiling with satisfaction at his jovial 
 countenance, his bustling and compe 
 tent ways, and his comical attempts at 
 English had this season swollen up 
 into a burly and consequential lout, 
 with a straw-coloured sprouting on 
 his upper-lip, and a military manner. 
 They called him Fritz now, and he 
 gave me beer out of the old keg after I 
 had heard the new one tapped. 
 
Observations in Philistia 217 
 
 The evening gatherings of the vil 
 lagers in the hotel, too, were not amus 
 ing as they once had been. The huge 
 lion-maned and grossly over-bearded 
 Kantor or music-master, who came reg 
 ularly at nightfall to thump on the 
 table with his bludgeon-like walking- 
 stick, to roar forth impassioned mono 
 logues on religion and politics, and to 
 bellow ceaselessly at Fritzchen for 
 more beer, had formerly delighted me. 
 This time he seemed only a noisy nui 
 sance, and the half-circle of grave old 
 retired foresters and middle-aged Jdger 
 officers who sat watching him over 
 their pipes, striving vainly now and 
 again to get in a word edgewise about 
 the auctions of felled trees in the 
 woods, or the mutinous tendencies of 
 the charcoal-burners, presented them- 
 
218 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 selves in the light of tirtesome prigs. 
 If they had been worth their salt, I 
 felt, they would long ago have brained 
 the Kantor with their stoneware mugs. 
 Even as I walked I began to be con 
 scious that a three weeks stay in the 
 Harz was a good deal of time, and that 
 the remaining third would certainly 
 hang on my hands. 
 
 By the time I reached the telegraph 
 station I had my answer to Uncle Dud 
 ley ready in my mind. He liked the 
 forcible imagery of Australia and the 
 Far West ; and I would speak to him 
 at this joyful juncture after his own 
 heart. It seemed that I could best do 
 this by giving him to understand that 
 I was celebrating his news that I was, 
 in one of his own phrases, "painting 
 the town red." It required some in- 
 
Observations in Philistia 219 
 
 genuity to work this idea out right, but 
 I finally wrote what appeared to an 
 swer the purpose : " Bracken und Umge- 
 bung sind roth gemalen" and handed it 
 in to the man at the window. 
 
 He was a young man with close- 
 cropped yellow hair and spectacles, 
 holding his chin and neck very stiff in 
 the high collar of his uniform. He 
 glanced over my despatch, at first with 
 careless dignity. Then he read it 
 again attentively., Then he laid it on 
 the table, and bent his tight-buttoned 
 form over it as well as might be in a 
 severe and prolonged scrutiny. At 
 last he raised himself, turned a petri 
 fying gaze on through his glasses at 
 me, and shook his head. 
 
 "It is not true," he said. "-Some ,/ 
 one has you deceived." 
 
22O Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 "But," I tried to explain to him, 
 with the little German that I knew 
 scattering itself in all directions in the 
 face of this crisis, "it is a figure of 
 speech, a joke, a 
 
 The telegraph man stared coldly at 
 my luckless despatch, and then at me. 
 "You would wish to state to your 
 friend, perhaps," he suggested, "that 
 they seem as if they had been colored 
 with red, owing to the change in the 
 leaves." 
 
 "No, no," I put in. "It must be 
 that they have been painted, are 
 painted, or he will not me under 
 stand." 
 
 "But, my good sir," retorted the 
 operator with emphasis, "they are not 
 painted! From the door gaze you 
 forth! What make you with this non- 
 
Observations in Philistia 221 
 
 sense, that Brocken and vicinity are 
 red painted?" 
 
 "Well, then," I said wearily, op 
 pressed by the magnitude of the task, 
 " I don t know how to word it myself, 
 but you can fix it for me. Just say 
 that I am going to paint them red that 
 will do just as well." 
 
 " But you shall not ! It is forbidden ! 
 exclaimed the official holding himself 
 like a poker, and glaring vehemence 
 through his glasses. " It is strongly 
 forbidden ! When you one brush-mark 
 shall make, quick to the prison go you. 
 In Germany have we for natural beauty 
 respect also laws." 
 
 Reluctantly, but of necessity, I aban 
 doned metaphor, and in a humble spirit 
 telegraphed in English to Uncle Dud 
 ley at his club that I was very glad. 
 
222 Mrs. Albert Grund} 
 
 Even as my pen clung in irresolution 
 on the paper over this word "glad," 
 the impulse rose in me to add : " Tired 
 of Harz. Am returning immediately." 
 
 "When the same here is," remarked 
 the operator, moodily studying the un 
 known words, " in Brunswick stopped 
 it will be." 
 
 I translated it for him, and added, 
 " I go from here home, to be where offi 
 cials their own business mind." 
 
 He nodded, not unamiably, and re 
 plied as he handed me out my change: 
 " Yes, I know : England. So well their 
 own business there officials mind, that 
 Balfour to Argentina easily comes." 
 
 Walking up the hillside again, al 
 ready quite captive to the fascination 
 of the morrow s homeward flight, I met 
 at the turn of the path a family party 
 
Observations in Philistia 223 
 
 father, mother, and two girls in the 
 younger teens seated along the rocky 
 siding, and gazing with a common air 
 of dejection upon a portentous row of 
 bags and portmanteaus at their feet. 
 The notion that they were Hamburg 
 ers died still-born. Nothing more ob 
 viously un-German than these way 
 farers was ever seen. 
 
 l I hope, sir," the man spoke up as I 
 approached, "that I am right in pre 
 suming that you speak English !" 
 
 I bowed assent, and even as I did so, 
 recognised him. "I hope /am right," 
 I answered, "in thinking that I have 
 met you before at Mr. Albert Grun- 
 dy s in London you are the American 
 gentleman with the Oboid Oil Engine, 
 are you not?" 
 
 "Well, by George!" he cried, rising 
 
224 Mrs. Albert Grnndy 
 
 and offering his hand with frank de 
 light, and introducing me in a single 
 comprehensive wave to his wife and 
 daughters. "Yes, sir," he went on, 
 " and I wish I had an Oboid here right 
 now up in the basement of that stone 
 boarding-house on the knoll there 
 just for the sake of heating up, and 
 shutting down the valves, and blowing 
 the whole damned thing sky-high. 
 That would suit me, sir, right down to 
 the ground." 
 
 "We re strangers here, sir," he ex 
 plained in answer to my question : t: we d 
 seen a good deal of the Dutch at home 
 I mean our home and we thought 
 we d like to take a look at em in the 
 place they come from. Well, sir, 
 we ve had our look, and we re satisfied. 
 We don t want any more on our plate, 
 
Observations in Philistia 225 
 
 thank you. One helping is an elegant 
 sufficiency. Do you know the trick 
 they played on us? Why, I took a 
 team of horses yesterday from a place 
 they called Ibsenburg or Ilsenburg, or 
 some such name, and had it explained 
 to my driver that he was to take us up 
 to the top of the Brocken, there, and 
 stop all night, and fetch us back this 
 morning. When we got up as far as 
 Shierke, there, it was getting pretty 
 dark, and the women -folks were ner 
 vous, and so we laid up for the night. 
 There didn t seem anything for the 
 driver to do but set around in the 
 kitchen and drink beer, and he needed 
 money for that, and so I gave him 
 some loose silver, and told him to 
 make himself at home. We got the 
 
 words out of a dictionary for that 
 15 
 
226 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 mac hen sie selbst zu Heimwe figured era 
 out to be and I spoke them at him 
 slowly and distinctly, so that he had 
 no earthly excuse for not understand 
 ing. But, would you believe it, sir, 
 the miserable cuss just up and skipped 
 out, horses, rig and all, while we were 
 getting supper ! And here we were this 
 morning, landed high and dry. No 
 conveyance, nobody to comprehend a 
 word of English, no nothing. We 
 haven t seen the top of their darned 
 mountain even." 
 
 "What I m more concerned about, I 
 tell Wilbur," put in the lady, "is see 
 ing the bottom of it. If they had only 
 sense enough to make valises and 
 bonnet-boxes ball-shaped, we could 
 have rolled em down hill." 
 
 "There ll be no trouble about all 
 
Observations in Philistia 227 
 
 that," I assured them, and we talked 
 for a little about the simple enough 
 process of getting their luggage 
 carried down to the village, and of 
 finding a vehicle there. I, indeed, 
 agreed to make one of their party on 
 quitting the Harz, that very afternoon. 
 
 " And now tell me about the 
 Grundys," I urged, when these more 
 pressing matters were out of the way. 
 " I got a wire to-day saying hinting 
 that they are in luck s way again/ 
 
 " Is that so?" exclaimed the Ameri 
 can, at once surprised and pleased. 
 "I m glad to hear it. I can t guess 
 what it might be in. Grundy s got so 
 many irons in the fire some white hot, 
 some lukewarm, some frosted straight 
 through you never can tell. The 
 funniest thing is he can t tell himself. 
 
228 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 Why, sir, those men of yours in the 
 City of London, they don t know any 
 more about business than a babe un 
 born. If they were in New York they d 
 have their eye-teeth skinned out of 
 their heads in the shake of a lamb s 
 tail. Why, we ve been milking them 
 dry for a dozen years back. And yet, 
 you know, somehow 
 
 "Somehow ?" I echoed, encourag 
 ingly. 
 
 " Well, sir, somehow that s the odd 
 thing about it they don t stay milked." 
 
DISCLOSING THE EDUCATIONAL 
 INFLUENCE EXERTED BY THE 
 ESSEX COAST, AND OTHER MAT 
 TERS, INCLUDING REASONS FOR 
 JOY. 
 
IT down here by the fire no, in 
 the easy chair," said Ermyn- 
 trude, with a note of solicitude in her 
 kindly voice. " Mamma won t be home 
 for half an hour yet, and I want a nice, 
 quiet, serious talk with you. Oh, it s 
 going to be extremely serious, and you 
 must begin by playing that you are at 
 least one hundred and fifty years old." 
 
 "That won t be so difficult," I re 
 plied, not without the implication of 
 injury. " It will only be adding a few 
 decades to the venerableness that I 
 seem always to possess in your eyes." 
 
 " Oh !" said Ermie, and looked at me 
 inquiringly for a moment. Then she 
 
 seated herself, and gazed with much 
 231 
 
232 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 steadiness into the fire. I waited for 
 the nice serious talk to begin and 
 waited a long time. 
 
 "Well, my dear child," I broke in 
 upon the silence at last, " I hoped to 
 have been the very first to come and 
 tell your mother how deeply glad I was 
 to see you all back again in Fernbank. 
 But that wretched rheumatism of mine 
 at my age, you know " 
 
 I was watching narrowly for even 
 the faintest sign of deprecation. She 
 did not stir an eyelash. 
 
 "Yes," she suddenly began, still in 
 tently gazing into the fire ; " papa has 
 got his money all back, and more. 
 That is, it isn t the same money, but 
 somebody else s I m sure I don t know 
 whose. Sometimes I feel sorry for 
 those other people, whoever they are, 
 
Observations in Philistia 233 
 
 who have had to give it up to us. 
 Then, other times, I am so glad simply 
 to be in again where it s warm that I 
 don t care." 
 
 "The firelight suits your face, 
 Ermie," I said, noting with the pleas 
 ure appropriate to my position as the 
 oldest friend of the family, how sweetly 
 the soft radiance played upward upon 
 the fair young rounded throat and chin, 
 and tipped the little nostrils with rosy 
 light. 
 
 "Fortunately," she went on, as if I 
 had not spoken, "some Americans 
 took the house furnished in September 
 for three months I think, poor souls, 
 that they believed it was the London 
 season and so we never had to break 
 up, and we were able to get back again 
 in time for Uncle Dudley to plant all 
 
234 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 his bulbs. They seem to have been 
 very quiet people. Mamma had a kind 
 of notion that they would practise with 
 bucking horses on the tennis-lawn, and 
 shoot at bottles and clay pigeons here 
 in the drawing-room. The only thing 
 we could find that they did was to paste 
 thick paper over the ventilator in the 
 dining-room. And yet a policeman 
 told our man that they slept with their 
 bedroom windows open all night. Cu 
 rious, isn t it?" 
 
 "I like to have one of these nice, 
 quiet, serious talks with you, Ermie," 
 I said. 
 
 Even at this she did not lift her eyes 
 from the grate. "Oh, don t be im 
 patient, it will be serious enough," 
 she warned me. "They say, you 
 know, that drowning people see, in a 
 
Observations in Philistia 235 
 
 single instant of time, whole years of 
 events, whole books full of things. 
 Well, I ve been under water for six 
 months, and and I ve noticed a good 
 deal." 
 
 " Ah ! is there a submarine observa 
 tion station at Clacton-on-Sea? Now 
 you speak of it, I have heard of queer 
 fish being studied there." 
 
 " None queerer than we, my dear 
 friend, you may be sure. Mamma was 
 right in choosing the place. We never 
 once saw a soul we knew. Of course, 
 it is the dullest and commonest thing 
 on earth but it exactly fitted us dur 
 ing that awful period. We were going 
 at first to Cromer, but mamma learned 
 that that was the chosen resort of dis 
 solute theatrical people it seems there 
 has been a poem written in which it is 
 
236 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 called Poppyland, which mamma saw 
 at once must be a cover for opium-eat 
 ing and all sorts of dissipation. So 
 we went to Clacton instead. But what 
 I was going to say is this I did a great 
 deal of thinking all through those six 
 months. I don t say that I am any 
 wiser than I was, because, for that 
 matter, I am very much less sure about 
 things than I was before. But I was 
 simply a blank contented fool then. 
 Now it s different to the extenj that 
 I ve stirred up all sorts of questions and 
 problems buzzing and barking about 
 me, and I don t know the answers to 
 them, and I can t get clear of them, 
 and they re driving me out of my head 
 and there you are. That s what I 
 wanted to talk with you about." 
 
 I shifted my feet on the fender, and 
 
Observations in Philistia 237 
 
 nodded with as sensible an expression 
 as I could muster. 
 
 " That s why I said you must pretend 
 to yourself that you are very old quite 
 a fatherly person, capable of giving a 
 girl advice sympathetic advice. In 
 the first place of course you know that 
 the engagement with that Hon. Knob- 
 beleigh Jones has been off for ages. 
 Don t interrupt me! It isn t worth 
 speaking of except for one point. His 
 father, Lord Skillyduff, was the prin 
 cipal rogue in the combination which 
 plundered papa of his money. Having 
 got the Grundy money they had no use 
 for the Grundy girl. Now, he justified 
 his rascality by pleading that he had 
 to make provision for his daughters, 
 and everybody said he was a good 
 father. Papa goes in again through 
 
238 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 some other opening, and after a long 
 fight brings out a fresh fortune, which 
 he has taken away from somebody else 
 and I heard him tell mamma that 
 he was doing it for the sake of his 
 daughters. People will say Jie is a 
 good father I know /do." 
 
 "None better in this world," I as 
 sented cordially. 
 
 "Well, don t you see," Ermyntrude 
 went on, "that puts daughters in the 
 light of a doubtful blessing. Papa s 
 whole worry and struggle was for us 
 for me. I was the load on his back. I 
 don t like to be a load. While we 
 were prosperous, there was only one 
 way for me to get down that is by 
 marriage. When we became poor, 
 there was another way that I should 
 earn my own living. But this papa 
 
Observations in Philistia 239 
 
 wouldn t listen to. He quite swore 
 about it vowed he would rather work 
 his fingers to the bone ; rather do any 
 thing, no matter what it was, or what 
 people thought of him for doing it, 
 than that a daughter of his should take 
 care of herself. He would look upon 
 himself as disgraced, he said. Those 
 lodgings of ours at Clacton weren t 
 specially conducive to good temper, I m 
 afraid ; for I told him that the real dis 
 grace would be to keep me in idleness 
 to sell to some other Knobbeleigh 
 Jones, or to palm me off on some better 
 sort of young man who would bind 
 himself to work for me all his life, and 
 then find that I would have been dear 
 at the price of a fortnight s labor and 
 then mamma cried and papa, he swore 
 more and and 
 
240 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 I stirred the fire here, and then 
 blushed to rediscover that it was as 
 bestos I was knocking about. " How 
 stupid of me!" I exclaimed, and mur 
 mured something about having been a 
 stranger to Fernbank so long. 
 
 Ermyntrude took no notice. " I 
 made a pretence of going up to London 
 on a visit, "she continued, "and I spent 
 five days looking about, making in 
 quiries, trying to get some notion of 
 how girls who supported themselves 
 made a beginning. I talked a little 
 with such few girls that I knew as were 
 in town, and I cared to see guardedly 
 of course. They had no idea save in 
 the way of the governess or music 
 teacher. I d cut my throat before I d 
 be either of those forced to dress like 
 ladies on the wages of a seamstress, 
 
Observations in Philistia 241 
 
 and to smile under the insults of trades 
 men s wives and their louts of children. 
 An actress I might be, after I had 
 starved a long time in learning my 
 business but before that mamma 
 would have died of shame. Then 
 there are typewriters, and lady journal 
 ists and telegraph clerks I am surly 
 enough sometimes to do that last to 
 perfection but they all have to have 
 special talents or knowledge. As for 
 saleswomen in the shops there are a 
 dozen poor genteel wretches standing 
 outside ready to claw each other s eyes 
 out for every vacancy. I went over 
 Euston Road way at noon, and I 
 watched the work-girls come out of the 
 factories and workshops, and they had 
 such sharp, knowing, bullying faces 
 that I knew I should be a helpless fool 
 
 16 
 
242 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 among them. And watching them 
 and watching the other girls on the 
 street ... in the Strand and Piccadilly 
 I told you I was going to talk seri 
 ously, my dear friend it all came to 
 seem to me like a nightmare. It 
 frightened me. These were the girls 
 whose fathers had failed to provide for 
 them that was absolutely all the dif 
 ference between them and me. I had 
 looked lazily down at marriage as a 
 chance of escaping being bored here 
 at Fernbank. They were all lookig 
 fiercely up at marriage as the one only 
 chance of rescue from weary toil, star 
 vation wages, general poverty and 
 misery. In both cases the idea was 
 the same to find some man, no matter 
 what kind of a man, if only he will take 
 it upon himself to provide something 
 
Observations in Philistia 243 
 
 different. You see what poor, depend 
 ent things we really are ! Why should 
 it be so? That s what I want to know." 
 
 "Oh, that s all you want to know, is 
 it?" I remarked, after a little pause. 
 " Well, I think I think you had better 
 give me notice of the question." 
 
 " I have tried to read what thinkers 
 say about it," she added; "but they 
 only confuse one the more. There is 
 a Dr. Wallace whom the papers speak 
 of as an authority, and he has been 
 writing a long article this very week 
 or else it is an interview and he says 
 that everything will be all right, that 
 all the nice women will marry all the 
 good men, and that the other kinds will 
 die off immediately, and everybody will 
 be oh, so happy in a regenerated so 
 ciety. That is another thing I wanted 
 
244 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 to ask you about. He speaks they 
 all speak so confidently about this 
 regenerated society. Do you happen 
 to know when it is to be?" 
 
 "The date has not been fixed, I be 
 lieve," I replied. 
 
 The early winter twilight had dark 
 ened the room, and the light from the 
 grate glowed ruddily upon the girl s 
 face as she bent forward, her chin upon 
 her clasped hands, looking into the fire. 
 
 "There is another date which re 
 mains undetermined," I added, falter 
 ing not a little at heart, but keeping 
 my tongue under fair control. " I 
 should like to speak to you about it, if 
 I may take off my lamb s-wool wig and 
 Santa Claus beard, and appear before 
 you once more as a contemporary citi 
 zen. It is this, Ermie. I am not so 
 
Observations in Philistia 245 
 
 very old, after all. There is only a 
 shade over a dozen years between us 
 say a baker s dozen. My habits my 
 personal qualities, tolerable and other 
 wise, are more or less known to you. 
 I am prosperous enough, so far as this 
 world s goods go. But I am tired of 
 
 living " 
 
 I stopped short, and stared in turn 
 blankly at the mock coals. A freez 
 ing thought had just thrust itself into 
 the marrow of my brain. She would 
 think that I was saying all this because 
 her father had regained and augmented 
 his fortune. I strove in a numb, 
 puzzled way to retrace what I had just 
 uttered to see if the words offered 
 any chance of getting away upon other 
 ground and could not remember at 
 all. 
 
246 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 "Tired of living," I heard Ermyn- 
 trude echo. I saw her nod her head 
 comprehendingly in the firelight. She 
 sighed. 
 
 "Yes, except upon conditions," I 
 burst forth. " I weary of living alone. 
 There hasn t been a time for years 
 when I didn t long to tell you this and 
 most of all at Clacton, if I had known 
 you were at Clacton. You have ad 
 mitted yourself that nobody knew you 
 were there." The words came more 
 easily now. " But always before I 
 shrank from speaking. There was 
 something about you too childlike, too 
 innocent, too too " 
 
 "Too silly," suggested Ermie, with 
 an affable effect of helping me out. 
 
 Then she unlocked her fingers, and, 
 still looking into the fire, stretched out 
 
Observations in Philistia 247 
 
 a hand backward to me. "All the 
 same," she murmured, after a little, 
 "it isn t an answer to my question, 
 you know." 
 
 "But it is to mine," I made glad 
 response, " and in my question all the 
 others are enwrapped always have 
 been, always will be. And, oh, darling 
 one " 
 
 "That is mamma in the hall," said 
 Ermyntrude. 
 
DESCRIBING IMPRESSIONS OF A MO 
 MENTOUS INTERVIEW, LOOSELY 
 GATHERED BY ONE WHO, AL 
 THOUGH PRESENT, WAS NOT 
 QUITE IN IT. 
 
A /[RS. ALBERT has smiled upon 
 
 my suit to be her son-in-law. 
 The smile did not, however, gush 
 forth spontaneously at the outset. 
 When the opportunity for imparting 
 our great news came, we three were in 
 the drawing-room, and Mrs. Albert, 
 who had just entered, had been allowed 
 to discover me holding Ermyntrude s 
 passive hand in mine. She cast a swift 
 little glance over us both, and seemed 
 not to like what she saw. I was con 
 scious of the impression on the instant 
 that Ermyntrude did not particularly 
 like it either. An effect of profound 
 isolation, absurd enough, but depress- 
 
 ingly real, suddenly encompassed me. 
 251 
 
252 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 I began talking something the words 
 coming out and scattering quite on 
 their own incoherent account and the 
 gist of what they made me say sounded 
 in my ears as if it were a determined 
 enemy who was saying it. Why should 
 I be speaking of my age, and the fact 
 that I had held Ermie on my knee as 
 a child, and even of my rheumatism? 
 And did I actually allude to them? or 
 only hear the clamorous echoes of con 
 science in my guilty soul, the while my 
 tongue was uttering other matters? I 
 don t know, and the fear that Ermie 
 would admit that she really hadn t been 
 paying attention has restrained me from 
 asking her since. 
 
 But Mrs. Albert was paying atten 
 tion. She held me with a cool and 
 unblinking eye during my clumsy 
 
Mrs. Albert Grundy 253 
 
 monologue, and she continued this 
 steady gaze for a time after I had 
 finished. She stirred the small and 
 shapely headgear of black velvet and 
 birds-wing which she had worn in from 
 the street, just by the fraction of a for 
 ward inch, to show that she understood 
 what I had been saying and also very 
 much which I had left unsaid. 
 
 " Hm m!" the good lady remarked 
 at length. "I see!" 
 
 "Well, mamma, having seen," Er- 
 myntrude turned languidly in her chair 
 to observe, lifting the hand which 
 still rested within mine into full and 
 patent view, and then withdrawing 
 it abruptly "having seen, and been 
 seen, there s really nothing more to do, 
 is there?" 
 
 "She is very young," said the 
 
254 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 mother, in a tentative musing manner 
 which suggested the thought that I, on 
 the other hand, was very much the 
 other way. 
 
 Ermyntrude sniffed audibly, and rose 
 to her feet. " I am three-and-twenty," 
 she said, "and that is enough, thank 
 you." 
 
 There was something in it all which 
 I did not understand. The sensation 
 of being out of place, as in the trying- 
 on room of a dressmaker s, oppressed 
 me. The sex were effecting sundry 
 manoeuvres and counter - marchings 
 peculiar to themselves so much I 
 could see by the way in which the two 
 were talking with their eyes but what 
 it was all about was beyond me. The 
 mother finally inclined her head to one 
 side, and pursed together her lips. 
 
Observations in Philistia 255 
 
 Ermyntrude drew herself to her full 
 stature, threw up her chin for a moment 
 like one of Albert Moore s superb full- 
 throated goddesses, and then relaxed 
 with that half-cheerful sigh which we 
 express in types with "heigho!" It 
 was at once apparent to me that the 
 situation had lightened but how or 
 why I cannot profess to guess. Uncle 
 Dudley, to whom I subsequently nar 
 rated what I had observed, abounded in 
 theories, but upon reflection they do 
 not impress, much less convince, me. 
 Here is in substance one of the several 
 hypothetical conversations which he 
 sketched out as having passed in that 
 moment of pre-occupied and surcharged 
 silence : 
 
 MOTHER {lowering brows}. You maybe sure 
 that at the very best it will be Bayswater. 
 
256 Mrs. Albert Grnndy 
 
 DAUGHTER [with quiver of nostrils]. Better 
 that than hanging on for a Belgravia which never 
 comes. 
 
 MOTHER [disclosing the tips of two teeth]. It 
 is a chance of a title going for ever. 
 
 DAUGHTER [curling lip]. What chance is ever 
 likely here ? 
 
 MOTHER [lifting brows]. He s as old as 
 Methusaleh ! 
 
 DAUGHTER [flashing eyes]. That s my busi 
 ness ! 
 
 MOTHER [little trembling of the eyelashes]. 
 You will never know how I have striven and 
 struggled for you ! 
 
 DAUGHTER [smoothing features]. Merely the 
 innate maternal instinct, my dear, common to all 
 mammalia. 
 
 MOTHER [beginning to tip head sideiuisc] . It 
 is true that Tristram is docile, sheep-like, 
 simple 
 
 DAUGHTER [lifting her chin]. And old enough 
 to be enchained at my feet all his life. 
 
 MOTHER [head much to one side]. And he has 
 always been extremely cordial with me 
 
 DAUGHTER [chin high in air]. And not another 
 girl in my set has had a proposal tor years. 
 
 MOTHER [brightening eye]. We shall be in 
 time to buy everything at the January sales ! 
 
Observations in Philistia 257 
 
 [MOTHER smiles ; DAUGHTER sighs relief. The 
 imaginations of both wander pleasantly off to 
 visions of sublimated Christmas shopping, in 
 connection with the trousseau and betrothal 
 gifts. General joy, ,] 
 
 As I have said, this is Uncle Dud 
 ley s idea, not mine. My own fancy 
 prefers to conjure up a tenderer dia 
 logue, in which the mother, all fond 
 solicitude, bids the maiden search well 
 her heart, and answer only its true ap 
 peal, and the sweet daughter, timid, 
 fluttering, half-frightened and wholly 
 glad, flashes back from the depths of 
 her soul the rapt assurance of her fate. 
 But Dudley was certainly right about 
 the ending, as the first words Mrs. 
 Albert uttered go to show. 
 
 " Don t forget to remind me, then, 
 about presents for the Gregory chil 
 dren," she said all at once, in a swift 
 17 
 
2 $8 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 sidelong whisper at Ermyntrude. 
 Then she turned, and as I gazed 
 wistfully upon her face, it melted se 
 dately, gracefully, a little at a time, 
 into the smile I sought. 
 
 " My dear Tristram," she began, and 
 her voice took on a coo of genuine 
 kindliness and warmth as she went on, 
 " of course Albert and I have had other 
 views and the dear girl is perfectly 
 qualified to adorn the most exalted and 
 exclusive circles if I do say it myself 
 
 but but her happiness is our one 
 desire, and if she feels that it is getting 
 
 I would say, if you and she are quite 
 clear in your own minds and we both 
 have the greatest confidence in your 
 practical common sense, and your honor 
 and we have all learned to be fond of 
 you and and I am really very glad!" 
 
Observations in Philistia 259 
 
 "Most of all things in the world, 
 dear lady, I hoped for this," I had be 
 gun to say, with fervor. I stopped, 
 upon the discovery that Mrs. Albert 
 was not listening, but had turned and 
 was conferring with her daughter in 
 half-audible asides. 
 
 "Mercy, no!" the mother said. 
 "They d know in a minute that it had 
 been a present to us. That old Mrs. 
 Gregory is a perfect lynx for detecting 
 such things. I suppose their boys are 
 too big for tricycles, else your father 
 knows a dealer who " 
 
 My own Ermie looked thoughtful. 
 "It won t seem queer, you think, our 
 bursting in upon them with Christmas 
 presents like this without provoca 
 tion?" she asked* 
 
 " My dear child, queer or not queer," 
 
260 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 said Mrs. Albert, "it is imperative. 
 You know how much depends upon it 
 there are plenty of others who would 
 be equally useful in various ways, but 
 not like the Gregorys and if there were 
 there s no time now. If this could 
 have happened, now, a fortnight ago, 
 or even last week " 
 
 "Yes, but it didn t," replied Ermyn- 
 trude. "It only happened to-day." 
 She turned to me, with a little laugh 
 in her eyes. " Mamma complains that 
 we delayed so long. We have inter 
 fered with the Christmas arrange 
 ments." 
 
 " If I had only known ! But I claim 
 to be treated as one of the family, you 
 know I couldn t quite grasp what you 
 were saying about the Gregorys. I 
 gather that our our betrothal involves 
 
Observations in Philistia 261 
 
 Christmas presents for them, but I con 
 fess I don t know why. Or oughtn t I 
 to have asked, dear?" 
 
 For answer Ermyntrude looked sau 
 cily into my face, twisted her dear nose 
 into a pretty little mocking grim 
 ace, and ran out of the room. Mrs. 
 Albert vouchsafed no explanation, but 
 talked of other matters and there were 
 enough to talk about. 
 
 It was not, indeed, till late in the 
 evening, when Uncle Dudley and I 
 were upon our last cigar, that I hap 
 pened to recall the mystifying incident 
 of the Gregorys. 
 
 " That s simplicity itself, "said Uncle 
 Dudley. " The Gregorys own one of the 
 tidiest country seats in Nottingham 
 shire lovely old house, sylvan arbors, 
 high wall, fascinating rural roads in 
 
262 Mrs. Albert Grundy 
 
 the very heart of county society, too 
 O, a most romantic and eligible place!" 
 
 "Well, what of it? What has that 
 to do with Ermyntiuie and me and 
 Santa Clans?" 
 
 " If you will read the Morning Post 
 the day after your wedding, my dear, 
 dull friend, you will learn that Colonel 
 Gregory has placed at the disposal of a 
 certain bridal couple for their honey 
 moon his ideal country residence. The 
 paper will not state why, but I will tell 
 you in confidence. It will be because 
 the bride s mother is a resourceful and 
 observant woman, who knows how to 
 plant at Christmas that she may gather 
 at Easter." 
 
 " I hate to have you always so beastly 
 cynical, Dudley," I was emboldened to 
 exclaim. 
 
Observations in Philistia 263 
 
 Uncle Dudley regarded me atten 
 tively for an instant. He took a 
 thoughtful sip at his drink, and then 
 began smiling at his glass. When he 
 turned to me again, the smile had 
 grown into a grin. 
 
 "You are belated, my boy," he said. 
 " You ought to have married into the 
 Grundys years ago. You were just 
 born to be one of the family." 
 
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