U-v 1 > 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
BY THE SAME AUTHOR 
 HERETICS 
 ORTHODOXY 
 GEORGE BERNARD SHAW 
 ALL THINGS CONSIDERED 
 THE BALL AND THE CROSS 
 
IN THE DARK ENTRANCE THERE APPEARED A FLAMING FIGURE 
 
THE NAPOLEON 
 NOTTING HILL 
 
 By 
 
 GILBERT K. CHESTERTON 
 
 Author of " Herbtics," " Orthodoxy," " George Bernard Shai 
 "All Things CoNsiiBKiiD," "The Ball and the Cross." 
 
 With Seven Illustrations by 
 WILLIAM GRAHAM ROBERTSON 
 and a Map of the Seat of War 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 JOHN LANE COMPANY 
 
 MCMIX 
 
GENERAL fj 
 
 Copyright 1904 
 By John Lane 
 
 %/ 
 
 r? 
 
 First Edition April 1904 
 
 Set up and Electrotyped by 
 William G. Hewitt, New York, U. S. A. 
 
TO HILAIRE BELLOC 
 
 For every tiny town or place 
 God made the stars especially ; 
 Babies look up with owlish face 
 And see them tangled in a tree : 
 You saw a moon from Sussex Downs, 
 A Sussex moon, untravelled still, 
 I saw a moon that was the town's, 
 The largest lamp on Campden Hill. 
 
 Tea ; Heaven is everywhere at home) 
 The big blue cap that always fits, 
 And so it is {be calm ; they come 
 To goal at last, my wandering wits), 
 So is it with the heroic thing ; 
 This shall not end for the world's end 
 And though the sullen engines swing, 
 Be you not much afraid, my friend. 
 
 This did not end by Nelson' s urn 
 Where an immortal England sits — 
 Nor where your tall young men in turn 
 Drank death like wine at Austerlitz. 
 And when the pedants bade us mark 
 What cold mechanic happenings 
 Must come ; our souls said in the dark, 
 " Belike ; but there are likelier things. ft 
 7 
 
 190762 
 
Dedication 
 
 Liktlier across these flats afar 
 These sulks levels smooth and free 
 The drums shall crash a waltz of war 
 And Death shall dance with Liberty g 
 Likelier the barricades shall blare 
 Slaughter below and smoke above, 
 And death and hate and hell declare 
 That men have found a thing to love. 
 
 Far from your sunny uplands set 
 I saw the dream ; the streets I trod 
 The lit straight streets shot out and met 
 The starry streets that point to God. 
 This legend of an epic hour 
 A child I dreamed, and dream it stilly 
 Under the great grey water-tower 
 That strikes the stars on Camp den Hill. 
 
 G. K. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Book I 
 
 Chapter Page 
 I. Introductory Remarks on the Art of 
 
 Prophecy 13 
 
 II. The Man in Green 21 
 
 III. The Hill of Humour 4.9 
 
 Book II 
 
 I. The Charter of the Cities 65 
 
 II. The Council of the Provosts .... 82 
 
 III. Enter a Lunatic 102 
 
 Book III 
 
 I. The Mental Condition of Adam Wayne . 125 
 
 II. The Remarkable Mr. Turnbull . . . 147 
 
 III. The Experiment of Mr. Buck . . . . 163 
 
 9 
 
Contents 
 
 Book IV 
 
 Chapter Page 
 
 I. The Battle of the Lamps 189 
 
 II. The Correspondent of *<Thb Court 
 
 Journal" 208 
 
 III. The Great Army op South Kensing- 
 ton . . , 224 
 
 Book V 
 
 I. The Empire of Notting Hill .... 259 
 
 II. The Last Battle 279 
 
 III. Two Voices 291 
 
BOOK I 
 
UNivtKPM ' 
 
 OF 
 
 THE NAPOLEON 
 OF NOTTING HILL 
 
 Chapter I — Introductory Remarks on the 
 'Art of Prophecy 
 
 THE human race, to which so many of 
 my readers belong, has been playing 
 at children's games from the begin- 
 ning, and will probably do it till the end, which 
 is a nuisance for the few people who grow 
 up. And one of the games to which it is 
 most attached is called, "Keep to-morrow 
 dark," and which is also named (by the 
 rustics in Shropshire, I have no doubt) "Cheat 
 the Prophet." The players listen very care- 
 fully and respectfully to all that the clever 
 men have to say about what is to happen in 
 the next generation. The players then wait until 
 all the clever men are dead, and bury them nicely. 
 They then go and do something else. That is 
 all. For a race of simple tastes, however, it is 
 great fun. 
 
 For human beings, being children, have the 
 childish wilfulness and the childish secrecy. And 
 they never have from the beginning of the 
 
 13 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 world done what the wise men have seen to be 
 inevitable. They stoned the false prophets, it is 
 said; but they could have stoned true prophets 
 with a greater and juster enjoyment. Individu- 
 ally, men may present a more or less rational 
 appearance, eating, sleeping, and scheming. But 
 humanity as a whole is changeful, mystical, 
 fickle, delightful. Men are men, but Man is a 
 woman. 
 
 But in the beginning of the twentieth century 
 the game of Cheat the Prophet was made far 
 more difficult than it had ever been before. 
 The reason was, that there were so many 
 prophets and so many prophecies, that it was 
 difficult to elude all their ingenuities. When a 
 man did something free and frantic and entirely 
 his own, a horrible thought struck him after- 
 wards; it might have been predicted. When- 
 ever a duke climbed a lamp-post, when a dean 
 got drunk, he could not be really happy, he 
 could not be certain that he was not fulfilling some 
 prophecy. In the beginning of the twentieth 
 century you could not see the ground for clever 
 men. They were so common that a stupid 
 man was quite exceptional, and when they found 
 him, they followed him in crowds down the 
 street and treasured him up and gave him some 
 high post in the State. And all these clever 
 
 14 
 
Introductory Remarks 
 
 men were at work giving accounts of what 
 would happen in the next age, all quite clear, 
 all quite keen-sighted and ruthless, and all quite 
 different. And it seemed that the good old 
 game of hoodwinking your ancestors could not 
 really be managed this time, because the ances- 
 tors neglected meat and sleep and practical poli- 
 tics, so that they might meditate day and 
 night on what their descendants would be likely 
 to do. 
 
 But the way the prophets of the twentieth 
 century went to work was this* They took 
 something or other that was certainly going on 
 in their time, and then said that it would go on 
 more and more until something extraordinary 
 happened. And very often they added that in 
 some odd place that extraordinary thing had 
 happened, and that it showed the signs of the 
 times. 
 
 Thus, for instance, there were Mr. H. G. 
 Wells and others, who thought that science 
 would take charge of the future; and just as the 
 motor-car was quicker than the coach, so some 
 lovely thing would be quicker than the motor- 
 car; and so on for ever. And there arose from 
 their ashes Dr. Quilp, who said that a man 
 could be sent on his machine so fast round the 
 world that he could keep up a long chatty con- 
 
 15 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 versation in some old-world village by saying 
 a word of a sentence each time he came round. 
 And it was said that the experiment had been 
 tried on an apoplectic old major, who was sent 
 round the world so fast that there seemed to be 
 (to the inhabitants of some other star) a con- 
 tinuous band round the earth of white whiskers, 
 red complexion and tweeds — a thing like the ring 
 of Saturn. 
 
 Then there was the opposite school. There 
 was Mr. Edward Carpenter, who thought we 
 should in a very short time return to Nature, 
 and live simply and slowly as the animals do. 
 And Edward Carpenter was followed by James 
 Pickie, D.D. (of Pocahontas College), who said 
 that men were immensely improved by grazing, 
 or taking their food slowly and continuously, 
 after the manner of cows. And he said that he 
 had, with the most encouraging results, turned 
 city men out on all fours in a field covered with 
 veal cutlets. Then Tolstoy and the Humani- 
 tarians said that the world was growing more 
 merciful, and therefore no one would ever desire 
 to kill. And Mr. Mick not only became a vege- 
 tarian, but at length declared vegetarianism 
 doomed ("shedding," as he called it finely, "the 
 green blood of the silent animals"), and pre- 
 dicted that men in a better age would live on 
 
 16 
 
CITY MEN OUT ON ALL FOURS IN A FIELD COVERED WITH 
 VEAL CUTLETS 
 
Introductory Remarks 
 
 nothing but salt. And then came the pamphlet 
 from Oregon (where the thing was tried), the 
 pamphlet called "Why should Salt suffer ?" and 
 there was more trouble. 
 
 And on the other hand, some people were 
 predicting that the lines of kinship would be- 
 come narrower and sterner. There was Mr. 
 Cecil Rhodes, who thought that the one thing of 
 the future was the British Empire, and that 
 there would be a gulf between those who were 
 of the Empire and those who were not, between 
 the Chinaman in Hong Kong and the Chinaman 
 outside, between the Spaniard on the Rock of 
 Gibraltar and the Spaniard off it, similar to the 
 gulf between man and the lower animals. And 
 in the same way his impetuous friend, Dr. Zoppi 
 ("the Paul of Anglo-Saxonism"), carried it yet 
 further, and held that, as a result of this view, 
 cannibalism should be held to mean eating a 
 member of the Empire, not eating one of the 
 subject peoples, who should, he said, be killed 
 without needless pain. His horror at the idea 
 of eating a man in British Guiana showed how 
 they misunderstood his stoicism who thought 
 him devoid of feeling. He was, however, in a 
 hard position; as it was said that he had 
 attempted the experiment, and, living in London, 
 had to subsist entirely on Italian organ-grinders. 
 
 17 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 And his end was terrible, for just when he had 
 begun, Sir Paul Swiller read his great paper at 
 the Royal Society, proving that the savages were 
 not only quite right in eating their enemies, but 
 right on moral and hygienic grounds, since it 
 was true that the qualities of the enemy, when 
 eaten, passed into the eater. The notion that the 
 nature of an Italian organ-man was irrevocably 
 growing and burgeoning inside him was almost 
 more than the kindly old professor could bear. 
 
 There was Mr. Benjamin Kidd, who said 
 that the growing note of our race would be the 
 care for and knowledge of the future. His idea 
 was developed more powerfully by William 
 Borker, who wrote that passage which every 
 schoolboy knows by heart, about men in future 
 ages weeping by the graves of their descendants, 
 and tourists being shown over the scene of the 
 historic battle which was to take place some cen- 
 turies afterwards. 
 
 And Mr. Stead, too, was prominent, who 
 thought that England would in the twentieth 
 century be united to America; and his young 
 lieutenant, Graham Podge, who included the 
 states of France, Germany, and Russia in the 
 American Union, the State of Russia being 
 abbreviated to Ra. 
 
 There was Mr. Sidney Webb, also, who said 
 18 
 
Introductory Remarks 
 
 that the future would see a continuously increas- 
 ing order and neatness in the life of the people, 
 and his poor friend Fipps, who went mad and 
 ran about the country with an axe, hacking- 
 branches off the trees whenever there were not 
 the same number on both sides. 
 
 All these clever men were prophesying with 
 every variety of ingenuity what would happen 
 soon, and they all did it in the same way, by 
 taking something they saw 'going strong/ as the 
 saying is, and carrying it as far as ever their 
 imagination could stretch. This, they said, was 
 the true and simple way of anticipating the 
 future. "J us t. as," said Dr. Pellkins, in a fine 
 passage, — "just as when we see a pig in a litter 
 larger than the other pigs, we know that by an 
 unalterable law of the Inscrutable it will some 
 day be larger than an elephant, — just as we know, 
 when we see weeds and dandelions growing 
 more and more thickly in a garden, that they 
 must, in spite of all our efforts, grow taller than 
 the chimney-pots and swallow the house from 
 sight, so we know and reverently acknowledge, 
 that when any power in human politics has shown 
 for any period of time any considerable activity, 
 it will go on until it reaches to the sky." 
 
 And it did certainly appear that the prophets 
 had put the people (engaged in the old game of 
 
 l 9 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 Cheat the Prophet), in a quite unprecedented 
 difficulty. It seemed really hard to do anything 
 without fulfilling some of their prophecies. 
 
 But there was, nevertheless, in the eyes of 
 labourers in the streets, of peasants in the fields, 
 of sailors and children, and especially women, a 
 strange look that kept the wise men in a perfect 
 fever of doubt. They could not fathom the 
 motionless mirth in their eyes. They still had 
 something up their sleeve; they were still playing 
 the game of Cheat the Prophet. 
 
 Then the wise men grew like wild things, and 
 swayed hither and thither, crying, "What can 
 it be? What can it be? What will London 
 be like a century hence ? Is there anything we have 
 not thought of? Houses upside down — more 
 hygienic, perhaps? Men walking on hands 
 — make feet flexible, don't you know? Moon 
 . . . motor-cars ... no heads . . ." And so 
 they swayed and wondered until they died and 
 were buried nicely. 
 
 Then the people went and did what they 
 liked. Let me no longer conceal the painful 
 truth. The people had cheated the prophets of 
 the twentieth century. When the curtain goes 
 up on this story, eighty years after the 
 present date, London is almost exactly like what 
 it is now. 
 
 30 
 
Chapter II — The Man in Green 
 
 VERY few words are needed to explain 
 why London, a hundred years hence, 
 will be very like it is now, or rather, 
 since I must slip into a prophetic past, why 
 London, when my story opens, was very like 
 it was in those enviable days when I was still 
 alive. 
 
 The reason can be stated in one sentence. The 
 people had absolutely lost_faith in revolutions. 
 All revolutions are doctrinal — such as the 
 French one, or the one that introduced Chris- 
 tianity. For it stands to common sense that 
 you cannot upset all existing things, customs, 
 and compromises, unless you believe in some- 
 thing outside them, something positive and 
 divine. Now, England, during this century, lost 
 all belief in this. It believed in a thing called 
 Evolution. And it said, "All theoretic changes 
 have ended in blood and ennui. If we change, 
 we must change slowly and safely, as the animals 
 do. Nature's revolutions are the only successful 
 ones. There has been no conservative reaction in 
 favour of tails." 
 
 And some things did change. Things that 
 were not much thought of dropped out of 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 sight. Things that had not often happened did 
 not happen at all. Thus, for instance, the 
 actual physical force ruling the country, the 
 soldiers and police, grew smaller and smaller, 
 and at last vanished almost to a point. The 
 people combined could have swept the few 
 policemen away in ten minutes: they did not, 
 because they did not believe it would do them 
 the least good. They had lost faith in revolu- 
 tions. 
 
 Democracy was dead; for no one minded 
 the governing class governing. England was 
 now practically a despotism, but not an 
 hereditary one. Some one in the official class 
 was made King. No one cared how: no one 
 cared who. He was merely an universal secre- 
 tary. 
 
 In this manner it happened that everything 
 in London was very quiet. That vague and 
 somewhat depressed reliance upon things hap- 
 pening as they have always happened, which is 
 with all Londoners a mood, had become an 
 assumed condition. There was really no reason 
 for any man doing anything but the thing he had 
 done the day before. 
 
 There was therefore no reason whatever why 
 the three young men who had always walked up 
 to their Government office together should not 
 
 zz 
 
The Man in Green 
 
 walk up to it together on this particular 
 wintry and cloudy morning. Everything in that 
 age had become mechanical, and Government 
 clerks especially. All those clerks assembled 
 regularly at their posts. Three of those clerks 
 always walked into town together. All the 
 neighbourhood knew them : two of them were 
 tall and one short. And on this particular 
 morning the short clerk was only a few seconds 
 late to join the other two as they passed his 
 gate: he could have overtaken them in three 
 strides ; he could have called after them easily. But 
 he did not. 
 
 For some reason that will never be under- 
 stood until all souls are judged (if they are ever 
 judged; the idea was at this time classed with 
 fetish worship) he did not join his two com- 
 panions, but walked steadily behind them. The 
 day was dull, their dress was dull, everything 
 was dull; but in some odd impulse he walked 
 through street after street, through district after 
 district, looking at the backs of the two men, 
 who would have swung round at the sound of 
 his voice. Now, there is a law written in the 
 darkest of the Books of Life, and it is this: 
 If you look at a thing nine hundred and 
 ninety-nine times, you are perfectly safe; if 
 you look at it the thousandth time, you are 
 
 23 
 
The "Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 in frightful clanger of seeing it for the first 
 time. 
 
 So the short Government official looked at the 
 coat-tails of the tall Government officials, and 
 through street after street, and round corner after 
 corner, saw only coat-tails, coat-tails, and again 
 coat-tails — when, he did not in the least know 
 why, something happened to his eyes. 
 
 Two black dragons were walking backwards 
 in front of him. Two black dragons were look- 
 ing at him with evil eyes. The dragons were 
 walking backwards it was true, but they kept 
 their eyes fixed on him none the less. The eyes 
 which he saw were, in truth, only the two buttons 
 at the back of a frock-coat: perhaps some 
 traditional memory of their meaningless character 
 gave this half-witted prominence to their 
 gaze. The slit between the tails was the nose- 
 line of the mobster: whenever the tails flapped 
 in the winter wind the dragons licked their 
 lips. It was only a momentary fancy, but the 
 small clerk found it imbedded in his soul ever 
 afterwards. He never could again think of men 
 in frock-coats except as dragons walking back- 
 wards. He explained afterwards, quite tactfully 
 and nicely, to his two official friends, that 
 while feeling an inexpressible regard for each 
 of them he could not seriously regard the face 
 
 *4 
 
The Man in Green 
 
 of either of them as anything but a kind of 
 tail. It was, he admitted, a handsome tail — a 
 tail elevated in the air. But if, he said, any 
 true friend of theirs wished to see their faces, 
 to look into the eyes of their soul, that friend 
 must be allowed to walk reverently round 
 behind them, so as to see them from the rear. 
 There he would see the two black dragons with 
 the blind eyes. 
 
 But when first the two black dragons sprang 
 out of the fog upon the small clerk, they had 
 merely the effect of all miracles — they changed 
 the universe. He discovered the fact that all 
 romantics know — that adventures happen on 
 dull days, and not on sunny ones. When the 
 chord of monotony is stretched most tight, then 
 it breaks with a sound like song. He had scarcely 
 noticed the weather before, but with the four dead 
 eyes glaring at him he looked round and realised 
 the strange dead day. 
 
 The morning was wintry and dim, not misty, 
 but darkened with that shadow of cloud or snow 
 which steeps everything in a green or copper 
 twilight. The light there is on such a day seems 
 hot so much to come from the clear heavens as 
 to be a phosphorescence clinging to the shapes 
 themselves. The load of heaven and the clouds 
 is like a load of waters, and the men move like 
 
 25 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 fishes, feeling that they are on the floor of a sea. 
 Everything in a London street completes the 
 fantasy; the carriages and cabs themselves 
 resemble deep-sea creatures with eyes of flame. 
 He had been startled at first to meet two dragons. 
 Now he found he was among deep-sea dragons 
 possessing the deep sea. 
 
 The two young men in front were like the 
 small young man himself, well-dressed. The lines 
 of their frock-coats and silk hats had that luxuri- 
 ant severity which makes the modern fop, hideous 
 y as he is, a favourite exercise of the modern 
 draughtsman ; that element which Mr. Max Beer- 
 bohm has admirably expressed in speaking of 
 "certain congruities of dark cloth and the rigid 
 perfection of linen.". 
 
 They walked with the gait of an affected 
 snail, and they spoke at the longest intervals, 
 dropping a sentence at about every sixth lamp- 
 post. 
 
 They crawled on past the lamp-posts; their 
 mien was so immovable that a fanciful descrip- 
 tion might almost say, that the lamp-posts 
 crawled past the men, as in a dream. Then 
 the small man suddenly ran after them and 
 said — 
 
 "I want to get my hair cut. I say, do you 
 know a little shop anywhere where they cut your 
 
 26 
 
The Man in Green 
 
 hair properly ? I keep on having my hair cut, but 
 it keeps on growing again." 
 
 One of the tall men looked at him with the air 
 of a pained naturalist. 
 
 "Why, here is a little place," cried the small 
 man, with a sort of imbecile cheerfulness, as the 
 bright bulging window of a fashionable toilet- 
 saloon glowed abruptly out of the foggy twilight, y 
 "Do you know, I often find hairdressers when 
 I walk about London. I'll lunch with you at Cicco- 
 nani's. You know, I'm awfully fond of hair- 
 dressers' shops. They're miles better than those 
 nasty butchers'." And he disappeared into the 
 doorway. 
 
 The man called James continued to gaze after 
 him, a monocle screwed into his eye. 
 
 "What the devil do you make of that fellow ?" 
 he asked his companion, a pale young man with a 
 high nose. 
 
 The pale young man reflected conscientiously 
 for some minutes, and then said — 
 
 "Had a knock on his head when he was a kid, 
 I should think." 
 
 "No, I don't think it's that," replied the Hon- 
 ourable James Barker. "I've sometimes fancied 
 he was a sort of artist, Lambert." 
 
 "Bosh!" cried Mr. Lambert, briefly. 
 
 "I admit I can't make him out," resumed 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 Barker, abstractedly; ''he never opens his mouth 
 without saying something so indescribably 
 half-witted that to call him a fool seems 
 the very feeblest attempt at characterisation. 
 But there's another thing about him that's rather 
 funny. Do you know that he has the one 
 collection of Japanese lacquer in Europe? Have 
 you ever seen his books? All Greek poets 
 and mediaeval French and that sort of 
 thing. Have you ever been in his rooms? 
 It's like being inside an amethyst. And he 
 moves about in all that and talks like — like a 
 turnip." 
 
 "Well, damn all books. Your blue books as 
 well," said the ingenuous Mr. Lambert, with a 
 friendly simplicity. "You ought to under- 
 stand such things. What do you make of 
 him?" 
 
 "He's beyond me," returned Barker. "But if 
 you asked me for my opinion, I should say he 
 was a man with a taste for nonsense, as they 
 call it — artistic fooling, and all that kind of 
 thing. And I seriously believe that he has 
 talked nonsense so much that he has half 
 bewildered his own mind and doesn't know 
 the difference between sanity and insanity. 
 He has gone round the mental world, so to 
 speak, and found the place where the East and 
 
 28 
 
The Man in Green 
 y 
 
 the West are one, and extreme idiocy is as good 
 as sense. But I can't explain these psychological 
 games. ,, 
 
 "You can't explain them to me," replied Mr. 
 Wilfrid Lambert, with candour. 
 
 As they passed up the long streets towards 
 their restaurant the copper twilight cleared 
 slowly to a pale yellow, and by the time they 
 reached it they stood discernible in a toler- 
 able winter daylight. The Honourable James 
 Barker, one of the most powerful officials in 
 the English Government (by this time a 
 rigidly official one), was a lean and elegant 
 young man, with a blank handsome face and 
 bleak blue eyes. He had a great amount of 
 intellectual capacity, of that peculiar kind which 
 raises a man from throne to throne and lets him 
 die loaded with honours without having either 
 amused or enlightened the mind of a single 
 man. Wilfrid Lambert, the youth with the nose 
 which appeared to impoverish the rest of his 
 face, had also contributed little to the enlargement 
 of the human spirit, but he had the honourable 
 excuse of being a fool. 
 
 Lambert would have been called a silly 
 man; Barker, with all his cleverness, might 
 have been called a stupid man. But mere silliness 
 and stupidity sank into insignificance in 
 
 29 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 the presence of the awful and mysterious 
 treasures of foolishness apparently stored up in 
 the small figure that stood waiting for them 
 outside Cicconani's. The little man, whose 
 name was Auberon Ouin, had an appearance 
 compounded of a baby and an owl. His round 
 head, round eyes, seemed to have been designed 
 by nature playfully with a pair of compasses. 
 His fiat dark hair and preposterously long frock- 
 coat gave him something of the look of a 
 child's "Noah." When he entered a room of 
 strangers, they mistook him for a small boy, and 
 wanted to take him on their knees, until he spoke, 
 when they perceived that a boy would have been 
 more intelligent. 
 
 "I have been waiting quite a long time," said 
 Quin, mildly. "It's awfully funny I should see 
 you coming up the street at last." 
 
 "Why?" asked Lambert, staring. "You told 
 us to come here yourself." 
 
 "My mother used to tell people to come to 
 places," said the sage. 
 
 They were about to turn into the restaurant 
 with a resigned air, when their eyes were caught 
 by something in the street. The weather, though 
 cold and blank, was now quite clear and across 
 the dull brown of the wood pavement and between 
 the dull grey terraces was moving something not 
 
 30 
 
The Man in Green 
 
 to be seen for miles around — not to be seen 
 perhaps at that time in England — a man dressed 
 in bright colours. A small crowd hung on the 
 man's heels. 
 
 He was a tall stately man, clad in a military 
 uniform of brilliant green, splashed with great 
 silver facings. From the shoulder swung a 
 short green furred cloak, somewhat like that of 
 a Hussar, the lining of which gleamed every now 
 and then with a kind of tawny crimson. His 
 breast glittered with medals; round his neck was 
 the red ribbon and star of some foreign order; 
 and a long straight sword, with a blazing hilt, 
 trailed and clattered along the pavement. At 
 this time the pacific and utilitarian development 
 of Europe had relegated all such customs to 
 the Museums. The only remaining force, the 
 small but well-organised police, were attired in 
 a sombre and hygienic manner. But even 
 those who remembered the last Life Guards and 
 Lancers who disappeared in 19 12 must have 
 known at a glance that this wasjnot,. and never 
 had been, an English uniform; and this convic- 
 tion would have been heightened by the yellow 
 aquiline face, like Dante carved in bronze, which 
 rose, crowned with white hair, out of the green 
 military collar, a keen and distinguished, but not 
 an English face. 
 
 31 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 The magnificence with which the green-clad 
 gentleman walked down the centre of the road 
 would be something difficult to express in 
 human language. For it was an ingrained 
 simplicity and arrogance, something in the mere 
 carriage of the head and body, which made ordi- 
 nary moderns in the street stare after him; but 
 it had comparatively little to do with actual 
 conscious gestures or expression. In the matter 
 of these merely temporary movements, the 
 man appeared to be rather worried and 
 inquisitive, but he was inquisitive with the 
 inquisitiveness of a despot and worried as with 
 the responsibilities of a god. The men who 
 lounged and wondered behind him followed 
 partly with an astonishment at his brilliant 
 uniform, that is to say, partly because of that 
 instinct which makes us all follow one who looks 
 like a madman, but far more because of that 
 instinct which makes all men follow (and wor- 
 ship) any one who chooses to behave like a king. 
 He had to so sublime an extent that great quality 
 of royalty — an almost imbecile unconsciousness 
 of everybody, that people went after him as they 
 do after kings — to see what would be the first 
 thing or person he would take notice of. And 
 all the time, as we have said, in spite of his quiet 
 splendour, there was an air about him as if 
 
 32 
 
The Man in Green 
 
 he were looking for somebody; an expression of 
 inquiry. 
 
 Suddenly that expression of inquiry vanished, 
 none could tell why, and was replaced by an 
 expression of contentment. Amid the rapt 
 attention of the mob of idlers, the magnificent 
 green gentleman deflected himself from his direct 
 course down the centre of the road and walked 
 to one side of it. He came to a halt opposite to 
 a large poster of Colman's Mustard erected on a 
 wooden hoarding. His spectators almost held 
 their breath. 
 
 He took from a small pocket in his uniform 
 a little penknife; with this he made a slash at 
 the stretched paper. Completing the rest of the 
 operation with his fingers, he tore off a strip or 
 rag of paper, yellow in colour and wholly irregu- 
 lar in outline. Then for the first time the great 
 being addressed his adoring onlookers — 
 
 "Can any one," he said, with a pleasing foreign 
 accent, "lend me a pin ?" 
 
 Mr. Lambert, who happened to be nearest, and 
 who carried innumerable pins for the purpose of 
 attaching innumerable buttonholes, lent him one, 
 which was received with extravagant but dignified 
 bows, and hyperboles of thanks. 
 
 The gentleman in green, then, with every 
 appearance of being gratified, and even puffed up, 
 
 33 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 pinned the piece of yellow paper to the green silk 
 and silver-lace adornments of his breast. Then 
 he turned his eyes round again, searching and 
 unsatisfied. 
 
 "Anything else I can do, sir?" asked Lambert, 
 with the absurd politeness of the Englishman 
 when once embarrassed. 
 
 "Red," said the stranger, vaguely, "red." 
 
 "I beg your pardon ?" 
 
 "I beg yours also, Sefior," said the stranger, 
 bowing. "I was wondering whether any of you 
 had any red about you." 
 
 "Any red about us ? — well really — no, I don't 
 think I have — I used to carry a red bandanna 
 once, but — " 
 
 "Barker," asked Auberon Quin, suddenly, 
 "where's your red cockatoo? Where's your red 
 cockatoo ?" 
 
 "What do you mean?" asked Barker, desper- 
 ately. "What cockatoo? You've never seen me 
 with any cockatoo." 
 
 "I know," said Auberon, vaguely mollified. 
 "Where's it been all the time?" 
 
 Barker swung round, not without resent- 
 ment. 
 
 "I am sorry, sir," he said, shortly but civilly, 
 "none of us seem to have anything red to lend 
 you. But why, if one may ask — " 
 
 34 
 
The Man in Green 
 
 "I thank you, Senor, it is nothing. I can, since 
 there is nothing else, fulfil my own require- 
 ments. " 
 
 And standing for a second of thought with 
 the penknife in his hand, he stabbed his left palm. 
 The blood fell with so full a stream that it 
 struck the stones without dripping. The foreigner 
 pulled out his handkerchief and tore a piece from 
 it with his teeth. The rag was immediately soaked 
 in scarlet. 
 
 "Since you are so generous, Senor," he said, 
 "another pin, perhaps." 
 
 Lambert held one out. with eyes protruding 
 like a frog's. 
 
 The red linen was pinned beside the yellow 
 paper, and the foreigner took off his hat. 
 
 "I have to thank you all, gentlemen," he said; 
 and wrapping the remainder of the handkerchief 
 round his bleeding hand, he resumed his walk with 
 an overwhelming stateliness. 
 
 While all the rest paused, in some disorder, 
 little Mr. Auberon Quin ran after the stranger 
 and stopped him, with hat in hand. Considerably 
 to everybody's astonishment, he addressed him 
 in the purest Spanish — 
 
 "Senor," he said in that language, "pardon a 
 hospitality, perhaps indiscreet, towards one who 
 appears to be a distinguished, but a solitary guest 
 
 35 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 in London. Will you do me and my friends, with 
 whom you have held some conversation, the 
 honour of lunching with us at the adjoining res- 
 taurant ?" 
 
 The man in the green uniform had turned a 
 fiery colour of pleasure at the mere sound of his 
 own language, and he accepted the invitation with 
 that profusion of bows which so often shows, in 
 the case of the Southern races, the falsehood of 
 the notion that ceremony has nothing to do with 
 feeling. 
 
 "Sefior," he said, "your language is my own; 
 but all my love for my people shall not lead me 
 to deny to yours the possession of so chivalrous 
 an entertainer. Let me say that the tongue is 
 Spanish but the heart English." And he passed 
 with the rest into Cicconani's. 
 
 "Now, perhaps/' said Barker, over the fish and 
 sherry, intensely polite, but burning with curi- 
 osity, "perhaps it would be rude of me to ask 
 why you did that?" 
 
 "Did what, Senior ?" asked the guest, who spoke 
 English quite well, though in a manner indefinably 
 American. 
 
 "Well," said the Englishman, in some confu- 
 sion, "I mean tore a strip off a hoarding and 
 ... er ... cut yourself . . . and . . ." 
 
 "To tell you that, Sefior," answered the other, 
 36 
 
The Man in Green 
 
 with a certain sad pride, "involves merely telling 
 you who I am. I am Juan del Fuego, President 
 of Nicaragua." 
 
 The manner with which the President of 
 Nicaragua leant back and drank his sherry 
 showed that to him this explanation covered 
 all the facts observed and a great deal more. 
 Barker's brow, however, was still a little 
 clouded. 
 
 "And the yellow paper," he began, with anxious 
 friendliness, "and the red rag . . ." 
 
 "The yellow paper and the red rag," said 
 Fuego, with indescribable grandeur, "are the 
 colours of Nicaragua." 
 
 "But Nicaragua ..." began Barker, with 
 great hesitation, "Nicaragua is no longer 
 a . . ." 
 
 "Nicaragua has been conquered like Athens. 
 Nicaragua has been annexed like Jerusalem," 
 cried the old man, with amazing fire. "The 
 Yankee and the German and the brute powers 
 of modernity have trampled it with the hoofs of 
 oxen. But Nicaragua is not dead. Nicaragua is 
 an idea." -* 
 
 Auberon Quin suggested timidly, "A brilliant 
 idea." 
 
 "Yes," said the foreigner, snatching at the 
 word. "You are right, generous Englishman, 
 
 37 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 An idea brilliant, a burning thought. Sefior, you 
 asked me why, in my desire to see the colours 
 of my country, I snatched at paper and blood. 
 Can you not understand the ancient sanctity of 
 colours? The Church has her symbolic colours. 
 And think of what colours mean to us 
 — think of the position of one like myself, 
 who can see nothing but those two col- 
 ours, nothing but the red and the yellow. To 
 me all shapes are equal, all common and noble 
 things are in a democracy of combination. 
 Wherever there is a field of marigolds and the 
 red cloak of an old woman, there is Nicaragua. 
 Wherever there is a field of poppies and a 
 yellow patch of sand, there is Nicaragua. 
 Wherever there is a lemon and a red sunset, 
 there is my country. Wherever I see a red 
 pillar-box and a yellow sunset, there my heart 
 beats. Blood and a splash of mustard can be my 
 heraldry. If there be yellow mud and red mud 
 in the same ditch, it is better to me than white 
 stars." 
 
 "And if," said Quin, with equal enthusiasm, 
 "there should happen to be yellow wine and red 
 wine at the same lunch, you could not confine 
 yourself to sherry. Let me order some Burgundy, 
 and complete, as it were, a sort of Nicaraguan 
 heraldry in your inside." 
 
 38 
 
1 
 
 The Man in Green 
 
 Barker was fiddling with his knife, and was 
 evidently making up his mind to say something, 
 with the intense nervousness of the amiable 
 Englishman. 
 
 "I am to understand, then," he said at last, 
 with a cough, "that you, ahem, were the 
 President of Nicaragua when it made its — er — 
 one must, of course, agree — its quite heroic resist- 
 ance to — er — " 
 
 The ex-President of Nicaragua waved his 
 hand. 
 
 "You need not hesitate in speaking to me," he 
 said. "I am quite fully aware that the whole ten- 
 dency of the world of to-day is against Nicaragua 
 and against me. I shall not consider it any dimin- 
 ution of your evident courtesy if you say what 
 you think of the misfortunes that have laid my 
 republic in ruins." 
 
 Barker looked immeasurably relieved and 
 gratified. 
 
 "You are most generous, President," he said, 
 with some hesitation over the title, "and I will 
 take advantage of your generosity to express the 
 doubts which, I must confess, we moderns have 
 about such things as — er — the Nicaraguan inde- 
 pendence." 
 
 "So your sympathies are," said Del Fuego, 
 quite calmly, "with the big nation which — " 
 
 39 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 "Pardon me, pardon me, President," said 
 Barker, warmly; "my sympathies are with no 
 nation. You misunderstand, I think, the 
 modern intellect. We do not disapprove of the 
 fire and extravagance of such commonwealths as 
 yours only to become more extravagant on a 
 larger scale. We do not condemn Nicaragua 
 because we think Britain ought to be more 
 Nicaraguan. We do not discourage small 
 I / nationalities because we wish large nationalities 
 V^ to have all their smallness, all their uniformity 
 of outlook, all their exaggeration of spirit. 
 If I differ with the greatest respect from 
 your Nicaraguan enthusiasm, it is not because a 
 nation or ten nations were against you; it is 
 because civilisation was against you. We moderns 
 believe in a great cosmopolitan civilisation, one 
 which shall include all the talents of all the 
 absorbed peoples — " 
 
 "The Senor will forgive me/' said the 
 President. "May I ask the Senor how, under 
 ordinary circumstances, he catches a wild 
 horse ?" 
 
 "I never catch a wild horse," replied Barker, 
 with dignity. 
 
 "Precisely," said the other; "and there ends 
 your absorption of the talents. That is what I 
 complain of your cosmopolitanism. When you 
 
 40 
 
The Man in Green 
 
 say you want all peoples to unite, you really 
 mean that you want all peoples to unite to 
 learn the tricks of your people. If the 
 Bedouin Arab does not know how to read, 
 some English missionary or schoolmaster must 
 be sent to teach him to read, but no one ever 
 says, 'This schoolmaster does not know how to 
 ride on a camel; let us pay a Bedouin to teach 
 him.' You say your civilisation will include 
 all talents. Will it? Do you really mean to 
 say that at the moment when the Esquimaux 
 has learnt to vote for a County Council, you 
 will have learnt to spear a walrus? I recur to 
 the example I gave. In Nicaragua we had a 
 way of catching wild horses — by lassooing the 
 fore feet — which was supposed to be the best in 
 South America. If you are going to include all 
 the talents, go and do it. If not, permit me 
 to say, what I have always said, that some- 
 thing went from the world when Nicaragua was 
 civilised." 
 
 "Something, perhaps, ,, replied Barker, "but 
 that something a mere barbarian dexterity. I do 
 not know that I could chip flints as well as a 
 primeval man, but I know that civilisation can 
 make these knives which are better, and I trust 
 to civilisation." 
 
 "You have good authority," answered the 
 41 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 Nicaraguan. "Many clever men like you have 
 trusted to civilisation. Many clever Babylo- 
 nians, many clever Egyptians, many clever 
 men at the end of Rome. Can you tell 
 trie, in a world that is flagrant with the failures 
 of civilisation, what there is particularly immortal 
 about yours ?" 
 
 "I think you do not quite understand, 
 President, what ours is," answered Barker. 
 "You judge it rather as if England was still a 
 poor and pugnacious island; you have been 
 long out of Europe. Many things have 
 happened." 
 
 "And what," asked the other, "would you call 
 the summary of those things ?" 
 
 "The summary of those things," answered 
 Barker, with great animation, "is that we are 
 rid of the superstitions, and in becoming so we 
 have not merely become rid of the superstitions 
 which have been most frequently and most 
 enthusiastically so described. The super- 
 stition of big nationalities is bad, but the 
 superstition of small nationalities is worse. The 
 superstition of reverencing our own country is 
 bad, but the superstition of reverencing other 
 people's countries is worse. It is so everywhere, 
 and in a hundred ways. The superstition 
 of monarchy is bad, and the superstition of ari- 
 
 42 
 
The Man in Green 
 
 stocracy is bad, but the superstition of democracy 
 is the worst of all." 
 
 The old gentleman opened his eyes with some 
 surprise. 
 
 "Are you, then," he said, "no longer a democ- 
 racy in England ?" 
 
 Barker laughed. 
 
 "The situation invites paradox," he said. "We 
 are, in a sense, the purest democracy. We have 
 become a despotism. Have you not noticed how 
 continually in history democracy becomes despo- 
 tism ? People call it the decay of democracy. It 
 is simply its fulfilment. Why take the trouble 
 to number and register and enfranchise all the 
 innumerable John Robinsons, when you can take 
 one John Robinson with the same intellect or lack 
 of intellect as all the rest, and have done with it? 
 The old idealistic republicans used to found de- 
 mocracy on the idea that all men were equally 
 intelligent. Believe me, the sane and enduring 
 democracy is founded on the fact that all men are 
 equally idiotic. Why should we not choose out 
 of them one as much as another? All 
 that we want for Government is a man 
 not criminal and insane, who can rapidly look 
 over some petitions and sign some proclamations. 
 To think what time was wasted in arguing 
 about the House of Lords, Tories saying it 
 
 43 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 ought to be preserved because it was clever, and 
 Radicals saying it ought to be destroyed 
 because it was stupid, and all the time no 
 one saw that it was right because it was stupid, 
 because that chance mob of ordinary men 
 thrown there by accident of blood, were a 
 great democratic protest against the Lower 
 House, against the eternal insolence of the 
 aristocracy of talents. We have established now 
 in England, the thing towards which all systems 
 have dimly groped, the dull popular despo- 
 tism without illusions. We want one man at the 
 head of our State, not because he is bril- 
 liant or virtuous, but because he is one 
 man and not a chattering crowd. To avoid the 
 possible chance of hereditary diseases or such 
 things, we have abandoned hereditary monarchy. 
 The King of England is chosen like a juryman 
 upon an official rotation list. Beyond that the 
 whole system is quietly despotic, and we have not 
 found it raise a murmur." 
 
 "Do you really mean," asked the President, 
 incredulously, "that you choose any ordinary man 
 that comes to hand and make him despot 
 — that you trust to the chance of some alphabeti- 
 cal list. . . ." 
 
 "And why not?" cried Barker. "Did not 
 half the historical nations trust to the chance of 
 
 44 
 
The Man in Green 
 
 dt 
 
 the eldest sons of eldest sons, and did not half 
 of them get on tolerably well? To have 
 a perfect system is impossible; to have a 
 system is indispensable. All hereditary mon- \ 
 archies were a matter of luck : so are 
 alphabetical monarchies. Can you find a deep 
 philosophical meaning in the difference between 
 the Stuarts and the Hanoverians? Believe me, 
 I will undertake to find a deep philosophical 
 meaning in the contrast between the dark 
 tragedy of the A's, and the solid success of the 
 B's." ' 
 
 "And you risk it?" asked the other. "Though 
 the man may be a tyrant or a cynic or a 
 criminal ?" 
 
 "We risk it," answered Barker, with a perfect 
 placidity. "Suppose he is a tyrant — he is still 
 a check on a hundred tyrants. Suppose he is a 
 cynic, it is to his interest to govern well. Suppose 
 he is a criminal — by removing poverty and sub- 
 stituting power, we put a check on his criminality. 
 In short, by substituting despotism we have put 
 a total check on one criminal and a partial check 
 on all the rest." 
 
 The Nicaraguan old gentleman leaned over 
 with a queer expression in his eyes. 
 
 "My church, sir," he said, "has taught me to 
 respect faith. I do not wish to speak with any 
 
 45 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 disrespect of yours, however fantastic. But do 
 you really mean that you will trust to the ordinary 
 man, the man who may happen to come next, as a 
 good despot ?" 
 
 "I do," said Barker, simply. "He may not be 
 a good man. But he will be a good despot. For 
 when he comes to a mere business routine of 
 government he will endeavour to do ordinary 
 justice. Do we not assume the same thing in a 
 jury?" 
 
 The old President smiled. 
 
 "I don't know," he said, "that I have any 
 particular objection in detail to your excellent 
 scheme of Government. My only objection is a 
 quite personal one. It is, that if I were asked 
 whether I would belong to it, I should ask first 
 of all, if I was not permitted, as an alternative, 
 to be a toad in a ditch. That is all. You cannot 
 argue with the choice of the soul." 
 
 "Of the soul," said Barker, knitting his brows, 
 "I cannot pretend to say anything, but speaking 
 in the interests of the public — " 
 
 Mr. Auberon Quin rose suddenly to his 
 feet. 
 
 "If you'll excuse me, gentlemen," he said, 
 "I will step out for a moment into the air." 
 
 "I'm so sorry, Auberon," said Lambert, good- 
 naturedly; "do you feel bad?" 
 
 46 
 
The Man in Green 
 
 "Not bad exactly," said Auberon, with self- 
 restraint; "rather good, if anything. Strangely 
 and richly good. The fact is I want to reflect a 
 little on those beautiful words that have just been 
 uttered. 'Speaking', yes, that was the phrase, 
 'speaking in the interests of the public.' One 
 cannot get the honey from such things without 
 being alone for a little." 
 
 "Is he really off his chump, do you think?" 
 asked Lambert. 
 
 The old President looked after him with queerly 
 vigilant eyes. 
 
 "He is a man, I think," he said, "who cares 
 for nothing but a joke. He is a dangerous 
 man." 
 
 Lambert laughed in the act of lifting some 
 maccaroni to his mouth. 
 
 "Dangerous !" he said. "You don't know little 
 Quin, sir !" 
 
 "Every man is dangerous," said the old man 
 without moving, "who cares only for one thing. 
 I was once dangerous myself." 
 
 And with a pleasant smile he finished his coffee 
 and rose, bowing profoundly, passed out into the 
 fog, which had again grown dense and sombre. 
 Three days afterwards they heard that he had 
 died quietly in lodgings in Soho. 
 
 47 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 Drowned somewhere else in the dark sea of 
 fog was a little figure shaking and quaking, 
 with what might at first sight have seemed 
 terror or ague: but which was really that 
 strange malady, a lonely laughter. He was 
 repeating over and over to himself with a rich 
 accent — "But speaking in the interests of the 
 public. . . ." 
 
 48 
 
Chapter III — The Hill of Humour 
 
 I 
 
 (•(•"][" N a little square garden of yellow roses, 
 beside the sea," said Auberon Quin, 
 "there was a Nonconformist minister 
 who had never been to Wimbledon. His 
 family did not understand his sorrow or the 
 strange look in his eyes. But one day they 
 repented their neglect, for they heard that a body 
 had been found on the shore, battered, but 
 wearing patent leather boots. As it happened, 
 it turned out not to be the minister at all. 
 But in the dead man's pocket there was a return 
 ticket to Maidstone." 
 
 There was a short pause as Quin and his friends 
 Barker and Lambert went swinging on through 
 the slushy grass of Kensington Gardens. Then 
 Auberon resumed. 
 
 "That story," he said reverently, "is the test 
 of humour." 
 
 They walked on further and faster, wading 
 through higher grass as they began to climb a 
 slope. 
 
 "I perceive," continued Auberon, "that you 
 have passed the test, and consider the anecdote 
 excruciatingly funny; since you say nothing. 
 Only coarse humour is received with pot-house 
 
 49 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 applause. The great anecdote is received in 
 silence, like a benediction. You felt pretty bene- 
 dicted, didn't you, Barker ?" 
 
 "I saw the point," said Barker, somewhat 
 loftily. 
 
 "Do you know," said Quin, with a sort of idiot 
 gaiety, "I have lots of stories as good as that. 
 Listen to this one." 
 
 And he slightly cleared his throat. 
 
 "Dr. Poly carp was, as you all know, an 
 unusually sallow bimetallist. There/ people 
 of wide experience would say, 'There goes the 
 sallowest bimetallist in Cheshire.' Once this was 
 said so that he overheard it: it was said by an 
 actuary, under a sunset of mauve and grey. 
 Polycarp turned upon him. 'Sallow!' he cried 
 fiercely, 'sallow! Qais Merit Gracchos de sedi- 
 tione querentes/ It was said that no actuary 
 ever made game of Dr. Polycarp again." 
 
 Barker nodded with a simple sagacity. Lam- 
 bert only grunted. 
 
 "Here is another," continued the insatiable 
 Quin. "In a hollow of the grey-green hills of 
 rainy Ireland, lived an old, old woman, whose 
 uncle was always Cambridge at the Boat Race. 
 But in her grey-green hollows, she knew nothing 
 of this: she didn't know that there was a Boat 
 Race. Also she did not know that she had an 
 
 5° 
 
The Hill of Humour 
 
 uncle. She had heard of nobody at all, except 
 of George the First, of whom she had heard (I 
 know not why), and in whose historical 
 memory she put her simple trust. And by and 
 by, in God's good time, it was discovered that 
 this uncle of hers was not really her uncle, and 
 they came and told her so. She smiled 
 through her tears, and said only, 'Virtue is its 
 own reward/ " 
 
 Again there was a silence, and then Lambert 
 said — 
 
 "It seems a bit mysterious." 
 
 "Mysterious !" cried the other. "The true 
 humour is mysterious. Do you not realise the 
 chief incident of the nineteenth and twentieth 
 centuries ?" 
 
 "And what's that ?" asked Lambert, shortly. 
 
 "It is very simple," replied the other. "Hitherto 
 it was the ruin of a joke that people did not 
 see it. Now it is the sublime victory of a joke 
 that people do not see it. Humour, my friends, 
 is the one sanctity remaining to mankind. It is 
 the one thing you are thoroughly afraid of. Look 
 at that tree." 
 
 His interlocutors looked vaguely towards a 
 beech that leant out towards them from the ridge 
 of the hill. 
 
 "If," said Mr. Quin, "I were to say that you 
 5i 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 did not see the great truths of science exhibited 
 by that tree, though they stared any man 
 of inteHect in the face, what would you 
 think or say? You would merely regard me 
 as a pedant with some unimportant theory 
 about vegetable cells. If I were to say that you 
 did not see in that tree the vile misman- 
 agement of local politics, you would dismiss 
 me as a Socialist crank with some particular fad 
 about public parks. If I were to say that you 
 were guilty of the supreme blasphemy of look- 
 ing at that tree and not seeing in it a new 
 religion, a special revelation of God, you would 
 simply say I was a mystic, and think no more 
 about me. But if" — and he lifted a pontifical 
 hand — "if I say that you cannot see the humour 
 of that tree, and that I see the humour 
 of it — my God! you will roll about at my 
 feet." 
 
 He paused a moment, and then resumed. 
 
 "Yes; a sense of humour, a weird and 
 delicate sense of humour, is the new religion of 
 mankind! It is towards that men will strain 
 themselves with the asceticism of saints. 
 Exercises, spiritual exercises, will be set in it. It 
 will be asked, 'Can you see the humour of this 
 iron railing?' or 'Can you see the humour of 
 this field of corn? Can you see the humour of 
 
 52 
 
The Hill of Humour 
 
 the stars? Can you see the humour of the sun- 
 sets ?' How often I have laughed myself to sleep 
 over a violet sunset." 
 
 "Quite so," said Mr. Barker, with an intelligent 
 embarrassment. 
 
 "Let me tell you another story. How often 
 it happens that the M.P.'s for Essex are less 
 punctual than one would suppose. The least 
 punctual Essex M.P., perhaps, was James 
 Wilson, who said, in the very act of plucking a 
 poppy — " 
 
 Lambert suddenly faced round and struck his 
 stick into the ground in a defiant attitude. 
 
 "Auberon," he said, "chuck it. I won't stand 
 it. . It's all bosh." 
 
 Both men stared at him, for there was some- 
 thing very explosive about the words, as if 
 they had been corked up painfully for a long 
 time. 
 
 "You have," began Quin, "no—" 
 
 "I don't care a curse," said Lambert, violently, 
 "whether I have 'a delicate sense of humour' or 
 not. I won't stand it. It's all a confounded 
 fraud. There's no joke in those infernal tales 
 at all. You know there isn't as well as I 
 do." 
 
 "Well," replied Quin, slowly, "it is true that 
 I, with my rather gradual mental processes, did 
 
 S3 
 
The Napoleon of Nottmg Hill 
 
 not see any joke in them. But the finer sense of 
 Barker perceived it." 
 
 Barker turned a fierce red, but continued to 
 stare at the horizon. 
 
 "You ass," said Lambert; "why can't you be 
 like other people ? Why can't you say something 
 really funny, or hold your tongue ? The man who 
 sits on his hat in a pantomime is a long sight 
 funnier than you are." 
 
 Quin regarded him steadily. They had reached 
 the top of the ridge and the wind struck their 
 faces. 
 
 "Lambert," said Auberon, "you are a great and 
 good man, though I'm hanged if you look it. You 
 are more. You are a great revolutionist or 
 deliverer of the world, and I look forward to 
 seeing you carved in marble between Luther 
 and Danton, if possible in your present atti- 
 tude, the hat slightly on one side. I said as I 
 came up the hill that the new humour was the 
 last of the religions. You have made it the last 
 of the superstitions. But let me give you a very 
 serious warning. Be careful how you ask 
 me to do anything outre, to imitate the man 
 in the pantomime, and to sit on my hat. Because 
 I am a man whose soul has been emptied 
 of all pleasures but folly. And for twopence I'd 
 do it." 
 
 54 
 
The Hill of Humour 
 
 "Do it then," said Lambert, swinging his stick 
 impatiently. "It would be funnier than the bosh 
 you and Barker talk." 
 
 Quin, standing on the top of the hill, stretched 
 his hand out towards the main avenue of Kensing- 
 ton Gardens. 
 
 "Two hundred yards away," he said, "are all 
 your fashionable acquaintances with nothing on 
 earth to do but to stare at each other and at 
 us. We are standing upon an elevation under 
 the open sky, a peak as it were of fantasy, a 
 Sinai of humour. We are in a great pulpit or 
 platform, lit up with sunlight, and half London 
 can see us. Be careful how you suggest things 
 to me. For there is in me a madness which goes 
 beyond martyrdom, the madness of an utterly 
 idle man." 
 
 "I don't know what you are talking about," 
 said Lambert, contemptuously. "I only know I'd 
 rather you stood on your silly head, than talked 
 so much." 
 
 "Auberon! for goodness' sake ..." cried 
 Barker, springing forward; but he was too late. 
 Faces from all the benches and avenues were 
 turned in their direction. Groups stopped 
 and small crowds collected; and the sharp 
 sunlight picked out the whole scene in blue 
 green and black, like a picture in a child's toy- 
 
 55 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 book. And on the top of the small hill Mr. 
 Auberon Quin stood with considerable athletic 
 neatness upon his head, and waved his patent- 
 leather boots in the air. 
 
 "For God's sake, Quin, get up, and don't 
 be an idiot," cried Barker, wringing his 
 hands; "we shall have the whole town 
 here." 
 
 "Yes, get up, get up, man," said Lambert, 
 amused and annoyed. "I was only fooling; get 
 up." 
 
 Auberon did so with a bound, and flinging his 
 hat higher than the trees, proceeded to hop about 
 on one leg with a serious expression. Barker 
 stamped wildly. 
 
 "Oh, let's get home, Barker, and leave him," 
 said Lambert; "some of your proper and 
 correct police will look after him. Here they 
 come !" 
 
 Two grave-looking men in quiet uniforms came 
 up the hill towards them. One held a paper in 
 his hand. 
 
 "There he is, officer," said Lambert, cheerfully ; 
 "we ain't responsible for him." 
 
 The officer looked at the capering Mr. Quin 
 with a quiet eye. 
 
 "We have not come, gentlemen," he said, 
 "about what I think you are alluding to. We 
 
 56 
 
The Hill of Humour 
 
 have come from head-quarters to announce the 
 selection of His Majesty the King. It is the 
 rule, inherited from the old regime, that the 
 news should be brought to the new 
 Sovereign immediately, wherever he is; so 
 we have followed you across Kensington 
 Gardens." 
 
 Barker's eyes were blazing in his pale face. 
 He was consumed with ambition throughout 
 his life. With a certain dull magnanimity of 
 the intellect he had really believed in the 
 chance method of selecting despots. But this 
 sudden suggestion, that the selection might 
 have fallen upon him, unnerved him with 
 pleasure. 
 
 "Which of us," he began, and the respectful 
 official interrupted him. 
 
 "Not you, sir, I am sorry to say. If I 
 may be permitted to say so, we know your 
 services to the Government, and should be 
 very thankful if it were. The choice has 
 fallen . . ." 
 
 "God bless my soul!" said Lambert, jumping 
 back two paces. "Not me. Don't say I'm auto- 
 crat of all the Russias." 
 
 "No, sir," said the officer, with a slight cough 
 and a glance towards Auberon, who 
 was at that moment putting his head 
 
 57 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 between his legs and making a noise like a 
 cow; "the gentleman whom we have to 
 congratulate seems at the moment — er — er — 
 occupied. " 
 
 "Not Quin!" shrieked Barker, rushing up 
 to him; "it can't be. Auberon, for God's sake 
 pull yourself together. You've been made 
 King!" 
 
 With his head still upside down between his 
 legs, Mr. Quin answered modestly — 
 
 "I am not worthy. I cannot reasonably claim 
 to equal the great men who have previously 
 swayed the sceptre of Britain. Perhaps the only 
 peculiarity that I can claim is that I am probably 
 the first monarch that ever spoke out his soul to 
 the people of England with his head and 
 body in this position. This may in some sense 
 give me, to quote a poem that I wrote in my 
 youth — . 
 
 A nobler office on the earth 
 
 Than valour, power of brain, or birth 
 
 Could give the warrior kings of old. 
 
 The intellect clarified by this posture — " 
 
 Lambert and Barker made a kind of rush at 
 
 him. 
 
 "Don't you understand?" cried Lambert. 
 
 "It's not a joke. They've really made you 
 
 58 
 
The Hill of Humour 
 
 King. By gosh! they must have rum 
 taste," 
 
 "The great Bishops of the Middle Ages," 
 said Quin, kicking his legs in the air, as he was 
 dragged up more or less upside down, 
 "were in the habit of refusing the honour of 
 election three times and then accepting it. A 
 mere matter of detail separates me from those 
 great men. I will accept the post three times and 
 refuse it afterwards. Oh! I will toil for you, 
 my faithful people! You shall have a banquet of 
 humour." 
 
 By this time he had been landed the right way 
 up, and the two men were still trying in 
 vain to impress him with the gravity of the 
 situation. 
 
 "Did you not tell me, Wilfrid Lambert," he 
 said, "that I should be of more public value if 
 I adopted a more popular form of humour ? And 
 when should a popular form of humour be more 
 firmly riveted upon me than now, when I have 
 become the darling of a whole people? 
 Officer," he continued, addressing the 
 startled messenger, "are there no ceremonies to 
 celebrate my entry into the city?" 
 
 "Ceremonies," began the official, with embar- 
 rassment, "have been more or less neglected for 
 some little time, and — " 
 
 59 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 Auberon Quin began gradually to take off his 
 coat. 
 
 "All ceremony," he said, "consists in the 
 reversal of the obvious. Thus men, when they 
 wish to be priests or judges, dress up like women. 
 Kindly help me on with this coat." And he held 
 it out. 
 
 "But, your Majesty," said the officer, after 
 a moment's bewilderment and manipulation, 
 "you're putting it on with the tails in 
 front." 
 
 "The reversal of the obvious," said the 
 King, calmly, "is as near as we can come 
 to ritual with our imperfect apparatus. Lead 
 on." 
 
 The rest of that afternoon and evening was 
 to Barker and Lambert a nightmare, which they 
 could not properly realise or recall. The King, 
 with his coat on the wrong way, went towards 
 the streets that were awaiting him, and the old 
 Kensington Palace which was the Royal resi- 
 dence. As he passed small groups of men, 
 the groups turned into crowds, and gave forth 
 sounds which seemed strange in welcoming an 
 autocrat. Barker walked behind, his brain 
 reeling, and, as the crowds grew thicker and 
 thicker, the sounds became more and more un- 
 usual. And when he had reached the great 
 
 60 
 
The Hill of Humour 
 
 market-place opposite the church, Barker knew 
 that he had reached it, though he was roods 
 behind, because a cry went up such as had 
 never before greeted any of the kings of the 
 earth. 
 
 I 
 
 U 
 
BOOK II 
 
Chapter I — The Charter of the Cities 
 
 LAMBERT was standing bewildered out- 
 side the door of the King's apart- 
 ments amid the scurry of astonish- 
 ment and ridicule. He was just passing out 
 into the street, in a dazed manner, when James 
 Barker dashed by him. 
 
 "Where are you going?" he asked. 
 
 "To stop all this foolery, of course," 
 replied Barker; and he disappeared into the 
 room. 
 
 He entered it headlong, slamming the door, 
 and slapping his incomparable silk hat on the 
 table. His mouth opened, but before he could 
 speak, the King said — 
 
 "Your hat, if you please." 
 
 Fidgetting with his fingers, and scarcely know- 
 ing what he was doing, the young politician held 
 it out. 
 
 The King placed it on his own chair, and sat 
 on it. 
 
 "A quaint old custom," he explained, smiling 
 above the ruins. "When the King receives the 
 representatives of the House of Barker, the hat 
 of the latter is immediately destroyed in this man- 
 ner. It represents the absolute finality of the 
 
 65 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 act of homage expressed in the removal of it. 
 It declares that never until that hat shall once 
 more appear upon your head (a contingency 
 which I firmly believe to be remote) shall the 
 House of Barker rebel against the Crown of 
 England." 
 
 Barker stood with clenched fist, and shaking 
 
 up. 
 
 "Your jokes," he began, "and my property — " 
 and then exploded with an oath, and 
 stopped again. 
 
 "Continue, continue," said the King, waving 
 his hands. 
 
 "What does it all mean?" cried the other, 
 with a gesture of passionate rationality. "Are 
 you mad?" 
 
 "Not in the least," replied the King, pleasantly. 
 "Madmen are always serious ; they go mad from 
 lack of humour. You are looking serious your- 
 self, James." 
 
 "Why can't you keep it to your own private 
 life?" expostulated the other. "You've got 
 plenty of money, and plenty of houses now to 
 play the fool in, but in the interests of this 
 public—" 
 
 "Epigrammatic," said the King, shaking his 
 finger sadly at him. "None of your daring 
 scintillations here. As to why I don't do it in 
 
 66 
 
The Charter of the Cities 
 
 private, I rather fail to understand your question. 
 The answer is of comparative limpidity. I don't 
 do it in private, because it is funnier to do it in 
 public. You appear to think that it would be 
 amusing to be dignified in the banquet hall and 
 in the street, and at my own fireside (I could 
 procure a fireside) to keep the company in a 
 roar. But that is what every one does. Every 
 one is grave in public, and funny in private. 
 My sense of humour suggests the reversal of 
 this; it suggests that one should be funny in 
 public, and solemn in private. I desire to make 
 the State functions, parliaments, coronations, 
 and so on, one roaring old-fashioned panto- 
 mime. But, on the other hand, I shut myself 
 up alone in a small store-room for two hours a 
 day, where I am so dignified that I come out 
 quite ill." 
 
 By this time Barker was walking up and down 
 the room, his frock coat flapping like the black 
 wings of a bird. 
 
 "Well, you will ruin the country, that's all," he 
 said shortly. 
 
 "It seems to me," said Auberon, "that the 
 tradition of ten centuries is being broken, and 
 the House of Barker is rebelling against the 
 Crown of England. It would be with regret (for 
 I admire your appearance) that I should be 
 
 67 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 obliged forcibly to decorate your head with the 
 remains of this hat, but— " 
 
 "What I can't understand," said Barker, 
 flinging up his fingers with a feverish American 
 movement, "is why you don't care about anything 
 else but your games." 
 
 The King stopped sharply in the act of 
 lifting the silken remnants, dropped them, 
 and walked up to Barker, looking at him 
 steadily. 
 
 "I made a kind of vow," he said, "that I would 
 not talk seriously, which always means answering 
 silly questions. But the strong man will always 
 be gentle with politicians. 
 
 'The shape my scornful looks deride 
 Required a God to form;' 
 
 if I may so theologically express myself. And 
 for some reason I cannot in the least understand, 
 I feel impelled to answer that question of yours, 
 and to answer it as if there were really 
 such a thing in the world as a serious subject. 
 You ask me why I don't care for anything else. 
 Can you tell me, in the name of all the gods 
 you don't believe in, why I should care for any- 
 thing else ?" 
 
 "Don't you realise common public necessities ?" 
 cried Barker. "Is it possible that a man of your 
 
 68 
 
The Charter of the Cities 
 
 intelligence does not know that it is every one's 
 interest — " 
 
 "Don't you believe in Zoroaster? Is it possible 
 that you neglect Mumbo- Jumbo ?" returned 
 the King, with startling animation. "Does 
 a man of your intelligence come to me 
 with these damned early Victorian ethics? 
 If, on studying my features and manner, you 
 detect any particular resemblance to the Prince 
 Consort, I assure you you are mistaken. 
 Did Herbert Spencer ever convince you — did 
 he ever convince anybody — Did he ever for one 
 mad moment convince himself — that it must 
 be to the interest of the individual to feel 
 a public spirit? Do you believe that, if 
 you rule your department badly, you stand any 
 more chance, or one half of the chance, of being 
 guillotined, that an angler stands, of being pulled 
 into the river by a strong pike? Herbert \ 
 Spencer refrained from theft for the same reason 
 that he refrained from wearing feathers in his 
 hair, because he was an English gentleman with 
 different tastes. I am an English gentleman with 
 different tastes. He liked philosophy. I like 
 art. He liked writing ten books on the nature 
 of human society. I like to see the Lord 
 Chamberlain walking in front of me with 
 a piece of paper pinned to his coat-tails. It is 
 
 69 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 my humour. Are you answered? At any rate, 
 I have said my last serious word to-day, and my 
 last serious word I trust for the remainder of 
 my life in this Paradise of Fools. The remainder 
 of my conversation with you to-day, which 
 I trust will be long and stimulating, I propose 
 to conduct in a new language of my own 
 by means of rapid and symbolic movements of 
 the left leg. ,, And he began to pirouette 
 slowly round the room with a preoccupied 
 expression. 
 
 Barker ran round the room after him, bom- 
 barding him with demands and entreaties. But 
 he received no response except in the new 
 language. He came out banging the door again, 
 and sick like a man coming on shore. As 
 he strode along the streets he found himself 
 suddenly opposite Cicconani's restaurant, and 
 for some reason there rose up before him 
 the green fantastic figure of the Spanish 
 General, standing, as he had seen him last, at 
 the door with the words on his lips, "You 
 cannot argue with the choice of the 
 soii M 
 
 The King came out from his dancing with the 
 air of a man of business legitimately tired. He 
 put on an overcoat, lit a cigar, and went out into 
 the purple night. 
 
 70 
 
«M*M king of the castle 1 
 
The Charter of the Cities 
 
 "I will go," he said, "and mingle with the 
 people." 
 
 He passed swiftly up a street in the neigh- 
 bourhood of Notting Hill, when suddenly he 
 felt a hard object driven into his waistcoat. 
 He paused, put up a single eye-glass, and 
 beheld a boy with a wooden sword and a paper 
 cocked hat, wearing that expression of awed 
 satisfaction with which a child contemplates his 
 work when he has hit some one very hard. The 
 King gazed thoughtfully for some time at his 
 assailant, and slowly took a note-book from his 
 breast-pocket. 
 
 "I have a few notes," he said, "for my 
 dying speech;" and he turned over the leaves. 
 "Dying speech for political assassination; 
 ditto, if by former friend — h'm, h'm. 
 Dying speech for death at hands of injured hus- 
 band (repentant). Dying speech for same 
 (cynical). I am not quite sure which meets the 
 present. ..." 
 
 "I'm the King of the Castle," said the boy, 
 truculently, and very pleased with nothing in 
 particular. 
 
 The King was a kind-hearted man, and very 
 fond of children, like all people who are fond of 
 the ridiculous. 
 
 "Infant," he said, "I'm glad you are so 
 71 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 stalwart a defender of your old inviolate Notting 
 Hill. Look up nightly to that peak, my child, 
 where it lifts itself among the stars so ancient, 
 so lonely, so unutterably Notting. So long as 
 you are ready to die for the sacred mountain, 
 even if it were ringed with all the armies of 
 Bays water — " 
 
 The King stopped suddenly, and his eyes 
 shone. 
 
 "Perhaps," he said, "perhaps the noblest of 
 all my conceptions. A revival of the arrogance 
 of the old mediaeval cities applied to our 
 glorious suburbs. Clapham with a city guard. 
 Wimbledon with a city wall. Surbiton tolling 
 a bell to raise its citizens. West Hampstead 
 going into battle with its own banner. It shall 
 be done. I, the King, have said it." And 
 hastily presenting the boy with half-a-crown, 
 remarking, "For the war-chest of Notting 
 Hill," he ran violently home at such a rate of 
 speed that crowds followed him for miles. On 
 reaching his study, he ordered a cup of coffee, 
 and plunged into profound meditation upon the 
 project. At length he called his favourite 
 Equerry, Captain Bowler, for whom he had a 
 deep affection, founded principally upon the shape 
 of his whiskers. 
 
 "Bowler," he said, "isn't there some society of 
 72 
 
The Charter of the Cities 
 
 historical research, or something of which I am 
 an honorary member ?" 
 
 "Yes, sir," said Captain Bowler, rubbing his 
 nose, "you are a member of The Encouragers 
 of Egyptian Renaissance/ and The Teutonic 
 Tombs Club/ and The Society for the Recovery 
 of London Antiquities/ and — " 
 
 "That is admirable," said the King. "The 
 London Antiquities does my trick. Go to the 
 Society for the Recovery of London Antiquities 
 and speak to their secretary, and their sub- 
 secretary, and their president, and their vice- 
 president, saying, The King of England is 
 proud, but the honorary member of the Society 
 for the Recovery of London Antiquities is 
 prouder than kings. I should like to tell you of 
 certain discoveries I have made touching the 
 neglected traditions of the London boroughs. 
 The revelations may cause some excitement, 
 stirring burning memories and touching old 
 wounds in Shepherd's Bush and Bayswater, in 
 Pimlico and South Kensington. The King 
 hesitates, but the honorary member is firm. 
 I approach you invoking the vows of my initia- 
 tion, the Sacred Seven Cats, the Poker of Per- 
 fection, and the Ordeal of the Indescribable 
 Instant (forgive me if I mix you up with the 
 Clan-na-Gael or some other club I belong to), 
 
 73 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 and ask you to permit me to read a paper at 
 your next meeting on the 'Wars of the London 
 Boroughs.' Say all this to the Society, Bowler. 
 Remember it very carefully, for it is most 
 important, and I have forgotten it altogether, 
 and send me another cup of coffee and some 
 of the cigars that we keep for vulgar and 
 successful people. I am going to write my 
 paper." 
 
 The Society for the Recovery of London 
 Antiquities met a month after in a corrugated 
 iron hall on the outskirts of one of the southern 
 suburbs of London. A large number of people 
 had collected there under the coarse and flaring 
 gas-jets when the King arrived, perspiring and 
 genial. On taking off his great-coat, he was 
 perceived to be in evening dress, wearing the 
 Garter. His appearance at the small table, 
 adorned only with a glass of water, was received 
 with respectful cheering. 
 
 The chairman (Mr. Huggins) said that he was 
 sure that they had all been pleased to listen to 
 such distinguished lecturers as they had heard 
 for some time past (hear, hear). Mr. Burton 
 (hear, hear), Mr. Cambridge, Professor King 
 (loud and continued cheers), our old friend Peter 
 Jessop, Sir William White (loud laughter), 
 and other eminent men, had done honour to 
 
 74 
 
The Charter of the Cities 
 
 their little venture (cheers). But there were 
 other circumstances which lent a certain unique 
 quality to the present occasion (hear, hear). So 
 far as his recollection went, and in connection 
 with the Society for the Recovery of London 
 Antiquities it went very far (loud cheers), he 
 did not remember that any of their lecturers had 
 borne the title of King. He would therefore call 
 upon King Auberon briefly to address the 
 meeting. 
 
 The King began by saying that this speech 
 might be regarded as the first declaration of 
 his new policy for the nation. "At this 
 supreme hour of my life I feel that to no one 
 but the members of the Society for the Recovery 
 of London Antiquities can I open my heart 
 (cheers). If the world turns upon my policy, 
 and the storms of popular hostility begin 
 to rise (no, no), I feel that it is here, with 
 my brave Recoverers around me, that I 
 can best meet them, sword in hand ,, (loud 
 cheers). 
 
 His Majesty then went on to explain that, now 
 old age was creeping upon him, he proposed 
 
 io ucvuic nis remaining sirengm iu ui ink- 
 ing about a keener sense of local patriotism ./[~ 
 in the various municipalities of London. How ^ 
 
 to devote his remaining strength to bring- 
 
 municipalities 
 few of them knew the legends of their own 
 
 75 
 
 ^ OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 boroughs ! How many there were who had never 
 heard of the true origin of the Wink of 
 Wandsworth! What a large proportion of the 
 younger generation in Chelsea neglected to 
 perform the old Chelsea Chuff! Pimlico no 
 longer pumped the Pimlies. Battersea had for- 
 gotten the name of Blick. 
 
 There was a short silence, and then a voice said 
 "Shame." 
 
 The King continued: "Being called, how- 
 ever unworthily, to this high estate, I have 
 resolved that, so far as possible, this neglect shall 
 cease. I desire no military glory. I lay claim 
 to no constitutional equality with Justinian 
 or Alfred. If I can go down to history as the 
 man who saved from extinction a few old 
 English customs, if our descendants can say 
 it was through this man, humble as he was, that 
 the Ten Turnips are still eaten in Fulham, and 
 the Putney parish councillor still shaves one half 
 of his head, I shall look my great fathers rever- 
 ently but not fearfully in the face when I go down 
 to the last house of Kings." 
 
 The King paused, visibly affected, but collect- 
 ing himself, resumed once more. 
 
 "I trust that to very few of you, at least, I 
 need dwell on the sublime origins of these legends. 
 The very names of your boroughs bear wit- 
 
 76 
 
The Charter of the Cities 
 
 ncss to them. So long as Hammersmith is 
 called Hammersmith, its people will live in 
 the shadow of that primal hero, the Black- 
 smith, who led the democracy of the Broadway 
 into battle till he drove the chivalry of 
 Kensington before him and overthrew them 
 at that place which in honour of the best blood 
 of the defeated aristocracy is still called Ken- 
 sington Gore. Men of Hammersmith will not 
 fail to remember that the very name of Kensing- 
 ton originated from the lips of their hero. 
 For at the great banquet of reconciliation held 
 after the war, when the disdainful oligarchs 
 declined to join in the songs of the men of the 
 Broadway (which are to this day of a rude and 
 popular character), the great Republican leader, 
 with his rough humour, said the words which 
 are written in gold upon his monument, Tittle 
 birds that can sing and won't sing, must be made 
 to sing/ So that the Eastern Knights were 
 called Cansings or Kensings ever afterwards. 
 But you also have great memories, O men 
 of Kensington! You showed that you could 
 sing, and sing great war-songs. Even after 
 the dark day of Kensington Gore, history 
 will not forget those three Knights who 
 guarded your disordered retreat from Hyde 
 Park (so called from your hiding there), those 
 
 77 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 three Knights after whom Knightsbridge is 
 named. Nor will it forget the day of your 
 re-emergence, purged in the fire of calamity, 
 cleansed of your oligarchic corruptions, when, 
 sword in hand, you drove the Empire of Ham- 
 mersmith back mile by mile, swept it past its 
 own Broadway, and broke it at last in a battle 
 so long and bloody that the birds of prey have 
 left their name upon it. Men have called it, 
 with austere irony, the Ravenscourt. I shall 
 not, I trust, wound the patriotism of Bays- 
 water, or the lonelier pride of Brompton, or 
 that of any other historic township, by taking 
 these two special examples. I select them, not 
 because they are more glorious than the rest, 
 but partly from personal association (I am 
 myself descended from one of the three heroes 
 of Knightsbridge), and partly from the con- 
 sciousness that I am an amateur antiquarian, 
 and cannot presume to deal with times and 
 places more remote and more mysterious. It 
 is not for me to settle the question between 
 two such men as Professor Hugg and Sir 
 William Whisky as to whether Notting Hill 
 means Nutting Hill (in allusion to the rich 
 woods which no longer cover it), or whether it 
 is a corruption of Nothing-ill, referring to its 
 reputation among the ancients as an Earthly 
 
 78 
 
The Charter of the Cities 
 
 Paradise. When a Podkins and a Jossy con- 
 fess themselves doubtful about the boundaries 
 of West Kensington (said to have been traced 
 in the blood of Oxen), I need not be ashamed 
 to confess a similar doubt. I will ask you to 
 excuse me from further history, and to assist 
 me with your encouragement in dealing with 
 the problem which faces us to-day. Is this 
 ancient spirit of the London townships to die out ? 
 Are our omnibus conductors and policemen to lose 
 altogether that light which we see so often in 
 their eyes, the dreamy light of 
 
 'Old unhappy far-off things 
 And battles long ago' 
 
 — to quote the words of a little-known poet 
 who was a friend of my youth? I have re- 
 solved, as I have said, so far as possible, to 
 preserve the eyes of policemen and omnibus 
 conductors in their present dreamy state. For 
 what is a state without dreams ? And the remedy 
 I propose is as follows: — 
 
 "To-morrow morning at twenty-five minutes 
 past ten, if Heaven spares my life, I purpose to 
 issue a Proclamation. It has been the work of 
 my life, and is about half finished. With the 
 assistance of a whisky and soda, I shall conclude 
 the other half to-night, and my people will 
 
 79 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 receive it to-morrow. All these boroughs where 
 you were born, and hope to lay your bones, shall 
 be reinstated in their ancient magnificence, — 
 Hammersmith, Kensington, Bayswater, Chelsea, 
 Battersea, Clapham, Balham, and a hundred 
 others. Each shall immediately build a city 
 wall with gates to be closed at sunset. Each 
 shall have a city guard, armed to the teeth. 
 Each shall have a banner, a coat-of-arms, and, 
 if convenient, a gathering cry. I will not enter 
 into the details now, my heart is too full. 
 They will be found in the proclamation itself. 
 You will all, however, be subject to enrolment 
 in the local city guards, to be summoned to- 
 gether by a thing called the Tocsin, the meaning 
 of which I am studying in my researches into 
 history. Personally, I believe a tocsin to be 
 some kind of highly paid official. If, therefore, 
 any of you happen to have such a thing as a 
 halberd in the house, I should advise you to prac- 
 tise with it in the garden." 
 
 Here the King buried his face in his handker- 
 chief and hurriedly left the platform, overcome 
 by emotions. 
 
 The members of the Society for the Recovery 
 of London Antiquities rose in an indescribable 
 state of vagueness. Some were purple with 
 indignation; an intellectual few were purple with 
 
 80 
 
The Charter of the Cities 
 
 laughter; the great majority found their minds 
 a blank. There remains a tradition that one pale 
 face with burning blue eyes remained fixed upon 
 the lecturer, and after the lecture a red-haired 
 boy ran out of the room. 
 
Chapter II — The Council of the Provosts 
 
 THE King got up early next morning 
 and came down three steps at a 
 time like a schoolboy. Having eaten 
 his breakfast hurriedly, but with an appetite, 
 he summoned one of the highest officials of 
 the Palace, and presented him with a shill- 
 ing. "Go and buy me," he said, "a shill- 
 ing paint-box, which you will get, unless 
 the mists of time mislead me, in a shop at the 
 corner of the second and dirtier street that 
 leads out of Rochester Row. I have already 
 requested the Master of the Buckhounds to 
 provide me with cardboard. It seemed to me 
 (I know not why) that it fell within his 
 department." 
 
 The King was happy all that morning with 
 his cardboard and his paint-box. He was 
 engaged in designing the uniforms and 
 coats-of-arms for the various municipalities 
 of London. They gave him deep and no 
 inconsiderable thought. He felt the respon- 
 sibility. 
 
 "I cannot think," he said, "why people should 
 think the names of places in the country more 
 
 82 
 
The Council of the Provosts 
 
 poetical than those in London. Shallow 
 romanticists go away in trains and stop in places 
 called Hugmy-in-the-Hole, or Bumps-on-the- 
 Puddle. And all the time they could, if they 
 liked, go and live at a place with the dim, 
 divine name of St. John's Wood. I have 
 never been to St. John's Wood. I dare 
 not. I should be afraid of the innumer- 
 able night of fir trees, afraid to come upon 
 a blood-red cup and the beating of the wings 
 of the Eagle. But all these things can be 
 imagined by remaining reverently in the Harrow 
 train." 
 
 And he thoughtfully retouched his design for 
 the head-dress of the halberdier of St. John's 
 Wood, a design in black and red, compounded 
 of a pine tree and the plumage of an eagle. 
 Then he turned to another card. "Let us 
 think of milder matters," he said. "Lavender 
 Hill! Could any of your glebes and combes 
 and all the rest of it produce so fragrant an 
 idea? Think of a mountain of lavender 
 lifting itself in purple poignancy into the silver 
 skies and filling men's nostrils with a new 
 breath of life — a purple hill of incense. It is 
 true that upon my few excursions of discovery 
 on a halfpenny tram I have failed to hit the 
 precise spot. But it must be there; some poet 
 
 83 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 called it by its name. There is at least warrant 
 enough for the solemn purple plumes (following 
 the botanical formation of lavender) which I 
 have required people to wear in the neighbour- 
 hood of Clapham Junction. It is so everywhere, 
 after all. I have never been actually to South- 
 fields, but I suppose a scheme of lemons and 
 olives represent their austral instincts. I have 
 never visited Parson's Green, or seen either the 
 Green or the Parson, but surely the pale-green 
 shovel-hats I have designed must be more or less 
 in the spirit. I must work in the dark and 
 let my instincts guide me. The great love I 
 bear to my people will certainly save me from 
 distressing their noble spirit or violating their 
 great traditions." 
 
 As he was reflecting in this vein, the door was 
 flung open, and an official announced Mr. Barker 
 and Mr. Lambert. 
 
 Mr. Barker and Mr. Lambert were not particu- 
 larly surprised to find the King sitting on the 
 floor amid a litter of water-colour sketches. 
 They were not particularly surprised because the 
 last time they had called on him they had 
 found him sitting on the floor, surrounded by 
 a litter of children's bricks, and the time before 
 surrounded by a litter of wholly unsuccessful 
 attempts to make paper darts. But the trend of 
 
 84 
 
The Council of the Provosts 
 
 the royal infant's remarks, uttered from amid 
 this infantile chaos, was not quite the same affair. 
 For some time they let him babble on, con- 
 scious that his remarks meant nothing. And 
 then a horrible thought began to steal over 
 the mind of James Barker. He began to 
 think that the King's remarks did not mean 
 nothing. 
 
 "In God's name, Auberorf," he suddenly 
 volleyed out, startling the quiet hall, "you 
 don't mean that you are really going to 
 have these city guards and city walls and 
 things?" 
 
 "I am, indeed," said the infant, in a quiet 
 voice. "Why shouldn't I have them? I have 
 modelled them precisely on your political prin- 
 ciples. Do you know what I've done, 
 Barker? I've behaved like a true Barkerian. 
 I've . . . but perhaps it won't interest you, the 
 account of my Barkerian conduct." 
 
 "Oh, go on, go on," cried Barker. 
 
 "The account of my Barkerian conduct," said 
 Auberon, calmly, "seems not only to interest, but 
 to alarm you. Yet it is very simple. It 
 merely consists in choosing all the provosts 
 under any new scheme by the same principle 
 by which you have caused the central despot 
 to be appointed. Each provost, of each city, 
 
 85 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 under my charter, is to be appointed by 
 rotation. Sleep, therefore, my Barker, a rosy 
 sleep." 
 
 Barker's wild eyes flared. 
 
 "But, in God's name, don't you see, Quin, 
 that the thing is quite different? In the centre 
 it doesn't matter so much, just because the 
 whole object of despotism is to get some sort 
 of unity. But if any damned parish can go to 
 any damned man — " 
 
 "I see your difficulty," said King Auberon, 
 calmly. "You feel that your talents may be 
 neglected. Listen!" And he rose with im- 
 mense magnificence. "I solemnly give to my 
 liege subject, James Barker, my special and 
 splendid favour, the right to override the 
 obvious text of the Charter of the Cities, and 
 to be, in his own right, Lord High Provost of 
 South Kensington. And now, my dear James, 
 you are all right. Good day." 
 
 "But—" began Barker. 
 
 "The audience is at an end, Provost," said the 
 King, smiling. 
 
 How far his confidence was justified, it would 
 require a somewhat complicated description to 
 explain. "The Great Proclamation of the 
 Charter of the Free Cities" appeared in due 
 course that morning, and was posted by bill- 
 
 86 
 
The Council of the Provosts 
 
 stickers all over the front of the Palace, the 
 King assisting them with animated directions, 
 and standing in the middle of the road, with his 
 head on one side, contemplating the result. It 
 was also carried up and down the main thorough- 
 fares by sandwichmen, and the King was, with 
 difficulty, restrained from going out in that 
 capacity himself, being, in fact, found by the 
 Groom of the Stole and Captain Bowler, 
 struggling between two boards. His excite- 
 ment had positively to be quieted like that of a v^ 
 
 chi,<l - Ut/k^C^ 
 
 The reception which the Charter of the 
 
 Cities met at the hands of the public may mildly 
 be described as mixed. In one sense it was 
 popular enough. In many happy homes that 
 remarkable legal document was read aloud on 
 winter evenings amid uproarious appreciation, 
 when everything had been learnt by heart from 
 that quaint but immortal old classic, Mr. W. 
 W. Jacobs. But when it was discovered 
 that the King had every intention of seriously 
 requiring the provisions to be carried out, of 
 insisting that the grotesque cities, with their 
 tocsins and city guards, should really come 
 into existence, things were thrown into a 
 far angrier confusion. Londoners had no 
 particular objection to the King making a 
 
 87 
 
 I 
 
\J 
 
 The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 fool of himself, but they became indig- 
 nant when it became evident that he 
 wished to make fools of them; and protests 
 began to come in. 
 
 The Lord High Provost of the Good and 
 Valiant City of West Kensington wrote a re- 
 spectful letter to the King, explaining that upon 
 State occasions it would, of course, be his duty 
 to observe what formalities the King thought 
 proper, but that it was really awkward for a 
 decent householder not to be allowed to go out 
 and put a post-card in a pillar-box without 
 being escorted by five heralds, who announced, 
 with formal cries and blasts of a trumpet, that 
 the Lord High Provost desired to catch the 
 post. 
 
 The Lord High Provost of North Kensington, 
 who was a prosperous draper, wrote a curt busi- 
 ness note, like a man complaining of a railway 
 company, stating that definite inconvenience 
 had been caused him by the presence of the hal- 
 berdiers, whom he had to take with him every- 
 where. When attempting to catch an omnibus to 
 the City, he had found that while room could 
 have been found for himself, the halberdiers had 
 a difficulty in getting into the vehicle — believe 
 him, theirs faithfully. 
 
 The Lord High Provost of Shepherd's Bush 
 
The Council of the Provosts 
 
 said his wife did not like men hanging round the 
 kitchen. 
 
 The King was always delighted to listen to 
 these grievances, delivering lenient and kingly an- 
 swers, but as he always insisted, as the abso- 
 lute sine qua non, that verbal complaints should 
 be presented to him with the fullest pomp of 
 trumpets, plumes, and halberds, only a few reso- 
 lute spirits were prepared to run the gauntlet of 
 the little boys in the street. 
 
 Among these, however, was prominent the 
 abrupt and business-like gentleman who ruled 
 North Kensington. And he had before long, 
 occasion to interview the King about a matter 
 wider and even more urgent than the problem 
 of the halberdiers and the omnibus. This was 
 the greatest question which then and for long 
 afterwards brought a stir to the blood and a 
 flush to the cheek of all the speculative builders 
 and house agents from Shepherd's Bush to the 
 Marble Arch, and from Westbourne Grove to 
 High Street, Kensington. I refer to the great 
 affair of the improvements in Notting Hill. 
 The scheme was conducted chiefly by Mr. 
 Buck, the abrupt North Kensington magnate, 
 and by Mr. Wilson, the Provost of Bayswater. 
 A great thoroughfare was to be driven through 
 three boroughs, through West Kensington, 
 
 89 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 North Kensington and Notting Hill, opening 
 at one end into Hammersmith Broadway, and 
 at the other into Westbourne Grove. The 
 negotiations, buyings, sellings, bullying and 
 bribing took ten years, and by the end of 
 it Buck, who had conducted them almost 
 single-handed, had proved himself a man of the 
 strongest type of material energy and material 
 diplomacy. And just as his splendid patience 
 and more splendid impatience had finally brought 
 him victory, when workmen were already de- 
 molishing houses and walls along the great line 
 from Hammersmith, a sudden obstacle appeared 
 that had neither been reckoned with nor dreamed 
 of, a small and strange obstacle, which, like a 
 speck of grit in a great machine, jarred the 
 whole vast scheme and brought it to a stand- 
 still, and Mr. Buck, the draper, getting with 
 great impatience into his robes of office and 
 summoning with indescribable disgust his 
 halberdiers, hurried over to speak to the 
 King. 
 
 Ten years had not tired the King of his joke. 
 There were still new faces to be seen looking 
 out from the symbolic head-gears he had 
 designed, gazing at him from amid the pastoral 
 ribbons of Shepherd's Bush or from under the 
 sombre hoods of the Blackfriars Road. And the 
 
 90 
 
The Council of the Provosts 
 
 interview which was promised him with the 
 Provost of North Kensington he anticipated 
 with a particular pleasure, for "he never really 
 enjoyed," he said, "the full richness of the 
 mediaeval garments unless the people compelled 
 to wear them were very angry and business- 
 like." 
 
 Mr. Buck was both. At the King's com- 
 mand the door of the audience-chamber was 
 thrown open and a herald appeared in the 
 purple colours of Mr. Buck's commonwealth 
 emblazoned with the Great Eagle which the 
 King had attributed to North Kensington, in 
 vague reminiscence of Russia, for he always V^3'; 
 insisted on regarding North Kensington as some J "Uiy 
 kind of semi-arctic neighbourhood. The herald 
 announced that the Provost of that city desired | 
 audience of the King. 
 
 "From North Kensington?" said the King, 
 rising graciously. "What news does he bring 
 from that land of high hills and fair women ? He 
 is welcome." 
 
 The herald advanced into the room, and was 
 immediately followed by twelve guards clad in 
 purple, who were followed by an attendant 
 bearing the banner of the Eagle, who was 
 followed by another attendant bearing the 
 keys of the city upon a cushion, who was 
 
 91 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 followed by Mr. Buck in a great hurry. 
 When the King saw his strong animal face 
 and steady eyes, he knew that he was in the 
 presence of a great man of business, and con- 
 sciously braced himself. 
 
 "Well, well," he said, cheerily coming down 
 two or three steps from a dais, and striking his 
 hands lightly together, "I am glad to see you. 
 Never mind, never mind. Ceremony is not 
 everything. ,, 
 
 "I don't understand your Majesty/' said the 
 Provost, stolidly. 
 
 "Never mind, never mind," said the King, 
 gaily. "A knowledge of Courts is by no means 
 an unmixed merit; you will do it next time, no 
 doubt." 
 
 The man of business looked at him sulkily from 
 under his black brows and said again without 
 show of civility — 
 
 "I don't follow you." 
 
 "Well, well," replied the King, good-naturedly, 
 "if you ask me I don't mind telling you, 
 not because I myself attach any importance to 
 these forms in comparison with the Honest 
 Heart. But it is usual — it is usual — that is 
 all, for a man when entering the presence 
 of Royalty to lie down on his back on 
 the floor and elevating his feet towards heaven 
 
 92 
 
The Council of the Provosts 
 
 (as the source of Royal power) to say 
 three times 'Monarchical institutions improve 
 the manners/ But there, there — such pomp 
 is far less truly dignified than your simple 
 kindliness." 
 
 The Provost's face was red with anger and he 
 maintained silence. 
 
 "And now," said the King, lightly, and with 
 the exasperating air of a man softening a snub; 
 "what delightful weather we are having! You 
 must find your official robes warm, my Lord. 
 I designed them for your own snow-bound 
 land." 
 
 "They're as hot as hell," said Buck, briefly. "I 
 came here on business." 
 
 "Right," said the King, nodding a great 
 number of times with quite unmeaning solem- 
 nity; "right, right, right. Business, as the sad 
 glad old Persian said, is business. Be punctual. 
 Rise early. Point the pen to the shoulder. 
 Point the pen to the shoulder, for you know 
 not whence you come nor why. Point the pen 
 to the shoulder, for you know not when you go 
 nor where." 
 
 The Provost pulled a number of papers 
 from his pocket and savagely flapped them 
 open. 
 
 93 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 "Your Majesty may have heard," he began, 
 sarcastically, "of Hammersmith and a thing 
 called a road. We have been at work ten 
 years buying property and getting compulsory 
 powers and fixing compensation and squaring 
 vested interests, and now at the very end, 
 I the thing is stopped by a fool. Old Prout, 
 who was Provost of Notting Hill, was a 
 business man, and we dealt with him quite 
 satisfactorily. But he's dead, and the cursed 
 lot has fallen to a young man named Wayne, 
 who's up to some game that's perfectly 
 incomprehensible to me. We offer him a 
 better price than any one ever dreamt of, but 
 he won't let the road go through. And his 
 Council seem to be backing him up. It's mid- 
 summer madness." 
 
 The King, who was rather inattentively 
 engaged in drawing the Provost's nose with 
 his finger on the window-pane, heard the last two 
 words. 
 
 "What a perfect phrase that is," fie said. 
 " 'Midsummer madness !' " 
 
 "The chief point is," continued Buck, 
 doggedly, "that the only part that is really 
 in question is one dirty little street — Pump 
 Street — a street with nothing in it but a public 
 house and a penny toy-shop, and that sort of 
 
 94 
 
The Council of the Provosts 
 
 thing. All the respectable people of Notting Hill 
 have accepted our compensation. But the in- 
 effable Wayne sticks out over Pump Street. 
 Says he's Provost of Notting Hill. He's only 
 Pro vast of Pump Street." 
 
 "A good thought," replied Auberon. " I like 
 the idea of a Provost of Pump Street. Why not 
 let him alone?" 
 
 "And drop the whole scheme!" cried out 
 Buck, with a burst of brutal spirit. 'Til be 
 damned if we do. No. I'm for sending 
 in workmen to pull down without more 
 ado." 
 
 "Strike for the purple Eagle," cried the King, 
 hot with historical associations. 
 
 "I'll tell you what it is," said Buck, losing 
 his temper altogether. "If your Majesty 
 would spend less time in insulting respect- 
 able people with your silly coats-of- 
 arms, and more time over the business of 
 the nation — " 
 
 The King's brow wrinkled thoughtfully. 
 
 "The situation is not bad," he said; "the 
 haughty burgher defying the King in his own 
 Palace. The burgher's head should be thrown 
 back and the right arm extended; the left may 
 be lifted towards Heaven, but that I leave to 
 your private religious sentiment. I have sunk 
 
 95 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 back in this chair, stricken with baffled fury. Now 
 again, please." 
 
 Buck's mouth opened like a dog's, but before 
 he could speak another herald appeared at the 
 door. 
 
 "The Lord High Provost of Bayswater," he 
 said, "desires an audience." 
 
 "Admit him," said Auberon. "This is a jolly 
 day." 
 
 The halberdiers of Bayswater wore a pre- 
 vailing uniform of green, and the banner which 
 was borne after them was emblazoned with a 
 green bay-wreath on a silver ground, which the 
 King, in the course of his researches into a 
 bottle of champagne, had discovered to be the 
 quaint old punning cognisance of the city of 
 Bayswater. 
 
 "It is a fit symbol," said the King, "your im- 
 mortal bay-wreath. Fulham may seek for 
 wealth, and Kensington for art, but when 
 did the men of Bayswater care for anything but 
 glory?" 
 
 Immediately behind the banner, and almost 
 completely hidden by it, came the Provost of 
 the city, clad in splendid robes of green and 
 silver with white fur and crowned with bay. 
 He was an anxious little man with red whiskers, 
 originally the owner of a small sweet-stuff shop. 
 
 96 
 
The Council of the Provosts 
 
 "Our cousin of Bayswater," said the King, 
 with delight; "what can we get for you?" 
 The King was heard also distinctly to mutter, 
 "Cold beef, cold 'am, cold chicken," his voice 
 dying into silence. 
 
 "I came to see your Majesty," said the Provost 
 of Bayswater, whose name was Wilson, "about 
 that Pump Street affair." 
 
 "I have just been explaining the situation to 
 his Majesty," said Buck, curtly, but recovering 
 his civility. "I am not sure, however, whether 
 his Majesty knows how much the matter affects 
 you also." 
 
 "It affects both of us, yer see, yer Majesty, as 
 this scheme was started for the benefit of the 'ole 
 neighbourhood. So Mr. Buck and me we put our 
 'eads together — " 
 
 The King clasped his hands. 
 
 "Perfect," he cried in ecstacy. "Your heads 
 together ! I can see it ! Can't you do it now ? Oh, 
 do do it now." 
 
 A smothered sound of amusement appeared to 
 come from the halberdiers, but Mr. Wilson 
 looked merely bewildered, and Mr. Buck merely 
 diabolical. 
 
 "I suppose," he began, bitterly, but the 
 King stopped him with a gesture of lis- 
 tening. 
 
 97 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 "Hush," he said, "I think I hear some one else 
 coming. I seem to hear another herald, a herald 
 whose boots creak.' ' 
 
 As he spoke another voice cried from the door- 
 way — 
 
 "The Lord High Provost of South Kensington 
 desires an audience." 
 
 "The Lord High Provost of South Kensing- 
 ton!" cried the King. "Why, that is my 
 old friend James Barker ! What does he want 
 I wonder? If the tender memories of friendship 
 have not grown misty, I fancy he wants some- 
 thing for himself, probably money. How are you, 
 James ?" 
 
 Mr. James Barker, whose guard was attired 
 in a splendid blue, and whose blue banner 
 bore three gold birds singing, rushed, in 
 his blue and gold robes, into the room. 
 Despite the absurdity of all the dresses, 
 it was worth noticing that he carried his 
 better than the rest, though he loathed it as 
 much as any of them. He was a gentle- 
 man, and a very handsome man, and could 
 not help unconsciously wearing even his 
 preposterous robe as it should be worn. 
 He spoke quickly, but with the slight 
 initial hesitation he always showed in address- 
 ing the King, due to suppressing an impulse 
 
 98 
 
The Council of the Provosts 
 
 to address his old acquaintance in the old 
 way. 
 
 "Your Majesty — pray forgive my intrusion. 
 It is about this man at Pump Street. I see you 
 have Buck here, so you have probably heard what 
 is necessary. I — " 
 
 The King swept his eyes anxiously round the 
 room, which now blazed with the trappings of 
 three cities. 
 
 "There is one thing necessary," he said. 
 
 "Yes, your Majesty," said Mr. Wilson of Bays- 
 water, a little eagerly. "What does yer Majesty 
 think necessary?" 
 
 "A little yellow," said the king, firmly. 
 "Send for the Provost of West Kensing- 
 ton." 
 
 Amid some materialistic protests he was 
 sent for and arrived with his yellow halber- 
 diers in his saffron robes, wiping his fore- 
 head with a handkerchief. After all, placed 
 as he was, he had a good deal to say on 
 the matter. 
 
 "Welcome, West Kensington," said the 
 King. "I have long wished to see you, touch- 
 ing that matter of the Hammersmith land to 
 the south of the Rowton House. Will you 
 hold it feudally from the Provost of Hammer- 
 smith? You have only to do him homage by 
 
 99 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 putting his left arm in his overcoat and then 
 marching home in state." 
 
 "No, your Majesty; I'd rather not," 
 said the Provost of West Kensington, who 
 was a pale young man with a fair mous- 
 tache and whiskers, who kept a successful 
 dairy. 
 
 The King struck him heartily on the 
 shoulder. 
 
 "The fierce old West Kensington blood," 
 he said; "they are not wise who ask it to do 
 homage." 
 
 Then he glanced again round the room. It 
 was full of a roaring sunset of colour, and he 
 enjoyed the sight, possible to so few artists — 
 the sight of his own dreams moving and 
 blazing before him. In the foreground the 
 yellow of the W T est Kensington liveries out- 
 lined itself against the dark blue draperies of 
 South Kensington. The crests of these again 
 brightened suddenly into green as the almost 
 woodland colours of Bayswater rose behind 
 them. And over and behind all, the great 
 purple plumes of North Kensington showed 
 almost funereal and black. 
 
 "There is something lacking," said the King, 
 "something lacking. What can — Ah, there it is ! 
 —there it is !" 
 
 100 
 
The Council of the Provosts 
 
 
 In the doorway had appeared a new figure, a 
 herald in flaming red. He cried in a loud but 
 unemotional voice — 
 
 "The Lord High Provost of Notting Hill de- 
 sires an audience." 
 
 IOI 
 
Chapter III — Enter a Lunatic 
 
 THE King of the Fairies, who was, it is 
 to be presumed, the godfather of King 
 Auberon, must have been very favour- 
 able on this particular day to his fantastic 
 godchild, for with the entrance of the guard 
 of the Provost of Notting Hill there was 
 a certain more or less inexplicable addition 
 to his delight. The wretched navvies and 
 sandwich-men who carried the colours of 
 Bayswater or South Kensington, engaged 
 merely for the day to satisfy the Royal 
 hobby, slouched into the room with a com- 
 paratively hang-dog air, and a great part of the 
 King's intellectual pleasure consisted in the 
 contrast between the arrogance of their swords 
 and feathers and the meek misery of their 
 faces. But these Notting Hill halberdiers in 
 their red tunics belted with gold had the 
 air rather of an absurd gravity. They 
 seemed, so to speak, to be taking part in 
 the joke. They marched and wheeled into 
 position with an almost startling dignity and dis- 
 cipline. 
 
 They carried a yellow banner with a great 
 red lion, named by the King as the Notting 
 
 102 
 
Enter a Lunatic 
 
 Hill emblem, after a small public-house in the 
 neighbourhood, which he once frequented. 
 
 Between the two lines of his followers there 
 advanced towards the King a tall, red-haired 
 young man, with high features, and bold blue 
 eyes. He would have been called handsome, 
 but that a certain indefinable air of his nose 
 being too big for his face, and his feet for his 
 legs, gave him a look of awkwardness and 
 extreme youth. His robes were red, according 
 to the King's heraldry, and alone among the 
 Provosts, he was girt with a great sword. This 
 was Adam Wayne, the intractable Provost ofv 
 Notting Hill. 
 
 The King flung himself back in his chair, and 
 rubbed his hands. 
 
 "What a day, what a day!" he said to himself. 
 "Now there'll be a row. I'd no idea it would 
 be such fun as it is. These Provosts are so very 
 indignant, so very reasonable, so very right. This 
 fellow, by the look in his eyes, is even more 
 indignant than the rest. No sign in those 
 large blue eyes, at any rate, of ever having 
 heard of a joke. He'll remonstrate with the 
 others, and they'll remonstrate with him, and 
 they'll all make themselves sumptuously happy 
 remonstrating with me." 
 
 "Welcome, my Lord," he said aloud. "What 
 103 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 news from the Hill of a Hundred Legends? 
 What have you for the ear of your King? 
 I know that troubles have arisen between you 
 and these others, our cousins, but these 
 troubles it shall be our pride to compose. And 
 I doubt not, and cannot doubt, that your love 
 for me is not less tender, no less ardent than 
 theirs." 
 
 Mr. fluck made a bitter face, and James 
 Barker's nostrils curled; Wilson began to 
 giggle faintly, and the Provost of West Ken- 
 sington followed in a smothered way. But the 
 big blue eyes of Adam Wayne never changed, 
 and he called out in an odd, boyish voice down 
 the hall— 
 
 "I bring homage to my King. I bring him the 
 only thing I have — my sword." 
 
 And with a great gesture he flung it down 
 on the ground, and knelt on one knee behind 
 it. 
 
 There was a dead silence. 
 
 "I beg your pardon," said the King, blankly. 
 
 "You speak well, sire," said Adam Wayne, 
 "as you ever speak, when you say that my love 
 is not less than the love of these. Small would 
 it be if it were not more. For I am the heir of 
 your scheme — the child of the great Charter. 
 I stand here for the rights the Charter gave me, 
 
 104 
 
"I BRING HOMAGE TO MY KING 
 
Enter a Lunatic 
 
 and I swear, by your sacred crown, that where I 
 stand, I stand fast." 
 
 The eyes of all five men stood out of their 
 heads. 
 
 Then Buck said, in his jolly, jarring voice : "Is 
 the whole world mad?" 
 
 The King sprang to his feet, and his eyes 
 blazed. 
 
 "Yes," he cried, in a voice of exultation, 
 "the whole world is mad, but Adam Wayne 
 and me. It is true as death what I told you 
 long ago, James Barker, seriousness sends men 
 mad. You are mad, because you care for 
 politics, as mad as a man who collects tram 
 tickets. Buck is mad, because he cares for 
 money, as mad as a man who lives on opium. 
 Wilson is mad, because he thinks himself right, 
 as mad as a man who thinks himself God 
 Almighty. The Provost of West Kensington 
 is mad, because he thinks he is respectable, as 
 mad as a man who thinks he is a chicken. All 
 men are mad, but the humourist, who cares for 
 nothing and possesses everything. I thought; 
 that there was only one humourist in EnglandJ 
 Fools! — dolts! — open your cows' eyes; there 
 are two! In Notting Hill — in that unpromis- 
 ing elevation — there has been born an artist! 
 You thought to spoil my joke, and bully me out 
 
 ios 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 of it, by becoming more and more modern, more 
 and more practical, more and more bustling 
 and rational. Oh, what a feast it was to answer 
 you by becoming more and more august, 
 more and more gracious, more and more ancient 
 and mellow ! But this lad has seen how to bowl 
 me out. He has answered me back, vaunt for 
 vaunt, rhetoric for rhetoric. He has lifted 
 the only shield I cannot break, the shield 
 of an impenetrable pomposity. Listen to him. 
 You have come, my Lord, about Pump 
 Street?" 
 
 "About the city of Notting Hill," answered 
 Wayne, proudly. "Of which Pump Street is a 
 living and rejoicing part." 
 
 "Not a very large part," said Barker, contemp- 
 tuously. 
 
 "That which is large enough for the rich to 
 covet," said Wayne, drawing up his head, "is 
 large enough for the poor to defend." 
 
 The King slapped both his legs, and waved his 
 feet for a second in the air. 
 
 "Every respectable person in Notting Hill," 
 cut in Buck, with his cold, coarse voice, "is for 
 us and against you. I have plenty of friends in 
 Notting Hill." 
 
 "Your friends are those who have taken your 
 gold for other men's hearthstones, my Lord 
 
 106 
 
Enter a Lunatic 
 
 Buck," said Provost Wayne. "I can well believe 
 they are your friends.'' 
 
 "They've never sold dirty toys, anyhow," said 
 Buck, laughing shortly. 
 
 "They've sold dirtier things," said Wayne, 
 calmly; "they have sold themselves." 
 
 "It's no good, my Buckling," said the King, 
 rolling about on his chair. "You can't cope 
 with this chivalrous eloquence. You can't cope 
 with an artist. You can't cope with the 
 humourist of Notting Hill. O, Nunc dimittis — 
 that I have lived to see this day ! Provost Wayne, 
 you stand firm?" 
 
 "Let them wait and see," said Wayne. "If 
 I stood firm before, do you think I shall weaken 
 now that I have seen the face of the King? 
 For I fight for something greater, if greater 
 there can be, than the hearthstones of my 
 people and the Lordship of the Lion. I fight for 
 your royal vision, for the great dream you 
 dreamt of the League of the Free Cities. You 
 have given me this liberty. If I had been a 
 beggar and you had flung me a coin, if I had 
 been a peasant in a dance and you had flung 
 me a favour, do you think I would have let it 
 be taken by any ruffians on the road? This 
 leadership and liberty of Notting Hill is a gift 
 from your Majesty. And if it is taken from 
 
 107 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 me, by God! it shall be taken in battle, and 
 the noise of that battle shall be heard in the 
 flats of Chelsea and in the studios of St. John's 
 Wood." 
 
 "It is too much — it is too much," said the 
 King. "Nature is weak. I must speak to 
 you, brother artist, without further disguise. 
 Let me ask you a solemn question. Adam 
 Wayne, Lord High Provost of Notting Hill, 
 don't you think it splendid?" 
 
 "Splendid !" cried Adam Wayne. "It has the 
 splendour of God." 
 
 "Bowled out again," said the King. "You will 
 keep up the pose. Funnily, of course, it is serious. 
 But seriously, isn't it funny?" 
 
 "What?" asked Wayne, with the eyes of a 
 baby. 
 
 "Hang it all, don't play any more. The whole 
 business — the Charter of the Cities. Isn't it im- 
 mense?" 
 
 "Immense is no unworthy word for that glori- 
 ous design." 
 
 "Oh, hang you — but, of course, I see. You 
 want me to clear the room of these reasonable 
 sows. You want the two humourists alone 
 together. Leave us, gentlemen." 
 
 Buck threw a sour look at Barker, and at a 
 sullen signal the whole pageant of blue and green, 
 
 108 
 
Enter a Lunatic 
 
 of red, gold and purple rolled out of the 
 room, leaving only two in the great hall, the King 
 sitting in his seat on the dais, and the red-clad 
 figure still kneeling on the floor before his fallen 
 sword. 
 
 The King bounded down the steps and smacked 
 Provost Wayne on the back. 
 
 "Before the stars were made," he cried, "we 
 were made for each other. It is too beautiful. 
 Think of the valiant independence of Pump Street. 
 That is the real thing. It is the deification of the 
 ludicrous." 
 
 The kneeling figure sprang to his feet with a 
 fierce stagger. 
 
 "Ludicrous !" he cried, with a fiery face. 
 
 "Oh come, come," said the King, impatiently. 
 "You needn't keep it up with me. The augurs 
 must wink sometimes from sheer fatigue of the 
 eyelids. Let us enjoy this for half an hour, not 
 as actors, but as dramatic critics. Isn't it a joke?" 
 
 Adam Wayne looked down like a boy, and 
 answered in a constrained voice — 
 
 "I do not understand your Majesty. I cannot 
 believe that while I fight for your royal charter 
 your Majesty deserts me for these dogs of. the 
 gold hunt." 
 
 "Oh, damn your— But what's this ? What the 
 devil's this?" 
 
 109 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 The King stared into the young Provost's 
 face, and in the twilight of the room began 
 to see that his face was quite white and his lip 
 shaking. 
 
 "What in God's name is the matter?" cried 
 Auberon, holding his wrist. 
 
 Wayne flung back his face, and the tears were 
 shining on it. 
 
 "I am only a boy," he said, "but it's true. I 
 would paint the Red Lion on my shield if I had 
 only my blood." 
 
 King Auberon dropped the hand and stood 
 without stirring, thunderstruck. 
 
 "My God in Heaven!" he said; "is it 
 possible that there is within the four seas of 
 Britain a man who takes Notting Hill seri- 
 ously?—" 
 
 "And my God in Heaven!" said Wayne pas- 
 sionately; "is it possible that there is within the 
 four seas of Britain a man who does not take it 
 seriously ?" 
 
 The King said nothing, but merely went 
 back up the steps of the dais, like a man dazed. 
 He fell back in his chair again and kicked his 
 heels. 
 
 "If this sort of thing is to go on," he said 
 weakly, "I shall begin to doubt the superiority 
 of art to life. In Heaven's name, do not play 
 
Enter a Lunatic 
 
 with me. Do you really mean that you are — 
 God help me! — a Notting Hill patriot — that you 
 are—" 
 
 Wayne made a violent gesture, and the King 
 soothed him wildly. 
 
 "All right — all right — I see you are; but let 
 me take it in. You do really propose to 
 fight these modern improvers with their boards 
 and inspectors and surveyors and all the rest 
 of it—" 
 
 "Are they so terrible?" asked Wayne, scorn- 
 fully. 
 
 The King continued to stare at him as if he 
 were a human curiosity. 
 
 "And I suppose," he said, "that you think that 
 the dentists and small tradesmen and maiden 
 ladies who inhabit Notting Hill, will rally with 
 war-hymns to your standard ?" 
 
 "If they have blood they will," said the 
 Provost. 
 
 "And I suppose," said the King, with his head 
 back among the cushions, "that it never 
 crossed your mind that" — his voice seemed to 
 lose itself luxuriantly — "never crossed your mind 
 that any one ever thought that the idea of a 
 Notting Hill idealism was — er — slightly — slightly 
 ridiculous." 
 
 "Of course they think so," said Wayne, 
 in 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 "What was the meaning of mocking the 
 prophets ?" 
 
 "Where?" asked the King, leaning forward. 
 "Where in Heaven's name did you get this mirac- 
 ulously inane idea?" 
 
 "You have been my tutor, Sire," said the 
 Provost, "in all that is high and honour- 
 able." 
 
 "Eh?" said the King. 
 
 "It was your Majesty who first stirred my dim 
 patriotism into flame. Ten years ago, when I 
 was a boy (I am only nineteen), I was playing 
 on the slope of Pump Street, with a wooden 
 sword and a paper helmet, dreaming of great 
 wars. In an angry trance I struck out with 
 my sword and stood petrified, for I saw that I 
 had struck you, Sire, my King, as you wandered 
 in a noble secrecy, watching over your people's 
 welfare. But I need have had no fear. Then 
 was I taught to understand Kingliness. You 
 neither shrank nor frowned. You summoned 
 no guards. You invoked no punishments. 
 But in august and burning words, which are 
 written in my soul, never to be erased, you 
 told me ever to turn my sword against the 
 enemies of my inviolate city. Like a priest 
 pointing to the altar, you pointed to the hill of 
 Notting. 'So long/ you said, 'as you are 
 
 112 
 
Enter a Lunatic 
 
 ready to die for the sacred mountain, even if it 
 were ringed with all the armies of Bayswater.' 
 I have not forgotten the words, and I have 
 reason now to remember them, for the hour is 
 come and the crown of your prophecy. The sacred 
 hill is ringed with the armies of Bayswater, and 
 I am ready to die." 
 
 The King was lying back in his chair, a kind of 
 wreck. 
 
 "O Lord, Lord, Lord," he murmured, "what 
 a life! what a life! All my work! I 
 seem to have done it all. So you're the red- 
 haired boy that hit me in the waistcoat. What 
 have I done? God, what have I done? I 
 thought I would have a joke, and I have 
 created a passion. I tried to compose a 
 burlesque, and it seems to be turning halfway 
 through into an epic. What is to be done 
 with such a world? In the Lord's name, 
 wasn't the joke broad and bold enough? I 
 abandoned my subtle humour to amuse you, and 
 I seem to have brought tears to your eyes. What's 
 to be done with people when you write a 
 pantomime for them — call the sausages classic 
 festoons, and the policeman cut in two a tragedy 
 of public duty? But why am I talking? Why 
 am T asking questions of a nice young gentle- 
 man who is totally mad ? What is the good of it ? 
 
 113 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 What is the good of anything? O Lord, O 
 Lord!" 
 
 Suddenly he pulled himself upright. 
 
 "Don't you really think the sacred Notting Hill 
 at all absurd ?" 
 
 "Absurd?" asked Wayne, blankly. "Why 
 should I?" 
 
 The King stared back equally blankly. 
 
 "I beg your pardon ?" he said. 
 
 "Notting Hill," said the Provost, simply, "is 
 a rise or high ground of the common earth, on 
 which men have built houses to live, in which they 
 are born, fall in love, pray, marry, and die. Why 
 should I think it absurd?" 
 
 The King smiled. 
 
 "Because, my Leonidas — " he began, then 
 suddenly, he knew not how, found his mind 
 was a total blank. After all, why was it 
 absurd? Why was it absurd? He felt as 
 if the floor of his mind had given way. He felt 
 as all men feel when their first principles are 
 hit hard with a question. Barker always 
 felt so when the King said, "Why trouble about 
 politics ?" 
 
 The King's thoughts were in a kind of rout; 
 he could not collect them. 
 
 "It is generally felt to be a little funny," he 
 said, vaguely. 
 
 114 
 
Enter a Lunatic 
 
 "I suppose/' said Adam, turning on him with 
 a fierce suddenness, "I suppose you fancy cruci- 
 fixion was a serious affair?" 
 
 "Well, I— " began Auberon, "I admit I 
 have generally thought it had its graver 
 side." 
 
 "Then you are wrong," said Wayne, with 
 incredible violence. "Crucifixion is comic. It 
 is exquisitely diverting. It was an absurd and 
 obscene kind of impaling reserved for people who 
 were made to be laughed at — for slaves and pro- 
 vincials — for dentists and small tradesmen, as you 
 would say. I have seen the grotesque gallows- 
 shape, which the little Roman gutter-boys 
 scribbled on walls as a vulgar joke, blazing 
 on the pinnacles of the temples of the world. And 
 shall I turn back?" 
 
 The King made no answer. 
 
 Adam went on, his voice ringing in the 
 roof. 
 
 "This laughter with which men tyrannise is 
 not the great power you think it. Peter was 
 crucified, and crucified head downwards. 
 What could be funnier than the idea of a 
 respectable old Apostle upside down? What 
 could be more in the style of your modern 
 humour? But what was the good of it? 
 Upside down or right side up, Peter was Peter 
 
 "5 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 to mankind. Upside down he still hangs over 
 Europe, and millions move and breathe only in 
 the life of his church." 
 
 King Auberon got up absently. 
 
 "There is something in what you say," he 
 said. "You seem to have been thinking, young 
 man." 
 
 "Only feeling, sire," answered the Provost. "I 
 was born, like other men, in a spot of the 
 earth which I loved because I had played boys' 
 games there, and fallen in love, and talked with 
 my friends through nights that were nights of 
 the gods. And I feel the riddle. These 
 little gardens where we told our loves. These 
 streets where we brought out our dead. Why 
 should they be commonplace? Why should 
 they be absurd ? Why should it be grotesque 
 to say that a pillar-box is poetic when for a 
 year I could not see a red pillar-box against the 
 yellow evening in a certain street without being 
 wracked with something of which God keeps 
 the secret, but which is stronger than sorrow or 
 joy? Why should any one be able to 
 raise a laugh by saying 'the Cause of Notting 
 Hill'? — Notting Hill where thousands of 
 immortal spirits blaze with alternate hope and 
 fear." 
 
 Auberon was flicking dust off his sleeve with 
 116 
 
Enter a Lunatic 
 
 quite a new seriousness on his face, distinct from 
 the owlish solemnity which was the pose of his 
 humour. 
 
 "It is very difficult, ,, he said at last "It 
 is a damned difficult thing. I see what you 
 mean — I agree with you even up to a point 
 — or I should like to agree with you, if 
 I were young enough to be a prophet 
 and poet. I feel a truth in everything you 
 say until you come to the words 'Notting 
 Hill.' And then I regret to say that the old 
 Adam awakes roaring with laughter and makes 
 short work of the new Adam, whose name is 
 Wayne" 
 
 For the first time Provost Wayne was silent, 
 and stood gazing dreamily at the floor. Even- 
 ing was closing in, and the room had grown 
 darker. 
 
 "I know," he said, in a strange, almost 
 sleepy voice, "there is truth in what you say, 
 too. It is hard not to laugh at the common 
 names — I only say we should not. I have 
 thought of a remedy ; but such thoughts are rather 
 terrible." 
 
 "What thoughts?" asked Auberon. 
 
 The Provost of Notting Hill seemed to have 
 fallen into a kind of trance; in his eyes was an 
 elvish light. 
 
 "7 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 "1 know of a magic wand, but it is a wand 
 that only one or two may rightly use, and only 
 seldom. It is a fairy wand of great fear, stronger 
 than those who use it — often frightful, often 
 wicked to use. But whatever is touched with 
 it is never again wholly common. Whatever 
 is touched with it takes a magic from outside 
 the world. If I touch, with this fairy wand, 
 the railways and the roads of Notting Hill, 
 men will love them, and be afraid of them for 
 ever." 
 
 "What the devil are you talking about?" asked 
 the King. 
 
 "It has made mean landscapes magnificent, 
 and hovels outlast cathedrals," went on the 
 madman. "Why should it not make lamp- 
 posts fairer than Greek lamps, and an 
 omnibus ride like a painted ship? The 
 touch of it is the finger of a strange per- 
 fection." 
 
 "What is your wand?" cried the King, im- 
 patiently. 
 
 "There it is," said Wayne; and pointed 
 to the floor, where his sword lay flat and 
 shining. 
 
 "The sword!" cried the King; and sprang up 
 straight on the dai's. 
 
 "Yes, yes," cried Wayne, hoarsely. "The 
 118 
 
Enter a Lunatic 
 
 things touched by that are not vulgar. The things 
 touched by that — " 
 
 King Auberon made a gesture of horror. 
 
 "You will shed blood for that !" he cried. "For 
 a cursed point of view — n 
 
 "Oh, you kings, you kings," cried out Adam, 
 in a burst of scorn. "How humane you are, how 
 tender, how considerate. You will make war 
 for a frontier, or the imports of a foreign har- 
 bour; you will shed blood for the precise duty 
 on lace, or the salute to an admiral. But for 
 the things that make life itself worthy or 
 miserable — how humane you are. I say here, 
 and I know well what I speak of, there were 
 never any necessary wars but the religious 
 wars. There were never any just wars but 
 the religious wars. There were never any 
 humane wars but the religious wars. For 
 these men were fighting for something that 
 claimed, at least, to be the happiness of a 
 man, the virtue of a man. A Crusader 
 thought, at least, that Islam hurt the soul of every 
 man, king or tinker, that it could really cap- 
 ture. I think Buck and Barker and these 
 rich vultures hurt the soul of every man, hurt 
 every inch of the ground, hurt every brick of the 
 houses, that they can really capture. Do you 
 think I have no right to fight for Notting Hill, 
 
 119 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 you whose English Government has so often 
 fought for tomfooleries? If, as your rich 
 friends say, there are no gods, and the skies 
 are dark above us, what should a man fight for, 
 but the place where he had the Eden of 
 childhood and the short heaven of first love? If 
 no temples and no scriptures are sacred, 
 what is sacred if a man's own youth is 
 not sacred ?" 
 
 The King walked a little restlessly up and down 
 the dais. 
 
 "It is hard," he said, biting his lips, "to 
 assent to a view so desperate — so respon- 
 sible . . ." 
 
 As he spoke, the door of the audience chamber 
 fell ajar, and through the aperture came, like the 
 sudden chatter of a bird, the high, nasal, but well- 
 bred voice of Barker. 
 
 "I said to him quite plainly — the public inter- 
 ests—" 
 
 Auberon turned on Wayne with violence. 
 
 "What the devil is all this? What am I 
 saying? What are you saying? Have you 
 hypnotised me? Curse your uncanny blue 
 eyes! Let me go. Give me back my sense 
 of humour. Give it me back. Give it me back, 
 I say!" 
 
 "I solemnly assure you," said Wayne, uneasily, 
 1 20 
 
Enter a Lunatic 
 
 with a gesture, as if feeling all over himself, "that 
 I haven't got it." 
 
 The King fell back in his chair, and went into 
 a roar of Rabelaisian laughter. 
 
 "I don't think you have," he cried. 
 
 131 
 
BOOK III 
 
Chapter I — The Mental Condition of 
 Adam Wayne 
 
 A LITTLE while after the King's acces- 
 sion a small book of poems appeared, 
 called "Hymns on the Hill." They 
 were not good poems, nor was the book 
 successful, but it attracted a certain amount 
 of attention from one particular school of V 
 critics. The King himself, who was a mem- 
 ber of the school, reviewed it in his capacity 
 of literary critic to "Straight from the 
 Stables," a sporting journal. They were known 
 as the Hammock School, because it had been cal- 
 culated malignantly by an enemy that no less 
 than thirteen of their delicate criticisms had 
 begun with the words, "I read this book in a 
 hammock: half asleep in the sleepy sunlight, 
 I . . . "; after that there were important 
 differences. Under these conditions they liked 
 everything, but especially everything silly. 
 "Next to authentic goodness in a book," they 
 said — "next to authentic goodness in a book 
 (and that, alas! we never find) we desire a rich 
 badness." Thus it happened that their praise 
 (as indicating the presence of a rich badness) 
 was not universally sought after, and authors 
 
 125 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 became a little disquieted when they found the 
 eye of the Hammock School fixed upon them with 
 peculiar favour. 
 
 The peculiarity of "Hymns on the Hill" 
 was the celebration of the poetry of London as 
 distinct from the poetry of the country. This 
 sentiment or affectation, was of course, not un- 
 common in the twentieth century, nor was it, 
 although sometimes exaggerated, and sometimes 
 artificial, by any means without a great truth 
 at its root, for there is one respect in which 
 a town must be more poetical than the country, 
 since it is closer to the spirit of man; for 
 London, if it be not one of the masterpieces of 
 man, is at least one of his sins. A st reet is 
 reaj ]y more poetical than a meadow , because 
 a street has a secret . A street is going some- 
 where, an d a. me adow nowhere. ^ But, in the 
 case of the book called "Hymns on the Hill," 
 there was another peculiarity, which the King 
 pointed out with great acumen in his review. He 
 was naturally interested in the matter, for 
 he had himself published a volume of lyrics 
 about London under his pseudonym of "Daisy 
 Daydream." 
 
 This difference, as the King pointed out, con- 
 sisted in the fact that, while mere artificers like 
 "Daisy Daydream" (on whose elaborate style the 
 
 126 
 
Mental Condition of Adam Wayne 
 
 King, over his signature of "Thunderbolt," 
 was perhaps somewhat too severe) thought to 
 praise London by comparing it to the country — 
 using nature, that is, as a background from which 
 all poetical images had to be drawn — the more 
 robust author of "Hymns on the Hill" praised 
 the country, or nature, by comparing it to the 
 town, and used the town itself as a background. 
 "Take," said the critic, "the typically feminine 
 lines, To the Inventor of The Hansom Cab' — 
 
 'Poet, whose cunning carved tbis amorous shell, 
 Where twain may dwell.' 
 
 "Surely," wrote the King, "no one but a 
 woman could have written those lines. A 
 woman has always a weakness for nature; with 
 her, art is only beautiful as an echo or shadow 
 of it. She is praising the hansom cab by 
 theme and theory, but her soul is still a child by 
 the sea, picking up shells. She can never be 
 utterly of the town, as a man can; indeed, do 
 we not speak (with sacred propriety) of 'a 
 man about town'? Who ever spoke of a 
 woman about town? However much, physically, 
 'about town' a woman may be, she still 
 models herself on nature; she tries to carry 
 nature with her; she bids grasses to grow 
 on her head, and furry beasts to bite her about 
 
 127 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 the throat. In the heart of a dim city, she 
 models her hat on a flaring cottage garden of 
 flowers. We, with our nobler civic sentiment, 
 model ours on a chimney pot ; the ensign of civili- 
 sation. And rather than be without birds, she 
 will commit massacre, that she may turn 
 her head into a tree, with dead birds to sing 
 on it." 
 
 This kind of thing went on for several pages, 
 and then the critic remembered his subject, and 
 returned to it. 
 
 "Poet, whose cunning carved this amorous shell, 
 Where twain may dwell." 
 
 "The peculiarity of these fine though femi- 
 nine lines," continued "Thunderbolt," "is, as 
 we have said, that they praise the hansom cab 
 by comparing it to the shell, to a natural thing. 
 Now, hear the author of 'Hymns on the Hill,' 
 and how he deals with the same subject. In 
 his fine nocturne, entitled 'The Last Omni- 
 bus/ he relieves the rich and poignant melancholy 
 of the theme by a sudden sense of rushing at the 
 end — 
 
 'The wind round the old street corner 
 Swung sudden and quick as a cab.' 
 
 "Here the distinction is obvious. 'Daisy 
 
 128 
 
Mental Condition of Adam Wayne 
 
 Daydream' thinks it a great compliment to a 
 hansom cab to be compared to one of the spiral 
 chambers of the sea. And the author of 
 'Hymns on the Hill' thinks it a great compli- 
 ment to the immortal whirlwind to be compared 
 to a hackney coach. He surely is the real 
 admirer of London. We have no space to speak 
 of all his perfect applications of the idea; of the 
 poem in which, for instance, a lady's eyes are 
 compared, not to stars, but to two perfect street- 
 lamps guiding the wanderer. We have no 
 space to speak of the fine lyric, recalling the 
 Elizabethan spirit, in which the poet, instead of 
 saying that the rose and the lily contend in her 
 complexion, says, with a purer modernism, that 
 the red omnibus of Hammersmith and the 
 white omnibus of Fulham fight there for the 
 mastery. How perfect the image of two contend- 
 ing omnibuses !" 
 
 Here, somewhat abruptly, the review con- 
 cluded, probably because the King had to send 
 off his copy at that moment, as he was in some 
 want of money. But the King was a very good 
 critic, whatever he may have been as King, and 
 he had, to a considerable extent, hit the right 
 nail on the head. "Hymns on the Hill" was not 
 at all like the poems originally published in 
 praise of the poetry of London. And the reason 
 
 129 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 was that it was really written by a man who 
 had seen nothing else but London, and who 
 regarded it, therefore, as the universe. It was 
 written by a raw, red-headed lad of sev- 
 enteen, named Adam Wayne, who had been 
 born in Notting Hill. An accident in his 
 seventh year prevented his being taken away to 
 the seaside, and thus his whole life had been 
 passed in his own Pump Street, and in its neigh- 
 bourhood. And the consequence was, that he 
 saw the street-lamps as things quite as eternal as 
 the stars; the two fires were mingled. He saw 
 the houses as things enduring, like the moun- 
 tains, and so he wrote about them as one would 
 write about mountains. Nature puts on a dis- 
 guise when she speaks to every man; to 
 this man she put on the disguise of Notting 
 Hill. Nature would mean to a poet born 
 in the Cumberland hills, a stormy skyline 
 and sudden rocks. Nature would mean to a 
 poet born in the Essex flats, a waste of 
 splendid waters and splendid sunsets. So 
 nature meant to this man Wayne a line of 
 violet roofs and lemon lamps, the chiaroscuro of 
 the town. He did not think it clever or 
 funny to praise the shadows and colours of the 
 town ; he had seen no other shadows or colours, 
 and so he praised them — because they were 
 
 130 
 
Mental Condition of Adam yne 
 
 shadows and colours. He saw all this ix use 
 he was a poet, though in practice a bad poe L 
 It is too often forgotten that just as a bad ma.- 
 is nevertheless a man, so a bad poet is neverthe- 
 less a poet. * 
 
 Mr. Wayne's little volume of verse was a com- 
 plete failure; and he submitted to the decision 
 of fate with a quite rational humility, went back 
 to his work, which was that of a draper's* 
 assistant, and wrote no more. He still retained 
 his feeling about the town of Notting Hill, 
 because he could not possibly have any other 
 feeling, because it was the back and base of 
 his brain. But he does not seem to have made 
 any particular attempt to express it or insist 
 upon it. 
 
 He was a genuine natural mystic, one of 
 those who live on the border of fairyland. But 
 he was perhaps the first to realise how often 
 the boundary of fairyland runs through a 
 crowded city. Twenty feet from him (for he 
 was very short-sighted) the red and white and 
 yellow suns of the gas-lights thronged and 
 melted into each other like an orchard of 
 fiery trees, the beginning of the woods of 
 elf-land. 
 
 But, oddly enough, it was because he was a 
 small poet that he came to his strange and 
 
 131 
 
1 
 
 The Napoleon of Rotting Hill 
 
 isolated triumph. It was because he was a 
 failure in literature that he became a portent in 
 English history. He was one of those to whom 
 nature has given the desire without the power 
 of artistic expression. He had been a dumb 
 poet from his cradle. He might have been so 
 to his grave, and carried unuttered into the dark- 
 ness a treasure of new and sensational song. 
 But he was born under the lucky star of a 
 single coincidence. He happened to be at the 
 head of his dingy municipality at the time of 
 the King's jest, at the time when all munici- 
 palities were suddenly commanded to break out 
 into banners and flowers. Out of the long 
 procession of the silent poets who have been 
 passing since the beginning of the world, this 
 one man found himself in the midst of an 
 heraldic vision, in which he could act and speak 
 and live lyrically. While the author and the 
 victims alike treated the whole matter as a silly 
 public charade, this one man, by taking it 
 seriously, sprang suddenly into a throne of 
 artistic omnipotence. Armour, music, stand- 
 ards, watch-fires, the noise of drums, all 
 the theatrical properties were thrown before him. 
 This one poor rhymster, having burnt his own 
 rhymes, began to live that life of open air and 
 acted poetry of which all the poets of the earth 
 
 132 
 
Mental Condition of Adam Wayne 
 
 have dreamed in vain ; the life for which the Iliad 
 is only a cheap substitute. 
 
 Upwards from his abstracted childhood, Adam 
 Wayne had grown strongly and silently in a 
 certain quality or capacity which is in modern 1 
 cities almost entirely artificial, but which can be 
 natural, and was primarily almost brutally I 
 natural in him, the quality or capacity off 
 patriotism. It exists, like other virtues and* 
 vices, in a certain undiluted reality. It is not 
 confused with all kinds of other things. A 
 child speaking of his country or his village 
 may make every mistake in Mandeville or 
 tell every lie in Munchausen, but in his state- 1 
 ment there will be no psychological lies any| 
 more than there can be in a good song. Adam 
 Wayne, as a boy, had for his dull streets in 
 Notting Hill the ultimate and ancient senti- 
 ment that went out to Athens or Jerusalem. He 
 knew the secret of the passion, those secrets 
 which make real old national songs sound so 
 strange to our civilisation. He knew that real* 
 patriotism tends to sing about sorrows and J 
 forlorn hopes much more than about victory.; 
 He knew that in proper names themselves is 
 half the poetry of all national poems. Above 
 all, he knew the supreme psychological fact 
 about patriotism, as certain in connection with 
 
 133 
 
The Napoleon of Notti?ig Hill 
 
 it as that a fine shame comes to all lovers, the 
 fact that the patriot never under any circum- 
 stances boasts of the largeness of his country, 
 but always, and of necessity, boasts of the 
 smallness of it. 
 
 All this he knew, not because he was a 
 philosopher or a genius, but because he was a 
 child. Any one who cares to walk up a side 
 slum like Pump Street, can see a little Adam 
 claiming to be king of a paving-stone. And 
 he will always be proudest if the stone is 
 almost too narrow for him to keep his feet 
 inside it. 
 
 It was while he was in such a dream of 
 defensive battle, marking out some strip of 
 street or fortress of steps as the limit of his 
 haughty claim, that the King had met him, and, 
 with a few words flung in mockery, ratified 
 for ever the strange boundaries of his soul. 
 Thenceforward the fanciful idea of the defence 
 of Notting Hill in war became to him a thing as 
 solid as eating or drinking or lighting a pipe. 
 He disposed his meals for it, altered his plans 
 for it, lay awake in the night and went over it 
 again. Two or three shops were to him an 
 arsenal; an area was to him a moat; corners of 
 balconies and turns of stone steps were points 
 for the location of a culverin or an archer. It is 
 
 134 
 
Mental Condition of Adam Wayne 
 
 almost impossible to convey to any ordinary 
 imagination the degree to which he had trans- 
 VK^ajJ »M#ed the leaden London landscape to a 
 romantic gold. The process began almost in 
 babyhood, and became habitual like a literal 
 madness. It was felt most keenly at nighty 
 when London is really herself, when her lights]! 
 shine in the dark like the eyes of innumerably 
 cats, and the outline of the dark houses has thf 
 bold simplicity of blue hills. But for him the 
 night revealed instead of concealing, and he 
 read all the blank hours of morning and after- 
 noon, by a contradictory phrase, in the light 1 ^ 
 x>f that darkness/ To this man, at any rate, the 
 inconceivable had happened. The artificial city 
 had become to him nature, and he felt the curb- 
 stones and gas-lamps as things as ancient as the 
 sky. , J 
 
 One instance may suffice. Walking along 
 Pump Street with a friend, he said, as he 
 gazed dreamily at the iron fence of a little 
 front garden, "How those railings stir one's 
 blood." 
 
 His friend, who was also a great intellectual 
 admirer, looked at them painfully, but without 
 any particular emotion. He was so troubled 
 about it that he went back quite a large 
 number of times on quiet evenings and stared 
 
 135 
 
The Napoleon of JSfotting Hill 
 
 at the railings, waiting for something to happen 
 to his blood, but without success. At last he 
 took refuge in asking Wayne himself. He 
 discovered that the ecstacy lay in the one 
 point he had never noticed about the railings 
 even after his six visits, the fact that they 
 were like the great majority of others in 
 London, shaped at the top after the manner 
 of a spear. As a child, Wayne had half 
 unconsciously compared them with the spears in 
 pictures of Lancelot and St. George, and 
 had grown up under the shadow of the graphic 
 association. Now, whenever he looked at 
 them, they were simply the serried weapons 
 that made a hedge of steel round the sacred 
 homes of Notting Hill. He could not have 
 cleansed his mind of that meaning even if he 
 tried. It was not a fanciful comparison, or 
 anything like it. It would not have been true 
 to say that the familiar railings reminded him of 
 spears; it would have been far truer to say that 
 the familiar spears occasionally reminded him of 
 railings. 
 
 A couple of days after his interview with the 
 King, Adam Wayne was pacing like a caged 
 lion in front of live shops that occupied the 
 upper end of the disputed street. They were a 
 grocer's, a chemist's, a barber's, an old curiosity 
 
 136 
 
Mental Condition of Adam Wayne 
 
 shop, and a toy-shop that sold also newspapers. 
 It was these five shops which his childish 
 fastidiousness had first selected as the essentials 
 of the Notting Hill campaign, the citadel of the 
 city. If Notting Hill was the heart of thej 
 universe, and Pump Street was the heart of 
 Notting Hill, this was the heart of Pump! 
 Street. The fact that they were all small \ 
 and side by side realised that feeling for a! 
 formidable comfort and compactness which, as 
 we have said, was the heart of his patriotism 
 and of all patriotism. The grocer (who had a 
 wine and spirit license) was included because he 
 could provision the garrison; the old curiosity 
 shop because it contained enough swords, pis- 
 tols, partisans, cross-bows, and blunderbusses • 
 to arm a whole irregular regiment; the toy and 
 paper shop because Wayne thought a free press 
 an essential centre for the soul of Pump Street; 
 the chemist's to cope with outbreaks of dis- 
 ease among the besieged ; and the barber's because 
 it was in the middle of all the rest, and the 
 barber's son was an intimate friend and spiritual 
 affinity. 
 
 It was a cloudless October evening settling 
 down through purple into pure silver around the 
 roofs and chimneys of the steep little street, 
 which looked black and sharp and dramatic. In 
 
 i37 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 the deep shadows the gas-lit shop fronts 
 gleamed like five fires in a row, and before 
 them, darkly outlined like a ghost against 
 some purgatorial furnaces, passed to and fro the 
 tall bird-like figure and eagle nose of Adam 
 Wayne. 
 
 He swung his stick restlessly, and seemed fit- 
 fully talking to himself. 
 
 "There are, after all, enigmas," he said, "even 
 to the man who has faith. There are doubts 
 that remain even after the true philosophy is 
 completed in every rung and rivet. And here 
 is one of them. Is the normal human need, 
 the normal human condition, higher or lower 
 than those special states of the soul which 
 call out a doubtful and dangerous glory? 
 those special powers of knowledge or sacrifice 
 which are made possible only by the existence of 
 evil? Which should come first to our affec- 
 tions, the enduring sanities of peace or the 
 half-maniacal virtues of battle? Which should 
 come first, the man great in the daily round or 
 the man great in emergency? Which should 
 come first, to return to the enigma before me, 
 the grocer or the chemist? Which is more 
 certainly the stay of the city, the swift chival- 
 rous chemist or the benignant all-providing 
 grocer? In such ultimate spiritual doubts 
 
 138 
 
Mental Condition of Adam Wayne 
 
 it is only possible to choose a side by the 
 higher instincts and to abide the issue. In 
 any case, I have made my choice. May I be 
 pardoned if I choose wrongly, but I choose the 
 grocer." 
 
 "Good morning, sir," said the grocer, who 
 was a middle-aged man, partially bald, with harsh 
 red whiskers and beard, and forehead lined with 
 all the cares of the small tradesman. "What can 
 I do for you, sir?" 
 
 Wayne removed his hat on entering the shop, 
 with a ceremonious gesture, which, slight as 
 it was, made the tradesman eye him with the 
 beginnings of wonder. 
 
 "I come, sir," he said soberly, "to appeal to 
 your patriotism." 
 
 "Why, sir," said the grocer, "that sounds like 
 the times when I was a boy and we used to have 
 elections." 
 
 "You will have them again," said Wayne, 
 firmly, "and far greater things. Listen, Mr. 
 Mead. I know the temptations which a grocer 
 has to a too cosmopolitan philosophy. I can 
 imagine what it must be to sit all day as you do 
 surrounded with wares from all the ends of the 
 earth, from strange seas that we have never 
 sailed and strange forests that we could not « 
 even picture. No Eastern king ever had such 
 
 139 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 argosies or such cargoes coming from the sun- 
 rise and the sunset, and Solomon in all his 
 glory was not enriched like one of you. India 
 is at your elbow," he cried, lifting his voice and 
 pointing his stick at a drawer of rice, the grocer 
 making a movement of some alarm, "China is 
 before you, Demerara is behind you, America is 
 above your head, and at this very moment, like 
 some old Spanish admiral, you hold Tunis in your 
 hands." 
 
 Mr. Mead dropped the box of dates which he 
 was just lifting, and then picked it up again 
 vaguely. 
 
 Wayne went on with a heightened colour, but in 
 a lowered voice, 
 
 "I know, I say, the temptations of so inter- 
 national, so universal a vision of wealth. I 
 know that it must be your danger not to fall 
 like many tradesmen into too dusty and me- 
 chanical a narrowness, but rather to be too 
 broad, to be too general, too liberal. If a 
 narrow nationalism be the danger of the pastry- 
 cook, who makes his own wares under his own 
 heavens, no less is cosmopolitanism the danger of 
 the grocer. But I come to you in the name of 
 that patriotism which no wanderings or en- 
 lightenments should ever wholly extinguish, 
 and I ask you to remember Notting Hill. For, 
 
 140 
 
Mental Condition of Adam Wayne 
 
 after all, in this cosmopolitan magnificence, she 
 has played no small part. Your dates may 
 come from the tall palms of Barbary, your 
 sugar from the strange islands of the tropics, 
 your tea from the secret villages of the Empire 
 of the Dragon. That this room might be 
 furnished, forests may have been spoiled under 
 the Southern Cross, and leviathans speared 
 under the Polar Star. But you yourself — 
 surely no inconsiderable treasure — you yourself, 
 the brain that wields these vast interests — you 
 yourself, at least, have grown to strength and 
 wisdom between these grey houses and under 
 this rainy sky. This city which made you, and 
 thus made your fortunes, is threatened with war. 
 Come forth and tell to the ends of the earth this 
 lesson. Oil is from the North and fruits from 
 the South; rices are from India and spices from 
 Ceylon; sheep are from New Zealand and men 
 from Notting Hill" 
 
 The grocer sat for some little while, with dim 
 eyes and his mouth open, looking rather like a 
 fish. Then he scratched the back of his head, and 
 said nothing. Then he said — 
 
 "Anything out of the shop, sir ?" 
 
 Wayne looked round in a dazed way. Seeing 
 a pile of tins of pine-apple chunks, he waved his 
 stick generally towards them. 
 
 141 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 "Yes," he said, 'Til take those." 
 
 "All those, sir?" said the grocer, with greatly 
 increased interest. 
 
 "Yes, yes; all those," replied Wayne, still a 
 little bewildered, like a man splashed with cold 
 water. 
 
 "Very good, sir; thank you, sir," said the 
 grocer with animation. "You may count upon 
 my patriotism, sir." 
 
 "I count upon it already," said Wayne, and 
 passed out into the gathering night. 
 
 The grocer put the box of dates back in its 
 place. 
 
 "What a nice fellow he is," he said. "It's odd 
 how often they are nice. Much nicer than those 
 as are all right." 
 
 Meanwhile Adam Wayne stood outside the 
 glowing chemist's shop, unmistakably waver- 
 ing. 
 
 "What a weakness it is," he muttered. 
 "I have never got rid of it from childhood. 
 The fear of this magic shop. The grocer is rich, 
 he is romantic, he is poetical in the truest sense, 
 but he is not — no, he is not supernatural. 
 But the chemist! All the other shops stand in 
 Notting Hill, but this stands in Elf-land. Look 
 at those great burning bowls of colour. It 
 must be from them that God paints the sunsets. 
 
 142 
 
Mental Condition of Adam Wayne 
 
 It is superhuman, and the superhuman is all the 
 more uncanny when it is beneficent. That is the 
 root of the fear of God. I am afraid. But I must 
 be a man and enter." 
 
 He was a man, and entered. A short, dark 
 young man was behind the counter with spec- 
 tacles, and greeted him with a bright but entirely 
 business-like smile. 
 
 "A fine evening, sir," he said. 
 
 "Fine, indeed, strange Father," said Adam, 
 stretching his hands somewhat forward. "It is 
 on such clear and mellow nights that your shop 
 is most itself. Then they appear most perfect, 
 those moons of green and gold and crimson, 
 which from afar, oft guide the pilgrim of pain 
 and sickness to this house of merciful witch- 
 craft." 
 
 "Can I get you anything?" asked the 
 chemist. 
 
 "Let me see," said Wayne, in a friendly 
 but vague manner. "Let me have some Sal 
 Volatile." 
 
 "Eightpence, tenpence, or one and sixpence 
 a bottle?" said the young man genially. 
 
 "One and six — one and six," replied Wayne, 
 with a wild submissiveness. "I come to ask you, 
 Mr. Bowles, a terrible question." 
 
 He paused and collected himself. 
 143 
 
The Napoleon of Netting Hill 
 
 "It is necessary," he muttered — "it is neces- 
 sary to be tactful, and to suit the appeal to each 
 profession in turn. 
 
 "I come," he resumed aloud, "to ask you a 
 question which goes to the roots of your miracu- 
 lous toils. Mr. Bowles, shall all this witchery 
 cease?" And he waved his stick around the 
 shop. 
 
 Meeting with no answer, he continued with 
 animation — 
 
 "In Notting Hill we have felt to its core the 
 elfish mystery of your profession. And now Not- 
 ting Hill itself is threatened." 
 
 "Anything more, sir?" asked the chemist. 
 
 "Oh," said Wayne, somewhat disturbed — 
 "oh, what is it chemists sell? Quinine, I 
 think. Thank you. Shall it be destroyed? I 
 have met these men of Bayswater and North 
 Kensington — Mr. Bowles, they are materialists. 
 They see no witchery in your work, even 
 when it is brought within their own borders. They 
 think the chemist is commonplace. They think 
 him human." 
 
 The chemist appeared to pause, only a mo- 
 ment, to take in the insult, and immediately 
 said — 
 
 "And the next article, please?" 
 
 "Alum," said the Provost, wildly. "I 
 144 
 
Mental Condition of Adam Wayne 
 
 resume. It is in this sacred town alone that 
 your priesthood is reverenced. Therefore, when 
 you fight for us you fight not only for yourself, 
 but for everything you typify. You fight not 
 only for Notting Hill, but for Fairyland, for as 
 surely as Buck and Barker and such men hold 
 sway, the sense of Fairyland in some strange man- 
 ner diminishes.' , 
 
 "Anything more, sir ?" asked Mr. Bowles, with 
 unbroken cheerfulness. * v 
 
 "Oh yes, jujubes — Gregory powder — mag- 
 nesia. The danger is imminent. In all this 
 matter I have felt that I fought not merely 
 for my own city (though to that I owe all 
 my blood), but for all places in which these 
 great ideas could prevail. I am fighting not 
 merely for Notting Hill, but for Bayswater 
 itself; for North Kensington itself. For if 
 the gold-hunters prevail, these also will lose 
 all their ancient sentiments and all the mystery 
 of their national soul. I know I can count upon 
 you." 
 
 "Oh, yes, sir," said the chemist, with great 
 animation, "we are always glad to oblige a good 
 customer." 
 
 Adam Wayne went out of the shop with a deep 
 sense of fulfilment of soul. 
 
 "It is so fortunate," he said, "to have 
 145 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 tact, to be able to play upon the peculiar 
 talents and specialities, the cosmopolitanism of 
 the grocer and the world-old necromancy 
 of the chemist. Where should I be without 
 tact?" 
 
 jfjiet^*^ 
 
 146 
 
Chapter II — The Remarkable Mr. Turn- 
 bull 
 
 AFTER two more interviews with shop- 
 men, however, the patriot's confi- 
 dence in his own psychological 
 diplomacy began vaguely to wane. Despite 
 the care with which he considered the peculiar 
 rationale and the peculiar glory of each sepa- 
 rate shop, there seemed to be something unre- 
 sponsive about the shopmen. Whether it was 
 a dark resentment against the uninitiate for 
 peeping into their masonic magnificence, he could 
 not quite conjecture. 
 
 His conversation with the man who kept 
 the shop of curiosities had begun encourag- 
 ingly. The man who kept the shop of curiosi- 
 ties had indeed enchanted him with a phrase. 
 He was standing drearily at the door of his 
 shop, a wrinkled man with a grey pointed 
 beard, evidently a gentleman who had come down 
 in the world. 
 
 "And how does your commerce go, you 
 strange guardian of the past?" said Wayne, 
 affably. 
 
 "Well, sir, not very well," replied the man, 
 with that patient voice of his class which is one 
 
 i47 
 
The Napoleon of Hotting Hill 
 
 I of the most heart-breaking things in the world. 
 "Things are terribly quiet." 
 
 Wayne's eyes shone suddenly. 
 
 "A great saying," he said, "worthy of a man 
 whose merchandise is human history. Terribly 
 quiet; that is in two words the spirit of this 
 age, as I have felt it from my cradle. I some- 
 times wondered how many other people felt the 
 oppression of this union between quietude and 
 terror. I see blank well-ordered streets and 
 men in black moving about inoffensively, 
 sullenly. It goes on day after day, day after 
 day, and nothing happens; but to me it is like 
 a dream from which I might wake screaming. 
 To me the straightness of our life is the 
 straightness of a thin cord stretched tight. Its 
 stillness is terrible. It might snap with a noise 
 like thunder. And you who sit, amid the debris 
 of the great wars, you who sit, as it were, 
 upon a battlefield, you know that war was less 
 terrible than this evil peace; you know that 
 the idle lads who carried those swords under 
 Francis or Elizabeth, the rude Squire or 
 Baron who swung that mace about in Picardy 
 or Northumberland battles, may have been 
 terribly noisy, but were not like us, terribly 
 quiet." 
 
 Whether it was a faint embarrassment of con- 
 
The Remarkable Mr. Turnbull 
 
 science as to the original source and date of the 
 weapons referred to, or merely an engrained 
 depression, the guardian of the past looked, if 
 anything, a little more worried. 
 
 "But I do not think," continued Wayne, 
 "that this horrible siknce of modernity will y 
 last, though I think for the present it will 
 increase. What a farce is this modern liberality. | 
 Freedom of speech means practically in our 
 modern civilisation that we must only talk 
 about unimportant things. We must not talk 
 about religion, for that is illiberal; we must not 
 talk about bread and cheese, for that is talking 
 shop; we must not talk about death, for that is 
 depressing; we must not talk about birth, for 
 that is indelicate. It cannot last. Something 
 must break this strange indifference, this 
 strange dreamy egoism, this strange loneli- 
 ness of millions in a crowd. Something 
 must break it. Why should it not be you and 
 I? Can you do nothing else but guard 
 relics ?" 
 
 The shopman wore a gradually clearing expres- 
 sion, which would have led those unsympathetic 
 with the cause of the Red Lion to think that the 
 last sentence was the only one to which he had 
 attached any meaning. 
 
 "I am rather old to go into a new business," 
 149 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 he said, "and I don't quite know what to be 
 either." 
 
 "Why not," said Wayne, gently having reached 
 the crisis of his delicate persuasion — "why not be 
 a Colonel ?" 
 
 It was at this point, in all probability, that the 
 interview began to yield more disappointing 
 results. The man appeared inclined at first to 
 regard the suggestion of becoming a Colonel 
 as outside the sphere of immediate and relevant 
 discussion. A long exposition of the inevit- 
 able war of independence, coupled with the 
 purchase of a doubtful sixteenth-century sword 
 for an exaggerated price, seemed to resettle 
 matters. Wayne left the shop, however, some- 
 what infected with the melancholy of its 
 owner. 
 
 That melancholy was completed at the 
 barber's. 
 
 "Shaving, sir ?" inquired that artist from inside 
 his shop. 
 
 "War!" replied Wayne, standing on the 
 threshold. 
 
 "I beg your pardon," said the other, sharply. 
 
 "War!" said Wayne, warmly. "But not for 
 anything inconsistent with the beautiful and 
 the civilised arts. War for beauty. War for 
 society. War for peace. A great chance is 
 
 iSo 
 
The Remarkable Mr. Turribull 
 
 offered you of repelling that slander which, 
 in defiance of the lives of so many artists, 
 attributes poltroonery to those who beautify 
 and polish the surface of our lives. Why should 
 not hairdressers be heroes? Why should 
 not— " 
 
 "Now, you get out," said the barber, irascibly. 
 "We don't want any of your sort here. You get 
 out." 
 
 And he came forward with the desperate 
 annoyance of a mild person when enraged. 
 
 Adam Wayne laid his hand for a moment on 
 the sword, then dropped it. 
 
 "Notting Hill," he said, "will need her 
 bolder sons ;" and he turned gloomily to the 
 toy-shop. 
 
 It was one of those queer little shops so 
 constantly seen in the side streets of London, 
 which must be called toy-shops only because toys 
 upon the whole predominate; for the re- 
 mainder of goods seem to consist of almost 
 everything else in the world — tobacco, exercise- 
 books, sweet-stuff, novelettes, halfpenny paper 
 clips, halfpenny pencil sharpeners, bootlaces, and 
 cheap fireworks. It also sold newspapers, and 
 a row of dirty-looking posters hung along the 
 front of it. 
 
 "I am afraid," said Wayne, as he entered, 
 151 
 
The 'Napoleon of Rotting Hill 
 
 "that I am not getting on with these tradesmen 
 as I should. Is it that I have neglected to rise 
 to the full meaning of their work ? Is there some 
 secret buried in each of these shops which no mere 
 poet can discover ?" 
 
 He stepped to the counter with a depression 
 which he rapidly conquered as he addressed the 
 man on the other side of it, — a man of short 
 stature, and hair prematurely white, and the look 
 of a large baby. 
 
 "Sir," said Wayne, "I am going from house 
 to house in this street of ours, seeking to stir 
 up some sense of the danger which now threatens 
 our city. Nowhere have I felt my duty so diffi- 
 cult as here. For the toy-shop keeper has 
 to do with all that remains to us of Eden before 
 the first wars began. You sit here meditating 
 continually upon the wants of that wonderful 
 time when every staircase leads to the stars, and 
 every garden-path to the other end of nowhere. 
 Is it thoughtlessly, do you think, that I strike 
 the dark old drum of periU in the paradise of 
 children? But consider a moment; do not 
 condemn me hastily. Even that paradise itself 
 contains the rumour or beginning of that danger, 
 just as the Eden that was made for perfection 
 contained the terrible tree. For judge childhood, 
 even by your own arsenal of its pleasures. You 
 
 152 
 
The Remarkable Mr, Turnbull 
 
 keep bricks; you make yourself thus, doubt- 
 less, the witness of the constructive instinct 
 older than the destructive. You keep dolls; 
 you make yourself the priest of that divine 
 id oja trv. You keep Noah's Arks; you per- 
 petuate the memory of the salvation of all life as 
 a precious, an irreplaceable thing. But do you 
 keep only, sir, the symbols of this prehistoric 
 sanity, this childish rationality of the earth ? Do 
 you not keep more terrible things? What are 
 those boxes, seemingly of lead soldiers, that 
 I see in that glass case? Are they not wit- 
 nesses to that terror .and beauty, that 
 desire for a lovely death, which could not 
 be excluded-, even from the immortality of 
 Eden? Do not despise the lead soldiers, Mr. 
 Turnbull." 
 
 "I don't," said Mr. Turnbull, of the toy-shop, 
 shortly, but with great emphasis. 
 
 "I am glad to hear it," replied Wayne. "I 
 confess that I feared for my military schemes 
 the awful innocence of your profession. How 
 I thought to myself, will this man, used only to 
 the wooden swords that give pleasure, think 
 of the steel swords that give pain? But I am 
 at least partly reassured. Your tone suggests 
 to me that I have at least the entry of a gate of 
 your fairyland — the gate through which the 
 
 i53 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 soldiers enter, for it cannot be denied — I ought, 
 sir, no longer to deny, that it is of soldiers that 
 I come to speak. Let your gentle employment 
 make you merciful towards the troubles of the 
 world. Let your own silvery experience tone 
 down our sanguine sorrows. For there is war in 
 Notting HM." 
 
 The little toy-shop keeper sprang up suddenly, 
 slapping his fat hands like two fans on the 
 counter. 
 
 "War?" he cried. "Not really, sir? Is 
 it true? Oh, what a joke! Oh, what a sight for 
 sore eyes !" , 
 
 Wayne was almost taken aback by this out- 
 burst. 
 
 "I am delighted," he stammered. "I had no 
 notion — " 
 
 He sprang out of the way just in time to avoid 
 Mr. Turnbull, who took a flying leap over 
 the counter and dashed to the front of the 
 shop. 
 
 "You look here, sir," he said; "you just look 
 here. ,, 
 
 He came back with two of the torn posters 
 in his hand which were flapping outside his 
 shop. 
 
 "Look at those, sir," he said, and flung them 
 down on the counter. 
 
 154 
 
The Remarkable Mr. Turribull 
 
 Wayne bent over them, and read on one 
 
 REDUCTION OF THE CENTRAL DERVISH CITY. 
 REMARKABLE, ETC." 
 
 On the other he read — 
 
 NICARAGUAN CAPITAL SURRENDERS AFTER A 
 
 Wayne bent over them again, evidently 
 puzzled; then he looked at the dates. They 
 were both dated in August fifteen years before. 
 
 "Why do you keep these old things?" he said, 
 startled entirely out of his absurd tact of mysti- 
 cism. "Why do you hang them outside your 
 shop?" 
 
 "Because," said the other, simply, "they are 
 the records of the last war. You men- 
 tioned war just now. It happens to be my 
 hobby." 
 
 Wayne lifted his large blue eyes with an infan- 
 tile wonder. 
 
 "Come with me," said Turnbull, shortly, 
 and led him into a parlour at the back of the 
 shop. 
 
 iS5 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 In the centre of the parlour stood a large 
 deal table. On it were set rows and rows of 
 the tin and lead soldiers which were part of the 
 shopkeeper's stock. The visitor would have 
 thought nothing of it if it had not been for 
 a certain odd grouping of them, which did not 
 seem either entirely commercial or entirely 
 haphazard. 
 
 "You are acquainted, no doubt," said Turn- 
 bull, turning his big eyes upon Wayne — "you 
 are acquainted, no doubt, with the arrangement 
 / of the American and Nicaraguan troops in the 
 last battle." And he waved his hand towards 
 the table. 
 
 "I am afraid not," said Wayne. "I—" 
 
 "Ah, you were at that time occupied too much, 
 perhaps, with the Dervish affair. You will 
 find it in this corner." And he pointed to 
 a part of the floor where there was another 
 ^arrangement of children's soldiers grouped here 
 and there. 
 
 "You seem," said Wayne, "to be interested in 
 military matters." 
 
 "I am interested in nothing else," answered the 
 toy-shop keeper, simply. 
 
 Wayne appeared convulsed with a singular, 
 suppressed excitement. 
 
 "In that case," he said, "I may approach you 
 156 
 
The Remarkable Mr. Turribull 
 
 with an unusual degree of confidence. Touch- 
 ing the matter of the defence of Notting Hill, 
 I— " 
 
 "Defence of Notting Hill? Yes, sir. This 
 way, sir/' said Turnbull, with great perturba- 
 tion. "Just step into this side room;" and he 
 led Wayne into another apartment, in which the 
 table was entirely covered with an arrange- 
 ment of children's bricks. A second glance at 
 it told Wayne that the bricks were arranged in 
 the form of a precise and perfect plan of Notting 
 Hill. "Sir," said Turnbull, impressively, "you 
 have, by a kind of accident, hit upon the whole 
 secret of my life. As a boy, I grew up among 
 the last wars of the world, when Nicaragua was 
 taken and the dervishes wiped out. And I 
 adopted it as a hobby, sir, as you might adopt 
 astronomy or bird-stuffing. I had no ill-will 
 to any one, but I was interested in war as a 
 science, as a game. And suddenly I was bowled 
 out. The big Powers of the world, having 
 swallowed up all the small ones, came to that 
 confounded agreement, and there was no more 
 war. There was nothing more for me to do but 
 to do what I do now — to read the old cam- 
 paigns in dirty old newspapers, and to work them 
 out with tin soldiers. One other thing had 
 occurred to me. I thought it an amusing fancy 
 
 i57 
 
The Napoleon of Hotting Hill 
 
 to make a plan of how this district of ours ought 
 to be defended if it were ever attacked. It seems 
 to interest you too." 
 
 "If it were ever attacked," repeated Wayne, 
 awed into an almost mechanical enunciation. 
 "Mr. Turnbull, it is attacked. Thank Heaven, 
 I am bringing to at least one human being the 
 news that is at bottom the only good news to 
 any son of Adam. Your life has not been 
 useless. Your work has not been play. Now, 
 when the hair is already grey on your head, 
 Turnbull, you shall have your youth. God 
 has not destroyed it, He has only deferred it. 
 Let us sit down here, and you shall explain to me 
 this military map of Notting Hill. For you and 
 I have to defend Notting Hill together." 
 
 Mr. Turnbull looked at the other for a mo- 
 ment, then hesitated, and then sat down 
 beside the bricks and the stranger. He did 
 not rise again for seven hours, when the dawn 
 broke. 
 
 • • • • • • 
 
 The headquarters of Provost Adam Wayne 
 and his Commander-in-Chief consisted of a small 
 and somewhat unsuccessful milk-shop at the 
 corner of Pump Street. The blank white 
 morning had only just begun to break over the 
 blank London buildings when Wayne and 
 
 158 
 
The Remarkable Mr. Tumbull 
 
 Turnbull were to be found seated in the cheer- 
 less and unswept shop. Wayne had something > 
 feminine in his character; he belonged to that j 
 class of persons who forget their meals when A 
 anything interesting is in hand. He had had 
 nothing for sixteen hours but hurried glasses of 
 milk, and, with a glass standing empty beside 
 him, he was writing and sketching and dotting 
 and crossing out with inconceivable rapidity 
 with a pencil and a piece of paper. Turnbull 
 was of that more masculine type in which a 
 sense of responsibility increases the appetite, 
 and with his sketch-map beside him he was 
 dealing strenuously with a pile of sandwiches in 
 a paper packet, and a tankard of ale from th^ 
 tavern opposite, whose shutters had just been 
 taken down. Neither of them spoke, and there 
 was no sound in the living stillness except 
 the scratching of Wayne's pencil and the squeal-^ 
 ing of an aimless-looking cat. At length Wayne 
 broke the silence by saying — 
 
 "Seventeen pounds, eight shillings and nine- 
 pence." 
 
 Turnbull nodded and put his head in the tank- 
 ard. 
 
 "That," said Wayne, "is not counting the five 
 pounds you took yesterday. What did you do 
 with it?" 
 
 159 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 "Ah, that is rather interesting !" replied Turn- 
 bull, with his mouth full. "I used that five pounds 
 in a kindly and philanthropic act." 
 
 Wayne was gazing with mystification in his 
 queer and innocent eyes. 
 
 "I used that five pounds," continued the other, 
 "in giving no less than forty little London boys 
 rides in hansom cabs." 
 
 "Are you insane ?" asked the Provost. 
 
 "It is only my light touch," returned Turn- 
 bull. "These hansom-cab rides will raise the 
 tone — raise the tone, my dear fellow — of our 
 London youths, widen their horizon, brace 
 their nervous system, make them acquainted 
 with the various public monuments of our great 
 city. Education, Wayne, education. How many 
 excellent thinkers have pointed out that political 
 reform is useless until we produce a cultured pop- 
 ulace. So that twenty years hence, when these 
 boys are grown up — " 
 
 "Mad!" said Wayne, laying down his pencil; 
 "and five pounds gone!" 
 
 f "You are in error," explained Turnbull. "You 
 
 /grave creatures can never be brought to under- 
 
 / stand how much quicker work really goes 
 
 with the assistance of nonsense and good meals. 
 
 Stripped of its decorative beauties, my statement 
 
 I was strictly .accurate. Last night I 'gave forty 
 
 1 ' % * 160 
 
The Remarkable Mr. Turribull 
 
 half-crowns to forty little boys, and sent them 
 all over London to take hansom cabs. I told 
 them in every case to tell the cabman to 
 bring them to this spot. In half an hour from 
 now the declaration of war will be posted up. At 
 the same time the cabs will have begun to 
 come in, you will have ordered out the guard, 
 the little boys will drive up in state, we shall 
 commandeer the horses for cavalry, use the 
 cabs for barricade, and give the men the choice 
 between serving in our ranks and detention in 
 our basements and cellars. The little boys we 
 can use as scouts. The main thing is that we 
 start the war with an advantage unknown in all 
 the other armies — horses. And now," he said, 
 finishing his beer, "I will go and drill the 
 troops." 
 
 And he walked out of the milk-shop, leaving 
 the Provost staring. 
 
 A minute or two afterwards, the Provost 
 laughed. He only laughed once or twice in 
 his life, and then he did it in a queer way as if 
 it were an art he had not mastered. Even he 
 saw something funny in the preposterous coup of 
 the half-crowns and the little boys. He did not 
 see the monstrous absurdity of the whole 
 policy and the whole war. He enjoyed it 
 seriously as a crusade, that is, he enjoyed it 
 
 161 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 far more than any joke can be enjoyed. Turn- 
 bull enjoyed it partly as a joke, even more 
 perhaps as a reversion from the things he hated 
 — modernity and monotony and civilisation. To 
 break up the vast machinery of modern life and 
 use the fragments as engines of war, to make the 
 barricade of omnibuses and points of vantage of 
 chimney-pots, was to him a game worth infinite 
 risk and trouble. He had that rational and delib- 
 erate preference which will always to the end 
 trouble the peace of the world, the rational and 
 deliberate preference for a short life and a merry 
 one. 
 
 
 M 
 
 
 162 
 
Chapter III — The Experiment of Mr. 
 Buck 
 
 AN earnest and eloquent petition was 
 sent up to the King signed with 
 the names of Wilson, Barker, Buck, 
 Swindon and others. It urged that at the 
 forthcoming conference to be held in his 
 Majesty's presence touching the final disposi- 
 tion of the property in Pump Street, it 
 might be held not inconsistent with political 
 decorum and with the unutterable respect they 
 entertained for his Majesty if they appeared in 
 ordinary morning dress, without the costume 
 decreed for them as Provosts. So it happened 
 that the company appeared at that council in 
 frock coats and that the King himself limited his 
 love of ceremony to appearing (after his not 
 unusual manner), in evening dress with one 
 order — in this case not the Garter, but the button 
 of the Club of Old Clipper's Best Pals, a 
 decoration obtained (with difficulty) from a 
 half-penny boy's paper. Thus also it happened 
 that the only spot of colour in the room 
 was Adam Wayne, who entered in great 
 dignity with the great red robes and the great 
 sword. 
 
 163 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 "We have met," said Auberon, "to decide the 
 most arduous of modern problems. May we be 
 successful." And he sat down gravely. 
 
 Buck turned his chair a little and flung one 
 leg over the other. 
 
 "Your Majesty," he said, quite good-humour- 
 edly, "there is only one thing I can't 
 understand, and that is why this affair is not 
 settled in five minutes. Here's a small prop- 
 erty which is worth a thousand to us and is not 
 worth a hundred to any one else. We offer 
 the thousand. It's not business-like, I know, 
 for we ought to get it for less, and it's not reason- 
 able and it's not fair on us, but I'm damned if I 
 can see why it's difficult." 
 
 "The difficulty may be very simply stated," 
 said Wayne. "You may offer a million and it 
 will be very difficult for you to get Pump 
 Street." 
 
 "But, look here, Mr. Wayne," cried Barker, 
 striking in with a kind of cold excitement. 
 "Just look here. You've no right to take up a 
 position like that. You've a right to stand 
 out for a bigger price, but you aren't doing 
 that. You're refusing what you and every sane 
 man knows to be a splendid offer simply from 
 malice or spite — it must be malice or spite. 
 And that kind of thing is really criminal; it's 
 
 164 
 
The Experiment of Mr. Buck 
 
 against the public good. The King's Government 
 would be justified in forcing you." 
 
 With his lean fingers spread on the table he 
 stared anxiously at Wayne's face, which did not 
 move. 
 
 "In forcing you ... it would," he repeated. 
 
 "It shall," said Buck, shortly, turning to the 
 table with a jerk. "We have done our best to 
 be decent." 
 
 Wayne lifted his large eyes slowly. 
 
 "Was it my Lord Buck," he enquired, "who 
 said that the King of England 'shall' do some- 
 thing?" 
 
 Buck flushed and said testily — 
 
 "I mean it must — it ought to, as I say we've 
 done our best to be generous. I defy any one 
 to deny it. As it is Mr. Wayne, I don't want 
 to say a word that's uncivil. I hope it's not 
 uncivil to say that you can be, and ought to be, 
 in gaol. It is criminal to stop public works for 
 a whim. A man might as well burn ten 
 thousand onions in his front garden or bring 
 up his children to run naked in the street, 
 as do what you say you have a right to do. 
 People have been compelled to sell before 
 now. The King could compel you, and I hope 
 he will." 
 
 "Until he does," said Wayne, calmly, "the 
 165 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 power and government of this great nation is 
 on my side and not yours, and I defy you to 
 defy it." 
 
 "In what sense," cried Barker, with his 
 feverish eyes and hands, "is the Government on 
 your side?" 
 
 With one ringing movement Wayne unrolled a 
 great parchment on the table. It was decorated 
 down the sides with wild water-colour sketches of 
 vestrymen in crowns and wreaths. 
 
 "The Charter of the Cities," he began. 
 
 Buck exploded in a brutal oath and laughed. 
 
 "That tomfool's joke. Haven't we had 
 enough — " 
 
 "And there you sit," cried Wayne, springing 
 erect and with a voice like a trumpet, "with no 
 argument but to insult the King before his 
 face." 
 
 Buck rose also with blazing eyes. 
 
 "I am hard to bully," he began — and the slow 
 tones of the King struck in with incomparable 
 gravity — 
 
 "My Lord Buck, I must ask you to remem- 
 ber that your King is present. It is not often 
 that he needs to protect himself among his sub- 
 jects." 
 
 Barker turned to him with frantic gestures. 
 
 "For God's sake don't back up the madman 
 166 
 
The Experiment of Mr. Buck 
 
 now," he implored. "Have your joke another 
 time. Oh, for Heaven's sake — " 
 
 "My Lord Provost of South Kensington," said 
 King Auberon, steadily. "I do not follow your 
 remarks which are uttered with a rapidity 
 unusual at Court. Nor do your well-meant 
 efforts to convey the rest with your fingers 
 materially assist me. I say that my Lord 
 Provost of North Kensington, to whom I spoke, 
 ought not in the presence of his Sovereign to 
 speak disrespectfully of his Sovereign's ordi- 
 nances. Do you disagree?" 
 
 Barker turned restlessly in his chair, and Buck 
 cursed without speaking. The King went on in 
 a comfortable voice — 
 
 "My Lord Provost of Notting Hill, proceed." 
 
 Wayne turned his blue eyes on the King, and 
 to every one's surprise there was a look in them 
 not of triumph, but of a certain childish distress. 
 
 "I am sorry, your Majesty," he said; "I fear 
 I was more than equally to blame with the 
 Lord Provost of North Kensington. We were 
 debating somewhat eagerly, and we both rose 
 to our feet. I did so first, I am ashamed to say. 
 The Provost of North Kensington is, there- 
 fore, comparatively innocent. I beseech your 
 Majesty to address your rebuke chiefly, at 
 least, to me. Mr. Buck is not innocent, for 
 
 167 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 he did no doubt, in the heat of the moment, 
 speak disrespectfully. But the rest of the dis- 
 cussion he seems to me to have conducted with 
 great good temper." 
 
 Buck looked genuinely pleased, for business 
 men are all simple-minded, and have therefore 
 that degree of communion with fanatics. The 
 King, for some reason, looked, for the first time 
 in his life, ashamed. 
 
 "This very kind speech of the Provost of Not- 
 ting Hill," began Buck, pleasantly, "seems to 
 me to show that we have at last got on to a 
 friendly footing. Now come, Mr. Wayne. 
 Five hundred pounds have been offered to you 
 for a property you admit not to be worth a 
 hundred. Well, I am a rich man and I won't 
 be outdone in generosity. Let us say fifteen 
 hundred pounds, and have done with it. And 
 let us shake hands." And he rose, glowing and 
 laughing. 
 
 "Fifteen hundred pounds," whispered Mr. 
 Wilson of Bayswater ; "can we do fifteen hundred 
 pounds?" 
 
 "I'll stand the racket," said Buck heartily. 
 "Mr. Wayne is a gentleman and has spoken up 
 for me. So I suppose the negotiations are at an 
 end." 
 
 Wayne bowed. 
 
 168 
 
The Experiment of Mr. Buck 
 
 "They are indeed at an end. I am sorry I can- 
 not sell you the property." 
 
 "What?" cried Mr. Barker, starting to his 
 feet. 
 
 "Mr. Buck has spoken correctly," said the 
 King. 
 
 "I have, I have," cried Buck, springing up also; 
 "I said—" 
 
 "Mr. Buck has spoken correctly," said the 
 King; "the negotiations are at an end." 
 
 All the men at the table rose to their feet; 
 Wayne alone rose without excitement. 
 
 "Have I, then," he said, "your Majesty's per- 
 mission to depart? I have given my last 
 answer." 
 
 "You have it," said Auberon, smiling, but not 
 lifting his eyes from the table. And amid a dead 
 silence the Provost of Notting Hill passed out of 
 the room. 
 
 "Well ?" said Wilson, turning round to Barker, 
 "Well?" 
 
 Barker shook his head desperately. 
 
 "The man ought to be in an asylum," he 
 said. "But one thing is clear, we need not 
 bother further about him. The man can be 
 treated as mad." 
 
 "Of course," said Buck, turning to him with 
 sombre decisiveness. "You're perfectly right, 
 
 169 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 Barker. He is a good enough fellow, but he 
 can be treated as mad. Let's put it in simple 
 form. Go and tell any twelve men in any 
 town, go and tell any doctor in any town, 
 that there is a man offered fifteen hundred 
 pounds for a thing he could sell commonly 
 for four hundred, and that when asked for a 
 reason for not accepting it he pleads the inviolate 
 sanctity of Notting Hill and calls it the Holy 
 Mountain. What would they say? What more 
 can we have on our side than the common- 
 sense of everybody? On what else do all laws 
 rest? I'll tell you, Barker, what's better than 
 any further discussion. Let's send in workmen 
 on the spot to pull down Pump Street. And if 
 old Wayne says a word, arrest him as a lunatic. 
 That's all." 
 
 Barker's eyes kindled. 
 
 "I always regarded you, Buck, if you don't 
 mind my saying so, as a very strong man. I'll 
 follow you." 
 
 "So, of course, will I," said Wilson. 
 
 Buck rose again impulsively. 
 
 "Your Majesty," he said, glowing with popu- 
 larity, "I beseech your Majesty to consider 
 favourably the proposal to which we have com- 
 mitted ourselves. Your Majesty's leniency, 
 our own offers, have fallen in vain on that 
 
 170 
 
The Experiment of Mr. Buck 
 
 extraordinary man. He may be right. He 
 may be God. He may be the devil. But we 
 think it, for practical purposes, more prob- 
 able that he is off his head. Unless that 
 assumption were acted on, all human affairs 
 would go to pieces. We act on it, and we 
 propose to start operations in Notting Hill at 
 once." 
 
 The King leaned back in his chair. 
 
 "The Charter of the Cities ..." he said with 
 a rich intonation. 
 
 But Buck, being finally serious, was also 
 cautious, and did not again make the mistake of 
 disrespect. 
 
 "Your Majesty," he said, bowing, "I am 
 not here to say a word against anything your 
 Majesty has said or done. You are a far better 
 educated man than I, and no doubt there were 
 reasons, upon intellectual grounds, for those 
 proceedings. But may I ask you and appeal to 
 your common good-nature for a sincere answer? 
 When you drew up the Charter of the Cities 
 did you contemplate the rise of a man like 
 Adam Wayne? Did you expect that the 
 Charter — whether it was an experiment, or a 
 scheme of decoration, or a joke — could ever 
 really come to this — to stopping a vast scheme 
 of ordinary business, to shutting up a road, to 
 
 171 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 spoiling the chances of cabs, omnibuses, railway 
 stations, to disorganising half a city, to risking a 
 kind of civil war? Whatever were your objects, 
 were they that ?" 
 
 Barker and Wilson looked at him admiringly; 
 the King more admiringly still. 
 
 "Provost Buck," said Auberon, "you speak in 
 public uncommonly well. I give you your point 
 with the magnanimity of an artist. My scheme 
 did not include the appearance of Mr. Wayne. 
 Alas ! would that my poetic power had been great 
 enough." 
 
 "I thank your Majesty," said Buck, courte- 
 ously but quickly. "Your Majesty's statements 
 are always clear and studied: therefore I may 
 draw a deduction. As the scheme, whatever it 
 was, on which you set your heart did not 
 include the appearance of Mr. Wayne, it will 
 survive his removal. Why not let us clear 
 away this particular Pump Street, which does 
 interfere with our plans, and which does not, by 
 your Majesty's own statement, interfere with 
 yours." 
 
 "Caught out!" said the King, enthusiastically 
 and quite impersonally, as if he were watching a 
 cricket match. 
 
 "This man Wayne," continued Buck, "would 
 be shut up by any doctors in England. But we 
 
 172 
 
The Experiment of Mr. Buck 
 
 only ask to have it put before them. Mean- 
 while no one's interests, not even in all proba- 
 bility his own, can be really damaged by going 
 on with the improvements in Notting Hill. Not 
 our interests, of course, for it has been the 
 hard and quiet work of ten years. Not the 
 interests of Notting Hill, for nearly all its 
 educated inhabitants desire the change. Not 
 the interests of your Majesty, for you say, with 
 characteristic sense, that you never contemplated 
 the rise of the lunatic at all. Not, as I say, his 
 own interests, for the man has a kind heart and 
 many talents, and a couple of good doctors would 
 probably put him righter than all the free cities 
 and sacred mountains in creation. I therefore 
 assume, if I may use so bold a word, that your 
 Majesty will not offer any obstacle to our pro- 
 ceeding with the improvements." 
 
 And Mr. Buck sat down amid subdued but 
 excited applause among the allien 
 
 "Mr. Buck," said the King, "I beg your pardon, 
 for a number of beautiful and sacred thoughts,/ 
 in which you were generally classified as 2^ 
 fool. But there is another thing to be consid- 
 ered. Suppose you send in your workmen, 
 and Mr. Wayne does a thing regrettable indeed, 
 but of which I am sorry to say, I think him quite 
 capable — knocks their teeth out." 
 
 m 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 "I have thought of that, your Majesty," said 
 Mr. Buck, easily, "and I think it can simply 
 be guarded against. Let us send in a strong 
 guard of say a hundred men — a hundred of 
 the North Kensington Halberdiers" (he smiled 
 grimly), "of whom your Majesty is so fond. 
 Or say — a hundred and fifty. The whole 
 population of Pump Street, I fancy, is only about 
 a hundred." 
 
 "Still they might stand together and lick you," 
 said the King, dubiously. 
 
 "Then say two hundred," said Buck, gaily. 
 
 "It might happen," said the King, restlessly, 
 "that one Notting Hiller fought better than two 
 North Kensingtons." 
 
 "It might," said Buck, coolly; "then say two 
 hundred and fifty." 
 
 The King bit his lip. 
 
 "And if they are beaten, too," he said 
 viciously. 
 
 "Your Majesty," said Buck, and leaned back 
 easily in his chair. "Suppose they are. If any- 
 thing be clear, it is clear that all fighting 
 matters are mere matters of arithmetic. Here 
 we have a hundred and fifty say of Notting Hill 
 soldiers. Or say two hundred. If one of 
 them can fight two of us — we can send in, not 
 four hundred, but six hundred, and smash 
 
 m 
 
The Experiment of Mr. Buck 
 
 him. That is all. It is out of all immediate 
 probability that one of them could fight four of 
 us. So what I say is this. Run no risks. 
 Finish it at once. Send in eight hundred men i 
 and smash him — smash him almost without y 
 seeing him. And go on with the improve-/\ 
 ments." \ 
 
 And Mr. Buck pulled out a bandanna and blew 
 his nose. 
 
 "Do you know, Mr. Buck," said the King, 
 staring gloomily at the table, "the admirable 
 clearness of your reason produces in my mind 
 a sentiment which I trust I shall not offend 
 you by describing as an aspiration to punch 
 your head. You irritate me sublimely. What 
 can it be in me? Is it the relic of a moral 
 sense ?" 
 
 "But your Majesty," said Barker, eagerly and 
 suavely, "does not refuse our proposals ?" 
 
 "My dear Barker, your proposals are as dam- 
 nable as your manners. I want to have nothing 
 to do with them. Suppose I stopped them 
 altogether. What would happen ?" 
 
 Barker answered in a very low voice — 
 
 "Revolution." 
 
 The King glanced quickly at the men around 
 the table. They were all looking down silently: 
 their brows were red. 
 
 i7S 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 He rose with a startling suddenness, and an 
 unusual pallor. 
 
 "Gentlemen," he said, "you have overruled me. 
 Therefore I can speak plainly. I think Adam 
 Wayne, who is as mad as a hatter, worth 
 more than a million of you. But you have the 
 force, and, I admit, the common sense, and he is 
 lost. Take your eight hundred halberdiers and 
 smash him. It would be more sportsmanlike to 
 take two hundred." 
 
 "More sportsmanlike," said Buck, grimly, "but 
 a great deal less humane. We are not artists, and 
 streets purple with gore do not catch our eye in 
 the right way." 
 
 "It is pitiful," said Auberon. "With five or 
 six times their number there will be no fight at 
 all." 
 
 "I hope not," said Buck, rising and adjusting 
 his gloves. "We desire no fight, your Majesty. 
 We are peaceable business men." 
 
 "Well," said the King, wearily, "the conference 
 is at an end at last." 
 
 And he went out of the room before any one 
 else could stir. 
 
 • • • • • « 
 
 Forty workmen, a hundred Bayswater Halber- 
 diers, two hundred from South, and three from 
 North Kensington, assembled at the foot of Hol- 
 
 176 
 
The Experiment of Mr. Buck 
 
 land Walk and marched up it, under the general 
 direction of Barker, who looked flushed and 
 happy in full dress. At the end of the procession 
 a small and sulky figure lingered like an urchin. 
 It was the King. 
 
 "Barker," he said at length, appealingly, "you 
 are an old friend of mine — you understand 
 my hobbies as I understand yours. Why can't 
 you let it alone? I hoped that such fun 
 might come out of this Wayne business. Why 
 can't you let it alone? It doesn't really so much 
 matter to you — what's a road or so? For me 
 it's the one joke that may save me from 
 pessimism. Take fewer men and give me an 
 hour's fun. Really and truly, James, if you 
 collected coins or humming-birds, and I could 
 buy one with the price of your road, I would 
 buy it. I collect incidents — those rare, those 
 precious things. Let me have one. Pay a few 
 pounds for it. Give these Notting Hillers a 
 chance. Let them alone." 
 
 "Auberon," said Barker, kindly, forgetting all 
 royal titles in a rare moment of sincerity,* 
 "I do feel what you mean. I have had mo- 
 ments when these hobbies have hit me. I have 
 had moments when I have sympathised with 
 your humours. I have had moments, though 
 you may not easily believe it, when I have 
 
 177 
 
 ( 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 sympathised with the madness of Adam Wayne. 
 But the world, Auberon, the real world, is 
 not run on these hobbies. It goes on great 
 brutal wheels of facts — wheels on which you 
 are the butterfly. And Wayne is the fly on 
 the wheel." 
 
 Auberon's eyes looked frankly at the other's. 
 
 "Thank you, James; what you say is true. 
 It is only a parenthetical consolation to me to 
 compare the intelligence of flies somewhat favour- 
 ably with the intelligence of wheels. But it is the 
 nature of flies to die soon, and the nature of 
 wheels to go on for ever. Go on with the wheel. 
 Good-bye, old man." 
 
 And James Barker went on, laughing, with a 
 high colour, slapping his bamboo on his leg. 
 
 The King watched the tail of the retreating 
 regiment with a look of genuine depression, which 
 made him seem more like a baby than ever. 
 Then he swung round and struck his hands 
 together. 
 
 "In a world without humour," he said, 
 "the only thing to do is to eat. And how 
 perfect an exception! How can these people 
 strike dignified attitudes, and pretend that 
 things matter, when the total ludicrousness of 
 life is proved by the very method by which it 
 is supported? A man strikes the lyre, and 
 
 178 
 
The Experiment of Mr. Buck 
 
 says, 'Life is real, life is earnest/ and then 
 goes into a room and stuffs alien substances into 
 a hole in his head. I think Nature was indeed\ 
 a little broad in her humour in these matters. / 
 But we all fall back on the pantomime, as 
 I have in this municipal affair. Nature has 
 her farces, like the act of eating or the shape 
 of the kangaroo, for the more brutal appe- 
 tite. She keeps her stars and mountains for 
 those who can appreciate something more 
 subtly ridiculous." He turned to his equerry. 
 "But, as I said 'eating/ let us have a picnic like 
 two nice little children. Just run and bring 
 me a table and a dozen courses or so, and 
 plenty of champagne, and under these swinging 
 boughs, Bowler, we will return to Nature." 
 
 It took about an hour to erect in Holland Lane 
 the monarch's simple repast, during which 
 time he walked up and down and whistled, but 
 still with an unaffected air of gloom. He had 
 really been done out of a pleasure he had 
 promised himself, and had that empty and 
 sickened feeling which a child has when dis- 
 appointed of a pantomime. When he and the^ 
 equerry had sat down, however, and consumed a 
 fair amount of dry champagne, his spirits began 
 mildly to revive. 
 
 "Things take too long in this world," he said. 
 179 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 "I detest all this Barker ian business about 
 evolution and the gradual modification of things. 
 I wish the world had been made in six days, 
 and knocked to pieces again in six more. 
 And I wish I had done it. The joke's good 
 enough in a broad way, sun and moon and the 
 image of God, and all that, but they keep it up 
 so damnably long. Did you ever long for a 
 miracle, Bowler ?" 
 
 "No, sir," said Bowler, who was an evolution- 
 ist, and had been carefully brought up. 
 
 "Then I have," answered the King. "I have 
 walked along a street with the best cigar in the 
 cosmos in my mouth, and more Burgundy 
 inside me than you ever saw in your life, 
 and longed that the lamp-post would turn into 
 an elephant to save me from the hell of blank 
 existence. Take my word for it, my evolu- 
 tionary Bowler, don't you believe people when 
 they tell you that people sought for a sign, and 
 V \ believed in miracles because they were ignorant. 
 They did it because they were wise, filthily, vilely 
 \ wise — too wise to eat or sleep or put on their 
 ^ boots with patience. This seems delightfully like 
 a new theory of the origin of Christianity, which 
 would itself be a thing of no mean absurdity. Take 
 some more wine." 
 
 The wind blew round them as they sat at their 
 180 
 
The Experiment of Mr. Buck 
 
 little table, with its white cloth and bright 
 wine-cups, and flung the tree-tops of Holland 
 Park against each other, but the sun was in that 
 strong temper which turns green into gold. The 
 King pushed away his plate, lit a cigar slowly, 
 and went on — 
 
 "Yesterday I thought that something next 
 door to a really entertaining miracle might 
 happen to me before I went to amuse the 
 worms. To see that red-haired maniac waving 
 a great sword, and making speeches to his 
 incomparable followers, would have been a 
 glimpse of that Land of Youth from which 
 the Fates shut us out. I had planned some 
 quite delightful things. A Congress of Knights- 
 bridge with a treaty, and myself in the chair, 
 and perhaps a Roman triumph, with jolly old 
 Barker led in chains. And now these wretched 
 prigs have gone and stamped out the exquisite 
 Mr. Wayne altogether, and I suppose they will 
 put him in a private asylum somewhere in their 
 damned humane way. Think of the treasures 
 daily poured out to his unappreciative keeper! 
 I wonder whether they would let me be his 
 keeper. But life is a vale. Never forget at 
 any moment of your existence to regard it in the 
 light of a vale. This graceful habit, if not 
 acquired in youth — " 
 
 181 
 
The Napoleon of Nolting Hill 
 
 The King stopped, with his cigar lifted, for 
 there had slid into his eyes the startled look of 
 a man listening. He did not move for a few 
 moments; then he turned his head sharply 
 towards the high, thin, and lath-like paling which 
 fenced certain long gardens and similar spaces 
 from the lane. From behind it there was 
 coming a curious scrambling and scraping 
 noise, as of a desperate thing imprisoned in this 
 box of thin wood. The King threw away his 
 cigar, and jumped on to the table. From this 
 position he saw a pair of hands hanging with a 
 hungry clutch on the top of the fence. Then 
 the hands quivered with a convulsive effort, and 
 a head shot up between them — the head of one 
 of the Bayswater Town Council, his eyes and 
 whiskers wild with fear. He swung himself 
 over, and fell on the other side on his face, and 
 groaned openly and without ceasing. The next 
 moment the thin, taut wood of the fence was 
 struck as by a bullet, so that it reverberated 
 like a drum, and over it came tearing and 
 cursing, with torn clothes and broken nails and 
 bleeding faces, twenty men at one rush. The 
 King sprang five feet clear off the table on to 
 the ground. The moment after the table was 
 flung over, sending bottles and glasses flying, 
 and the debris was literally swept along the 
 
 182 
 
The Experiment of Mr. Buck 
 
 ground by that stream of men pouring past, and 
 Bowler was borne along with them, as the 
 King said in his famous newspaper article, 
 "like a captured bride." The great fence 
 swung and split under the load of climbers that 
 still scaled and cleared it. Tremendous gaps 
 were torn in it by this living artillery; and 
 through them the King could see more and 
 more frantic faces, as in a dream, and more and 
 more men running. They were as miscel- 
 laneous as if some one had taken the lid off 
 a human dustbin. Some were untouched, some 
 were slashed and battered and bloody, some 
 were splendidly dressed, some tattered and 
 half-naked, some were in the fantastic garb of 
 the burlesque cities, some in the dullest mod- 
 ern dress. The King stared at all of them, but 
 none of them looked at the King. Suddenly he 
 stepped forward. 
 
 "Barker," he said, "what is all this?" 
 "Beaten," said the politician — "beaten all to 
 hell!" And he plunged past with nostrils 
 shaking like a horse's, and more and more men 
 plunged after him. 
 
 Almost as he spoke, the last standing strip of 
 fence bowed and snapped, flinging, as from 
 a catapult, a new figure upon the road. He wore 
 the flaming red of the halberdiers of Notting 
 
 183 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 Hill, and on his weapon there was blood, 
 and in his face victory. In another moment 
 masses of red glowed through the gaps of 
 the fence, and the pursuers, with their halberds, 
 came pouring down the lane. Pursued and pur- 
 suers alike swept by the little figure with the 
 owlish eyes, who had not taken his hands out of 
 his pockets. 
 
 The King had still little beyond the confused 
 sense of a man caught in a torrent — the feeling 
 of men eddying by. Then something happened 
 which he was never able afterwards to describe, 
 and which we cannot describe for him. Suddenly 
 in the dark entrance, between the broken gates 
 of a garden, there appeared framed a flaming 
 figure. 
 
 Adam Wayne, the conqueror, with his face 
 flung back, and his mane like a lion's, stood 
 with his great sword point upwards, the red 
 raiment of his office flapping round him like 
 the red wings of an archangel. And the King 
 saw, he knew not how, something new and over- 
 whelming. The great green trees and the 
 great red robes swung together in the wind. 
 The sword seemed made for the sunlight. The 
 preposterous masquerade, born of his own 
 mockery, towered over him and embraced the 
 
 world. This was the normal, this was sanity, 
 
 184 
 
The Experiment of Mr. Buck 
 
 this was nature; and he himself, with his 
 rationality and his detachment and his black frock 
 coat, he was the exception and the accident — 
 a blot of black upon a world of crimson and 
 gold. 
 
 ^Ai^J>w 
 
 185 
 
BOOK IV 
 
Chapter I — The Battle of the Lamps ~ 
 
 MR. BUCK, who, though retired, fre- 
 quently went down to his big 
 drapery stores in Kensington High 
 Street, was locking up those premises, being 
 the last to leave. It was a wonderful evening 
 of green and gold, but that did not trouble 
 him very much. If you had pointed it out, 
 he would have agreed seriously, for the rich 
 always desire to be artistic. 
 
 He stepped out into the cool air, buttoning up 
 his light coat, and blowing great clouds from 
 his cigar, when a figure dashed up to him in an- 
 other yellow overcoat, but unbuttoned and flying 
 behind him. 
 
 "Hullo, Barker!" said the draper. "Any of 
 our summer articles? You're too late. Fac- 
 tory Acts, Barker. Humanity and progress, 
 my boy." 
 
 "Oh, don't chatter," cried Barker, stamping. 
 "We've been beaten." 
 
 "Beaten — by what?" asked Buck, mystified. 
 
 "By Wayne." 
 
 Buck looked at Barker's fierce white face for 
 the first time, as it gleamed in the lamplight. 
 
 "Come and have a drink," he said. • 
 189 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 They adjourned to a cushioned and glaring 
 buffet, and Buck established himself slowly and 
 lazily in a seat, and pulled out his cigar-case. 
 
 "Have a smoke," he said. 
 
 Barker was still standing, and on the fret, but 
 after a moment's hesitation, he sat down, as if he 
 might spring up again the next minute. They 
 ^ordered drinks in silence. 
 
 "How did it happen ?" asked Buck, turning his 
 big bold eyes on him. 
 
 "How the devil do I know?" cried Barker. 
 "It happened like — like a dream. How can 
 two hundred men beat six hundred? How can 
 they?" 
 
 "Well," said Buck, coolly. "How did they? 
 You ought to know." 
 
 "I don't know. I can't describe," said the 
 other, drumming on the table. "It seemed 
 like this. We were six hundred and marched 
 with those damned poleaxes of Auberon's — 
 the only weapons we've got. We marched two 
 abreast. We went up to Holland Walk, between 
 the high palings which seemed to me to go 
 straight as an arrow for Pump Street. I was 
 near the tail of the line and it was a long one. 
 When the end of it was still between the high 
 palings, the head of the line was already crossing 
 Holland Park Avenue. Then the head plunged 
 
 190 
 
KL'i'i'i'i'm.i'i'rriTl'riTl 
 
 n< 
 
The Battle of the Lamps 
 
 into the network of narrow streets on the 
 other side, and the tail and myself came out on 
 the great crossing. When we also had reached 
 the northern side and turned up a small street 
 that points, crookedly as it were, towards 
 Pump Street, the whole thing felt different. The 
 streets dodged and bent so much that the head 
 of our line seemed lost altogether: it might as 
 well have been in North America. And all this 
 time we hadn't seen a soul." 
 
 Buck, who was idly dabbing the ash of his 
 cigar on the ash-tray, began to move it deliber- 
 ately over the table, making feathery grey lines, 
 a kind of map. 
 
 "But though the little streets were all de- 
 serted (which got a trifle on my nerves), as 
 we got deeper and deeper into them, a thing 
 began to happen that I couldn't understand. 
 Sometimes a long way ahead — three turns or 
 corners ahead, as it were — there broke suddenly 
 a sort of noise, clattering, and confused cries, 
 and then stopped. Then, when it happened, 
 something, I can't describe it — a kind of shake 
 or stagger went down the line, as if the line 
 were a live thing, whose head had been struck, 
 or had been an electric cord. None of us knew 
 why we were moving, but we moved and 
 jostled. Then we recovered, and went on 
 
 191 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 through the little dirty streets, round corners, 
 
 and up twisted ways. The little crooked streets 
 
 began to give me a feeling I can't explain — as if 
 
 it were a dream. I felt as if things had lost their 
 
 reason, and we should never get out of the 
 
 maze. Odd to hear me talk like that, isn't it ? The 
 
 streets were quite well-known streets, all down 
 
 on the map. But the fact remains. I wasn't afraid 
 
 - «>f something happening. I was afraid of nothing 
 
 / /v ver na PP en i n g — nothing ever happening for all 
 
 / God's eternity. ,, 
 
 He drained his glass and called for more 
 whisky. He drank it and went on. 
 
 "And then something did happen. Buck, it's 
 the solemn truth, that nothing has ever happened 
 to you in your life. Nothing had ever happened 
 to me in my life." 
 
 "Nothing ever happened!" said Buck, staring. 
 "What do you mean?" 
 
 "Nothing has ever happened," repeated Barker, 
 with a morbid obstinacy. "You don't know 
 what a thing happening means? You sit in 
 your office expecting customers, and customers 
 come; you walk in the street expecting friends, 
 and friends meet you; you want a drink and 
 get it; you feel inclined for a bet and make 
 it. You expect either to win or lose, and 
 you do either one or the other. But 
 
 192 
 
The Battle of the Lamps 
 
 things happening !" and he shuddered ungov- 
 ernably. 
 
 "Go on," said Buck, shortly. "Get on." 
 
 "As we walked wearily round the corners, 
 something happened. When something hap- 
 pens, it happens first, and you see it afterwards. 
 It happens of itself, and you have nothing to do 
 with it. It proves a dreadful thing — that there 
 are other things besides one's self. I can only 
 put it in this way. We went round one turn- 
 ing, two turnings, three turnings, four turnings, 
 five. Then I lifted myself slowly up from the 
 gutter where I had been shot half senseless, 
 and was beaten down again by living men 
 crashing on top of me, and the world was full 
 of roaring, and big men rolling about like nine- 
 pins." 
 
 Buck looked at his map with knitted brows. 
 
 "Was that Portobello Road ?" he asked. 
 
 "Yes," said Barker. "Yes; Portobello Road— 
 I saw it afterwards; but, my God — what a 
 place it was! Buck, have you ever stood and 
 let a six foot of a man lash and lash at 
 your head with six feet of pole with six 
 pounds of steel at the end? Because, when 
 you have had that experience, as Walt 
 Whitman says, 'you re-examine philosophies an 
 religions.' " 
 
 193 
 
 • 
 
The Napoleon of Hotting Hill 
 
 "I have no doubt," said Buck. "If that 
 was Portobello Road, don't you see what 
 happened ?" 
 
 "I know what happened exceedingly well. I 
 was knocked down four times; an experience 
 which, as I say, has an effect on the mental 
 attitude. And another thing happened, too. I 
 knocked down two men. After the fourth 
 fall (there was not much bloodshed — more 
 brutal rushing and throwing — for nobody could 
 use their weapons), after the fourth fall, I say, 
 I got up like a devil, and I tore a poleaxe out 
 of a man's hand and struck where I saw the 
 scarlet of Wayne's fellows, struck again and 
 again. Two of them went over, bleeding on 
 the stones, thank God — and I laughed and 
 found myself sprawling in the gutter again, and 
 got up again, and struck again, and broke my 
 halberd to pieces. I hurt a man's head, 
 though." 
 
 Buck set down his glass with a bang, and spat 
 out curses through his thick moustache. 
 
 "What is the matter ?" asked Barker, stopping, 
 for the man had been calm up to now, and 
 now his agitation was far more violent than 
 his own. 
 
 "The matter?" said Buck, bitterly; "don't you 
 see how these maniacs have got us? Why 
 
 194 
 
The Battle of the Lamps 
 
 should two idiots, one a clown and the other a 
 screaming lunatic, make sane men so different 
 from themselves? Look here, Barker; I will give 
 you a picture. A very well-bred young man 
 of this century is dancing about in a frock-coat. 
 He has in his hands a nonsensical seventeenth 
 century halberd, with which he is trying to 
 kill men in a street in Notting Hill. Damn 
 it ! don't you see how they've got us ? Never 
 mind how you felt — that is how you looked. 
 The King would put his cursed head on one 
 side and call it exquisite. The Provost of 
 Notting Hill would put his cursed nose in 
 the air and call it heroic. But in Heaven's 
 name what would you have called it — two days 
 before?" 
 
 Barker bit his lip. 
 
 "You haven't been through it, Buck," he 
 said. "You don't understand fighting— 'the 
 atmosphere." 
 
 "I don't deny the atmosphere," said Buck, 
 striking the table. "I only say it's their atmos- 
 phere. It's Adam Wayne's atmosphere. It's the 
 atmosphere which you and I thought had vanished 
 from an educated world for ever." 
 
 "Well, it hasn't," said Barker; "and if you have 
 any lingering doubts, lend me a poleaxe and I'll 
 show you." 
 
 195 
 
 \ 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 There was a long silence, and then Buck 
 turned to his neighbour and spoke in that good- 
 tempered tone that comes of a power of looking 
 ^^facts in the face; the tone in which he concluded 
 great bargains. 
 
 "Barker," he said, "you are right. This 
 old thing — this fighting, has come back. It has 
 come back suddenly and taken us by surprise. 
 So it is first blood to Adam Wayne. But, 
 unless reason and arithmetic and everything 
 else have gone crazy, it must be next and 
 last blood to us. But when an issue has really 
 arisen, there is only one thing to do — to 
 study that issue as such and win in it. Barker, 
 since it is fighting, we must understand fight- 
 ing. I must understand fighting as coolly and 
 completely as I understand drapery; you must 
 understand fighting as coolly and completely 
 as you understand politics. Now, look at 
 the facts. I stick without hesitation to my 
 original formula. Fighting, when we have the 
 stronger force, is only a matter of arithmetic. 
 It must be. You asked me just now how two 
 hundred men could defeat six hundred. I can 
 tell you. Two hundred men can defeat six 
 hundred when the six hundred behave like 
 fools. When they forget the very conditions 
 they are fighting in; when they fight in a 
 
 196 
 
The Battle of the Lamps 
 
 swamp as if it were a mountain; when they 
 fight in a forest as if it were a plain; when they 
 fight in streets without remembering the object of 
 streets." 
 
 "What is the object of streets?" asked 
 Barker. 
 
 "What is the object of supper?" cried 
 Buck, furiously. "Isn't it obvious? This 
 military science is mere common sense. The 
 object of a street is to lead from one place 
 to another; therefore all streets join; therefore 
 street fighting is quite a peculiar thing. You 
 advanced into that hive of streets as if you were 
 advancing into an open plain where you could 
 see everything. Instead of that you were 
 advancing into the bowels of a fortress, with 
 streets pointing at you, streets turning on you, 
 streets jumping out at you, and all in the 
 hands of the enemy. Do you know what 
 Portobello Road is? It is the only point on 
 your journey where two side streets run up 
 opposite each other. Wayne massed his men on 
 the two sides, and when he had let enough 
 of your line go past, cut it in two like a 
 worm. Don't you see what would have saved 
 
 you ?' 
 
 Barker shook his head. 
 
 "Can't your 'atmosphere' help you?" asked 
 197 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 Buck, bitterly. "Must I attempt explanations 
 in the romantic manner? Suppose that, as you 
 were fighting blindly with the red Notting 
 Hi Hers who imprisoned you on both sides, 
 you had heard a shout from behind them. 
 Suppose, oh, romantic Barker! that behind 
 the red tunics you had seen the blue and gold 
 of South Kensington taking them in the rear, 
 surrounding them in their turn and hurling them 
 on to your halberds." 
 
 "If the thing had been possible,'' began Barker, 
 cursing. 
 
 "The thing would have been as possible," said 
 Buck, simply; "as simple as arithmetic. There 
 are a certain number of street entries that lead 
 to Pump Street. There are not nine hundred; 
 there are not nine million. They do not grow 
 in the night. They do not increase like mush- 
 rooms. It must be possible with such an over- 
 whelming force as we have to advance by all of 
 them at once. In every one of the arteries, or 
 approaches, we can put almost as many men as 
 Wayne can put into the field altogether. Once do 
 that and we have him to demonstration. It is 
 like a proposition in Euclid." 
 
 "You think that is certain," said Barker, 
 anxious but dominated delightfully. 
 
 "Fll tell you what I think," said Buck, getting 
 198 
 
The Battle of the Lamps 
 
 up jovially. "I think Adam Wayne made an 
 uncommonly spirited little fight. And I think I 
 am confoundedly sorry for him." 
 
 "Buck, you are a great man," cried Barker, » 
 rising also. "You've knocked me sensible 
 again. I am ashamed to say it, but I was/ 
 getting romantic. Of course, what you say 
 is adamantine sense. Fighting, being physical,/ / 
 must be mathematical. We were beaten because 
 we were neither mathematical nor physical nor> 
 anything else — because we deserved to be beaten. 
 Hold all the approaches, and with our force we 
 must have him. When shall we open the next 
 campaign ?" 
 
 "Now," said Buck, and walked out of the 
 bar. 
 
 "Now!" cried Barker, following him eagerly. 
 "Do you mean now ? It is so late." 
 
 Buck turned on him, stamping. 
 
 "Do you think fighting is under the Factory 
 Acts?" he said. And he called a cab. "Notting 
 Hill Gate Station," he said, and the two drove 
 off. 
 
 A genuine reputation can sometimes be made 
 in an hour. Buck, in the next sixty or eighty 
 minutes showed himself a really great man of 
 action. His cab carried him like a thunder- 
 
 199 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 bolt from the King to Wilson, from Wilson 
 to Swindon, from Swindon to Barker again; 
 if his course was jagged, it had the jagged- 
 ness of the lightning. Only two things he 
 carried with him, his inevitable cigar and the 
 map of North Kensington and Notting Hill. 
 There were, as he again and again pointed out, 
 with every variety of persuasion and violence, 
 only nine possible ways of approaching Pump 
 Street within a quarter of a mile around it; 
 three out of W T estbourne Grove, two out of 
 Ladbroke Grove, and four out of Notting Hill 
 High Street. And he had detachments of 
 two hundred each, stationed at every one of the 
 entrances before the last green of that strange 
 sunset had sunk out of the black sky. 
 
 The sky was particularly black, and on this 
 alone was one false protest raised against the 
 triumphant optimism of the Provost of North 
 Kensington. He overruled it with his infectious 
 common sense. 
 
 "There is no such thing," he said, "as night 
 in London. You have only to follow the line of 
 street lamps. Look, here is the map. Two 
 hundred purple North Kensington soldiers 
 under myself march up Ossington Street, 
 two hundred more under Captain Bruce, 
 of the North Kensington Guard, up Clanricarde 
 
 200 
 
The Battle of the Lamps 
 
 Gardens.* Two hundred yellow West Kensing- 
 tons under Provost Swindon attack from Pern- 
 bridge Road. Two hundred more of my men from 
 the eastern streets, leading away from Queen's 
 Road. Two detachments of yellows enter 
 by two roads from Westbourne Grove. 
 Lastly, two hundred green Bayswaters come 
 down from the North through Chepstow Place, 
 and two hundred more under Provost Wilson 
 himself, through the upper part of Pembridge 
 Road. Gentlemen, it is mate in two moves. The 
 enemy must either mass in Pump Street and 
 be cut to pieces — or they must retreat past 
 the Gaslight & Coke Co. — and rush on my four 
 hundred — or they must retreat past St. Luke's 
 Church and rush on the six hundred from 
 the West. Unless we are all mad, it's 
 plain. Come on. To your quarters and await 
 Captain Bruce's signal to advance. Then you 
 have only to walk up a line of gas-lamps and 
 smash this nonsense by pure mathematics. To- 
 morrow we shall be all civilians again." 
 
 His optimism glowed like a great fire in the* 
 night, and ran round the terrible ring in which 
 Wayne was now held helpless. The fight was 
 
 • Clanricarde Gardens at this time was no longer a cul-de- 
 sac, but was connected by Pump Street to Pembridge Square. 
 See map. 
 
 201 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 already over. One man's energy for one hour had 
 saved the city from war. 
 
 For the next ten minutes Buck walked up and 
 down silently beside the motionless clump of 
 his two hundred. He had not changed his 
 appearance in any way, except to sling across 
 his yellow overcoat a case with a revolver in it. 
 So that his light-clad modern figure showed up 
 oddly beside the pompous purple uniforms of his 
 halberdiers, which darkly but richly coloured the 
 black night. 
 
 At length a shrill trumpet rang from some way 
 up the street; it was the signal of advance. 
 Buck briefly gave the word, and the whole 
 purple line, with its dimly shining steel, moved 
 up the side alley. Before it was a slope of 
 street, long, straight, and shining in the dark. 
 It was a sword pointed at Pump Street, the heart 
 at which nine other swords were pointed that 
 night. 
 
 A quarter of an hour's silent marching 
 
 brought them almost within earshot of any 
 
 ' tumult in the doomed citadel. But still there 
 
 was no sound and no sign of the enemy. This 
 
 time, at any rate, they knew that they were closing 
 
 in on it mechanically, and they marched on 
 
 under the lamplight and the dark without any 
 
 of that eerie sense of ignorance which Barker 
 
 202 
 
The Battle of the Lamps 
 
 had felt when entering the hostile country by one 
 avenue alone. 
 
 "Halt — point arms!" cried Buck, suddenly, 
 and as he spoke there came a clatter of feet 
 tumbling along the stones. But the halberds 
 were levelled in vain. The figure that rushed 
 up was a messenger from the contingent of the 
 North. 
 
 "Victory, Mr. Buck !" he cried, panting, "they 
 are ousted. Provost Wilson of Bayswater has 
 taken Pump Street." 
 
 Buck ran forward in his excitement. 
 
 "Then, which way are they retreating? It 
 must be either by St. Luke's to meet Swindon, or 
 by the Gas Company to meet us. Run like mad 
 to Swindon and see that the yellows are hold- 
 ing the St. Luke's Road. We will hold 
 this, never fear. We have them in an iron trap. 
 Run!" 
 
 As the messenger dashed away into the dark- 
 ness, the great guard of North Kensington 
 swung on with the certainty of a machine. 
 Yet scarcely a hundred yards further their 
 halberd points again fell in line gleaming in the 
 gas-light. For again a clatter of feet was heard 
 on the stones, and again it proved to be only the 
 messenger. 
 
 "Mr. Provost," he said, "the yellow West Ken- 
 203 
 
/ 
 
 The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 singtons have been holding the road by St. 
 Luke's for twenty minutes since the capture of 
 Pump Street. Pump Street is not two hundred 
 yards away, they cannot be retreating down that 
 road." 
 
 "Then they are retreating down this!" said 
 Provost Buck, with a final cheerfulness, "and by 
 good fortune down a well-lighted road, though it 
 twists about. Forward!" 
 
 As they moved along the last three hundred 
 yards of their journey, Buck fell, for the first time 
 in his life, perhaps, into a kind of philo- 
 sophical reverie, for men of his type are always 
 made kindly, and as it were melancholy, by suc- 
 cess. 
 
 "I am sorry for poor old Wayne, I really am," 
 he thought. "He spoke up splendidly for me 
 at that Council. And he blacked old Barker's 
 eye with considerable spirit. But I don't 
 see what a man can expect when he fights 
 against arithmetic, to say nothing of civilisation. 
 And what a wonderful hoax all this military 
 genius is. I suspect I've just discovered what 
 Cromwell discovered, that a sensible tradesman 
 is the best general, and that a man who can 
 buy men and sell men can lead and kill them. 
 The thing's simply like adding up a column in a 
 ledger. If Wayne has two hundred men, he 
 
 204 
 
The Battle of the Lamps 
 
 can't put two hundred men in nine places at once. 
 If they're ousted from Pump Street they're 
 flying somewhere. If they're not flying past 
 the church they're flying past the Works. And 
 so we have them. We business men should 
 have no chance at all except that cleverer peo- 
 ple than we get bees in their bonnets that 
 prevent them from reasoning properly — so we 
 reason alone. And so I, who am comparatively 
 stupid, see things as God sees them, as a vast 
 machine. My God, what's this?" And he 
 clapped his hands to his eyes and staggered 
 back. 
 
 Then through the darkness he cried in a dread- 
 ful voice — 
 
 "Did I blaspheme God ? — I am struck blind." 
 
 "What ?" wailed another voice behind him, the 
 voice of a certain Wilfred Jarvis of North Ken- 
 sington. 
 
 "Blind!" cried Buck; "blind!" 
 
 "I'm blind, too !" cried Jarvis, in an agony. 
 
 "Fools, all of you," said a gross voice behind 
 them; "we're all blind. The lamps have gone 
 out." 
 
 "The lamps — but why? where?" cried Buck, 
 turning furiously in the darkness. "How are we 
 to get on? How are we to chase the enemy? 
 Where have they gone ?" 
 
 205, 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 "The enemy went — " said the rough voice 
 behind, and then stopped, doubtfully. 
 
 "Where?" shouted Buck, stamping like a mad- 
 man. 
 
 "They went," said the gruff voice, "past the 
 Gas Works, and they've used their chance." 
 
 "Great God !" thundered Buck, and snatched at 
 his revolver; "do you mean they've turned 
 out--" 
 
 But almost before he had spoken the words, he 
 was hurled like a stone from a catapult into the 
 midst of his own men. 
 
 "Notting Hill! Notting Hill!" cried frightful 
 voices out of the darkness, and they seemed 
 to come from all sides, for the men of North 
 Kensington, unacquainted with the road, had 
 lost all their bearings in the black world of blind- 
 ness. 
 
 "Notting Hill ! Notting Hill !" cried the invis- 
 ible people, and the invaders were hewn down 
 horribly with black steel, with steel that gave no 
 glint against any light. 
 
 • ••••• 
 
 Buck, though badly maimed with the blow of 
 a halberd, kept an angry but splendid sanity. He 
 groped madly for the wall and found it. Strug- 
 gling with crawling fingers along it, he found 
 a side opening and retreated into it with the 
 
 206 
 
The Battle of the Lamps 
 
 remnants of his men. Their adventures dur- 
 ing that prodigious night are not to be de- 
 scribed. They did not know whether they were 
 going towards or away from the enemy. Not 
 knowing where they themselves were, or where 
 their opponents were, it was mere irony to ask 
 where was the rest of their army. For a thing 
 had descended upon them which London does not 
 know — darkness, which was before the stars were 
 made, and they were as much lost in it as if they 
 had been made before the stars. Every now and 
 then, as those frightful hours wore on, they buf- 
 fetted in the darkness against living men, who 
 struck at them and at whom they struck, with 
 an idiot fury. When at last the grey dawn came, 
 they found they had wandered back to the edge 
 of the Uxbridge Road. They found that in those 
 horrible eyeless encounters, the North Kensing- 
 tons and the Bayswaters and the West Kensing- 
 tons had again and again met and butchered each 
 other, and they heard that Adam Wayne was bar- 
 ricaded in Pump Street. X %h 
 
 Jr* 
 
 f^Jr 
 
 t<* 
 
 207 
 
Chapter II — The Correspondent of the 
 Court Journal 
 
 tXOURNALISM had become like most other 
 | such things in England, under the cautious 
 ** government and philosophy represented 
 by James Barker, somewhat sleepy and much 
 diminished in importance. This was partly due 
 to the disappearance of party government and 
 public speaking, partly to the compromise or 
 dead-lock which had made foreign wars im- 
 possible, but mostly, of course, to the temper 
 of the whole nation, which was that of a 
 people in a kind of back-water. Perhaps 
 the most well-known of the remaining news- 
 papers was the Court Journal, which was pub- 
 lished in a dusty but genteel-looking office just 
 out of Kensington High Street. For when 
 all the papers of a people have been for years 
 growing more and more dim and decorous 
 and optimistic, the dimmest and most de- 
 corous and most optimistic is very likely 
 to win. In the journalistic competition which 
 was still going on at the beginning of the 
 twentieth century, the final victor was the 
 Court Journal. 
 
 For some mysterious reason the King had 
 
 2Q§ 
 
The Correspondent of the Court Journal 
 
 a great affection for hanging about in the Court 
 Journal office, smoking a morning cigarette and 
 looking over files. Like all ingrainedly idle men, 
 he was very fond of lounging and chatting ia% 
 places where other people were doing work. But 
 one would have thought that, even in the prosaic 
 England of his day, he might have found a more 
 bustling centre. 
 
 On this particular morning, however, he came 
 out of Kensington Palace with a more alert step 
 and a busier air than usual. He wore an extrava- 
 gantly long frock-coat, a pale-green waistcoat, 
 a very full and degage black tie, and curious 
 yellow gloves. This was his uniform as Colo- 
 nel of a regiment of his own creation, the ist 
 Decadents Green. It was a beautiful sight to 
 see him drilling them. He walked quickly 
 across the Park and the High Street, lighting his 
 cigarette as he went, and flung open the door of 
 the Court Journal office. 
 
 "You've heard the news, Pally — youVe heard 
 the news ?" he said. 
 
 The Editor's name was Hoskins, but the King 
 called him Pally, which was an abbreviation of 
 Paladium of our Liberties. 
 
 "Well, your Majesty," said Hoskins, slowly 
 (he was a worried, gentlemanly looking person, 
 with a wandering brown beard) — "well, your 
 
 209 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 Majesty,. I have heard rather curious things, 
 but I—" 
 
 "You'll hear more of them," said the King, dan- 
 cing a few steps of a kind of negro shuffle. "You'll 
 hear more of them, my blood-and-thunder tribune. 
 Do you know what I am going to do for 
 you?" 
 
 "No, your Majesty," replied the Paladium, 
 vaguely. 
 
 "I'm going to put your paper on strong, 
 dashing, enterprising lines," said the King. 
 "Now, where are your posters of last night's 
 defeat?" 
 
 "I did not propose, your Majesty," said the 
 Editor, "to have any posters exactly — " 
 
 "Paper, paper!" cried the King, wildly; 
 "bring me paper as big as a house. I'll do you 
 posters. Stop, I must take my coat off." He 
 began removing that garment with an air of 
 set intensity, flung it playfully at Mr. Hoskins' 
 head, entirely enveloping him, and looked at 
 himself in the glass. "The coat off," he 
 said, "and hat on. That looks like a sub- 
 editor. It is indeed the very essence of 
 sub-editing. Well," he continued, turning 
 round abruptly, "come along with that 
 paper." 
 
 The Paladium had only just extricated himself 
 
 210 
 
The Correspondent of the Court Journal 
 
 reverently from the folds of the King's frock- 
 coat, and said bewildered — 
 
 "I am afraid, your Majesty — " 
 
 "Oh, you've got no enterprise," said Auberon. 
 "What's that roll in the corner? Wall-paper? 
 Decorations for your private residence? Art in 
 the home, Pally? Fling it over here, and I'll 
 paint such posters on the back of it that when 
 you put it up in your drawing-room you'll paste 
 the original pattern against the wall." And 
 the King unrolled the wall-paper, spreading 
 it over the whole floor. "Now give me the scis- 
 sors," he cried, and took them himself before the 
 other could stir. 
 
 He slit the paper into about five pieces, each 
 nearly as big as a door. Then he took a big blue 
 pencil and went down on his knees on the dusty 
 oil-cloth, and began to write on them, in huge 
 letters — 
 
 "from the front. 
 
 general buck defeated. 
 
 darkness, danger, and death. 
 
 wayne said to be in pump street. 
 
 He contemplated it for some time, with his head 
 on one side, and got up, with a sigh. 
 
 211 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 "Not quite intense enough," he said — "not 
 alarming. I want the Court Journal to be feared 
 as well as loved. Let's try something more hard- 
 hitting." And he went down on his knees again. 
 After sucking the blue pencil for some time, he 
 began writing again busily. "How will this do?" 
 he said — 
 
 "wayne's wonderful victory/' 
 
 "I suppose," he said, looking up appealingly, 
 and sucking the pencil — "I suppose we couldn't 
 say Victory* — 'Wayne's wonderful wictory'? 
 No, no. Refinement, Pally, refinement. I 
 have it." 
 
 "WAYNE WINS. 
 
 ASTOUNDING FIGHT IN THE DARK. 
 
 The gas-lamps in their courses, fought against 
 Buck." 
 
 "(Nothing like our fine old English transla- 
 tion. ) What else can we say ? Well, anything to 
 annoy old Buck ;" and he added, thoughtfully, in 
 smaller letters — 
 
 "Rumoured Court-martial on General Buck." 
 
 "Those will do for the present," he said, and 
 turned them both face downwards. "Paste, 
 please." 
 
 212 
 
The Correspondent of the Court Journal 
 
 The Paladium, with an air of great terror, 
 brought the paste out of an inner room. 
 
 The King slabbed it on with the enjoyment of 
 a child messing with treacle. Then taking one 
 of his huge compositions fluttering in each 
 hand, he ran outside, and began pasting them 
 up in prominent positions over the front of the 
 office. 
 
 "And now," said Auberon, entering again 
 with undiminished vivacity — "now for the leading 
 article." 
 
 He picked up another of the large strips of 
 wall-paper, and, laying it across a desk, pulled 
 out a fountain-pen and began writing with 
 feverish intensity, reading clauses and fragments 
 aloud to himself, and rolling them on his tongue 
 like wine, to see if they had the pure journalistic 
 flavour. 
 
 "The news of the disaster to our forces in 
 Notting Hill, awful as it is, awful as it is — (no, 
 distressing as it is), may do some good if it draws 
 attention to the what's-his-name inefficiency 
 (scandalous inefficiency, of course) of the Gov- 
 ernment's preparations. In our present state 
 of information, it would be premature (what 
 a jolly word!) — it would be premature to cast 
 any reflections upon the conduct of General 
 Buck, whose services upon so many stricken 
 
 213 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 fields (ha, ha!), and whose honourable scars 
 and laurels, give him a right to have judgment 
 upon him at least suspended. But there is one 
 matter on which we must speak plainly. We 
 have been silent on it too long, from feelings, 
 perhaps of mistaken caution, perhaps of mis- 
 taken loyalty. This situation would never have 
 arisen but for what we can only call the inde- 
 fensible conduct of the King. It pains us to say 
 such things, but, speaking as we do in the 
 public interests (I plagiarise from Barker's 
 famous epigram), we shall not shrink because of 
 the distress we may cause to any individual, 
 even the most exalted. At this crucial moment 
 of our country, the voice of the People demands 
 with a single tongue, 'Where is the King?' 
 What is he doing while his subjects tear each 
 other in pieces in the streets of a great city? 
 Are his amusements and his dissipations (of 
 which we cannot pretend to be ignorant) so 
 engrossing that he can spare no thought for a 
 perishing nation ? It is with a deep sense of our 
 responsibility that we warn that exalted person 
 that neither his great position nor his incom- 
 parable talents will save him in the hour of 
 delirium from the fate of all those who, in the 
 madness of luxury or tyranny, have met the 
 English people in the rare day of its wrath." 
 
 214 
 
The Correspondent of the Court Journal 
 
 "I am now," said the King, "going to write 
 an account of the battle by an eye-witness." 
 And he picked up a fourth sheet of wall-paper. 
 Almost at the same moment Buck strode 
 quickly into the office. He had a bandage round 
 his head. 
 
 "I was told," he said with his usual gruff civ- 
 ility, "that your Majesty was here." 
 
 "And of all things on earth," cried the King, 
 with delight, "here is an eye-witness! An eye- 
 witness who, I regret to observe, has at present 
 only one eye to witness with. Can you write 
 us the special article, Buck? Have you a rich 
 style?" 
 
 Buck, with a self-restraint which almost 
 approached politeness, took no notice whatever of 
 the King's maddening geniality. 
 
 "I took the liberty, your Majesty," he said 
 shortly, "of asking Mr. Barker to come here 
 also." 
 
 As he spoke, indeed, Barker came swinging 
 into the office, with his usual air of hurry. 
 
 "What is happening now?" asked Buck, turn- 
 ing to him with a kind of relief. 
 
 "Fighting still going on," said Barker. 
 "The four hundred from West Kensington 
 were hardly touched last night. They hardly 
 got near the place. Poor Wilson's Bayswater 
 
 215 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 men got cut about, though. They fought con- 
 foundedly well. They took Pump Street 
 once. What mad things do happen in the 
 world. To think that of all of us it should be 
 little Wilson with the red whiskers who came out 
 best" 
 
 The King made a note on his paper — 
 
 "Romantic Conduct of Mr. Wilson." 
 
 "Yes," said Buck, "it makes one a bit less proud 
 y/ of one's 'hV " 
 
 The King suddenly folded or crumpled up the 
 paper, and put it in his pocket. 
 
 "I have an idea," he said. "I will be an eye- 
 witness. I will write you such letters from 
 the Front as will be more gorgeous than the 
 real thing. Give me my coat, Paladium. I 
 entered this room a mere King of England. I 
 leave it, Special War Correspondent of the Court 
 Journal. It is useless to stop me, Pally ; it is vain 
 to cling to my knees, Buck ; it is hopeless, Barker, 
 to weep upon my neck. 'When duty calls' — the 
 remainder of the sentiment escapes me. You will 
 receive my first article this evening by the eight 
 o'clock post." 
 
 And, running out of the office, he jumped 
 upon a blue Bayswater omnibus that went 
 swinging by. 
 
 216 
 
The Correspondent of the Court Journal 
 
 "Well," said Barker, gloomily, "well." 
 
 "Barker," said Buck, "business may be lower 
 than politics, but war is, as I discovered last 
 night, a long sight more like business. You 
 politicians are such ingrained demagogues that 
 even when you have a despotism you think of 
 nothing but public opinion. So you learn to tack 
 and run, and are afraid of the first breeze. Now 
 we stick to a thing and get it. And our mistakes 
 help us. Look here ! at this moment we've beaten 
 Wayne." 
 
 "Beaten Wayne," repeated Barker. 
 
 "Why the dickens not?" cried the other, 
 flinging out his hands. "Look here. I said last 
 night that we had them by holding the 
 nine entrances. Well, I was wrong. We 
 should have had them but for a singular event 
 — the lamps went out. But for that it was 
 certain. Has it occurred to you, my bril- 
 liant Barker, that another singular event has hap- 
 pened since that singular event of the lamps going 
 out?" 
 
 "What event?" asked Barker. 
 
 "By an astounding coincidence, the sun has 
 
 risen," cried out Buck, with a savage air of 
 
 patience. "Why the hell aren't we holding all 
 
 those approaches now, and passing in on them 
 
 again? It should have been done at sunrise. 
 
 217 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Mill 
 
 The confounded doctor wouldn't let me go out. 
 You were in command." 
 
 Barker smiled grimly. 
 
 "It is a gratification to me, my dear Buck, 
 to be able to say that we anticipated your 
 suggestions precisely. We went as early as 
 possible to reconnoitre the nine entrances. 
 Unfortunately, while we were fighting each 
 other in the dark, like a lot of drunken 
 navvies, Mr. Wayne's friends were working 
 very hard indeed. Three hundred yards from 
 Pump Street, at every one of those entrances, 
 there is a barricade nearly as high as the houses. 
 They were finishing the last, in Pembridge 
 Road, when we arrived. Our mistakes," he cried 
 bitterly, and flung his cigarette on the ground. 
 "It is not we who learn from them." 
 
 There was a silence for a few moments, and 
 Barker lay back wearily in a chair. The office 
 clock ticked exactly in the stillness. 
 
 At length Barker said suddenly — 
 
 "Buck, does it ever cross your mind what this 
 is all about? The Hammersmith to Maida 
 Vale thoroughfare was an uncommonly good 
 speculation. You and I hoped a great deal 
 from it. But is it worth it? It will cost us 
 thousands to crush this ridiculous riot. Suppose 
 we let it alone?" 
 
 218 
 
The Correspondent of the Court Journal 
 
 "And be thrashed in public by a red-haired 
 madman whom any two doctors would lock up?" 
 cried out Buck, starting to his feet. "What do 
 you propose to do, Mr. Barker? To apologise 
 to the admirable Mr. Wayne? To kneel to the 
 Charter of the Cities? To clasp to your 
 bosom the flag of the Red Lion? To kiss in 
 succession every sacred lamp-post that saved 
 Notting Hill? No, by God! My men fought 
 jolly well — they were beaten by a trick. And 
 they'll fight again." 
 
 "Buck," said Barker, "I always admired you. 
 And you were quite right in what you said the 
 other day." 
 
 "In what?" 
 
 "In saying," said Barker, rising quietly, 
 "that we had all got into Adam Wayne's 
 atmosphere and out of our own. My friend, 
 the whole territorial kingdom of Adam Wayne 
 extends to about nine streets, with barricades at 
 the end of them. But the spiritual kingdom of 
 Adam Wayne extends, God knows where — 
 it extends to this office at any rate. The red- 
 haired madman whom any two doctors would 
 lock up is filling this room with his roar- 
 ing, unreasonable soul. And it was the red- 
 haired madman who said the last word you 
 spoke." 
 
 219 
 
The Napoleon of Hotting Hill 
 
 Buck walked to the window without replying. 
 "You understand, of course," he said at last, 
 "I do not dream of giving in." 
 
 The King, meanwhile, was rattling along on 
 the top of his blue omnibus. The traffic of 
 London as a whole had not, of course, been 
 greatly disturbed by these events, for the affair 
 was treated as a Notting Hill riot, and that 
 area was marked off as if it had been in the 
 hands of a gang of recognised rioters. The 
 blue omnibuses simply went round as they 
 would have done if a road were being 
 mended, and the omnibus on which the cor- 
 respondent of the Court Journal was sitting 
 swept round the corner of Queen's Road, 
 Bayswater. 
 
 The King was alone on the top of the vehicle, 
 and was enjoying the speed at which it was 
 going. 
 
 "Forward, my beauty, my Arab," he said, 
 patting the omnibus encouragingly, "fleetest of 
 all thy bounding tribe. Are thy relations with 
 thy driver, I wonder, those of the Bedouin and 
 his steed? Does he sleep side by side with 
 thee—" 
 
 His meditations were broken by a sudden 
 and jarring stoppage. Looking over the edge, 
 
 220 
 
KING AUBERON DESCENDED FROM THE OMNIBUS WITH DIGNITY 
 
The Correspondent of the Court Journal 
 
 he saw that the heads of the horses were being 
 held by men in the uniform of Wayne's army, 
 and heard the voice of an officer calling out 
 orders. 
 
 King Auberon descended from the omnibus 
 with dignity. The guard or picket of red hal- 
 berdiers who had stopped the vehicle did not 
 number more than twenty, and they were under 
 the command of a short, dark, clever-looking 
 young man, conspicuous among the rest as 
 being clad in an ordinary frock-coat, but girt 
 round the waist with a red sash and a long 
 seventeenth-century sword. A shiny silk hat 
 and spectacles completed the outfit in a pleasing 
 manner. 
 
 "To whom have I the honour of speaking?'' 
 said the King, endeavouring to look like 
 Charles L, in spite of personal difficulties. 
 
 The dark man in spectacles lifted his hat with 
 equal gravity. 
 
 "My name is Bowles," he said. "I am a 
 chemist. I am also a captain of O company of 
 the army of Notting Hill. I am distressed at 
 having to incommode you by stopping the 
 omnibus, but this area is covered by our procla- 
 mation, and we intercept all traffic. May I 
 ask to whom I have the honour — Why, good 
 gracious, I beg your Majesty's pardon. I am 
 
 221 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 quite overwhelmed at finding myself concerned 
 with the King." 
 
 Auberon put up his hands with indescribable 
 grandeur. 
 
 "Not with the King," he said ; "with the special 
 war correspondent of the Court Journal." 
 
 "I beg your Majesty's pardon," began Mr. 
 Bowles, doubtfully. 
 
 "Do you call me Majesty? I repeat," said 
 Auberon firmly, "I am a representative of 
 the press. I have chosen, with a deep sense 
 of responsibility, the name of Pinker. I 
 should desire a veil to be drawn over the 
 past." 
 
 "Very well, sir," said Mr. Bowles, with an 
 air of submission, "in our eyes the sanctity of 
 the press is at least as great as that of the 
 throne. We desire nothing better than that 
 our wrongs and our glories should be widely 
 known. May I ask, Mr. Pinker, if you have any 
 objection to being presented to the Provost and 
 to General Turnbull?" 
 
 "The Provost I have had the honour of 
 meeting," said Auberon, easily. "We old 
 journalists, you know, meet everybody. I 
 should be most delighted to have the same 
 honour again. General Turnbull, also, it would 
 be a gratification to know. The younger m^n 
 
 222 
 
The Correspondent of the Court Journal 
 
 are so interesting. We of the old Fleet Street 
 gang lose touch with them." 
 
 "Will you be so good as to step this way ?" said 
 the leader of O company. 
 
 "I am always good," said Mr. Pinker. "Lead 
 
 »3 
 
Chapter III — The Great Army of South 
 
 Kensington 
 
 — . i, , , , __ 
 
 THE article from the special correspond- 
 ent of the Court Journal arrived in 
 due course, written on very coarse 
 copy-paper in the King's arabesque of hand- 
 writing, in which three words filled a page, 
 and yet were illegible. Moreover, the con- 
 tribution was the more perplexing at first 
 as it opened with a succession of erased para- 
 graphs. The writer appeared to have attempted 
 the article once or twice in several jour- 
 nalistic styles. At the side of one experiment 
 was written, "Try American style," and the 
 fragment began — 
 
 "The King must go. We want gritty men. 
 Flapdoodle is all very ... ;" and then broke 
 off, followed by the note, "Good sound journalism 
 safer. Try it." 
 
 The experiment in good sound journalism 
 appeared to begin — 
 
 "The greatest of English poets has said that a 
 rose by any . . ." 
 
 This also stopped abruptly. The next anno- 
 tation at the side was almost undecipherable, but 
 seemed to be something like — 
 
 224 
 
The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 "How about old Steevens and the mot juste t 
 E.g. . P 
 
 "Morning winked a little wearily at me over 
 the curt edge of Campden Hill and its houses 
 with their sharp shadows. Under the abrupt 
 black cardboard of the outline, it took some 
 little time to detect colours; but at length I saw 
 a brownish yellow shifting in the obscurity, and 
 I knew that it was the guard of Swindon's West 
 Kensington army. They are being held as a 
 reserve, and lining the whole ridge above the 
 Bayswater Road. Their camp and their main 
 force is under the great water works tower on 
 Campden Hill. I forgot to say that the water 
 works tower looked swart. 
 
 "As I passed them and came over the curve 
 of Silver Street, I saw the blue cloudy masses of 
 Barker's men blocking the entrance to the high- 
 road like a sapphire smoke (good). The dispo- 
 sition of the allied troops, under the general 
 management of Mr. Wilson, appears to be as 
 follows, — The Yellow Army (if I may so 
 describe the West Kensingtonians) lies, as I 
 have said, in a strip along the ridge; its furthest 
 point westward being the west side of Camp- 
 den Hill Road, its furthest point eastward 
 the beginning of Kensington Gardens. The 
 Green Army of Wilson lines the Notting Hill 
 
 225 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 High Road itself from Queen's Road to the cor- 
 ner of Pembridge Road, curving round the 
 latter, and extending some three hundred yards 
 up towards Westbourne Grove. Westbourne 
 Grove itself is occupied by Barker of South Ken- 
 sington. The fourth side of this rough square, 
 the Queen's Road side, is held by some of Buck's 
 Purple warriors. 
 
 "The whole resembles some ancient and dainty 
 Dutch flower-bed. Along the crest of Campden 
 Hill lie the golden crocuses of West Kensington. 
 They are, as it were, the first fiery fringe of 
 the whole. Northward lies our hyacinth 
 Barker, with all his blue hyacinths. Round to 
 the south-west run the green rushes of Wilson 
 of Bayswater, and a line of violet irises (aptly 
 symbolised by Mr. Buck) complete the whole. 
 The argent exterior ... (I am losing the style. 
 I should have said * Curving with a whisk' 
 instead of merely 'Curving.' Also I should 
 have called the hyacinths 'sudden.' I cannot keep 
 this up. War is too rapid for this style of 
 writing. Please ask the office-boy to insert mots 
 justes. ) . 
 
 "The truth is that there is nothing to report. 
 That commonplace element which is always 
 ready to devour all beautiful things (as the 
 Black Pig in the Irish Mythology will finally 
 
 226 
 
The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 devour the stars and gods) ; that commonplace 
 element, as I say, has in its Black Piggish way 
 devoured finally the chances of any romance in 
 this affair; that which once consisted of absurd 
 but thrilling combats in the streets, has degen- 
 erated into something which is the very prose of 
 warfare — it has degenerated into a siege. A 
 siege may be defined as a peace plus the p 
 inconvenience of war. Of course Wayne can- 
 not hold out. There is no more chance of 
 help from anywhere else than of ships from the 
 moon. And if old Wayne had stocked his 
 street with tinned meats till all his garrison 
 had to sit on them, he couldn't hold out for more 
 than a month or two. As a matter of melan- 
 choly fact he has done something rather like 
 this. He has stocked his street with food 
 until there must be uncommonly little room to 
 turn round. But what is the good ? To hold out 
 for all that time and then to give in of neces- 
 sity, what does it mean? It means waiting until 
 your victories are forgotten and then taking the 
 trouble to be defeated. I cannot understand how 
 Wayne can be so inartistic. 
 
 "And how odd it is that one views a thing 
 quite differently when one knows it is defeated. 
 I always thought Wayne was rather fine. But 
 now, when I know that he is done for, there seems 
 
 227 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 to be nothing else but Wayne. All the streets 
 seem to point at him, all the chimneys seem to 
 lean towards him. I suppose it is a mor- 
 bid feeling ; but Pump Street seems to be the 
 only part of London that I feel physically. I 
 suppose, I say, that it is morbid. I suppose it is 
 exactly how a man feels about his heart when his 
 heart is weak. Tump Street' — the heart is a 
 pump. And I am drivelling. 
 
 "Our finest leader at the front is beyond all 
 question, General Wilson. He has adopted 
 alone among the other Provosts the uniform of 
 his own halberdiers, although that fine old six- 
 teenth-century garb was not originally intended to 
 go with red side-whiskers. It was he who, against 
 a most admirable and desperate defence, broke 
 last night into Pump Street and held it for at 
 least half an hour. He was afterwards expelled 
 from it by General Turnbull, of Notting Hill, 
 but only after desperate fighting and the sudden 
 descent of that terrible darkness which proved so 
 much more fatal to the forces of General Buck and 
 General Swindon. 
 
 "Provost Wayne himself, with whom I had, 
 with great good fortune, a most interesting 
 interview, bore the most eloquent testimony to 
 the conduct of General Wilson and his men. His 
 precise words are as follows: — 'I have bought 
 
 228 
 
The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 sweets at his funny little shop when I was four 
 years old, and ever since. I never noticed 
 anything, I am ashamed to say, except that 
 he talked through his nose, and didn't wash 
 himself particularly. And he came over our bar- 
 ricade like a devil from hell/ I repeated this 
 speech to General Wilson himself, with some 
 delicate improvements, and he seemed pleased 
 with it. He does not, however, seem pleased 
 with anything so much just now as he is with 
 the wearing of a sword. I have it from the 
 front on the best authority that General 
 Wilson was not completely shaved yesterday. It 
 is believed in military circles that he is growing a 
 moustache. . . . 
 
 "As I have said, there is nothing to report. 
 I walk wearily to the pillar-box at the corner 
 of Pembridge Road to post my copy. Nothing 
 whatever has happened, except the preparations 
 for a particularly long and feeble siege, during 
 which I trust I shall not be required to be at 
 the Front. As I glance up Pembridge Road in 
 the growing dusk, the aspect of that road 
 reminds me that there is one note worth adding. 
 General Buck has suggested, with characteristic 
 acumen, to General Wilson, that in order to 
 obviate the possibility of such a catastrophe 
 as overwhelmed the allied forces in the last 
 
 229 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 advance on Notting Hill (the catastrophe, I 
 mean, of the extinguished lamps), that each 
 soldier should have a lighted lantern round his 
 neck. This is one of the things which I really 
 admire about General Buck. He possesses 
 what people used to mean by 'the humility of 
 the man of science,' that is, he learns steadily 
 from his mistakes. Wayne may score off him in 
 some other way, but not in that way. The lan- 
 terns look like fairy lights as they curve round 
 the end of Pembridge Road. 
 
 "Later. — I write with some difficulty, because 
 the blood will run down my face and make pat- 
 terns on the paper. Blood is a very beautiful 
 thing; that is why it is concealed. If you 
 ask me why blood runs down my face, I can 
 only reply that I was kicked by a horse. If 
 you ask me what horse, I can reply with some 
 pride that it was a war-horse. If you ask me how 
 a war-horse came on the scene in our simple 
 pedestrian warfare, I am reduced to the necessity, 
 so painful to a special correspondent, of recount- 
 ing my experiences. 
 
 "I was, as I have said, in the very act of post- 
 ing my copy at the pillar-box, and of glancing 
 as I did so up the glittering curve of Pem- 
 bridge Road, studded with the lights of Wil- 
 
 230 
 
The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 son's men. I don't know what made me pause 
 to examine the matter, but I had a fancy 
 that the line of lights, where it melted into the 
 indistinct brown twilight, was more indistinct than 
 usual. I was almost certain that in a certain 
 stretch of the road where there had been five 
 lights there were now only four. I strained 
 my eyes; I counted them again, and there 
 were only three. A moment after there were 
 only two; an instant after only one; and an 
 instant after that the lanterns near to me 
 swung like jangled bells, as if struck suddenly. 
 They flared and fell; and for the moment the 
 fall of them was like the fall of the sun and stars 
 out of heaven. It left everything in a primal 
 blindness. As a matter of fact, the road was 
 not yet legitimately dark. There were still 
 red rays of a sunset in the sky, and the 
 brown gloaming was still warmed, as it were, 
 with a feeling as of firelight. But for three 
 seconds after the lanterns swung and sank, I 
 saw in front of me a blackness block- 
 ing the sky. And with the fourth second I 
 knew that this blackness which blocked the sky 
 was a man on a great horse; and I was 
 trampled and tossed aside as a swirl of horse- 
 men swept round the corner. As they turned 
 I saw that they were not black but scarlet; 
 
 231 
 
 OF THE ^ 
 UWIVFRCitv 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Bill 
 
 they were a sortie of the besieged, Wayne riding 
 ahead. 
 
 "I lifted myself from the gutter, blinded with 
 blood from a very slight skin-wound, and, 
 queerly enough, not caring either for the blind- 
 ness or for the slightness of the wound. For 
 one mortal minute after that amazing cavalcade 
 had spun past, there was dead stillness on the 
 empty road. And then came Barker and all his 
 halberdiers running like devils in the track of 
 them. It had been their business to guard the 
 gate by which the sortie had broken out ; but they 
 had not reckoned, and small blame to them, on 
 cavalry. As it was, Barker and his men made a 
 perfectly splendid run after them, almost catching 
 Wayne's horses by the tails. 
 
 "Nobody can understand the sortie. It con- 
 sists only of a small number of Wayne's 
 garrison. Turnbull himself, with the vast mass 
 of it, is undoubtedly still barricaded in Pump 
 Street. Sorties of this kind are natural enough 
 in the majority of historical sieges, such as 
 the siege of Paris in 1870, because in such 
 cases the besieged are certain of some support 
 outside. But what can be the object of it 
 in this case? Wayne knows (or if he is too 
 mad to know anything, at least Turnbull 
 knows) that there is not, and never has been, 
 
 232 
 
The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 the smallest chance of support for him outside; 
 that the mass of the sane modern inhabitants of 
 London regard his farcical patriotism with as 
 much contempt as they do the original idiotcy 
 that gave it birth — the folly of our miserable 
 King. What Wayne and his horsemen are 
 doing nobody can even conjecture. The general 
 theory round here is that he is simply a traitor, 
 and has abandoned the besieged. But all such 
 larger but yet more soluble riddles are as 
 nothing compared to the one small but un- 
 answerable riddle: Where did they get the 
 horses ? 
 
 "Later. — I have heard a most extraordinary 
 account of the origin of the appearance of the 
 horses. It appears that that amazing person, 
 General Turnbull, who is now ruling Pump 
 Street in the absence of Wayne, sent out, on 
 the morning of the declaration of war, a vast 
 number of little boys (or cherubs of the gutter, 
 as we pressmen say), with half-crowns in their 
 pockets, to take cabs all over London. No less 
 than a hundred and sixty cabs met at Pump 
 Street; were commandeered by the garrison. 
 The men were set free, the cabs used to make 
 barricades, and the horses kept in Pump Street, 
 where they were fed and exercised for several 
 
 2 33 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 days, until they were sufficiently rapid and 
 efficient to be used for this wild ride out of 
 the town. If this is so, and I have it on the 
 best possible authority, the method of the sortie 
 is explained. But we have no explanation of 
 its object. Just as Barker's Blues were swing- 
 ing round the corner after them, they were 
 stopped, but not by an enemy; only by the 
 voice of one man, and he a friend. Red 
 Wilson of Bayswater ran alone along the main 
 road like a madman, waving them back with 
 a halberd snatched from a sentinel. He was 
 in supreme command, and Barker stopped at the 
 corner, staring and bewildered. We could hear 
 Wilson's voice loud and distinct out of the 
 dusk, so that it seemed strange that the great 
 voice should come out of the little body. 'Halt, 
 South Kensington! Guard this entry, and pre- 
 vent them returning. I will pursue. Forward, 
 the Green Guards!' 
 
 "A wall of dark blue uniforms and a wood 
 of pole-axes was between me and Wilson, for 
 Barker's men blocked the mouth of the road in 
 two rigid lines. But through them and through 
 the dusk I could hear the clear orders and the 
 clank of arms, and see the green army of Wilson 
 marching by towards the west. They were 
 our great fighting-men. Wilson had filled 
 
 234 
 
The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 them with his own fire; in a few days they had 
 become veterans. Each of them wore a silver 
 medal of a pump, to boast that they alone 
 of all the allied armies had stood victorious in 
 Pump Street. 
 
 "I managed to slip past the detachment of 
 Barker's Blues, who are guarding the end of 
 Pembridge Road, and a sharp spell of running 
 brought me to the tail of Wilson's green army 
 as it swung down the road in pursuit of the flying 
 Wayne. The dusk had deepened into almost 
 total darkness; for some time I only heard 
 the throb of the marching pace. Then sud- 
 denly there was a cry, and the tall fighting 
 men were flung back on me, almost crushing 
 me, and again the lanterns swung and jingled, 
 and the cold nozzles of great horses pushed 
 into the press of us. They had turned and 
 charged us. 
 
 " 'You fools V came the voice of Wilson, 
 cleaving our panic with a splendid cold 
 anger. 'Don't you see? the horses have no 
 riders V 
 
 "It was true. We were being plunged at by 
 a stampede of horses with empty saddles. 
 What could it mean? Had Wayne met some 
 of our men and been defeated ? Or had he flung 
 these horses at us as some kind of ruse or mad 
 
 235 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 new mode of warfare, such as he seemed bent on 
 inventing? Or did he and his men want to get 
 away in disguise? Or did they want to hide in 
 houses somewhere? 
 
 "Never did I admire any man's intellect 
 (even my own) so much as I did Wilson's at 
 that moment. Without a word, he simply 
 pointed the halberd (which he still grasped) to 
 the southern side of the road. As you know, 
 the streets running up to the ridge of Campden 
 Hill from the main road are peculiarly steep, 
 they are more like sudden flights of stairs. We 
 were just opposite Aubrey Road, the steepest of 
 all; up that it would have been far more diffi- 
 cult to urge half-trained horses than to run up on 
 one's feet. 
 
 "'Left wheel!' hallooed Wilson. They have 
 gone up here,' he added to me, who happened to 
 be at his elbow. 
 
 " 'Why?' I ventured to ask. 
 
 " • Can't say for certain,' replied the Bays- 
 water General. They've gone up here in a great 
 hurry anyhow. They've simply turned their 
 horses loose, because they couldn't take them 
 up. I fancy I know. I fancy they're trying 
 to get over the ridge to Kensington or Ham- 
 mersmith, or somewhere, and are striking 
 up here because it's just beyond the end of our 
 
 236 
 
The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 line. Damned fools, not to have gone further 
 along the road, though. They've only just 
 shaved our last outpost. Lambert is hardly 
 four hundred yards from here. And I've sent 
 him word.' 
 
 " ' Lambert !' I said. 'Not young Wilfrid Lam- 
 bert — my old friend/ 
 
 " 'Wilfrid Lambert's his name,' said the Gen- 
 eral; "used to be a 'man about town;' silly 
 fellow with a big nose. That kind of man 
 always volunteers for some war or other. And 
 what's funnier, he generally isn't half bad at it. 
 Lambert is distinctly good. The yellow West 
 Kensingtons I always reckoned the weakest 
 part of the army; but he has pulled them 
 together uncommonly well, though he's sub- 
 ordinate to Swindon, who's a donkey. In the 
 attack from Pembridge Road the other night he 
 showed great pluck.' 
 
 " 'He has shown greater pluck than that/ I 
 said. 'He has criticised my sense of humour. 
 That was his first engagement.' 
 
 "This remark was, I am sorry to say, lost on 
 the admirable commander of the allied forces. 
 We were in the act of climbing the last half of 
 Aubrey Road, which is so abrupt a slope that it 
 looked like an old-fashioned map leaning up 
 against the wall. There are lines of little trees, 
 
 237 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 one above the other, as in the old-fashioned 
 map. 
 
 "We reached the top of it, panting some- 
 what, and were just about to turn the corner 
 by a place called (in chivalrous anticipation of 
 our wars of sword and axe) Tower Crecy, when 
 we were suddenly knocked in the stomach (I 
 can use no other term) by a horde of men 
 hurled back upon us. They wore the red 
 uniform of Wayne; their halberds were broken; 
 their foreheads bleeding; but the mere impetus 
 of their retreat staggered us as we stood at the 
 last ridge of the slope. 
 
 " 'Good old Lambert P yelled out, suddenly, the 
 stolid Mr. Wilson of Bayswater, in an uncon- 
 trollable excitement. 'Damned jolly old Lam- 
 bert ! He's got there already ! He's driving them 
 back on us! Hurrah! hurrah! Forward the 
 Green Guards!' • 
 
 "We swung round the corner eastwards, Wil- 
 son running first, brandishing the halberd. 
 
 "Will you pardon a little egotism ? Every one 
 likes a little egotism, when it takes the form, 
 as mine does in this case, of a disgraceful confes- 
 sion. The thing is really a little interesting, 
 because it shows how the merely artistic habit 
 has bitten into men like me. It was the 
 most intensely exciting occurrence that had ever 
 
 238 
 
/ay, almost 
 
 second it i 
 
 of it even \ 
 
 he second I V 
 
 The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 come to me in my life; and I was really in- 
 tensely excited about it. And yet, as we turned 
 that corner, the first impression I had was of 
 something that had nothing to do with the fight 
 at all. I was stricken from the sky as by a 
 thunderbolt, by the height of the Waterworks 
 Tower on Campden Hill. I don't know whether 
 Londoners generally realise how high it looks 
 when one comes out, in this way, almost 
 immediately under it. For the 
 seemed to me that at the foot 
 human war was a triviality. For the 
 felt as if I had been drunk with some trivial 
 orgie, and that I had been sobered by the shock 
 of that shadow. A moment afterwards, I 
 realised that under it was going on something 
 more enduring than stone, and something 
 wilder than the dizziest height — the agony of* 
 man. And I knew that compared to that, this 
 overwhelming tower was itself a triviality ; it was 
 a mere stalk of stone which humanity could snap 
 like a stick. 
 
 "I don't know why I have talked so much" about 
 this silly old Waterworks Tower, which at the 
 very best was only a tremendous back- 
 ground. It was that, certainly, a sombre and 
 awful landscape, against which our figures were 
 relieved. But I think the real reason was, that 
 
 239 
 
The Napoleon of Not ting Hill 
 
 there was in my own mind so sharp a transition 
 from the tower of stone to the man of flesh. For 
 what I saw first when I had shaken off, as it 
 were, the shadow of the tower, was a man, and a 
 man I knew. 
 
 "Lambert stood at the further corner of the 
 street that curved round the tower, his figure 
 outlined in some degree by the beginning of 
 moonrise. He looked magnificent, a hero; but 
 he looked something much more interesting 
 than that. He was, as it happened, in almost 
 precisely the same swaggering attitude in which 
 he had stood nearly fifteen years ago, when he 
 swung his walking-stick and struck it into the 
 ground, and told me that all my subtlety was 
 drivel. And, upon my soul, I think he required 
 more courage to say that than to fight as he does 
 now. For then he was fighting against some- 
 thing that was in the ascendant, fashionable, and 
 victorious. And now he is fighting (at the risk 
 of his life, no doubt) merely against something 
 which is already dead, which is impossible, 
 futile; of which nothing has been more impos- 
 sible and futile than this very sortie which 
 has brought him into contact with it. People 
 nowadays allow infinitely too little for the 
 psychological sense of victory as a factor in 
 affairs. Then he was attacking the degraded 
 
 240 
 
The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 but undoubtedly victorious Quin; now he is 
 attacking the interesting but totally extinguished 
 [Wayne. 
 
 "His name recalls me to the details of the 
 scene. The facts were these. A line of red 
 halberdiers, headed by Wayne, were marching 
 up the street, close under the northern wall, which 
 is, in fact, the bottom of a sort of dyke or forti- 
 fication of the Waterworks. Lambert and his 
 yellow West Kensingtons had that instant 
 swept round the corner and had shaken the 
 Waynites heavily, hurling back a few of the more 
 timid, as I have just described, into our 
 very arms. When our force struck the tail of 
 Wayne's, every one knew that all was up with 
 him. His favourite military barber was struck 
 down. His grocer was stunned. He him- 
 self was hurt in the thigh, and reeled 
 back against the wall. We had him in a trap 
 with two jaws. 'Is that you?' shouted Lambert, 
 genially, to Wilson, across the hemmed-in host 
 of Notting Hill. That's about the ticket/ re- 
 plied General Wilson; 'keep them under the 
 wall.' 
 
 "The men of Notting Hill were falling fast. 
 Adam Wayne threw up his long arms to the 
 wall above him, and with a spring stood upon 
 it, a gigantic figure against the moon. He tore 
 
 241 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 the banner out of the hands of the standard- 
 bearer below him, and shook it out suddenly 
 above our heads, so that it was like thunder in 
 the heavens. 
 
 " 'Round the Red Lion !' he cried. 'Swords 
 round the Red Lion! Halberds round the 
 Red Lion! They are the thorns round the 
 rose.' 
 
 "His voice and the crack of the banner made 
 a momentary rally, and Lambert, whose idiotic 
 face was almost beautiful with battle, felt it as 
 by an instinct, and cried — 
 
 " 'Drop your public-house flag, you footler ! 
 Drop it!' 
 
 " 'The banner of the Red Lion seldom stoops/ 
 said Wayne, proudly, letting it out luxuriantly on 
 the night wind. 
 
 "The next moment I knew that poor Adam's 
 sentimental theatricality had cost him much. 
 Lambert was on the wall at a bound, his sword 
 in his teeth, and had slashed at Wayne's 
 head before he had time to draw his sword, 
 his hands being busy with the enormous flag. 
 He stepped back only just in time to avoid 
 the first cut, and let the flag-staff fall, so that 
 the spear-blade at the end of it pointed to 
 Lambert. 
 
 " 'The banner stoops/ cried Wayne, in a voice 
 242 
 
The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 that must have startled streets. 'The banner 
 of Notting Hill stoops to a hero/ And with 
 the words he drove the spear-point and half 
 the flag-staff through Lambert's body and dropped 
 him dead upon the road below, a stone upon the 
 stones of the street. 
 
 " 'Notting Hill ! Notting Hill !' cried Wayne, 
 in a sort of divine rage. 'Her banner is 
 all the holier for the blood of a brave enemy! 
 Up on the wall, patriots ! Up on the wall ! Not- 
 ting Hill r 
 
 "With his long strong arm he actually 
 dragged a man up on to the wall to be silhouetted 
 against the moon, and more and more men 
 climbed up there, pulled themselves and were 
 pulled, till clusters and crowds of the half- 
 massacred men of Pump Street massed upon the 
 wall above us. 
 
 " 'Notting Hill ! Notting Hill !' cried Wayne, 
 unceasingly. 
 
 " 'Well, what about Bayswater ?' said a worthy 
 working-man in Wilson's army, irritably. 'Bays- 
 water for ever!' 
 
 " 'We have won !' cried Wayne, striking 
 his flag-staff in the ground. 'Bayswater 
 for ever! We have taught our enemies 
 patriotism !' 
 
 " 'Oh, cut these fellows up and have done 
 243 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 with it!' cried one of Lambert's lieutenants, 
 who was reduced to something bordering on 
 madness by the responsibility of succeeding to 
 the command. 
 
 " 'Let us by all means try/ said Wilson, 
 grimly; and the two armies closed round the 
 third. 
 
 "I simply cannot describe what followed. I 
 am sorry, but there is such a thing as physical 
 fatigue, as physical nausea, and, I may add, as 
 physical terror. Suffice it to say that the above 
 paragraph was written about n p.m., and that 
 it is now about 2 a.m., and that the battle is 
 not finished, and is not likely to be. Suffice it 
 further to say that down the steep streets which 
 lead from the Waterworks Tower to the Not- 
 ting Hill High Road, blood has been running, 
 and is running, in great red serpents, that 
 curl out into the main thoroughfare and shine in 
 the moon. 
 
 "Later. — The final touch has been given to all 
 this terrible futility. Hours have passed; morn- 
 ing has broken ; men are still swaying and fight- 
 ing at the foot of the tower and round the corner 
 of Aubrey Road ; the fight has not finished. But 
 
 I know it is a farce. 
 
 244 
 
The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 "News has just come to show that Wayne's 
 amazing sortie, followed by the amazing resist- 
 ance through a whole night on the wall of the 
 Waterworks, is as if it had not been. What 
 was the object of that strange exodus we shall 
 probably never know, for the simple reason that 
 every one who knew will probably be cut to 
 pieces in the course of the next two or three 
 hours. 
 
 "I have heard, about three minutes ago, that 
 Buck and Buck's methods have won after all. 
 He was perfectly right, of course, when one 
 comes to think of it, in holding that it was 
 physically impossible for a street to defeat a 
 city. While we thought he was patrolling the 
 eastern gates with his Purple army; while we 
 were rushing about the streets and waving 
 halberds and lanterns; while poor old Wilson 
 was scheming like Mqltke and fighting like 
 Achilles to entrap the wild Provost of Notting 
 Hill, — Mr. Buck, retired draper, has simply 
 driven down in a hansom cab and done some- 
 thing about as plain as butter and about as 
 useful and nasty. He has gone down to South 
 Kensington, Brompton, and Fulham, and by 
 spending about four thousand pounds of his 
 private means, has raised an army of nearly as 
 many men; that is to say, an army big enough 
 
 245 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 to beat, not only Wayne, but Wayne and all his 
 present enemies put together. The army, I under- 
 stand, is encamped along High Street, Kensing- 
 ton, and fills it from the Church to Addison Road 
 Bridge. It is to advance by ten different roads 
 uphill to the north. 
 
 "I cannot endure to remain here. Every- 
 thing makes it worse than it need be. The 
 dawn, for instance, has broken round Campden 
 Hill; splendid spaces of silver, edged with 
 gold, are torn out of the sky. Worse still, 
 Wayne and his men feel the dawn; their faces, 
 though bloody and pale, are strangely hopeful 
 . . . insupportably pathetic. Worst of all, for 
 the moment they are winning. If it were not 
 for Buck and the new army they might just, and 
 only just, win. 
 
 "I repeat, I cannot stand it. It is like watch- 
 ing that wonderful play of old Maeterlinck's 
 (you know my partiality for the healthy, jolly 
 old authors of the nineteenth century), in 
 which one has to watch the quiet conduct of 
 people inside a parlour, while knowing that the 
 very men are outside the door whose word can 
 blast it all with tragedy. And this is worse, 
 for the men are not talking, but writhing and 
 bleeding and dropping dead for a thing that is 
 already settled — and settled against them. The 
 
 246 
 
The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 Lt grey 
 ;, as it / 
 will be I 
 
 great grey masses of men still toil and tug and 
 sway hither and thither around the great grey 
 tower; and the tower is still motionless, 
 will always be motionless. These men will 
 crushed before the sun is set; and new men 
 will arise and be crushed, and new wrongs 
 done, and tyranny will always rise again like 
 the sun, and injustice will always be as fresh 
 as the flowers of spring. And the stone 
 tower will always look down on it. Matter, 
 in its brutal beauty, will always look down 
 on those who are mad enough to consent to 
 die, and yet more mad, since they consent to 
 live." 
 
 Thus ended abruptly the first and last contribu- 
 tion of the Special Correspondent of the Court 
 Journal to that valued periodical. 
 
 The Correspondent himself, as has been said, 
 was simply sick and gloomy at the last news of 
 the triumph of Buck. He slouched sadly down 
 the steep Aubrey Road, up which he had the 
 night before run in so unusual an excitement, 
 and strolled out into the empty dawn-lit main 
 road, looking vaguely for a cab. He saw 
 nothing in the vacant space except a blue- 
 and-gold glittering thing, running very fast, 
 which looked at first like a very tall beetle, 
 
 247 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 but turned out, to his great astonishment, to be 
 Barker. 
 
 "Have you heard the good news?" asked that 
 gentleman. 
 
 "Yes/' said Quin, with a measured voice. "I 
 have heard the glad tidings of great joy. Shall 
 we take a hansom down to Kensington? I see 
 one over there." 
 
 They took the cab, and, were, in four minutes, 
 fronting the ranks of the multitudinous and 
 invincible army. Quin had not spoken a word 
 all the way, and something about him had 
 prevented the essentially impressionable Barker 
 from speaking either. 
 
 The great army, as it moved up Kensington 
 High Street, calling many heads to the number- 
 less windows, for it was long indeed — longer than 
 the lives of most of the tolerably young — since 
 such an army had been seen in London. Com- 
 pared with the vast organisation which was now 
 swallowing up the miles, with Buck at its head 
 as leader, and the King hanging at its tail as 
 journalist, the whole story of our problem was 
 insignificant. In the presence of that army the 
 red Notting Hills and the green Bayswaters 
 were alike tiny and straggling groups. In its 
 presence the whole struggle round Pump Street 
 was like an ant-hill under the hoof of an ox. 
 
 248 
 
The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 Every man who felt or looked at that infinity of 
 men knew that it was the triumph of Buck's 
 brutal arithmetic. Whether Wayne was right 
 or wrong, wise or foolish, was quite a fair mat- 
 ter for discussion. But it was a matter oj 
 history. At the foot of Church Street, opposij 
 Kensington Church, they paused in their glowing 
 good humour. 
 
 "Let us send some kind of messenger or herald 
 up to them," said Buck, turning to Barker and 
 the King. "Let us send and ask them to cave in 
 without more muddle." 
 
 "What shall we say to them?" said Barker, 
 doubtfully. 
 
 "The facts of the case are quite sufficient," 
 rejoined Buck. "It is the facts of the case that 
 make an army surrender. Let us simply say 
 that our army that is fighting their army, 
 and their army that is fighting our army, 
 amount altogether to about a thousand men. Say 
 that we have four thousand. It is very simple. 
 Of the thousand fighting, they have at the 
 very most, three hundred, so that, with those 
 three hundred, they have now to fight four 
 thousand seven hundred men. Let them do it 
 if it amuses them." 
 
 And the Provost of North Kensington 
 laughed. 
 
 249 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 The herald who was despatched up Church 
 Street in all the pomp of the South Kensington 
 blue and gold, with the Three Birds on his tabard, 
 was attended by two trumpeters. 
 
 "What will they do when they consent?" 
 asked Barker, for the sake of saying some- 
 thing in the sudden stillness of that immense 
 army. 
 
 "I know my Wayne very well," said Buck, 
 laughing. "When he submits he will send a red 
 herald flaming with the Lion of Notting Hill. 
 Even defeat will be delightful to him, since it is 
 formal and romantic." 
 
 The King, who had strolled up to the head of 
 the line, broke silence for the first time. 
 
 "I shouldn't wonder," he said, "if he defied 
 you, and didn't send the herald after all. I don't 
 think you do know your Wayne quite so well as 
 you think." 
 
 "All right, your Majesty," said Buck, easily; 
 "if it isn't disrespectful, I'll put my political cal- 
 culations in a very simple form. I'll lay you ten 
 pounds to a shilling the herald comes with the 
 surrender." 
 
 "All right," said Auberon. "I may be wrong, 
 but it's my notion of Adam Wayne that he'll die 
 in his city, and that, till he is ckad ? it will not be 
 a safe property." 
 
 250 
 
The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 "The bet's made, your Majesty," said Buck. 
 
 Another long silence ensued, in the course of 
 which Barker alone, amid the motionless 
 army, strolled and stamped in his restless 
 way. 
 
 Then Buck suddenly leant forward. 
 
 "It's taking your money, your Majesty," he 
 said. "I knew it was. There comes the herald 
 from Adam Wayne." 
 
 "It's not," cried the King, peering forward also. 
 "You brute, it's a red omnibus." 
 
 "It's not," said Buck, calmly; and the King 
 did not answer, for down the centre of the spa- 
 cious and silent Church Street was walking, 
 beyond question, the herald of the Red Lion, with 
 two trumpeters. 
 
 Buck had something in him which taught 
 him how to be magnanimous. In his hour of 
 success he felt magnanimous towards Wayne, 
 whom he really admired; magnanimous towards 
 the King, off whom he had scored so publicly; 
 and, above all, magnanimous towards Barker, 
 who was the titular leader of this vast South 
 Kensington army, which his own talent had 
 evoked. 
 
 "General Barker," he said, bowing, "do you 
 propose now to receive the message from the be- 
 sieged ?" 
 
 251 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 Barker bowed also, and advanced towards the 
 herald. 
 
 "Has your master, Mr. Adam Wayne, received 
 our request for surrender ?" he asked. 
 
 The herald conveyed a solemn and respectful 
 affirmative. 
 
 Barker resumed, coughing slightly, but encour- 
 aged. 
 
 "What answer does your master send ?" 
 
 The herald again inclined himself sub- 
 missively, and answered in a kind of mono- 
 tone. 
 
 "My message is this. Adam Wayne, Lord 
 High Provost of Notting Hill, under the 
 charter of King Auberon and the laws of God 
 and all mankind, free and of a free city, greets 
 James Barker, Lord High Provost of South 
 Kensington, by the same rights free and 
 honourable, leader of the army of the South. 
 With all friendly reverence, and with all con- 
 stitutional consideration, he desires James 
 Barker to lay down his arms, and the whole 
 army under his command to lay down their 
 arms also." 
 
 Before the words were ended the King had 
 run forward into the open space with shining 
 eyes. The rest of the staff and the forefront 
 of the army were literally struck breathless. 
 
 252 
 
The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 When they recovered they began to laugh 
 beyond restraint; the revulsion was too 
 sudden. 
 
 "The Lord High Provost of Notting Hill," 
 continued the herald, "does not propose, in the 
 event of your surrender, to use his victory for 
 any of those repressive purposes which others 
 have entertained against him. He will leave you 
 your free laws and your free cities, your flags 
 and your governments. He will not destroy the 
 religion of South Kensington, or crush the old 
 customs of Bays water." 
 
 An irrepressible explosion of laughter went up 
 from the forefront of the great army. 
 
 "The King must have had something to do 
 with this humour," said Buck, slapping his thigh. 
 "It's too deliciously insolent. Barker, have a glass 
 of wine." 
 
 And in his conviviality he actually sent a 
 soldier across to the restaurant opposite the 
 church and brought out two glasses for a 
 toast. 
 
 When the laughter had died down, the herald 
 continued quite monotonously — 
 
 "In the event of your surrendering your 
 arms and dispersing under the superintendence 
 of our forces, these local rights of yours shall 
 be carefully observed. In the event of your 
 
 253 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 not doing so, the Lord High Provost of Not- 
 ting Hill desires to announce that he has just 
 captured the Waterworks Tower, just above 
 you, on Campden Hill, and that within ten min- 
 utes from now, that is, on the reception 
 through me of your refusal, he will open the great 
 reservoir and flood the whole valley where you 
 stand in thirty feet of water. God save King 
 Auberon !" 
 
 Buck had dropped his glass and sent a great 
 splash of wine over the road. 
 
 "But — but — " he said ; and then by a last and 
 splendid effort of his great sanity, looked the facts 
 in the face. 
 
 "We must surrender, ,, he said. "You could 
 do nothing against fifty thousand tons of 
 water coming down a steep hill, ten minutes 
 hence. We must surrender. Our four thousand 
 men might as well be four. Vicisti Galilcee! Per- 
 kins, you may as well get me another glass of 
 wine." 
 
 In this way the vast army of South Kensing- 
 ton surrendered and the Empire of Notting Hill 
 began. One further fact in this connection 
 is perhaps worth mentioning — the fact that, 
 after his victory, Adam Wayne caused the 
 great tower on Campden Hill to be plated with 
 gold and inscribed with a great epitaph, saying 
 
 254 
 
The Great Army of South Kensington 
 
 that it was the monument of Wilfrid Lambert, 
 the heroic defender of the place, and sur- 
 mounted with a statue, in which his large 
 nose was done something less than jus- 
 tice to. 
 
 255 
 
BOOK V 
 
Chapter I — "The Empire of Notting 
 Hill" 
 
 ON the evening of the third of Octo- 
 ber, twenty years after the great 
 victory of Notting Hill, which 
 gave it the dominion of London, King 
 Auberon, came, as of old, out of Kensing- 
 ton Palace. 
 
 He had changed little, save for a streak or 
 two of grey in his hair, for his face had always 
 been old, and his step slow, and, as it were, 
 decrepit. 
 
 If he looked old, it was not because of any- 
 thing physical or mental. It was because he 
 still wore, with a quaint conservatism, the 
 frock-coat and high hat of the days before the 
 great war. "I have survived the Deluge," he 
 said. "I am a pyramid, and must behave as 
 such." 
 
 As he passed up the street the Kensingtonians, 
 in their picturesque blue smocks, saluted him 
 as a King, and then looked after him as a 
 curiosity. It seemed odd to them that men had 
 once worn so elvish an attire. 
 
 The King, cultivating the walk attributed to 
 the oldest inhabitant ("Gaffer Auberon" his 
 
 259 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 friends were now confidentially desired to call 
 him), went toddling northward. He paused, 
 with reminiscence in his eye, at the Southern 
 Gate of Notting Hill, one of those nine great 
 gates of bronze and steel, wrought with reliefs 
 of the old battles, by the hand of Chiffy him- 
 self. 
 
 "Ah!" he said, shaking his head and assum- 
 ing an unnecessary air of age, and a provincialism 
 of accent, "Ah! I mind when there warn't none 
 of this here." 
 
 He passed through the Ossington Gate, sur- 
 mounted by a great lion, wrought in red copper 
 on yellow brass, with the motto, "Nothing 111." 
 The guard in red and gold saluted him with his 
 halberd. 
 
 It was about sunset, and the lamps were 
 being lit. Auberon paused to look at them, for 
 they were Chiffy's finest work, and his artistic 
 eye never failed to feast on them. In memory 
 of the Great Battle of the Lamps, each great 
 iron lamp was surmounted by a veiled figure, 
 sword in hand, holding over the flame an iron 
 hood or extinguisher, as if ready to let it fall 
 if the armies of the South and West should 
 again show their flags in the city. Thus no 
 child in Notting Hill could play about the 
 streets without the very lamp-posts reminding 
 
 260 
 
The Empire of Notting Hill 
 
 him of the salvation of his country in the dread- 
 ful year. 
 
 "Old Wayne was right in a way," com- 
 mented the King. "The sword does make 
 things beautiful. It has made the whole world - 
 romantic by now. And to think people once* 
 thought me a buffoon for suggesting a romantic 
 Notting Hill. Deary me, deary me (I think 
 that is the expression). It seems like a previous 
 existence. ,, 
 
 Turning a corner he found himself in Pump 
 Street, opposite the four shops which Adam 
 Wayne had studied twenty years before. He 
 entered idly the shop of Mr. Mead, the grocer. 
 Mr. Mead was somewhat older, like the rest of 
 the world, and his red beard, which he now 
 wore with a moustache, and long and full, was 
 partly blanched and discoloured. He was 
 dressed in a long and richly embroidered robe 
 of blue, brown, and crimson, interwoven with 
 an Eastern complexity of pattern, and covered 
 with obscure symbols and pictures, representing 
 his wares passing from hand to hand and from 
 nation to nation. Round his neck was the 
 chain with the Blue Argosy cut in turquoise, 
 which he wore as Grand Master of the Grocers. 
 The whole shop had the sombre and sumptuous 
 look of its owner. The wares were displayed 
 
 261 
 
The Napoleo?i of Notting Hill 
 
 as prominently as in the old days, but they 
 were now blended and arranged with a sense of 
 tint and grouping, too often neglected by the 
 dim grocers of those forgotten days. The 
 wares were shown plainly, but shown not so 
 much as an old grocer would have shown his 
 stock, but rather as an educated virtuoso would 
 have shown his treasures. The tea was stored 
 in great blue and green vases, inscribed with the 
 nine indispensable sayings of the wise men of 
 China. Other vases of a confused orange and 
 purple, less rigid and dominant, more humble 
 and dreamy, stored symbolically the tea of India. 
 A row of caskets of a simple silvery metal 
 contained tinned meats. Each was wrought 
 with some rude but rhythmic form, as a shell, a 
 horn, a fish, or an apple, to indicate what material 
 had been canned in it. 
 
 "Your Majesty," said Mr. Mead, sweep- 
 ing an Oriental reverence. "This is an 
 honour to me, but yet more an honour to 
 the city." 
 
 Auberon took off his hat. 
 
 "Mr. Mead," he said, "Notting Hill, 
 whether in giving or taking, can deal in 
 nothing but honour. Do you happen to sell 
 liquorice ?" 
 
 "Liquorice, sire," said Mr. Mead, "is not the 
 262 
 
The Empire of Notling Hill 
 
 least important of our benefits out of the dark 
 heart of Arabia." 
 
 And going reverently towards a green and sil- 
 ver canister, made in the form of an Arabian 
 mosque, he proceeded to serve his customer. 
 
 "I was just thinking, Mr. Mead," said the 
 King reflectively, "I don't know why I should 
 think about it just now, but I was just thinking of 
 twenty years ago. Do you remember the times 
 before the war?" 
 
 The grocer, having wrapped up the liquorice 
 sticks in a piece of paper (inscribed with some 
 appropriate sentiment), lifted his large grey 
 eyes dreamily, and looked at the darkening sky 
 outside. 
 
 "Oh yes, your Majesty," he said. "I remem- 
 ber these streets before the Lord Provost be- 
 gan to rule us. I can't remember how we felt 
 very well. All the great songs and the fight- 
 ing change one so; and I don't think we can 
 really estimate all we owe to the Provost; but 
 I can remember his coming into this very shop 
 twenty-two years ago, and I remember the 
 things he said. The singular thing is that 
 as far as I remember I thought the things he 
 said odd at that time. Now it's the things that 
 I said, as far as I can recall them, that seem to 
 me odd — as odd as a madman's antics." 
 
 263 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 "Ah!" said the King; and looked at him with 
 f an unfathomable quietness. 
 
 "I thought nothing of being a grocer then," 
 /hd said. "Isn't that odd enough for anybody? 
 I thought nothing of all the wonderful places 
 that my goods come from, and wonderful ways 
 that they are made. I did not know that I was 
 for all practical purposes a king with slaves 
 spearing fishes near the secret-pool, and gather- 
 ing fruits in the islands under the world. My 
 mind was a blank on the thing. I was as mad as 
 a hatter." 
 
 The King turned also, and stared out into the 
 dark, where the great lamps that commemorated 
 the battle were already flaming. 
 
 "And is this the end of poor old Wayne?" 
 he said, half to himself. "To inflame every 
 one so much that he is lost himself in the blaze. 
 Is this his victory, that he, my incomparable 
 Wayne, is now only one in a world of Waynes? 
 Has he conquered and become by conquest com- 
 / monplace? Must Mr. Mead, the grocer, talk as 
 high as he? Lord ! what a strange world in which 
 a man cannot remain unique even by taking the 
 ^J " trouble to go mad." 
 
 And he went dreamily out of the shop. 
 
 He paused outside the next one almost pre- 
 cisely as the Provost had done two decades before. 
 
 264 
 
 / 
 
"A FINE EVENING SIR," 3AID THE CHBMJ8T 
 
The Empire of Notting Hill 
 
 "How uncommonly creepy this shop looks," 
 he said. "But yet somehow encouragingly 
 creepy, invitingly creepy. It looks like some- 
 thing in a jolly old nursery story in which you 
 are frightened out of your skin, and yet know 
 that things always end well. The way those 
 low sharp gables are carved like great black 
 bat's wings folded down, and the way those 
 queer-coloured bowls underneath are made to 
 shine like giant's eye-balls. It looks like a 
 benevolent warlock's hut. It is apparently a 
 chemist's." 
 
 Almost as he spoke, Mr. Bowles, the chemist, 
 came to his shop door in a long black velvet 
 gown and hood, monastic as it were, but yet 
 with a touch of the diabolic. His hair was 
 still quite black, and his face even paler than of 
 old. The only spot of colour he carried was a 
 red star cut in some precious stone of strong 
 tint, hung on his breast. He belonged to the 
 Society of the Red Star of Charity, founded on 
 the lamps displayed by doctors and chemists. 
 
 "A fine evening, sir," said the chemist. 
 "Why, I can scarcely be mistaken in supposing 
 it to be your Majesty. Pray step inside and 
 shaj^ a bottle of sal-volatile, or anything that 
 may take your fancy. As it happens there is 
 aft old acquaintance of your Majesty's in my 
 
 265 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 shop carousing (if I may be permitted the term) 
 upon that beverage at this moment." 
 
 The King entered the shop, which was an 
 Aladdin's garden of shades and hues, for as the 
 chemist's scheme of colour was more brilliant than 
 the grocer's scheme, so it was arranged with even 
 more delicacy and fancy. Never, if the phrase 
 may be employed, had such a nosegay of medi- 
 / cines been presented to the artistic eye. 
 
 But even the solemn rainbow of that evening 
 interior was rivalled or even eclipsed by the 
 figure standing in the centre of the shop. His 
 form, which was a large and stately one, was 
 clad in a brilliant blue velvet, cut in the richest 
 Renaissance fashion, and slashed so as to show 
 gleams and gaps of a wonderful lemon or pale 
 yellow. He had several chains round his neck 
 and his plumes, which were of several tints of 
 bronze and gold, hung down to the great gold 
 hilt of his long sword. He was drinking a 
 dose of sal-volatile, and admiring its opal tint. 
 The King advanced with a slight mystification 
 towards the tall figure, whose face was in shadow, 
 then he said — 
 
 "By the Great Lord of Luck, Barker!" 
 
 The figure removed his plumed cap, showing 
 the same dark head and long, almost ejjuine, 
 face which the King had so often seen fWg 
 
 266 
 
The Empire of Notting Hill 
 
 out of the high collar of Bond Street. Except 
 for a grey patch on each temple, it was totally 
 unchanged. 
 
 "Your Majesty," said Barker, "this is a 
 meeting nobly retrospective, a meeting that has 
 about it a certain October gold. I drink to old 
 days ;" and he finished his sal-volatile with simple 
 feelingf. 
 
 T! am delighted to see you again, Barker," 
 said the King. "It is, indeed, long since we 
 met. What with my travels in Asia Minor, 
 and my book having to be written (you have 
 read my 'Life of Prince Albert for Children/ of 
 course), we have scarcely met twice since the 
 Great War. That is twenty years ago." 
 
 "I wonder," said Barker, thoughtfully, "if I 
 might speak freely to your Majesty." 
 
 "Well," said Auberon, "it's rather late in the 
 day to start speaking respectfully. Flap away, my 
 bird of freedom." 
 
 "Well, your Majesty," replied Barker, lower- 
 ing his voice, "I don't think it will be so long to 
 the next war." 
 
 "What do you mean?" asked Auberon. 
 
 "We will stand this insolence no longer," 
 burst out Barker, fiercely. "We are not slaves 
 because Adam Wayne twenty years ago cheated 
 us with a water-pipe. Notting Hill is Notting 
 
 *>7 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 Hill; it is not the world. We in South 
 Kensington, we also have memories — aye, and 
 hopes. If they fought for these trumpery 
 shops and a few lamp-posts, shall we not fight 
 for the great High Street and the sacred Natural 
 History Museum ?" 
 
 "Great Heavens!" said the astounded Au- 
 beron. "Will wonders never cease? Have the 
 two greatest marvels been achieved? Have 
 you turned altruistic, and has Wayne turned 
 seMsh ? Are * you the patriot, and he the 
 tyrant?" 
 
 "It is not from Wayne himself altogether that 
 the evil comes," answered Barker. "He, in- 
 deed, is now mostly wrapped in dreams, and 
 sits with his old sword beside the fire. But 
 Notting Hill is the tyrant, your Majesty. Its 
 Council and its crowds have been so intoxicated 
 by the spreading over the whole city of Wayne's 
 old ways and visions, that they try to meddle 
 with every one, and rule every one, and civilise 
 every one, and tell every one what is good for 
 him. I do not deny the great impulse which 
 his old war, wild as it seemed, gave to the civic 
 life of our time. It came when I was still a 
 young man, and I admit it enlarged my career. 
 But we are not going to see our own cities 
 flouted and thwarted from day to day because 
 
 268 
 
The Empire of Hotting Hill 
 
 of something Wayne did for us all nearly a 
 quarter of a century ago. I am just waiting 
 here for news upon this very matter. It is 
 rumoured that Notting Hill has vetoed the 
 statue of General Wilson they are putting up 
 opposite Chepstow Place. If that is so, it is 
 a black and white shameless breach of the terms 
 on which we surrendered to Turnbull after the 
 battle of the Tower. We were to keep our 
 own customs and self-government. If that 
 is so — " 
 
 "It is so," said a deep voice; and both men 
 turned round. 
 
 A burly figure in purple robes, with a silver 
 eagle hung round his neck and moustaches 
 almost as florid as his plumes, stood in the 
 doorway. 
 
 "Yes," he said, acknowledging the King's start, 
 "I am Provost Buck, and the news is true. These 
 men of the Hill have forgotten that we fought 
 round the Tower as well as they did, and 
 that it is sometimes foolish, as well as base, to 
 despise the conquered." 
 
 "Let us step outside," said Barker, with a grim 
 composure. 
 
 Buck did so, and stood rolling his eyes up and 
 down the lamp-lit street. 
 
 "I would like to have a go at smashing all 
 269 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 this," he muttered, "though I am over sixty. I 
 would like — " 
 
 His voice ended in a cry, and he reeled back a 
 step, with his hands to his eyes, as he had done 
 in those streets twenty years before. 
 
 "Darkness !" he cried — "darkness again ! What 
 does it mean ?" 
 
 For in truth every lamp in the street had 
 gone out, so that they could not see even each 
 other's outline, except faintly. The voice of the 
 chemist came with startling cheerfulness out of 
 the density. 
 
 "Oh, don't you know?" he said. "Did they 
 never tell you this is the Feast of the Lamps, 
 the anniversary of the great battle that almost 
 lost and just saved Notting Hill? Don't you 
 know, your Majesty, that on this night twen- 
 ty-one years ago we saw Wilson's green uni- 
 forms charging down this street, and driving 
 Wayne and Turnbull back upon the gas-works, 
 righting with their handful of men like fiends from 
 hell? And that then, in that great hour, Wayne 
 sprang through a window of the gas-works, 
 with one blow of his hand brought darkness on 
 the whole city, and then with a cry like a 
 lion's, that was heard through four streets, flew 
 at Wilson's men, sword in hand, and swept 
 them, bewildered as they were, and ignorant of 
 
 270 
 
The Empire of Notting Hill 
 
 the map, clear out of the sacred street again ? And 
 don't you know that upon that night every year 
 all lights are turned out for half an hour while 
 we sing the Notting Hill anthem in the darkness ? 
 Hark ! there it begins." 
 
 Through the night came a crash of drums, and 
 then a strong swell of human voices — 
 
 "When the world was in the balance, there was night on 
 
 Notting Hill, 
 (There was night on Notting Hill): it was nobler than the 
 
 day; 
 On the cities where the lights are and the firesides glow. 
 From the seas and from the deserts came the thing we did 
 
 not know, 
 Came the darkness, came the darkness, came the darkness 
 on the foe, 
 And the old guard of God turned to bay. 
 For the old guard of God turns to bay, turns to bay, 
 And the stars fall down before it ere its banners fall to-day. 
 For when armies were arcund us as a howling and a horde, 
 When falling was the citadel and broken was the sword, 
 The darkness came upon them like the Dragon of the Lord, 
 When the old guard of God turned to bay." 
 
 The voices were just uplifting themselves in a 
 second verse, when they were stopped by a scurry 
 and a yell. Barker had bounded into the street 
 with a cry of "South Kensington!" and a 
 drawn dagger. In less time than man could 
 blink, the whole packed street was full of curses 
 and struggling. Barker was flung back against 
 
 271 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 the shop-front, but used the second only to draw 
 his sword as well as his dagger, and calling out, 
 "This is not the first time I've come through the 
 thick of you," flung himself again into the press. 
 It was evident that he had drawn blood at last, 
 for a more violent outcry arose, and many other 
 knives and swords were discernible in the faint 
 light. Barker, after having wounded more than 
 one man, seemed on the point of being flung 
 back again, when Buck suddenly stepped out 
 into the street. He had no weapon, for he 
 affected rather the peaceful magnificence of the 
 great burgher, than the pugnacious dandyism 
 which had replaced the old sombre dandyism 
 in Barker. But with a blow of his clenched 
 fist he broke the pane of the next shop, which 
 was the old curiosity shop, and, plunging in his 
 hand, snatched a kind of Japanese scimitar, and 
 calling out, "Kensington ! Kensington !" rushed to 
 Barker's assistance. 
 
 Barker's sword was broken, but he was laying 
 about him with his dagger. Just as Buck ran 
 up, a man of Notting Hill struck Barker down, 
 but Buck struck the man down on top of him, 
 and Barker sprang up again, the blood running 
 down his face. 
 
 Suddenly all these cries were cloven by a 
 great voice, that seemed to fall out of heaven. 
 
 272 
 
The Empire of Notting Hill 
 
 It was terrible to Buck and Barker and the King 
 from its seeming to come out the empty skies; 
 but it was more terrible because it was a familiar 
 voice, and one which at the same time they had 
 not heard for so long. 
 
 "Turn up the lights/' said the voice from 
 above them, and for a moment there was no reply, 
 but only, a tumult. 
 
 "In the name of Notting Hill, and of the great 
 Council of the City, turn up the lights." 
 
 There was again a tumult and a vagueness 
 for a moment, then the whole street and every 
 object in it sprang suddenly out of the darkness, 
 as every lamp sprang into life. And looking up 
 they saw, standing upon a balcony near the roof 
 of one of the highest houses, the figure and the 
 face of Adam Wayne, his red hair blowing behind 
 him, a little streaked with grey. 
 
 "What is this, my people?" he said. "Is it 
 altogether impossible to make a thing good 
 without it immediately insisting on being 
 wicked? The glory of Notting Hill in having 
 achieved its independence, has been enough 
 for me to dream of for many years, as I sat 
 beside the fire. Is it really not enough for 
 you, who have had so many other affairs to 
 excite and distract you? Notting Hill is a 
 nation. Why should it condescend to be a 
 
 273 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 mere Empire? You wish to pull down the 
 statue of General Wilson, which the men of 
 Bayswater have so rightly erected in West- 
 bourne Grove. Fools! Who erected that 
 statue? Did Bayswater erect it? No. Not- 
 ting Hill erected it. Do you not see that it is 
 the glory of our achievement that we have 
 infected the other cities with the idealism of 
 Notting Hill? It is we who have created not 
 only our own side, but both sides of this con- 
 troversy. O too humble fools — why should you 
 wish to destroy your enemies? You have done 
 something more to them. You have created your 
 enemies. You wish to pull down that gigantic 
 silver hammer, which stands, like an obelisk, in 
 the centre of the Broadway of Hammersmith. 
 Fools! Before Notting Hill arose, did any 
 person passing through Hammersmith Broad- 
 way expect to see there a gigantic silver hammer ? 
 You wish to abolish the great bronze figure of 
 a knight standing upon the artificial bridge at 
 Knightsbridge. Fools! Who would have 
 thought of it before Notting Hill arose? I 
 have even heard, and with deep pain I have 
 heard it, that the evil eye of our imperial 
 envy has been cast towards the remote horizon 
 of the west, and that we have objected to the 
 great black monument of a crowned raven, 
 
 274 
 
The Empire of dotting Hill 
 
 which commemorates the skirmish of Ravens- 
 court Park. Who created all these things? 
 Were they there before we came? Cannot 
 you be content with that destiny which was 
 enough for Athens, which was enough for 
 Nazareth? the destiny, the humble purpose 
 of creating a new world. Is Athens angry 
 because Romans and Florentines have adopted 
 her phraseology for expressing their own 
 patriotism? Is Nazareth angry because as a 
 little village it has become the type of all little 
 villages out of which, as the Snobs say, no good 
 can come? Has Athens asked every one to 
 wear the chlamys? Are all followers of the 
 Nazarene compelled to wear turbans? No! 
 but the soul of Athens went forth and made 
 men drink hemlock, and the soul of Nazareth 
 went forth and made men consent to be cru- 
 cified. So has the soul of Notting Hill gone 
 forth and made men realise what it is to 
 live in a city. Just as we inaugurated our 
 symbols and ceremonies, so they have inaugu- 
 rated theirs; and are you so mad as to con- 
 tend against them? Notting Hill is right; it 
 has always been right. It has moulded itself on 
 its own necessities, its own sine qua non, 
 it has accepted its own ultimatum. Because 
 it is a nation it has created itself. And 
 
 275 
 
The Napoleon of Not ting Hill 
 
 because it is a nation it can destroy itself. 
 Notting Hill shall always be the judge. If 
 it is your will because of this matter of 
 General Wilson's statue to make war upon 
 Bayswater — " 
 
 A roar of cheers broke in upon his words, 
 and further speech was impossible. Pale to 
 the lips, the great patriot tried again and again 
 to speak; but even his authority could not keep 
 down the dark and roaring masses in the 
 street below him. He said something further, 
 but it was not audible. He descended at last 
 sadly from the garret in which he lived, and 
 mingled with the crowd at the foot of the houses. 
 Finding General Turnbull, he put his hand on 
 his shoulder with a queer affection and gravity, 
 and said — 
 
 "To-morrow, old man, we shall have a new 
 experience, as fresh as the flowers of spring. 
 We shall be defeated. You and I have been 
 through three battles together, and have some- 
 how or other missed this peculiar delight. It 
 is unfortunate that we shall not probably be 
 able to exchange our experiences, because, as it 
 most annoyingly happens, we shall probably both 
 be dead." 
 
 Turnbull looked dimly surprised. 
 
 "I don't mind so much about being dead," he 
 276 
 
The Empire of dotting Hill 
 
 said, "but why should you say that we shall be 
 defeated?" 
 
 "The answer is very simple," replied Wayne, 
 calmly. "It is because we ought to be defeated. # 
 We have been in the most horrible holes before 
 now; but in all those I was perfectly certain 
 that the stars were on our side, and that we ought 
 to get out. Now, I know that we ought not to 
 get out ; and that takes away from me everything 
 with which I won." 
 
 As Wayne spoke he started a little, for both 
 men became aware that a third figure was listen- 
 ing to them — a small figure with wondering 
 eyes. 
 
 "Is it really true, my dear Wayne," said the 
 King, interrupting, "that you think you will be 
 beaten to-morrow?" 
 
 "There can be no doubt about it whatever," 
 replied Adam Wayne; "the real reason is the one 
 of which I have just spoken. But as a conces- 
 sion to your materialism, I will add that they 
 have an organised army of a hundred allied cities 
 against our one. That in itself, however, would 
 be unimportant." 
 
 Quin, with his round eyes, seemed strangely 
 insistent. 
 
 "You are quite sure," he said, "that you must 
 be beaten?" 
 
 277 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 "I am afraid," said Turnbull, gloomily, "that 
 there can be no doubt about it." 
 
 "Then," cried the King, flinging out his 
 'arms, "give me a halberd! Give me a halberd, 
 somebody! I desire all men to witness that I, 
 Auberon, King of England, do here and now 
 abdicate and implore the Provost of Notting Hill 
 to permit me to enlist in his army. Give me a 
 halberd!" 
 
 He seized one from some passing guard, and, 
 shouldering it, stamped solemnly after the shout- 
 ing columns of halberdiers which were, by this 
 time, parading the streets. He had, however, 
 nothing to do with the wrecking of the statue 
 of General Wilson, which took place before 
 morning. 
 
 278 
 
Chapter II — The Last Battle 
 
 THE day was cloudy when Wayne went 
 down to die with all his army in 
 Kensington Gardens; it was cloudy 
 again when that army had been swal- 
 lowed up by the vast armies of a new world. 
 There had been an almost uncanny interval 
 of sunshine, in which the Provost of Notting 
 Hill, with all the placidity of an onlooker, had 
 gazed across to the hostile armies on the 
 great spaces of verdure opposite; the long 
 strips of green and blue and gold lay 
 across the park in squares and oblongs 
 like a proposition in Euclid wrought in a 
 rich embroidery. But the sunlight was a 
 weak and, as it were, a wet sunlight, and 
 was soon swallowed up. Wayne spoke to 
 the King, with a queer sort of coldness and 
 languor, as to the military operations. It was 
 as he had said the night before, that being 
 deprived of his sense of an impracticable rec-* 
 titude he was, in effect, being deprived of 
 everything. He was out of date, and at sea in 
 a mere world of compromise and competition, 
 of Empire against Empire, of the tolerably right 
 and the tolerably wrong. When his eye fell on 
 
 279 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 the King, however, who was marching very 
 gravely with a top hat and a halberd, it 
 brightened slightly. 
 
 "Well, your Majesty," he said, "you at least 
 ought to be proud to-day. If your children 
 are fighting each other, at least those who 
 win are your children. Other kings have dis- 
 tributed justice, you have distributed life. 
 Other kings have ruled a nation, you have 
 created nations. Others have made kingdoms, 
 you have begotten them. Look at your children, 
 father." And he stretched his hand out towards 
 the enemy. 
 
 Auberon did not raise his eyes. 
 
 "See how splendidly," cried Wayne, "the new 
 cities come on — the new cities from across the 
 river. See where Battersea advances over 
 there — under the flag of the Lost Dog; and 
 Putney — don't you see the Man on the White 
 Boar shining on their standard as the sun 
 catches it? It is the coming of a new age, your 
 Majesty. Notting Hill is not a common em- 
 tf pire; it is a thing like Athens, the mother of 
 a mode of life, of a manner. of living, which 
 shall renew the youth of the world — a thing 
 like Nazareth. When I was young I remem- 
 ber, in the old dreary days, wiseacres used to 
 write books about how trains would get faster, 
 
 28Q 
 
The Last Battle 
 
 and all the world would be one empire, and 
 tram-cars go to the moon. And even as a child 
 I used to say to myself, Tar more likely 
 that we shall go on the crusades again, or 
 worship the gods of the city.' And so it has 
 been. And I am glad, though this is my last 
 battle." 
 
 Even as he spoke there came a crash of steel 
 from the left, and he turned his head. 
 
 "Wilson!" he cried, with a kind of joy. 
 "Red Wilson has charged our left. No one 
 can hold him in; he eats swords. He is as keen 
 a soldier as Turnbull, but less patient — less 
 really great. Ha! and Barker is moving. 
 How Barker has improved; how hand- 
 some he looks. It is not all having plumes; 
 it is also having a soul in one's daily life. 
 Ha!" 
 
 And another crash of steel on the right 
 showed that Barker had closed with Notting 
 Hill on the other side. 
 
 "Turnbull is there!" cried Wayne. "See 
 him hurl them back! Barker is checked! 
 Turnbull charges — wins! But our left is 
 broken. Wilson has smashed Bowles and 
 Mead, and may turn our flank. Forward, the 
 Provost's Guard!" 
 
 And the whole centre moved forward, 
 381 
 
 Ik 
 
The Napoleon of dotting Hill 
 
 Wayne's face and hair and sword flaming in 
 the van. 
 
 The King ran suddenly forward. 
 
 The next instant a great jar that went through 
 it told that it had met the enemy. And right 
 over against them through the wood of their own 
 weapons Auberon saw the Purple Eagle of Buck 
 of North Kensington. 
 
 On the left Red Wilson was storming the 
 broken ranks, his little green figure conspicuous 
 even in the tangle of men and weapons, with 
 the flaming red moustaches and the crown of 
 laurel. Bowles slashed at his head and tore away 
 some of the wreath, leaving the rest bloody, 
 and, with a roar like a bull's, Wilson sprang at 
 him, and, after a rattle of fencing, plunged his 
 point into the chemist, who fell, crying 
 "Notting Hill!" Then the Notting Hillers 
 wavered, and Bayswater swept them back in con- 
 fusion. Wilson had carried everything before 
 him. 
 
 On the right, however, Turnbull had carried 
 the Red Lion banner with a rush against 
 Barker's men, and the banner of the Golden 
 Birds bore up with difficulty against it. 
 Barker's men fell fast. In the centre Wayne 
 and Buck were engaged, stubborn and confused. 
 So far as the fighting went, it was precisely 
 
 282 
 
The Last Battle 
 
 equal. But the fighting was a farce. For behind 
 the three small armies with which Wayne's 
 small army was engaged lay the great sea 
 of the allied armies, which looked on as yet as 
 scornful spectators, but could have broken all four 
 armies by moving a finger. 
 
 Suddenly they did move. Some of the front 
 contingents, the pastoral chiefs from Shepherd's 
 Bush, with their spears and fleeces, were seen 
 advancing, and the rude clans from Paddington 
 Green. They were advancing for a very good 
 reason. Buck, of North Kensington, was sig- 
 nalling wildly; he was surrounded, and totally 
 cut off. His regiments were a struggling 
 mass of people, islanded in a red sea of Notting 
 Hill. 
 
 The allies had been too careless and confident. 
 They had allowed Barker's force to be broken 
 to pieces by Turnbull, and the moment that 
 was done, the astute old leader of Notting Hill 
 swung his men round and attacked Buck behind 
 and on both sides. At the same moment Wayne 
 cried "Charge!" and struck him in front like a 
 thunderbolt. 
 
 Two-thirds of Buck's men were cut to pieces 
 before their allies could reach them. Then the 
 sea of cities came on with their banners like 
 breakers, and swallowed Notting Hill for ever. 
 
 283 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 The battle was not over, for not one of Wayne's 
 meir would surrender, and it lasted till sundown, 
 and long after. But it was decided ; the story of 
 Notting Hill was ended. 
 
 When Turnbull saw it, he ceased a moment 
 from fighting, and looked round him. The even- 
 ing sunlight struck his face; it looked like a 
 child's. 
 
 "I have had my youth," he said. Then 
 snatching an axe from a man, he dashed into 
 the thick of the spears of Shepherd's Bush, 
 and died .somewhere far in the depths of their 
 reeling ranks. Then the battle roared on; 
 every man of Notting Hill was slain before 
 night. 
 
 Wayne was standing by a tree alone after the 
 battle. Several men approached him with axes. 
 One struck at him. His foot seemed partly to 
 slip ; but he flung his hand out, and steadied him- 
 self against the tree. 
 
 Barker sprang after him, sword in hand, and 
 shaking with excitement. 
 
 "How large now, my lord," he cried, "is the 
 Empire of Notting Hill?" 
 
 Wayne smiled in the gathering dark. 
 
 "Always as large as this," he said, and 
 swept his sword round in a semi-circle of 
 silver. 
 
The Last Battle 
 
 Barker dropped, wounded in the neck; and 
 Wilson sprang over his body like a tiger-cat, 
 rushing at Wayne. At the same moment there 
 came behind the Lord of the Red Lion a cry 
 and a flare of yellow, and a mass of the West 
 Kensington halberdiers ploughed up the slope, 
 knee-deep in grass, bearing the yellow ban- 
 ner of the city before them, and shouting 
 aloud. 
 
 At the same second Wilson went down 
 under Wayne's sword, seemingly smashed 
 like a fly. The great sword rose again like a 
 bird, but Wilson seemed to rise with it, and, his 
 sword being broken, sprang at Wayne's throat 
 like a dog. The foremost of the yellow hal- 
 berdiers had reached the tree and swung his 
 axe above the struggling Wayne. With a 
 curse the King whirled up his own halberd and 
 dashed the blade in the man's face. He 
 reeled, and rolled down the slope, just as the 
 furious Wilson was flung on his back again. 
 And again he was on his feet, and again 
 at Wayne's throat. Then he was flung again, 
 but this time laughing triumphantly. Grasped 
 in his hand was the red and yellow favour 
 that Wayne wore as Provost of Notting Hill. 
 He had torn it from the place where it had been 
 carried for twenty-five years. 
 
 285 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 With a shout the West Kensington men 
 closed round Wayne, the great yellow banner 
 flapping over his head. 
 
 "Where is your favour now, Provost?" cried 
 the West Kensington leader. 
 •" And a laugh went up. 
 
 Adam struck at the standard-bearer and 
 brought him reeling forward. As the banner 
 stooped, he grasped the yellow folds and tore off 
 a shred. A halberdier struck him on the shoul- 
 der, wounding bloodily. 
 
 "Here is one colour !" he cried, pushing the 
 yellow into his belt; "and here!" he cried, 
 pointing to his own blood, " Here is the 
 other." 
 
 At the same instant the shock of a sudden 
 and heavy halberd laid the King stunned or 
 dead. In the wild visions of vanishing conscious- 
 ness, he saw again something that belonged to an 
 utterly forgotten time, something that he had 
 seen somewhere long ago in a restaurant. He 
 / saw, with his swimming eyes, red and yellow, 
 the colours of Nicaragua. 
 
 Quin did not see the end. Wilson, wild with 
 joy, sprang again at Adam Wayne, and the 
 great sword of Notting Hill was whirled above 
 once more. Then men ducked instinctively at 
 the rushing noise of the sword coming down 
 
 286 
 
The Last Battle 
 
 out of the sky, and Wilson of Bayswater was 
 smashed and wiped down upon the floor like a 
 fly. Nothing was left of him but a wreck; but 
 the blade that had broken him was broken. In 
 dying he had snapped the great sword and the 
 spell of it ; the sword of Wayne was broken at the 
 hilt. One rush of the enemy carried Wayne by 
 force against the tree. They were too close to 
 use halberd or even sword; they were breast to 
 breast, even nostrils to nostrils. But Buck got 
 his dagger free. 
 
 "Kill him!" he cried, in a strange stifled 
 voice. "Kill him! Good or bad, he is none 
 of us ! Do not be blinded by the face ! . . . God ! 
 have we not been blinded all along !" and he 
 drew his arm back for a stab and seemed to close 
 his eyes. 
 
 Wayne did not drop the hand that hung on 
 
 to the tree-branch. But a mighty heave went 
 
 over his breast and his whole huge figure, 
 
 like an earthquake over great hills. And with 
 
 that convulsion of effort he rent the branch 
 
 out of the tree, with tongues of torn 
 
 wood. And swaying it once only, he let the 
 
 splintered club fall on Buck, breaking his 
 
 neck. The planner of the Great Road fell 
 
 face foremost dead, with his dagger in a grip of 
 
 steel. 
 
 287 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 "For you and me, and for all brave men, my 
 brother," said Wayne, in his strange chant, 
 "there is good wine poured in the inn at the end 
 of the world." 
 
 The packed men made another lurch or 
 heave towards him; it was almost too dark 
 to fight clearly. . He caught hold of the oak 
 again, this time getting his hand into a wide 
 crevice and grasping, as it were, the bowels 
 of the tree. The whole crowd, numbering 
 some thirty men, made a rush to tear him 
 away from it; they hung on with all their 
 weight and numbers, and nothing stirred. A 
 solitude could not have been stiller than that 
 group of straining men. Then there was a faint 
 sound. 
 
 "His hand is slipping," cried two men in exul- 
 tation. 
 
 "You don't know much of him," said another, 
 grimly (a man of the old war). "More likely 
 his bone cracks." 
 
 "It is neither — by God, it is neither!" said one 
 of the first two. 
 
 "What is it, then ?" asked the second, 
 
 "The tree is falling," he replied. 
 
 "As the tree falleth, so shall it lie," said 
 Wayne's voice out of the darkness, and it had 
 the same sweet and yet horrible air that it had 
 
 288 
 
The Last Battle 
 
 Diness, I » - 
 
 ing tc W X* 
 
 it lie. X/\ 
 
 ms of /if 
 
 had throughout, of coming from a great distance, 
 n^ix. ~~fore or after the event. Even when he 
 was struggling like an eel or battering like a 
 madman, he spoke like a spectator. "As thet 
 tree falleth, so shall it lie," he said. "Men have! 
 called that a gloomy text. It is the essence! 
 of all exultation. I am doing now % wjiat I have 1 
 done all my life, what is the only happiness, I 
 what is the only universality. I am clinging * 
 something. Let it fall, and there let 
 Fools, you go about and see the kingdoms 
 the earth, and are liberal, and wise, and cosmo- 
 politan, which is all that the devil can give you 
 — all that he could offer to Christ only to be 
 spurned away. I am doing what the truly wise 
 do. When a child goes out into the gar- 
 den and takes hold of a tree, saying, 'Let 
 this tree be all I have/ that moment its roots 
 take hold on hell and its branches on the 
 stars. The joy I have is what the lover 
 knows when a woman is everything. It is 
 what a savage knows when his idol is every- 
 thing. It is what I know when Notting Hill 
 is everything. I have a city. Let it stand or 
 fall." 
 
 As he spoke, the turf lifted itself like a 
 living thing, and out of it rose slowly, like 
 crested serpents, the roots of the oak. Then 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 the great head of the tree, that seemed a 
 green cloud among grey ones, swept the sky- 
 suddenly like a broom, and the whole tree 
 heeled over like a ship, smashing every one 
 in its fall. 
 
 ago 
 
Chapter III — Two Voices 
 
 IN a place in which there was total darkness 
 for hours, there was also for hours total 
 silence. Then a voice spoke out of the 
 darkness, no one could have told from where, and 
 said aloud — 
 
 "So ends the Empire of Notting Hill. As it 
 began in blood, so it ended in blood, and all things* 
 are always the same." 
 
 And there was silence again, and then again 
 there was a voice, but it had not the same tone; it 
 seemed that it was not the same voice. 
 
 "If all things are always the same, it is 
 because they are always heroic. If all things 
 are always the same, it is because they are 
 always new. To each man one soul only is 
 given; to each soul only is given a little power 
 — the power at some moments to outgrow and 
 swallow up the stars. If age after age that power 
 comes upon men, whatever gives it to them is 
 great. Whatever makes men feel old is mean 
 — an empire or a skin-flint shop. Whatever 
 makes men feel young is great — a great war 
 or a love story. And in the darkest of the 
 books of God there is written a truth that is 
 also a riddle. It is of the new things that men 
 
 291 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 tire — of fashions and proposals and improve- 
 ments and change. It is the old things that 
 startle and intoxicate. It is the old things 
 that are young. There is no sceptic who does 
 not feel that many have doubted before. There 
 is no rich and fickle man who does not feel that 
 all his novelties are ancient. There is no 
 worshipper of change who does not feel upon 
 his neck the vast weight of the weariness of 
 the universe. But we who do the old things are 
 fed by nature with a perpetual infancy. No man 
 who is in love thinks that any one has been 
 in love before. No woman who has a child 
 thinks that there have been such things as 
 children. No people that fight for their own city 
 are haunted with the burden of the broken em- 
 pires. Yes, oh dark voice, the world is always 
 the same, for it is always unexpected." 
 
 A little gust of wind blew through the night, 
 and then the first voice answered — 
 
 "But in this world there are some, be they 
 wise or foolish, whom nothing intoxicates. 
 There are some who see all your disturbances 
 like a cloud of flies. They know that while 
 men will laugh at your Notting Hill, and will 
 study and rehearse and sing of Athens and 
 Jerusalem, Athens and Jerusalem were silly 
 suburbs like your Notting Hill. They know that 
 
 292 
 
Two Voices 
 
 the earth itself is a suburb, and can feel only 
 drearily and respectably amused as they move 
 upon it." 
 
 "They are philosophers or they are fools," 
 said the other voice. "They are not men. Men 
 live, as I say, rejoicing from age to age in 
 something fresher than progress — in the fact 
 that with every baby a new sun and a new moon 
 are made. If our ancient humanity were a 
 single man, it might perhaps be that he would 
 break down under the memory of so many 
 loyalties, under the burden of so many diverse 
 heroisms, under the load and terror of all the 
 goodness of men. But it has pleased God so 
 to isolate the individual soul that it can only 
 learn of all other souls by hearsay, and to each 
 one goodness and happiness come with the 
 youth and violence of lightning, as momentary 
 and as pure. And the doom of failure that lies 
 on all human systems does not in real fact affect 
 them any more than the worms of the inevitable 
 grave affect a children's game in a meadow. Not- 
 ting Hill has fallen; Notting Hill has died. But 
 that is not the tremendous issue. Notting Hill 
 has lived." 
 
 "But if," answered the other voice, "if what 
 is achieved by all these efforts be only the 
 common contentment of humanity, why do 
 
 293 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 men so extravagantly toil and die in them ? Has 
 nothing been done by Notting Hill that any 
 chance clump of farmers or clan of savages 
 would not have done without it? What might 
 have been done to Notting Hill if the world 
 had been different may be a deep question; 
 but there is a deeper. What could have hap- " 
 pened to the world if Notting Hill had never 
 been?" 
 
 The other voice replied — 
 
 "The same that would have happened to the 
 world and all the starry systems if an apple-tree 
 grew six apples instead of seven; something 
 would have been eternally lost. There has 
 never been anything in the world absolutely 
 like Notting Hill. There will never be any- 
 thing quite like it to the crack of doom. I 
 cannot believe anything but that God loved it 
 as He must surely love anything that is itself 
 and unreplaceable. But even for that I do not 
 care. If God, with all His thunders, hated it, 
 I loved it." 
 
 And with the voice a tall, strange figure lifted 
 itself out of the debris in the half -darkness. 
 
 The other voice came after a long pause, and 
 as it were hoarsely. 
 
 "But suppose the whole matter were really a 
 hocus-pocus. Suppose that whatever meaning 
 
 294 
 
Two Voices 
 
 you may choose in your fancy to give to it, the 
 real meaning of the whole was mockery. Sup- 
 pose it was all folly. Suppose — " 
 
 "I have been in it," answered the voice from 
 the tall and strange figure, "and I know it was 
 not." 
 
 A smaller figure seemed half to rise in the 
 dark. 
 
 "Suppose I am God," said the voice, "and 
 suppose I made the world in idleness. Suppose 
 the stars, that you think eternal, are only the 
 idiot fireworks of an everlasting schoolboy. 
 Suppose the sun and the moon, to which you 
 sing alternately, are only the two eyes of one 
 vast and sneering giant, opened alternately in a 
 never-ending wink. Suppose the trees, in my 
 eyes, are as foolish as enormous toad-stools. 
 Suppose Socrates and Charlemagne are to me 
 only beasts, made funnier by walking on their 
 hind legs. Suppose I am God, and having made 
 things, laugh at them." 
 
 "And suppose I am man," answered the 
 other. "And suppose that I give the answer 
 that shatters even a laugh. Suppose I do not 
 laugh back at you, do not blaspheme you, do 
 not curse you. But suppose, standing up 
 straight under the sky, with every power of my 
 being, I thank you for the fools' paradise you 
 
 295 
 
The Najyoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 have made. Suppose I praise you, with a lit- 
 eral pain of ecstasy, for the jest that has 
 brought me so terrible a joy. If we have taken 
 the child's games, and given them the serious- 
 ness of a Crusade, if we have drenched your 
 grotesque Dutch garden with the blood of 
 martyrs, we have turned a nursery into a 
 temple. I ask you, in the name of Heaven, who 
 wins ?" 
 
 The sky close about the crest of the hills 
 and trees was beginning to turn from black 
 to grey, with a random suggestion of the 
 morning. The slight figure seemed to crawl 
 towards the larger one, and the voice was more 
 human. 
 
 "But suppose, friend," it said, "suppose that, 
 in a bitterer and more real sense, it was all a 
 mockery. Suppose that there had been, from 
 the beginning of these great wars, one who 
 watched them with a sense that is beyond ex- 
 pression, a sense of detachment, of responsibility, 
 of irony, of agony. Suppose that there were one 
 who knew it v/as all a joke.' , 
 
 The tall figure answered — 
 
 "He could not know it. For it was not all a 
 joke." 
 
 And a gust of wind blew away some clouds that 
 sealed the sky-line, and showed a strip of silver 
 
 296 
 
WAYNE, IT WAS ALL A JOKE 
 
Two Voices 
 
 behind his great dark legs. Then the other voice 
 came, having crept nearer still. 
 
 "Adam Wayne," it said, "there are men 
 who confess only in articulo mortis; there are 
 people who blame themselves only when they 
 can no longer help others. I am one of them. 
 Here, upon the field of the bloody end of it 
 all, I come to tell you plainly what you would 
 never understand before. Do you know who I 
 am?" 
 
 "I know you, Auberon Quin," answered the 
 tall figure, "and I shall be glad to unburden your 
 spirit of anything that lies upon it." 
 
 "Adam Wayne," said the other voice, "of 
 what I have to say you cannot in common 
 reason be glad to unburden me. Wayne, it 
 was all a joke. When I made these cities, I cared 
 no more for them than I care for a centaur, 
 or a merman, or a fish with legs, or a pig 
 with feathers, or any other absurdity. When 
 I spoke to you solemnly and encouragingly 
 about the flag of your freedom and the peace 
 of your city, I was playing a vulgar practical 
 joke on an honest gentleman, a vulgar prac- 
 tical joke that has lasted for twenty years. 
 Though no one could believe it of me perhaps, 
 it is the truth that I am a man both timid and 
 tender-hearted. I never dared in the early days 
 
 297 
 
The Napoleon of Notting Hill 
 
 of your hope, or the central days of your 
 supremacy, to tell you this; I never dared to 
 break the colossal calm of your face. God 
 knows why I should do it now, when my farce 
 has ended in tragedy and the ruin of all your 
 people! But I say it now. Wayne, it was done 
 as a joke." 
 blew the sky clearer and clearer, leaving great 
 
 There was silence, and the freshening breeze 
 spaces of the white dawn. 
 
 At last Wayne said, very slowly — 
 
 "You did it all only as a joke ?" 
 
 "Yes," said Quin. 
 
 "When you conceived the idea," went on 
 Wayne, dreamily, "of an army for Bayswater 
 and a flag for Notting Hill, there was no gleam, 
 no suggestion in your mind that such things 
 might be real and passionate?" 
 
 "No," answered Auberon, turning his round, 
 white face to the morning with a dull and splen- 
 did sincerity ; "I had none at all." 
 
 Wayne sprang down from the height above 
 him and held out his hand. 
 
 "I will not stop to thank you," he said, with 
 a curious joy in his voice, "for the great 
 good for the world you have actually wrought. 
 All that I think of that I have said to you a 
 moment ago, even when I thought that your 
 
 . 298 
 
Two Voices 
 
 voice was the voice of a derisive omnipotence, its 
 laughter older than the winds of heaven. But_ 
 let me say what is immediate and true. You 
 and I, Auberon Quin, have both of us 
 throughout our lives been again and again called 
 mad. And we are mad. We are mad, be- 
 cause we are not two men but one man. We 
 are mad, because we are two lobes of the same 
 brain, and that brain has been cloven in two. 
 And if you ask for the proof of it, it is 
 not hard to find. It is not merely that you, 
 the humourist, have been in these dark days 
 stripped of the joy of gravity. It is not merely 
 that I, the fanatic, have had to grope without 
 humour. It is that though we seem to be oppo- 
 site in everything, we have been opposite like 
 man and woman, aiming at the same mo- 
 ment at the same practical thing. We are 
 the father and the mother of the Charter of I 
 the Cities. ,, -J 
 
 Quin looked down at the debris of leaves and 
 timber, the relics of the battle and stampede, 
 now glistening in the glowing daylight, and 
 finally said — 
 
 "Yet nothing can alter the antagonism — the 
 fact that I laughed at these things and you adored 
 them." 
 
 Wayne's wild face flamed with something 
 299 
 
The Napoleon of Nolting Hill 
 
 god-like, as he turned it to be struck by the sun- 
 rise. 
 
 "I know of something that will alter that an- 
 tagonism, something that is outside us, some- 
 thing that you and I have all our lives per- 
 haps taken too little account of. The equal and 
 eternal human being will alter that antagonism, 
 for the human being sees no real antagonism 
 between laughter and respect, the human being, 
 the common man, whom mere geniuses like 
 you and me can only worship like a god. 
 When dark and dreary days come, you and I 
 v^/are necessary, the pure fanatic, the pure satirist. 
 We have between us remedied a great wrong. 
 We have lifted the modern cities into that poetry 
 which every one who knows mankind knows 
 
 ito be immeasurably more common than the 
 commonplace. But in healthy people there is 
 no war between us. We are but the two lobes 
 of the brain of a ploughman. Laughter and love 
 are everywhere. The cathedrals, built in the 
 ages that loved God, are full of blasphemous gro- 
 tesques. The mother laughs continually at the 
 child, the lover laughs continually at the lover, 
 the wife at the husband, the friend at the 
 friend. Auberon Quin, we have been too long 
 separated; let us go out together. You have 
 I a halberd and I a sword, let us start our 
 
 300 
 
Two Voices 
 
 wanderings over the world. For we are its two 
 essentials. Come, it is already day." 
 
 In the blank white light Auberon hesitated a 
 moment. Then he made the formal salute with 
 his halberd, and they went away together into 
 the unknown world. 
 
 OF THE ^ 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
 £*U FORNIX 
 
 The End. 
 

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