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 PAGES FROM 
 A PRIVATE DIARY
 
 PAGES FROM 
 
 A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 "L'homme qul a le temps d'tcrire un journal 
 intime nous parait ne pas avoir suffisamment 
 compris comlien le monde est vaste." RENAN, 
 Feuilles Detaches. 
 
 LONDON 
 SMITH, ELDER, CO., 15 WATERLOO PLACE 
 
 1898 
 
 [All rights reserved]
 
 Printed by BALLANTYNE, HANSON & Co. 
 At the Ballantyne Press
 
 TO 
 MY VERY GOOD FRIEND 
 
 J. ST. LOE STRACHEY, esq'. 
 
 THE ONLY BEGETTER OF THESE ENSUING PAGES
 
 These " Pages from a Private Diary " are 
 reprinted from the Cornhill Magazine with 
 a few alterations and omissions.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE 
 DIARY 
 
 May 7//!, 1896. My birthday, and so as good 
 a day as any and a better day than most for be- 
 ginning these extracts from my journal. I had 
 thought of compiling a history of the parish by 
 way of " Typical Developments," but it turns out 
 that the new vicar is setting out on the same 
 enterprise ; and it is perhaps more in his way than 
 mine. Besides, there is very little history to tell. 
 
 " Our village is unhonoured yet in story, 
 The present residents its only glory," 
 
 as Sophocles says in the Coloneus (11. 62, 63). 
 
 The house-martins have begun to think about 
 building on the north side of the house. I had 
 the old nests taken down for the pleasure of seeing 
 these " amusive " little creatures, as Gilbert White 
 would call them, once more at their loved 
 masonry ; and this year I nailed boards across the 
 corners of the windows for cleanliness' sake. At 
 first they were rather puzzled, and sat on the 
 
 A
 
 2 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 cross-pieces looking out on the world like tiny 
 Dominicans ; then a pair began building in one 
 of the obtuse angles below ; then they took them- 
 selves off to a window on the east side which had 
 not been tampered with ; finally, as there was not 
 enough accommodation here for several families, 
 the rest have swallowed their feelings and begun 
 to build as usual. The nightingales are staying 
 longer in the garden than in any year I can 
 remember. There is a tradition that they used 
 to build in the hedge overhanging what was once 
 a more or less public road, but have not done so 
 since the road was added as a shrubbery to the 
 garden. I suppose now that we have a parish 
 council they feel at liberty to withdraw their 
 protest. Swinburne and Matthew Arnold are the 
 last poets who have dared speak of the nightin- 
 gale as Philomela. We all know now that it is 
 only the cock-bird who sings, and poets have had 
 to note the fact. Indeed the only virgin source 
 of inspiration left for modern poetry is Natural 
 Science. She is the tenth muse. There must 
 have been some people who backed the Faun 
 in his contest with Apollo, and I confess that in 
 the daytime the blackbird affects me more than 
 the nightingale, and in all moods. Sometimes it 
 has all the jauntiness of the Pan's pipe heralding 
 a Punch and Judy show, at other times the plan- 
 gent note, " the sense of tears " which is Pan's
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 3 
 
 contribution to serious art. I think it is partly 
 John Davidson's interest in blackbirds tht attracts 
 me to him above the other sixty or seventy young 
 gentlemen who make modern poetry. In the 
 " Thames Ditton " passage of the first " Fleet 
 Street Eclogues," he speaks of their " oboe-voices," 
 and again of their song as " broken music " one 
 of his cleverest adaptations of a Shakespearean 
 phrase. 
 
 %th. My old gardener has at last condescended 
 to retire. He has been on the place, I believe, 
 for sixty years, man and boy ; but for a long time 
 he has been doing less and less ; his dinner-hour 
 has grown by insensible degrees into two, his in- 
 tercalary luncheons and nuncheons more and 
 more numerous, and the state of the garden past 
 winking at. This morning he was rather de- 
 pressed, and broke it to me that I must try to 
 find some one to take his place. As some help, 
 he suggested the names of a couple of his cronies, 
 both well past their grand climacteric. When I 
 made a scruple of their age, he pointed out that 
 no young man of this generation could be de- 
 pended upon ; and further, that he wished to end 
 his days in his own cottage (i.e. my cottage) where 
 he had lived all his life, so that there would be a 
 difficulty in introducing any one from outside. I 
 suppose I must get a young fellow who won't 
 mind living for the present in lodgings. I make
 
 4 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 a point as far as possible of taking soldiers for 
 servants, feeling in duty bound to do so ; besides, 
 I like to have well set-up men about the place. 
 When they are teetotalers they do very well. 
 William, my coachman, is a teetotaler by pro- 
 fession, but, as the phrase goes, not a bigot. He 
 was a gunner,, and the other night I suppose 
 he had been drinking delight of battle with his 
 
 peers he brought me home from , where I 
 
 had been dining, in his best artillery style, as 
 though the carriage were a field-piece. 
 
 qth. C., who is just home from Cairo, came to 
 dine, and we had much talk about things military 
 which need not be recorded. It seems the 
 Sphinx's cap has been discovered, but one cannot 
 imagine this increasing his majesty ; hats are such 
 local and temporal things. C. remarked that some 
 of the papers had been speaking of the Sphinx as 
 " she " ; confusing it with the Greek sphinx that 
 asked riddles and made short work of the unfortu- 
 nates who failed to answer them. But is not his 
 beard in the British Museum ? The Egyptian 
 sphinx has far too much serenity to play either 
 the poser or the cannibal. But there is a riddling 
 sphinx of the Nile, a very modern and undignified 
 personage ; and the Egyptian question, one may 
 hope, has at last found an QEdipus in England, 
 one might almost say in Lord Cromer. For Lord 
 Cromer typifies, even to exaggeration, in the eyes
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 5 
 
 of native and European, our characteristic quali- 
 ties, strength of hand, and strength of purpose, 
 devotion to athletics and distrust of ideas. His 
 memorial is written in Milner's book, and no 
 praise can be too high for his exhibition of the 
 *-' Justum et tenacem propositi virum " ; the man 
 who knows his mind and won't be bribed. It is 
 curious to notice the new type that is being created 
 by young England in Egypt. The usual British 
 alertness, not to say menace, of manner is soothed 
 down into an Oriental dreaminess, as though time 
 had never been called money, and there was no 
 such superstition as free-will ; but of course the 
 Orientalising is only superficial. 
 
 iifh. To-day falls our customary beating of 
 the bounds. But the new vicar is for still older 
 customs, and wants to revive the Rogation-tide 
 procession with a litany, especially in view of the 
 present drought. Tom, who is patron of the living 
 and parson's warden, refused to take part and 
 " make a guy of himself," as he expressed it ; and 
 Farmer Smith, his colleague, said very bluntly that 
 he would have no papist nonsense in his fields, 
 and " besides, there couldn't be any rain till the 
 wind shifted." So, as the substantial men stood 
 aloof, the vicar had to content himself with the 
 choir-boys, who celebrated the new forms with 
 too much of the old spirit. I suppose my wander- 
 ing life has purged me from a good deal of insular
 
 6 PAGES FOM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 and Protestant prejudice, for I confess there seems 
 more sense and present advantage in the religious 
 rite than in the civil, when boundaries are all 
 registered in maps. But we have lost whatever 
 instinct we ever had for picturesque ceremonial. 
 
 The other day I saw the town council of 
 
 turn out to meet a Royal Princess ; the majority 
 wore gowns which were much too short for them, 
 and their hats were the various hats of every day. 
 In short, they were ridiculous, and seemed to 
 know it. 
 
 This Jingoism in America is too silly. A little 
 while ago it was England, now it is Spain. A 
 schoolboy translated Horace's " Dulce et decorum 
 est pro patria mori " by " sweetness and decency 
 have died out of the land." Jingoism is the school- 
 boy's version of patriotism. 
 
 i3//i. It was to-day, how many years ago, that 
 I put a certain serious question to Sophia. The 
 crisis came as we stood by the lily-convally bed in 
 
 the old Manor House garden at . There 
 
 was only one lily with any of its bells fully out, 
 and I gave it her, and now I reckon any year 
 normal which brings its lilies into flower by the 
 1 3th, to let me pay my annual tribute. This 
 year they came a few days too soon. 
 
 The copses and commons our Berkshire com- 
 mons are little forests seem this year more beau- 
 tiful than ever. The bloom of all the flowering
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 7 
 
 trees, thorns, chestnuts, &c., even the elms and 
 oaks, has been abnormal. The primroses are 
 yielding place now to the wild hyacinths, which 
 show through the trees in broad belts, and smell 
 almost as strong as a bean-field. Soon the bracken 
 will supersede both. My poet Davidson speaks 
 somewhere of these hyacinths as 
 
 " like a purple smoke 
 Far up the bank." 
 
 The description is very just. I have a notion that 
 this is what Fletcher meant by " harebells dim," if 
 we accept that emendation, 1 for what we now 
 call the harebell comes too long after the prim- 
 rose to be connected with it. The beeches are in 
 their full spring beauty, but the oaks are devoured 
 by caterpillar, and too many of them are lying all 
 abroad and naked, like giants stripped of their 
 armour. The depression of agriculture, which 
 town Radicals affect to disbelieve in, is having 
 this result amongst others, that every stick worth 
 cutting is being cut, except in the parks of the big 
 landowners or on the glebes of the clergy, who 
 are debarred from " waste " by law. Old philo- 
 logers used to explain Berkshire to mean Bare- 
 oak-shire ; and the nakedness of the land will soon 
 justify the name. 
 
 1 " Primrose, first-born child of Ver, 
 Merry Springtime's harbinger 
 With her bells dim."
 
 8 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 . To-day is the centenary of the vaccination 
 of James Phipps by Jenner, which Gloucester, his 
 birthplace, has been celebrating in so becoming a 
 fashion. " No prophet is accepted in his own 
 country." A stranger giving himself out as from 
 Gloucester, probably some wag who knew our 
 nervousness, called a few days ago at the village 
 shop, and the excitement in consequence among 
 the well-to-do has been extraordinary. Tom's 
 wife at once issued a placard appealing to all 
 mothers to set a good example by being re- 
 vaccinated. It appeared in the shop window next 
 the new muzzling order, and seems to have got 
 mixed up with it, for the postman carried about 
 the news that in - village " all the w^omen 
 were to be muzzled and all the dogs vaccinated." 
 Yesterday was fixed for the doctor's attendance, 
 and old Widow - , who is eighty-eight, was the 
 first voluntary victim. This morning I offered 
 my wife and children and slaves. The cook, I am 
 told, ripped up her sleeve with a pair of scissors, 
 and then went off into hysterics ; the ruddy David 
 turned the complementary colour, but remembered 
 the story of the Spartan boy in the " Sixth 
 Standard Reader," and did not scream or struggle. 
 Rumour brings in momentarily fresh stories of 
 heroism. 
 
 Why did Mr. Austin receive the laurel ? Tom, 
 who thinks that to love Lord Salisbury is a Con-
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 9 
 
 servative education, is annoyed when I put the 
 question ; but I am convinced it arose from a 
 confusion between Swinford and Swinburne, very 
 natural to one more familiar with scientific than 
 literary distinctions. Our arguments, however, 
 never become really serious, as Tom is not con- 
 cerned to defend the honour of any poets but 
 those who belong to the county, and these, so far 
 as we know, are only two, Chaucer and the 
 laureate Pye. Chaucer's connection with Don- 
 nington is doubtful ; but the Pyes are a Farring- 
 don family, and the poet Pye planted that con- 
 spicuous clump of trees above the town on the 
 west known as Farringdon Folly. 
 
 i5///. The wave of Conservatism seems to have 
 brought with it a revival of interest in heraldry. 
 Or is this merely due to the savage mania for 
 collecting book-plates ? I bought to-day Miss 
 Austen's " Persuasion " in a rather pretty edition, 
 and found her coat-of-arms printed inside the 
 cover by way of ex-libris. The publishers seem to 
 carry this piece of folly through all their reprints, 
 Shakespeare, by way of eminence, having his 
 achievement treated in two styles. Perhaps the 
 new taste may spread in time to the upper classes, 
 and prevent ladies printing their family crest on 
 envelopes within a shield. One observes too, 
 that printers and publishers are reviving their old 
 signs ; Longmans publish " at the Sign of the
 
 10 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Ship " ; the new poetry is sold " at the Bodley 
 Head," or "the bodiless head" as a humorist 
 called it, and I have heard the suggestion made 
 that the new type of " evil and adulterous " novel 
 should not be procurable except " at the sign of 
 the prophet Jonah." This would be a useful guide 
 to us country bumpkins. But to return to Miss 
 Austen. I notice that the first page of this last 
 edition of " Persuasion " piously preserves the 
 awkward misprint of a full-stop in the middle of 
 the description of Sir Walter Elliot and the 
 Baronetage: "There any unwelcome sensations 
 arising from domestic affairs changed naturally 
 into pity and contempt. As he turned over the 
 almost endless creations of last century, &c." 
 
 i6//r. Read debate on Navy Estimates. Virgil 
 has put our foreign policy into a single line, 
 " Pacem orare manu, pnefigere puppibus arma," 
 which one might translate, after Dryden, " Provoke 
 a peace and yet pretend a war." 
 
 The Spectator, surfeited for the moment of cat 
 and dog stories, has been opening its voracious 
 columns to a collection of Irish bulls, very curious 
 wildfowl. Many of them present no recognisable 
 bullish features ; others are bulls in appearance 
 only, and for the most part confusions of metaphor 
 that happen to be amusing, of the type of the 
 familiar " he never opened his mouth without 
 putting his foot in it " (which is not a bull, because
 
 II 
 
 it does not refer to the mouth, though it seems 
 to). The story about "never being able to keep 
 an emetic on the stomach " is in the same way 
 a bull only in appearance ; for the remark has no 
 sense at all if the man knew what an emetic was, 
 unless he meant it humorously ; and in neither 
 case would it be a bull. It is of the essence of a 
 bull that it should be nonsense in form only, not 
 in matter. One of the best of those in the 
 Spectator is the following : " When one counts 
 the accidents, dangers, and diseases which beset 
 the journey of life, the wonder is a man lives till 
 he dies." The Irish have no exclusive property 
 in mixtures of metaphor, though their greater 
 imaginativeness makes them more figurative in 
 speech than the common run of Englishmen, and 
 their impetuosity tends to confusion. The follow- 
 ing passage is from the carefully written memoirs 
 of one of the greatest English scholars of the 
 century, Mark Pattison : " Even at this day a 
 country squire or rector, on landing with his cub 
 under his wing in Oxford, finds himself much 
 at sea as to the respective advantages or demerits 
 of the various colleges" (p. 16) ; and of course 
 Shakespeare mixes his metaphors freely. 
 
 iSth. I notice that household tempers get 
 tinder-like in a prolonged drought, from the 
 commander-in-chief downwards. Add to this that 
 all the servants' arms have " taken." Time and a
 
 12 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 few drops of rain will allay these fevers, But 
 meanwhile the rain does not come. " Why don't 
 you let David " the ruddy buttons " help you 
 with that, Laura ? " " Please, sir, me and David- 
 hates each other." " My love, why is Proserpine 
 all blubbered?" (Proserpine is so styled because 
 she works upstairs in the morning and downstairs 
 in the afternoon.) " Oh, John, she has broken 
 Uncle George's Venetian glass, and I have been 
 speaking to her. I never saw such a careless girl ; 
 but there, they're all alike." 
 
 iqfh. At luncheon, Miss A., the Scotch gover- 
 ness, asked me if I liked buns. I replied that I 
 liked them if they were made with sultana raisins 
 and not currants. She blushed, and explained that 
 she meant the poet " Buns." This, it seems, is the 
 patriotic manner of pronouncing Burns. Or Let 
 me say a patriotic manner. For I recollect being 
 taken to hear a lecture in Edinburgh by a Scotch 
 friend, who when it was over inveighed against the 
 speaker's accent. " Why," said I, " I thought it 
 was Scotch!" "Scotch," said he, "it was Fife- 
 shire, man." Miss A. may hail from Fife. Well, 
 I pleaded to an enthusiasm for certain verses of the 
 poet, and asked for her favourite passage. It was 
 this : 
 
 " To catch dame Fortune's golden smile, 
 
 Assiduous wait upon her ; 
 
 And gather gear by every wile 
 
 That's justify'd by honour.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 13 
 
 Not for to hide it in a hedge 
 
 Nor for a train attendant, 
 But for the glorious privilege 
 
 Of being independent." 
 
 Poor Miss A. ! She showed me the Burns number 
 of a Scots journal in which persons of importance 
 gave their pet quotations. No one seemed to care 
 for the best things. I suppose in the case of songs 
 that are actually sung, it soon becomes impossible 
 to criticise the words. I find even Dr. Service 
 mentioning as the best of Burns's songs, " Mary 
 Morison," " My Nannie O," and " Of a' the airts 
 the wind can blaw." Now, unhappily, I am no 
 songster, and do not know the tunes of any of 
 these ; but I should unhesitatingly assert that to 
 mention the first two in the same breath as the 
 third is "to unstop the string of all degree." In 
 " Mary Morison " the only lines that deserve saying 
 as well as singing are the final couplets of the 
 second and third stanzas 
 
 " I sigh'd and said amang them a', 
 
 Ye are na Mary Morison." 
 and 
 
 " A thought ungentle canna be 
 
 The thought o' Mary Morison." 
 
 But these are not sufficient to compensate the 
 insipidity of the rest. " My Nannie O " opens well ; 
 after that there are irreproachable sentiments ; but 
 for " the golden cadence of poesy, caret." " Of a'
 
 14 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 the airts " is a creature of another element. The 
 first verse, perhaps, comes as near the border-line 
 where simplicity joins tameness as is safe for a 
 great poet, and the last two lines are not good ; 
 but what amends in the second stanza ! Even here 
 I should not like to pin my faith to the fourth line, 
 but the rest is as perfect as a song can be, both in 
 pathos and imagination. It is an interesting study 
 to compare the two versions of " Ye banks and 
 braes of bonnie Doon." The extra two syllables 
 in the even lines of the later version seem to me 
 to give the sorrow weight ; the shorter line is jerky 
 in comparison. 
 
 " Ye flowery banks o' bonnie Doon 
 
 How can ye bloom sae fair ! 
 How can ye chant, ye little birds, 
 
 And I sae fu' o' care ! 
 Thou'lt break my heart, thou bonnie bird, 
 
 That sings upon the bough : 
 Thou minds me o' the happy days 
 
 When my fause luve was true. 
 
 Ye banks and braes o' bonnie Doon, 
 
 How can ye bloom sae fresh and fair ! 
 How can ye chant, ye little birds, 
 
 And I sae weary fu' o' care ! 
 Thou'lt break my heart, thou warbling bird, 
 
 That wantons thro' the flowering thorn ; 
 Thou minds me o' departed joys, 
 
 Departed never to return." 
 
 Burns never wrote anything so " simple, sensuous, 
 and passionate " as the first four lines of the
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 15 
 
 amended version, the epithet " little " seems to me 
 exquisite ; but the second quatrain is spoilt, the 
 last line being as bad as anything in his English 
 songs. This inequality is a curious point about 
 Burns ; where he is equal throughout, as in " Auld 
 Lang Syne " and " John Anderson, my Jo," neither 
 of which has a word one could wish other than 
 it is, it is because the pitch is not very high ; in 
 the poems where he touches sublimity, the pitch is 
 never maintained throughout. Few people would 
 wish a line away from " My luve is like the red, red 
 rose," but few would deny that the first two stanzas 
 are better than the last ; and in the " Farewell to 
 Nancy," which contains his finest as well as his 
 best known verses and surely the love lyric in 
 England has never so perfectly crystallised a 
 tear 
 
 " But to see her was to love her ; 
 
 Love but her, and love for ever. 
 
 Had we never loved sae kindly, 
 
 Had we never loved sae blindly, 
 
 Never met or never parted, 
 
 We had ne'er been broken-hearted ! " 
 
 there occurs what is perhaps the worst couplet he 
 ever wrote 
 
 " Deep in heart-wrung tears I'll pledge thee. 
 Warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee." 
 
 And he actually repeats these lines to end with. Of 
 course, Burns was a superb satirist, and to enjoy
 
 1 6 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 his satire one is content to make acquaintance 
 with the Scotch Kirk, and the Scotch de'il, and 
 even with Scotch haggis. 
 
 2 is/. Rain at last, but too late and too little to 
 save the hay. My wife and daughter -have for a 
 long time been involving me in a bicycle contro- 
 versy. In vain have I repeated that my prejudices 
 are against the exercise for women ; they fixed 
 upon the word " prejudice," and called for reasons. 
 I appealed to custom; Sophia thought it enough 
 to point to the fashion ; Eugenia, knowing how 
 penetrable I am to a quotation from Shakespeare, 
 overbore me with "What custom wills, in all 
 things should we do't," &c., from " Coriolanus." 
 So I yielded, and it was arranged they should 
 take lessons, and this morning I was permitted to 
 accompany them to see their progress. E. was 
 decidedly graceful, and carried herself well ; but 
 what shall I say of my dear wife ? 
 
 22nd. To Oxford; wandered through the Bod- 
 leian gallery and looked at the old curiosities, and 
 many new ones, such as the Shelley papers. How 
 like Lord Salisbury is to the portrait of his great 
 ancestor riding on a mule ! Has Mr. Gould alle- 
 gorised this ? Walked about and told the towers. 
 Probably St. Mary's spire will satisfy nobody. 
 Why has B. N. C. put so monstrous a lion and 
 unicorn over its new porch ? Magdalen looked 
 beautiful, but not so beautiful as before the bridge
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 17 
 
 was widened for the tramway. Somehow the 
 narrow bridge helped the height of the tower. 
 But the modern spirit hates privilege, even the 
 privilege of beauty ; and only Radicals may job. 
 There was much talk at luncheon about the admis- 
 sion of women to degrees. It seemed to be the 
 married dons who had led the attack. Possibly 
 they have lived so long on terms of insipid equality 
 with the other sex that they do not realise the 
 effect of mixed lectures upon impressionable under- 
 graduates. Courtship is like " hunt the whistle " ; 
 you can't play at it with any interest after you 
 know the game. But there are always fresh gene- 
 rations coming up to whom the whole thing is 
 new ; and, let dons say what they please, the uni- 
 versities, no less than the public schools, exist for 
 the training of youth. Happily, the undergraduates 
 so far take the Conservative side. The Radical 
 party forget, too, that if it became as much the 
 fashion for girls as for men to reside at a university, 
 they would no longer be all " reading girls," as at 
 present, but a smart set, and what the effect would 
 be Ouida alone could prognosticate. In the after- 
 noon strolled round the Parks, but was driven by 
 weather into the Museum. The anthropological 
 collections seem well arranged, and very interesting,, 
 especially the musical instruments. Who would 
 have guessed that the guitar is a development from 
 the bow-string ? The new Professor of Art was 
 
 B
 
 1 8 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 lecturing in the theatre to a few, but doubtless fit, 
 ladies. Of the matter I could not judge, but the 
 style was excellent simple, dignified, and finished, 
 without the over-elaboration usually affected by 
 art-lecturers. One passage especially struck me 
 upon the splendid audacity of pigments in attempt- 
 ing to render human character, and succeeding. 
 Went to the service at Magdalen Chapel, and 
 
 afterwards dined with , and had dessert in 
 
 common room ; vintage and anecdotes were both 
 old and sound, so that no one desired new ; 
 " across the " chestnuts " and the wine " renewed 
 
 my friendship with . 
 
 2 $rd. This morning's Standard celebrates the 
 close of the session by a leading article, in the 
 conventional three paragraphs, on the Beauties 
 of Nature. But the new wine retains a strong 
 constitutional smack from the old bottles. The 
 " golden tassels of the laburnum " overhang " hun- 
 dreds of villa residences," each " a typical English 
 home," and when we escape from the suburbs it 
 is to contemplate the " county seats and splendidly 
 timbered parks, through which run rights of way 
 preserved for the public from generation to gene- 
 ration." It always was the landlords who preserved 
 rights of way, and commons too. But it is not 
 only the striking features of the landscape, it is the 
 inscrutable spirit of .the Universe itself that is to 
 be whipped into the Government lobby. " Nature
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 19 
 
 is a Conservative force, admonishing us all to keep 
 together, to act together," by joining her flocks of 
 sheep or leagues of primroses ; her method is " a 
 wise, slow continuity, evolving and revolving," like 
 the Great Wheel, no doubt, and " patient under 
 passing disappointments," as, for example, when it 
 gets stuck. It is a great faith, and ennobles poli- 
 tics with a religious sanction. But it is a game 
 that two can play at ; and it strikes me that the 
 Radicals could make out a better abstract case 
 for themselves as followers of Nature. Take, for 
 instance, the following passage from a scientific 
 writer ; what a capital text it would make for a 
 dithyrambic leader in the Daily Chronicle ! " Physi- 
 cal life may be said to be the continual struggle 
 every moment against surrounding and imminent 
 death ; the resistance of an undiscoverable principle 
 against unceasing forces ; and it holds its own and 
 lasts by replacing waste, by repairing injuries, by coun- 
 teracting poisons." 
 
 25/7*. Whit-Monday is a high day with many 
 of the Benefit Clubs in our neighbourhood. It 
 has, in fact, taken the place of the old Berkshire 
 feast or " revel," which was already fast decom- 
 posing when Hughes described it in " Tom Brown's 
 Schooldays." There is only one old man in the 
 village, so far as I can learn, who ever took part in 
 a " back-swording " contest, and he only once. His 
 story is that an " old gamester " asked him to make
 
 20 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 play for him, promising to let him off easily ; but 
 the incessant flicker of the single-stick before his 
 eyes so roused his bile that, being a brawny fellow, 
 he beat down the old gamester's guard by sheer 
 force and " broke his head." He has no senti- 
 mental regret at the disappearance of backsword- 
 ing, which, as he describes it, must have been 
 brutal enough ; and he insists that the wrestling 
 was as bad, the shoes of the wrestlers being often 
 full of blood from cuts made by the sharp leather. 
 A degenerate age is content with cricket and foot- 
 ball, which are vastly better civilisers both of thews 
 and temper. All the morning on Whit-Monday, 
 the purveyors of amusement, mostly gipsy, are 
 getting their stalls, and cocoa-nut pavilions, and 
 merry-go-rounds into place ; then the town band 
 arrives a little before noon and plays the members 
 into church. Dinner follows in the big barn, the 
 gentlemen interested in the club carving the joints. 
 When everybody is well wound up, the annual 
 meeting is held, the honorary secretary makes an 
 inaudible report, new officers are elected, the 
 Queen's health is drunk, and everybody proposes 
 a vote of thanks to everybody else. Then the 
 whole company migrates into Tom's park and 
 gardens to watch the cricket-match, or sing or 
 loaf as their fancy leads them, except a few thirsty 
 enthusiasts who prefer playing skittles at the Blue 
 Boar for a cheese to make them thirstier. In time
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 21 
 
 comes dancing, and in time the band marches out of 
 the park drawing the youths and maidens after it. 
 
 29/7?. The scythes have begun in the bottom 
 meadow ; there is no more cheerful sight and no 
 more delicious sound, when the grass is worth 
 cutting, but this year it is all " bennets." " It shall 
 be called Bottom's Dream, because there is no 
 bottom." Turned over Bacon's Essays. He is 
 not Shakespeare, but he is often as surprisingly 
 modern, sentence after sentence seems written with 
 an eye to current events. Take this, for instance : 
 "To be master of the sea is an abridgment of a 
 monarchy [i.e. a monarchy in miniature]. Surely 
 at this day, with us of Europe, the vantage of 
 strength at sea (which is one of the principal 
 dowries of the kingdom of Great Britain) is great ; 
 both because most of the kingdoms of Europe are 
 not merely inland, but girt with the sea most part 
 of their compass ; and because the wealth of both 
 Indies seems in great part but an accessory to the 
 command of the seas." 
 
 And here is our Armenian policy. Among 
 unjustifiable wars Bacon ranks those " made by 
 foreigners under the pretence of justice or pro- 
 tection to deliver the subject of others from 
 tyranny and oppression." 
 
 And here is a judgment on the Transvaal Gov- 
 ernment : " All States that are liberal of naturalisa- 
 tion towards strangers are fit for empire."
 
 22 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Here, too, is one side of the Colonial Secretary : 
 " Wonderful is the case of boldness in civil busi- 
 ness : What first ? Boldness. What second and 
 third ? Boldness. It doth fascinate and bind hand 
 and foot ; therefore we see it hath done wonders 
 in popular states, and more ever upon the first 
 entrance of bold persons into action." This is, 
 of course, the passage from which Danton stole 
 his " II nous faut de 1'audace, encore de 1'audace, 
 toujours de 1'audace." 
 
 Here is a good criticism on the Drink Com- 
 mission : " In choice of committees for ripening 
 business for the Council, it is better to choose 
 indifferent persons than to make an indifferency by 
 putting in those that are strong on both sides." 
 
 Finally, the following judgment of a great 
 soldier on duelling might well be commended to 
 the notice of the German Emperor : " It were 
 good that men did ' hearken to the saying of 
 Consalvo, the great and famous commander, that 
 was wont to say ' a gentleman's honour should 
 be de tela crassiore of a good strong warp or web, 
 that every little thing should not catch in it.' " 
 
 3O/A. The post this morning has more waste 
 paper than ever. There are six prospectuses of 
 joint-stock companies, most of them offering gold 
 mines. Will Africa never cease blowing bubbles ? 
 
 o 
 
 It is not insignificant that money-lenders' letters 
 are increasing in proportion. There are a couple
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 23 
 
 to-day. One gentleman suggests " remunerative 
 but not exorbitant interest," and writes in a boyish 
 hand that is very frank and engaging. Indeed, 
 I opened the letter first, thinking it was from 
 Harry. The other fellow puts a crest on his 
 envelope, a hound's head with the motto, " Fides 
 in adversis," which is even more touching. It 
 strikes me that " a crocodile's head, the eyes dis- 
 tilling tears, all proper," with for motto " Beati 
 pauperes," or " Dare quam accipere," would be 
 much more appropriate. Then there is an enor- 
 mous circular from a gentleman who is urgent 
 that I should go with him on an educational tour 
 to Jericho, or a co-operative cruise to shoot polar 
 bears. And then there are the wine-lists. There 
 is no such good reading to be had, if you lunch 
 alone, as an advertiser's wine-list ; to a person of 
 imagination and gouty tendency it is more stimu- 
 lating and far more innocuous than the wine itself. 
 Indeed, I suspect that what these vintners sell is 
 not half so precious as their description of it. 
 
 June ist. The pitiful accident reported this 
 morning, that befell the Russian crowd in the 
 Khodinsky Plain waiting for their coronation mugs 
 between three and four thousand being crushed 
 to death impresses one with the vast size of modern 
 nations. The description in Matthew Paris, which 
 I have just been reading, of the crowd at the 
 coronation of our Henry III. presents an almost
 
 24 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 ludicrous contrast. We are told that the citizens 
 of London went out to meet the king in holiday 
 attire, and vied with one another in trying the 
 speed of their horses ; and that the Constable of 
 Chester attended the king and kept the people back 
 with a wand when they pressed forward unduly. 
 
 2nd. Came to visit Aunt Julia at Barchester. 
 The ecclesiastical atmosphere of the Close is some- 
 what rarefied and hard to breathe ; but for a few 
 days I rather enjoy it. And the cathedral music 
 is capital. The factions seem in a flourishing 
 condition. The Dean has put down a Turkey 
 carpet in the sanctuary, which the Archdeacon's 
 party resent as an unspeakable outrage, consider- 
 ing what has been going on among the Christians 
 in Anatolia and Crete. On the other hand, the 
 Archdeacon's daughter has become engaged to a 
 minor canon. Aunt Julia, who is a staunch sup- 
 porter of the Dean, told me of the engagement 
 with a light in her eye and a deprecatory movement 
 of the hands that meant, "What could you expect?" 
 I asked if she knew the gentleman. Her reply 
 was, " My dear, I have seen the young man going 
 backwards and forwards to his duties." She went 
 on to say that of course she should call after the 
 wedding, but it would make a great deal of 
 awkwardness, as it was her custom to do no more 
 than leave cards on the wives of the minor canons. 
 This phrase of " leaving cards " always reminds
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 25 
 
 me of a story, which may be in Joe Miller, but 
 we tell it of a distinguished ecclesiastical neighbour. 
 He had a new groom, fresh from one of the racing- 
 stables, who was to accompany him one day in a 
 long round of leave-taking calls, and was sent into 
 the house before starting to get some cards. When 
 they reached the last house, the order came, " Leave 
 two cards here, James," and the reply followed, " I 
 can't, my lord ; there's only the ace of spades left." 
 4//z. The papers are enthusiastic about the 
 victory of Persimmon, or rather the Prince of 
 Wales, at the Derby. Nothing succeeds like suc- 
 cess, and the Prince is popular, so that even we 
 who for local reasons wished " Tueful " (as we call 
 him) to win, take our beating philosophically. But 
 why should the Stock Exchange burst out into 
 singing " God bless the Prince of Wales ? " Could 
 it be that these gentlemen were interested in 
 Turf reform, and foresaw in the Prince's good 
 fortune, with a horse of his own breeding, a good 
 time coming in which everything should be straight 
 and aboveboard ? It is not racing, however, so 
 much as betting and the misery it leads to, that 
 offends thoughtful people. Everybody has read 
 " Esther Waters," with its scenes of sordid tragedy. 
 If the Prince of Wales were to discountenance 
 heavy betting, a great deal of good might be done. 
 For betting, like drinking, though a natural taste, 
 is much under the influence of fashion. The
 
 26 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 " Paget Papers " contain a letter from the last 
 Prince of Wales who won the Derby, in which 
 he speaks of drunkenness in these engaging terms : 
 " The rest were bad enough, God knows, except 
 myself, though my every glass was a Bumper to 
 your health. I can safely swear I never flinched 
 one, dear Arthur, and you well know I am not 
 even upon indifferent occasions a shirker. Since 
 that day the old girl has never ceased being tipsy 
 twice a day," &c. 
 
 We have moved away from those days, and 
 not long ago one of the Royal princes spoke of 
 drunkenness as "the only enemy that England 
 had to fear." If the Prince of Wales would only 
 say that now of gambling ! 
 
 " Lordes may finden other manner play 
 Honest enough to drive the day away," 
 
 said Chaucer, and he was brought up at court. 
 
 6th. Old Juniper is dead. He called in the 
 village carpenter last night to receive directions 
 about his funeral and to make his will. The poor 
 here are very cautious not to employ the gentry 
 in these testamentary matters, as they fear the 
 knowledge of their little savings might impede the 
 flow of charity. Tom, who is precentor and wears 
 a surplice in church like Sir Thomas More, whom 
 he much respects, used to make a point of the 
 choir being present at all funerals. But one
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 27 
 
 spring an epidemic so increased the mortality that 
 he got tired, and the sixth corpse was condemned 
 to be buried plain. So now the vicar summons 
 a few boys from the school ; and certainly singing 
 the Psalm very much lightens and seems to chris- 
 tianise the service. One has to see a country 
 funeral to appreciate the real luxury of woe. The 
 deceased may have been all that was disagreeable 
 and degraded, and his death may be acknowledged 
 on all hands to be a good riddance, but the con- 
 ventions must be respected. The mourners walk 
 behind the bier in a longer or shorter procession 
 of pairs, a man to the right with a woman on his 
 left arm, and a handkerchief in his free hand. 
 The exact position of the handkerchief varies with 
 the locality ; here it is pressed to the right cheek. 
 In church they remain seated, leaning forward in 
 an ecstasy of uncontrollable grief during the whole 
 service ; then the procession is re-formed. This 
 is Bacon's " custom copulate and conjoined," 
 and a mighty power it is, and perhaps in a dim 
 way it makes for righteousness. On the Sunday 
 following the burial all the mourners that have 
 not scattered to distant homes come to church, 
 where they expect some pulpit reference and an 
 appropriate hymn. 
 
 9//t. Sophia's birthday. It is desperate work 
 finding presents in the country. However, at 
 I picked up a rather pretty piece of mosaic
 
 28 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 binding, which I have filled with writing-paper 
 to make an album. 
 
 I have long meditated keeping an album myself 
 of another sort, a commonplace book, what Milton 
 calls a " topick-folio." This is one of those resolu- 
 tions that come with every first of January, and 
 too often go with it ; though a very fat volume 
 lying here on the table has its first few pages filled 
 with the harvest of several new beginnings. Lazi- 
 ness has something to do with the irresolution ; the 
 habit of reading in the Balfour position perhaps 
 more ; more still the conviction at the moment 
 that if a passage is very good there is small risk 
 of forgetting it (a terrible mistake !) ; but most of 
 all that paralysing sentence in Marcus Aurelius, 
 " No longer delude thyself ; thou wilt never read 
 thine own notes, nor the extracts from books which 
 thou wast reserving for thy old age" (iii. 14). 
 
 i oth. The cuckoo to-day has a decided hiccough. 
 
 Saw some young partridges as I drove in to . 
 
 The barber was more interesting than usual. He 
 has received a commission from some distinguished 
 person to count how many light and how many 
 dark-haired people he operates upon in a month. 
 The theory, as he propounded it, was that the 
 dark-haired people were clever, but weak, and the 
 light-haired strong and foolish, and that having 
 been for centuries oppressed by superior force, 
 the aboriginal black-haired folks are now coming
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 29 
 
 to the front again. He called them Hibernian 
 (query Iberian). " Shy-traffickers, the dark Iberians 
 come." Lunched at club. Talk turned on eccen- 
 tric wills. Dr. had a friend who picked up 
 
 an old gentleman's hat in Piccadilly, and, before 
 returning it, wiped off the dirt, which so delighted 
 the old gentleman that he asked for the young 
 man's card, and left him his fortune. The legatee 
 was killed in the Soudan three months after. The 
 moral seems to be, have polite relations, and inherit 
 the consequences of their virtue. 
 
 1 1 th. Went to P.'s wedding. Everything went 
 happily, and everybody seemed contented. There 
 was an extempore sermon, which began by dividing 
 itself into three heads ; and this a little frightened 
 me, but the heads proved to be without tails. The 
 service itself is one of the best in the Prayer-Book, 
 being short and to the purpose ; but it would be 
 better still for a few slight changes. For example, 
 the officiating clergyman emphasised a distinction 
 between the man's " plighting " his troth and the 
 woman's " giving " hers, which is surely a distinc- 
 tion without a difference. Then what does " With 
 my body I thee worship " mean ? And might not 
 the wife's promise be brought a little more up to 
 date ? New women, new promises. In older days 
 the woman had to promise to be " bonnair and 
 buxom in bed and at board." We like them to be 
 so still ; but we " hold it not honesty to have it
 
 30 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 thus set down." Might not the " obey " follow 
 the " buxom " into limbo ? My wish for P. and 
 his wife is that they may hit the mean, as in other 
 things so in their conjugalities, between the extra- 
 vagant complacency that Lamb ridicules and some 
 people's brusquerie. Of the latter I heard an amus- 
 ing instance the other day. B. said to his wife, 
 " Why are your dresses half an inch longer than 
 any other woman's ? To which she replied, 
 " Because I am your wife. Otherwise the other 
 women's dresses would be half an inch shorter 
 than mine." And a new sting has been intro- 
 duced into connubial controversy by chatter about 
 heredity. Two young friends of mine were over- 
 heard wrangling the other day as to which was 
 to blame for their very much spoilt daughter's 
 wilfulness. On second thoughts I am not sure 
 that we have done altogether well to get rid of that 
 old promise. The unsoured Milton found in it his 
 youthful ideal : 
 
 " Come, thou goddess fair and free, 
 In heaven yclep'd Euphrosyne, 
 And by men heart-easing Mirth, 
 
 So buxom, blithe, and debonair." 
 
 All moral novelists agree that conduct at board 
 is nine-tenths of wedded life. Is it not Anthony 
 Hope who says, " Her eyes looked as if they would 
 expect too much of me at breakfast " ? and there
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 31 
 
 is the same feeling, heightened to mania, in Q.'s 
 " You are too fat, Lydia." Yes, " to be buxom at 
 board " is to be perfect, and of all boards none is 
 so difficult as the breakfast-table. The old con- 
 ventual practice of having a person to read some 
 dull book or an office during the meal might be 
 introduced with advantage into country houses 
 where the post comes in late. But for the 
 " obedience " ? No doubt all males must hold 
 Milton's theory that obedience is their due, but 
 the un-success of Milton's practice is strongly in 
 favour of disguising the claim : 
 
 " Therefore God's universal law 
 Gave to the man despotic power 
 Over his female in due awe ; 
 Nor from that right to part an hour, 
 Smile she or lour : 
 So shall he least confusion draw 
 On his whole life, not sway'd 
 By female usurpation, or dismay'd. 
 But had we best retire ? I see a storm." 
 
 The same chorus in " Samson " enumerates, not 
 without surprise and chagrin, all the fine male 
 qualities to which the other sex can be im- 
 penetrable, and gives up the puzzle of affinity as 
 hopeless : 
 
 " It is not virtue, wisdom, valour, wit, 
 Strength, comeliness of shape, or amplest merit, 
 That woman's love can win or long inherit ; 
 But what it is, hard is to say, 
 Harder to hit."
 
 32 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Ladies, I am told, find it no less puzzling to 
 account for the fascination exercised by many of 
 their own sex who are neither beautiful nor witty. 
 
 Mrs. 's drawing-room is the rendezvous of all 
 
 the bachelors and married men in the country- 
 side, of whom I am the least. Why do we go 
 there ? Let me examine myself. I go because 
 she makes me feel comfortable and contented ; 
 because she seems to say always the right thing, 
 the thing I want said to me. She moves like a 
 goddess in a magical atmosphere of sympathy. 
 I go in bruised and battered and resentful, and 
 feeling all my tale of years, and come out like 
 ;son from Medea's tub, young and sleek and 
 self-satisfied. I was there when Major Ursa 
 himself, the biggest bear in the country, was 
 lugged in by his wife against his will, all 
 bristles, to pay some social debt, and saw him 
 take leave in less than twenty minutes, purring 
 like a pussy. And now he comes without Mrs. 
 Ursa. 
 
 i5//z. There has been thunder about all day, 
 and this afternoon some twenty good flashes of 
 lightning, but no rain. After dinner I was reading, 
 over my cigar in the garden, Dr. Garnett's selection 
 from Coventry Patmore, which seems to contain 
 that poet's salvage. After enjoying my favourite 
 poems, I turned once more to the very spirited 
 but to me incomprehensible piece called "To the
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 33 
 
 Unknown Eros," and found it no more luminous 
 than usual. 
 
 " It is a Spirit though it seems red gold ; 
 And such may no man, but by shunning, hold. 
 Refuse it, though refusal be despair ; 
 And thou shalt feel the phantom in thy hair." 
 
 As I reached that line, though I was unconscious 
 of any wilful act of refusal, red gold not being 
 much proffered in these parts, I felt the phantom 
 in my hair just at the nape of the neck and a 
 very unpleasant sensation it was. When I re- 
 covered my presence of mind, the phantom proved 
 to be a very big moth, which had settled there and 
 was flapping its wings. I do not suppose this is 
 altogether w r hat Patmore meant, but it was an apt 
 illustration. It is an annus mirabilis for Lepidoptera. 
 i gfh. Went to town for several days. We have 
 been reading aloud in the evenings lately Doughty's 
 " Arabia Deserta," which is a powerful piece of 
 writing, though mannered ; and a passage in praise 
 of precious stones has taken such hold of the femi- 
 nine mind that I have been afraid to act as escort 
 in shopping thoroughfares. This is what D. says : 
 " The Oriental opinion of the wholesome operation 
 of precious stones, in that they store the mind with 
 admirable beauties, remains perhaps at this day a 
 part of the marvellous estimation of inert gems 
 amongst us. Those indestructible elect bodies, as 
 stars, shining to us out of the dim mass of matter, 
 
 c
 
 34 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 are comfortable to our fluxuous feeble souls and 
 bodies ; in this sense all gems are cordial, and of 
 an influence religious. These elemental flowering 
 lights almost persuade us of a serene eternity, and 
 are of things (for the inestimable purity) which 
 separate us from the superfluous study of the 
 world" (i. 315). Certainly pearls are very beauti- 
 ful objects, and their wearers as certainly find them 
 " comfortable" and " cordial "; and the two or three 
 thousand pounds one has to pay for a necklace 
 may be an exceedingly good investment into the 
 bargain if it persuades us of a serene eternity. 
 Conscience would be for once on the side of the 
 expense. The lady at the Royal Academy whom 
 Sargent has painted in her pearls does look to 
 have a very tranquil soul, as though separated 
 from the superfluous study of the world. What 
 pearls they are, and what paint ! But if I had 
 the money to spend I should buy my immortality 
 directly of Mr. Sargent rather than of Mr. Spink. 
 How good the Chamberlain is too ! People may 
 grumble that there is not much revelation of char- 
 acter in the face beyond keenness and will ; but is 
 there in the living face ? And to make the eyes 
 big and yearning, as Watts too often does, by 
 way of " divinely through all hindrance finding 
 the man " behind them, is not to paint a portrait. 
 
 2oth. Sunday. Went to Church. Service 
 
 Gregorian, preacher Gorian. At least he thought
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 35 
 
 he was, but what he really resembled was an 
 earwig endeavouring to extricate himself from a 
 filbert, and frantically waving his flippers. The 
 matter was what that shrewd judge, Mr. Pepys, 
 would have called " unnecessary." What a bore 
 it must be to have foolish imitators ! In the after- 
 noon to St. Paul's, where the service is said to be 
 the best in Europe ; but ah, the reredos ! How 
 awful for three or four venerable clergymen to 
 have the responsibility of decorating a cathedral ! 
 The days of bishop builders are gone by, and pro- 
 bably the professional architect has it all his own 
 way, except for the occasional pressure of public 
 opinion. I could not get near enough to the choir 
 to judge of the new ceiling, but the general colour 
 effect seemed good. 
 
 2 is/. Stood for some time on the doorstep 
 drawing in the electrical force of London, and 
 feeling like a mouse in oxygen. It is only we 
 country cousins who really enjoy London, just as 
 it is only Londoners who really enjoy the country, 
 and the enjoyment on both sides may be a good 
 deal due to misunderstanding. A little chap from 
 Seven Dials is said to have called a lark " a 
 bloomin' cock-sparrow in a fit," and I may be 
 doing even greater injustice to the passers-by when 
 I fancy them pulsing with the high fever of exist- 
 ence. I am glad London has found singers of 
 late. Some very genuine poets have not been
 
 36 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 kind to it ; " that tiresome, dull place," says Gray ; 
 and Cowper is more impolite still ; but then he 
 was mad. In Kensington Gardens I met K. for 
 the first time since our disagreement. He treated 
 me very civilly, like a stranger, though we had 
 been close friends for ten years. That is the 
 worst of your idealist ; all his friends are angels 
 
 and all his opponents ; so that to cross him 
 
 is to experience, in his estimation, the fall of 
 Lucifer. He sadly lacks humour, or, what comes 
 to the same thing, a sense of proportion. To 
 console myself I walked round the Albert Memorial, 
 and found Hiram and Bezaleel an excellent tonic. 
 Tom met us in the afternoon at the Academy, and 
 took us, as usual, to criticise the construction of 
 the hayricks. He was much impressed by a picture 
 called " Whoa, steady ! " wherein were represented 
 two plough-horses, the one capering while the 
 other stood impassive : he vowed he had never 
 seen so steady a horse in his life, and was de- 
 termined to purchase it, if he could find out from 
 the painter where it lived. I could not get him to 
 admire Clausen's " Crow-boy," who was evidently, 
 he thought, one of the present soft generation, 
 spoilt by too long keeping at school, even if he 
 had not got, as he suspected, St. Vitus's dance ; 
 La Thangue's ducks, too, very much puzzled him. 
 
 We dined at 's, and talked about ghosts. L. 
 
 gave us the only true and genuine account of the
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 37 
 
 Glamis ghost, in whose room he had slept since 
 its happy decease. I told the story of my grand- 
 father and the headless horseman, and of the 
 ghost who rolls my lawn every 2Qth February. 
 F. had seen too many ghosts to believe in them. 
 She told us how, when the clock struck twelve, 
 a party consisting of an old gentleman and three 
 girls used to appear nightly in her bedroom. 
 Once she determined not to open her eyes, but 
 a strange rustling all round the room roused her 
 curiosity, and when she looked there were ears of 
 corn mixed with poppies thrusting themselves from 
 behind each picture frame. The old gentleman 
 seemed much amused. 
 
 22nd. To my dentist, who gave me the laughing- 
 gas, and " charmed ache with air " ; dreamt that 
 I was being dragged down through a sea of blood. 
 Went to the club to write letters and lunch, and 
 recover tone ; then walked through the Park to 
 make calls. How rare it is to find ladies in society 
 who know what they think about anything ! They 
 hand on opinions like counters, all of which are 
 of equal conversational value. If your ears are 
 long enough, you may hear the judgments you 
 have just expressed, original as you may think them, 
 being passed on to Mr. X. as the merest common- 
 place. One pleasure of an excursion to town is 
 the sight of pretty dresses. In the country the 
 dress of the upper class becomes plainer and
 
 38 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 plainer year by year as that of the classes below 
 waxes in flamboyancy. Perhaps some ladies push 
 the principle to an extreme. One of my neigh- 
 bours while waiting for the train at - - station, 
 where she is not known, was accosted by a farmer 
 and asked, " How many did her master keep ? " 
 (i.e. how many servants) ; and the photo- 
 grapher pronounces it impossible nowadays to 
 obtain an artistic picture of any county lady, 
 because their dresses fit so ill. Ladies whose 
 husbands have made a fortune recently, and buy 
 a country " cottage with a double coach-house," 
 should be clever enough to take the hint. 
 
 2 $rd. Came down in the train with Archdeacon 
 
 . One of Smith's newspaper boys amused 
 
 me very much by pressing on him the sporting 
 journals. He told me of a very sharp lad who 
 once offered him the World, and when he shook 
 his head, explained " Christmas Number, sir." I 
 have no doubt our Berkshire breed is very virtuous, 
 and it is far from stupid, but one does sometimes 
 wish for a little of the cockney smartness. It 
 strikes me that " paiper," for " paper," which must 
 have come to London from Essex, is less fashion- 
 able along the line than it used to be, and may 
 quite go out, like the v for a 1 , of which Dickens 
 made so much. 
 
 26th. Q. has reprinted some of his Speaker 
 " causeries," and delightful table-talk they are.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 39 
 
 Q.'s criticism has the flavour of first principles 
 that one associates with Oxford scholarship and 
 philosophy. For the honour of Oxford I am glad 
 to see a protest against Mr. Hardy's system of the 
 universe, and also an additional paragraph on 
 Davidson's " Ballad of a Nun," a poem that, with 
 all my admiration for D., I have never been able 
 to read a second time. Q. explains that the style 
 on a first reading blinded him to the sense. In 
 that misfortune he was not alone. On a certain 
 Monday morning late in '94 a queue of respectable 
 middle-aged ladies thrust its way along Vigo Street 
 into the " Bodley Head," asking for copies of the 
 " Ballad of a Nun " by a Mr. Davidson. When 
 the pressure was a little eased, the publisher 
 ventured to inquire the cause of the sudden 
 demand, as the Saturday papers had not contained 
 any remarkable review. The answer was that the 
 
 Archdeacon of W had charged them on their 
 
 souls' health to procure it. Dear Archdeacon ! 
 He knew the story from the Gesta Romanorum or 
 from Miss Procter's version, and too carelessly 
 assumed that D. meant the same thing. The one 
 of Q.'s papers I incline to regret is that upon 
 Samuel Daniel, and for an entirely selfish reason. 
 Loving Daniel, I should be sorry if he were 
 " boomed." My feeling about him is very much 
 that excusable jealousy which made Q. himself 
 refuse Gigadibs the explanation of a certain " Troy "
 
 40 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 custom. (See the preface to "The Delectable 
 Duchy.") 
 
 27th. The roads are execrable. This year 
 they should have been better than usual, as the 
 District Council has taken them over, and the 
 contractors have no inducement, as the farmers 
 had, to delay mending them till too late for the 
 flints to work in ; so the metal was put on in 
 good time, but the drought has made them 
 thoroughly rotten again. Down in the vale they 
 use granite instead of flints, and if the parsons 
 and farmers who compose the council would only 
 take to cycling, we should soon see flints dis- 
 carded here also. We should see also the hedge- 
 clippings swept up. I have been learning to 
 bicycle ; what I especially dislike about it is the 
 second or hind-wheel jolt after one has kept one's 
 temper over the first. What I especially enjoy 
 is the exhilaration of running downhill. I find, 
 too, that my ideas flow more easily when in rapid 
 motion, this may be a sign of decrepitude, 
 but if I descend to register them they are gone. 
 Some scientific genius should invent a bicycle- 
 phonograph into which one could talk. 
 
 To bicycle amongst country villages is a very 
 good way in which to test their ethos. In some 
 places the traveller is laughed at, or tripped up, 
 or stoned, or the children spread tacks across the 
 road ; in others, perhaps only a mile or two
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 41 
 
 distant, he is as safe from molestation as in a 
 London suburb. I have noticed and the ex- 
 perience is not palatable to my Radical friends, 
 but it is this that where the natives are barbar- 
 ous it is a sign that there is no resident squire or 
 no competent parson. 
 
 July ist. The young wrynecks, alas ! are dead, 
 no doubt killed by their parents through my folly 
 in taking one out of the nest. They are very un- 
 common birds in the neighbourhood, hence my 
 wish to examine them. They dug their hole in 
 an old apple tree just below where it had lost a 
 branch, so that the wood was rotten ; and not 
 more than five feet from the ground, so that I 
 could watch them easily. Of course, I had to 
 widen the orifice before I could remove the 
 youngster. The snake-like twist they can give to 
 their neck, and their snake-like hiss, make them 
 rather uncanny birds, and may account for their 
 use in divination by Greek wizards. They were 
 spread-eagled on a wheel, and turned, or per- 
 haps whirled, round. Simaetha, in Theocritus, 
 uses such a wheel to charm back her faithless 
 lover, Delphis. The poor birds must have re- 
 joiced at the advent of Christianity, modern 
 Christian witches preferring to conjure with 
 robins and other birds of bright plumage. 
 
 2nd. The Agricultural Rating Bill passed its 
 third reading by two county Radical votes over
 
 42 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 the Government maiority. The Committee de- 
 bates have slowly exhibited, or perhaps evolved, 
 the Government position, at last clearly stated by 
 Mr. Balfour in his concluding speech, that the 
 Bill is meant not only to relieve a greatly dis- 
 tressed industry in redemption of election pledges, 
 but also as a contribution towards remedying the 
 present monstrous injustice in the assessment 
 to local rates. It is to be hoped that the Govern- 
 ment will sooner or later overhaul the whole 
 bad business, but not without more deliberation 
 than they thought necessary before overhauling 
 our educational system. The Janus-faced con- 
 tention of the Opposition that the proposed relief 
 is, as regards the landowners, an enormous sub- 
 sidy, but as regards the agriculture interest gene- 
 rally a drop in the bucket, reminds me of an ancient 
 story about a little girl and a piece of cake : 
 
 Little Girl : Is that large piece of cake for grandfather? 
 
 Mamma : No, dear, for you. 
 
 Little Girl : What a small piece of cake. 
 
 The new vicar, who is not so good a Conservative 
 as we could wish, is indignant with the Govern- 
 ment for not allowing the relief to the clergy on 
 Tythe Rent Charge. At present, he tells me, he 
 pays half as much rates as Tom ; and when the Act 
 comes into operation he will pay exactly the same 
 amount, for Tom, who farms his own land, will get 
 the reduction. This certainly seems preposterous
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 43 
 
 in regard, for example, to the road rate, for Tom 
 wears the road much more with his carriage horses 
 and plough teams than the vicar with his one pony 
 and " humble vehicle." I noticed in the Rate Book 
 to-day that Tythe Rent Charge is now entered as 
 " buildings." It was " land " for the sake of being 
 rated, and ceases to be " land " when rates on land 
 are reduced. But how can it be " buildings " ? 
 
 4//z. A curious example presented itself this 
 morning of our growing sensitiveness to criticism, 
 and also of our ready invention in the manufac- 
 ture of scandal. A person who makes mineral 
 water at some distance from here sent in his card 
 and asked to see me, and on being shown into 
 the library began this catechism : " Sir, did you 
 
 pay a visit to last Friday week ? Did you 
 
 stop to lunch ? Did you say at lunch that my 
 soda water was enough to give everybody typhus 
 fever ? " I endeavoured to persuade the little 
 man that he was misinformed, that I did not so 
 much as know that he existed ; still less, if pos- 
 sible, that he made mineral waters ; that I could 
 not, therefore, have censured them ; and that so 
 far as my memory served the topic did not arise ; 
 so that his friend the footman must have confused 
 two people and two occasions. I then warned 
 him that perhaps the circulation of such a report 
 was not the most advantageous form of self- 
 advertisement, because a man's mineral water
 
 44 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 should be not only pure, but above suspicion. 
 He left in some excitement, generously accepting 
 my disclaimer, but determined to find the truth 
 somehow. I was tempted to suggest that he 
 might find the truth at the bottom of his well, 
 but he would not have understood. Poor lady ! 
 No wonder Lucian thought her a/u.vpa KOL ao-a</? 
 TO \pu>ju.a wan and washed out in complexion ; 
 but it would be a pity she should have typhus. 
 
 6th. The garden sun-dial came unriveted from 
 its pedestal some months ago, and has been laid 
 aside ever since, as it seemed to the ladies a pity 
 to lose the opportunity of decorating it with a 
 motto. We are all gone crazy about mottoes in 
 this part of the world. Every new house that is 
 built must have its motto, and the selection gives 
 a good deal of entertainment both to the house- 
 builders and their neighbours. Well, fashion 
 must be followed, so this morning I have been 
 reading through Mrs. Gatty's collection of sun- 
 dial mottoes, being stimulated to industry by my 
 stop-gap gardener's inquiry whether he might not 
 put a pot of hydrangeas on the pedestal. So I 
 explained its purpose. The best mottoes seem to 
 be the best known, such as " Non nisi ccelesti 
 radio," " Horas non numero nisi serenas," " Pere- 
 unt et imputantur," but one cannot use these. A 
 favourite device was to print " we shall," and leave 
 " di(e) al(l) " to be supplied by the local wits ;
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 45 
 
 but that is too macabre. I remember an uncle of 
 mine choosing " Sensim sine sensu " from the De 
 Senectute, and being very indignant with a friend 
 of his, a fine scholar, who tried to convince him 
 that he had pitched upon an interpolation. On 
 the whole, I doubt if I shall find anything better 
 than my first idea of " Cogitavi dies antiques" ("I 
 have considered the days of old"), from the yyth 
 Psalm. It is dignified, and to a reflective mind 
 monitory without being impudently didactic, and 
 I am fond of the Vulgate. The seventeenth- 
 century preachers and essayists were fortunate in 
 being able to quote it, " to saffron with their pre- 
 dicacioun," but it should be kept for sober occasions. 
 Matthew Arnold was something too liberal in his 
 use : it became a mere trick of style with him. 
 
 Jth. I notice that one of the papers in a 
 report of the Queen's Review of her Jubilee Nurses, 
 says, "The nurses curtsied thrice simultaneously, 
 which had a novel and pleasing effect." 
 
 8th. Made our annual excursion to White 
 Horse Hill. We lunched, as usual, at the " Blow- 
 ing Stone." Five minutes' practice once a year 
 for half a century has not taught me the trick of 
 blowing it, and Sophia remains the one member 
 of the family who can rouse the fog-horn blast 
 by which Alfred is said to have gathered his forces. 
 It was almost too warm for the climb, but we per- 
 sisted, and were rewarded at the top by the breeze
 
 46 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 over the downs. I drove Sophia in the light pony- 
 cart along the Ridgeway to Uffington Castle, and 
 (to quote the words of a recent Spectator) " enjoyed 
 the sensations of a British chief driving his spring- 
 less car to the fortress of his tribe." But, more 
 fortunate than this writer, we did not smash our 
 chariot in effecting an entrance into the camp. 
 The vale lies stretched out below in vast and level 
 panorama, "like the garden of the Lord," and 
 there is no such lovely sight, to my thinking, 
 anywhere. It is a little sad, too, for all the towns 
 one sees are slowly decaying, largely through their 
 own folly in refusing the Great Western Railway. 
 Reading had more foresight, and in the half- 
 century has more than trebled its population. 
 Perhaps it is not so sad after all, for Wantage 
 remains what it was to Bishop Butler if not quite 
 what it was to King Alfred, and Farringdon has 
 still its memories of Saxon kings (not to mention 
 Pye), while Reading is like a strong ass couching 
 down between the two burdens of Sutton's seeds 
 and Palmer's biscuits. After tea we drove on to 
 Uffington village for the sake of Hughes's memory. 
 But the church is a splendid specimen of Early 
 English architecture, and well worth a visit for 
 its own sake, as our American cousins are sure 
 to find out soon, and make it a shrine of pilgrim- 
 age. The vicar should open a subscription list 
 for some memorial, as they are doing at Rugby.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 47 
 
 The school-house still stands as it did when Tom 
 Brown and Jacob Doodlecalf were caught at the 
 porch by the choleric wheelwright, only the date 
 over the door is not 1671, as you see it in the 
 illustration, but 1617. The inscription just indi- 
 cated in the picture is as follows : 
 
 " Nil fcedum dictu vitiiq ; base limina tangat 
 Intra quae pueri. A.D. 1637." 
 
 The " pueri " is emphatic, and is explained by one 
 of the rules of the founder on the walls within : 
 
 " Whereas it is the most common and usual 
 course for many to send their daughters to com- 
 mon schools to be taught together with and 
 amongst all sorts of youths, which course is by 
 many conceived very uncomely and not decent, 
 therefore the said schoolmaster may not admit 
 any of that sex to be taught in the said school." 
 
 The room is now used as a village reading-hall. 
 Tom Hughes's " Scouring of the White Horse " 
 describes with a wonderful vividness, which was 
 one of his gifts as a writer, the " pastimes " that 
 used to be held on occasion of the scouring, and 
 it remains their memorial. For now the old idol 
 is kept clean by the tenant without ceremony. 
 It is a quaint notion an ancient idol scoured by 
 a muscular Christian. People who write in the 
 papers are not old enough to remember the 
 hideous Clapham School religion, from which
 
 48 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 " muscular Christianity " helped to deliver us. 
 There is a good sketch of it in Laurence Oliphant's 
 " Piccadilly." Its outward symbol was black kid 
 gloves, and its passwords were many, perhaps 
 the most odious being the word " engage." When 
 a clergyman called, it was quite customary for 
 him to say, " Shall we engage ? " and then and 
 there you were expected to let him hale you into 
 the presence of your Maker. Its organ in the 
 press was a paper called the Record, which ruled 
 the religious world with a rod of iron. Any 
 parson caught thinking for himself was noted, 
 
 and 
 
 " Without reprieve condemned to death 
 For want of well-pronouncing shibboleth ; " 
 
 the " death " in question being not only profes- 
 sional, the disfavour of Lord Shaftesbury and loss 
 of preferment, but " the second death " as well, 
 with quarters assigned in the disciplinary depart- 
 ment of paradise. The persecution of that good 
 man Frederick Maurice, the prophet of the mus- 
 culars, the memory of which has been preserved, 
 like a fly in amber, by Tennyson's delightful ode 
 to him, helped to disgust moderate people ; and 
 meanwhile the Oxford school was growing in 
 influence. Of course " muscular Christianity " 
 could never have become really popular with the 
 clergy, as it reduced them to the position of 
 second-rate laymen.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 49 
 
 ioth. There was a nut-hatch very busy in one 
 of the limes this morning. The bees are also 
 busy there ; but listening to them as they " im- 
 proved the shining hour" made me less and less 
 inclined for business myself. In fact, I fell asleep. 
 A modern poet notes " a hum of bees in the 
 queenly robes of the lime " as one of the most 
 delightful noises in nature, and so it is ; though 
 his line, when I quote it, makes Sophia shake 
 
 her petticoats. On my way to , to consult 
 
 my lawyer about a boundary dispute with G. P., 
 I met a party of three magpies, which should bode 
 good fortune. Prosit ! The hedges are in their 
 full summer glory 
 
 " lovely to see 
 
 With mullein, and mallow, and agrimony, 
 With campion and chicory handsome and tall, 
 And the darling red poppy that's gayest of all," 
 
 to quote a very old-fashioned poetaster. Indeed, 
 such is summer's pomp and prodigality, that many 
 things slip by without being enough enjoyed. 
 That ancient allegory of the pursuit of pleasure, 
 which still eludes the pursuer, is wonderfully true 
 even of such a mild delight as the enjoyment of 
 summer ; one cannot really set to work to enjoy 
 it ; the enjoyment comes when it wills in chance 
 waves ; but I have ever an absurd feeling that, 
 while I am occupied with business indoors, flowers 
 are wasting their sweetness, and birds their melody, 
 
 D
 
 50 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 and summer is growing old. But to go out is not 
 necessarily to find enjoyment. 
 
 The visit of the Artillery Company of Massa- 
 chusetts to their elder brethren in England should 
 help to patch up the sentimental alliance between 
 the two countries. But sentiment will not last 
 unless it is supported by courtesy and tact. Now r 
 it is a curious and unfortunate thing that while 
 individual Americans often excel Englishmen in 
 these qualities (one need go no further for an 
 instance than Colonel Walker of the H.A.C., and 
 that fine phrase of his about her Majesty, " her 
 queenliness as a woman and her \vomanliness as 
 a queen ") the bulk of those prominent in politics 
 seem singularly destitute of both, and there is 
 no diplomatic tradition. There is an interesting 
 Taller (No. 41) about the Artillery Company, 
 describing a sham fight in the streets of London 
 on June 29, 1709 ; which shows that the H.A.C. 
 was to the wits of tw T o centuries ago what the Rifle 
 Volunteers were to Punch in the sixties. 
 
 nth. There seems a chance of the Parish 
 Council meetings becoming more lively. Both 
 Tom and his wife are on the council, Tom being 
 chairman, and they regard it as a highly useful 
 means of registering their benevolent ukases. But 
 the vicar, who has been elected this year, is full 
 of notions and w r ants to democratise it. As a first 
 step, to ensure publicity for the discussions, he
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 51 
 
 has persuaded a few old women to attend the 
 meetings, all the men being too busy in their 
 gardens and not very keenly interested. Last night 
 there was a debate about housing. The vicar 
 maintained that certain cottages (not Tom's) were 
 a disgrace to the village, and that the people who 
 live in them were very respectable people who had 
 a right (ominous word !) to decent houses if they 
 could pay for them. Tom replied that if he or 
 any one else built new cottages for these people, 
 other people anything but respectable would be 
 only too glad to come into the empty ones. That 
 is true enough. The solution, of course, is for Tom 
 to buy the cottages in question, and either recon- 
 struct or pull them down ; and this, if no one 
 suggests it to him, he will probably do. But 
 such debates as last night's will soon bring up the 
 council to the level of interest of Lord Salisbury's 
 circus. 
 
 15/7*. St. Swithin's : just enough rain for the 
 " apple christening." 
 
 H.M. Inspector paid a "visit without notice" to 
 the school. At least it was without notice so far 
 as the schoolmaster was concerned ; I had known 
 the awful secret for three days past, as he had 
 proposed himself for luncheon. So I happened 
 to call at the school and found him there. He is 
 a good inspector, if a trifle " tarrifying," as we say 
 here. Most inspectors are terrifying ; so much
 
 52 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 depends upon their verdict, and it is difficult for 
 them to keep the sense of their importance out of 
 their manner. One inspector I know exercises a 
 quite extraordinary and basilisco-like fascination by 
 virtue of a rather stony blue eye, and a lapis-lazuli 
 in his finger-ring of the same tint. These in a 
 remarkable way react upon and reduplicate each 
 other. He, too, is a good fellow, but full of fads, 
 and the worst of these is grammar. I heard him 
 once take a class in grammar. He asked, amongst 
 other useless things, the meaning of " intransitive." 
 Happily no child knew, so he proceeded to explain. 
 " Intransitive means not going over; an intransitive 
 verb expresses an action that does not go over to an 
 object. For example, the \erbjump is intransitive ; 
 if I say, 'the cat jumps/ I describe an action that 
 doesn't 'go over.'" O mad inspector! I fear 
 your teaching proved more intransitive than your 
 cat's jump. At luncheon H.M. Inspector amused 
 us with professional anecdotes. At a remote vil- 
 lage school he had surprised the infant mistress 
 watering the children with a garden rose before 
 the examination began to keep them fresh. Another 
 story was of a child whom he asked to explain the 
 word " pilgrim." " Please, sir, a man who travels 
 about." " But I travel about. Am I a pilgrim ? " 
 " Please, sir, a good man." As an example of what 
 is meant by " visualising " in children (and the 
 want of it in inspectors), he told us of a small boy
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 53 
 
 who could not add nine to seven. The inspector, 
 to make the sum easy, put it thus : " Suppose you 
 had nine apples in one hand and seven in the 
 other, how many would you have altogether ? " 
 " I should have two jolly good handfuls." 
 
 i6th. The papers report this morning the un- 
 veiling of three monuments : a bust in the Abbey 
 of Thomas Arnold, a statue to Newman at the 
 Brompton Oratory, and a granite column crowned 
 by a bust of Shakespeare in the churchyard of St. 
 Mary, Aldermanbury, to the editors of the first 
 folio, Heminge and Condell. It was interesting 
 to notice as characteristic of our tolerant age that 
 several distinguished persons passed from the first 
 of these celebrations to the second. The names 
 of Heminge and Condell are less re'pandus ; but 
 their service to literature cannot easily be exagge- 
 rated, and it is pleasant to think that the great 
 public should recognise who it is they have to 
 thank (under Shakespeare) for eighteen of his 
 thirty-six dramas. " We have but collected them," 
 they say, " and done an office to the dead to pro- 
 cure his orphans guardians, without ambition either 
 of self-profit or fame ; only to keep the memory 
 of so worthy a friend and fellow alive as was our 
 Shakespeare." Fellow implies that they were players 
 Heminge a poor one, " Stuttering Hemmings," 
 he is called ; but besides being players, they were 
 the leading proprietors and managers of the Globe
 
 54 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 and Blackfriars theatres, and so the owners of the 
 plays they allowed to be published. In Shake- 
 speare's will there is an item interlined : " To my 
 fellowes, John Hemynges, Richard Burbage, and 
 Henry Cundell, xxvjs viij d a peece to buy them 
 ringes." The commentator Steevens has some 
 amusing remarks on the greasy condition of most 
 copies of the first folio that have come down : 
 
 "Of all volumes those of popular entertainment 
 are soonest injured. It would be difficult to name 
 four folios that are oftener found in dirty and 
 mutilated condition, than this first assemblage 
 of Shakespeare's plays, ' God's Revenge against 
 Murder,' ' The Gentleman's Recreation,' and 
 'Johnson's Lives of the Highwaymen.' Though 
 Shakespeare was not, like Fox the Martyrologist, 
 deposited in churches to be thumbed by the con- 
 gregation, he generally took post on our hall tables ; 
 and that a multitude of his pages have ' their effect 
 of gravy ' may be imputed to the various eatables set 
 out every morning on the same boards. It should 
 seem that most of his readers were so chary of 
 their time, that (like Pistol, who gnaws his leek 
 and swears all the while) they fed and studied at 
 the same instant. I have repeatedly met with 
 thin flakes of pie-crust between the leaves of ouf 
 author. These unctuous fragments, remaining 
 long in close confinement, communicated their 
 grease to several pages deep on each side of them.
 
 PAGES FKOM A PRIVATE DIARY 55 
 
 It is easy enough to conceive how such accidents 
 might happen how Aunt Bridget's mastication 
 might be disordered at the sudden entry of the 
 Ghost into the Queen's closet, and how the half- 
 chewed morsel dropped out of the gaping Squire's 
 mouth when the visionary Banquo seated himself 
 in the chair of Macbeth. Still, it is no small 
 eulogium on Shakespeare that his claims were 
 more forcible than those of hunger. Most of the 
 first folios now extant are known to have belonged 
 to ancient families resident in the country." Would 
 that our ancient family possessed its copy, how 
 succulent soever ! 
 
 1 Sth. Met some people who have long lived at 
 Woodbridge, and tried to glean a few fresh stories 
 about Edward Fitz-Gerald, but with no success. 
 All they could tell me was that he never enter- 
 tained and rarely accepted invitations ; that he 
 walked about a great deal always wearing a plaid, 
 always apparently lost in thought and recognising 
 nobody, being indeed also short-sighted. He seems 
 to have been regarded by the neighbours with a 
 certain awe as a student and man of letters, though 
 no one quite knew what he wrote or studied. The 
 story lingers in the place that he once instructed 
 his boatman to sew him up in a hammock when 
 he died and pitch him overboard. But I am 
 told that his tomb is now a place of pilgrimage, I 
 suppose to young gentlemen who think the quatrains
 
 56 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 of Omar Khayyam the last word in the criticism 
 of life. The pity of it, that Fitz-Gerald should 
 have sacrificed so exquisite a literary gift to refur- 
 bishing such antique pessimism, and the irony of 
 it, for a man who was always censuring Tennyson 
 for his effeminating sentiment and calling on him 
 for trumpet-blasts. I suppose if a man will live 
 alone in the country and dine daily on vegetables 
 and his own heart, there is no resisting pessimism. 
 But Fitz-Gerald would himself have recognised 
 that the quatrains were the poem of a mood. C. 
 gave me lately E. F. G.'s Sophocles, with his auto- 
 graph, and the funny churchwarden-Gothic book- 
 plate designed for him by Thackeray. I remember 
 being once told by the late W. B. Scott that Fitz- 
 Gerald and Charles Keene were friends for a long 
 time on the ground of a common attachment to 
 the bagpipes before either knew the side of the 
 other that the world now cares for. 
 
 I9//7. Sunday. Megrims, so did not go to 
 church. Who was it said that the one pleasure 
 that never palled was the pleasure of not going to 
 church ? I have a notion that it was the Bishop 
 
 of . Anyhow it could only be by reference 
 
 to a constant type that the aberration would 
 interest. Having Fitz-Gerald in my mind, I took 
 down the first volume of " Wesley's Journal," a book 
 of which E. F. G. thought highly, to read by way 
 of sermon. It covers the years of Wesley's mis -
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 57 
 
 sionary expedition to the new colony of Georgia. 
 One does not know which to wonder at most, his 
 toughness of body or his toughness of mind. Both 
 were extraordinary. What would one of even our 
 hardest-worked London clergy think of the follow- 
 ing Sunday programme : 
 
 5-6.30 A.M. First English prayers. 
 9. Italian service for the Vaudois. 
 10.30-12.30. English service and sermon, 
 i P.M. French sermon. 
 
 2. Catechising of children. 
 
 3. English evensong, followed by prayer meeting, &c. 
 6.30. German service, at which, however, Wesley attended 
 
 only. 
 
 For another proof of his very remarkable 
 physique, one might take this account of a 
 travelling adventure, which was by no means 
 unparalleled in his Colonial experience : 
 
 " Mr. Delamotte and I, with a guide, set out to 
 walk to the Cow-pen ; when we had walked two 
 or three hours, our guide told us plainly, ' He did 
 not know where we were.' However, believing 
 it could not be far off, we thought it best to go 
 on. In an hour or two we came to a cypress 
 swamp, which lay directly across our way ; there 
 was not time to walk back to Savannah before 
 night, so we walked through it, the water being 
 about breast high. By that time we had gone a 
 mile beyond it, we were out of all path, and it
 
 58 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 being now past sunset, we sat down, intending to 
 make a fire and to stay there till morning ; but 
 finding our tinder wet we were at a stand. I 
 advised to walk on still, but my companions being 
 faint and weary, were for lying down, which we 
 accordingly did about six o'clock ; the ground was 
 as wet as our cloaks, which (it being a sharp frost) 
 were soon froze together ; however, I slept till six 
 in the morning. There fell a heavy dew in the 
 night, which covered us over as white as snow. 
 Within an hour after sunrise we came to a plan- 
 tation, and in the evening, without any hurt, to 
 Savannah." (Wednesday, December 23, 1736.) 
 
 Every page of the journal testifies to the scholar 
 no less than the gentleman. He quotes obscure 
 Greek epigrams ; he reads to his Savannah flock 
 exhortations of St. Ephrem Syrus. Fancy Mr. 
 H. P. Hughes reciting the rhythms of this saint 
 to a congregation at St. James's Hall ! On his 
 voyage back to England he reads Machiavelli to 
 see what can be made of that political dissenter, 
 and comes to a decided conclusion : 
 
 " In my passage home, having procured a cele- 
 brated book, the works of Nicholas Machiavel, I 
 set myself carefully to read and consider it. I 
 began with a prejudice in his favour, having been 
 informed he had often been misunderstood, and 
 greatly misrepresented. I weighed the sentiments 
 that were less common ; transcribed the passages
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 59 
 
 wherein they were contained ; compared one 
 passage with another, and endeavoured to form 
 a cool impartial judgment. And my cool judg- 
 ment is, that if all the other doctrines of devils 
 which have been committed to writing since letters 
 were in the world were collected together in one 
 volume, it would fall short of this : and that should 
 a prince form himself by this book, so calmly 
 recommending hypocrisy, treachery, lying, robbery, 
 oppression, adultery, whoredom, and murder of all 
 kinds, Domitian or Nero would be an angel of 
 light compared to that man." (January 26, 1737.) 
 22nd. Read at the Club Mr. Gladstone's attack 
 on the minor poet in Henley's New Review. " He 
 may write if he likes, but he must not print." The 
 advice has an air of wisdom, and it may be offered 
 with even more urgency to translators of Horace. 
 For translation, though undoubtedly a useful exer- 
 cise, cannot deserve printer's ink and paper unless 
 the translator be a poet of equal genius with his 
 author. And poets do not, as a rule, think it 
 worth \vhile to translate each other. Why is it 
 that Horace appeals so irresistibly to the prosaic 
 mind even of good men ? Why, for instance, 
 should the venerable hand that gave us an anno- 
 tated Psalter give us also a version of Horace ? 
 For my part, I sympathise strongly with the poet, 
 still happily living, who, on being asked to English 
 an ode of Horace, replied, " I should as soon
 
 60 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 think of doing Moore into Greek anapaests or 
 Tupper into Greek elegiacs." Mr. Gladstone sug- 
 gests that when a man discovers he is not a great 
 poet he should cease to print. But how is this 
 simple-sounding discovery to be made ? The poet 
 does not, like the orator, appeal to the crowd, and 
 estimate his greatness by the poll. He knows that 
 if his gift is original it must at first be vocal only 
 to the understanding few, for the crowd read only 
 what their demagogues bid them. It was Bright 
 who made Sir Lewis Morris's vogue, and for how 
 many reputations is not Mr. Gladstone responsible ! 
 The recent competition for the laureateship, which 
 to thoughtless people seemed so ridiculous, meant 
 no more than that poets, like other authors, prefer 
 a large to a small sale, and so wished to secure 
 the great public that buys only what has the cachet. 
 But Mr. Gladstone would reply, let the young poet 
 consult the critics. 
 
 Alas ! who are the critics ? His critic may be 
 the man he snubbed yesterday at the Club ; or 
 some young puppy fresh from the university bent 
 on using his milk-teeth at all costs ; or some editor, 
 with a bee in his bonnet, determined that Bilson 
 shall be the greatest living poet, and every other 
 father's son, Tomson, Dickson, and Harrison no- 
 where. Austin Dobson has an interesting apologue, 
 called " The Poet and the Critics," in " At the Sign 
 of the Lyre." If, on the other hand, the young
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 6 1 
 
 poet gets praise, it will probably be because he is 
 himself a member of the press-gang. The public, 
 then, being uninterested, and the critics interested, 
 the young poet must fall back on himself. But if 
 he understands how bad his first book is, it will 
 only be because he has the power to make the next 
 better, and so he will try again. Similarly he will 
 try again, if he thinks his book good. So that the 
 situation is really hopeless, and must be left. 
 
 24/7*. Stayed in town to attend the presentation 
 of the statuette of Sir Thomas More to the Chelsea 
 Library. It is curious that London should be 
 content with such a meagre memorial of one of 
 her greatest sons. 
 
 Went afterwards to a meeting of a little society 
 to encourage the employment of men who have 
 served their time with the colours. Could not a 
 similar society be started to find occupation for 
 retired officers ? Surely we are as a class the 
 most pitiable people in the world. A day arrives 
 when we lose our chief interest in life. The 
 routine work of duty, the slave that bore the 
 burden and heat with a light heart and easy 
 conscience falls dead ; and we must look about 
 for a successor. Sometimes the by-work is set to 
 the mill, and loses much of its zest in consequence. 
 L. turns his lathe now all the morning, instead of 
 at odd moments, and his house is fast filling with 
 useless little pots ; H. scours the country collecting
 
 62 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 grandfather's clocks for the sake of the brass 
 corners on their faces ; M. has taken up with the 
 Church Association, and pesters the bishops with 
 resolutions against Rome. They are fairly happy ; 
 but how many I know at Eastbourne and Southsea 
 and other watering-places, who are sorely con- 
 scious, except for a month or two in autumn, of 
 the passage of time " time's discrete flow," as the 
 psychologists call it the odious now, now, now. 
 "A man's life's no more than to say one," said 
 Hamlet ; but that was his hopelessly unpractical 
 turn of mind, or possibly his fulness of matter. 
 To many it is to say one, one, one, as the clock 
 ticks. 
 
 27th. Went to the sale at Manor. Fuller 
 
 long ago remarked that Berkshire land was skittish 
 and apt to throw its rider ; but since the great fall 
 in prices it has been changing hands very rapidly. 
 The old yeomen of whom the county has long 
 made its boast Mavor attributing to Mr. Pitt the 
 saying " that no minister could command ten votes 
 in Berkshire " are finding it impossible to go on 
 farming at a loss, and are selling their land to 
 rich strangers from town. The old manor-houses 
 are pulled down and mansions take their place. 
 It is a sad change for the yeomen and their friends, 
 and perhaps for the country, but profitable for the 
 peasantry, who will get better paid and housed. 
 
 z. What a topsy-turvy sort of vanity is that
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 63 
 
 which takes pleasure in being like distinguished 
 people. I met a curate this afternoon at our 
 Member's garden-party who is the very twin of 
 the Archbishop of Canterbury, 1 only that he is of 
 course " less consequential about the legs." He 
 had the archiepiscopal carriage and look, even to 
 the smile, which is a good smile, though not quite 
 so good as the Pope's; that seems to have more 
 centuries behind it. I know, too, several middle- 
 aged gentlemen who are not unlike the newspaper 
 pictures of the Prince of Wales. But how can the 
 resemblance in any reasonable way feed vanity, as 
 it certainly does ? There is more interest in being 
 like the mighty dead, because one may cherish a 
 mild Pythagoreanism. For example, my own nick- 
 name at school was Socrates, and I have recently 
 discovered that I might have sat for the portrait of 
 Ravaillac. Sophia often asks me why I keep a 
 picture of the poet Gray on my mantelpiece ; the 
 reason is that it is so very like her, especially 
 about the chin ; but I do not like to say so, as she 
 might not be flattered. 
 
 August ist. I am not happy. The cause of 
 my unhappiness is nothing very great, but, on the 
 contrary, something very small indeed ; so small 
 that it might be deemed below the dignity of a 
 journal were I not able to record it in classical 
 phrase. " There is an insect with us, especially in 
 
 1 The late Archbishop Benson.
 
 64 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 chalky districts, which is very troublesome and 
 teasing all the latter end of the summer, getting 
 into people's skins and raising tumours, which itch 
 intolerably. This animal (which is called a harvest- 
 bug) is very minute, scarce discernible to the naked 
 eye, of a bright scarlet colour, and of the genus 
 of acarus." (White's " Selborne," Letter 35.) 
 Everybody has his pet specific ; in past years I 
 have employed the oil of cajeput ; but the success 
 is indifferent, and the aura one moves in un- 
 deniably pungent. My wife has endeavoured to 
 convince me that I should resent it in my 
 neighbours. 
 
 2nd. It is no longer the fashion to relate one's 
 dreams at breakfast, but last night's dream, as 
 much as I can remember of it, is worth recording. 
 It was an episode in a police case. I was in a 
 well-lighted train half asleep when another train 
 flared by and roused me. Looking in its direction 
 I saw reflected in the windows of the passing 
 carriages a scuffle, gagging, and robbery that was 
 being transacted in the next compartment to mine ; 
 and at the end of the journey I identified the 
 criminal. I do not remember that this possibility 
 has been used by any writer of detective fiction. 
 The idea is of no use to me whatever, and I should 
 be glad to exchange it for something more service- 
 able. My more usual dreams are dialogues. It 
 seems an extraordinary thing that one should be
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 65 
 
 able to converse with oneself and enjoy all the 
 excitement of expectation as to what is to come 
 next. I ask a searching question or deliver what 
 seems a crushing retort, and wait anxiously for 
 the reply just as if the interlocutor were another 
 person. But probably this is the ordinary ex- 
 perience of the novelist or dramatist the sort 
 with imagination, I mean ; only they see visions 
 while I but dream dreams. At least, I know 
 
 whenever I meet , he is sure to say, " Isn't 
 
 that a magnificent thing so-and-so says in my new 
 piece ? it is so like him ; " whereas his natural 
 modesty would prevent his calling attention to his 
 own good things. I have always regretted that 
 the ingenious author of " Happy Thoughts " got 
 so little way with his " Handbook of Repartee ; " 
 it would have been invaluable to me in waking 
 hours when my wit is always r esprit de I'escalier. 
 But failing this, it would be useful to have an his- 
 torical handbook not " what to say to an Abbe 
 or Fakir," but what actually has been said in the 
 way of repartee to or by distinguished Fakirs and 
 Abbes. The book would naturally begin with the 
 best things of the Abbe de Talleyrand. Not the 
 least interesting pages would be those devoted to 
 Bus-drivers and Policemen ; for the wit in these 
 cases is sometimes as subtle as in the more 
 polished examples, and I heartily sympathise with 
 Burton, author of the "Anatomy of Melancholy," 
 
 E
 
 66 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 whose one amusement was listening to the wit 
 encounters of Oxford bargees. The other day I 
 overheard the following : 
 
 A. Does your mother take in washing? 
 
 2?. Yes, and she ain't particular to having a gentleman- 
 lodger, but he must know how to behave hisself like a gentle- 
 man, yer know. 
 
 I thought this excellent in several respects ; it did 
 not take umbrage at the suggestion of the laundry, 
 but accepted it and went even further into bio- 
 graphical particulars, and then produced the sting, 
 where the sting ought to be, in the tail. As some 
 help to the future author of the Handbook, I note 
 that one useful form of repartee depends upon 
 Paronomasia, another upon looking closely at 
 Metaphors, a third upon Quotation. A good 
 example of the first is the reply of Sir Robert 
 Walpole to Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, who 
 was indignant at being offered the revived Order 
 of the Bath, and would take nothing but the 
 Garter : " Madam, the Bath must come before the 
 Garter." x Of the second, this is the best instance 
 that occurs to me at the moment : 
 
 Ritualist, At least you will own that Art is the handmaid 
 of Religion ? 
 
 Protestant. Yes, and I wish Religion would give her a 
 month's notice. 
 
 1 This story proves incidentally that washing did not, like Christmas 
 Trees and Crystal Palaces, come in with the late Prince Consort.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 67 
 
 The third I will illustrate from the same witty 
 scholar, whose praise is in the University. An 
 Ibsenite was running down Shakespeare and say- 
 ing his characters were not " alive." To which 
 my friend replied : " Oh yes, they're alive, but not 
 kicking; certainly not kicking." In many cases a 
 repartee is helped by a stammer. Of this use 
 Charles Lamb is the classical example, but my 
 Oxford friend runs him hard. 
 
 4//z. To-day the ladies set off by train to South- 
 sea, and I on my bicycle. I ran first to Farnham, 
 so as to spend a few hours at the Volunteer Man- 
 oeuvres. The hops in the neighbourhood looked 
 well. Some were shown me that had grown in 
 the same field for three hundred years, but it will 
 soon not pay to grow them. After tea I resumed 
 my journey, and joined the Portsmouth road at 
 Petersfield. I noticed on the way that Wolmer 
 Pond was nearly dry. In such a drought a hun- 
 dred and fifty years ago search was made in the 
 bed, and there was a great find of Roman coins. 
 It might be worth while to try again. 
 
 5 fh. I strolled after breakfast to see who of my 
 old acquaintance might be here. For a time the 
 pageant of bright faces was singularly attractive ; 
 then I longed for some one to chat with or, at least, 
 nod to apothecary, plough-boy, thief. I mused 
 with Bacon, " Little do men perceive what solitude 
 is and how far it extendeth ; for a crowd is not
 
 68 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 company, and faces are but a gallery of pictures." 
 Which meant that my liver was beginning to show 
 its distaste for the seaside ; luckily I soon met 
 
 Colonel , and in talk over old times forgot 
 
 my melancholy. The roads were all crowded 
 with bicycles, and their smoothness justifies the 
 exercise. Ladies outnumber men and are more 
 dangerous to pedestrians, being too careless in 
 turning corners without ringing their bells. It 
 seems the fashion to read as one wheels. Some 
 enterprising publisher should start a Bicycle 
 Library, on light paper with big type. So far I 
 have escaped injury, but Bob, the fox terrier, was 
 run over this morning. No doubt he was a good 
 deal to blame. This is his first visit to a town, 
 and he has been trying to maintain the country 
 etiquette of speaking to every dog he meets 
 which is dangerous among so many vehicles. 
 There is a grand parade of bicyclists before 
 dinner, when the skilful exhibit their tricks. Some 
 enthusiasts appear again in the evening. And 
 certainly the gliding motion of so many lamps, 
 the noiseless noise of the machines, and the half- 
 seen passage of ambling nymphs and caracoling 
 cavaliers has a very pleasing effect. 
 
 7//r. A correspondent is good enough to inform 
 me that the story I entered in my journal on July 2 
 about the groom's confusion between playing 
 and visiting cards was told him at Constantinople
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 69 
 
 in 1847 by a Turk whom he met at table in the 
 Hotel de 1'Europe, but he told it of a lady. The 
 Turk proved to be a certain Seyd Ali, well known 
 at that date as an interpreter, in which capacity he 
 served in Colonel Chesney's Euphrates Expedition. 
 The tale is probably told in every society which 
 uses both sorts of cards, and speaks of them as 
 " cards " without a qualifying epithet. 
 
 nth. It is astonishing that the Admiralty do 
 not take more pains to interest our inland villages 
 in seafaring. Only one boy has in my recollection 
 gone from us for a sailor, and he did not get 
 further than Portsmouth, being obliged to return 
 as he had no certificate of good conduct. He was 
 one of Tom's under-gardeners and had a soul 
 above cabbages. So the next time vegetables irked 
 him he went to Reading, and took his shilling in 
 the ordinary way. He was much above the aver- 
 age yokel in intelligence I fancy he had a dash of 
 gipsy-blood in him and is now a clarionet player 
 in the band. Cheap excursions will do much good 
 in breaking down the old horror of the sea. I 
 remember a sick boy of my old gardener's being 
 sent to a Convalescent Home, and charged by his 
 mother on no account to go near the water. After 
 his first day he wrote home a post-card, which his 
 mother showed me in fear and trembling ; this was 
 its audacious message : " There is nothing to be 
 afraid of, it comes up like a snale."
 
 70 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 14/7?. Whenever there is likely to be work with 
 the House of Lords, I read the Daily Chronicle, 
 as in old days we used to read the Star "for 
 sweetness and charity," as Matthew Arnold said. 
 It has hardly been up to its best vituperative form 
 over the Irish Land Bill. " Splendid fatuity " and 
 " unutterable farce " are not epoch-making phrases; 
 they lack discrimination ; and " three ridiculous 
 old gentlemen," as the description of a quorum, is 
 unworthy even of the Star of to-day. Possibly the 
 editor of the Chronicle has discovered the elixir, and 
 secured perpetual youth ; but even so, " old " is 
 ungracious ; and why " ridiculous " ? So many 
 peers in the present House have been made and 
 not born, that their intellect and manners are 
 probably yet pretty much those of commoners. 
 But it takes indignation to make satire, and though 
 a landlord is an evil beast enough (while a " pro- 
 prietor" subtle distinction is an angel), none 
 but a spiritual peer can rouse the Chronicle to a 
 really fine frenzy. I have never forgotten a sen- 
 tence that closed the story of the rejection of the 
 Home Rule Bill. "Thus the Bishops completed 
 the work which their ancestors, the Scribes and 
 Pharisees, began eighteen hundred years ago." I 
 have often thought that this sentence had some- 
 thing to do with the Radical collapse at the polls. 
 Of course the Chronicle is not without virtues, not 
 the least being its enterprise ; and I have been
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 71 
 
 shown once or twice a piece of literary criticism 
 that it would be hard to overpraise. 
 
 1 5//7. The news that to-day is Hospital Saturday 
 in Southsea was broken to us at breakfast by the 
 maid bringing in a collecting-box. 
 
 " The veins unfill'd, our blood is cold, and then 
 We pout upon the morning, are unapt 
 To give." 
 
 However, we had plenty of opportunity, when 
 our souls were suppler, to amend our beneficence. 
 The streets were crowded with young women 
 dressed like nurses and wearing a red cross, who 
 smiled and smiled, and pushed a box into one's 
 waistcoat. For a time I smiled and put them by ; 
 but at last was driven to my bicycle. Even then 
 they lay waiting at the thievish corners of the 
 streets, and bade one stand and deliver. The 
 young men seemed to like it, but my seat is per- 
 haps not so good as theirs, and I took to a country 
 road. I see one of the papers has an apposite 
 article on bazaars and other church leeches, on 
 the whole condemning them. They seem to me as 
 justifiable as the smiles of these engaging damsels. 
 Both are an attempt to divert by cajolery certain 
 sums from the milliner and cigar merchant to the 
 sick and needy. Good churchmen, of course, tythe 
 their incomes for charity, but there are churchmen 
 and churchwomen who do not, and it is for these
 
 72 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 that bazaars exist. In old days such were dealt 
 with firmly by the priest at the deathbed ; if we 
 substitute the love of pleasure for the fear of pain, 
 we employ no higher, but certainly no lower, 
 motive. It does not seem in any sense fair to 
 class bazaars with gambling hells ; there is no 
 question of doing evil that good may come ; it is 
 a fact that Flavia, 1 now as much as a century ago, 
 requires some stronger stimulus than pure benevo- 
 lence before she will put her silver penny in the 
 alms-dish, and the fact must be taken account of. 
 Goldsmith tells a capital story of the method Beau 
 Nash employed to extort a subscription from a 
 reluctant duchess for the hospital at Bath : 
 
 "The sums he gave, and collected for the hos- 
 pital, were great, and his manner of doing it was 
 no less admirable. I am told that he was once 
 collecting money in Wiltshire's room for that pur- 
 pose, when a lady entered who is more remark- 
 able for her wit than her charity, and not being 
 able to pass by him unobserved, she gave him a 
 pat with her fan, and said, You must put down a 
 trifle for me, Nash, for I have no money in my pocket. 
 Yes, madam, says he, that I will, with pleasure, if 
 
 1 " If any one asks Flavia to do something in charity, if she likes the 
 person who makes the proposal, or happens to be in a right temper, she 
 will toss him half-a-crown or a crown, and tell him if he knew what a 
 long Milliner's bill she had just received, he would think it a great 
 deal for her to give." (Law's " Serious Call," p. 96 ; but see the whole 
 witty description of this modish lady. )
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 73 
 
 your grace will tell me when to stop : then taking 
 a handful of guineas out of his pocket, he began to 
 tell them into his white hat, one, two, three, four, 
 five. Hold, hold, says the dutchess, consider what 
 you are about. Consider your rank and fortune, 
 madam, says Nash, and continued telling, six, 
 seven, eight, nine, ten. Here the dutchess called 
 again, and seemed angry. Pray compose your- 
 self, madam, cried Nash, and don't interrupt the 
 work of charity ; eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, 
 fifteen. Here the dutchess stormed and caught 
 hold of his hand. Peace, madam, says Nash ; you 
 shall have your name written in letters of gold, 
 madam, and upon the front of the building, madam. 
 Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty. / 
 wont pay a farthing more, says the dutchess. Charity 
 hides a multitude of sins, replies Nash. Twenty- 
 one, twenty-two, twenty-three, twenty-four, twenty- 
 five. Nash, says she, / protest you frighten me out of 
 my wits, L d, I shall die ! Madam, you will never 
 die with doing good ; and if you do, it will be the 
 better for you, answered Nash, and was about to 
 proceed ; but perceiving her grace had lost all 
 patience, a parley ensued, when he, after much 
 altercation, agreed to stop his hand, and com- 
 pound with her grace for thirty guineas. The 
 dutchess, however, seemed displeased the whole 
 evening ; and when he came to the table where 
 she was playing, bid him stand farther, an ugly
 
 74 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 devil> for she hated the sight of him. But her grace 
 afterwards, having a run of good luck, called Nash to 
 her. Come, says she, / will be friends with you, though 
 you are a fool ; and to let you see I am not angry, there 
 is ten guineas more for your charity. But this I insist 
 on, that neither my name nor the sum shall be men- 
 tioned." (" Life of Richard Nash, Esq.," p. 121.) 
 
 i8th. It would be an astonishing thing, but 
 for the known laziness of human nature, that 
 parents should allow their children to attend 
 revivalistic meetings on the beach at sea- 
 side places. The religion of children should 
 be simple and home-made, enthusiastic, if you 
 please, but breezy and full of ozone ; the reverse 
 of morbid. Now the spiritual methods of these 
 beach-combers are about as healthy as their 
 physical methods. They collect a vast array of 
 children together, and seat them cheek by jowl, 
 dirty by clean, on a hot August day, in circles 
 of an inferno, with a double row of nurses behind 
 to keep out any stray whiffs of fresh air ; and 
 then instead of telling them, as our Catechism 
 does, that they are Christians and should behave 
 themselves as such, they call them sinners, who 
 will probably die young, and then the preacher 
 will not answer for the consequences. In some 
 cases, too, that I know of, the preacher has told 
 children to come against their parents' wishes ; a 
 pretty religion, surely, that begins with the breach
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 75 
 
 of the first ethical commandment. Parents that 
 I have remonstrated with for allowing their chil- 
 dren to attend these services defend themselves by 
 saying that it may do the children good ; a plea 
 that shows the importance of the Johnsonian pre- 
 cept to free one's mind from cant. 
 
 i()th. My term of patience at the sea having 
 reached its period, we have come for a few days' 
 
 visit to the B 's, near Guildford, to fill the 
 
 interval before we are expected at P 's place 
 
 in Norfolk. I took train to Petersfield, as it 
 seemed unnecessary to labour up the south 
 slope of the downs, and then followed the Ports- 
 mouth road through Liphook, &c. The heather 
 was in brilliant beauty, and a Scotsman whom I 
 boarded on the road confessed that it put him 
 in mind of his own country. I vowed that 
 should I ever become a potentate, I would be 
 " Sowdun of Surrye." My friendly Scot, by his 
 pleasant society, more than halved the toil of 
 climbing Hindhead. He pointed out the objects 
 of interest on the road, such as the " Seven 
 Thorns" Inn, telling me how the landlord re- 
 sented Mrs. Oliphant's use of it in the " Cuckoo 
 in the Nest." When we reached the top he 
 showed me all the counties of England and the 
 glory of them. The run from Hindhead down 
 to Godalming will remain long in memory. The 
 road was perfect ; it was about mid-day, and
 
 76 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 exceedingly hot ; but the rapid motion made a 
 breeze, which seemed to insulate me from the 
 flames. There was no one else on the road for 
 the seven miles of descent ; and this was perhaps 
 as well, for my spirits were so much raised that 
 I could not help shouting. I thought of Elijah 
 going to heaven in a chariot of fire, and ex- 
 tinguished a scruple about the downward direc- 
 tion by a vague reference to Antipodes. Every 
 now and then the wind brought a hot whiff of 
 the bramble. In the valley there was shade once 
 more, and the aromatic smell of firs ; but what 
 ointment is not spoilt by flies ? I was so much 
 cheered by the journey that I conceived a tender- 
 ness for any bicyclists I met, and would have 
 accosted them had they not looked strangely on 
 me. There should be (perhaps there is) some 
 formal salutation for the road, or better several, 
 one for meeting on a level, one of encourage- 
 ment to the bicyclist going up hill, one of con- 
 gratulation to the fortunate brother going down. 
 2ist. Was Mr. Watts present at Millais' 
 
 funeral ? The Daily , in one column, tells 
 
 me that "conspicuous among those, &c., was 
 the venerable form, &c.," and in another that 
 " in accordance with his habitual practice, Mr. 
 Watts did not attend the ceremony." It must 
 be very difficult for an editor to maintain con- 
 sistency among so many picturesque writers. I
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 77 
 
 remember at the end of the Ashanti War that 
 the same paper honoured Prince Henry as a 
 patriot who gave his life for his country, and 
 applauded the withholding of rewards from the 
 survivors who no less had to face the dangerous 
 climate. " It would be a remarkable arrow that 
 should pick out only the brave," said the Spartan 
 prisoner in Thucydides ; so these gentlemen attri- 
 buted too much discrimination to the malaria. 
 
 2$th. The papers report that the Pope has in- 
 cluded Zola's " Rome " in the Index Expurgatorius. 
 Was it not Pio Nono who, being asked by an 
 author to do something for a book of his, after 
 long reflection, replied, " I will tell you what I 
 can do ; I can put it on the Index " ? 
 
 September $th. A chronicle of sport so many 
 guns and such and such a bag is not lively read- 
 ing for any but the particular sportsman, and it 
 takes a meteorologist to find interest in a chronicle 
 of bad weather ; so for the early days of Sep- 
 tember I leave the record of birds and rain to the 
 exuberant imagination. We travelled into Nor- 
 folk leisurely at the end of last month, taking 
 Cambridge and Ely on our way. Sometimes we 
 journeyed by rail, sometimes on our own w T heels, 
 and in the latter mode of progress seemed to 
 renew the golden age when folks were content 
 to ride on horseback, and had time to look about 
 them. But even behind the horseman rode " black
 
 78 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Care " ; nor does that Fury desert the bicyclist, 
 though forced by the exiguity of the saddle to 
 shift her position to one or other tyre, where she 
 stands, like Fortune, on the ever-rolling circle, 
 
 " Allowing us a breath, a little scene, 
 Inspiring us with self and vain conceit, 
 and humour 5 d thus, 
 Comes at the last, and with a little pin . . ." 
 
 Cambridge was just emptying itself of what are 
 called " Extension students," many of them school- 
 mistresses who take the opportunity of enlarging 
 the range of their interests or hearing the latest 
 theories on some pet hobby. Without being in 
 the least what Peacock calls a " Pantopragmatic " 
 one may allow that lectures in this way fulfil a 
 useful function ; and probably there has never 
 been since the days of the sophists so well-con- 
 sidered an attempt on the part of those who know 
 to share their knowledge and spread enthusiasm. 
 The ladies had not seen Cambridge before, and 
 were becomingly impressed with its characteristic 
 glories the rosy-brown brick of Trinity and St. 
 John's and Queen's ; the " backs " ; King's Chapel ; 
 and not least the marvellous statue of Newton 
 " with his prism and silent face." We plucked a 
 few mulberries, too, from Milton's tree at Christ's. 
 
 Coming from the undulations of a down country, 
 we were much struck by the peculiar beauty of the 
 eastern counties, the beauty of a flat landscape
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 79 
 
 the long stretch of meadows to a dim horizon, 
 broken by clumps of trees, an occasional windmill, 
 or the glimpse of a white sail on a hidden stream. 
 Even the geometrical canals had prospective. 
 
 6///. Last Sunday and to-day we drove into 
 Norwich for the cathedral service. The English 
 Matins and Evensong are sui generis; how dif- 
 ferent they are from the corresponding Roman 
 services, out of which they have been evolved, 
 any traveller knows who has heard the choir office 
 gone through in a foreign church, " entuned in 
 the nose full seemely." They are English to the 
 core, and are excellently fitted to express or sup- 
 press, to half reveal and half conceal, what the 
 average Englishman calls his religious feelings. 
 The double chant is a kind of symbol of the 
 whole, and those Italianate clergy who hold by 
 Gregorians deny their birthright. I could wish 
 it were the custom not to begin singing till the 
 " O Lord, open Thou our lips " ; the Exhortation 
 on G, as usually rendered, is about as silly and 
 unimpressive a piece of ceremonial as was ever 
 devised, and the General Confession is only a 
 little better. I sympathise in this point with the 
 hot-heads who are for getting back to Edward's 
 First Prayer Book, which opened admirably with 
 the " Our Father." More attention might be given 
 in cathedrals as well as parish churches, to the 
 reading of the lessons. A style is required mid-
 
 8o PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 way between the dull monotone sometimes affected 
 by the High Church school and the over-dramatic 
 manner of others. At Norwich last Sunday a 
 very exalted dignitary thundered out St. Paul's 
 advice about buying your meat at the butcher's 
 without asking too many questions, as though it 
 were a matter of eternal spiritual import to all 
 present, instead of a mere piece of antiquarianism. 
 We lunched in Norwich, as I wished to hear Tom 
 Mann, who was advertised to address a meeting 
 in the afternoon. He had not much voice and 
 strained it painfully, but he was impressive from 
 the nervous energy and the air of conviction with 
 which he spoke ; and I was agreeably surprised 
 at his moderation. 
 
 jth. I have a great respect for the Standard 
 newspaper ; it maintains, as a rule, a dignity and 
 a self-restraint which in these last days are be- 
 coming rare. But, too often, when an article 
 is required on the British aristocracy, it puts the 
 pen into the hand of our old friend Jeames de la 
 Pluche. There is no mistaking his style this 
 morning. The Duke of Maryborough has been 
 feasting Conservative associations a circumstance 
 that would have inspired Theognis, who said, 
 " You should eat and drink with the nobility, for 
 from the good you will learn what is good." 
 Twenty - five centuries pass and the spirit of 
 Theognis takes flesh again in Jeames. " It is
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 8 1 
 
 well," he says, " that these great gatherings should 
 sometimes be held in the grounds belonging to 
 members of the aristocracy whose ancestors have 
 helped to make the history of England. For 
 there is nothing better calculated to make men 
 Conservatives in the best sense of the word than 
 a knowledge of our national history, and the steps 
 by which its glory grew. It may be true enough 
 that the celebrated man, the founder of the ducal 
 House of Maryborough, had his weak points. 
 Addison's famous simile of the angel has often 
 been laughed at, but there is quite as much truth in 
 it as in most similes? and it is well that the people 
 should be from time to time reminded of the fact 
 that aristocracy tends to develop qualities not less 
 valuable in the domestic arena [' domestic arena ' 
 is good], than on the field of battle. The 
 ' calmness ' imputed to Marlborough at the most 
 trying moments of his career is one of these." 
 The party press is generally secure in appeal- 
 ing to popular ignorance. Still, to tell them 
 that aristocracy tends to develop calmness of the 
 
 1 What does this mean ? The Tatler of the day (No. 43) praised it, 
 apart from its "sublimity," on the ground that it complimented "the 
 general and his queen at the same time." 
 
 " So when an Angel by Divine Command 
 With rising Tempests shakes a guilty Land, 
 Such as of late o'er pale Britannia past, 
 Calm and serene he drives the furious Blast ; 
 And, pleas'd th' Almighty's Orders to perform, 
 Rides in the Whirl-wind, and directs the Storm." 
 
 F
 
 82 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Maryborough type, however true it may be, is 
 not wise ; it is not calculated to make them 
 Conservatives in any sense of the term. Nor is 
 it wise generally to encourage much investigation 
 into the title-deeds of " our old nobility." Lord 
 Verulam (than whom none knew better) says very 
 pregnantly, " Those that are first raised to nobility 
 are commonly more virtuous [i.e. capable], 1 but 
 less innocent, than their descendants ; for there 
 is rarely any rising but by a commixture of 
 good and evil arts." Lord Wolseley spoilt his 
 apology for Marlborough by printing the Duke's 
 portrait in the book, a portrait with sui amans 
 written in every line of the " calm " and handsome 
 face. 
 
 8//i. I spent a day looking at the best of the 
 forty churches that Norwich can boast, but made 
 no discoveries not already made in the guide-books. 
 In St. Andrew's Church I visited the tomb of Sir 
 John Suckling for the sake of his poet son, who is 
 figured kneeling by it. The porter who showed 
 me over what was once the church of the Domini- 
 cans, and is now two public halls, had the true 
 ecclesiological instinct, and should have been a 
 verger. " It is quite vexing," said he, " when I 
 
 1 Cf. Winter's Tale, iv. 3 : 
 
 " AUTOLYCUS. I cannot tell for which of his virtues it was, but he 
 was certainly whipped out of the court. 
 " CLOWN. His vices, you would say. 
 " AUTOLYCUS. Vices, I would say, sir."
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 83 
 
 read the old histories to see there used to be a 
 high altar here, with stalls all round it, and you 
 could look the whole length from choir to nave. 
 Now there's nothing to see " (with a wave of his 
 arm to the civic pictures) " but these old celebrities 
 very interesting, no doubt, for the costumes of 
 the period." I felt sympathy as well as pity for 
 the old-fashioned fellow, who did not know that 
 our masses are now evangelised by picture exhibi- 
 tions. 1 I made my way also to Borrow's house 
 and the site of Sir Thomas Browne's. They have 
 recently been marked by tablets. The inmates of 
 the former a very pretty house, standing back 
 from the main street and approached by a narrow 
 entry seemed amused at my interest in Borrow, of 
 whom they had naturally never heard till the tablet 
 made their house a shrine of occasional pilgrimage. 
 loth. Rain. I found on the library table the 
 Romanes lecture by Dr. Creighton on the " English 
 National Character." It is specially interesting at 
 the present moment from its main thesis, which is 
 that from the first England has shown " a tendency 
 to withdraw cautiously from the general system of 
 Europe and go its own way. ... Its dominant 
 
 1 I once saw an example of sudden conversion. Arrius and Arria 
 were strolling along the galleries at Hampton Court, looking very much 
 depressed. At last Arrius saw a word that pierced home to him. It 
 
 was " landing at Margate." He turned round to his companion 
 
 and said, ' ' Good old Margate, good old 'all by the sea ! let's go and 
 have a drink ! "
 
 84 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 motive seems simply to have been a stubborn 
 desire to manage its own affairs in its own way, 
 without any interference from outside." The 
 Bishop illustrates this from England's relation 
 both to the Empire and the Papacy. Some of the 
 national characteristics are very happily sketched. 
 " Who does not know the travelling Englishman 
 aggrieved because he may not argue the rights of 
 his particular case as against some general rule, 
 which the native finds no difficulty in dutifully 
 obeying ? His grievance lies in the sense that 
 the rules never contemplated his particular case." 
 
 Never shall I forget the picture of swearing 
 
 in choice Italian at a station-master because he 
 would not let us have our luggage after office 
 hours. The trunks lay behind a glass-door, con- 
 spicuous to all, and it needed but a turn of the 
 key to release them, and there were excellent 
 reasons why they should not remain there all 
 night, but rules were rules. The Bishop tells a 
 good and characteristically English story of Robert 
 Tomson of Andover, who sailed from Bristol to 
 Cadiz with the purpose of making his fortune, 
 learned Spanish, sailed to Mexico, suffered ship- 
 wreck and plague, reached his destination, found 
 a Scotsman l there who befriended him, talked 
 
 1 Is this not also characteristic, both as to the friendliness and the 
 enterprise? In the dark days before the gospel of Free Trade was 
 preached, we English were a little jealous of our northern brethren, as
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 85 
 
 theology, was delated to the Inquisition, sent back 
 to Seville and imprisoned for three years, married 
 a fortune, and lived happily ever after. 
 
 i^th. We came for a few days to this hotel at 
 Lowestoft for a final breath of the sea air. There 
 must be people who like hotel life, as they stay 
 here for months together ; but it is impossible to 
 say of it, as Johnson said of taverns in his day, 
 that "there is a general freedom from anxiety." 
 On the contrary, the ladies seem anxious to out- 
 shine each other in their dresses, the men in their 
 vintages. In my youth champagne was reserved 
 for festival occasions ; here it is drunk like beer. 
 This is good for the exchequer, but it strikes me 
 as ungentlemanlike. After dinner last night some 
 
 Boswell abundantly testifies. Among the recently printed Dartmouth 
 papers is a letter written when George III. was king, which contains 
 the following amusing paragraph: "I am certainly the most unfor- 
 tunate man in the world. Two Scotsmen, the only two, I am per- 
 suaded, who are not in office and employment, have plundered the 
 house in Hanover Square. I wish the Administration had provided 
 for them before. If I had been pillaged with the rest of the nation, or 
 persecuted with the rest of the Opposition, I could have been contented, 
 but these private pilferings are very unfair. However, by the vigilance 
 of Sir John Fielding, and notwithstanding all the endeavours of Lord 
 Mansfield and the rest of the Cabinet Council, the thieves are taken, 
 and now my mother is much more alarmed at the thought of their 
 being hanged than she was with the robbery ; but I tell her she may 
 be perfectly easy, that they are very safe, and will be in place and in 
 the House of Commons next Parliament." It is undoubtedly a great 
 advantage to belong to a little clan, if its members are vigorous and 
 patriotic, and if I were an author I should certainly turn Scotsman or 
 else Roman Catholic. Then I should be sure that my merits would 
 not fail of recognition in the press.
 
 86 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 singers came on to the lawn, and I had an oppor- 
 tunity of hearing the current comic songs. The 
 one most applauded celebrated the cheap chicanery 
 of some rascal who left his cabman in the lurch, 
 &c. ; the chorus was, " He's waiting there for me." 
 This would seem to lend colour to Sir Edward 
 Fry's indictment of our commercial morality. I 
 had some talk with a literary lady, or rather she 
 had some talk with me, but to me it was dis- 
 appointing, being for the most part personal 
 gossip. I did not see how she differed from any 
 ordinary matron who gives away her " friends " 
 with a cup of tea, except that the friends were 
 people who write books. This reminds me that 
 
 I met this morning young , whose novels are 
 
 coming into notice. He asked my felicitations 
 on his approaching marriage, which I gave with 
 sincerity, and offered a piece of advice into the 
 bargain not to formulate his wife's faults, should 
 he ever discover any. It is my experience that 
 faults are less easily pardoned when " set in a 
 note-book," and this is the business of the novelist. 
 I regard this sage counsel with some complacency 
 as the " something attempted, something done " 
 that has earned my night's repose. For at the 
 seaside I behave very much like the exquisite who 
 " made a point of never doing any work between 
 meals." 
 
 I4/A. It is a long time since I have stayed in a
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 87 
 
 house fronting a public road, and either my nerves 
 have become case-softened with age or the children 
 of this generation are noisier than their prede- 
 cessors. Hawkers and street organists I do not 
 complain of ; they have a use in the common- 
 wealth, though I am far from believing they do 
 not take a savage ioy in wreaking what amounts 
 
 <j j j <j 
 
 to a revenge upon society. The noises that anger 
 me are such as have no use. At this instant a 
 girl, aged about twelve, is riding her bicycle up 
 and down the street, ringing her bell furiously all 
 the time for sheer delight in the din ; a small boy, 
 not to be outdone, is drawing a stick along the 
 railings ; a second hoyden is being dragged by her 
 companions in a little cart, shuffling her feet on 
 the pavement as she goes ; and a very small child 
 is making daylight sick with a bladder whistle. 
 " Eating strawberry jam to the sound of a 
 trumpet " was a child's notion of heaven. One 
 comprehends why the celibate schoolmen assigned 
 as many babies as possible a limbo to themselves. 
 
 " Continue auditae voces, vagitus et ingens, 
 Infantumque animse flentes." 
 
 Had they lived in these days of emancipated 
 children, they would have extended its hospitality 
 to noise-makers of riper years. 
 
 I'jth. This morning I watched the fishing- 
 boats being tugged out of the harbour a very
 
 picturesque sight. They were roped together in a 
 long chain, and by their bobbing motion suggested 
 a caravan of camels. The sails were red and 
 weathered for the most part to beautiful tints. 
 There have been two fatal accidents lately in 
 hydraulic lifts ; the last victim bore the dis- 
 tinguished but ill-omened name of Richard Plan- 
 tagenet. The earliest reference I remember to a 
 lift for people comes in the Greville " Memoirs " ; 
 it was constructed for Victor Emmanuel at Genoa. 
 " For the comfprt of their bodies he has had a 
 machine made like a car, which is drawn up by a 
 chain from the bottom to the top of the house ; 
 it holds about six people, who can be at pleasure 
 elevated to any storey ; and at each landing-place 
 there is a contrivance to let them in and out " 
 (March 18, 1830). The description is a little 
 wanting in precision. 
 
 2 is/. The weather cannot be better described 
 than by our Berkshire phrase " wunnerful cas'alty." 
 For several days the glass had been slowly rising, 
 and no rain fell here all Sunday. By mid-day 
 the oats that remained out were dry enough to 
 carry, and the ricks were opened to receive them, 
 when lo ! a waterspout for some four hours. 
 
 The Vicar and his wife came to dine for the 
 first time, and we had a small party, chiefly clergy 
 folk, to meet them. He seems a good fellow at 
 bottom, despite his curious and inconsequential
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 89 
 
 streak of Socialism. He has a little the air of a 
 disappointed man ; the fallentis semita vitce is, I 
 suspect, neither his courage nor his choice, but 
 his necessity in being married. He took a good 
 degree at Oxford, and was expected to do some- 
 thing considerable, but his great book is still to 
 write, and being something of a poet and little of 
 a partisan, no politician, and not even a nephew 
 of the Lord Chancellor, he has not attracted public 
 patronage ; and, as his children are growing 
 numerous, he was glad to accept Tom's offer. I 
 was a little afraid at one point in the meal that 
 conversation would be stranded, and I heard 
 Sophia open a discussion on the difference be- 
 tween a " pie " and a " tart," which is with her a 
 signal of distress ; but by introducing a clerical 
 topic we got into deep water again. Some one 
 referred to the Times' letters on the poverty of so 
 many country livings, expressing strong resent- 
 ment at the irrelevant irruption of grumbling 
 laymen headed by a gentleman whom I blushed 
 to hear described as " Giant Grim." It is odd 
 that Churchmen should lag so far behind Dissenters 
 in the matter of providing for their ministers. I 
 noticed in church a few Sundays ago, that a full 
 quarter of the offertory sentences enforce this 
 duty, but these are seldom read : I suppose the 
 parson can hardly be expected to read them. In 
 the country farmers and even squires feel they are
 
 90 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 being generous in simply paying their tythe, for- 
 getting that they inherited, or bought, or leased 
 the land subject to that charge, so that it does not 
 come out of their own pockets. " Us wun't be 
 prosperous," said one fine old Berkshire farmer, 
 "till us have fewer of they black parsons, and 
 more of they black pigs." Happily for the Vicar, 
 Tom redeemed his tythe before the great fall in 
 prices. My neighbour T., who makes his money 
 out of starch and farms for pleasure, sets a good 
 example by paying his tythe at par instead of seventy 
 per cent. Some one mentioned the cartoons in 
 the Westminster Gazette dealing with the Armenians ; 
 and from that the talk drifted to the unpopularity 
 of the clergy, which that paper had lately dis- 
 cussed. It is difficult in the country to arrive at 
 a judgment on the matter. " Murmuring in their 
 tents" is and always was the peculiar vice of the 
 wilderness, and the parson comes in for even a 
 bigger share than the squire. He visits too seldom, 
 or too frequently, or at awkward hours ; he is 
 inquisitorial in distributing alms, or lets himself be 
 hoodwinked by impostors ; his preaching is too 
 short or too long, commonplace or over 'people's 
 heads. The older parsons professed to remark 
 little change in the attitude of their parishioners to 
 them, but the younger men complained that their 
 advice was apt to be resented as interference. 
 This is what one would expect ; the new sense
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 91 
 
 of independence would feel a little deplace and 
 ashamed of itself before old gentlemen who 
 did not recognise its existence, especially if they 
 were humorous and dictatorial, of the Menenius 
 Agrippa type, like so many country parsons of 
 the old school. While the port was going round, 
 I ventured a few remarks about my sermon ex- 
 periences while away from home. I had found 
 the sermons as a rule good, but badly delivered. 
 I quoted Byrom for a similar judgment last century, 
 and suggested that each rural deanery should 
 acquire the services of an elocution master for a 
 number of lessons. A clerical neighbour, who 
 has an irritating trick in the pulpit of connecting 
 his clauses by the interjection urrer, demurred, on 
 the ground that their congregations would prefer 
 them, as at present, to speak " as a man to men." 
 I explained that my suggestion implied nothing 
 more than a - little coaching in voice-production. 
 22nd. I had a curious shock this afternoon. 
 
 In the bookseller's at I had been turning 
 
 over Ruskin's "Ariadne Florentina," looking at 
 the reproductions of the so-called Botticelli sibyls, 
 and by way of contrast Michael Angelo's aged 
 Cumasan sibyl, which, with characteristic humour 
 and unfairness, Ruskin labels "The Nymph be- 
 loved of Apollo." The inevitable law of associa- 
 tion brought back to mind the place in Petronius 
 (48), "Sibyllam quidem Cumis ego ipse oculis
 
 92 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 meis vidi in ampulla pendere, et cum illi pueri 
 dicerent 2//3<AAa, rl Oe\eis ; respondebat ilia 
 a-jroQavelv OeXco, 1 which must mean, "At Cumae I 
 saw with my own eyes the sibyl hanging in a 
 bottle." The idea this conveys to one is of those 
 shrivelled organisms that are preserved in spirits 
 on museum shelves. While I was walking 
 through the streets and musing how the sibyl 
 came to be in so awkward a plight, I saw 
 staring me in the face in an Italian ware- 
 houseman's window the startling announcement, 
 " Respectable girls, about 1 8, wanted for bottling." 
 I rubbed my eyes incredulously, but there seemed 
 to be no mistake. Presently, of course, I saw I 
 had been misled by an ambiguous use of the 
 verbal noun. 
 
 2^th. I am sometimes glad to be old, and 
 never more so than when I come across advice 
 to parents on the education of their children. 
 Eugenia was brought up on no scientific prin- 
 ciple ; " I 'spect she growed ; " and I do not 
 believe she is any the worse for that. Nowadays 
 there are reviews edited by old maids to teach 
 parents their business ; associations of parents to 
 encourage each other and exchange experiences ; 
 worst of all, syndicates to spy upon children and 
 tabulate their little ways. I hope the children do 
 
 1 [And when the boys called to her, "What do you want, sibyl?" 
 she replied, " I want to die."]
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 93 
 
 their best to puzzle these too curious observers ; 
 one would judge so from some of the stories the 
 professors collect. I am satisfied that what 
 parents want is common sense and not psychology. 
 Neither the mother of the Gracchi nor the mother 
 of the Wesleys had psychology, but the latter, at 
 any rate, abounded in common sense. These 
 important reflections arise from a story just told 
 me by a very young mother who yearns to be 
 scientific, and make the punishment, in the words 
 of a great moralist, " fit the crime." A few Sun- 
 days ago she had arranged a water party, and as 
 her little Tommy had told a lie he was not to be 
 allowed to join it, but was to go to church 
 instead. The retribution struck her as most 
 artistic ; Tommy would get good and yet he 
 would be miserable. What more could be desired 
 in any punishment ? I was sorely tempted to 
 inquire why, if one was certain to get good in 
 church, she sacrificed herself by arranging a 
 picnic ; however I could not resist telling her of 
 the effect. such a retributory worship had upon a 
 little girl of my acquaintance. She showed no 
 sign of contrition or rebellion till the Creed, when 
 she curtsied elaborately and ostentatiously at the 
 name of Pontius Pilate. 
 
 2<)th. I went this morning to the funeral of 
 my dear friend H. S. I had seen her several 
 times lately, and I saw her also after death. The
 
 94 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 change is always striking. Sometimes the indi- 
 vidual merges in the family type ; sometimes it is 
 only the care that seems wiped out in a great 
 calm. In this case the calm had given place to 
 care. The smile that had made light of suffering 
 was quite gone ; and one understood what a 
 triumph the spirit had for so long been celebrating 
 over the flesh, by the naked anguish of the flesh 
 when the spirit had departed. That beautiful 
 phrase of Jeremy Taylor's, " weeds and outworn 
 faces," came into my mind ; and I saw its truth 
 as I had not seen it before. I was never less 
 moved at a funeral ; the poor coffined body 
 seemed exactly expressed by a word I had always 
 disliked, " the remains " ; and I could not lament 
 that it should be buried. For once I came near 
 an appreciation of the splendid scorn in the 
 familiar words, " O grave, where is thy victory ? " 
 Since her death I have not been able altogether 
 to suppress a regret that on the last occasions of 
 our meeting the conversation was on no higher 
 than its ordinary level ; but it seemed at the time 
 right that it should be as it was, and her sense of 
 fitness was impeccable. Moreover the art of not 
 saying things is more difficult than that of say- 
 ing them, and its success proportionately great. 
 " None but a tragedian can die by rule and 
 wait till he says a fine thing on his exit. In real 
 life this is a chimera ; and by noble spirits it will
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 95 
 
 be done decently, without the ostentation of it." 
 Oucere, Does not this of Steele show him a finer 
 gentleman than his friend Addison, with his 
 " Come and see how a Christian can die ?" 
 
 3o///. George S. writes this morning: "My 
 mother always thought of everybody but herself, 
 and the least return we can make for her un- 
 selfishness is to be glad for her sake that the long 
 waiting is over. As you would guess from your 
 knowledge of her, she was remarkably cheerful to 
 the last, and it was difficult on the Saturday 
 morning, in the intervals of her paroxysms, to 
 believe the doctor that she could not last out the 
 day. The only hint she gave us of being herself 
 aware how near the end was, was to look round 
 with a queer little smile when the doctor had left 
 the room, and say, f Do you know I fancy he's at 
 the end of his tether ? ' Of course we understood, 
 and respected her reticence. She passed away 
 under the morphia, and we were all glad she 
 should have been spared leave-takings. I still 
 find myself nursing things to tell her ; and one 
 of my sisters had run upstairs to show her a very 
 beautiful wreath sent for her funeral before she 
 remembered. So impossible is it to realise the 
 loss." 
 
 October ist. All one's letters to-day are bills ; 
 these are the angelic messages of comfort that our 
 modern Michaelmas brings us. They sing an ever
 
 96 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 new song, an elegant and simple melody, which 
 shapes itself somewhat differently in the ears of 
 each, but to which none can be deaf. This is 
 how Macaulay heard it : 
 
 " Taxes, rent, sisters ; carriage, wages, clo'es, 
 
 Coals, wine, alms, pocket-cash, subscriptions, treats ; 
 Bills weekly these, and miscellaneous those, 
 Travel the list completes." 
 
 ^th. William Morris is dead and the genera- 
 tion is poorer by a most virile and versatile type. 
 Johnson's epitaph on Goldsmith, with the change 
 of a word, would well become Morris. " Nullum 
 fere ornandi genus non tetigit, nullum quod tetigit 
 non ornavit." When a great man dies it is im- 
 possible not to forecast, idly enough, the judgment 
 of posterity. His name, certainly, one would say, 
 must live with those of Sheraton and Adam and 
 Chippendale. It may live with Aldus and Stephanus 
 and Pickering ; but I question whether our grand- 
 children will think his types so good as his designs ; 
 and at best they are reactionary. What will be 
 his place in poetry ? " Virgil," says R., " will live 
 as long as the race, but he was content to write 
 but twenty lines a day. Morris could write seven 
 hundred." Yes ; but how many did Homer write ? 
 There is undoubtedly something in Morris that is 
 not of an age, or, at any rate, not of our age, even 
 
 if it be not for all time. My neighbour at , 
 
 who is the only soul for miles round to be called a
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 97 
 
 soul, considers Morris more primitive even than 
 Homer or Herodotus, who have already the re- 
 flective man's melancholy, whereas the so-called 
 melancholy of Morris is more instinctive, being a 
 straightforward recognition of the facts of life and 
 death untainted by philosophy. He compares 
 him in this respect, and in the fact that an extreme 
 simplicity of sentiment is accompanied by an 
 infinite refinement of the senses, with Pierre Loti, 
 whom Lemaitre has spoken of as " la plus delicate 
 machine a sensations que j'ai jamais rencontree." 
 To this conjunction of a most complicated sensi- 
 tive apparatus with the reflective powers of a child 
 my friend would attribute Morris's socialism, which 
 is always sentimental, not theoretic. It would 
 help to explain also his want of humour and of 
 dramatic power, which were real wants in his 
 nature, despite Nupkins, G. B. S., and Mr. Watts- 
 Dunton. My own favourite volumes are "The 
 Defence of Guenevere " and " Sigurd," the latter 
 for Sundays because of its excellent moral ; but 
 one cannot take up any of his verse anywhere 
 without feeling in it the inexplicable magic. In- 
 ferior artists have copied his designs, but they 
 cannot copy his poetry. They may have the seed, 
 but they cannot raise the flower. He saw the 
 world with his own eyes, and this is what we 
 mean by genius, not any capacity for taking pains. 
 Some one has told us that Morris could not 
 
 G
 
 98 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 " polish or refine " ; that if a thing did not please 
 him it was not corrected, but done over again. 
 The only correction I know of is in the " Song 
 of the Nymph to Hylas," which was reprinted in 
 " Poems by the Way," with the two best lines 
 spoiled. Any comparison, therefore, with a poet 
 like Virgil is beside the mark. Morris gives us, as 
 a rule, not quotable lines, but a light in which we 
 see things an atmosphere. The verse oftenest in 
 my mind is one printed I don't know when or 
 where : 
 
 " Christ keep the Hollow Land 
 
 All the summer tide ! 
 Still we cannot understand 
 
 How the waters glide, 
 / 
 
 Only dimly seeing them 
 
 Coldly slipping through 
 Many green-lipped cavern-mouths, 
 Where the hills are blue." 
 
 That is Morris in quintessence, a drop distilled 
 from his peculiar and inestimable murex. 
 
 nth. Lord Rosebery has resigned, and the 
 Press, which used to scoff, is like a running river 
 of tears, meant, of course, to drown Sir William. 
 Thus an emancipated party gets rid of two leaders 
 at once ; and yet it does not seem happy. Tacitus, 
 who has phrases for everything, puts the case in 
 a pretty epigram : " Magis sine domino quam in 
 libertate." How true that is of the Liberal party !
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 99 
 
 It is tnasterless rather than free, because for free- 
 dom one must not only be able to do what one 
 pleases, but know what it pleases one to do. Mr. 
 Asquith at the Edinburgh meeting figured as the 
 faithful lieutenant " miles alacer," to quote Tacitus 
 again, " qui tamen jussa ducum interpretari quam 
 exsequi mallet" a prompt soldier, but with a 
 turn for putting a gloss of his own on the com- 
 mands of his general. Mr. Gladstone meanwhile 
 comes in for a big share of the blame. Why must 
 he be making speeches ? " Retire men cannot 
 when they would ; neither will they when it were 
 reason, but are impatient of privateness even 
 in age and sickness, which require the shadow ; 
 like old townsmen, that will be still sitting at their 
 street door, though thereby they offer age to 
 scorn." 
 
 Sir William Harcourt has been discussing agri- 
 culture in Wales this w r eek in a speech which 
 would make every landlord's heart of us rejoice 
 if only we did not know better. The speaker 
 proves all landlords to be exceedingly well off by 
 leaving out of count the working expenses of the 
 property, say some thirty per cent. Sir William 
 is only a younger brother, and Malwood is not 
 a big estate, but even a younger brother might 
 have some inkling of so elementary a truth 
 as this. His ignorance wilful, I fear is on a 
 level with that of the town curate who on being
 
 100 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 preferred to a country living urged his parishioners 
 to be content with milking their cows once on 
 the Sunday ; or that of the town poet who said 
 to his country hostess at breakfast : " This is 
 capital honey ; may I ask, do you keep a bee ? " 
 
 13/7*. Bob is growing into rather a good shot, 
 as becomes his father's son, and, I may add, his 
 uncle's nephew. He told me when we were out 
 together to-day a curious tale of something that 
 happened as he was taking a stroll on Sunday 
 afternoon. Two pheasants rose some distance off, 
 and he pointed his stick at them, and to his 
 amazement down they came. When he got to 
 the spot he found the solution of the mystery : 
 they had flown against some barbed wire. Tom 
 was abroad last autumn and did not shoot his 
 covers, so that many of the birds are old and so 
 untender. In such a case the prudent housewife 
 cooks them with an onion inside. Bob gave me 
 also some odd experiences of his in pursuit of 
 relations. He has a strong clannish instinct, and 
 spent some part of his holidays bicycling in the 
 neighbourhood where our family used to be settled. 
 In one of the villages he was amused to see his 
 name over the grocer's shop, and went in to buy 
 a bun, hoping to get the name on a paper bag. 
 But they were too primitive to have advertisements. 
 He saw, however, on the shopman's face a nose 
 so like his own that it seemed to stamp him of the
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY IOI 
 
 same stock. Bob's nose had always been a rather 
 sore subject with him ; at times he has meditated 
 recourse to the nose-curer's, for it is not in itself 
 beautiful, and it does not resemble any family 
 nose we know of. But now it looked as if his 
 own despised organ were really the aboriginal nose, 
 and all others not genuine. He asked the man 
 how long he had lived in the village, and was 
 
 answered : " Mr. , my master, has been here 
 
 these twenty years ; I am only his foreman." So 
 the mystery of the nose was no nearer being 
 solved. In another village seeing the name on 
 a gravestone, he asked the sexton, who happened 
 to be in the churchyard, whether there were any 
 people of that name still about. " Nobbut one," 
 said the sexton, " who comes here in the summer." 
 "In the summer? why in the summer?" "Oh, 
 because he isn't out in the winter." " Is he so 
 delicate, then ? " " No, he's in the workhouse." 
 This a little cooled Bob's zeal. He is a good boy 
 and pleasant company, and I miss him greatly 
 when the holidays are over. I am always amused 
 at the cleverness of boys who are clever at all. 
 They seem to know as much about most matters 
 as their elders, and to be even more keenly in- 
 terested. What is it we gain in growing older 
 besides the " orbis veteribus notus," the globe 
 known to the ancients as the Oxford orator 
 in my day used to call what tailors hint at as
 
 102 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 " the lower chest " ? Let us hope the improve- 
 ment is ethical ; we learn perhaps a little more 
 self-restraint, or at least concealment, unless we 
 are great geniuses. The geniuses keep the lamb's 
 heart among the full-grown flocks, to the no little 
 discomfort of the flocks. 
 
 i^th. Tom and I went up with Robert to-day 
 
 to matriculate him at College, and I believe 
 
 we enjoyed the outing more than he did, being 
 without arriere-pensee. The Warden was exceed- 
 ingly civil, as Tom remarked, adding that it was 
 as well some few heads of houses should be old 
 enough to remember the Crimean War. Tom 
 does not share the new feeling about Russia. He 
 had not been at Oxford for many years, and what 
 most struck him was the encroachment of the 
 town upon the University. At Carfax he could 
 hardly restrain his indignation ; turning now to 
 the municipal buildings, which seem to flaunt over 
 " the House," and then to the blank where Carfax 
 Church used to stand. Fortunately, the one 
 offence served as a counter-irritant to the other, 
 or I fear he might have been taken with an apo- 
 plexy. W T hen we came opposite the new building 
 of B.N.C., and saw the gigantic lion and unicorn, 
 "That, I suppose," said he, "is where my old 
 tailor has moved to out of St. Aldate's ; he used to 
 be ' by appointment to the King ! ' ' However, he 
 was put in good temper presently by the sight of
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 103 
 
 a few young horsemen coming over Magdalen 
 Bridge. " I should have thought," he said, " that 
 so modern-spirited and ingenious a University as 
 Oxford would have invented a new method of 
 hunting adapted to the bicycle ! " (this with a look 
 at me and a marked paroxytone accent) ; then, 
 after giving Robert a caution against wasting his 
 time and money over horses, he launched out into 
 anecdotes of his own youth, which bore a very 
 pink complexion. 
 
 iqth. St. Luke is allowing us a second summer 
 this year ; the roads are drying famously ; the 
 farmers have got to work at their wheat sowing, 
 and the ladies to their pleasant chatter about the 
 " autumnal tints." It is a remarkable season for 
 hedge-fruit, hips and haws and holly, and this, say 
 the local weather-prophets, betokens a hard winter. 
 The yew berries those coral lamps in a green 
 night have been especially numerous and beauti- 
 ful ; in fact, our solitary commons have become 
 like the sacred grove at Colonus rav aftarov Oeov 
 <pv\\d$a fj-vpioKap-nov. Walnuts, too, are plentiful. 
 How much were walnuts a dozen in Queen Anne's 
 reign ? Here is the answer in a letter of Steele's : 
 
 "DEAR PRUE, I send you seven pen'orth of wall- 
 nutts at five a penny, which is the greatest proof 
 I can give you at present of my being with my 
 whole Heart yrs, RICHD. STEELE."
 
 104 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Outside the letter is written, "There are but 29 
 Walnutts ; " but the " passionate lover and faithfull 
 husband" made ample amends for the six he had 
 diverted to his own use by a present the next day 
 of " half a hundred more." To know what a wal- 
 nut should be one must have travelled in Persia ; 
 in our northern latitudes it remains, as its name 
 denotes, the " foreign nut," never properly ripen- 
 ing, and even when mollified by port presenting a 
 grave problem to the digestion. The rooks seem 
 very fond of them. Several times lately, as I have 
 been driving, a sparrow-hawk has risen from 
 behind the hedge, lying in wait, I suppose, for 
 partridges. I saw yesterday three long-tailed tits, 
 and to-day a kingfisher ; and a few days since six 
 magpies. What does that portend ? 
 
 22nd. By way of reaction from talking about 
 Nelson and Trafalgar, and singing the glorious 
 day's renown, I kept last night a very peaceful 
 centenary in reading over again Jane Austen's 
 " Pride and Prejudice," which, though not pub- 
 lished until 1813, was begun in the October of 
 1796, as we learn from Mr. Austen Leigh's memoir. 
 How real the characters remain ! The proud Mr. 
 Darcy and the prejudiced Miss Elizabeth Bennet 
 are naturally the liveliest. The portrait of the 
 former especially is painted with the finish of a 
 miniature in a number of very delicate touches. 
 We know his stare, his height.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 105 
 
 " ' I assure you,' cried Bingley, ' that if Darcy were not such 
 a great tall fellow in comparison with myself, I should not pay 
 him half so much deference.' Mr. Darcy smiled ; but Elizabeth 
 thought she could perceive that he was rather offended, and 
 therefore checked her laugh." 
 
 This characteristic indisposition to be laughed 
 at, in one who was so great a critic of others, is 
 emphasised again in the final scene : 
 
 "Elizabeth longed to observe that Mr. Bingley had been a 
 most delightful friend so easily guided that his worth was 
 invaluable ; but she checked herself. She remembered that he 
 had yet to learn to be laughed at, and it was rather too early 
 to begin." 
 
 Everybody who can is allowed to make a con- 
 tribution to our knowledge of the hero's character 
 Mrs. Gardiner, the old housekeeper, even the 
 wicked Wickham : 
 
 " Mr. Darcy can please where he chuses. He can be a con- 
 versible companion if he thinks it worth his while. Among 
 those who are at all his equals in consequence, he is a very 
 different man from what he is to the less prosperous. His 
 pride never deserts him ; but with the rich he is liberal-minded, 
 just, sincere, rational, honourable, and perhaps agreeable 
 allowing something for fortune and figure." 
 
 Change the words rich and less prosperous, and 
 you have Miss Austen's judgment as well as 
 Bingley's. Again : 
 
 " Lady Catherine has the reputation of being remarkably 
 sensible and clever ; but I rather believe she derives part of 
 her abilities from her rank and fortune, part from her authori-
 
 106 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 tative manner, and the rest from the pride of her nephew, who 
 chuses that every one connected with him should have an under- 
 standing of the first class." 
 
 The two most carefully elaborated scenes in the 
 book are Darcy's first proposal to Elizabeth and 
 his aunt's visit to Longbourn. Both seem to me 
 quite perfect. In any one less accustomed than 
 Darcy was to look at everything on the side on 
 which it concerned himself, without imagination to 
 see how it would strike others, or less unable, from 
 long habit, 1 to dissimulate his feelings, the opening 
 declaration would have been impossible, but in 
 him it is in character. Equally well drawn are 
 his surprise at Elizabeth's refusal of his suit, his 
 shock at being called " ungentlemanlike," his dis- 
 passionate view of Bingley's courtship of Jane, 
 and his frank, surprised defence of what was called 
 incivility. " Could you expect me to rejoice in 
 the inferiority of your connections, to congratulate 
 myself on the hope of relations whose condition 
 in life is so decidedly beneath my own ? " It is 
 interesting to remark that Miss Austen, whether 
 
 1 Elizabeth Bennet's remarks over the pianoforte at Rosings about 
 the duty of practising social virtues are quite a revelation to Darcy. 
 " I certainly have not the talent which some people possess," said 
 Darcy, " of conversing easily with those I have never seen before. I 
 cannot catch their tone of conversation or appear interested in their 
 concerns, as I often see done." " My fingers," said Elizabeth, " do not 
 move over the instrument in the masterly manner which I see so many 
 women's do. But then I have always supposed it to be my own fault 
 because I would not take the trouble of practising."
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 107 
 
 she studied Darcy from the life or built him up 
 from suggestions, understood exactly how such a 
 character would be produced. During the con- 
 versation on that famous walk to the Lucases, 
 Darcy says : 
 
 " I have been a selfish being all my life, in practice, though 
 not in principle. As a child, I was taught what was right; 
 but I was not taught to correct my temper. I was given good 
 principles, but left to follow them in pride and conceit. Unfor- 
 tunately an only son, I was spoiled by my parents, who, though 
 good themselves, allowed, encouraged, almost taught me to 
 be selfish and overbearing to care for none beyond my own 
 family circle, to think meanly of all the rest of the world, to 
 wish, at least, to think meanly of their sense and worth com- 
 pared with my own." 
 
 The other dialogue that between Elizabeth and 
 Lady Catherine de Burgh is still more finely 
 imagined. Her ladyship's insufferable rudeness is 
 always of the well-bred variety ; it is that of a 
 feminine Darcy, sui amans sine rivali, but without 
 cultivation, and never crosses the line into vul- 
 garity. It keeps its end steadily in view with 
 great self-possession, and when finally defeated 
 hurls none but social thunderbolts. " I take no 
 leave of you, Miss Bennet ; I send no compli- 
 ments to your mother ; I am most seriously 
 displeased." 
 
 Of the minor characters I confess to admiring 
 Mrs. Bennet most. To be witty the author had 
 but to be Jane Austen, but to be foolish and
 
 108 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 inconsequent required no little imagination ; and 
 though Mrs. Bennet is not always equal to herself 
 as which of us is ? she never quite sinks to 
 caricature. Her high-water mark is, perhaps, her 
 famous contribution to the old wrangle between 
 town and country life : 
 
 " ' The country,' said Darcy, ' can in general supply but few 
 subjects for such a study [i.e. of character]. In a country 
 neighbourhood you move in a very confined and unvarying 
 society.' 
 
 " ' But people themselves alter so much, that there is something 
 new to be observed in them for ever.' 
 
 " ' Yes, indeed,' cried Mrs. Bennet, offended by his manner 
 of mentioning a country neighbourhood. ' I assure you there 
 is quite as much of that going on in the country as in 
 town.'" 
 
 Inimitable, too, is the new light on the question 
 of entail. " Such things I know are all chance in 
 this world. There is no knowing how estates will 
 go when once they come to be entailed." 
 
 Lydia Bennet also, for the same reason that I 
 admire her mother, inspires me with unbounded 
 respect. Mary alone I confess myself unable to 
 believe in, and even to be told that she married 
 " one of her Uncle Philip's clerks, and was content 
 to be considered a star in the society of Meryton," 
 does not convince me. I have no doubt the fault is 
 in myself, because on the only other point in which 
 I ever doubted Miss Austen, a prolonged residence 
 in a country neighbourhood has persuaded me
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 109 
 
 of my error. 1 It was a point in the character of 
 the Rev. William Collins. In one of his apologetic 
 speeches to Mrs. Bennet (which, like his compli- 
 mentary epistles, ought to supply a word to the 
 language ; we should speak of " making " as well 
 as " sending a Collins "), he says : 
 
 " Resignation to inevitable evils is the duty of us all : the 
 peculiar duty of a young man who has been so fortunate as I 
 have been in early preferment, and I trust I am resigned. 
 Perhaps not the less so from feeling a doubt of my positive 
 happiness had my fair cousin honoured me with her hand ; for 
 I have often observed that resignation is never so perfect as 
 when the blessing denied begins to lose somewhat of its value 
 in our estimation." 
 
 I used to think that the voice here was the 
 voice of Jane Austen, for once breaking in and 
 not inexcusably laughing at our reverend friend. 
 But experience of life has convinced me I was 
 wrong ; and certainly the logic is the same as that 
 of the famous dictum about dress : " I would 
 advise you merely to put on whatever of your 
 clothes is superior to the rest there is no occa- 
 sion for anything more." For the rest, Mr. 
 Bennet is admirable, Charlotte Lucas is a very 
 careful study of a very ordinary girl, and her little 
 
 1 Sophia will have it that all through " Pride and Prejudice," which 
 is the author's first book, the note is a little forced, and points out that 
 Jane Austen showed herself half conscious of this by describing it as 
 " wanting shade."
 
 110 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 brother has expressed for all time a deep human 
 sentiment when he declared he would not care 
 how proud he was if he was as rich as Mr. Darcy. 
 Of Jane Austen's heroines, Miss Thackeray said 
 once in Cornhill that they were distinguished by a 
 certain " gentle self-respect and humour and hard- 
 ness of heart " from those of to-day, when " we 
 have gained in emphasis what we have lost in 
 calm, in happiness, in tranquillity." Miss Austen 
 has suffered more than most authors at the hands 
 of her illustrators. How delightful it would have 
 been if her novels had first appeared in Cornhill 
 with Walker's or Millais's pictures ! For though 
 it is undoubtedly a bore to read a novel for the 
 first time in sections, nothing is pleasanter than to 
 go back upon it in this way, tasting it like old 
 wine. Mr. Cooke's persons are devoid of any 
 character whatever, almost of expression ; Mr. 
 Brock's are not much better ; and Mr. Thomson's, 
 though they are more like real people, are not 
 Miss Austen's people. Look at the conceited boy, 
 for instance, who does duty for Darcy ; Darcy 
 was thirty. The name of the novel was borrowed 
 from the following passage at the end of Miss 
 Burney's " Cecilia " : 
 
 "The whole of this unfortunate business," said 
 Dr. Lyster, " has been the result of PRIDE and 
 PREJUDICE . . . ; yet this remember, that if to 
 PRIDE and PREJUDICE you owe your miseries, so
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY III 
 
 wonderfully is good and evil balanced that to 
 PRIDE and PREJUDICE you will also owe their 
 termination." In the old editions the words glare 
 at you in big capitals as they are here printed, 
 and look to us like a reference to Miss Austen's 
 novel they are really a prophecy before the 
 event. I note finally that a book-lover (whose 
 name I know but will not say) burrowing the 
 other day in the heaps of a London bookseller 
 (whose name I know also but refrain also from 
 saying), unearthed a nearly complete set of Miss 
 Austen's novels in the original edition, which he 
 bought for as many shillings as they usually cost 
 guineas. The bookseller discovered his mistake 
 before the buyer had left the shop, but, being a 
 man of his word, stuck to his first price. Tell that 
 in Gath ! 
 
 2.yd. Lord Rosebery at Colchester made a 
 political allegory of the oyster. He spoke of him 
 as " an eminently self-contained character. His 
 shell is his castle, his house is attached to a rock, 
 and within that shell and attached to that rock he 
 is absolutely aloof from the storms and catas- 
 trophes of the world." The moral is not difficult 
 to draw. In politics let us be not selfish, oh 
 dear, no, but self-contained. Being an old- 
 fashioned person, I prefer the old-fashioned word 
 selfishness ! but, call it what you please, I prefer 
 the old-fashioned moral of the oyster allegory as
 
 112 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 it is drawn in that delightful Buddhist sermon in 
 Mitford's "Tales of Old Japan" (ii. 153): 
 
 " There is a certain powerful shellfish called the Sazaye, with 
 a very strong operculum. Now this creature, if it hears that 
 there is any danger astir, shuts up its shell from within with a 
 loud noise, and thinks itself perfectly safe. One day a Tai and 
 another fish in envy at this said 
 
 " ' What a strong castle this is of yours, Mr. Sazaye ! When 
 you shut up your lid from within, nobody can so much as point 
 a finger at you. A capital figure you make, sir.' 
 
 "When he heard this, the Sazaye, stroking his beard, 
 replied : ' Well, gentlemen, although you are so good as to 
 say so, it's nothing to boast of in the way of safety, yet I 
 must admit that when I shut myself up thus I do not feel 
 much anxiety.' 
 
 "And as he was speaking thus, with the pride that apes 
 humility, there came the noise of a great splash ; and the shell- 
 fish, shutting up his lid as quickly as possible, kept quite still, 
 and thought to himself, what in the world the noise could be. 
 Could it be a net ? Could it be a fish-hook ? What a bore it 
 was always having to keep such a sharp look-out ! Were the 
 Tai and the other fish caught, he wondered ; and he felt quite 
 anxious about them ; however, at any rate he was safe. And 
 so the time passed ; and when he thought all was safe, he 
 stealthily opened his shell, and looked all round him, and there 
 seemed to be something wrong, something with which he was 
 not familiar. As he looked a little more carefully, lo and behold, 
 there he was in a fishmonger's shop, and with a card marked 
 ' sixteen cash ' on his back." 
 
 24/7*. I saw at the club in one of the weekly 
 papers an announcement of the death of the sister 
 of Thomas Lovell Beddoes. I confess that, great 
 as my interest in Beddoes has always been, I did 
 not know that any sister was still surviving ; I do 
 not recollect any reference being made to her at
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 113 
 
 the time it was deemed requisite to publish the sad 
 story of his suicide. This was in 1890, when Mr. 
 E. W. Gosse, a son of the distinguished naturalist, 
 who has himself meditated the Muse, printed the 
 poetical remains from papers given to Robert 
 Browning by Beddoes' life-long friend and bio- 
 grapher, T. F. Kelsall. Beddoes' poetry will 
 always be caviare to the general, but two or three 
 things, such as " Dream-Pedlary," are creeping 
 into anthologies. In my library I have a copy 
 both of the " Improvisatore " and the " Bride's 
 Tragedy," bound in that straight-grained morocco 
 with stamped Gothic ornament which was then 
 orthodox ; they belonged to Beddoes' college friend, 
 T. G. H. Bourne, and the former of them contains 
 Beddoes' book-plate. I have also his Shakespeare, 
 which is interesting from the passages marked ; 
 though they are not of any recondite beauty, nor 
 especially concerned, as one might have expected, 
 with "graves and worms and epitaphs." They 
 are such as the following : 
 
 " Most choice, forsaken ; and most lov'd, despised." 
 
 " Our indiscretion sometimes serves us well 
 When our deep plots do pall." 
 
 I am happy also in possessing a copy of the 
 " Posthumous Poems " of Shelley, which Beddoes 
 financed, and Leigh Hunt published, and Sir 
 
 H
 
 114 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Timothy suppressed. But probably this is not so 
 scarce as Beddoes' own books. 
 
 November 2nd. There was a curious demonstra- 
 tion in the farmyard this morning, suggesting to the 
 philosophic mind that men are but chickens of a 
 larger growth ; at least proving that the common- 
 wealth of fowls contains an element which we in 
 our vanity are apt to consider especially human, 
 for human and humane are the same word. Two 
 cocks were taking steps to settle a dispute in the 
 fearless old fashion with beak and spur ; all the 
 preliminaries of the duel had been gone through 
 punctiliously, and the principals were about to 
 engage, when a bevy of fair guinea-hens, some 
 twenty in number, rushed again and again between 
 the combatants, and at last succeeded in frustrating 
 their purpose. The manners of guinea-fowl repay 
 attention ; at the first blush they appear foolish 
 birds indeed, as witless as a guinea-hen is one of 
 our family proverbs but this is a vulgar error; 
 and perhaps some day I may collect into a letter 
 to the press some ana upon the subject, to which 
 the touching story of the dove's laying one 
 immortelle on the bosom of his dead mate will be as 
 moonlight unto sunlight. Here I note that they 
 are the Quakeresses of their society. Observe their 
 dress, how low in tone the familiar slate-colour 
 but how rich in substance. Observe how they 
 segregate themselves from the other barn-door
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 115 
 
 fowls, and prefer to roost in a tree, from which in 
 winter they sometimes fall down frozen, rather 
 than sleep in a Gothic building with their fellow 
 Christians. I have mentioned above a remarkable 
 instance of their distaste for bloodshed ; they carry 
 this so far that it is a matter of great difficulty to 
 catch and kill them. In one point only would 
 they have displeased George Fox, they are ex- 
 tremely loquacious ; but then so is the new school 
 of " Friends." 
 
 jth. I journeyed to Reading to spend a few 
 hours in the bookshops, for since Mr. Saintsbury 
 went north to profess in Edinburgh, there is a 
 little more chance of picking up there some 
 unconsidered trifles. But in Broad Street I en- 
 countered the High Sheriff's coach taking the Lord 
 Chief Justice to the Assize Court, and not having 
 yet seen Lord Russell on the bench I joined the 
 Hogarthian crowd and followed him in. Two or 
 three things struck me ; first, and most conspicu- 
 ously, the utter boredom of the poor High Sheriff, 
 who has to sit next the judge in a tight uniform, 
 and look wiser than he feels ; secondly, the good 
 nature of the police, who handle the prisoners as 
 if they loved them ; then the half-stupid look of 
 the prisoners, as if they had come by a dark stair 
 into a great light, and the villainous look they 
 have, due to the want of linen round the throat ; 
 but what struck me most was the very evident
 
 Il6 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 effort made by the judge to say something that 
 might impress each offender who came before 
 him. With counsel he was a good deal less 
 patient, taking them in snuff in more senses than 
 one. The cases were disgusting, and I did not 
 sit long, but turned into the Biscuit Factory to 
 see my favourite sight, the making of cracknels. 
 It is the very type of hell. First the poor 
 flakes of souls are thrown into the boiling waves 
 of Pyriphlegethon and disappear ; presently they 
 rise to the surface, and are skimmed out and 
 dashed into the biting lymph of Cocytus 
 
 " And feel the bitter change 
 Of fierce extremes, extremes by change more fierce." 
 
 Since first I saw the sight and I never go to 
 Reading without seeing it, if it is to be seen I 
 cannot eat a cracknel, and they are my favourite 
 biscuits, without calling to mind those mediaeval 
 pictures in which lost souls are being crushed 
 between the jaws of a monster I will not name. 
 It is not altogether an agreeable reminiscence. 
 The Reading shopkeepers are an amiable set of 
 men who display their wares with something of 
 the enthusiasm more common among vendors of 
 curiosities, taking an interest in the things it would 
 seem for their own sake ; though the curiosity- 
 mongers sometimes carry their indifference to 
 custom a little far. For instance, old A. showed
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 1 17 
 
 me an enamelled snuff-box given by Napoleon to 
 one of his generals, and all I could get out of him 
 about it was, " Ah ! I have refused a price for 
 that ; " what price I couldn't bring him to say. 
 Perhaps he was on intimate terms with my banker, 
 and knew it could not concern me in any practical 
 sense. The jeweller, on the other hand, to whom 
 I had to go about some repairs, brought out a 
 magnificent peridot with the remark, " For this 
 I am only asking 800 guineas." "Ah!" I said, 
 " really, is that all ? " I suspect this engaging habit 
 of taking a customer's wealth for granted arises 
 from their experience that " imputation " is a force 
 in the market no less than in morals. People dis- 
 cover they can afford things because the dealer 
 assumes that virtue in them. Possunt quia posse 
 videntur. How many and how cunning are the 
 excuses one considers it necessary to make to one- 
 self for purchases ! Now that a thing is cheap; now 
 that it is so much more satisfactory to buy a really 
 good thing for a five-pound note than to be always 
 squandering crowns. It is the price we pay for 
 keeping a conscience, that it will still be talking 
 and must be cajoled ! The oddest excuse ever 
 devised for violent bibliomania is surely this of 
 Coleridge's, which I came upon yesterday : 
 
 "In case of my speedy death, it would answer 
 to buy a ^100 worth of carefully chosen books, in 
 order to attract attention to my library and to give
 
 Il8 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 accession to the value of books by their co-existing 
 with co-appurtenants" ("Anima Poetae," p. 183). 
 
 Alas ! to most of us that thought of speedy 
 death is rather a deterrent. There are a few 
 heroes who put Nunc mihi, tnox aliis on their book- 
 plates ; just as there are a few philosophical poets 
 like Lucretius who take a pride in the thought 
 that all concourses of atoms (and books are, in 
 a way, atoms) are but fortuitous and will soon 
 dissolve ; but who, except a philosopher, would 
 buy books with his own auction catalogue before 
 his mind's eye ? And books are such a bad in- 
 vestment. " I was at a sale the other day," said 
 a bookseller to me, " it was Lord C.'s, and if it had 
 not been for an Italian, I could have bought at my 
 own price." " Bless the Italian ! " said I. I make 
 it a religious duty to attend all the book sales 
 within reach, just to help up the price for the sake 
 of "the fatherless children and widows," but if 
 ordinary book-collectors were wise they would 
 stipulate in their wills, as I have done, that their 
 books are not to be sold by auction, but valued 
 by two trustworthy booksellers independently, and 
 the larger offer accepted. The only book of any 
 special interest I found in Reading to-day was a 
 miscellaneous volume of first editions of Byron's 
 poems with the autograph of Helen Shelley ; and 
 I bought little else, though I was haunted all day 
 by that phrase of Coleridge's about " co-existing
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 119 
 
 with co-appurtenants." Folios, quartos, dumpy 
 duodecimos, seemed to be putting out forlorn 
 hands to me, and entreating that I should end 
 their exile and let them co-exist with some co- 
 appurtenant on my happy shelves. And here at 
 home I am conscious, as never before, of great 
 gaps ; lacuna valde deflendce. But that way madness 
 lies ! I suppose every one has a grain of malice 
 in his composition somewhere, and if he is a book- 
 collector it is apt to show itself there ; perhaps as 
 harmless a vent as it can take. Mr. Lang tells a 
 moral tale of a certain Thomas Blinton who suf- 
 fered a terrible purgatory for collecting the early 
 amorous poetry of Bishops and Cabinet Ministers. 
 My wicked passion is for presentation copies of 
 books (not being minor poetry or otherwise un- 
 interesting) by living authors ; and it has usually 
 been not the gratitude of men but the high price 
 asked for the autograph that has left me mourning. 
 A catalogue to-day advertises a copy of " Modern 
 Painters," with the inscription " Coventry K. Pat- 
 more, Esq., 1 with the author's sincere regards, 
 15 Jan. 1856," but the price demanded is ex- 
 orbitant. I am particularly sorry to lose it because 
 my secret cabinet already contains a presentation 
 copy of a poem of Mr. Patmore's to another living 
 and distinguished man of letters. Only once did 
 
 1 See entry on Nov. 27.
 
 120 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 I ever mention such a purchase to the donor of 
 the book ; it was in the early days of my zeal, and 
 not being a maker of books I did not understand 
 all the forces involved ; but I received a severe 
 lesson. I had gone up to town for a night, had 
 found the book in a shop, and by a curious chance 
 was dining with the writer, who was, and is, a 
 great friend. Both my friend and his wife have a 
 remarkable gift of silence, and the announcement 
 of my discovery, made too light-heartedly, was 
 received in a polar stillness that froze the blood. 
 Both looked at their plates steadily while a man 
 could count fifty ; then my friend said, " For the 
 time of year we are remarkably free from fog." 
 Of course, being after all a man and no worm, I 
 was obliged to recur to my topic, but I have never 
 repeated the experiment. 
 
 1 6th. One of the greatest charms of autumn is 
 the opportunity it offers for improvements in the 
 house and garden and estate. I think even Tom 
 feels this new spirit in the blood, and in the 
 intervals of hunting roams round his fields, plant- 
 ing hedges and making fences, and perhaps can be 
 brought by the woodman now and then to cut any 
 tree that is palpably noxious to a neighbour a 
 neighbouring tree, that is, not a human being ; 
 Tom has no sympathy with the modern notion that 
 trees can prejudice health. The medical officer 
 may tell us we shall never be without a spring
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 121 
 
 epidemic till a whirlwind gets in and has a good 
 game of ninepins ; but Tom inherits my father's 
 taste for planting and distaste for cutting, so that 
 medical officers preach to deaf ears. And certainly 
 the Hall stands well above the village, and out of 
 harm's way. My " improvements " this year will 
 be simple enough : a door knocked through a 
 blank wall, a new flower border in the kitchen 
 garden, a tree felled to open a view, and the Gothic 
 porch taken down from the doorway, which is 
 Georgian. This last alteration has cost me some 
 searchings of heart ; for the porch itself is of some 
 antiquity. Sophia points out that on wet days our 
 callers w r ill have to stand in the rain till the door 
 is opened ; but a little rain hurts no one, and 
 besides on wet days people do not call, or, if they 
 do, they carry umbrellas. I suppose the passion 
 for making improvements rests at bottom on the 
 law of self-preservation, our surroundings being 
 really a part of ourselves. It is a way of giving 
 freshness to worn impressions, of bringing into 
 notice again what is ever tending to slip below 
 the level of consciousness. Even Eugenia, I have 
 observed, though inclined to parsimony in matters 
 of toilette, manages to vary her dress with con- 
 siderable skill ; and at least once a season Sophia 
 rearranges the drawing-room furniture, and re- 
 hangs some of the dining-room pictures. We 
 are all more or less obliged by nature to say with
 
 122 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Nebuchadnezzar, " Is not this great Babylon, that 
 I have built ? " If we did not, we should lapse, 
 not only into vegetarianism, like that unfortunate 
 monarch, but into vegetables. 
 
 igt/i, Fogs are not pleasant even in the 
 country, but they are clean, and sometimes they 
 are beautiful. To-day, for instance, the plough 
 teams were at work in the field called " Lynches " 
 (I believe from its terraces), and the broadening 
 purple- brown bands and the fallow between them 
 were filmed over with a velvety opalescence very 
 like the tender bloom on cold gravy. 
 
 I made a note the other day of my scepticism 
 as to the civilising influence of picture galleries 
 upon uneducated people. I had occasion to-day 
 to show myself no less sceptical about another 
 fashionable form that modern philanthropy takes, 
 namely, to collect a savage horde of London 
 roughs and take them to spend an afternoon in 
 a friend's grounds. What good result is aimed 
 at ? Not fresh air, for that can be as well enjoyed 
 in the public parks ! If the parties were under 
 the patronage of the Fabian Society I could under- 
 stand them, and I . should applaud their policy, 
 for nothing could be so well contrived to make 
 people envious. But what good object do they 
 serve ? It is difficult by your smiles, however 
 gracious, to persuade a hundred people whom 
 you have never seen before that you are pleased
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 123 
 
 to see them ; they are not deceived, and they are 
 not in the least pleased to see you ; they come 
 frankly for what they can get. A lady who has 
 been in the habit of conducting such parties, and 
 to whom this afternoon I opened these views, was 
 horrified at first by their " cynicism," as she 
 phrased it ; but presently she told me not a few 
 stories which on reflection may perhaps lead her 
 to spend her time and talents more profitably. 
 On one occasion she had been remonstrating 
 with some factory girls for picking their hostess's 
 apples ; they were quite small and green, for it 
 was early summer ; and the girls turned on her 
 with indignant surprise. "Why, if we don't take 
 them now, we shan't get another chance." If 
 good ladies who practise such hospitality would 
 extend it to unfortunate members of their own 
 class, it would be appreciated. But it is far easier 
 to wash the feet of ten beggars than entertain one 
 poor relation. Speaking of the Fabian Society 
 has put me in mind of an amusing circumstance 
 relating to William Morris, that befell a year or 
 two ago. We were paying our first call upon a 
 newly-married pair, the husband (call him Mr. 
 John Bull) being a typical country squire. Mrs. 
 Bull has an inclination towards art, or perhaps 
 I should say art-in-the-home. Some patterns of 
 chintz had just arrived and were being inspected, 
 and as we were old friends the examination was
 
 124 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 not stopped by our visit. Presently Mr. B. had 
 an inspiration : " I suppose they're not from that 
 Socialist fellow, who says I mustn't have a glass 
 of sherry, because my fogger can only afford beer ; 
 what's his name ? Morris ; because, if they are, 
 I won't let him drink his sherry at my expense." 
 Alas, they were Morris's ! The discussion was 
 not continued in our presence, but we were pretty 
 sure remonstrance would be unavailing ; and so 
 Sophia consoled pretty Mrs. B. by saying she 
 knew of a place where they made the most 
 delightful copies of really old things for ridiculously 
 low prices, &c. &c. I respect a man who carries 
 his political principles into domestic life. I heard 
 the other day that this same young gentleman 
 had ransacked a whole toy-shop to find something 
 for his heir-apparent not " made in Germany." 
 But no one is absolutely consistent, and I know 
 by pleasant experience that even Mr. Bull is not 
 a stickler for British wine and tobacco. 
 
 27/7?. The papers to-day announce the death of 
 Mr. Patmore. The great poets at the beginning of 
 the century died young, at the end they are living 
 to full age; I say "great poets" because, if the 
 quality of his best work be considered, there seems 
 no reason why Patmore should not rank as such. 
 Take away his five-o'clock-tea verses, his political 
 verses, his Roman Catholic verses, with their mystical 
 and somewhat nauseous Mariolatry, and there still
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 125 
 
 remains a considerable volume that will live as long 
 as any of the later verse of the century, because it has 
 something to say and says it exquisitely. To men- 
 tion "A Revelation" and "The Spirit's Epochs" 
 from "The Angel in the House," "A Farewell," 
 " The Departure," " Winter," and " The Toys," is 
 to enumerate half-a-dozen poems that the world 
 unless it very much alters will not willingly 
 let die ; but it is not to exhaust the list of suc- 
 cesses. Many of the " Preludes " in " The Angel 
 in the House," besides those already referred to, 
 all written in the octosyllabic metre over which 
 he attained such mastery, are excellent. An old 
 favourite of mine is "The Wife's Tragedy," which 
 mounts in pathos verse after verse till it reaches 
 its height in that single-line simile ; perhaps the 
 best, certainly the most unforgettable, thing in 
 Patmore. 
 
 " Man must be pleased : but him to please 
 
 Is woman's pleasure ; down the gulf 
 Of his condoled necessities 
 She casts her best, she flings herself. 
 
 And whilst his love has any life, 
 
 Or any eye to see her charms, 
 At any time she's still his wife, 
 
 Dearly devoted to his arms ; 
 She loves with love that cannot tire ; 
 
 And when, ah woe, she loves alone, 
 Through passionate duty love springs higher, 
 
 As grass grows taller round a stone"
 
 126 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 It marks the accomplished artist that after achiev- 
 ing such success and popularity in one style, 
 Patmore should in " The Unknown Eros " have 
 achieved equal success, though not equal popu- 
 larity, in verse of an entirely different stamp 
 a kind of choral ode, imitated probably from 
 Drummond of Hawthornden. To take a speci- 
 men, from a passage where a poet for once speaks 
 well of his critic : 
 
 " How high of heart is one, and one how sweet of 
 
 mood; 
 
 But not all height is holiness, 
 Nor every sweetness good ; 
 And grace will sometimes lurk where who could 
 
 guess ? 
 
 The critic of his kind, 
 Dealing to each his share, 
 With easy humour, hard to bear, 
 May not impossibly have in him shrined, 
 As in a gossamer globe or thickly-padded pod, 
 Some small seed dear to God." 
 
 Well, one hopes so, especially when one praises. 
 
 28^/7. In turning over a chest of old books I 
 found an album that had belonged to my mother 
 in early youth, made about the years 1816-22. 
 There were prints of many Berkshire towns and 
 great houses, a vast collection of newspaper cut- 
 tings, and much manuscript verse. The cuttings 
 were largely from poets' corners, the poets being 
 Haynes Bayley, Mrs. Hemans, L. E. L., Barry 
 Cornwall, and other extinct meteors ; but some
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 127 
 
 were anecdotes and some were conundrums a 
 form of merriment now happily restricted to 
 children's parties. The main interest lay of course, 
 and the only remaining interest lies, in the original 
 contributions of the author's friends. Warren 
 Hastings appears to have been much worshipped, 
 and his retirement at Daylesford is sung very 
 tropically 
 
 " Naught invades 
 
 The still unbroken twilight of the shades 
 Save the cool whisper of the tumbling rill, 
 Which from the shelvy side of yon hoar hill, 
 Now caught, now lost amid th' obtruding leaves, 
 Foams down the craggy channel which it cleaves, 
 Then through the vale with mitigated force 
 Glides unperceived, forgetful of its source ; 
 As one by ceaseless persecution worn, 
 Beset with ills, yet proof to fortune's scorn, 
 Greatly retires, collected and resigned, 
 Nor casts one look of self-reproach behind." 
 
 What a pity that Gray had anticipated that last 
 line ! I know a young poet who has written a 
 very pretty ode which opens, " Let us go hence, 
 she will not hear my songs ! " which probably 
 seems to him a considerable improvement on Mr. 
 Swinburne's " Let us go hence, my songs, she will 
 not hear ! " 
 
 On another page of the album I came upon 
 some doggerel which would seem to have been 
 penned with a view to giving as exactly as possible
 
 128 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 the current pronunciation of certain words, the 
 spelling of which was even more unhelpful than 
 usual. 
 
 " Once in merry Berkshire there 1- 
 -ived a charming little girl, 
 With a charming dog called Smut, 
 Tan as tan, and black as soot, 
 Who could draw a cart, and fetch 
 All he wanted, beg, and catch. 
 Once, alas ! poor Smut was lost ; 
 It was winter, and the frost 
 Nipt his little chest, which was 
 Most susceptible, because 
 Bred so delicately, which 
 Is not good for dogs and such. 
 
 Ah, they found him on the moor, 
 Oil and wine in haste they pour, 
 Wrap him safe as any man in 
 Mother's best and warmest flannen, 
 While to ease his racking cough he 
 Has to suck the finest toffee ; 
 But in vain came comfort then ; 
 Poor Smut never smiled again." 
 
 This effusion is not signed. I cannot believe that 
 my grandmother composed it ; probably it is the 
 work of some precisian of the schoolroom. To be 
 really useful, however, the vowels should be repre- 
 sented by more accurate symbols. Are we meant, 
 for example, to give the vowel in " toffee " the 
 sound in of or in off? Probably the latter, for I was 
 brought up to say coff-ee, and I so spoke the word 
 without shame till my marriage, when the breadth 
 of my vowel offended Sophia. A man who could
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 129 
 
 exchange tobacco for snuff to please his mistress 
 is not likely to stick at a vowel, and " cof-fee " it 
 became ; but alas ! the very first day on which I 
 aired my new accomplishment to a guest it was 
 
 the late Duke of , who honoured us by a call 
 
 at the old Chobham camp he replied to my "Will 
 you have tea or cof-fee ? " with " Thank you, a cup 
 of coff-ee would be very pleasant ; " and coff-ee it 
 has remained for me. It is pitiful to remark what 
 havoc the Board schoolmasters and railway porters 
 are making among place names. Even at Lowes- 
 toft and Kelvedon, as I noticed in October, you 
 hardly hear now the old-fashioned Lestoff and 
 Keldon ; and Edward Fitz-Gerald would turn in his 
 grave to hear Boulge pronounced Bowlge instead 
 of Bowidge. 
 
 December 1st. Punch has struck a new vein this 
 week in a comic armoury. Some of the charges 
 are witty enough, but it is a pity not to make the 
 thing a little more heraldically correct by mention- 
 ing in every case the tincture of the field, &c. 
 Those persons who play pencil and paper games 
 after dinner will find it an amusing pastime to 
 concoct achievements of the sort. Having a family 
 party last night we made an experiment at such 
 a game, and led off with the Sultan of Turkey. 
 Almost everybody gave him for crest " a Saracen's 
 head couped at the neck proper," which showed 
 good feeling. An alternative was : a savage from 
 
 I
 
 130 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 the middle gules holding in the dexter hand a 
 scimitar guttd de sang, in the sinister a paper of 
 reforms reversed. For supporters, dexter : a bear 
 sejant affrontee imperially crowned or, holding in 
 its paws a bezant ; sinister : a bull counter rampant 
 regardant, or. One of the suggested shields was : 
 Purpure, a cross im-potent ermine, surmounted by 
 a decrescent sable. In explanation of this it should 
 be noted that Du Cange derives " ermine " from 
 "Armenian." I may add that I was given for 
 my own crest by a long-suffering family <( a 
 King Charles' head wreathed about the temples 
 ermine." 
 
 At the curiosity shop in yesterday, among 
 
 the highly - priced rubbishy books I came upon 
 the autobiography of a last-century bookseller, 
 and in turning the leaves found the following 
 sentence on small causes leading to great 
 results, which no one but a bookseller could 
 have penned : 
 
 " Sir Isaac Newton would probably never have 
 studied the system of gravitation had he not been 
 under an apple-tree when some of the fruit loosened 
 from the branches and fell to the earth ; it was the 
 question of a simple gardener concerning a pump 
 that led Galileo to study and discover the weight 
 of the air ; to the tones of a Welsh harp are we 
 indebted for the bard of Gray ; and Gibbon formed 
 the design of that truly great work, his ' History of the
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 ^Decline of the Roman Empire] while viewing the rttins 
 -of the Capitol!' 
 
 An apple, a pump, a Welsh harp, and 
 .Rome ! ^ 
 
 2nd. A Devonshire district council has been 
 mending its roads with Druidical remains, thereby 
 proving itself as Christian and iconoclastic as any 
 Cathedral chapter. : Still more far-reaching changes 
 have been made in our own council by a mere 
 stroke of the pen, and have excited no protest. In 
 future no trees are to be planted in the hedges 
 by the roadsides, and no. cottages are to be roofed 
 with thatch. The bicyclist will rejoice at the first 
 of these orders, because undoubtedly the dripping 
 from trees makes mire; but the lover of the 
 picturesque may well wring his hands. The 
 second order seems to be made in the interest of 
 the infernal machines that snort down the roads 
 scattering sparks and frightening your horses. But 
 why should not motor-engines of the new type 
 replace them ? Berkshire (headed by Thatcham) 
 should get up a monster petition against this piece 
 of folly. 
 
 gfh. Village concerts have taken a new de- 
 velopment hereabouts. The old-fashioned penny- 
 reading, where the choir tenor, used to warble 
 /'.The Lass of Richmond '111," and the vicar's son 
 break down in " The Night before Waterloo," has 
 gone " where Orpheus and where Homer are,"
 
 132 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 and we have instead Christy Minstrels, with Bones, 
 Tambo, and Mr. Johnson all complete, and all as 
 black as your hat. Bones is Tom's groom, and no 
 doubt the blacking helps to give him confidence. 
 I believe he submits the joke-list beforehand, so 
 that there may be no offence in it. The jokes, 
 indeed, are quite inoffensive, very childlike and 
 bland, and not a little vague ; they would have 
 delighted the soul of Hadrian, from whose time 
 some of them perhaps date. I believe they derive 
 immediately from those comic papers that one 
 sees people buy at railway-stations and read in the 
 train without a smile. But a few are home-made 
 and topical. The vicar came in for a rap last 
 evening for not lighting the churchyard lamp on 
 week nights ; and the parish council is a standing 
 dish. A village Pasquin might find it worth while 
 to get hold of some less dependent Bones, and 
 write the jokes. 
 
 I2//E Winter seems to have come at last not 
 " the weeping winter all whose flowers are tears," 
 which has been here too long already, but the 
 winter 
 
 " When bicycles hang by the wall, 
 And Dick the shepherd blows his nail " , 
 
 instead of his tyre. I made a short experiment 
 this morning, but the ruts were frozen hard, and 
 the snow hid the flints, so that I had a rough 
 journey, and once or twice I was near falling.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 133 
 
 But anything is better than slush and south wind. 
 A Berkshire poet (for we still have poets) has lately 
 published an ode to this wind perhaps really 
 liking it, perhaps as a peace - offering, just as 
 Kingsley tried to conciliate the north-easter, which, 
 nevertheless, proved implacable and killed him. 
 In this matter, as in others, I am content to be 
 on the side of Shakespeare, who never alludes to 
 the south wind but in disparaging terms. His 
 characters curse by it. " All the contagion of the 
 South light on you," says Coriolanus ; " a south- 
 west blow on ye," says Caliban, " and blister you 
 all o'er ; " and Thersites, who is less of a gentleman 
 than these, and has less reticence, expands the 
 curse into a dozen lines of diseases. The "sweet 
 south " that many editors read in the famous 
 opening lines of tl Twelfth Night " is a quite 
 impossible conjecture of Pope's for "the sweet 
 sound." 
 
 i6lh. I read after dinner Dr. Birkbeck Hill's 
 "Talks about Autographs," which the publisher 
 pro singulan sua humanitate has lent me. Dr. Hill 
 I knew for a vivacious talker when he lived at 
 Burghfield, and I love an autograph but even too 
 well, so that I turned the pages with lively expec- 
 tation. The autograph letters here presented are 
 naturally of very various degrees of interest, and 
 collectors will contrast them, now with a smile, 
 now with a sigh, with their own specimens. For
 
 1 34 PAGES- FROM TV: PRIVATE^ DIARY 
 
 ^xample, I prefer my own -letter from Miss Mar-, 
 tineau, lamenting the death of her prophet, Mr., 
 Atkinson, to the one here given about the slave? 
 trade ; my Newman, too, is more characteristic. 1 ' 
 But I grow gloomily covetous over the Sir Thomas; 
 Browne and the famous Gowper letter about; Mr.; 
 Bull, the dissenting minister with .every virtue andi 
 only one vice tobacco. The Matthew Arnold on> 
 the deceased wife's sister question is interesting ;y 
 it is an answer to a gentleman who complained) 
 that owing to the prohibition he had been married 1 , 
 eight years only out of his eighty. The letter is 
 dated from a Methodist training college where. 
 Arnold was examining. One wonders whether in 
 a Socialist state the Merry England of the future, 
 a great poet will be relieved from such iritoler-. 
 able drudgery, or whether even in that millennium: 
 he will only be allowed to write his poetry and his 
 essays if he can prove himself of substantial use to 
 the community by making chairs and wall-papers. 
 
 1 1 print it pro bono piiblico : 
 
 "THE ORATORY : March 29, 1879. 
 
 "Mv DEAR SIR, You must not think I have willingly .delayed my; 
 answer to so kind a letter as yours. I thank you very much for it, and 
 feel the value of such, though I should not myself allow that I was 
 driven out of the Anglican Church, instead of leaving it because the' 
 Truth was elsewhere. But I know what your meaning was, and it was. 
 a kind meaning to me. 
 
 "Thank you also for your congratulations on my elevation. It has, 
 as you may suppose, startled and even scared me, when I was of the. 
 age when men look out for death rather than any other change. I am, 
 my dear Sir, very truly yours, JOHN II. NEWMAN."
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 135 
 
 Arnold's reports are very good reading, but his 
 methods of examination were sometimes highly 
 poetical. I remember a tale told by a fellow 
 inspector of a class of girl pupil-teachers that he 
 asked Arnold to examine for him. Arnold gave 
 them all the excellent mark. " But," said the 
 other inspector, " surely they are not all as good 
 as they can be; some must be better than 
 others." " Perhaps that is so," replied Arnold ; 
 " but then, you see, they are all such very nice 
 girls." 
 
 There is a letter from Mr. Ruskin, dated 1858, 
 sending a message to Jones [Sir Edward Burne- 
 Jones] that his stained-glass windows would not 
 quite do, a message not delivered until nearly forty 
 years after. 
 
 Dr. Hill's book is written for the American 
 market, and therefore should not be judged by 
 too English a standard. Moreover, it is professedly 
 talk and not literature ; but occasionally the talk 
 is irritating. I do not refer to the irreverent squibs, 
 and crackers that are let off with boyish enjoy- 
 ment at what are my own idols in Church and 
 State ; that is fair enough, and I am the last person 
 to resent either a swingeing blow or a rapier thrust, 
 administered in gentlemanlike fashion, by Radical 
 or Nonconformist. It is Dr. Hill's irrelevant 
 morality that distresses me. Why must poor 
 Hartley Coleridge's weakness be dragged in by
 
 136 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 the head and ears ? And why because Lamb is 
 mentioned must gin be mentioned too ? A furni- 
 ture broker had recently for sale Lamb's spirit 
 case ; and if I could have afforded the sacrifice 
 I would have bought it to burn. 
 
 i8th. I was roused from sleep last night about 
 half-past five by hearing Sophia strike a match and 
 address some one in a very excited tone, to the 
 effect that she could see him, and he needn't hope 
 to escape, and that her husband was a magistrate, 
 with other threats. When I was fully awake, I 
 gathered that she had heard a man walking up 
 and down in the room. But if so he had dis- 
 appeared, so I took a poker and went downstairs 
 for further search. I have a great dislike to enter 
 rooms before the evidences of the last night's occu- 
 pation have been removed ; everything looks un- 
 canny ; and this morning the curtains seemed to 
 bulge a great deal as though they were hiding 
 very substantial burglars. We had been warned 
 once or twice lately by our blue-nosed policeman 
 that a little party of old offenders had come into 
 the neighbourhood, and yesterday the terrier dis- 
 appeared, so that we were in a suspicious humour. 
 However, I found no one, and imagined that 
 Sophia had been dreaming, or that our friendly 
 ghosts had been at their tricks again. For they 
 have a queer habit occasionally of rushing across 
 the drawing-room floor and flinging up the window
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 137 
 
 at least that is what the noise sounds like. Later 
 in the day we heard there had been a slight shock 
 of earthquake, and several of our neighbours had 
 imagined that the tremor, which ran east and 
 west, was caused by a person hurrying across the 
 room. 
 
 2 is/. We came to London for a couple of days' 
 shopping ; that is to say, Sophia came for shopping 
 and I for the pleasure of coming. Not that the 
 country even in winter gives me the spleen, but 
 after a few months in the wilderness of mid-Berk- 
 shire it is exhilarating to look in the faces of some 
 apparently intelligent human beings. We started 
 in a fog which promised fine weather in town, and 
 we were not disappointed. London was as full 
 as it could hold ; the streets were full, the shops 
 over-full ; to buy a penny stamp at the Post 
 Office it was necessary to take your place in a long 
 queue. But everybody seemed in good spirits; 
 matronly dames, puffing papas, tall serious sisters 
 were letting themselves be tugged down every street 
 by apple-cheeked schoolboys ; nursemaids smiled 
 as they pushed their perambulators through the 
 thickest of the crowd ; the poor tired shop-girls 
 smiled under the fostering eye of the shop-walker ; 
 even the sombre pavement artist chose subjects 
 that smacked of the season, high-coloured roast 
 beef of Old England, plum pudding crowned with 
 no mortal holly ; and the mechanical people who
 
 138 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 touch their hats at. street corners and give five 
 sweeps if you drop in a penny were keeping 
 holiday, arid' cheerfully overlooked the mud at 
 their crossings. Having no business myself but 
 that of Chremes in the old comedy, I took great 
 interest in watching the crowds, and let my imagi- 
 nation work on the waifs and strays of conversa- 
 tion that floated by. I spent as usual a good deal 
 of time in the bookshops, as much for .the sake of 
 the buyers as the books. It is pretty to observe 
 ladies to whom a book is but a Christmas present 
 make their way into the. terra incognita of Bain or. 
 Hatchards or Bumpus, look vaguely round, make; 
 a despairing plunge or two, and then throw them-i 
 selves on the mercy of the benevolent despot, who 
 assigns them what will best suit Tom and Jack 
 and Margaret. The great bulk of the new books 
 seemed to be reprints of classic authors, which is- 
 a sign at least of healthy taste ; but it seems the 
 public will not buy them without a certificate pre- 
 fixed from some modern critic. So Scott is patted 
 on the back by Mr. Lang, Johnson by Mr. Birrell, 
 the rest of the eighteenth century writers by Mr., 
 Dobson, females in general by Mrs. Ritchie, Job 
 by Mr. Jacobs, and the world at large by Professor 
 Saintsbury. We were staying with our friend X.,.. 
 who is so good-natured that he does not resent our 
 using his house as an hotel. He was civil enough 
 to invite a few interesting people to meet us. He,
 
 PAGES: FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 139 
 
 is master of the simple secret that a great dinner- 
 party is. a great evil unless all the company are 
 bores. If there is a humorist at the upper end, 
 and the table is long, and you are in your proper 
 place below the salt, it is vexing, especially if you 
 are as. dull a dbg as I am, to see the signs of 
 merriment in which you cannot share. At home 
 I have! an old-fashioned round table, which holds 
 no. more than eight people, so that the talk must 
 be general, and under these circumstances I find 
 talk improves, because the wits have the stimulus 
 of an audience, and the audience of the wits. 
 
 2$th. -A bright day, which made the Christmas 
 salutation more easy and natural. But why do 
 some folks wish me " a happy " instead of " a 
 merry Christmas " ? Is it spiritual refinement ? 
 Do they think because they are virtuous there shall 
 be no cakes and ale ? Not being able to go to 
 church, I read Stevenson's "Christmas Sermon," 
 reprinted from Scribner in " Across the Plains." 
 Most laymen could, I imagine, write one good 
 sermon, into which they would put all their theo- 
 logy ; but though good such homilies would not 
 be gay. When laymen of literary genius mount 
 the pulpit it is a different matter. Matthew- 
 Arnold's " Christmas Sermon " was excellent read- 
 ing ; and though too full of his pet heresies, it said 
 a plain word for Christian morals. Stevenson 
 preaches to us the lesson he had so successfully
 
 140 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 taught himself, the duty of cheerfulness. The 
 older I grow, the greater value I set on this virtue, 
 and, considering the increase in suicides, I should 
 judge there was never more need for it. I have 
 known a wife (to put the matter from a man's 
 point of view) who by her resolute cheerfulness 
 enabled her husband to keep heart and head when 
 skirting the precipice of bankruptcy ; and I have 
 known a wife who by her curst 1 shrewishness 
 made even a crumpled rose-leaf as agonising as a 
 crown of thorns. Years ago I travelled many 
 months together with a friend, who was the most 
 cheerful companion in the world, and I had no 
 suspicion that there was another side to his tem- 
 perament until once at Lucerne we slept for a 
 couple of nights in adjoining rooms with but a 
 thin partition between. He is now dead, so I may 
 tell the story. Both mornings I was amazed to 
 hear a long soliloquy all the time he was dressing 
 to this effect : " Oh, I am the most unhappy man 
 alive ! Oh dear ! oh dear ! what is the use of 
 going on living ? Oh, the wearisomeness of it ! 
 How I hate and despise myself ! Wretch ! " and 
 so forth. It was just Carlyle's old wheezing clock : 
 " Once I was hap-hap-happy, but now I am meeser- 
 able!" And each morning he came down to 
 breakfast with his usual gaiety, so that I could but 
 assume he had, perhaps unconsciously, come to 
 
 1 I use the word in its Shakespearean sense.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 141 
 
 adopt this remarkable means of purging his melan- 
 choly ; and I felt a little ashamed of having pene- 
 trated his secret. 
 
 The post-bag, when at last it arrived, was full of 
 letters for the servants' hall ; Christmas cards, I 
 presume. I hope this means that the custom of 
 sending these picturesque souvenirs is sinking in 
 the scale, prior to disappearing altogether, as 
 valentines did. It may mean only that no cards 
 come to us because we never send any to 
 others. All such social habits soon become a 
 tyranny, from which it is wise to keep as free as 
 possible. 
 
 26th. The "Feast of Stephen" has long been 
 materialised into Boxing-day ; and even the well- 
 meant efforts of Dr. Neale and " Good King 
 Wenceslas" have not restored it to the proto- 
 martyr, A measure of the poverty of taste in 
 matters poetical is afforded by the popularity of 
 that very tame carol. For weeks before Christmas 
 we suffer it, and reward our persecutors with nuts 
 and apples. I made an attempt one year to sub- 
 stitute the old Stephen carol printed by the Percy 
 Society from a MS. of Henry VI.'s reign ; but the 
 old vicar objected. And perhaps from his point 
 of view he was right ; for the legend is entirely 
 independent of the story in Acts. It opens un- 
 blushingly :
 
 142 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 " Saint Stephen was a clerk 
 
 In King Herodes hall, 
 And served him of bread and cloth 
 
 As ever king befall. 
 Stephen out of kitchen came 
 
 With boares head on hand ; , 
 
 He saw a star was fair and bright 
 
 Over Bethlehem stand. 
 He cast adown the boares head 
 
 And went into the hall : 
 ' I forsake thee, King Herod, 
 
 And thy workes all. 
 I forsake thee, King Herod, 
 
 And thy workes all ; 
 There is a child in Bethlehem born 
 
 Is better than we all.'" 
 
 King Herod naturally remonstrates, and asks 
 Stephen if he has gone mad, or is striking for 
 higher wages. Stephen replies shortly, and keeps 
 to his point : 
 
 " Lacketh me neither gold or fee 
 
 Ne none riche weed ; 
 There is a child in Bethlehem born 
 Shall helpen us at our need." 
 
 This is too much for Herod, who gives his retainer 
 the lie symbolical : 
 
 " That is all so sooth, Stephen, 
 
 All so sooth, I wis, 
 As this capon crowe shall 
 That lieth here in my dish." 
 
 Three vigorous verses complete the episode : 
 
 " That word was not so soon said, 
 
 That word in that hall, 
 The capon crew, Christus natus est, 
 Among the lorde's all.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 143 
 
 ' Riseth up, my tormentors, 
 
 By two and all by one, 
 And leadeth Stephen out of this town, 
 
 And stoneth him with stone.' 
 Tooken they then Stephen 
 
 And stoned him in the way. 
 And therefore is his even 
 
 On Christes own day." 
 
 " Therefore " ! It is unblushing, as I said. But 
 as a carol it takes the colour out of " Good King 
 Wenceslas." 
 
 To-night the mummers came round. For old 
 sake's sake one does not refuse to see them, but 
 the glory has long ago departed. . At least, I seem 
 to remember that in my youth the performance 
 was better ; certainly it was the best of the village 
 boys who used to act, now it is the tag, rag, and 
 bobtail, and they do not take the trouble to learn 
 all the verses. The principal characters are King 
 George and a French officer, who fight, both get 
 -wounded, and are cured by a doctor ; Molly, who 
 acts as showman and chorus, and Beelzebub, who 
 comes in at the end, dressed like Father Christmas, 
 to collect the pennies. All the characters announce 
 themselves in the manner of the old miracle plays, 
 thus : 
 
 " I be King Gaarge, a nawble knight, 
 I lost some blood in English fight, 
 I care not for Spaniard, French, or Turk, 
 Where's the man as can do I hurt ? 
 And if before me he durs stan' 
 I'll cut un down with this deadly han', 
 I'll cut un and slash un as small as flies, 
 And send un to the cookshop to make mince pies," &c. &c.
 
 144 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 January isf, 1897. "And the new sun rose 
 bringing the new year." The glass also has risen, 
 and we may anticipate a couple of days of dry 
 weather. But our new weathercock, in the exuber- 
 ance of youthful spirits, is engaged in an endeavour, 
 by more and more rapid gyrations, to hit that point 
 of the compass which Feste calls the " south-north." 
 Now for good resolutions. I find, as age creeps 
 on, I spend too much time on the hearthrug with 
 hands in pockets and coat-tails over arms, while 
 letters remain to write and books to read. What 
 is to be done ? I knew an author once who 
 printed a placard with BEGIN upon it in giant 
 letters, and hung it in his study ; but, not to 
 speak of the disfigurement and the publicity, I 
 doubt the effectiveness of any such memento. I 
 can say " begin " to myself as often as I like without 
 budging an inch. It is far more efficacious to 
 set up an independent train of thought, and, by 
 becoming interested in something else, leave the 
 old attraction unconsciously. Mr. James (I mean 
 Mr. William James the humorist, who writes on 
 Psychology, not his brother the psychologist, who 
 writes novels) has an amusing dissertation on the 
 art of getting out of bed : 
 
 " We know what it is to get out of bed on a freezing morning 
 in a room without a fire, and how the very vital principle within 
 us protests against the ordeal. Probably most persons have 
 lain on" certain mornings for an hour at a time, unable to brace 
 themselves to the resolve. We think how late we shall be, how
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 145 
 
 the duties of the day will suffer ; we say, ' I must get up ; this 
 is ignominious,' &c. ; but still the warm couch feels too deli- 
 cious, the cold outside too cruel, and resolution faints away and 
 postpones itself again and again, just as it seemed on the verge 
 of bursting the resistance and passing over into the decisive 
 act. Now, how do we ever get up under such circumstances ? 
 If I may generalise from my own experience, we more often 
 than not get up without any struggle or decision at all. We 
 suddenly find that we have got up. A fortunate lapse of con- 
 sciousness occurs ; we forget both the warmth and the cold ; 
 we fall into some reverie connected with the day's life, in the 
 course of which the idea flashes across us, ' Hullo ! I must lie 
 here no longer ' an idea which at that lucky instant awakens 
 no contradictory or paralysing suggestions, and consequently 
 produces immediately the appropriate motor effects.''" 
 
 The problem for me seems, then, to resolve into 
 this how to secure a " fortunate lapse of con- 
 sciousness " soon after breakfast. I must engage 
 Eugenia to come into the library every morning 
 with an interesting piece of news ; or I must have 
 the post-bag placed on the writing-table away 
 from the fire. And I will begin to-morrow. 
 
 On December i9th I made a note of having 
 met a troop of six magpies, and wondered what 
 it portended. A correspondent is good enough 
 to send me a Cumbrian version of the old 
 rhyme : 
 
 " One for sorrow, 
 Two for mirth, 
 Three for a wedding, 
 Four for a birth ; 
 Five for Heaven, 
 Six for Hell, 
 Seven for the Divel's own sel'." 
 
 K
 
 146 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 In Berkshire, not being theologically minded, 
 we recognise only the first four lines. 
 
 2nd. I went yesterday with Sophia on a new- 
 year's visit to my aunt at Barchester. We had, 
 as usual, much talk about dignitaries au grand 
 se'rieux, relieved by one or two anecdotes told by 
 a clergyman more reverend than reverent. One 
 
 was of the late Bishop , who lost his train 
 
 through pacing sedately down the platform in the 
 serene confidence that he would be waited for. 
 
 Another was of the present Bishop of and 
 
 his Conference. It seems that his lordship is a 
 good chairman, in the sense that he keeps himself 
 to his chair and leaves the meeting to manage 
 itself. The whole business of wrangling over 
 academic resolutions, which there is no power 
 to make practical, is so transparently futile, that 
 a bishop may be readily excused for treating a 
 Diocesan Conference as a lesser Convocation and 
 going to sleep especially at the after-lunch sitting. 
 When it came to votes of thanks, the proposer 
 remarked that his lordship certainly deserved one, 
 because the business he had been engaged in was 
 so obviously distasteful. The Bishop rose twink- 
 ling with humour. He was at a loss to divine 
 how the kind proposer of the vote of thanks could 
 have come to such a conclusion. As a matter 
 of fact it was quite true. It reminded him of an 
 answer given in an examination to the question,
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 147 
 
 " Wherein lay the great sin of Moses at the striking 
 of the rock ? " The answer was, " I don't know ; 
 but I conclude it must have been something in 
 the expression of his countenance." One repartee 
 I will note because it told against me. An old- 
 fashioned canon was inveighing against his lord- 
 ship of for wearing a mitre. " But surely," 
 
 I said, "there is more sense in putting a mitre 
 on your head than on your notepaper and carnage 
 panels ! " " Then why don't you go about," said 
 he, " on state occasions in a helmet with your 
 crest atop ? " 
 
 5//i. A second sleepless night, and there is, un- 
 happily, no help for it. For I am cutting a wisdom 
 tooth, and have been engaged in the business 
 for more than a twelvemonth. The process is 
 inoffensive enough, unless I catch cold, as I did 
 yesterday, and then it becomes " tarrible tarrifying 
 and pertickler 'nights," as we say here. One tooth 
 came through a few months ago, and had to be 
 at once extracted. So I imagine it will be with 
 the other 
 
 " Ostendent terris hunc tantum fata, neque ultra 
 Esse sinent." 
 
 nth. During my convalescence I have been 
 reading the early volumes of Miss Burney's diary. 
 I found my old friends as diverting as ever. What 
 company could be better than Daddy Crisp, or
 
 148 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 those excellent young men, Mr. Seward the vain 
 and Mr. Crutchley the proud, or the S.S. who wept 
 at will, or the Lady Say and Sele of that epoch, 
 who went about quoting one sentence from her 
 sister's unprinted novel, " The Mausoleum of Julia," 
 or Mr. B y, who " lost four years of the happi- 
 ness of his life let's see, '71, '72, '73, '74 ay, 
 four years, sir, and all that kind of thing ; " or 
 Mrs. Vesey, who " thought it such a very disagree- 
 able thing, when one has just made acquaintance 
 with anybody and likes them, to have them die," 
 not to speak of the greater names, Burke and 
 Johnson, and Reynolds and Garrick ; Carter, 
 Chapone, Montague, and Thrale, and all the 
 humours of the Court. Of course there are 
 bores, too. The name of " sweet Mrs. Delany " 
 is a signal for skipping, so is Colonel Fairly (/>. 
 Digby), whom F. B. somewhat affected, recording 
 for hundreds of pages his talk about " longing to 
 die," and how he read her a volume of " Love 
 Letters," and elegant extracts from Akenside and 
 Beattie, and who then accepted a fat sinecure and 
 married a Miss Gunning. I thought it a good 
 opportunity, while the book was fresh in memory, 
 to look at Macaulay's essay, one of his latest, and 
 see how far it would save his declining reputation. 
 Its unfairness and inaccuracy struck me as extra- 
 ordinary. Nor were they due solely to political 
 prejudice. For instance, he has a very rhetorical
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 149 
 
 paragraph suggesting and rejecting all sorts of 
 impossible reasons why the Queen should have 
 offered Miss Burney a post at court. The ex- 
 planation is quite simple. Neither George III. 
 nor his consort were such fools as Macaulay 
 makes out ; they were both the Queen especially 
 much interested in literature, and wished to 
 have so distinguished a literary lady about them. 
 Moreover, Dr. Burney had just been refused the 
 post of conductor of the King's Band, and this 
 place for his daughter was meant as compensa- 
 tion. But it is too late in the day to review 
 Macaulay's review. One particularly glaring mis- 
 take is perhaps worth noting. Macaulay says : 
 " We have not the smallest doubt that Johnson 
 revised ' Cecilia/ and that he retouched the style 
 of many passages." Again, after quoting a passage, 
 " We say with confidence either Sam Johnson or 
 the devil." Now hear Miss Burney : " Ay," cried 
 Dr. Johnson, " some people want to make out 
 some credit to me from the little rogue's book. 
 I was told by a gentleman this morning that it 
 was a very fine book, if it was all her own. ' It 
 is all her own,' said I, ' for me, I am sure, for I 
 never saw one word of it before it was printed '" (ii. 
 172, ed. 1842). Thus a categorical denial to his 
 theory comes in the very book Macaulay was 
 reviewing ! 
 
 . What is a gentleman ? The question
 
 150 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 has been raised in the Morning Post by a corre- 
 spondent, who proposes to found a club open to 
 none but gentlemen of coat-armour, or, as he 
 prefers to say, " armigerous " persons. One 
 would have thought a man's armigerous instincts 
 hardly his most clubable side ; it was his own 
 page in Debrett that interested Sir Walter 
 Kellynch, not the rest of the Baronetage. Pro- 
 bably if this bold gentleman founds his club he 
 will find he has sown a crop of (heraldic) dragons' 
 teeth tl armigerd prcelia sevit htimo" to quote Pro- 
 pertius. For A, who is the tenth transmitter of 
 a coat-of-arms, will look coldly upon B and C, 
 who can only count five generations ; C, who 
 reckons twelve, will snub A ; the vanquished will 
 retire from the field, and soon the founder, who 
 no doubt has the longest pedigree out of Wales, 
 will be left alone in his glory. The correspond- 
 ence called forth by the proposal is amusing. 
 One person writes to expose it as a very palpable 
 attempt of Heralds' College to raise the wind ; 
 surcoats, according to this testy witness, being 
 on sale there, new or second-hand, surprisingly 
 cheap, and not much in demand ; being, in fact, 
 reach-me-downs, " things which take the eye and 
 have their price," as Browning says. Another 
 writer follows him with the lament that this has 
 been the sad case for four centuries. But why 
 draw the line at four centuries ? People have
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 151 
 
 been dubbed knight " on carpet consideration " 
 ever since dubbing was invented. Some coats-of- 
 arms or augmentations really represent achievements, 
 as they are all styled, and were won on the field 
 of battle ; but these are very few. All through 
 the fourteenth century it was the custom for 
 families to adopt what " achievements " they 
 pleased, quite independently of any doughty 
 deeds, though probably not without payment ; 
 and if one family happened to take a fancy, to a 
 coat that had already been adopted, there was a 
 pretty row, as in the Scrope and Grosvenor con- 
 troversy about azure, a bend or, in which Chaucer 
 was a witness. But where in such cases is 
 glorying ? No, " these things must not be 
 thought on after these ways." If Jones or I 
 receive some distinction a coat-of-arms, or an 
 augmentation, or a V.C., or a Turkish Order, 
 or a baronetcy it is best to accept the fact for 
 what it is worth, and be as proud as we can, 
 without raising any question of why and where- 
 fore, and the same wise maxim applies to 
 ancestral distinctions. I am exceedingly proud 
 of the fact (whenever I remember it) that an 
 ancestor of mine sealed a thirteenth-century deed 
 of gift with an etoile of six points ; but the glory 
 is simply " from its being far " ; he may have 
 been himself "some bright particular star," but 
 the chances are he was not ; and I have no
 
 152 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 doubt either he or his grandfather paid the Earl 
 Marshal 2d. for the privilege. When there are 
 no wars new families have no alternative but to 
 buy their decorations. Elizabeth, for a con- 
 sideration, made many hundreds of " armigeri," 
 by no means most of them warriors ; one was 
 Shakespeare, who would have jumped at the 
 chance, one feels sure, of joining an armigerous 
 club for the sake of hob-nobbing with Sir Thomas 
 Lucy. Of course, if besides being a new man, 
 you had the luck to bear a common name, you 
 could save your pocket and your countenance 
 by hooking yourself on by imaginary links to 
 some family already " gentle " (a Mr. Dawkins 
 in 1597 lost his ears for concocting some hundred 
 false pedigrees, for which see Debrett, passim) ; 
 or, if you thought this course too risky, you might 
 simply " convey " their shield, and trust to no 
 questions being asked, as most new people seem 
 to do now. I know of one gentleman who 
 couldn't make up his mind between two very 
 pretty coats borne by different families of his 
 name, and so used them both, and the effect 
 on his plate, which is the final cause of a coat- 
 of-arms, was very magnificent. Persons in a 
 lower rank of life are generally content with a 
 crest and motto for their notepaper. But what 
 is there in all this to enrage ? No one worth 
 deceiving is deceived. And why should any one
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 153 
 
 be jealous of new men ? Every family was new 
 once, and they became new, then as now, by 
 becoming wealthy. This is a commonplace of 
 satire right back to the time of Euripides (see 
 Frag. 20), and no doubt earlier. 
 
 But at bottom the question, "What is a 
 gentleman ? " is a serious one, and could not 
 have been raised in a more pointed manner 
 than by the proposal to found an armorial club. 
 It comes to this: Is the word "gentleman" to 
 be allowed to mean what in fact it has come to 
 mean in England a man of a certain type of 
 education and manners or is it to revert to its 
 original sense of " gentilis homo," a man of a 
 certain type of family ? William of Wykeham 
 answered the question deliberately in the former 
 sense by his famous motto, " Manners makyth 
 man," and the tradition of the English schools 
 and universities has consistently set in the same 
 direction. 1 The old story about the French 
 Marquis, who opined that the Almighty would 
 think twice before damning a gentleman of his 
 quality, doubtless finds an echo in all genuinely 
 " armigerous " bosoms ; but there is another tale 
 in Evelyn's Diary which puts what I believe to 
 
 1 Contrast what Queen Charlotte told Miss Burney of a certain 
 German Protestant nunnery, where the candidates' coats-of-arms were 
 put up several weeks to be examined, and if any flaw was found they 
 were not elected (ii. 402).
 
 154 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 be the English position as pointedly as the other 
 does that of the ancien regime : " March i o, 
 1682. Vrats told a friend of mine who accom- 
 panied him to the gallows, and gave him some 
 advice, that he did not value dying of a rush, 
 and hoped and believed God w r ould deale with 
 him like a gentleman ; " i.e. with courtesy and 
 consideration. Everybody would admit that 
 breeding has not a little to do with gentle 
 instincts, but three generations may be trusted 
 to do as much as thirty. 
 
 i8//r. A perfect winter's day. The light 
 thrown up from the snow makes all the indoor 
 colour vividly brilliant. I went to help the 
 Vicarage boys build a Grecian temple. With 
 great foresight they had rolled enormous wheels 
 of snow on Sunday afternoon while it was wet, 
 from which to-day they carved glistening blocks. 
 
 At I found a handsome piece of red morocco 
 
 binding, lettered " Trial of Warren Hastings, Esq., 
 1788." I suppose it had been one of the note- 
 books supplied to the peers. But the person to 
 whom it had fallen had given it for an album to 
 his daughter, who had copied in " Paradise and 
 the Peri ! " 
 
 zoth. I find myself somewhat indisposed, and 
 through my own fault. I make it a rule when 
 dining out to drink no wine unless I am quite 
 sure of the cellar, especially if my host is a
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 155 
 
 clergyman ; for the great fall in tythes has made 
 economy in the port wine bill generally necessary, 
 even among those who can still afford to dine. 
 I find that not a few of my neighbours follow 
 
 the same custom. Last night at , every one 
 
 sat as if at a teetotal festival vrifywv aolvois 
 until the cloth was drawn. But something in 
 my host's expression struck me as he helped 
 himself to port and sipped it critically, so that 
 at the second round I flung away discretion and 
 helped myself and sipped. Then I understood. 
 What I had taken for pride in his port was 
 defiance in his eye ; with just such a face Socrates 
 sipped his hemlock. "Any port in a storm," says 
 the proverb ; but it is a proverb for young men. 
 Even Tennyson, when he grew into years, be- 
 came more cautious, and no longer bade the 
 plump head-waiter at the " Cock," " Go fetch a 
 pint of port," without specifying the vintage. 
 Nay, the story goes that even at the tables of 
 the wealthy he would not drink till his son 
 had " tasted " for him. In that excellent book, 
 Law's " Serious Call," there is some serious and 
 excellent advice on this point : 
 
 " Octavius is a learned, ingenious man, well vers'd in most 
 parts of literature, and no stranger to any kingdom in Europe. 
 The other day, being just recover'd from a lingering fever, he 
 took upon him to talk thus to his friends : 
 
 " ' My glass] says he, ' is almost run out ; and your eyes see 
 how many marks of age and death I bear about me : But I plainly
 
 1 56 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 feel myself sinking away faster than any standers-by imagine. 
 I fully believe one year more will conclude my reckoning.' 
 
 "The attention of his friends was much rais'd by such a 
 declaration, expecting to hear something truly excellent from 
 so learned a man, who had but a year longer to live. When 
 Octavius proceeded in this manner : ' For these reasons,' says 
 he, ' my friends, I have left off all taverns, the wine of those 
 places is not good enough for me in this decay of nature. I 
 must now be nice in what I drink ; I can't pretend to do as 
 I have done ; and therefore am resolved to furnish my own 
 cellar with a little of the very best, tho' it cost me ever so much ' " 
 (ist ed. p. 210). 
 
 24/A. Robert came to luncheon before going 
 back to college, and we had a long chat about 
 Oxford. I judge the prevailing philosophical 
 tone there to be utilitarian, for the highest 
 praise Robert gave to anything was that it was 
 " useful," and the word seemed always in his 
 
 mouth. Dr. , who is a young Cambridge 
 
 graduate, happened to come in, and they must 
 fall to abuse of each other's university. I en- 
 deavoured to mediate, quoting Q.'s ballad, 1 which 
 neither knew ; also Selden's grave judgment : 
 "The best argument why Oxford should have 
 precedence of Cambridge is the Act of Parlia- 
 ment by which Oxford is made what it is, and 
 Cambridge is made what it is ; and in the Act it 
 takes place." I suppressed the last sentence, in 
 which Selden shows himself a true son of 
 Oxford : " Besides, Oxford has the best monu- 
 
 1 "Green Bays : Anecdote for Fathers."
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 157 
 
 ments to show." At last the doctor said to Robert, 
 " How strange it is that the only man in Oxford 
 who does anything should be a Cambridge man." 
 Upon this I resolutely closured the subject. It 
 is a curious controversy. Some people profess 
 to be able to tell at sight to which University 
 a man owes his education. The old epigram 
 says, " The Oxford man looks as if the world 
 belonged to him ; the Cambridge man as if he did 
 not care to whom it belonged." I have myself 
 seemed to remark a certain precision of outline 
 and want of atmosphere about the Cambridge 
 training, and perhaps a certain atmosphere and 
 want of precision about the Cambridge toilet 
 and manners ; but I fear I take even less interest 
 in the debate than I do in the annual boat-race. 
 I own it is a defect. I remember that the only 
 time Mr. Gladstone's eye brightened during his 
 delivery of the Romanes lecture a few years ago 
 was when he recited the old Caroline epigrams. 
 February 1st. 
 
 " February fill dyke 
 With black or white," 
 
 runs the rhyme, if it can be called a rhyme. It 
 does not say that the dykes need be filled with 
 both black and white on the first day of the 
 month ; but that is what has happened. We had 
 a steady fall of snow the greater part of the night, 
 and all day it has rained as steadily. I omitted
 
 158 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 to note at the beginning of last month, when we 
 visited Barchester, that we had from my aunt less 
 praise than usual of her own bishop, and I learned 
 the reason from one of the canon's wives. The 
 wave of Socialism had at last mounted to the 
 Palace, which had been giving a number of dances 
 to domestic servants, but none to the young people 
 of the Close, who were a little indignant, but not 
 so indignant as the servants in each household 
 who had been passed over. They had clubbed 
 together and hired the Assembly Rooms for a 
 Twelfth-Night ball, and every house in Barchester 
 was divided as to the policy of letting their 
 servants go. What if a respectably - dressed 
 burglar should get introduced to Caroline and 
 learn all about the customs of the house, where 
 the safe is, whether our diamonds only pretend to 
 be paste, whether we dine off gold or electro- 
 plate ? In the first part of each day, as I heard, 
 fathers of families were resolute against yielding 
 to any such absurdity, but dinner brought more 
 sombre thoughts. If cook should give notice ! 
 To lose a girl who could make soup like this ! 
 Was not Henri IV. politic who thought a kingdom 
 worth a mass ? After all, one might sit up oneself 
 for a night to let the maids in, and get on with 
 that Charge or that University sermon ; and then 
 morning again would bring more sober reflection. 
 Herodotus tells of a wise race who debated all
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 159 
 
 important questions both night and morning to 
 give both reason and passion their due. One 
 feels they must have found it difficult to come 
 to conclusions. But whether the ball was held, 
 and whether, in consequence, the Barchester cooks 
 and housemaids have all moved on one place like 
 the guests at the Mad Hatter's tea-party, I have 
 not heard. 
 
 5//t. It is still raining, and does not seem to 
 know how to stop, like crying children. All the 
 ponds have overflowed, and in one or two places 
 the roads have to be forded. It would take Mark 
 Tapley to be cheerful under the circumstances, 
 or Matthew Green ; but that last-named worthy 
 seems to have visited his farm 
 
 " Twenty miles from town, 
 Small, tight, salubrious, and his own," 
 
 only in fine weather ; for on wet days his pre- 
 scription for the spleen is 
 
 " To some coffee-house I stray, 
 For news, the manna of a day." 
 
 We have a coffee-house, but the villagers prefer 
 the tap-room at the " Blue Boar " ; and the news 
 there is not to-day's manna. 
 
 Sth. The glass is going up at a great pace, 
 but the wind has shifted from NW. to S. I 
 went to look at the lambs, and the old shepherd,
 
 l6o PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 who has a whole meteorological department in 
 his head, shook it at the weather. "We shall 
 have a fall 'fore this time to-morrow." Aristotle 
 bids us respect the opinions of the aged, even 
 when unaccompanied by reasons ; but their reasons 
 are often very entertaining. So I pressed him : 
 " Gentle shepherd, tell me why." " Well," said 
 he, " did you see the moon last night lying on 
 his back ? I know'd he meant summat by that ; 
 he means a fall 'fore this time to-morrow, snow 
 or rain however." 
 
 " Saint Valentines day, 
 When every fowl cometh to choose his mate." 
 
 And for once the day is worthy the occasion. 
 One tastes in the air the first freshness of spring, 
 and there rise in the memory forgotten scraps 
 of the early poets, who seem somehow to have 
 found the world fresher than we find it to-day ; 
 though even Chaucer complained that everything 
 was used up. A few birds have been told off, 
 as in The Assembly of Foufes, to sing the canticle 
 of Nature : 
 
 " Now welcome summer with thy sunne softe 
 That hast this winter weather overshaken." 
 
 I hope it may not prove a premature flourish. The 
 unusual depression of this winter is signalised by 
 the fact that our rooks, for the first time I can 
 remember, made no attempt to build at Christmas.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY l6l 
 
 The vicar is away to-day preaching at Cam- 
 bridge before his University. Dr. Merry (vero 
 quern nomine dicunf) has described the country 
 parson's experience on such occasions at Oxford 
 in a very humorous poem printed in " More 
 Echoes from the Oxford Magazine ; " and I sup- 
 pose it is much the same at Cambridge. Mean- 
 while, we poor silly sheep are left " encombred 
 in the myre," at the tender mercies of a " merce- 
 narie." I must own I felt some curiosity as to 
 whether the vicar would discover some new brand 
 of locum tenentes; his predecessor's substitutes I 
 used to suffer gladly, until he fell ill and they 
 came too often. There was the gentleman who 
 compared the Cross to a lightning-conductor, 
 and recommended us to embrace it ; there was 
 another who preached from Jude on the contest 
 for the body of Moses, and speculated in a very 
 entertaining manner on the purpose for which 
 Satan required it ; and there was a third who 
 made a substantial discourse of St. Peter's shadow, 
 pointing out, first, that it was an everyday shadow, 
 so that we ought never to despise the common- 
 place ; secondly, that it was an unemployed shadow, 
 and everything should have a use ; with a whole 
 hydra of heads besides, which I have forgotten. 
 The young gentleman to-day was of a more 
 modern school, a sort of Anglican dervish, who 
 pirouetted in the pulpit, and occasionally nearly
 
 1 62 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 shut himself up like a clasp-knife. What im- 
 pressed me most was his personification of 
 Septuagesima, in this way : " Septuagesima comes 
 to us, and lays a hand on our shoulder and 
 insists with us, and is urgent and shrill and 
 vehement, and intercedes and coaxes and per- 
 suades. She besets us and inveigles and adjures 
 and implores," &c. He had, too, a disagreeable 
 trick of emphasising not, against all idiom, in the 
 Commandments, e.g. "Thou shalt not steal," as if 
 we had said we should ; and again in the Second 
 Collect at Evening Prayer, " which the world 
 cannot give." Of course, the English negative is 
 enclitic ; the very form cannot proves this, as 
 do such contractions as doesn't, shouldn't, can't, 
 &c. To emphasise not, except in an antithesis, 
 is to commit a vulgar error ; or rather, it isn't, 
 for ordinary folks would not dream of doing so ; 
 it is to fall a victim to that disease of pedants 
 which the old physician of Norwich would have 
 styled Pseudodoxia Hieratica. I have long wondered 
 where locum tenentes are bred, for they are a dis- 
 tinct species of parson ; the ordinary sort, one 
 knows, hails from Oxford or Cambridge, and I 
 remember hearing that a friend's gardener once 
 gave as his reason for not going to church, " I've 
 lived in Oxford where the parsons are made, 
 and I don't think much of 'm." A catalogue 
 from a Birmingham curiosity dealer this morning
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 163 
 
 may throw some light on the problem, for an 
 entry runs : 
 
 " CLERGYMEN. A fine collection of 200 clergymen, 
 consisting of Protestant Ministers, Roman Catholics, 
 Wesleyan Methodists, Unitarians, and Presbyterians, 
 nice clean lot, 55." 
 
 That sounds almost too cheap, even in this 
 depressed state of the market. Perhaps it is a 
 misprint for .5, 55. 
 
 20//Z. A long letter came this morning from 
 Eugenia, who has reached Cairo, to her mother, 
 from which I have leave to transcribe a few of 
 the more general passages : 
 
 All the family met us in the hall and wel- 
 comed us most heartily. They are most charming 
 and delightful people, and they talk very good 
 English, with plenty of idioms to make us feel at 
 home, such as " the weather is briskish," " rather 
 queerish for Cairo." The house is large, and we 
 have a suite of rooms to ourselves, including a 
 bath-room. The decorations are mostly Eastern, 
 except a stuffed cotton cat which sits on the back 
 of the sofa. The children of the house talk 
 Arabic, French, Greek, German, and English, as 
 occasion requires. At present I feel like a person 
 in the " Arabian Nights " ; the servants are Afreets, 
 and we clap our hands for them to appear. The 
 major-domo waits at dinner in white gloves, after 
 first holding a magnificent basin and ewer for the
 
 164 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Pasha to wash his hands ; and the things to eat 
 are kabobs and pilafs. Of course, to break the 
 spell we have only to go to tea on Shepheard's 
 balcony on Saturday afternoon, when the English 
 band plays. That is pure West, even transatlantic, 
 as the other is pure East, but they are curiously 
 mingled everywhere else : electric tramways and 
 camels, bicycles and donkey boys, American 
 heiresses and black bundles with two eyes near 
 the top. We see Aladdin playing with his little 
 friends, and hopeless-looking bronze babies sit- 
 ting astride on one shoulder of their mothers, 
 holding by the top of their head. It used to be 
 the fashion to let them tumble, so as to disable 
 them for military service, until we took over the 
 army. 1 The blues and yellows are very fine ; but 
 the dirt beggars description, and the smells are 
 overdone. There is occasionally a spicy, peppery, 
 Eastern smell that is rather good, but some are 
 pure typhus. Of the sights, I think I like the 
 Sphinx best, then the running sais, then the 
 camels, then the donkey-boys ; the Barrage, too, 
 is very wonderful. I will copy a few days from 
 my diary. 
 
 Tuesday. The Pasha took us to the big mosque, 
 El Azhar, which is a university, the oldest in the 
 
 1 I think Eugenia is mistaken about this ; no doubt mothers occa- 
 sionally let their babies fall, but to disable them for service they used 
 to maim the trigger finger.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 165 
 
 world. There are about 8000 students, and they 
 do much the same work as when the university 
 was founded. Each professor sits by his own 
 column (the professorships are called columns 
 instead of chairs) and addresses his class in a 
 sing-song. Last year, in the cholera times, the 
 students resisted the sanitary orders of the police, 
 and some were shot. After lunch we went on an 
 
 expedition to old Cairo with Mr. X , in an 
 
 electric tramcar full of natives. The prix fixe is 
 a great mystery to them, as it is also on the rail- 
 way, where they lose their tempers and sometimes 
 their trains because the clerk will not bargain. 
 There was a disturbance at one point because 
 the guard gave a man rather less change than his 
 due ; one of the company said, " This guard is 
 often short of farthings ; it is a case for the 
 police." Of course Mr. X was our inter- 
 preter ; it is so much more amusing going about 
 with him than with a dragoman, as he tells us 
 what the people say. We saw, amongst other 
 things, a Coptic church, full of beautiful inlaid 
 work in ivory and mother-o'-pearl, and the mosque 
 with 360 pillars of marble and porphyry. The 
 sacristan was a potter, so we went afterwards to 
 see him at work. His pace was four pots in five 
 minutes. On the way back something went wrong 
 with the electrical communication ; a cord caught 
 in one of the wires, so the guard stood on
 
 1 66 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 the roof and poked it with a piece of sugar- 
 cane. 
 
 Friday. Dervishes we saw both the dancing 
 ones and the howling ones. Crowds of people, 
 mostly tourists, were looking on, and it was diffi- 
 cult to think of it as a religious service. The 
 dancers were just like the pictures one sees ; the 
 howlers were more dreadful, as every trace of in- 
 telligence went out of their faces as they rocked 
 themselves backwards and forwards, grunting "La 
 illdha il Allah." At Rhoda Island, where we went 
 to see the ancient Milometer, a little boy, who 
 showed us the precise spot where Moses was found 
 amongst the bulrushes, amused us by giving his 
 own age as two days old. When we showed sur- 
 prise, he raised it to three days. We suggested 
 years, but he said it was all the same. And so 
 it is in Egypt, at least as far as monuments and 
 institutions are concerned. The Greek nurse went 
 out to buy us some helvas (I think that is the 
 word), a somewhat greasy sweetmeat made of 
 butter and sugar in the shape of a Cheshire cheese, 
 and the boy in the shop asking how he should cut 
 it, his father replied with a frown, " As if you were 
 cutting off the head of a Christian." This shows 
 how high feeling runs. I wonder what people who 
 talk about " Egypt for the Egyptians " really mean ! 
 Who are the Egyptians the Turks, or the Arme- 
 nians, or the Greeks, or the Arabs, or the Copts ?
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 167 
 
 We dined with the at the Ghezireh Palace 
 
 Hotel, a beautiful palace built by Ismail for the 
 Empress Eugenie when she came to the opening 
 of the Suez Canal, and in which she slept one 
 night. At another table we saw the most interest- 
 ing sight we have seen yet, Slatin Pacha. After- 
 wards we looked on at the " Petits Chevaux " in the 
 Casino ; no one may stake more than two shillings 
 at a time, but you may bet what you please. 
 
 Wednesday. Lady Cromer's ball, which I am told 
 is the biggest thing in the year. The dancing- 
 room was very full, so I only danced once, and 
 came away very virtuously, like Cinderella, at 
 twelve o'clock. The next event of importance is 
 the Khedive's ball. It is usual for each Consul- 
 General to send in a list of suitable visitors to the 
 Khedive's Secretary. The American list this year 
 was returned with the remark that the Khedive 
 invited only the nobility, to which the Consul 
 replied that all Americans were " kings in their 
 own right," and, when no notice was taken, re- 
 turned his own card. The end of the story is 
 that they have all got their invitations "tout 
 Shepheard." 
 
 Saturday. This morning I went to the bazaars 
 with an American lady who wanted to buy some 
 Zouave jackets. She made a very good bargain 
 with the man, and he said, " You want to buy a 
 camel, an elephant, and you offer me a monkey,
 
 1 68 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 a sparrow ; " finally, he took .4 instead of the 
 -7, i os. he had asked at first. What I like about 
 shopping is the backsheesh. If you buy a hun- 
 dred cigarettes, they give you one to smoke on 
 the spot. Did it ever strike you that of the 
 "Thousand and One Nights," the odd one was 
 backsheesh ? To-night there was a performance of 
 " Our Boys " by English amateurs for the Armenian 
 fund. Of course not a single Turk was present, 
 but the house was quite full. You must excuse 
 the disconnectedness of this letter, as I have been 
 obeying father's commands to keep a diary. I 
 fear it is not a very full one ; in fact, the spirit 
 of the Nile has quite possessed me, and I have 
 adopted for a motto temporarily the word one 
 hears forty times a day, " Mallesch," which means 
 literally " Nothing on it," and practically " Never 
 mind." I am sure the Pyramids have lasted so 
 long because they do not worry. I know, so far, 
 about fifty Arabic words altogether, most of them 
 learnt while driving ; for the coachman shouts all 
 the time, " To the right ; to the left ; open your 
 eye, O woman ; listen, my uncle ; mind your legs, 
 O lady," and the people follow his instructions 
 without looking round. 
 
 2jth. I came upon a passage a few days ago 
 in Gower's Confessio Amantis (book iv.) describing 
 the "happy warrior," which, though not amus-
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 169 
 
 ing in itself for Gower inherited none of his 
 master's literary gifts has a footnote that made 
 me smile : 
 
 " He may not then himselve spare 
 Upon his travail for to serve 
 (Whereof that he may thank deserve) 
 Where as these men of armes be 
 Sometime over the greate sea, 
 And make many hasty rodes," 
 
 and the note remarks, " rodes = raids." 
 
 March isf. I went up to town to see my dentist. 
 By an odd chance Tom was also going to town, 
 and by the same train, and we narrowly escaped 
 meeting on the platform. Tom has a deeply- 
 rooted distaste to travelling with people whom he 
 can meet every day at home ; on the rare occa- 
 sions when he makes a journey he likes to pack as 
 much novelty into the enterprise as possible, and 
 I sympathise with the feeling. If you are a story- 
 teller, and have a chance for an hour of an entirely 
 new audience, it is heart-breaking to have it spoiled 
 by the presence of some one who knows all your 
 paradoxes and anecdotes, and sits bored. So 
 when I saw the dog-cart approaching I retired to 
 the waiting-room till the train came in, and then 
 got into a smoking-carriage. I came back by an 
 early train. Paddington was full of Eton boys, it 
 being St. David's Day. Though the pavements in 
 town were absolutely dry, I remarked that every 
 young gentleman had his trousers tucked up some
 
 1 70 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 three inches. I must tell our yokels this, as they 
 like to be in the fashion on Sunday. They have 
 already discarded the walking-cane in deference to 
 Oxford opinion. 
 
 I have heard in a roundabout way that Tom 
 went to town to have his photograph taken. I 
 am more than ever pleased we did not meet, as he 
 has always expressed himself in good set terms 
 against the vanity of being photographed, and I 
 should not have liked to make him blush. I 
 wonder how he stood the ordeal. Perhaps \ve 
 shall hear ; for if you have broken away from a 
 principle there is nothing like making a complete 
 volte-face and ignoring your old position. What is 
 the explanation of the something ridiculous that 
 attaches to the photographer's art ? No one feels 
 absurd in sitting to a painter. Is it the under- 
 breeding of the presiding genius that gives one 
 shame his airs and graces, his injunctions to 
 " look pleasant," or " moisten the lips," or " let 
 the light flash in the eye," his twisting of one's 
 elbow and spreading of one's fingers ? I am in- 
 clined to think it is not altogether this, for even a 
 Royal Academician must pose you ; nor, again, is 
 it the mere interposition of the mechanical camera, 
 but rather the fact that everything depends upon 
 the expression of a moment ; and the attempt to 
 choose a decent expression and maintain it on 
 one's face, even for ten or twenty seconds, is
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 171 
 
 disgusting. And then, too, the production of so 
 many copies has the same banal effect as the 
 hackneying of a phrase ; so that a photograph 
 is fitly styled a " counterfeit presentment." 
 
 2nd. Mr. Birrell in one of his essays mentions 
 the rareness of the works of our Berkshire laureate 
 Pye. If he does not possess the " Summary of 
 the Duties of a Justice of the Peace out of Sessions," 
 I should like the opportunity of presenting him 
 with it. It has a few poetical entries, e.g., " Carrots, 
 see Turnips." And this under Settlements : " It 
 would be unpardonable in me not to cite an 
 authority on this case, reported in rhyme - I 
 believe the only one in the books : 
 
 " A woman having settlement 
 
 Married a man with none ; 
 The question was, he being dead, 
 
 If that she had was gone? 
 Quoth Sir John Pratt, ' Her settlement 
 
 Suspended did remain 
 Living the husband but him dead 
 
 It doth revive again.' 
 
 Chorus of Puisne Judges. 
 ' Living the husband but him dead 
 
 It doth revive again.'" 
 
 Under the article " Pawning " comes this anec- 
 dote : " A soldier in the Guards came to me in 
 Queen's Square to swear to his having lost his 
 duplicate. I looked at the affidavit to see if it 
 were military accoutrements, &c., that he had 
 pawned, when to my surprise I found that he had
 
 172 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 pawned a 2 bank-note for IDS. 6d. On asking 
 an explanation of this odd circumstance, he said 
 he received the 2 note, and was resolved to pass 
 a jolly evening, but not to spend more than half 
 a guinea ; and to ensure this he pawned the note 
 for that sum, and destroyed the duplicate after- 
 wards, that he might not be able to raise the money 
 on it in case his resolution should give way while 
 he was drinking with his companions." 
 
 Let me note here a curious specimen of old- 
 fashioned law jargon from one of the year-books : 
 " Richardson Ch.Just. de C.B. al assizes at Salis- 
 bury in summer 1631 fuit assault per prisoner la 
 condemne pur felony que puis son condemnation 
 ject un brickbat a le dit Justice que narrowly mist 
 & per ceo immediately fuit indictment drawn per 
 Noy envers le prisoner & son dexter manus ampute 
 & fix al gibbet sur que luy mesme immediatement 
 hange in presence de Court." 
 
 3rd. Yesterday's storm is still raging, a remark- 
 able event on Ash Wednesday ; Nature on that day 
 doing her best as a rule to make Lent ridiculous 
 by a prodigality of sunshine. The poets who 
 speak of learning lessons from Nature, ought to 
 warn us to pick and choose very carefully. 
 Matthew Arnold in his " Discourses in America," 
 having to praise Emerson, quoted with approval 
 the following sentence : " Nature does not like our 
 benevolence or our learning much better than she
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 173 
 
 likes our frauds and wars. When we come out of 
 the caucus, or the bank, or the Abolition Conven- 
 tion, or the temperance meeting, or the Transcen- 
 dental Club into the fields and woods, she says 
 to us, ' So hot, my little sir ! " It must have been 
 the list of monstrous illustrations, rather than 
 benevolence and learning, that Matthew Arnold 
 joined in condemning, for he has supplied the 
 antidote to all such silly twaddle about conformity 
 with Nature in his own sonnet, which begins, " ' In 
 harmony with nature ? ' Restless fool," and contains 
 the fine lines : 
 
 " Know, man hath all which Nature hath, but more, 
 And in that more lie all his hopes of good." 
 
 I suppose when Wordsworth wrote the well- 
 known verse in the " Tables Turned " 
 
 " One impulse from a vernal wood 
 
 May teach you more of man, 
 Of moral evil and of good 
 Than all the sages can " 
 
 he had in mind the impulse to aspiration, as in his 
 poem about the Rainbow, " My heart leaps up," 
 &c. But other impulses are not unknown in 
 vernal woods, bird's-nesting, for instance. Cer- 
 tainly Eve's impulse from the famous apple-tree in 
 the perpetual spring of Paradise, taught her more 
 " of moral evil and of good " than her sage husband 
 knew before, and according to South, "Aristotle 
 was but the rubbish of an Adam." The only
 
 174 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 .creatures that seem to enjoy the gale are the rooks, 
 .who make head against it for the pleasure of sailing 
 back again. 
 
 Sth. Sophia seems to have taken an extraordinary 
 fancy to Mrs. Vicar, who is certainly as sprightly 
 as her sposo is the reverse. I overheard S. explain- 
 ing, as we walked through the glasshouses to-day, 
 that it was by a mere accident that my vines were 
 not at the vicarage. I wish she would not wear 
 her heart so very prominently on her sleeve before 
 newcomers. " These violent delights have violent 
 ends," and the time of grapes is not yet. Probably 
 she has taken so decided an attachment because 
 there is a slight coolness between her and my 
 sister - in - law, whose personal motto is, " Dixi, 
 custodiam," and who is apt to take into her custody 
 things beyond her proper province. And it is a 
 rule of the game in country villages not to be " out " 
 with everybody at once, or there could be no gossip. 
 
 io//z. Another letter has come from Eugenia in 
 Cairo, from which I make a few detached extracts : 
 
 A curious misunderstanding occurred on one of 
 our first days at dinner. I admired the dress of 
 the footmen, who were waiting, and asked if it be- 
 longed to the occupation. My host replied, " Oh, 
 no, they have always worn it." I found that he 
 had taken " occupation " in its technical sense for 
 the English occupation. Since then I am always 
 hearing the word so used, and now, even if it comes
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 175 
 
 iii a book, it seems to jump out at me. In the 
 " Tempest " to-day for I still read my daily 
 Shakespeare lection Gonzalo says that in his ideal 
 " Commonwealth" there should be "no occupation; 
 all men idle, all." How many Turkish pashas wish 
 the same ! l Another phrase one is always hearing 
 is Shughl Inglizi, which means " English work," 
 or, as we should say, "just like an Englishman." 
 It might be paraphrased by a phrase of Louis 
 Stevenson's, " quite mad, but wonderfully decent." 
 It is very comforting to find we have still left some- 
 thing of our old national reputation for honour. 
 In the bazaar the other day, I protested I had spent 
 all my money ; but the Hindoo replied, " Take the 
 things, and send me a cheque next year." I said, 
 "Would you say that to a Greek?" He smiled 
 and said, " You also, then, have had business with 
 Greeks." 5 Our pasha, who is a great friend to the 
 occupation, told us of a man who had some busi- 
 ness to arrange between here and Constantinople. 
 
 1 To cap Eugenia's quotation, the French may remember with satis- 
 faction the phrase in " Henry IV." : "As odious as the word occufy, 
 which was an excellent good word before it was ill-sorted." 
 
 2 How different is this from the old Athenian character : 
 
 r6 -y' etf<re/3j 
 /JLOVOIS Tap' vfjuv 7]Spov 
 Kal TovirieiK& Kal rb /XT? 
 
 [Among you above all other men I have found religion and a temper of 
 fairness and a habit of speaking the truth. ] The Greeks in Egypt are 
 among other things village usurers, and sell all the drink and hasheesh. 
 It is considered a good sign that, according to the latest census, they 
 are not increasing. One wishes they would all emigrate to Crete !
 
 176 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Here it took him, to his amazement, only five days, 
 and did not cost a penny ; whereas, at the other 
 end, he had spent three months and 200 besides 
 in baksheesh to oil the machine. One hears plenty 
 of stories concerning our national want of tact. 
 A young soldier is said to have remarked to the 
 Consul-General for Austria-Hungary, " Hungary 
 isn't much of a place, is it ? " and then, by way of 
 plastering the sore, " I suppose Austria is better." 
 Another young Englishman, who was in the street 
 police, arrested the coachman of a Consul-General 
 for not moving au ay from the front of Shepheard's 
 Hotel when another carriage drove up (which, as 
 you know, is the rule for ordinary folks), and had 
 to be dismissed to a higher post in another depart- 
 ment. I fear, therefore, that we are thought to be 
 honest because we are not clever enough to be 
 anything else ; and the explanation of any voluntary 
 surrender of profit or reputation is that stupidity 
 in that case has risen to mania. A typical instance 
 of Shughl Inglizt was Sir Colin Scott Moncrieff's 
 finding out Moughil Bey, the engineer who hadn't 
 succeeded with the Barrage, and making the Gov- 
 ernment give him a pension. . . . 
 
 The pasha told us to-day a story of a judgment 
 he gave, which reminded me of the Cadis in the 
 "Arabian Nights." He had imported an English 
 coachman and groom, and these did not agree 
 with the Moslem servants, who complained that
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 177 
 
 the Englishmen cursed their religion. " In what 
 language did they curse ? " " In Arabic." " How 
 long have they been here ? " " Six months." 
 " Have they had lessons in Arabic ? " " No." 
 " Then they learned the phrase from you. I will 
 tell them to curse you in English." " But we 
 don't want to be cursed at all." " Then why do 
 you curse them ? " And so, having extracted a 
 promise from each party to abstain from curses, 
 he dismissed them. . . . 
 
 One must not expect too much from Orientals. 
 In the East, as you will have noticed, the sheep 
 and the goats are very much alike. 
 
 i$th. I went to Cherry Orchard to get some 
 wild daffodils to take with me to town, " in their 
 yellow petticoat and green gown." Everything 
 about daffodils is interesting. The name is one 
 of the prettiest corruptions possible ; it ought to 
 be " affodil," as it comes through the French from 
 " asphodel " ; but the parasitic d is a great im- 
 provement. For some time both forms were in 
 use, affodil for what we now call " asphodel " or 
 " king's spear," and " daffodil " for the narcissus. 
 The poets have liked both the word and the 
 flower. Amongst their encomiums, Autolycus's 
 song and Perdita's few lines 
 
 " Daffodils 
 
 That come before the swallow dares, and take 
 The winds of March with beauty "- 
 
 If
 
 1 7$ PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 have never been equalled. I wonder how many 
 of the people who have quoted this lately know 
 what " take " means ! Herrick's popular verses 
 are a puzzle. Why does he say " we weep to see 
 you haste away so soon " ? The daffodil does not 
 haste away before noon, and if it did, nobody, not 
 even Rousseau, would drop the tear of sensibility. 
 As usual, when there is a difficulty the oracles are 
 dumb. Popular plant names were very vaguely 
 and loosely applied in old days, and Herrick may 
 have meant some other plant. Wordsworth's 
 poem on the daffodils he saw dancing on the 
 margin of Ullswater belong to his poetical prime. 
 They were written in 1804, the same year as 
 "The Affliction of Margaret," and "She was a 
 Phantom of Delight." The most Wordsworthian 
 lines in it, however 
 
 " They flash upon that inward eye 
 Which is the bliss of solitude " 
 
 were contributed by the poet's wife ; and his sister 
 celebrated the scene in a bit of prose no less 
 beautiful : " They grew among the mossy stones : 
 some rested their heads on these stones as on a 
 pillow, the rest tossed and reeled and danced, and 
 seemed as if they verily laughed with the wind, 
 they looked so gay and glancing." I wonder how 
 Tennyson came to think it legitimate to speak of 
 March as a " roaring moon of daffodil and crocus ; " 
 probably he liked the sound of the broad vowels,
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 179 
 
 and people quote it as a fine phrase instead of one 
 of his failures. 
 
 i5//r. Dentist. Then I took an omnibus down 
 Oxford Street, and through the zeal of the authori- 
 ties in repairing the asphalt we were compelled 
 to make a detour, so that I was deposited at the 
 very door of my destination, the British Museum, 
 for which, considering the rain, I was grateful. 
 It was what some people call an " almost provi- 
 dential " circumstance. I was much interested to 
 notice on my way to the MSS. room how many 
 people of the shabbier classes were reading the 
 autograph letters of celebrated people exhibited in 
 the show-cases. The spring fashions in the bonnet 
 shops are very wonderful. One never sees men 
 looking into hat shops our peculiar vanity is boots. 
 
 20th. I suppose the hunting season may be 
 supposed at an end now, as the barber did not 
 trim my eyebrows this morning. I noticed also 
 
 the first adder sunning himself by copse. 
 
 Larch rhymes with March, and the poets have 
 noted the fact ; but the larch is not careful, as a 
 rule, to bud in March in our prosy gardens. 
 There was, however, a rosy plumelet some ten 
 days ago on the old tree at the bottom of the 
 orchard, and to-day it is covered with them, 
 thanks to the mild weather, and each streamer 
 looks like a fibre of sea-weed stuck over with 
 diminutive sea-anemones. But meanwhile the
 
 l8o PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 " peck of March dust worth a king's ransom " has 
 not arrived, and the sowers are beginning to 
 despair. I read " The Thackerays in India," an 
 interesting account of many civil and military 
 servants of John Company. Sir W. W. Hunter 
 is an accomplished penman, with perhaps just a 
 thought too much style and sentiment, so that 
 he occasionally drops such a flower of pathos as 
 the following : " On the first anniversary of his 
 death she followed him to her own grave " (p. 177). 
 
 April 2nd. Yesterday the lawn was mown for 
 the first time this year. There is no such delight- 
 ful smell as that of fresh grass. To-day the ivy 
 has been cut on the house front, and the perfume 
 is as eminently disgusting. I had shut myself up 
 in the library with a book-catalogue, but was 
 driven forth by Brown's putting his hook through 
 a pane of glass and letting in the poison. So I 
 went bouquinant in earnest. 
 
 My friend the bookseller at told me an 
 
 amusing story about public spirit as it is under- 
 stood by provincial ladies. The widow of a 
 clergyman had sent for him to inspect her late 
 husband's library. She wished it divided into two 
 parts ; the books of any value she would sell, the 
 rest she would present to the free library. He 
 showed me one of the books he had bought an 
 unopened copy of " Horace Walpole's Letters," the 
 nine-volume edition. I had known the husband ;
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY l8l 
 
 his conversation was far from lively, and for all 
 those years he had dwelt by the side of this foun- 
 tain of wit without tasting. 
 
 yd. Bob came to luncheon before departing 
 on his first reading-party. He told me the only 
 amusing contribution made by the undergraduates 
 to the Nansen honorary degree festivity was the 
 cry, " What, no soap ! " I wonder if it was ex- 
 plained to the hero that the phrase is classical, 
 and what he thought of the marvellous piece of 
 improvisation from which it comes. Bob produced 
 also some new nonsense verses. I have a great 
 fondness for the Lear type of nonsense verse. One 
 of the best I know is a little old-fashioned now, 
 but it deserves recording : 
 
 " There was a young girl called Amanda, 
 Whose novels were thoroughly fin-de- 
 Sftcle, but I deem 
 'Twas her journal intime 
 That drove her papa to Uganda." 
 
 I say that to myself on fast-days, and I add this 
 sentence from Renan by way of Antiphon : " The 
 man who has time to keep a private diary has 
 never understood the immensity of the universe " 
 (Feuilles Detachers, 359). What interested me most 
 in Bob's budget was the piece of news that the 
 Magdalen authorities propose erecting a memorial 
 chapel to Gibbon which is to eclipse the Shelley 
 pantheon at University College opposite. There
 
 1 82 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 would seem from his story to have been consider- 
 able difference of opinion as to the form the 
 memorial should take. Some of the more old- 
 fashioned members of the committee advocated the 
 classical tradition that a hero should be represented 
 in his habit as he died (cf. the Dying Gladiator, all 
 the St. Sebastians, &c.), especially as the University 
 College people had put up a drowned Shelley. 
 But a reference to the Biographical Dictionary 
 showing that Gibbon had died of dropsy, their 
 idea was overruled. The next suggestion was that 
 the monument should be allegorical : Gibbon 
 should be figured in Roman armour the lorica, 
 it was thought, would be excellently fitted to his 
 somewhat gibbous person and by a general slack- 
 ness, or an appearance of unstable equilibrium, the 
 statue might be made to indicate that it represented 
 the historian of the Empire in its decline. An 
 alternative proposal was that a model of the ruined 
 Temple of Concord should be erected in the meadow 
 encircled by Addison's Walk, in which should be 
 placed a sitting statue of Gibbon at the moment 
 when the idea of his great book occurred to him. 1 
 On every i5th October which would naturally 
 be the first day of term the choir might go in 
 procession round it to represent the friars, and if 
 
 1 "It was at Rome, on the I5th of October 1764, as I sat musing 
 amidst the ruins of the Capitol, while the barefooted fryars were saying 
 vespers in the Temple of Jupiter, that the idea of writing the decline 
 and fall of the city started to my mind." (Autobiography.)
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 183 
 
 thought advisable a little judicious clockwork might 
 be introduced to help the illusion. Bob had not 
 heard whether any decision had as yet been taken 
 upon these various proposals. 
 
 5/A.- The Diamond Jubilee Procession looms 
 bigger than ever now that Parliament has risen, 
 and all nature seems to have become infected. 
 The hedgerow elms, the scarlet and yellow tulips 
 along the garden walks, the park palings, all seem 
 in procession. Where one used to meet one timber 
 waggon or traction-engine one seems now to meet 
 half-a-dozen. And the processions of sheep are 
 endless ! These last are like a nightmare. The 
 first surprise at meeting your bicycle carries about 
 a third of them past at a gallop. Then the leading 
 dowagers forget you, and look over the hedge as 
 though they were not the procession but the spec- 
 tators ; and if it were not for the sheep-dog you 
 would be crushed into mutton by the block. 
 
 Having escaped this fate to-day I got safe to ', 
 
 where I met a circus procession. It was exhibiting 
 a masque of English queens, such of them at least 
 as fall within the popular purview. There was 
 Queen Elizabeth and Mary of Scots, and Queen 
 Anne, and, high on a throne of royal state which 
 far outshone the wealth of Ormuz and of Ind, her 
 present gracious Majesty. The height served not 
 only to enhance the dignity, but to get over the 
 difficulty of the likeness.
 
 184 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 6th. In town to-day I was introduced to a 
 very intelligent young French anthropologist, who 
 is at work upon our manners and customs ; he 
 very good-naturedly showed me some proof-sheets 
 of one of his chapters. The English, he considers, 
 lack the genius for ceremonial, and are always 
 trying to invest what ceremonial habits they in- 
 herit with a utilitarian meaning. He illustrated 
 from washing, which as originally practised was 
 purely ceremonial. This primitive use is still re- 
 tained in baptism, though not without protest 
 from a section even of the religious world (there 
 followed here an account of the " Gotham " 
 (? Gorham) controversy, and of the sect who insist 
 on deferring baptism till it can be combined with 
 a swimming lesson). Relics of the old ceremonial 
 feeling he discovers in the phrase " to perform 
 ablutions," which is a newspaper synonym for 
 washing ; in the Order of the Bath ; and in the 
 thence derived point of honour among English 
 gentlemen to bathe ; but he regards the frequency 
 of this bathing as entirely due to the modern 
 worship of Hygeia, and points to the annual 
 dipping at Margate, still traditional among the 
 lower classes, as a genuine survival from the more 
 general practice. He notices incidentally as points 
 elucidating his contention, that the theatre of so 
 many affairs of honour in the last century was 
 Cold Bath Fields, and that the sedans in which
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 185 
 
 persons of quality used to be drawn to their 
 annual immersion are still known as Bath-chairs, 
 though they are now used only for invalids. 
 
 In Chelsea I came across a remarkable hand- 
 bill, which I transcribe as a "document" for the 
 historian of nineteenth-century morals : 
 
 NIGHT TOURS THROUGH WHITECHAPEL AND 
 DARKEST LONDON. 
 
 The West End Agency, in organising these tours through 
 Whitechapel and the East End, has been careful to select men 
 of well-known character and experience to conduct them, and 
 under their guidance no danger need be apprehended if their 
 advice is followed. 
 
 The party starts from the Agency's Offices at 8.30 P.M. and 
 returns by 12 P.M. 
 
 The charges are One Guinea each, or for a party of five, Four 
 Guineas. The party is limited to five in number. 
 
 Two clear days' notice is required of an intended visit, to 
 avoid disappointment, and the fee must be paid on booking the 
 tour. 
 
 Tall hats must not be worn. 
 
 Ladies who wish to see this neighbourhood can be conducted 
 round in the day, but under no circumstances by night. 
 
 The places visited are varied the resorts of the poorest of 
 the poor and in no city in the world can such sights be seen. 
 
 gift. I called at the vicarage to take my good 
 friend for a walk. We talked chiefly of Jowett, 
 whose Life has just appeared, and the vicar pro- 
 mised to lend it me. He mentioned that he had 
 at length summoned courage to dismiss his prede- 
 cessor's "odd man," and taken a young fellow 
 who showed at present more taste for gardening 
 than stable-work. Returning from a few days'
 
 1 86 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 visit, he found a mushroom-bed in one of the 
 stalls, and the coach-house doors quite blocked 
 by a nursery of young cabbage plants. The odd 
 man is a curious study : vicars may come and go, 
 but as a rule he goes on for ever, getting crustier 
 and crustier with age. If the parson stops many 
 years in the same living, and the odd man stops 
 with him, they grow to resemble each other. 
 There may be some art in the process, but there 
 is more nature. The odd man shaves or shapes 
 his beard like his master, and acquires his ex- 
 pressions ; but he also acquires his expression, 
 his gait, his manner ; and not only so, but his very 
 features seem to reshape themselves to the parson's 
 type, so that the odd man might often pass for a poor 
 relation. Such growing likenesses are, of course, 
 matters of common experience in people who live 
 much together in husbands and wives, for ex- 
 ample. My own father and mother, when they 
 travelled, were constantly taken for brother and 
 sister : so that one need not be surprised that 
 Abraham, from the longer life of patriarchs then, 
 found it very easy to assume that relationship with 
 Sarah when he visited Abimelech. One sees the 
 same thing in young people : schoolboys catch 
 more from their schoolmasters than their hand- 
 writing : and Eugenia used to astound .us by the 
 rapidity with which she became the " model " of 
 the reigning nurse. But the odd man's resem-
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 187 
 
 blance to his master is an odder case than any 
 of these. A mere creation of art is much less 
 interesting.' My barber, for instance, by virtue 
 of an orange-tawny beard cut into a particular 
 shape, has made himself a recognisable caricature 
 of the Lord- Lieutenant ; but the best specimen 
 of the art-product I ever saw was in Sheffield, 
 when I paid a visit years ago to Mr. Ruskin's 
 museum at its old home. Inside the door I found 
 a middle-aged man on a low stool no, it was not 
 Mr. Ruskin, but the generally neglige style of hair 
 and dress was a very careful study after his 
 pattern, and many of the superficial tricks of 
 manner had been successfully caught. This worthy 
 was sitting with the " Seven Lamps of Archi- 
 tecture " on his knees, following the lines with his 
 finger, like the blind beggars who read the Bible 
 at the corners of the streets to be seen of men. 
 He looked up at me presently, by an apparent 
 effort disengaging his attention from the book, 
 and asked what I should like to see for nothing 
 was exposed to the casual eye^and I suggested 
 missals. " Are you interested," said he, " in the 
 subject-matter of them, or only in the decora- 
 tion ? " I thought that an excellent parody of not 
 a little that Mr. Ruskin has written about Art. 
 
 19/7*. The first brood of thrushes fledged in 
 the garden. Yesterday, coming out of church, I 
 overheard a lady remark to her neighbour about
 
 1 88 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 the Easter decorations : " How very appropriate 
 all these primroses are to Lord Beaconsfield ! " It 
 recalled another naive saying that fell in my hear- 
 ing from the wife of an M.P., who, on going to 
 church one Sunday morning during a visit to their 
 borough for speech-making purposes, and rinding 
 it fairly full, exclaimed : " I declare they are giving 
 us quite an ovation." Such is the dignity of 
 statesmanship in a democracy. Is it not some- 
 what sinister that of all the Prime Ministers of 
 the Queen's reign it should be the most un- 
 English who is thus honoured with an annual 
 commemoration ; that the inventor of household 
 suffrage should be accounted the champion of the 
 Conservative cause ; and the most flamboyant of 
 personages be symbolised by the simple prim- 
 rose ? It is the most mysterious of cults, and 
 perhaps serves the useful purpose of keeping one 
 from taking party politics too seriously. Of course, 
 Mr. Greenwood may be right, and Lord Beacons- 
 field be an entirely misunderstood genius in politics 
 as in letters. " I write in irony," he is said to 
 have sighed, " and they call it bombast ; " so his 
 politics, too, may have been ironical. Turning 
 over the leaves of that remarkably clever day-book 
 of Mr. Bowyer Nichols's, which, by a quip upon 
 Hesiod, he has called " Words and Days," I find 
 Primrose Day commemorated in the most appro- 
 priately ambiguous manner. There is a quotation
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 189 
 
 from " Lothair," the only reference, I believe, to 
 primroses in any of the novels : 
 
 " ' These are for you, dear uncle,' said Clare Arundel, as she 
 gave him a rich cluster of violets ; 'just now the woods are 
 more fragrant than the gardens, and these are the produce of 
 our morning walk. I could have brought you some primroses, 
 but I do not like to mix violets with anything.' 
 
 " ' They say primroses make a capital salad,' said Lord St. 
 Jerome." 
 
 And this is followed by the very apposite lines 
 from " Peter Bell " : 
 
 " A primrose by the river's brim 
 A yellow primrose was to him, 
 And it was nothing more." 
 
 The story is told I know not on what authority 
 that the Queen, when she called the primrose 
 " his favourite flower," meant not Lord B.'s, but 
 Prince Albert's. If so, it would be but one 
 absurdity the more. Has any Wordsworthian 
 commentator analysed the attitude of Peter Bell 
 in regard to primroses ? If a primrose was a 
 primrose to him, he must at least have taken note 
 of it : primroses must have existed, so to say, in 
 his world. For logicians are emphatic in assert- 
 ing that no man ever yet made an identical 
 proposition. To say A is A (e.g. a primrose is a 
 primrose) means far more than it seems to mean. 
 There must be more in the predicate than in the 
 subject, or the statement would not be worth 
 making. And Mr. Bell went even further than
 
 190 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 this ; he gave evidence of a definite, though not 
 very exact, eye for colour. In short, there seems 
 reason for regarding him as a misunderstood 
 person, and in this respect also he sorts well with 
 Lord Beaconsfield. Miss May Kendall, in her 
 poem " Education's Martyr," has shown us what 
 depths of inappreciation, far below Bell's, there 
 may be in this matter of primroses : 
 
 " Primroses by the river's brim, 
 Dicotyledons were to him, 
 
 And they were nothing more." 
 
 Shakespeare, who lived before aestheticism, seems 
 to have considered the primrose an anaemic flower. 
 See "Winter's Tale," iv. 4, 125. 
 
 2o///. I dined with , who invited me to 
 
 meet a few literary people come from town for 
 Easter, to see a primrose and hear the nightingale. 
 There was much talk about books. I happened 
 to say of Gibbon's style that he had a re- 
 markable fondness for concluding sentences with 
 a genitive case, when my vis-a-vis turned very 
 red and addressed the company as follows : " I 
 made that remark twenty years ago, and " (with 
 a glare at me) " I have made it in print ; and " 
 (with a bow) " I am delighted to have my obser- 
 vation confirmed by so much more distinguished 
 a person." I fear this was the expression of a 
 pungent irony, as I am not distinguished, and the 
 speaker did not even know my name. Perhaps I
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 191 
 
 showed annoyance, for our host hastened to 
 interpose: "The remark was made long ago by 
 Rogers." I took this at the time for a gentle 
 Virgilian dust-throwing : " Hi motus animarum," 
 &c. But on turning up the " Table Talk " I find 
 this passage : 
 
 "It is well known that Fox visited Gibbon at Lausanne ; and 
 he was much gratified by the visit. Gibbon, he said, talked a 
 great deal, walking up and down the room, and generally ending 
 his sentences with a genitive case ; every now and then, too, 
 casting a look of complacency on his own portrait by Sir Joshua 
 Reynolds, which hung over the chimney-piece, that wonderful 
 portrait in which, while the oddness and vulgarity of the features 
 are refined away, the likeness is perfectly preserved" (p. 77). 
 
 Presently the talk fell upon Shakespeare's son- 
 nets, and one of the company defended Malone's 
 theory that the famous line 
 
 " A man in hue, all hues in his controlling," 
 
 must refer to a person called Hughes, and could 
 not otherwise be paraphrased. I ventured to 
 suggest that the imagined difficulty came from 
 taking " controlling " as a verbal noun governed 
 by in, instead of a participle agreeing with man ; 
 supply " hue " after " his," and the sense becomes 
 that the young gentleman's beauty controlled 
 the complexion of all who were in his presence, 
 making them blush, turn pale, &c. 
 
 The discussion continued for some time, and 
 found no end, in wandering mazes lost.
 
 192 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 2 ist. From the hollow imitations of the school- 
 children on every side I have no doubt that the 
 voice of the cuckoo has been heard in our land ; 
 and Sophia tells me she heard it yesterday. Riding 
 home last night with Eugenia I had reached the 
 
 top of Hill about seven o'clock, when from 
 
 the bushes on my right came two or three faint 
 notes faint, but unmistakably the nightingale's. 
 " Listen, Eugenia," I cried, but the notes were not 
 repeated. We have it on pseudo- Chaucerian 
 authority, supported by a long tradition, that it 
 is fortunate in love to hear the nightingale before 
 the cuckoo. 
 
 " And as I lay this other night waking 
 I thought how lovers had a tokening, 
 And among them it was a common tale 
 That it were good to hear the nightingale 
 Rather l than the lewde cuckoo sing." 
 
 But if, as in this case, the lover hear the nightin- 
 gale first and his lady the cuckoo, how then ? 
 Pseudo-Chaucer being dead, I must consult Pro- 
 fessor Skeat, who is supposed to inherit something 
 of his spirit. One cannot be thankful enough that 
 the cuckoo has in these last days purged himself 
 of his old Tudor associations. Perhaps Words- 
 worth attempted to carry the whitewashing a little 
 far ; a Berkshire poet comes nearer the mark with 
 the epithet " ribald." For the cuckoo is not a 
 
 1 i.e. earlier.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 193 
 
 nice character ; he always reminds me of Lord 
 Byron bearing about ostentatiously the pageant of 
 his bleeding heart, filling the air with clamorous 
 self-pity, and occasionally dropping an egg into 
 some one else's nest. 
 
 I went into school to hear the "general intelli- 
 gence " lesson. Our master has a great idea of 
 culture, and gives out questions on Monday in 
 each week for the children to cut their wisdom 
 teeth upon ; on Thursday he hears what informa- 
 tion they have gathered. Some of the questions 
 I have, on chance visits, seen written up on the 
 black-board have made me smile : Who is Grant 
 Allen ? who is Hall Caine ? Others have made 
 me weep : What is optimism ? what is pessimism ? 
 This week the questions were not so far-fetched. 
 We had an explanation of Eboracum, and were 
 told that the other archbishop signed his name 
 E. Cantab. ; we learned that Sir Henry Irving was 
 the greatest living actor, and Marie Corelli the 
 greatest living novelist ; that Lord Coleridge was 
 
 the present Chief-Justice, and Mr. a great 
 
 "educationist." We heard, too, about Stone- 
 henge and the White Horse, and what an M.P. 
 is, and a Bart, (we keep a Bart, a few parishes 
 off), and what the vicar wears round his neck in 
 church, and how much her Majesty has a year 
 to live on. Our schoolmaster is a perfect mine 
 of information, conveyed in sesquipedalian words. 
 
 N
 
 194 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Tom has a story that he went into school one day 
 at the Scripture hour, and heard the question put, 
 " What are the divisions in the Litany ? " To 
 which a baby of six gave this spirited answer : 
 " Invocations, convocations, comprecations, im- 
 precations, and execrations." Tom would not 
 swear to the ipsissima verba, but that was the 
 general impression. 
 
 May is/. " I come to her and cry ' mum,' she 
 cries ' budget,' and by that we know one another." 
 A good many of us accost the Exchequer in the 
 simple and hopeful temper of Master Slender, but 
 not unfrequently that lady's " budget " does us as 
 little good as sweet Anne Page's did him. This 
 year, however, the Chancellor has really thought it 
 worth while to pay us poor country folks a little 
 attention. It is at last admitted on behalf of 
 Government that we have as much right to letters 
 and telegrams as people in town, and Jubilee Day 
 is to inaugurate our new citizenship. People who 
 are accustomed to the business-like promptitude 
 of the young men and maidens in town offices 
 have little idea of the casual way in which things 
 are managed with us. A month or two since, 
 having to register a letter containing a small 
 present for the golden wedding of an old friend, 
 which had reached me too late for our own 
 despatch, I drove to a village on the. railway where 
 the mails leave two hours later. The following
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 195 
 
 dialogue ensued : Postmaster : " Do you know 
 how old I am ? " I : " No ; are you seventy- 
 five ? " P. : " Seventy-five ! I'm as old as Mr. 
 Gladstone. Don't look it, don't I ? No, I mayn't 
 look it, but I am. I've been postmaster here for 
 fifty year and more. Yes, I ain't so young as I 
 have a-been. Good day, sir." I : " But I want 
 a letter registered." P. : " Registered ! Well, I 
 hardly know. You see, I'm an old man now. Oh 
 yes, I've registered 'em in my day ; but I don't 
 somehow like the responsibility. No, I don't feel 
 as if at my age I ought to take the responsibility. 
 You see, I've been postmaster here, man and boy, 
 for " &c. &c. One sympathised with the old 
 man's sense of irresponsibility, which certainly 
 suited with his age and Mr. Gladstone's but what 
 was to be done with the letter ? In the end I had 
 to take it home again. The promised reduction 
 in porterage on telegrams will be welcome. 
 Thoughtless friends make this a considerable item 
 in the year's finance. Just lately I asked a man 
 down to take pot-luck for the week-end. " Don't 
 trouble to answer," I said, " but come if you can." 
 But his manners would not consent to this. Back 
 came a telegram : " Delighted to come " (porterage, 
 two shillings). In another hour came a second: "So 
 sorry ; detained by important business " (porterage, 
 two shillings). In another hour a third: "Can 
 come after all " (porterage, two shillings).
 
 196 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 2nd. By sitting in shelter on the south side of 
 the house it is possible to give a guess to-day at 
 what spring was meant to be, but hardly ever is. 
 The sun is lighting up the fresh green of the trees 
 and grass : 
 
 " No white nor red was ever seen 
 So amorous as this lovely green." 
 
 And the birds are singing after their kind. There 
 is a spirit of youth in everything, and in the very 
 air 
 
 " Aetherium sensum atque aurai simplicis ignem." 
 
 Be tempted to go round a corner, and the north- 
 east cuts like a knife ; but be content not to do so, 
 and you may exclaim with the poet : 
 
 "It were a most delightful thing 
 To live in a perpetual spring." 
 
 The Elizabethan writer of this charming couplet, 
 who, to use a vile phrase, " remains anonymous," 
 was not brought up, as I was, on the " Looking- 
 Glass of the Mind " a series of highly-didactic 
 stories borrowed from the French of Armand 
 Berquin, and adorned with sculptures by John 
 Bewick or he would have known better. For 
 there is a tale in that volume entitled " The 
 Absurdity of Young People's Wishes Exposed," 
 telling how Master Tommy exclaimed one day, 
 when taking the air with his father, " Oh, that it were
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 197 
 
 always spring ! " and was at once desired to write 
 that wish in his pocket-book. It chanced that when 
 summer came, Thomas and his parent were abroad 
 again in each other's company on one of the bright 
 days that diversify an English summer. " Oh," 
 cried Thomas, " that it were always summer ! " 
 " Write that wish, my dear boy," said his father, 
 " in your pocket-book." The same circumstances 
 recurred in both autumn and winter, the same 
 wish that the present might last, and the same 
 direction to make a note of it. And then the 
 absurdity of young people's wishes was exposed. 
 One does not know which to admire more the 
 far-sightedness and long memory of the parent, or 
 the tidy habits of the son, who kept the same 
 pocket-book going through four seasons. It was 
 the latter fact that almost drove my infant mind 
 into scepticism, and perhaps might have done so 
 had I not liked to admire the piety of the child 
 who would not spoil his parent's bon mot by stop- 
 ping his exclamations with autumn. 
 
 Our nightingales have been more numerous and 
 in better voice this spring than I ever remember 
 them ; probably they have liked the sun and not 
 disliked the wind. It has been a pleasant object 
 for an evening's walk to go from concert-brake 
 to concert-brake for each bird keeps his own 
 station and compare their voices ; for they differ 
 not unlike human singers and poets, one excelling
 
 198 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 in art, another in natural gifts, another in tender- 
 ness. By day, unless heard at a distance, their 
 music has too much " execution," even something 
 of the stridency of a mechanical pianoforte. Be- 
 sides nightingale and blackbird, the chaffinch has 
 been almost the only songster. The thrush seems 
 to be growing rarer, and we have no linnets or 
 goldfinches. Bullfinches there are in abundance ; 
 and if they could pipe, they might be tolerated ; 
 but then you must sacrifice your gooseberries. 
 Hazlitt once described in The Liberal a visit he paid 
 to Coleridge in 1798, in the course of which he 
 says : " I got into a metaphysical argument with 
 Wordsworth, while Coleridge was explaining the 
 different notes of the nightingale to his sister, in 
 which we neither of us succeeded in making our- 
 selves perfectly clear and intelligible." There was 
 so much of the nightingale about Coleridge's own 
 music that we cannot but lament that Hazlitt 
 wasted his time over Wordsworthian metaphysics, 
 instead of listening to and reporting the other con- 
 versation. But it was not improbably the same 
 conversation as that which formed the basis of the 
 so-called " Conversation poem " on the nightingale, 
 written in April 1798, and printed in "Lyrical 
 Ballads " ; for in it the poet addresses " my friend, 
 and thou our sister," This is the poem in which 
 Coleridge, first of our poets, departs from the 
 Philomela convention (to which he himself had
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 199 
 
 previously given in), allows the singer his true sex, 
 and denies his melancholy : 
 
 " 'Tis the merry nightingale ' 
 That crowds, and hurries, and precipitates 
 With fast thick warble his delicious notes, 
 As he were fearful that an April night 
 Would be too short for him to utter forth 
 His love-chant, and disburthen his full soul 
 Of all its music. .... 
 
 Never elsewhere in one place I knew 
 So many nightingales ; and far and near 
 In wood and thicket, over the wide grove, 
 They answer and provoke each other's songs, 
 With skirmish and capricious passagings, 
 And murmurs musical and swift jug-jug, 
 And one low piping sound more sweet than all." 
 
 Let me note here (a propos of Wordsworth and 
 Coleridge) a curious mistake that has been pointed 
 out to me in Matthew Arnold's book of " Selections 
 from Wordsworth." The " Stanzas written in 
 Thomson's Castle of Indolence ", are always under- 
 stood to contain portraits first of the poet himself 
 and then of his friend. But Arnold puts a foot- 
 note (S. T. Coleridge) to the first line of the 
 poem, " Within our happy Castle there dwelt 
 One," &c. Can this be anything but a slip or a 
 printer's blunder ? Could Arnold have thought 
 
 1 This description may not be so brilliant as the famous one of 
 Crashaw's, but it is closer to nature. Compare the "one low piping 
 sound more sweet than all," with Crashaw's " Trails her plain ditty in 
 one long-spun note."
 
 200 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 that, Wordsworth must have meant Coleridge by 
 the lines 
 
 " Ah, piteous sight it was to see this man 
 When he came back to us, a withered flower 
 Or like a sinful creature, pale and wan ?" 
 
 No doubt in "The Leech-gatherer," written a 
 few days before, Wordsworth had his friend in 
 mind when he said - 
 
 " We poets in our youth begin in gladness ; 
 But thereof comes in the end despondency and madness," 
 
 for Coleridge had just written his ode on " De- 
 jection." But as Coleridge had drawn in that ode 
 a flattering picture of Wordsworth (to whom it was 
 first inscribed under the name of Edmund 1 ) and 
 an unflattering picture of himself, it is unlikely that 
 Wordsworth, in returning the compliment, should 
 not have tried to rouse his friend from his melan- 
 choly by putting his best side forward and dwelling 
 
 1 How thankful we ought to be that poets have sometimes second 
 thoughts ! Edmund is a good name, but it lacks the ideality of 
 "Lady." It would not be easy to wax tender over "O EDMUND, in 
 this wan and heartless mood," or "O EDMUND, we receive but what 
 we give," or "Joy, virtuous EDMUND!" and it might even, if the 
 pseudonym were forgotten, lead to misconception, e.g. 
 
 " It tells another tale, with sounds less deep and loud ! 
 A tale of less affright 
 And tempered with delight, 
 As EDMUND'S self had framed the tender lay," &c. 
 
 In short, the banishment of Edmund can only be paralleled in its 
 miraculous effect on the poem with Wordsworth's banishment of "my 
 brother Jim " from " We are Seven."
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 2OI 
 
 on Coleridge's natural joyousness, as Coleridge 
 had dwelt upon his. The stanza, " Noisy he was 
 and gamesome as a boy," &c., is borne out by 
 such passages as this from Dorothy Wordsworth : 
 " Coleridge did not keep to the high road, but 
 leapt over a gate and bounded down the pathless 
 field." And then as to the portrait, "A noticeable 
 man with large grey eyes," &c. It is not quite in- 
 conceivable that Wordsworth should have spoken 
 of himself as " noticeable " ; but the " large grey 
 eye," " pale face," and " low-hung " lip are certainly 
 Coleridge. The lines about the " withered flower " 
 and the " sinful creature " seem to mean only that 
 Wordsworth would sometimes go for very long 
 walks, and come back exhausted. 
 
 4/A. These morning frosts are a little discon- 
 certing, but, the weather being dry, no harm has 
 
 yet been done to the fruit-trees. Dined at 's. 
 
 I sat by a lady who talked not amiss about 
 Spinoza, but by some mischance always called him 
 " Spinola." I suppose one day's acquaintance with 
 one book about him had left him still something 
 of a stranger. I know no reason why ladies should 
 not try to be philosophers, but I suspect that in 
 most cases they find " cheerfulness is always break- 
 ing in." After all, it need only be for one season. 1 
 But for my own part, as I cannot go from house 
 to house and pick up the phrases, but must dig in 
 
 1 " Nee cultura placet longior annua." HOR.
 
 202 PAGES FAOM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 my mind for thoughts and recollections, I prefer 
 to discuss my philosophy in the smoking- rather 
 than the dining-room. Nature abhors a divided 
 concoction. And so when my fair partner, after 
 despatching Spinola with her entree, turned on me 
 with a "Tell me now, do you honestly think 
 Green has added anything to Marsilio Ficino ? " I 
 replied, " Well, not more than Gray has added to 
 Guide Cavalcanti, or Black to Jacopo Sannazzaro." 
 How odd it is people will be pretentious 1 Per- 
 haps it is as well, for, if all had the courage of 
 their ignorance, the world would be a much duller 
 place. The heavy plunger is a joy for ever ; but 
 ladies should be more cautious. There is a story 
 I once heard in Oxford, that hot-bed of apocrypha, 
 about a literary gentleman from town who was 
 introduced to Professor - , and fell on his neck 
 with " I have so longed to know you ever since I 
 read your charming edition of Heraclitus." Un- 
 fortunately, when Heraclitus was named, his father 
 did not know he would have to run in double 
 harness with Democritus ; and the weeping philo- 
 sopher himself did not anticipate so " charming " 
 an Isis as the Oxford Professor to collect his scat- 
 tered fragments, or he would have endeavoured to 
 make them charming too. As it is, they consist of 
 dark sayings which, when emendation has done its 
 utmost, are conjectured to mean things like " Dry 
 light is the best."
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 203 
 
 . A fall of snow at breakfast; along the 
 downs it lies an inch thick. This is cheerful for 
 the farmers. The cause of my sudden retreat from 
 my wife and daughter at the sea has worked itself 
 off, and the bachelor feeling of emancipation which 
 succeeded has gone too, and I must confess to 
 feeling lonely. The true bachelor's solace is cham- 
 pagne. "When a button comes off," said my 
 friend, " I open a bottle of champagne and fasten it 
 on with the wire, which is both needle and thread 
 in one." But my doctor will not let me drink 
 champagne ; so the buttons of my bachelordom 
 cannot be so conveniently attached. 
 
 They say the Duchesse d'Alen<;on would not 
 escape from the terrible fire at the Paris Charity 
 Bazaar, on the ground that it was her duty and 
 privilege to go last. Why is it always of French 
 women, not of French men, that one hears these 
 
 stories of high-bred heroism ? told me the 
 
 other day of an ancestress of his, at a French 
 convent school, who was saved from the guillotine 
 during the Terror by her French companions 
 insisting, though with most courteous apologies, 
 upon preceding her to execution, so as to give her 
 a chance of an expected reprieve, which at last 
 came. 
 
 i6/A. The Jowett biography, which I finished 
 to-day, seems a capital piece of work, especially 
 the second volume. It keeps the best side of its
 
 204 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 hero prominent, without obscuring the fact that 
 there were other sides. Perhaps most readers will 
 rise from its perusal with the conviction that Jowett 
 was at once more kind, more pious, and more 
 heterodox than they had imagined ; a man to love 
 and revere and burn. Most great heretics have 
 been persons of singular piety and charm. Jowett 
 was not definite enough in his positions to have 
 disciples ; or if he may be allowed one, still he has 
 no disciple. But he cannot be acquitted of an 
 influence upon his young men like that for which 
 the wise Athenians got rid of Socrates. Whether 
 Jowett believed any religious truth that was not 
 held by Plato seems doubtful. When he was 
 Vice-Chancellor he walked home one Sunday with 
 the University preacher (who told me the story) 
 and gave him many reasons against the doctrine 
 of immortality, which the preacher had, in his 
 poor Christian way, been urging in the pulpit. 
 After luncheon the preacher started for his train 
 to town, but, his conscience pricking him that he 
 had been silent under Jowett's attack, he returned 
 in haste to the Master's lodgings and delivered his 
 soul : " Master, I ought to have said that I did 
 not agree with the views you expressed this 
 morning." To which the Master chirruped : 
 " I know ; good-bye ; you'll lose your train." 
 It is curious to observe that the Quarterly, once 
 so savage and tartarly, vies in eulogy with the
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 205 
 
 Edinburgh, and spends its strength in hammering 
 out thin Mr. Abbott's comparison between Jowett 
 and Johnson. Jowett, who knew his Shakespeare, 
 would have paralleled it in its Quarterly form with 
 the comparison between Macedon and Monmouth ; 
 " for there is figures in all things." One point of 
 comparison has escaped this reviewer. BosweU 
 remarked of a casual visitor that he "thought him 
 but a weak man." JOHNSON : " Why, yes, sir. 
 Here is a man who has passed through life without 
 experience ; yet I would rather have him with me 
 than a more sensible man who will not talk readily. 
 This man is always willing to say what he has to 
 say." " Yet," continues Boswell, " Dr. Johnson 
 had himself by no means that willingness which he 
 praised so much, and I think so justly ; for who 
 has not felt the painful effect of the dreary void, 
 when there is a total silence in a company, for any 
 length of time ? Johnson once observed to me, 
 ' Tom Tyers described me best. " Sir (said he), 
 you are like a ghost ; you never speak till you are 
 spoken to." ' " l Johnson, however, was not shy, like 
 Jowett, who attached an exaggerated importance to 
 being able " to speak across a dinner-table " from 
 the effort it cost himself. His other " moral 
 malady," at which also he is always tilting, was 
 sensitiveness ; but, like most shy and sensitive 
 people, he had very little realisation of these 
 
 1 iii. 307, Hill's edition.
 
 206 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 qualities in other people. Is it the publication of 
 Jowett's sermons that has filled all the pulpits with 
 attacks on " sensitiveness " ? Wherever I go I hear 
 nothing else : it seems the new sin. Jowett's bio- 
 graphers are generous of his letters, and more are 
 to follow. This is right, for he was a writer far 
 more than a talker unlike Johnson again and 
 put his best things into his books and letters. 
 Hence there are not many good things to be 
 gleaned from his table-talk here recorded ; the 
 best is that the inscription over the gate of Hell 
 may be " Ici on parle fran^ais." Moreover, he had 
 more care for exact truth than to allow himself to 
 slog like Magee. A criticism of his prose style 
 would be interesting. Mr. Abbott well remarks 
 that he excels in the phrase rather than in the 
 paragraph. I should like to see a dissertation on 
 his use of rhetorical figures especially meiosis and 
 bathos. To the first I should refer the charge 
 often alleged against him of taking low views of 
 things in his sermons ; it was a trick to catch the 
 undergraduate ear, and it succeeded. As an example 
 of the second, I remember a sentence from a letter 
 of congratulation : " Marriage not only doubles the 
 joys of life, it' quadruples them." Nobody but 
 Jowett would have dared to write that. He was 
 fond of taking well-known sentences and giving 
 them a twist or an inversion. An authentic ex- 
 ample does not at the moment occur to me ; but I
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 2 07 
 
 may illustrate by a parody. " It is often said, The 
 child is father of the man ; shall we not rather say, 
 The man is father of the child ? " His lectures were 
 sure to contain good things. He delighted in the 
 exact epithet. I recall a course of lectures on " Sub- 
 jects connected with Thucydides " (which discussed 
 incidentally the Homeric theory, the relations of 
 the Synoptic Gospels, Herodotus, &c.), in one of 
 which he gave each nation of antiquity an appro- 
 priate epithet, but had nothing ready (or so he 
 feigned) for the Egyptians, and looked for several 
 minutes out of the window. Then he gently 
 smacked his lips once or twice, and continued : 
 "That ambiguous people living on the shores of 
 their ancient river." I can't say this taught us 
 much political history, but it gave me a lifelong 
 respect for style. Once, being by chance in 
 Oxford when he was giving what proved to be his 
 last lectures as Greek professor, I heard him turn 
 his own reputation to good use. The matter of 
 the lecture, if true, was not new, and the Greek 
 dons who were there for politeness' sake had 
 begun to whisper to each other. Jowett heard 
 this, and laid a trap for them, which he baited with 
 an expected epigram. "And now we come to 
 Aristarchus, whom perhaps we may call . . . (dead 
 silence) . . . the great Aristarchus." (Peals of 
 laughter, in which Jowett joined as heartily as 
 any one.)
 
 208 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 The volumes contain several portraits. The 
 Watts picture, stiff as a poker, with a head like an 
 acidulated drop, and a most uncharacteristic sneer 
 on its thin lips, is properly ignored. Lady Aber- 
 cromby's portrait is not unlike him in the face, but 
 the face does not fit the head. I do not remember 
 Jowett in quite such cherubic youth as the Rich- 
 mond drawing exhibits, but that probably does not 
 much exaggerate his charm. For a true picture 
 of him in later life we must go to the despised art 
 of photography. The Cameron photograph printed 
 in Vol. II. is excellent; it is not only a good like- 
 ness, but it gives the ideal man, " divinely through 
 all hindrance." This cannot be said of Mr. Onslow 
 Ford's cenotaph exhibited in the Academy. Jowett 
 assisted at the opening of Mr. Ford's Shelley 
 Memorial at University College as he puts it 
 himself, " I was one Sir Topas in this interlude ; " 
 and we may continue the quotation, " Thus the 
 whirligig of time brings in his revenges ; " now he 
 is more personally interested in the question of 
 Pythagoras's opinion concerning wild-fowl. For 
 a fearful wild-fowl it is ! First of all, why is it so 
 tiny ? It looks like a miniature model, but the 
 precious materials prove it to be the thing itself. 
 But why should Jowett be represented the size of 
 a doll ? Is it some conspiracy of the Pusey House ? 
 And what does the emblem mean on the sar- 
 cophagus ? What is the significance of a winged
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 209 
 
 cockle-shell ? Is it an artistic rendering of High- 
 cockalorum ? It is no excuse that the artist has 
 bagged it from the Carlo Marsuppini monument at 
 Santa Croce in Florence, for symbolism was not 
 the strong point of the .fifteenth-century artists. I 
 wonder what Jowett would have said? Perhaps only, 
 being a kind man, that it was more appropriate to 
 Shelley than to himself, and had better be sent across 
 to University College with his compliments. 
 
 2oth.- London has had not a few poets; and 
 even politicians occasionally fall under the spell, 
 and " in metaphor their feelings seek relief." 
 Yesterday it was Lord Salisbury. " One of our 
 most extraordinary delusions [as young men] was 
 the imagination that the dominant opinion of 
 London in all its parts was much more Radical 
 than Conservative. It was the sort of delusion 
 that a man might feel when looking upon a dry 
 plain, and imagining that it is a waterless country, 
 till he has pierced the surface, and finds that 
 refreshing and abundant streams gush forth." To- 
 day Sir William also is among the prophets, and 
 takes up the burden of London : " There was a 
 time when the metropolis was a fertile Liberal 
 soil. By the accident of Nature (cheers) it has 
 become covered with thorns and briers ; but that 
 is no reason why with intelligence and energy it 
 should not be restored to its pristine fertility." 
 Of all the ornaments of style, as Aristotle long ago 
 
 O
 
 210 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 pointed out, metaphor is by far the most valuable, 
 being the product of original genius, and so having 
 a creative influence. 
 
 2 ist. There was some interesting evidence 
 given yesterday before the Select Committee on 
 Money Lending. One question and answer were 
 vastly entertaining : 
 
 Chairman : Who is the money-lender ? 
 Witness : Wilberforce. 
 Chairman : But what is his real name-? 
 Witness: Pocket. 
 
 Brutus, it seems, will not start a spirit as soon 
 as Caesar. 
 
 From the advertisement-sheet I cull " Bull-dog 
 for sale ; will eat anything ; very fond of children." 
 
 2$th. The ladies have been badly beaten at 
 Cambridge, the unchivalrous undergraduates have 
 made bonfires in honour of the event, and the 
 question of feminine bachelors may now go to 
 sleep at least for a decade. The question is one 
 that cannot be argued in the abstract, for abstrac- 
 tion is sure to be made of some very important 
 element in the problem. My sister-in-law looks 
 at the question from a matrimonial point of view. 
 " I am told," she says, " that some first-class girls 
 marry, some third-class, o second-class, and all the 
 failures. You must consider, therefore, whether 
 you wish to attract more frivolous girls to Cam- 
 bridge, and so increase their chances of marriage by
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 211 
 
 diminishing your son's chances of taking honours." 
 To me it seems sufficient to say that when the 
 Oxford or Cambridge degree comes to mean simply 
 attending lectures and passing examinations, it will 
 be time to put it on a level with that of London, 
 and grant it to women. At present it means 
 having lived in a certain society for a certain 
 length of time, and having learnt certain things, 
 the most important of which are not taught in 
 lecture-rooms. 
 
 29/7*. The house-martins have at last begun 
 building. 
 
 June \st. We are now not only in the year, 
 but in the month of Jubilee, and the word is on 
 every one's lips. One squire reports unto another 
 how he is going to celebrate the great event ; by 
 a dinner or a tea, by mugs round or medals, by 
 fire\vorks, or by some new edifice. Though a little 
 hesitating as to our own plans, we can each give a 
 shrewd guess at our neighbours' duty. My own 
 idea (for all whom it may concern) is that private 
 possessors of property once public should take 
 this opportunity of allowing it to revert to the 
 original owners. This was assuredly the way they 
 had of celebrating jubilees "down in Judee." 
 Country gentlemen who have enclosed commons, 
 lords who have impropriated tythe, antiquaries 
 whose private museums are decorated with church 
 fonts or registers or monumental brasses, should
 
 212 
 
 at once follow the excellent example of the Arch- 
 bishop of Canterbury, who has just restored the 
 log of the Mayflower to America, and purge them- 
 selves of ill-gotten gains. One case of spoliation 
 I have greatly at heart. In Walpole's " Anecdotes 
 of Painting" is figured by way of frontispiece a 
 fine window which was presented to him by the 
 then Earl of Ashburnham for the Gothic chapel at 
 Strawberry, having been begged or bought or pur- 
 loined from the church of Bexhill, in Sussex. 1 It 
 was bought at the Strawberry sale by a Mr. 
 Whitaker for ^30. Where is it now? I love 
 Horace Walpole, and should be glad if at last his 
 ghost might obtain repose by the return of the 
 glass. Happening to speak of the subject in a 
 room where was a bust of this virtuoso, two drops 
 of blood fell from its nostrils on to the pedestal ; 
 
 1 Horace Walpole writes to George Montagu (November 24, 1760) : 
 "I have found in a MS. that in the church of Beckley, or Becksley, in 
 Sussex, there are portraits on glass in a window of Henry the Third 
 and his Queen. I have looked in the map, and find the first name 
 between Bodiham and Rye, but I am not sure it is the place. [It was 
 not. Bexeley was the old name of what is now Bexhill. ] I will be 
 much obliged if you will write directly to your Sir Whistler, and beg 
 him to inform himself very exactly if there is any such thing in such a 
 church near Bodiham. Pray state it minutely ; because if there is I 
 will have them drawn for the frontispiece to my work " (iii. 365). At 
 first, then, it is clear, Walpole did not contemplate sacrilege. On 
 October 3, 1771, he writes to the Rev. William Cole : " I am building 
 a small chapel in my garden to receive two valuable pieces of antiquity, 
 and which have been presents singularly lucky for me. They are the 
 window from Bexhill with the portraits of Henry III. and his Queen, 
 procured for me by Lord Ashburnham ; the other is," &c. (v. 346).
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 213 
 
 which confirms me in my belief that its restoration 
 Avould be satisfactory to him. The excellent Sussex 
 Antiquarian Society would have no difficulty in 
 ascertaining the whereabouts of the window, and 
 might start a subscription list for its repurchase. 
 
 2nd. One of the most interesting social pheno- 
 mena to watch is the retreat from a position taken 
 up by some mistake or inadvertence. Ladies are 
 often great adepts in such strategy > the art, I sup- 
 pose, for ordinary mortals lies in a gradual retire- 
 ment through a sufficient number of insensible 
 degrees. This afternoon I was privileged to view 
 a superb performance in my own drawing-room. 
 We had a small party, and a writer of some cele- 
 brity was expected. At one point I overheard a 
 leader of our local society pour out an effusion of 
 civilities over the excellent and flattered but some- 
 what surprised doctor's lady of a neighbouring 
 parish, who, from a certain similarity of name, 
 was plainly being mistaken for the lioness. By 
 the simple method of accosting her as I passed, 
 and inquiring somewhat particularly after her 
 husband, I exposed the error, and- then . retreated 
 to watch the process of " drying up," which was 
 magnificent, but quite indescribable. Men do 
 these things with much less grace. The vicar 
 and I were fellow guests, he being a complete 
 stranger, at a house whose front door opened into 
 an old-fashioned hall, where company was assem-
 
 bled ; and when the hostess said to a young and 
 rather well-set-up servant out of livery, " Sidney, 
 will you take Mr. 's coat," the vicar under- 
 stood this as an introduction to Sidney, presumed 
 the son of the house, and wrung his hand with 
 the heartiest how d'ye do ? but not finding his 
 greeting returned, subsided into a cough. A more 
 awkward contretemps of the same sort happened 
 
 once to myself. I was in , and saw my dear 
 
 friend Mrs. B.'s pony-carriage outside a shop, with 
 a very pretty girl holding the reins, whose face I 
 knew perfectly, though I could not recollect her 
 name. So I made my bow and some comments 
 on the weather and the ponies, and while I stood 
 chatting, out came Mrs. B. and seemed much sur- 
 prised ; and then I remembered the young damsel 
 was her parlour-maid, whom, as I afterwards learned, 
 she was driving in to the dentist. All which mis- 
 adventures show that we live in a highly artificial 
 society. I will conclude these reminiscences with 
 one of a somewhat different nature. The scene 
 was a drawing-room meeting convened by Mrs. 
 Tom ; our local dignitary, who is the modern 
 Avatar of Menenius Agrippa, was bringing a very 
 witty speech to an end with an anecdote which 
 threw the meeting into a paroxysm of laughter, 
 when it flashed across his mind (and his face) that 
 he had been asked to dismiss the assembly with 
 the benediction. Luckily he could on occasion
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 21$ 
 
 produce a first-rate stammer, and this he at once 
 summoned to his assistance. " I have . . . been 
 . . . asked ... to conclude . . . with the b-b-b-ene- 
 diction . . . which ... I ... will . . now . . . 
 endeavour ... to give." The time this sentence 
 was made to occupy in delivery cannot be ade- 
 quately represented by dots and dashes ; it gave 
 us ample leisure to compose our features. We 
 all felt the " endeavour " to be a master-stroke. 
 
 yd. The rain came in the very nick of time 
 to save the hay ; and farmers are jubilant. " If I 
 had had the sun in one hand and a watering-pot 
 
 in the other," said old to me, " I could not 
 
 have mixed 'em better." What a flight of imagina- 
 tion ! The photographer from came over 
 
 to take a picture of some fine old barns that have 
 to be improved away. As there was no train back 
 for several hours, I was compelled to put at his 
 service a good deal of time and tobacco. Amongst 
 other compliments he said, " I wonder, sir, you 
 do not take to amateur photography." I replied 
 modestly that I feared I had no skill that way. 
 " Oh ! " said he, " amateur photography is easy 
 enough ; it's a very different thing from professional 
 photography. But what I was thinking was you 
 have so much leisure for it." Such is the gratitude 
 of men. They waste our time and then charge us 
 with idleness ! 
 
 I am glad to see that scholars like the Bishop of
 
 2l6 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Salisbury and Professor Skeat are protesting against 
 the insipidity of the term " Diamond Jubilee." The 
 right expression is " Great Jubilee." . . , 
 
 Strawberries are very good this year. I agree 
 with the Dr. Boteler whom Walton quotes that 
 "doubtless God might have made a better berry, 
 but doubtless He never did." For tarts, however, 
 there is nothing to equal bilberries till damsons 
 are ready. 
 
 $th. A lady writes to me about Beaconsfield's 
 affection for the primrose : 
 
 " I see that doubt is again thrown on the late 
 Lord Beaconsfield's love for primroses. However 
 incongruous such an affection may appear, he 
 certainly felt it. There is an old man in my little 
 country town, a very, very commonplace old 
 labourer, who once, long ago, did rough digging 
 work at Hughenden, and he declares that from the 
 earliest garden primrose to the latest to be found 
 in the woods, Lord Beaconsfield was never to be 
 seen without a primrose in his buttonhole one 
 blossom and no more which struck the man who 
 would have preferred a posy." 
 
 8th (Whit-Tuesday}. We should have begun 
 cutting the big meadow to-day but for the return 
 of rain. And yet I hardly resent the rain, as it 
 will make the village clean and sweet after yester- 
 day's revel. Our village is unluckily the rendezvous 
 of the district benefit club ; I say unluckily, for
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 21 J 
 
 many of its members give us little pleasure from 
 their company, and less advantage, unless it be on 
 the doubtful principle of the " drunken helot." It 
 is the ancient custom of the society to begin the 
 festival with a church service, which is attended 
 by the neigbouring clergy, with their wives and 
 daughters, to whom a sermon is preached by some 
 distinguished stranger upon the duty of brotherly 
 love. Meanwhile the club-men are refreshing 
 themselves after their dusty walk at the " Blue 
 Boar," and by the time their vicarious devotions 
 are over they are fresh enough for dinner, and 
 when dinner is over lively enough to discuss the 
 club balance-sheet. A Berkshire labourer's speech 
 is a thing worth hearing. The action is that of a 
 reaper. Tropes abound, borrowed for the most 
 part from the meeting-house, and it is difficult to 
 pierce through them to the point at issue. Yes- 
 terday a speaker began in biting accents : " I likes 
 church an' chapel " (long pause and dead silence) 
 " I say, I likes church an' chapel, 'cos I wants 
 t' go t' 'eaven." (Slight expressions of assent and 
 sympathy, after which the sentiment -is repeated ; 
 then new ground is broken.) " Passon tells I to 
 love one another ; and so I does, 'cos why ? I wants 
 t' go t' 'eaven. I likes church an' chapel ; an' I 
 goes t' church an' chapel, and I 'ears passon tell 
 I to love one another." But at this point several 
 members, thinking it would be well to have <" more
 
 2l8 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 matter and less art," interrupted with, " What be 
 maunderin' about, Tom ; what do 'ee want ? Stop 
 thee gab 'tain't a matin','' and the orator had to 
 blurt Out his grievance without more circumstance 
 at all. 
 
 qth. Cook has given warning, and I am not 
 surprised, considering the provocation. She had 
 
 become engaged to a young fellow in the 
 
 Regiment, while he was on a visit home, but, 
 bitterly disliking the service, had insisted upon 
 devoting twenty guineas of her savings to buy him 
 out. As soon as I heard of the arrangement I 
 told the boy, whom I had known from his cradle, 
 not to be a fool, and as his commanding-officer 
 told him so too, he made up his mind to finish his 
 seven years. But cook is not unnaturally exasper- 
 ated, and is determined to cast off for ever both 
 her ungrateful swain and her interfering master. 
 I shall .regret the cook, but not the interference. 
 It is always worth while to try at making silk purses 
 out of sows' ears ; and with the cavalier the attempt 
 has had some success. He has learned old Love- 
 lace's lesson : 
 
 " I could not love thee, dear, so much, 
 Loved I not honour more." 
 
 With the lady, of course, the attempt was fore- 
 doomed to failure. The occurrence throws a queer 
 light on the love affairs of domestic servants. 
 
 lotk. -My sister writes inviting us to stay with
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 219 
 
 her for the Jubilee week. She adds that even if 
 we do not care to see the procession, we shall be 
 glad to have seen it, which seems odd reasoning. 
 However, I am not a superior person like Tom, 
 who has begun to express himself in quite Miltonic 
 fashion about not troubling to cross the road to see 
 
 " The tedious pomp that waits 
 On princes, when their rich retinue long 
 Of horses led and grooms besmeared with gold 
 Dazzles the crowd, and sets them all agape." 
 
 For my part I think few sights so splendid as the 
 fluctuating movement of a body of well-drilled 
 troops seen approaching down a gentle slope. 
 Moreover, something must be conceded to loyalty. 
 We reckon ourselves as a rule a very loyal family. 
 My uncle Tom used to think it lese-majeste to stick 
 a " queen's head " upon a letter the wrong side up. 
 But he was a sailor, and had romantic notions about 
 many things ; even considering it unchivalrous to 
 profane with his feet the slippers fair hands had 
 worked for him. I will write to Caroline accepting 
 her invitation, and suggesting that the seats she 
 secures shall not be on a stand in the eye of Phoebus, 
 or at the back of a room with a view like that of 
 the lady of Shalott, who 
 
 " Through the mirror blue 
 Saw knights come riding two and two." 
 
 A procession to be enjoyed must be seen in great 
 reaches, if possible round a curve, and from not
 
 220 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 too great a height. We must be home again for 
 the village celebration on the 24th. 
 
 1 2th. I see in a catalogue this morning Lord 
 Byron's copy of Horace advertised as "his lord- 
 ship's favourite poet." The reference must be to 
 the famous verse in " Childe Harold " : 
 
 " Then farewell, Horace, whom I hated so." 
 
 I have long dreamed of a collection of such 
 41 favourites " among contemporary poets, to include 
 Byron's copies of Wordsworth's " Excursion " and 
 Southey's "Vision of Judgment," Wordsworth's 
 copy of " Peter Bell the Third," Coleridge's copy 
 of the " Lay of the Last Minstrel " (with marginalia), 
 and so on, down to our own day, and the Laureate's 
 copy of " Pacchiarotto." My catalogue contains 
 also a Bodoni folio Horace. Did any one ever 
 read Horace in folio ? The right Horace for read- 
 ing is the Baskerville i2mo, a beautiful book. It 
 was a true instinct that led Baskerville to publish 
 his Bible in royal folio, his Virgil in 4to, and his 
 Horace in 12010. Later, he printed Horace in 
 4to, and proceeded with a series of the other 
 Latin poets the world of collectors loving sets 
 but his first instinct was the right one. 
 
 up//*. There has been a great discussion in the 
 vHlage as to whether " God save the Queen " shall 
 be sung to-morrow in church ; and if so whether 
 it should be sung in its entirety, or in a selection,
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 221 
 
 or in a revised version. We managed to convince 
 the vicar that the revised versions were all intoler- 
 able, and as he objected on principle to confounding 
 anybody's politics, it was an easy compromise to 
 agree to sing the first and last stanzas. In time of 
 peace the second may lie on the shelf ; but if we 
 have to go to war again, it will be through other 
 people's politics, which will be all the better for 
 a little confounding. I never thought so well of 
 Henry Carey's verses as to-day when we compared 
 them with their would-be substitutes. As we are 
 to have a good deal of " Rule, Britannia," next 
 week, I have asked the schoolmaster to see that the 
 children sing the words correctly : 
 
 " Rule, Britannia Britannia, rule the waves," 
 
 not rules as one so often hears it. 
 
 22nd. I need not labour a description of to-day's 
 show. It will be enough to put away a copy of 
 to-morrow's newspaper. It was interesting to 
 observe the coolness of Lord Wolseley's reception 
 as he passed along 
 
 " Without more train 
 Accompanied than with his own complete 
 Perfections " 
 
 compared with the surprised shouts given when 
 Lord Roberts appeared at the head of the colonial 
 troops, for his name was not in the programme. 
 But what can the crowd know of the merits of
 
 222 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 either commander ? The spectators were as in- 
 teresting, though not so picturesque, as the pageant. 
 It was just such a crowd, though on a larger scale, 
 as Shakespeare saw watching the progresses of 
 Elizabeth, and described in " Coriolanus " : 
 
 " All tongues speak of her, and the bleared sights 
 Are spectacled to see her : your prattling nurse 
 Into a rapture lets her baby cry 
 While she chats her : the kitchen malkin pins 
 Her richest lockram 'bout her reechy neck, 
 Clambering the walls to eye her : stalls, bulks, windows, 
 Are smothered up, leads fill'd, and ridges horsed 
 With variable complexions, all agreeing 
 In earnestness to see her : seld-shown flamens 
 Do press among the popular throngs, and puff 
 To win a vulgar station : our veil'd dames 
 Commit the war of white and damask in 
 Their nicely-gawded cheeks to the wanton spoil 
 Of Phcebus' burning kisses." 
 
 The flamens were very conspicuous to-day, too ; 
 many of them had left home so early that they had 
 to offer their morning incense as they stood in the 
 press. Shakespeare's description makes no men- 
 tion of the police who are so essential a part of our 
 modern triumphs. They kept the crowd to-day 
 in good humour as cleverly as if they had been 
 supplied from Drury Lane. One interlude made 
 us merry for a good half-hour. Two long-legged 
 youngsters had climbed a lamp-post and were 
 sitting "horsed" on the projecting bars. First 
 one policeman, and then another, and then two
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 223 
 
 together, tried to swarm up and pull the culprits 
 down. Then we were regaled with "the lost 
 child," " the dog on the course," " the imaginary 
 pickpocket," and " the temptation of St. Robert " 
 (with a pocket pistol) and all the good old pieces, 
 which were received, as the phrase goes, "in the 
 spirit in which they were offered." The sun most 
 considerately kept out of the way till eleven o'clock, 
 but the next three hours made it hard work for the 
 troops lining the route, and not least for the officers 
 in their dress uniforms. Henry Erskine used to 
 say : " At the last day, when the secrets of all 
 hearts shall be disclosed, it will be known why 
 people wear tight boots." Some people have 
 complained that the procession was not expressive 
 of our great commercial enterprises. But why 
 should it have been ? It \vas a royal progress 
 with an escort, not a Lord Mayor's Show. As 
 long as we retain a monarchy, we must allow the 
 monarch to be something more than our picturesque 
 representative. But the fashionable Radical doc- 
 trine seems to be that the Royal family are merely 
 puppets for the amusement of Hob and Dick, who 
 may pull the strings at their pleasure. The Daily 
 Chronicle, yesterday, was indignant with the Prince 
 of Wales for staying in St. Paul's on Sunday till 
 the service was over, whereas its reporter was 
 anxious to get away after the sermon. " Some 
 misunderstanding must have arisen as to the time
 
 224 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 of their Royal Highnesses' departure from the 
 Cathedral. Nobody could have expected them to stay 
 for the Holy Communion which somewhat unneces- 
 sarily followed the Thanksgiving Service. . . . The 
 service was not over till a quarter-past one, and 
 the royal party might well have been out of the cathedral 
 an hour sooner" What delicious impertinence ! 
 
 2yd. To-day we were taken to the Victorian 
 Era Exhibition in order that we might gauge the 
 immense improvements that had characterised the 
 reign. In many cases, however, models had been 
 erected of things as they used to be, and this 
 spoiled the pleasant dream ; for they looked so 
 much finer in every way than what had taken 
 their place. " The spinsters and the knitters in the 
 sun " were specially charming, and I lingered for 
 quite a long time in their neighbourhood, hoping 
 to hear them sing " Come away, death ; " but I was 
 not fortunate. In the tea-room, whose walls were 
 completely covered with advertisements, I over- 
 heard a girl remark to her companion, " Why, you 
 could think you were in a picture-gallery, if you 
 shut your eyes." At night we chartered an omni- 
 bus to view the illuminations. I sat by the driver, 
 who good-naturedly pointed out the objects of 
 interest. His talk was very vivacious, and he made 
 use of many remarkable expressions ; but I could 
 not well jot them down at the time, and I have for- 
 gotten most of them since. Of some rather brilliant
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 225 
 
 transparencies in the West End, which I praised, 
 he said, "Oh, they're only paraphernalia; wait till 
 we get to the City." And certainly the City was 
 very splendid. The marble above St. Paul's dome 
 looked richer than I have ever seen it, with the 
 search-light upon it. My driver was frequently 
 indignant at the inefficient driving of vehicles that 
 got in his way, and though he plainly was holding 
 himself in, he could not restrain an occasional 
 " Other hand, matey," or " Now then, gardener." 
 He said the average of driving was much lower 
 since the cab strike. 
 
 24//z sir Walter Vivian all a summer's day," &c. 
 
 The village is very gay with flags ; it would be still 
 gayer if last night's rain had not made some of them 
 " run." This jest in many forms, with or without 
 reference to " fast " colours, or to the flags that run 
 having been " made in Germany," has served the 
 village wits the whole day. The Caterpillars have 
 done their best to festoon all the oaks ; the " Blue 
 Boar " has got a new coat of paint ; the roadsides 
 have been cleared of grass ; a triumphal arch has 
 been erected in front of the park gate ; and we are 
 all feeling very loyal and happy except such of us 
 as have still to get rid of our after-dinner speeches. 
 A thunderstorm has threatened for several hours, 
 and it seems doubtful if we shall be able to let off 
 the fireworks. 
 
 P
 
 226 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 1 1 P.M. The storm has passed down the valley 
 without interfering with us. The fireworks were 
 superb, especially the rockets. With what alacrity 
 they rise, and with what dignity they fall ! 
 
 26th. I saw to-day, at our small garden-party, 
 a sight too rarely seen a girl walking quite beauti- 
 fully. Her motion was the perfection of natural 
 movement, and breathed for me a new meaning 
 into the old classical poetry that speaks of goddesses 
 being recognisable by their walk vera incessu patuit 
 dea. English girls do not as a rule walk finely, and 
 so English poetry takes no heed of walking except 
 when it copies the antique as Shakespeare does in 
 the "Tempest" Masque: "Great Juno comes, I know 
 her by her gait," and Milton, speaking of Eve 
 
 " Soft she withdrew, and like a wood-nymph light, 
 Oread, or Dryad, or of Delia's train, 
 Betook her to the groves ; but Delia's self 
 In gait surpass'd and goddess-like deport." 
 
 It is a pure pleasure to have one's eyes opened 
 to a new grace, but then its withdrawal is a pure 
 pain, and Miss A.'s departure filled me with regret. 
 
 July ^rd. I am spending a few days in Surrey, 
 at my old friend K.'s, for bicycling. The roads 
 are far better than ours in Berkshire, and the 
 scenery is more diversified. I have visited Nor- 
 bury, and Juniper Hill, and Chesington, and the 
 other spots made interesting by Fanny Burney. 
 At Leatherhead I looked in vain for the old glass
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 227 
 
 which an old vicar, the celebrated antiquary, 
 Dallaway, had brought from France. It must 
 have been removed lately, as Murray still speaks 
 of it. I am a friend to the clergy on their sacer- 
 dotal side, but I think them as a rule but careless 
 custodians of Church property. To give a curious 
 instance. I wished some years ago to verify the 
 date of a marriage, and called upon the rector of 
 the church where the marriage had taken -place. 
 He assured me that the register I wanted was lost, 
 but I might see the others. It was cold comfort ; 
 but my good genius led me to assent, and I was 
 taken to the vestry, the chest was unlocked, and 
 the books exhibited. " Is there nothing else in 
 the box?" I asked. "No," said the rector, some- 
 what nettled ; " I have been here forty years, and 
 I should know what registers there are." " Of 
 course," said I, " but one side of the chest looks a 
 different colour from the other." " Nonsense ! " 
 said he. " Well," I said, " you must forgive my 
 presumption, but will you allow me to feel ? " And 
 without waiting for leave I felt, and flat against 
 one side of the chest was the missing register. 
 
 That is an instance of oversight rather than 
 neglect. But look at our own church ! What has it 
 not suffered from fashion and from heedlessness ! 
 It was fashion that made my great-grandfather put 
 in the beautiful panelled ceiling, and fashion that 
 made my father pull it down, the vicar acquiescing.
 
 228 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 It was fashion that sent our old plate to the 
 melting-pot, and our old font goodness knows 
 whither, perhaps to some pigsty ; and then ignorant 
 indifference came in to devour what fashion had 
 spared, blocked up the old rood-loft staircase, 
 pulled up the old tombstones and cut them into 
 lengths for flagging, turned out the old helmets 
 and hatchments, and made itself generally busy 
 with axes and hammers. Of course, occasionally 
 you do get a vicar who is a bit of an antiquary, 
 and takes an interest in his treasures. I knew 
 one once who used to skip up his chancel like a 
 priest of Dagon, for fear of treading on the precious 
 brasses that were inlaid in the floor. This was, 
 perhaps, carrying caution to an extreme. 
 
 5//r. There is such a large family of children 
 here that one grows young again oneself. Dorothy 
 came to me this morning, and asked if I knew the 
 words she liked best. They were " lack " and 
 " Mazawattee." She will, I suppose, be the poet 
 of the family. Sybil (a Sybil of the second gene- 
 ration, for Lord B.'s novel appeared so long ago 
 as 1845) is the eldest, and the censor of morals. 
 " I shouldn't call her a beast, Rosalind," she was 
 heard say to her sister ; " it is a vulgar word ; I 
 should call her a devil." How well that illustrates 
 the discrepancy of the two ideals, between which 
 even their elders are tossed ! You get it again in 
 that story of the Highland and Lowland servants
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 229 
 
 of one of the Hamiltons. Said the latter, " I wuss 
 I had an assurance that Mr. Hamilton was a con- 
 verted Christian." To which his indignant fellow : 
 " Mr. Hamilton a converted Christian ! Mr. Hamil- 
 ton is a pair-r-fet gentleman ! " 
 
 7//r. It is worth while at this moment to look 
 at the past history of Phil-Hellenism. Mommsen 
 has an interesting sketch of Greek history under 
 the Empire in his " Roman Provinces," in which 
 he shows how Greece was always the spoilt child 
 of the Powers. For instance, after the battle of 
 Pharsalia, in which the Athenians had taken the 
 side of Pompey, Caesar contented himself with 
 asking them " how often they would still ruin 
 themselves, and trust to be saved by the renown 
 of their ancestors." l Mommsen inclines to the 
 opinion that " the considerate treatment of the 
 Greeks in general, and the special kindness shown 
 by the Government to Hellas proper, did not re- 
 dound to the true benefit either of the Government 
 or of the country." But Mommsen's a German. 
 
 9///. To-day is the centenary of Burke's death, 
 but I hear of no commemorative speeches. And 
 yet it was only the death of his son that prevented 
 Burke's being Lord Beaconsfield ! In that case I 
 
 1 Cf. also what Plutarch relates of Sulla after the capture of Athens. 
 When he was entreated to stay the slaughter, "after that he had. some- 
 what said in praise of the ancient Athenians, he concluded in the end 
 to give the greater number unto the smaller, and the living to the dead" 
 (North's Translation, p. 474.)
 
 230 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 should certainly have joined the Primrose League. 
 I do not care much for the " Reflections on the 
 French Revolution," but the " American Speeches " 
 and the " Present Discontents " are full of the first 
 principles of politics. On every page one meets a 
 phrase or a paragraph that applies itself to modern 
 times. How wise he is about the Colonies : " I 
 look upon the imperial rights of Great Britain, and 
 the privileges which the colonists ought to enjoy 
 under these rights, to be just the most reconcilable 
 things in the world. The Parliament of Great Britain 
 sits at the head of her extensive empire in two capa- 
 cities : one, as the local legislature of this island ; 
 the other, and I think her nobler capacity, is what I 
 call her imperial character ." (Surely Burke must have 
 been Lord Beaconsfield after all !) " My hold of the 
 Colonies is in the close affection which grows from 
 common names, from kindred blood, from similar 
 privileges, andequal protection. These aretieswhich, 
 though light as air, are as strong as links of iron." 
 What a pity it was that the element of TO 
 -n-epiTTov so often marred his practical effective- 
 ness ! The best example I know (though in that 
 case we cannot regret the ineffectiveness) will be 
 found in Miss Burney's diary, where she describes 
 her emotions during the speech against Warren 
 Hastings : " His opening had struck me with the 
 highest admiration of his powers, from the elo- 
 quence, the imagination, the fire, the diversity of
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 231 
 
 expression, and the ready flow of language with 
 which he seemed gifted in a most superior manner 
 for any and every purpose to which rhetoric could 
 lead. And when he came to his two narratives, 
 when he related the particulars of those dreadful 
 murders, he interested, he engaged, he at last over- 
 powered me ; I felt my cause lost. I could hardly 
 keep on my seat. My eyes dreaded a single glance 
 towards a man so accused as Mr. Hastings ; I 
 wanted to sink on the floor, that they might be 
 saved so painful a sight. I had no hope he could 
 clear himself ; not another wish in his favour 
 remained. But when from this narration Mr. 
 Burke proceeded to his own comments and 
 declamation when the charges of rapacity, cruelty, 
 tyranny were general, and made with all the 
 violence of personal detestation, and continued 
 and aggravated without any further fact or illus- 
 tration, then there appeared more of study than 
 of truth, more of invective than of justice ; and, 
 in short, so little of proof to so much of passion, 
 that in a very short time I began to lift up my 
 head, my seat was no longer uneasy, my eyes 
 were indifferent which way they looked or what 
 object caught them, and before I was myself aware 
 of the declension of Mr. Burke's powers over my 
 feelings, I found myself a mere spectator in a 
 public place, and looking all around it with my 
 opera-glass in my hand" (iv. 119).
 
 232 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 nth. A slight bicycling accident kept me from 
 church, and I took down the third volume of 
 " Donne's Sermons." I went by preference to the 
 third volume, not because it contains my favourite 
 sermon, for that is the seventy-sixth of vol. i., 
 -with its magnificent close, but (let me confess) 
 because my copy is printed on large paper to 
 match the first two volumes, an$ is, so far as I 
 know, in that state unique. My choice to-day 
 justified itself by coming upon a State Sermon with 
 which one's new-tuned loyalty proved to be in 
 key ; a sermon, moreover, containing a panegyric 
 ,on the Great Queen ; a fact sufficiently remarkable 
 considering the sermon was preached at St. Paul's 
 Cross before the Council on the anniversary of 
 James's accession. For James did not love Eliza- 
 beth, or love her praises. 
 
 " We need not that Edict of the Senate of Rome, 
 Ut sub titulo gratiarum agendarum ; That upon pre- 
 tence of thanking our Princes for that which, we 
 say, they had done, Boni principes quce facerent recog- 
 noscerent, good Princes should take knowledge 
 what they were bound to do, though they had not 
 done so yet. We need not this Circuit, nor this 
 disguise; for Gods hand hath been abundant 
 towards us in raising Ministers of State, so quali- 
 fied, and so endowed : and such Princes as have 
 fastned their friendships, and conferred their 
 favors, upon such persons. We celebrate, season-
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 233 
 
 ably, opportunely, the thankful acknowledgment 
 of these mercies this day : This day, which God 
 made for us, according to the pattern of his first 
 days in the Creation ; where Vesper et mane dies 
 unus.j the evening first and then the morning made 
 up the day ; for here the saddest night and the 
 joyfullest morning, that ever the daughters of this 
 Island saw, made up this day. Consider the tears 
 of Richmond this night, and the joys of London at 
 this place, at this time, in the morning ; and we 
 shall find Prophecy even in that saying of the Poet, 
 Node plnit tota, showers of rain all night, of weep- 
 ing for our Soveraign ; and we would not be com- 
 forted, because she was not : And yet, redeunt 
 spectacula mane, the same hearts, the same eyes, the 
 same hands, were all directed upon recognitions, 
 and acclamations of her successor, in the morning : 
 And when every one of you in the City were run- 
 ning up and down like Ants, with their eggs bigger 
 than themselves, every man with his bags to seek 
 where to hide them safely, Almighty God shed 
 down His Spirit of Unity, and recollecting, and 
 reposedness, and acquiescence, upon you all. In 
 the death of that Queen, unmatchable, inimitable 
 in her sex ; that Queen, worthy, I will not say of 
 Nestors years, I will not say of Methusalems, but 
 worthy of Adams years if Adam had never fain ; 
 in her death we were all under one common flood 
 and depth of tears. But the Spirit of God moved
 
 234 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 upon the face of that depth : God took pleasure, and 
 found a savor of rest in our peaceful chearfulness, 
 and in our joyful and confident apprehension of 
 blessed days in His Government, whom he had 
 prepared at first and preserved so often for us. 
 
 " As the Rule is true, Cum de Malo principe posteri 
 tacent, manifestum est vilem facere prcesentem, when 
 men dare not speak of the vices of a Prince that 
 is dead, it is certain that the Prince that is alive 
 proceeds in the same vices ; so the inversion of 
 the Rule is true too, Cum de bono principe loquuntur, 
 when men may speak freely of the virtues of a 
 dead Prince, it is an evident argument that the 
 present Prince practises the same vertues ; for, if 
 he did not, he would not love to hear of them. 
 Of her, we may say (that which was well said, and 
 therefore it were pity it should not be once truly 
 said, for so it was not when it was first said to the 
 Emperor Julian), nihil humile aut abjectum cogitavil, 
 quia novit de se semper loquendum; she knew the 
 world would talk of her after her death, and there- 
 fore she did such things all her life were worthy 
 to be talked of" (p. 351). 
 
 There have been three deans who stand out 
 from the decanal multitude as ideal occupiers of 
 the metropolitan stall, men at once of broad 
 culture, fine eloquence, and passionate piety 
 Colet, Donne, and Church. They had much in 
 common, despite the differences proper to their
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 235 
 
 different periods, and one point especially, that 
 though living in the heart of the great city, they 
 pursued the fallentis semita vitce. It was a maxim of 
 Colet, and may well have been the maxim of his 
 like-minded successors, Si vis divinus esse, late ut 
 Deus. I was glad to see on my last visit to St. 
 Paul's that Donne's monument, in which he is 
 figured in his shroud, had been restored to the 
 south aisle. (See Walton's Life.) 
 
 By the way, I observe an appeal to men of 
 wealth in the newspapers, bidding them come 
 forward with subscriptions to decorate in St. 
 Paul's what still needs decorating. The appeal is 
 feathered with the promise to find room in the 
 scheme of decoration for the donor's coat-of-arms. 
 Certainly heraldic shields are highly decorative, 
 but except on monuments they seem a little out of 
 place in a cathedral. But the custom is, of course, 
 ancient and well established. Savonarola records 
 it in one of his Lenten sermons just four centuries 
 ago. " How is it that if I were to say, Give me 
 ten ducats to one in need, thou wouldst not give 
 them ? but if I tell thee, Spend a hundred for a 
 chapel here in St. Mark, wouldst thou do it ? Yes ! 
 in order to have thy coat-of-arms placed there. 
 Look through all convent buildings, and thou wilt 
 find them full of their founders' armorial bearings. 
 I raise my head to look above a door, thinking to 
 see a crucifix, and behold there is a shield ; I raise
 
 236 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 my head again a little further on, and behold there 
 is another shield. I don a vestment, thinking that 
 a crucifix is painted on it ; but arms have been 
 painted even there, the better to be seen by the 
 people." 
 
 1 4th. I dined yesterday with to meet a 
 
 few of his Irish friends. They had all been, as it 
 turned out, at Trinity College together, and there 
 is no such college for camaraderie. " I am so glad 
 you think so," one would say, " for your opinion 
 on a point like that is worth having." " I have 
 never forgotten," the other would presently take 
 occasion to remark, " the admirable way you put 
 that objection in Kottabos." To the mere outsider, 
 who had been bred but at an English university, 
 the utmost compliment they would allow was, " I 
 see your meaning." We had many anecdotes. 
 One was of Dr. Henry, the eccentric physician 
 and Virgilian commentator, who in his former 
 capacity refused to charge more than a five-shilling 
 fee, and wrote " Strictures on the Autobiography 
 of Dr. Cheyne," the fashionable practitioner of the 
 day ; and in the latter wandered over Europe on 
 foot, crossing the Alps seventeen times, in search 
 of illustrative matter for his "^Eneidea." On his 
 deathbed, what troubled him was the view he had 
 previously expressed about Dido ; with his last gasp 
 he said, " Dido was never married to Siehaeus/' 
 
 Another anecdote with the right Irish flavour
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 237 
 
 was of a Roman deacon sent to baptize a baby. 
 In the cabin he could find no water, but there 
 was a pot of tea. " Tea," he reasoned, " contains 
 water, the rest is but accident," and proceeded to 
 pour out a cup. But it was strong, even to black- 
 ness, so he went in search of water, and having 
 found some watered the tea down to a more 
 reasonable colour, christened the baby with it, 
 and reported the circumstance, as a case of con- 
 science, to his superior. It had not occurred to 
 him, having found the water, to use it by itself. 
 Other stories were donnish. One was of an under- 
 graduate's telegram : " I have missed my train ; 
 what shall I do ? I will come by the next." 
 Another, of a tutor's letter of condolence sent to a 
 bereaved parent. This was unkindly attributed to 
 Oxford. The tutor wrote : " I am sincerely grieved 
 to hear the sad news of your son's death. But I 
 must inform you he would have had to go down 
 in any case, as he had failed to satisfy the examiners 
 in classical Moderations." 
 
 23^. Bob is anxious to collect something 
 that no one else collects, and I have suggested 
 " dictionaries." . It will last him a year, cost only 
 a trifle, and give him a good deal of amusement 
 into the bargain. Cotgrave will enlarge his voca- 
 bulary of slang. I should like to have known 
 Cotgrave ; his conversation must have been highly 
 nervous and picturesque. Open the book any-
 
 238 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 where. Take, for instance, his explanation of 
 niais. " A neastling ; hence, a youngling, novice, 
 cunnie, ninnie, fop, noddie, cockney, dotterell, 
 peagoose ; a simple, witlesse, and unexperienced 
 gull." What a man to quarrel with ! I wonder 
 what Mrs. Cotgrave was like ! Under so tame a 
 word as journe'e you find an entry like this : 
 "Journee des Esperons. The battell of Spurres, 
 woon in the year 1513 by the English upon the 
 French, possessed with a sudden feare, and pre- 
 ferring one paire of heeles before two paire of 
 hands." That in a French-English dictionary ! 
 And history is not the only subject in which he 
 shows himself proficient. This is what he has to 
 say s. v. Haricot : " Mutton sod with little turneps, 
 some wine, and tosts of bread crumbled among ; 
 'tis also made otherwise, of small peeces of mutton 
 first a little sodden then fried in seam, with sliced 
 onions, and lastly boiled in beefe broath with 
 Parsley, Isop, and Sage : And in another fashion, 
 of livers boyled in a pipkin with sliced onions and 
 lard, verjuice, red wine, and vinegar, and served 
 up with tosts, small spices, and (sometimes) chopped 
 hearbs." Perhaps the most racy of all are his 
 versions of French proverbs. For vogue la gallere 
 he gives : " Let the world wag, slide, goe how it 
 will ; let goe, a God's name : not a pin matter 
 whether we sinke or swimme." Occasionally he 
 offers a metrical version.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 239 
 
 Then there is Bullokar, who, as befits a Doctor 
 of Physick, devotes himself chiefly to scientific 
 terms, as science was then understood ; that is to 
 say, he gives elaborate descriptions of the Phenix 
 and Scolopendra, &c., and of such famous trees as 
 the Sethim, " which never rotteth," from which 
 the Ark was made. Cockeram is even more 
 interesting, for he supplies not only easy words 
 for hard, but hard words for easy ; so that a 
 would-be gallant like Sir Andrew Aguecheek could 
 garnish his speech with picked phrases. Thus, for 
 "to vex" is given perasperate; for "to spurn" 
 apolactise; for to " put off your hat," vail your 
 bonnet. Occasionally our gallant might be misled, 
 as when he is told that the fine word for "false 
 witness " '^pseudo-martyr. Then there are Palsgrave 
 and Minsheu, whose " Guide into Tongues " con- 
 tains the first known list of subscribers, and a 
 very interesting list it is. And from the Stuarts 
 one can go back to the Promptorium Parvuloruw, 
 Catholicon Anglicum, &c., or on to Johnson and 
 his successors. 
 
 Bob also asks for a motto for his book-plate. I 
 have suggested Optimi Consiliarii Mortui, as appro- 
 priate to a collecter of old books. It might not 
 be amiss for the bulk of new books as well. 
 
 30/7*. We have had Lord Mayors who quoted 
 Latin, and Lord Mayors who talked French ; now 
 comes a Lord Mayor who lectures upon English.
 
 240 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 You should not say " Where do you come from ? " 
 " Where are you going to ? " his lordship is re- 
 ported as urging upon the boys of the City of 
 London School. " Such phrases are a misuse of 
 your magnificent English. Above all, you should 
 never say It's awfully jolly. What is awful is not 
 jolly, and that which is jolly is never awful." The 
 that which of the last sentence looks like a desperate 
 effort of the Lord Mayor to bring himself up to 
 his own magnificent standard of seventeenth- 
 century idiom. But do people in the City really 
 talk Old English, or is it confined to the Mansion 
 House ? There is an alderman approaching the 
 chair for whose prelections on history I wait with 
 an awful joy, 1 if the Lord Mayor will allow the 
 expression. For the alderman's history, like the 
 Lord Mayor's English, is seventeenth century, as 
 the following veracious anecdote will show. He 
 was exhibiting to a gentleman some famous pic- 
 tures in the Hall of his Company, portraits of 
 George I. and his consort, which had been mys- 
 teriously lost, and which he by good luck had found 
 in a bric-a-brac shop. " But how," said my friend, 
 "could such treasures a royal gift have been 
 taken so slight care of ? " " Ah," said the alderman, 
 " I have a theory about that, and I give it you for 
 what it is worth : I think they must have disappeared 
 in the confusion caused by the Great Fire ! " 
 
 1 "And snatch a fearful joy." Gray.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 241 
 
 August ist. To Cambridge through Oxford and 
 Bletchley a most tedious journey. I travelled 
 third-class, not because there is no fourth, as the 
 wits say, but hoping the unstuffed carriages would 
 be cooler, as they proved. Besides, I enjoy in 
 certain moods, the humours of " the masses " ; and 
 to-day I was not disappointed. A woman got in 
 presently with two children, the skin of all three 
 being concealed beneath a mask of dirt. But 
 though filthy, she knew her manners. When one 
 of the children sniffed, she sharply reprimanded 
 her and bade her use her handkerchief ; and the 
 dear child produced from her pocket a rag as 
 black as my hat. A party of workmen who 
 entered later extinguished their pipes with com- 
 plimentary references to this good woman, and 
 laid themselves out to amuse the children ; one 
 who had red hair putting it out of window for a 
 danger signal, &c. 
 
 6th. Bal . We are to spend three weeks 
 
 here with , who still shoots over his ancestral 
 
 moor instead of selling the privilege to some 
 wealthy Saxon. We travelled by the night train, 
 Tom and Bob and I in a corridor compartment, 
 the ladies in the wagon-lit, I fear I was but poor 
 company. I had just been reading " Les Aveugles," 
 for culture comes slowly up this way ; and the 
 portentous gloom of that work of imagination 
 " garr'd me grue," as folk say up here. So com- 
 
 Q
 
 242 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 pletely had it hypnotised me that I found it impos- 
 sible to contribute anything to the conversation 
 but a repetition of the most insignificant of my 
 neighbours' remarks, as though they were full of 
 profound meaning. With growing sleepiness the 
 conversation became still more Maeterlinckian, till 
 it altogether dropped into silence. When we were 
 roused at Carlisle by the official coming to examine 
 tickets, the sight of my neighbours fumbling hope- 
 lessly about them, and the strange, impassive face 
 of the collector between the two rows of us so 
 startled my dazed senses, that for a moment I 
 thought with horror that we were all ourselves in 
 the play. We had a ten-mile drive from the rail- 
 way terminus, and I sat on the box by the coach- 
 man, who gave me the names, with more or less 
 scorn, of the owners or occupiers of the chateaux 
 we passed. 
 
 9//i. Among some tea-party guests to-day we 
 were presented to a lady who credits herself with 
 " second sight." Though Southron-bred, and not 
 prone to this particular superstition, I confess to 
 having felt some uneasiness in her presence, as 
 part of her quality is to see people's faces more or 
 less covered with a grey veil, according as their 
 death is nearer or further off. Sophia kept her 
 own veil resolutely down, and I did not happen 
 to interest her. Tom did, and though he avoided 
 the good lady to the best of his power, and even
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 243 
 
 at last took refuge in the smoking-room, she tracked 
 him thither ; and from what I could afterwards glean 
 amongst his frequent exclamations of " Fudge ! " 
 the sibyl had given him a date on which he would 
 be in peril of a watery grave. It will be interest- 
 ing to see if he will give up his cruise to Norway. 
 Another odd power possessed by this lady is that 
 of seeing one's head in an aura of other heads, 
 these being the people who have most influenced 
 one. I was delighted to learn that my own cloud 
 of witnesses was so nebulous as to be indistinguish- 
 able. Others may lay this to my bad memory ; I 
 prefer to impute it to original genius. Eugenia's 
 most prominent ghostly companion was a young 
 person with what seemed to be a halo. Him she 
 claimed as St. Aldate, the saint for whom she has 
 peculiar devotion. But I tell her St. Aldate has 
 been exploded by the young Oxford historians ; 
 
 and the wraith is probably the new curate at 
 
 in his soft felt hat. We were greatly pleased at the 
 sibyl's success with Tom. " Only one head," said 
 she, " is very plainly marked ; and that is furnished 
 with a stubby chin-beard ; and has something odd 
 about the eyes, not a cast, nor a squint. . . ." 
 " It is a glass eye, ma'am," said Tom, " if, as I 
 infer, you are describing my gamekeeper." Surely 
 this is a new thing even in ghosts, the ghost with 
 a glass eye ! 
 
 In the evening we sat round the fire in the hall
 
 244 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 and told ghost stories, beginning with the ghost of 
 the house, of whom I then learned for the first 
 time. It haunts the corridor, which is perhaps 
 considerate ; though if I were a ghost I should 
 haunt the dining- or smoking-room, not of course 
 for the creature comforts, but for the society. 
 Scotland has this great advantage over England, 
 that in any company there are sure to be one or 
 two persons who have seen a ghost themselves. 
 One lady had seen several, but the particulars were 
 not especially remarkable, except in the case of 
 one which she saw in a street in Dresden pointing 
 to a scaffolded house, which fell the next day, 
 killing several persons. Another lady was more 
 sensitive with the ear than the eye. She was 
 sleeping in a room at a girls' school opening into 
 a large dormitory ; at the door came several raps, 
 and opening it suddenly, she found nothing at the 
 other side. By the post she heard that her aged 
 father had been picked up fainting outside her 
 bedroom door at home, at which he had knocked, 
 forgetting her absence. In another house, the 
 lower part of which had once formed part of 
 a monastery, she was nursing her mother who 
 was ill with heart disease ; and hearing suddenly 
 the cellar doors being unbarred, and suspecting 
 burglars, she hurried downstairs with the plate 
 that was brought to her mother's room every night, 
 to bribe the thieves to depart, fearing that the
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 245 
 
 shock of their appearance would kill the old lady. 
 But the doors were all fast. 
 
 1 2th. A fine day in every sense. But, admiring 
 Goldsmith's art in leaving his famous ""Grouse in 
 the gun-room " story to the imagination, I shall 
 follow his example. 
 
 I5//2. Now that the first fierce zest of slaughter 
 has been satiated, I have begun to explore the 
 beauties of this romantic neighbourhood. The 
 brown-watered river flows through the strath, and 
 there is fascination enough in hanging upon the 
 bridge or walking along the side to watch the 
 water swirling under. We came this morning 
 upon a little dell with a cascade dashing down 
 through it, and on the banks here and there 
 among ferns and thistles a rich poisonous-look- 
 ing plant, which, not being botanists, we named 
 " Aglavaine." It was a picture out of the " Faery 
 Queene," and if Una had appeared with her lion 
 we should hardly have been surprised. A little 
 higher, we found ourselves in Beulah, with the 
 Delectable Mountains full in view. 
 
 In the afternoon we made an excursion to 
 
 in a waggonette, indulging by the way in a form 
 of reciprocal torture, each side calling the attention 
 of the other to the beauties at its back. At the 
 best of times one resents having the obvious beau- 
 ties of the landscape pointed out to one ; even the 
 transports of the judicious are somewhat boring.
 
 246 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Coleridge tells a story of how at the Falls of Clyde 
 he was unable to find a word to express his feel- 
 ings. At last a stranger at his side said, " How 
 majestic ! " It was the precise term, and Coleridge 
 turned round and was saying, " Thank you, sir ; 
 that is the exact word for it," when the stranger 
 added in the same breath, " Yes, how very pretty ! " 
 One sight much impressed me. As we were nearing 
 a bridge with a single span, arching considerably, 
 a flock of Highland sheep with black twisting 
 horns appeared suddenly crowding the ridge in 
 face of us. It was quite beautiful. 
 
 i*]th. This duel between the French and Italian 
 princes is a godsend to the newspapers, and, taking 
 tale and moral together, fills many columns. The 
 moral of the matter is really very simple. Selden 
 in the Table Talk is reported as having said : " War 
 is lawful, because God is the only Judge betwixt 
 two that are supreme. Now, if a difference happen 
 betwixt two subjects, and it cannot be decided by 
 human testimony, why may they not put it to God 
 to judge between them by the permission of the 
 prince ? Nay, why should we not bring it down, 
 for argument's sake, to the swordmen ? One gives 
 me the lie ; 'tis a great disgrace to take it, the law 
 has made no provision to give remedy for the injury, 
 why am I not in this case supreme, and may there- 
 fore right myself ? " We have only to remember 
 that modern law has made provision to remedy
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 247 
 
 such injuries to see that duelling is therefore as 
 indefensible in these days as the old " wager of 
 battle," of which indeed it is a survival. 
 
 i8//z. A misty morning; what we English in 
 our violent idiom call " raining cats and dogs." 
 The books of the house did not, at the first blush, 
 look alluring. " Saurin's Sermons " (who was 
 Saurin ?), " The Scottish Biographical Dictionary," 
 The Edinburgh Review from the commencement, 
 Boswell's "Tour in the Hebrides" I noted 
 that for use if better books failed and then my 
 eye lighted on " Sir Charles Grandison." It was 
 just the book for the situation. At noon it cleared 
 suddenly, and we ventured out to the Highland 
 sports at . Of the party was a French pro- 
 fessor, a member of the Franco-Scottish League, 
 who considered it necessary to pay Eugenia com- 
 pliments, the very elaborateness of which would 
 have rendered them innocuous, even if they had 
 not been addressed to the company at large. He 
 compared the colour of the heather to her hair, at 
 which she did not look enchanted. I fancy the 
 compliment was a classical reminiscence, and I 
 fancy too they were not both looking at the same 
 patch ; for the colour varies greatly under so cloudy 
 a sky. The smoke from a cottage chimney which 
 showed blue against the firs gave him a better 
 opportunity. "To think, Mademoiselle Eugenie, 
 that so much beauty the exquisite blue of that
 
 248 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 smoke should depend upon the turbidity of the 
 medium. Is it unnatural that the blue of so 
 beautiful eyes should in their turn mediate a 
 turbidity ? " I don't think Eugenia quite under- 
 stood the theory of turbid media or the point of 
 the application. But the professor proceeded. 
 "It is a grand pity our poets know so little. I am 
 full of ideas, but the expression I can give them 
 does not satisfy. You know our poet Sully Prud- 
 homme. He asks a question which draws tears. 
 
 ' Partout scintillent les couleurs, 
 Mais d'ou vient cette force en elles ? 
 II existe un bleu dont je meurs 
 Parce qu'il est dans les prunelles.' 
 
 How much more tears should he draw, if like me 
 he knew the answer ! " At this point we reached 
 the field. The sports did not differ from those of 
 other places in the Highlands. Our professor grew 
 very eloquent over " tossing the caber." He had 
 no doubt that the sport, like the word, was origin- 
 ally Norman, and had come to Scotland with other 
 essentials of civilisation, such as " napery " and 
 " carafes," in the days when French and Scotch 
 were brothers-in-arms. I confess I have my doubts 
 about this. 1 We Southerners very much resented 
 the intrusion of hornpipes into the dancing com- 
 
 1 I quote the description of " Tossing the Caber" from the "Voces 
 Populi " of Mr. Anstey, a gentleman whose pen is as accurate as it is 
 facile. "The caber a rough fir-trunk twenty-one feet long is tossed, 
 that is, is lifted by six men, set on end, and placed in the hands of the
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 249 
 
 petitions. But on reflection I don't see why High- 
 landers should not be sailors as well as soldiers. 
 
 2$th. Our party, leaving the Toms behind, 
 returned by Edinburgh and York. Sophia left 
 the hospitable roof, according to her custom, with 
 a monstrous bunch of heather, a root or two of 
 tropaeolum, a basket of ferns, and a recipe for 
 scones, begged from the cook. 
 
 On our way to Perth, whom should we meet 
 but our young friend H. and his bride honey- 
 mooning. They were occupied, when we took 
 them by storm, in reading Maeterlinck's " Agla- 
 vaine and Selysette." I could not help congratu- 
 lating H. on finding his Aglavaine, without first 
 declining upon any Selysette with a -range of lower 
 feelings. I confess I forgot at the moment that 
 he had been engaged before ; but as he seemed to 
 have forgotten it too, no harm was done. Sophia, 
 when his present engagement was announced, had 
 been overjoyed, because, as she said, " now neither 
 of them can spoil another pair." I am afraid they 
 both have just a touch of the prig in their consti- 
 tution. When they had left the train at the little 
 station where they are fleeting the time carelessly, 
 Sophia, always tender-hearted, upbraided me with 
 my unkindness in comparing them to " those horrid 
 
 athlete, who after looking at it doubtfully for a time, poises it, raises it 
 a foot or two, and runs several yards with it, after which he jerks it 
 forward by a mighty effort, so as to pitch on the thicker end, and fall 
 over in the direction furthest from him."
 
 250 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 creatures." But it was plain they took my speech 
 for a compliment, as I knew they must. And I 
 protested I had said nothing nearly so unkind as a 
 remark that fell from her. I was saying to the 
 bride, " I suppose, when you get home, you will 
 be setting up a salon ?" And when she blushed 
 and bridled, Sophia put in, " Take my advice, my 
 dear, and set up a salle a manger" Sophia under- 
 values Maeterlinck's play through a feminine dis- 
 taste for irony, which does not allow her to 
 recognise that the author of the prigs knows how 
 priggish they are, even better than the reader. 
 When the book came from Mudie's we had quite 
 a warm discussion over it. " Now," Sophia began, 
 " in the first scene of all ; look at this description 
 of Aglavaine : ' Her hair is very strange . . . you 
 will see ... it seems to take part in every one of 
 her thoughts ... as she is happy or sad, so does 
 her hair smile or weep ; and this even at times 
 when she herself scarcely knows whether she should 
 be happy or whether she should be sad.' What 
 twaddle is that ! " " My dear," I said, " a most 
 unfortunate place to choose for censure. Living 
 here in the retirement of the country you have 
 never chanced to meet a case of emotional hair, 
 that is all. Now I have. At school there was a 
 boy whose hair used to play all sorts of pranks. 
 We used to make him eat marmalade, which he 
 hated but his hair liked, just to make it sit up.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 251 
 
 That is what the poet means here ; both were 
 cases of uncertainty between conflicting emotions." 
 " Well, then," said Sophia, " what does this mean ? 
 ' So long as we know not what it opens, nothing 
 can be more beautiful than a key.' " " My love," 
 I replied, " it means just what it says. I have 
 always admired your chatelaine, and I have not 
 the most distant idea which key fits the jam cup- 
 board. In fact," I continued, "you must accept 
 an author's remarks in the spirit in which they 
 are offered, and if he likes talking about hair and 
 keys, he is not to be blamed because you think 
 these subjects beneath mention. And as to the 
 play, you, my dear, must like Meligraine, and you, 
 Eugenia, cannot help loving Selysette ; and, for 
 my part, I can find a sentiment to echo even in 
 that prince of prigs Meleander : ' I wonder what 
 it is that Heaven will exact in return for having 
 allowed two such women to be near me.'" "And 
 I, too," said Sophia, " can find something to echo 
 even from Aglavaine : ' How beautiful of you ! you 
 grow more beautiful every day ; but do you think 
 it is right to be so beautiful ? ' ' 
 
 At Perth, Sophia started the idea that the luggage 
 had not arrived, although these eyes had seen it 
 labelled and put into the van. So after debating 
 the question we started in search. Certainly it 
 was not to be seen, and the guards knew nothing 
 of it. At last a porter advised us to look if it had
 
 252 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 not already been transferred to the train for Edin- 
 burgh, where we found it. What guerdon Sophia 
 gave to that porter is between themselves. From 
 having been brought up by her grandmother, who 
 flourished in the time of " vails " a word which, 
 curiously enough, still survives in Berkshire for 
 any kind of gratuity Sophia has an idea that 
 every servant who is reasonably civil to her should 
 be lavishly fee'd ; and, despite the injunctions of 
 the railway companies, she saps the altruistic 
 instincts of every guard and porter by the most 
 extravagant tips. At Edinburgh we paraded Princes 
 Street and saw the usual sights. By a wise provi- 
 sion the bonnet shops and book shops are arranged 
 so that husbands and wives may stare at what best 
 pleases them without losing each other. In one 
 shop I had the pleasure of hearing a lady with an 
 American accent ask for a portrait of Charles III.; 
 but the bookseller was no Jacobite, and did not 
 know whom she might be meaning. At the corner 
 of a street we came upon a young prophet preach- 
 ing to about thirty people. He was good-looking 
 and carefully dressed, his camel's hair being shaped 
 into the frock coat of ordinary civilisation. When 
 we came up, he was proving from the Apocalypse 
 that it was foretold the whole Church w r ould lapse 
 into error as a prelude to his re-discovery of the 
 truth. But Sophia does not like standing, and the 
 prophet took so long over the preliminaries that
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 253 
 
 we were forced to pass on without hearing the 
 new revelation. 
 
 I. cannot leave the train at York without remem- 
 bering the ancient tale of a sleepy traveller going 
 North, who, knowing his weakness, begged the 
 guard to see that he was put out at this station, 
 willy-nilly ; but to his disgust found himself at 
 Edinburgh, and " swore consumedly." " Well, 
 sir," said the guard, "you can swear a bit, but 
 nothing to the gentleman I put out at York.'* 
 Some publisher might do a good turn to himself 
 and to an impoverished order if he would com- 
 mission a few clergymen in each county to collect 
 the humorous tales of their district before they 
 lose all their original brightness. Yorkshire is 
 especially rich in such stories, the prevailing 
 quality being dry. The following was given me 
 recently by a Yorkshireman as an example of 
 " red-tape." A man is lying in extremis, while his. 
 daughter takes from the pot a fine ham. The old 
 man asks for a slice, and is met by the rebuff : 
 " Thee get on with thy deeing ; t' ham's for t* 
 funeral." 
 
 2jth. Home. We left summer behind and 
 find autumn here ; for raspberries, blackberries. 
 Bicycles have once more to take heed to their ways, 
 for the hedges are being clipped, and the stone walls 
 of Scotland had encouraged us to ride carelessly. 
 
 3o//f. The value of local tradition was well
 
 254 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 illustrated this morning by a speech of my neigh- 
 bour, old John Brown. I was showing a visitor 
 what few traces are left us of antiquity, and especi- 
 ally a field called " England's piece," which I have 
 no doubt, from its neighbourhood to an old camp 
 
 called Castle, was the scene of some battle 
 
 or skirmish between the English and Danes. Old 
 Brown was leaning over the fence at the time, and 
 I asked him if he had heard about any battle 
 fought there. " It were the battle of Waterloo, 
 sir," said he, "so they say, 'wever ; and I thinks 
 they're right, becos ye can see the bullut marks in 
 
 the fence." Speaking of Castle reminds me 
 
 of another curious piece of antiquarian intelligence. 
 The gentleman whose property it is has built a 
 keeper's lodge there in the castellated style ; and 
 once, when putting up for a picnic, I asked the 
 keeper by way of pleasantry whether that were 
 the castle, and was thunderstruck and delighted 
 to hear his answer : " Well, sir, some says it is, 
 some says it ain't : for myself, I rather think it 
 must be, and I'll tell you why : there s so much more 
 room inside than you'd think from looking at /?." 
 
 3 is/. A propos of my remarks on the sometimes 
 conflicting ideals of religion and gentlemanliness, 
 a lady sends me an amusing anecdote of a friend 
 who bewailed to her the loss of a somewhat ill- 
 bred but extremely wealthy neighbour, who had 
 been very liberal in his help to her country
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 255 
 
 charities. " Mr. X. is dead," said she ; " he was 
 so good and kind and helpful to me in all sorts 
 of ways ; he was so vulgar, poor dear fellow, we 
 could not know him in London ; but we shall 
 meet in heaven." 
 
 September ^rd. Birds are plentiful, so are hares. 
 There was once a Major Cartwright, a friend of 
 H. C. Robinson's, who used to give his friends an 
 invaluable piece of advice : " Always roast your 
 hare with the skin on." The Doctor told me a tale 
 this morning of a young novice in his profession 
 who was also somewhat of a novice with the gun, 
 and, after he had missed several coveys, the old 
 keeper said to him, " Let me have a shot. I'll doctor 
 'em." This is the best story so far this season. 
 
 Eugenia has been bringing a little colour into 
 the drab complexion of our village life by driving 
 her donkeys tandem. The result has justified the 
 experiment, for both donkeys go better together 
 than apart. The reason is simple. The leader 
 trots his best because he thinks he is not in the 
 cart, and the wheeler always goes well when there 
 is a horse or another donkey on ahead. 
 
 I had an odd dream last night. For some 
 reason I was attending a law lecture, and when I 
 first woke I could remember a good deal of it. 
 All I can now recall is one sentence. "This is 
 known as Statellion's case. He was servant to 
 Robert Burns, and was stabbed by him at a High-
 
 256 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 land wedding. In this case it was ruled that esse 
 in law is to be understood to mean esse ni fallor. 
 Thus ' I am stiff ' is to be construed, ' If I mistake 
 not, I am stiff.' " Sophia used to keep a book of 
 my bed-talk, but she once showed it me, and I 
 entreated her to destroy it. I may not be a 
 brilliant converser at the best of times, but I am 
 not such a fool as my sub-liminal personality, nor 
 am I such a humbug. For my s. 1. p. has, it 
 seems, a way of pulling up and feigning sleep just 
 when its remarks should begin to get interesting. 
 Thus, a few weeks since, according to Sophia, I 
 roused the darkness with the following important 
 observation : " The exact difference between 
 Whistler's etching and Seymour Haden's is . . ." 
 (snore). On another occasion this was on a 
 Sunday night I recited an original hymn, becom- 
 ing inaudible at the end of the lines, where the 
 rhymes ought to have been. The only scrap 
 Sophia got hold of was 
 
 " Do thy duty without works ; 
 It gives thee grace beyond thy will " 
 
 which is sufficiently mystical, not to say Antinomian. 
 $th (Saturday). I was on my way to the christen- 
 ing of T/s child at . The day was cold, and 
 
 the rector's wife is a motherly person. As we 
 stood round the font, the rector took up the ewer 
 and poured in the water. It was boiling, and the
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 257 
 
 steam ascended to the roof. As the rector is tall 
 and dignified, the action had a very solemn air, 
 and reminded me of the pictures of patriarchal 
 sacrifice in the old family Bible. There was no 
 cold water to be had, so there was nothing for it 
 but to sit down and wait. I noticed that the 
 village inn is called the "Angel," but exhibits on 
 its signboard an infant Bacchus wreathed with 
 grapes and sitting on a cask. I suppose he has 
 been christened. 
 
 A few friends to dinner. Talk fell on Tennyson. 
 Some one mentioned that one of his best poems, 
 the ode "To a Mourner," was very little known, 
 because it had been slipped in amongst the 1842 
 poems in a late edition. As an artist everybody 
 was disposed to rank him very high. I mentioned 
 that one of the most convincing proofs of his con- 
 summate skill was the leaving one line unrhymed 
 in the " Break, break, break," and " Oh that 'twere 
 possible ! " to gain the effect of spontaneity. 
 S. had a fling at " In Memoriam," but I defended 
 it, and especially the metre, which always seems 
 to me excellently chosen. The best proof of that 
 is the fact that Whewell accidentally fell into it 
 in writing a very emphatic sentence : 
 
 " And so no force however great, 
 Can strain a cord, however fine, 
 Into a horizontal line 
 That shall be [absolutely] straight." 
 
 R
 
 258 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 I have seen the passage, and the word is not 
 " absolutely," but I cannot remember what it is. 
 Talking of sonnets, some one praised E. C. Lefroy's 
 as the best written of late years, and I should 
 agree. There is an interesting memoir of him just 
 appeared, with a collected edition of his poems. 
 Old General X. was very anxious to show us how 
 the great Duke of Wellington used to eat figs. 
 But it turned out to be the ordinary way quadri- 
 section down to the stalk, and then four licks. 
 
 jth. I was amused by receiving through the 
 post a curious request from a blushing bridegroom, 
 whose father is a very old family friend, for advice 
 as to taming a shrew. He had read Shake- 
 speare's play in his secret chamber, but thought 
 the method rather violent, and not easy to put in 
 practice. In reply I have told him that I am 
 happily without experience, but as pure matter of 
 theory I think Shakespeare's principle excellent, 
 though its application in these days would have to 
 be Victorian, and not Tudor. The principle is 
 to have the worse temper of the two, and if an 
 occasion of dispute presents itself, to begin first 
 and finish last. People of original genius would 
 no doubt be able to devise methods of their own 
 proper to the special case. Thus, I have heard 
 of a literary man who let it be understood he was 
 preparing an essay on the Unreasonableness of 
 Women, and whenever his cara sposa became
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 259 
 
 shrewish, he would pull out his pocket-book and 
 make notes with an affectation of absorbed interest ; 
 which was not without effect his wife having 
 brains and some humour upon the volume and 
 brackishness of the stream. But it is, as a rule, 
 your unreasoning and unhumorous woman who 
 makes your shrew, and, notwithstanding the spread 
 of education, few women care to reason, and still 
 fewer have imagination enough to see things from 
 any point of view but their own. And yet men, 
 forgetting this elementary fact of psychology, go 
 on putting things to their wives in a clear and 
 convincing light, which is like pouring oil on a 
 fire. The only safety for those who feel the 
 method of Petruchio beyond them lies in flight 
 to some coward's castle, club, or billiard-room, or 
 library. Sophia, to whom I have communicated 
 these sentiments for criticism, thinks them un- 
 worthy of me, and insists that all shrewishness 
 comes either from bad health or confined interests. 
 If a young husband, she says, would choose his 
 house with some reference to his wife's neuralgia 
 as well as his own fishing, and would play chess 
 or piquet, or read Dante with her in the evenings, 
 and not be always praising his sisters, there would 
 be no shrews to be tamed. But Sophia was always 
 an optimist. 
 
 The local paper contains once more the adver- 
 tisement of a secluded residence in a " remote part
 
 260 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 of the county," that unmistakably means . 
 
 We welcome every change, but every change so 
 far has been for the worse. Within the last ten 
 years the house has been occupied by a fraudulent 
 bankrupt ; a major who had a sunstroke in India, 
 and if you crossed him would bite not his thumb 
 at you, but your thumb at him ; a gentleman 
 " with no visible means of subsistence," except a 
 very rough pony that he rode about, and a piece 
 of wood that he carved as he went ; a widow with 
 seven virgin orphans, who would talk nothing but 
 peerage ; a chicken farmer whose chickens were 
 impounded by the Cruelty to Animals Society ; 
 and at present by a person who eloped with his 
 neighbour's wife. Who will succeed ? The house 
 is so near that it is next to impossible not to 
 be affected by its occupants. It is that word 
 " secluded " that does all the mischief. I wish 
 Tom would buy the place and let it to a decent 
 tenant. 
 
 loth. A cold in the head has confined me to 
 the house for two days. These days indoors ought 
 to be so profitable, but are so useless. What 
 could one not read if only one's eyes and spirits 
 would permit one to read at all ! I have found it 
 impossible to do anything more intellectual than 
 paste book-plates into recent purchases, and sort 
 through letters. The last task is penitential. I 
 have so great a reverence for the written word 
 
 O
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 261 
 
 that I find it hard to destroy any but the most 
 trivial notes. And then the accumulation "cries 
 on havoc." Some day I must sort the old piles, 
 but from such an heroical adventure nature shrinks. 
 " Sometimes the friend is dead, sometimes the friend- 
 ship." And one must let sleeping friendships lie. 
 
 People are disposed to blame the penny post 
 for the decay of letter-writing, but they forget that 
 there was a penny post last century for letters in 
 London, while for others there were franks. So 
 that cheapness has little to do with it. I suspect 
 the fact that letters were known to be preserved 
 had not a little to do with the pains taken about 
 writing them. Other people besides Miss Jenkyns 
 experimented on a slate before seizing the last 
 half-hour before post time to put their mature 
 thoughts on paper. I remember still, though it 
 was a good many years ago, the shock I received 
 from seeing a friend crunch up a letter of mine 
 and throw it into his waste-paper basket. He did 
 it mechanically, and the epistle deserved no better 
 fate. But since that time, though all my letters 
 are too careless, those to him have been mere 
 scribble. Were I ever to write the one sermon 
 which all good laymen yearn to write, it should 
 be on the power of faith, or expectation, to 
 create the qualities, good or bad, with which it 
 credits people. Possunt quia posse videntur ; but 
 also non possunt, quia non posse videntur.
 
 262 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 igth. At the Harvest Festival to-day the Vicar 
 was badly stung by a wasp, attracted to him by 
 the ripe fruits with which the pulpit had been 
 lavishly decorated. It chose his leg for attack. I 
 have not yet received my annual sting, and feel like 
 Damocles whenever I think of it. What happens 
 is this. A wasp comes in at the window, and gets 
 warm and sleepy. When the lamps are lit it wakes 
 up, crawls along the bright edge of a piece of 
 furniture or the under side of a door-handle, and 
 you press it with unsuspecting hand. Or else it 
 crawls up your coat on to your neck ; your collar 
 squeezes it, and it " sits down." 
 
 loth. I called at the Vicarage this afternoon to 
 inquire, and found the wasp forgotten in a more 
 serious sting. " One fire drives out one fire." It 
 is an odd thing about the Vicar that his nose swells 
 and reddens when he is angry. He ought to be 
 told this, as the knowledge would make for peace. 
 I found he had been discussing with Tom a pro- 
 posal to cut down a tree on the glebe, to open a 
 view, as the Vicarage is pretty much shut in ; to 
 which Tom would by no means consent, on the 
 ground that the next vicar might prefer not to 
 have a view, and that it was easier to take trees 
 down than put them up again. The Vicar was 
 feeling righteously indignant, and spoke of appeal- 
 ing to the Archdeacon ; but I dissuaded him, as 
 the lay and clerical authorities are at present
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 263 
 
 sufficiently embroiled. " Why not," I said, " if 
 you want a view, walk over every morning and 
 enjoy Tom's ; or, better still, cut your tree up 
 instead of cutting it down ? " On our walk the 
 Vicar described to me Mr. Caine's new story, which 
 he had felt bound to read in the interest of his 
 profession. " He proposes to us," said he, " a 
 homicidal maniac, and worse, for a typical Chris- 
 tian, and shows his intimate knowledge of Church 
 affairs by blundering over so simple a matter as 
 the Marriage Service." He went on to suggest 
 getting some rich member of the House of Laymen 
 to endow a lectureship to literary men and women 
 on the clerical office and character. "Just look," 
 he said, " at the parson of fiction ; he is a priest 
 pour rire. Whether he is dressed up as a Cowley 
 father, or sits in his rectory garden cracking up 
 his creed ' into nuts and shells mere,' did you ever 
 meet anything like him in real life ? Look at Mr. 
 Hope's ' Father Stafford ' ! Look at the young 
 gentleman in Stevenson, who, though he had been 
 in orders several years, had not yet obtained his 
 first curacy." I thought the idea of the lectureship 
 a good one, especially if an occasional lecture were 
 given to poets and pressmen on clerical vestments 
 and ritual. Poets think a stole a sufficient cover- 
 ing for anybody in all sorts of weather. Milton 
 even sends out Morning in nothing but an amice, 
 which is the priest's neckcloth to keep his macassar
 
 264 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 from soiling the chasuble ; it survives also (if it 
 does survive) in what are called " bands." 
 
 " Thus passed the night so foul, till morning fair 
 Came forth with pilgrim steps in amice grey." 
 
 The Press is improving, but is still capable of 
 much, as any one may see from the Times account 
 of the recent doings at Ebbsfleet Roman, I regret 
 to say, but still deserving a skilled reporter. 1 
 
 Later in the day I came across Tom, who was 
 very amusing about the Vicar's view. " He says 
 to live in a ring-fence suffocates him, and he thinks 
 to fell a tree would relieve his oppression. It re- 
 minds me of the man at an inn who woke up in 
 the night and thought he couldn't sleep till he had 
 opened the window ; but he couldn't find the 
 fastening, so he smashed a pane, and then went to 
 sleep again like a top. In the morning he found 
 lie had broken a pane in the bookcase. Besides, I 
 know this mania for views and cutting grows on a 
 man : in ten years there wouldn't be a stick on the 
 glebe." " Speaking of stories," I said, " do you 
 remember the amusing old woman who, when her 
 servants overslept themselves half-an-hour on Mon- 
 day morning, called upstairs, ' Girls, it is six o'clock ; 
 to-morrow's Tuesday, and the next day's Wednes- 
 
 1 Lord Beaconsfield in "Endymion" speaks of "an aggregation of 
 lands baptized 'by protocols and christened by treaties." I wonder what 
 he took the difference to be.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 265 
 
 day ; here's half the week gone, and no work 
 done'?" 
 
 For my own part I sympathise with both Tom 
 and the Vicar : with Tom because I inherit my 
 father's distaste for the axe, and with the Vicar 
 from an experience of our early married life. 
 When we came to our present home, which was 
 then a farmhouse, there was on the lawn a gigantic 
 horse-chestnut tree. For the first year we let it 
 stand, and pointed out to all our guests what a 
 magnificent creature it was, as we drank our tea 
 beneath its " spreading " branches. And then 
 Sophia said one day : " My dear, this is a very 
 beautiful tree it always reminds me of Longfellow, 
 and makes me feel poetical ; but wouldn't it be 
 well to make a few windows in it to let in a little 
 air ? And perhaps it would be nice now and then 
 to see what the sun was doing. I sometimes think 
 it may have something to do with the maids' 
 anaemia." So after a little more talking the 
 colossal vegetable was doomed, and as limb after 
 limb was severed we felt very miserable and wicked. 
 Eugenia, who was just four years old, burst into 
 tears, and said, "I shall sit down on the grass;" 
 I suppose in self-abasement, but I never quite 
 understood what she meant ; and then suddenly 
 a gust from the north-west came through. It was 
 a sparkling September day, much like this, and to 
 have real wind in our own garden was so intoxicat-
 
 266 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 ing an experience that we laughed and played 
 idiotic gambols. The tree, in fact, was a fiend ; it 
 had for years absorbed all the fresh air like a 
 mammoth sponge, and left the garden stagnant. 
 
 2 is/. We are having a St. Matthew's summer. 
 To Oxford. We took the new guide-book, and 
 explored some of the colleges we less frequently 
 visit. Coming out of the lovely chapel at Trinity, 
 I glanced at a notice on the door in a familiar 
 hand, when an American remarked, " It is in 
 Latin," as who should say, " You're bit." I 
 thanked him for his information, and then he asked 
 whether, as he supposed this was the chief college 
 in the University, his son might try to enter, and 
 if he failed, whether he might try somewhere else ; 
 on which points I satisfied him as well as I could. 
 We peeped into Balliol, but the modern spirit was 
 too much for us. Time being money at this college, 
 the grass-plot in the front quad had been cut up 
 into triangles by gravel paths seeking the shortest 
 distance between every two doors. Wadham gave 
 us a great deal of pleasure, especially the garden 
 front, but the paths would be all the better for a 
 little of the Balliol gravel. The porter at All Souls' 
 was very sympathetic, and after sending us into 
 the chapel, which was open, while he finished his 
 newspaper, took us round, and showed us many 
 things of which guide-books make no mention. 
 For example, in the magnificent Codrington Library
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 267 
 
 he aroused a curious echo by clapping his hands 
 at a particular spot, rapped a marble table till it 
 rang like metal, and pointed out a peculiar expres- 
 sion on the face of the great Blackstone statue, 
 which on the hither side smiled and on the further 
 frowned true emblem of the law, from the point 
 of view of us litigants. If I were a bachelor, and 
 had the necessary qualifications, and could live in 
 the physical and spiritual atmosphere of Oxford, I 
 should choose to be a Fellow of All Souls', as was 
 an ancestor of mine in Henry VIII.'s time. There 
 nothing can disturb the mind bent on study, and 
 there are no undergraduates to vex the spirit ; and 
 if the cook, as may happen in any earthly paradise, 
 is unequal to himself at any meal, why one's 
 
 " Choler would be overblown 
 By walking once about the quadrangle," 
 
 as Shakespeare says. 
 
 2^th. I have received a letter from a young 
 lady at Wycombe who is kind enough to say she 
 dotes on my Diary, but asks, why don't I write a 
 " day-book " instead, like Bethia H. (name illegible), 
 because then I could bring in the dear old-fashioned 
 names of flowers, and give funny recipes from old 
 cookery-books, and mix some original poetry in 
 with it about morality and hellebore, and so on, in 
 those lovely Herricky verses, don't I know ? (I fear 
 I don't). And I am not to forget some astronomy,
 
 268 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 because they are doing astronomy at school, and 
 the names of the constellations are so delightfully 
 poetical. I fear neither cookery nor morals are 
 much in my way ; but I put the matter to Eugenia, 
 and though she disavowed any deep knowledge of 
 botany, she promised to do what she could, and 
 brought me the following verses on a dandelion : 
 
 " The peeping botanist, with glee, 
 Murmured ' perfection,' eyeing me ; 
 ' Nature,' he said, ' devise ne'er shall 
 A finer ligulifloral.' 
 The smug physician, for a sum, 
 Prescribed me as taraxacum 
 When Giles and Norman, seeking cherries, 
 Had surfeited of arum-berries. 
 Bethia, who in ancient books 
 Hunts quaint receipts to tease her cooks, 
 While meditating some new ballad, 
 Pulled my fresh leaves to make a salad. 
 The garden-boy, whose soul is mud, 
 Hath dug me up with ruthless spud, 
 And on his tumbril borne, I come 
 To slow and smoky martyrdom." 
 
 I told Eugenia that the verses could not, with 
 the widest construction of the term, be considered 
 " Herricky " ; I thought, too, they lacked freedom 
 of movement, and so advised her to try again. 
 Take, I said, something you remember from any 
 conversation we have had about flowers, in the 
 garden or on a walk, and put it into a six-line 
 stanza. This was the result :
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 269 
 
 "To BETHIA, WHO HAD CALLED ATTENTION TO A REMARK- 
 ABLY FINE PLANT OF CHICORY OR SUCCORY. 
 
 " ' How rarely,' quoth Bethia, ' doth one see 
 
 The chic- or succory with flowers so many ! 
 Too often sprawleth it right lazily 
 
 By the wayside, with too few flowers, if any ! 
 For once the plant hath soared to his ideal.' 
 Quoth I, ' Some chance hath sent it a full meal.'" 
 
 I was uncertain whether my correspondent wished 
 the morality to be mixed with the botany, or kept 
 separate. However, I lent Eugenia the " CEuvres 
 morales de M. le due de la Rochefoucault," and 
 this is what she brought me : 
 
 "A QUESTION RESOLVED. 
 
 "What is youth? you bid me guess. 
 'Tis a natural drunkenness. 
 'Tis a fever, slow to cure, 
 Yet without distemperature. 
 'Tis the folly of the reason, 
 'Tis a constitutional treason ; 
 Or, if this Bethia shocks, 
 'Tis any other paradox." 
 
 "ANOTHER QUESTION. 
 
 "'Twixt pride and amour propre the difference say? 
 Pride hates to owe, and amour propre to pay." 
 
 "To MEMORY, MOTHER OF THE MUSES. 
 
 " Blest Memory ! thy sacred nine 
 Could ne'er have babbled half a line 
 If thou, their mother, from thy lore, 
 Had not said much the same before."
 
 270 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Eugenia says she finds the morality easier to do 
 than the botany ; but she will try again at the 
 latter if my correspondent will state a little more 
 circumstantially what she wants, or, better still, 
 send a pattern. The astronomy she fears is 
 beyond her ; but then, most of the poetical names 
 have already been used up. 
 
 October ^th. The old debate between the advan- 
 tages of a town and country life could not but 
 incline, one must think, to the latter when the 
 season comes round for planting and replanting. 
 And yet I do not know that those who have 
 handled the question in poem or essay have made 
 anything of this most important factor in it ; which 
 helps to persuade one that the whole problem is 
 academic, and that the writers on both sides have 
 composed their eclogues in Fleet Street. The 
 only reference I recollect even in Marvell comes 
 in the couplet 
 
 " Transplanting flowers from the green hill 
 To crown her head and bosom fill " 
 
 which looks as if the word " transplanting " bore 
 no real significance to him. I suppose the old 
 4t formal " garden when once made left little scope 
 for improvement. Cowley would have sung these 
 joys in Pindaric strain had he but known them, 
 but he sadly confesses in dedicating his great 
 garden poem to Evelyn, " I stick still in the inn
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 271 
 
 of a hired house and garden, among weeds and 
 rubbish, and without the pleasantest work of human 
 industry, the improvement of something which we 
 call (not very properly, but yet we call) our own." 
 And in the next century Gray takes up the same 
 lament, writing to Norton Nicholls : " And so you 
 have a garden of your own, and you plant and 
 transplant, and are dirty and amused ; are not 
 you ashamed of yourself ? Why, I have no such 
 thing, you monster ; nor ever shall be either dirty 
 or amused as long as I live ! My gardens are in 
 the window like those of a lodger up three pair of 
 stairs in Petticoat Lane or Camomile Street, and 
 they go to bed regularly under the same roof that 
 I do : dear, how charming it must be to walk out 
 in one's own garden, and sit on a bench in the 
 open air with a fountain, and a leaden statue, and 
 a rolling stone, and an arbour !" (June 24, 1769). 
 That is so often what happens : the singers, the 
 Cowleys and Grays, lack experience, and those 
 who have experience cannot sing. This year the 
 rage for improvement has set in with more than 
 common severity, owing to the publication of a 
 very delightful book on gardening, by Mrs. Earle, 
 called " Pot-pourri from a Surrey Garden." I 
 first heard of it one day at breakfast in the follow- 
 ing manner. Eugenia began, " Wouldn't it be 
 nice to make a Dutch garden in the middle of our 
 lawn ? " I was so much taken aback by this out-
 
 272 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 landish proposal that I forbore to deprecate the 
 slang use of the word " nice," and could only 
 repeat " a Dutch garden ? " " Yes," said Eugenia ; 
 "you sink a wall four or five feet all round it, and 
 lay it out with beds and nice tiled walks, and have 
 steps down on each side, and a fountain in the 
 middle and a few statues, and plant tea-roses 
 
 against the wall " " Stop," I cried, " for 
 
 mercy's sake ; may I ask if you have made an 
 estimate of the probable cost of this Dutch para- 
 dise ? Imprimis, bricklayer ; shall we make the 
 enclosure twenty yards square and six feet high ? 
 That will come, with bricks at 303. a thousand, to 
 
 about ^25, and then time at 6d. an hour 
 
 But dare I ask, first, whence this Batavian inspira- 
 tion ? " And then I heard of Mrs. Earle, and how 
 she had pronounced against lawns. Nothing more 
 was heard for a week, and I hoped the infection 
 would pass, but it had bitten too deep ; and seeing 
 the book lying in every house I visited, and seeing, 
 too, the furrowed brows of most fathers of families, 
 I had serious thoughts of becoming a second Lord 
 George Gordon and starting a " No Pot-pourri 
 riot." Then I, too, had an inspiration. " Why," 
 I said, " copy the Dutch ? If the lawn is too 
 large for croquet under new rules, why not make 
 at the end of it a bowling-green, or rather a 
 boulingrin, as it used to be called ? You will save 
 your bricklayer's bill, as the sides are sloped and
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 273 
 
 turfed ; and you will have the satisfaction of doing 
 something a trifle more original than your neigh- 
 bours. The fountain must wait till water will run 
 uphill ; but I know of a noseless stone bust in a 
 curiosity shop that will do for a garden god just 
 as well as for Marcus Aurelius, whose name it now 
 bears." So it was agreed, and I lent Eugenia from 
 the library James's translation of le Blond's book, 1 
 which is full of the most elaborate plates of formal 
 gardens. I took the opportunity last night, when 
 the ladies had retired, to borrow Mrs. E.'s precious 
 volume, and I have found much in it that seems 
 to me true, much that is arguable, and much that, 
 
 1 " The Theory and Practice of Gardening : wherein is fully handled 
 all that relates to fine gardens, commonly called pleasure gardens, 
 consisting of Parterres, Groves, Bowling-Greens, &c. ; containing 
 several plans and general dispositions of gardens, new designs of 
 parterres, groves, grass-plots, mazes, banqueting-rooms, galleries, 
 porticos, and summer-houses of arbour-work, terrasses, stairs, foun- 
 tains, cascades, and other ornaments of use in the decoration and 
 embellishment of Gardens, &c. &c., by Le Sieur Alexander Le Blond. 
 Done from the late edition printed at Paris by John James of Green- 
 wich. 1728." Amongst the advertisements at the end of the book is 
 one worth copying : " England's newest way in all sorts of Cookery, 
 Pastry, and all Pickles that are fit to be used. Adorned with Copper 
 Plates. Setting forth the Manner of placing Dishes upon Tables. 
 And the newest Fashion of Mince Pies. By Henry Howard, Free- 
 Cook of London, and late Cook to his Grace the Duke of Ormond, 
 and since to the Earl of Salisbury, and Earl of Winchilsea. To which 
 are added the best Receipts for making Cakes, Mackroons, Biskets, 
 Gingerbread, /7V<r^-Bread ; as also for preserving, conserving, candy- 
 ing and drying Fruits ; Confectioning and making of Creams, Syllabubs, 
 and Marmalades of several Sorts. Likewise Additions of Beautifying 
 Waters and other Curiosities ; as also above fifty new Receipts are 
 added. Which renders the whole Work compleat. Price 2s. 6J." 
 
 S
 
 274 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 though true, I hold it not discreet to have thus set 
 down, such as the advice to buy second-hand fur- 
 niture. Why drive good taste into a mere fashion, 
 and so quadruple the price of pretty things for 
 those who can appreciate them ? There was a 
 time when silver of a good pattern could be bought 
 cheap because it was old ; now it is dear for the 
 same reason, just because old silver has become 
 fashionable. So with old Sheffield plate. So with 
 old furniture. I deeply offended some young friends 
 the other day by saying of a very beautiful piece of 
 Chippendale in their new-furnished house, "Why, 
 that must have cost ten pounds," when it had cost 
 twenty ; so much have prices risen since I fur- 
 nished. How well I recollect the horror of the 
 new domestics when what little furniture we had 
 arrived after our marriage ! The Persian rugs 
 were sent up to the servants' bedrooms ; and the 
 housemaid at once gave warning, on the ground, 
 as she told a fellow-servant, that "there was not a 
 stick in the house that wasn't second-hand." I 
 remember also, though it is nothing to the point, 
 my old aunt's paying her first call, and saying 
 to Sophia, "Now, my dear, I am sure there are 
 many things you must want in coming to a new 
 house, so I will give you a list of reliable char- 
 women." 
 
 I discovered further in Mrs. E.'s book the 
 authority for a dish that has suddenly made its
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 275 
 
 appearance on all tables about here green toma- 
 toes. Most outdoor tomato plants at this season 
 have many fruits that there is not heat enough to 
 ripen, and, it seems, Mrs. Earle has discovered a 
 way to treat them. Cooked according to her pre- 
 scription, they taste something like an artichoke. 
 In the receipt for brandy cherries, I should sub- 
 stitute sugar- candy for sugar a decided improve- 
 ment. It is very generous of this good lady to give 
 jaded housekeepers the benefit of her experience, 
 instead of amusing herself, like some literary ladies, 
 with rummaging impossible receipts out of ancient 
 tomes. I shall never forget how once, in early days 
 of literary enthusiasm, I had a carp dressed after 
 Walton's recipe for chub. I believe it was relished 
 in the kitchen, where taste is about a couple of 
 centuries behind the dining-room. And that reflec- 
 tion recalls the memory of an amusing anecdote of 
 travel. Some friends while staying at a Swiss hotel 
 were given a pudding with rum sauce. One mouth- 
 ful was more than enough for them, but the ser- 
 vants ate heartily and were very ill. That is the 
 first act. The second act, which synchronises with 
 the first, is the rage and grief of the male of the 
 party for the disappearance from his chamber of 
 a new and large bottle of bay rum. The solution 
 of the plot is obvious. The bottle found its way 
 mysteriously back again nearly empty. 
 
 5/. An autograph list, come by post, advertises
 
 276 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 a letter of G. H. Lewes's, written in 1871, propos- 
 ing to have texts from the works of George Eliot 
 hung up in schoolrooms and railway-stations " in 
 lieu of the often preposterous Bible texts thus hung 
 up and neglected." Oh, those ages of simple faith, 
 the early seventies ! The same list, with a fine 
 tolerance, catalogues a sermon by White of Sel- 
 borne on " Repentance," which is marked as 
 having been preached thirty-one times. There is 
 also what is styled a " telegram sent by Tennyson " 
 to his publisher ; but surely this must mean the 
 telegram received by the publisher, which would 
 be in the clerk's autograph. A repulsive item in 
 the catalogue, which at best cannot help being 
 somewhat ghoulish, is a collection of letters by 
 Mr. Ruskin. Surely Mr. Ruskin should not yet be 
 sold as mummy. 
 
 6th. I have been roaming the countryside in 
 
 search of a suitable house for . How few 
 
 have answered the agents' description ! Even when 
 I have been assured that the house had certain 
 conveniences, I have found them lacking. " Has 
 it a south aspect ? " I would inquire ; and would 
 find that what looked south was the larder ! One 
 beautiful old house attracted me greatly, and I 
 wondered it had been so long without a tenant, 
 till on reaching the basement, in the room beneath 
 the dining-room, the venerable housekeeper lifted 
 up a board and said with pride, " And here is the
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 277 
 
 cesspool ; it must be hundreds of years old." I 
 was much struck with the excellence of the roads 
 about Culham and Abingdon, an excellence due in 
 the main to the piety of the district in keeping up 
 toll-gates. Our fathers thought it right that those 
 who used the roads should pay for them in some 
 sort of proportion to their use ; the modern notion 
 is to let the squires and parsons pay for everything. 
 " Tax, tax tergo meo erit," cries the modern rate- 
 payer ; he cannot add " non euro." I have taken 
 what opportunities offered on my journey of seeing 
 any famous houses in the neighbourhood. Shaw 
 House, by Newbury, where King Charles was shot 
 at while making his toilet, has exquisite gables. 
 With Ufton Court I was a little disappointed ; the 
 middle part of the house, including the hall with 
 its beautiful ceiling, is occupied by the forester to 
 the estate, and only one of the wings is a dwelling- 
 house ; but its present tenant has deserved well of 
 lovers of antiquity by an admirable book upon the 
 house and manor. Its interest for literature is that 
 Pope describes it in his letters, and that it was the 
 home of his Belinda, Arabella Fermor. Bramshill 
 is a beautiful and perfect example of a Jacobean 
 mansion. In the descriptive volume put together 
 by the father of the present owner is a dunning 
 letter from the contractor to the Lord Zouch who 
 built it, which shows that human nature, both in 
 Lords and Commons, keeps to its types. It is
 
 278 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 written with bated breath and whispering humble- 
 ness, not without a shrewd sting in the tail : 
 
 " TO THE R T HONBLE THE LORD ZOUCH LORD WARDEN 
 "OF THE CINQ PORTS & ONE OF HIS MA TIES PRIVIE 
 " COUNCELL. 
 
 " The humble peticion of Thomas Selby. 
 
 " Humblie shewinge to your Lordshipp that 
 your peticioner hath wrought dyv res peeces of work 
 for your Lordshipp & the last peece of worke held 
 your peticioner on worke 1 6 weekes, during which 
 tyme your Peticioner borded himself. The stuffe 
 belonging to the worke cost 20 markes for which 
 your honor yet oweth your peticioner and for 
 which your peticioner is yet indebted to dyvers 
 men who seek daylie to arrest your said peticioner 
 for the same, soe that for feare he cannot perform 
 any busynes whereby to get his livinge beeing 
 restrayned of libertie to his utter undoinge. The 
 stuffe with your peticioner's labor came to xxij h as 
 by a particular noate on the other side, which your 
 peticioner (for your better satisfaccion) haith sent 
 your Lordshipp, which specifieth all the moneyes 
 that your peticioner haith receaved, the last receapt 
 was ten pounds, six pounds whereof was for dyvers 
 other workes done about the house, as by a bill 
 appeareth, and the four pounds was taken in part 
 of your peticioner's bill of xxij pounds.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 279 
 
 " Maie it thirfore please your good Lordshipp in 
 comiserating your poore servaunt for that xviiju 
 that remaynes of your peticioners bill due to your 
 saide peticioner three yeares and half. That it 
 would please your good Lordshipp to give order 
 for your peticioner's satisfaccion, & your peticioner 
 shall be ever bound to pray for your honors pros- 
 perous health & happines longe to continew. 
 
 " From the Ould Jury in London 
 
 "the xxiiij Januarii 1619." 
 
 Then follows : 
 
 " My Lord ... I humblie beseech your good 
 Lordshipp not to be offended with mee in taking 
 of this course, for this three years I have weighted 
 with peticions after your Lordshipp for my money, 
 and none of your gentlemen would take my peticion 
 to your Lordshipp nor surfer my admittance unto 
 you & for want of my mony I am utterly undone. 
 Therefore I humblie beseech your honor that I 
 may have my money or that your Lordshipp will 
 send unto my M r M r Thomas Capp in the old Jury 
 and let him understand your Lordshipp's pleasure ; 
 if your Lordshipp should not paie me my necessitie 
 is such that I must peticion to the Kinge, and send 
 your Lordshipp a Privie Scale ; beseeching your 
 Lordshipp to render my needes, and be noe way 
 offended wth me for seekinge of my owne."
 
 280 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 nth. Dinner conversation in October has a 
 way of repeating itself from year to year. There 
 is the discussion as to which birds taste the better, 
 wild or maize-fed ; there is the various descant on 
 the lamentation " up goes a guinea and down comes 
 half a crown ; " and there is the speculation whence 
 the local butcher procures his excellent supply of 
 game. To the last discussion those who stand and 
 wait could contribute a few interesting particulars, 
 for every local poacher is thoroughly well known. 
 My man William, for example, tells me he saw a 
 rag and bone man heavily laden with fattish rabbit- 
 skins about 4.30 this morning, as he was meditating 
 at his window, " but it was none of. his business." 
 As a rule, the local ne'er-do-wells do no more than 
 act as guides to the gangs that come over from the 
 county town. I was much struck to-day by a sharp 
 contrast between the manners of East and West 
 
 in regard to hospitality. When my friend 
 
 was in Turkey, he saw a man feeding his turkeys ; 
 and while he was so engaged, a flock of wild 
 turkeys came down to feed too. The man drove 
 them into a shed. " What shall you do with 
 them ? " asked my friend ; " kill them ? " Kill 
 them?" said the man ; "they are my guests. In 
 the morning I shall feed them and let them go." 
 To-day a hunted hare took refuge in a cottage 
 here, where it was presently jugged. I am far 
 from blaming the cottager ; I wish but to note the
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 281 
 
 contrast. The Western word " guest," philologers 
 tell us, is connected with " hostis." 
 
 Cf. Bacon: "The inclination to goodness is 
 imprinted deeply in the nature of man ; insomuch 
 that if it issue not towards men it will take unto 
 other living creatures ; as it is seen in the Turks, 
 a cruel people, who nevertheless are kind to beasts, 
 and give alms to dogs and birds ; insomuch as, 
 Busbechius reporteth, a Christian boy in Con- 
 stantinople had like to have been stoned for gagging 
 in a waggishness a long-billed fowl." l (Of Goodness 
 and Goodness of Nature.) 
 
 i^th. X., an old college friend of mine, came 
 down a fortnight since from Saturday to Monday, 
 and we found him a very pleasant companion. He 
 had a way of conversing easily on most subjects, 
 and (what is even more interesting) of making one 
 converse easily oneself. In the small hours, over 
 a pipe, I found myself telling him many anecdotes 
 of my past life adventures by sea and land, money 
 losses, bereavements, and what not. But since that 
 day I am nervous of opening a journal. I find my 
 anecdotes in the evening papers, my spiritual ex- 
 perience distilled into sonnets for the Weekly Observer, 
 my political reflections clothed in thunder in the 
 Daily Phonograph. My friend's friends should be 
 
 1 Mr. Harrison Weir writes to the papers to-day suggesting "in a 
 waggishness" that the cock that crows in the morn should be gagged. 
 Perhaps Mr. Long might be induced to make a muzzle order (i6th 
 August 1898).
 
 282 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 worth to him not less than five hundred pounds a 
 year ; but he must be continually enlarging his 
 circle, to allow for shrinkage. 
 
 The newspapers are full of the Church Congress. 
 I once went to a congress before the heyday in the 
 blood was tame and waited upon the judgment, 
 but I have never repeated the experiment, as I wish 
 to think well of the clergy. Is it or is it not an 
 argument against Socialism that people show badly 
 in groups, especially professional groups ? " The 
 merriment of parsons " is certainly, as Dr. Johnson 
 found it, " mighty offensive " ; but so is a meeting 
 of county gentlemen to protest against sacerdotal 
 tyranny. I suppose, too, between a syndicate of 
 employers and a trades union there is" not a penny- 
 weight to choose for the nasty things they will do and 
 say. And we all know " the poor in a lump is bad." 
 Hear the modern mystic : " Us sont la, rassembles 
 n'importe ou ; et lorsqu'ils se trouvent reunis, sans 
 qu'on sache pourqtioi, il semble que leur premier 
 soin soit de fermer d'abord les grandes portes de la 
 vie. Chacun d'eux cependant, lorsqu'il etait seul, a 
 vecu plus d'une fois selon son ame. . . . Quand ils 
 sont ensemble ils aiment a s'enivrerde choses basses. 
 Ils ont je ne sais quelle peur etrange de la beaute ; 
 et plus ils sont nombreux, plus ils en ont peur." 
 
 My sister has gone to the Women's Conference. 
 I do not know how ladies bear the test of union, 
 though I have heard tales of merciful individuals
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 283 
 
 becoming members of a Sweating Committee. 
 Charlotte tells me the platform is a fine revealer 
 of character. Your merely pretty and attractive 
 person dwindles there into insignificance, while 
 your really great woman doffs her cloak of com- 
 monplace and shines in her true brightness. 
 
 i6th. More " Pot-pourri." While " doing " my 
 Michaelmas accounts this morning, I found that 
 the butter book (for we use Tom's dairy) was half 
 as much again as last quarter, and the reason given 
 by the responsible Eugenia is that Mrs. Earle pro- 
 tests against economy in butter. On referring to 
 the passage, I find that she suggests instead an 
 economy in meat, and I pointed this out to E. ; 
 but the butcher's book shows no proportionate 
 diminution. This has led me to reflect how much 
 more infectious extravagance is than economy. I 
 can recollect some half-dozen pronouncements of 
 various people in favour of expansion in this or 
 that direction, and not one in favour of retrench- 
 ment. I suppose we shamefacedly keep our econo- 
 mies to ourselves. An intimate and impecunious 
 friend told me he said to his wife on their wedding- 
 day, " Now, however closely we have to cut things, 
 we will not try to save in the washing-bill." 
 Another friend cautioned me seriously as a young 
 man against reading penny papers instead of the 
 Times. A pious old clergyman once said to me, " I 
 have noticed that some people spend much brain
 
 284 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 power before every journey in making up their 
 minds whether to travel by first or second class. 
 The best rule is always to go first." My aunt warned 
 me, when I began to collect, never to buy cracked 
 china or imperfect books. And it was one of my 
 father's commonplaces that one must drink sound 
 wine and smoke good cigars. Now, I have found 
 all these counsels fruitful in my own experience. 
 On the other hand, one has to invent one's own 
 economies, and I have not got much further than 
 to use a wax taper instead of matches, to buy my 
 coals in the summer and stack them for winter, 
 never to be photographed, and to take in the three- 
 penny edition of Bradshaw instead of the sixpenny. 
 My father's dictum about sound wine comes the 
 more readily to memory as I was dining last even- 
 ing with a teetotaler who regards wine as poison, 
 and, I am bound to say, acts up to his theory. He 
 should at least dispense it in medicine glasses. I 
 have no prejudice against teetotalers. We have a 
 very flourishing (so-called) " temperance society " 
 in the village, and the result is seen in the increased 
 comfort of the cottagers. I used sometimes to 
 show my interest in the cause by taking the chair 
 at a meeting now and then, but I have given it up 
 since ladies have begun to appear on platforms ; 
 for ladies recognise no rules of the game. In the 
 middle of a passionate address they think it not 
 indecent to appeal to the chairman to set a good
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 285 
 
 example by taking the pledge. At the last meeting 
 I attended, a lady speaker, the wife of a clergyman, 
 told how her husband used always before his evening 
 service to eat an egg beaten up with brandy, which 
 made him bilious ; but since he had left off this 
 drunken habit, he had also left off his bilious attacks. 
 This was more than old B. could stand, for he roared 
 out, " 'Twere the egg, marm, what made he bilious. 
 You tell your mister to take t' brandy wi'out un." 
 One of the villagers at this meeting made a mys- 
 terious speech, in which he gave as his reason for 
 taking the pledge, that there was only in a pint of 
 beer as much goodness as would lie on a shilling. 
 I have one story that I used to keep in lavender for 
 these occasions ; I had it of the doctor. When he 
 was walking the hospitals, there was a brewer's 
 drayman who had broken his leg, and in six weeks 
 the bone had not set. So they questioned him 
 about his diet. "Was he accustomed to drink beer?" 
 "Yes, a little." "About how much ?" "Oh, not more 
 than three gallons a day." So they allowed him a 
 couple of quarts, and the leg began to mend at once. 
 22nd. The new Professor of Geology at Oxford 
 found some kind words to say in his inaugural 
 lecture about Dr. Plot, who wrote the natural 
 histories of Oxfordshire and Staffordshire. The 
 latter is sought by collectors for the beautiful plans 
 of the great houses in the county, but the work 
 itself is far above contempt. It proves the good
 
 286 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 doctor to have been a curious observer. He has 
 recorded, for example, instances of the now common 
 practice of lip-reading by deaf people : 
 
 " But I have more wonderful passages relating to 
 women than any of these yet to declare, whereof the 
 first and strangest is of one Mary Woodward of 
 Hardwick in the parish of Sandon, who loosing her 
 hearing at about 6 years of age, by her extra- 
 ordinary ingenuity and strickt observation of the 
 peoples lipps that convers't with her, could per- 
 fectly understand what any person said, though 
 they spake so low that the bystanders could not hear 
 it : as has been frequently experimented by the 
 right Honorable the Lady Gerard, and divers others 
 of her neighbours now living, with whom she would 
 go to Church, and bring away as much of the sermon 
 as the most attentive hearer there ; all which she 
 did, not with difficulty but so much ease and satis- 
 faction that if one turned aside and spake, that she 
 could not see his lipps, she thought herself much 
 disobliged. Nay so very well skill'd was she in this 
 Art (which w r e may call Labiomancy) as 'tis generally 
 beleived (though I could get no personall testimony 
 of it, some persons being dead, and others removed 
 into Ireland who sometimes lay with her) that in the 
 night time when in bed, if she might lay but her hand 
 on their lipps so as to feel the motions of them, she 
 could perfectly understand what her bedfellows said, 
 though it were never so dark. For confirmation
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 287 
 
 of the possibility and truth whereof, there are many 
 parallel Histories sent us from abroad, of persons 
 that have done the same in all particulars ... ; " 
 and then follows a string of cases from Borellus, 
 Job a Meek'ren, Petrus a Castro, Tulpius, and 
 Casaubon (p. 289). 
 25/A. 
 
 " This day is called the feast of Crispian, 
 And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by 
 From this day to the ending of the world 
 But we in it shall be remembered." 
 
 I wonder if any one but me keeps the feast of 
 Crispian. Good Navy Leaguers have difficulty 
 enough in getting people to remember Trafalgar. 
 The awkward thing is that you can't have a victory 
 without some one else having a defeat, and too 
 loud a flourish of trumpets might hurt sensitive 
 feelings across the water. Still, it is possible to be 
 too considerate ; our first business lies in educating 
 our own people, and not the least part of educa- 
 tion consists in praising famous men and our 
 fathers who begat us. The other side can always 
 persuade themselves that they were betrayed, or 
 that it was their tyrant who was defeated, not 
 themselves. And we shall not grudge them the 
 celebration of their own victories, such as Waterloo. 
 I wonder if Shakespeare kept the feast of Crispian. 
 I can imagine some soldier, a matter-of-fact person 
 like myself, calling at New Place on 25th October,
 
 288 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 two years after " Henry V." was written, and being 
 greatly shocked to find that Shakespeare did not 
 even know it was Agincourt day. I suppose if 
 persons of genius stimulate the rest of us, we must 
 not be too curious as to their practising what they 
 preach. I remember such a one expatiating to 
 me upon the titles of Scott's novels, and saying 
 of " Peveril of the Peak " : " Now I call that a 
 perfect name for a romantic novel ; no one could 
 hear it without being bitten with an instant wish 
 to know all about Peveril ; " and he rhapsodised 
 for several minutes on all that the name suggested 
 to him hairbreadth escapes, conspirators in gloomy 
 caverns, &c. &c. " Tell me the story," I said, 
 "for I am ashamed to say I have never read it." 
 " Nor have I," said my friend. 
 
 I was dozing to-night in my chair towards 
 eleven o'clock, when the cook rushed in, with hair 
 up-staring and the tongs in her hand, and begged 
 me to go to the back door, which was bewitched. 
 I took up a poker and a candle and went to inspect. 
 It was sufficiently curious. The door was shaking 
 as if it had the palsy, and the yard-dog outside 
 was yelping most uncomfortably. When I drew 
 the bolt the shaking at once stopped, and there 
 was a slight scuffling noise. The candle cleared 
 up the mystery by showing a small heap of debris 
 where a rat had been gnawing the sill to make a 
 way into the house. Its body must have pressed
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 289 
 
 against the door as it worked, and so caused the 
 shaking. But to which of us the rat had a 
 message we are yet in ignorance. 
 
 2jth. We are all in woe to-day, as the great 
 beech has been felled. For months we had shut 
 our eyes to the ominous cracks and more than 
 ominous rot, but at last it would not do. Its- 
 brother was blown down two years ago, and, as. 
 the newspapers are now prophesying a gale, it 
 seemed good policy to choose the direction in 
 which the tree should fall. Our neighbours think 
 us a little doting in our fondness, for the beech 
 did not conform to the regular type. As the two 
 trees had stood very close together, each had 
 branches only on one side ; and when the first 
 tree was down, the other looked wild and horrid 
 (in the classical sense), like a tree of Salvator 
 Rosa's. But it was beautiful in a way of its own, 
 and had never looked so beautiful as to-day in the 
 sunlight, all on fire with crimson and orange and 
 bro\vn and green ; as it fell the leaves shot away 
 from it like flames. Eugenia sketched it in water- 
 colours just before execution, and is going to have 
 a frame made for the portrait from one of the 
 branches a true relic. The rest will serve, per- 
 haps, no less well to keep it in memory, as it 
 should supply fuel to a pyre for many weeks. By 
 what looks to us at the moment like an odd attempt 
 at compensation, I hear that my kinsman Beaufoy 
 
 T
 
 290 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 {" foy " is fagus) was presented to-day with a son 
 and heir. 
 
 The first sod of the new bowling-green l was cut 
 this morning with due formality. I have had good 
 luck in my search for ornaments to decorate it. 
 An old house in the neighbourhood has just changed 
 hands ; and the new master, being a Nabob lately 
 returned, as the poet says, 
 
 " Home from the rule of Oriental races," 
 
 with a taste for fine art not unnaturally Orientalised, 
 has banished from the garden some very beautiful 
 Italian stone urns, carved with subjects in relief, 
 and these I have rescued from an adjoining farm. 
 They are delicately discoloured, which reminds me 
 that yesterday I met the vicar in a coat green with 
 
 1 The French writer, Le Blond, already referred to, who was a pupil 
 of the great gardener, Le Notre, is much exercised about this term 
 bowling-green. He says of it in Mr. James's translation, "The inven- 
 tion and original of the word bowling-green [boulingrin] comes to us 
 from England. Many authors derive it from the English words ; 
 namely, from bowl, which signifies a round body, and green, which 
 denotes a meadow, or field of grass ; probably because of the figure in 
 which it is sunk, which is commonly round, and covered with grass. 
 Others will have it, that the word takes its name from the large green- 
 plots, on which they are wont to play at bowls in England, and for 
 which purpose the English take care to keep their grass very short, 
 and extremely smooth and even. A boulingrin in France differs from 
 all this," &c., and he goes on to explain that it is only the sinking that 
 makes it a boulingrin, together with the turf that covers it ; the fact, 
 of course, being that bowling-greens in England were usually sunk. 
 After this desperate effort in philology it is not surprising to find our 
 author deriving the ha-ha, or sunk hedge, from the exclamation of 
 surprise, ah-ah, that breaks from the traveller at the vista beyond.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 291 
 
 age hurrying along on his bicycle at scorching 
 speed ; whereas to-day I met him as neat and 
 spruce as a new pin. He told me he was off to 
 town to lunch with his publisher. " And where," I 
 said, " were you posting to yesterday in such break- 
 neck haste ? " " Oh, I had to appear before the 
 Schools' Association to plead for a share in the 
 grant to necessitous schools." Dear vicar ! how 
 good-natured of him to dress for the part ! I see 
 he too has fallen a victim to the motto mania, and 
 has inscribed over his door, "Ut migraturus habita" 
 the text which so charmed Mrs. Ewing. I 
 wonder if the Crown or the Bishop will take the 
 hint. I fear neither is a frequent visitor. 
 
 2&th. The splendid weather seems at last to be 
 drawing to an end ; each day is " miskier " than 
 the last. But the few hours when the mist clears 
 are still glorious. As Henry Vaughan says, " Mists 
 make but triumphs for the day." 
 
 November $th. The memory of Guy Faux seems 
 likely to outlive that of many saints in the calendar, 
 whether Catholic or Positivist a consideration 
 which should supply a hint to the conservators of 
 the old religion or the inventors of new ones. 
 Let them celebrate their heroes with a bonfire ! 
 Bonfire, say the philologers, is bone-fire. What 
 could be more appropriate to the feasts of martyrs ? 
 Such fires, moreover, would be very useful for 
 burning up refuse, which in our villages has a way
 
 292 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 of festering in heaps and breeding disease. It would 
 seem that such fires were the custom on at least 
 one festival in old England: "In vigilia beati 
 Johannis colligunt pueri in quibusdam regionibus 
 ossa et quaedam alia immunda, et insimul cremant " 
 (Brand's "Antiquities," i. 298). The "Guy" in 
 our village varies from year to year. When the 
 Liberal party is in office it is apt to be the Premier, 
 or some other prominent Minister ; this year it was 
 a local personage. The pyre burned splendidly, 
 and had the usual maddening effect on the specta- 
 tors. The bigger boys leaped through the flames 
 like the old Moloch worshippers, and once two of 
 them, jumping from opposite sides, met in the 
 middle and nearly made a bone-fire of it in grim 
 earnest. The younger imps had furnished them- 
 selves with besom stumps dipped in tar, which 
 they flourished like male Maenads. Indeed, one 
 could almost have imagined oneself in a college 
 quadrangle at Oxford. 
 
 6th. A magnificent day for colour. Walking 
 eastwards about four o'clock I met a regiment of 
 some thousand lapwings at drill. Their evolutions 
 were very skilful, from line to column, and from 
 column to line. The level rays of the sun, as the 
 birds circled overhead, struck on their cuirasses 
 and made them shine like gold. 
 
 When the elements were mixed in me, the in- 
 gredients were omitted that go to make a partisan.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 293 
 
 J feel my deficiency whenever G. pays me a visit, 
 for his friends are always in the right, his foes 
 always in the wrong, any deed being but a colour- 
 less abstraction apart from the doer. Words follow 
 much the same law, especially if they are humorous. 
 We had the vicar and a few of our more literate 
 neighbours to meet him. At dinner I defended 
 some paradox, no matter what, and was rather 
 severely handled ; but G. afterwards congratulated 
 me on the admirable manner in which, as host, I 
 left the advantage to my guests. The compli- 
 ment was quite undeserved, but I liked it all the 
 same. 
 
 There seems to be a movement afoot just now 
 for preserving wild creatures of all sorts by making 
 paradises for them, but I hear of no paradise for 
 insects. And yet they too tend to extinction. The 
 ivy round our old houses does, of course, a great 
 deal towards preserving certain species, such as 
 wasps and spiders, but these are still plentiful. The 
 hornet, however, is growing quite scarce in Berk- 
 shire. When I was a child they were common 
 enough. I remember my father's old gardener 
 suffering severely from a sting. He brushed a 
 bevy away from a jargonelle pear tree with his hat, 
 but unhappily one stayed inside for purposes of 
 revenge, and as old Northway's head was bald, 
 the creature had a walk over. The hornet also 
 used to figure in a moral poem I was taught when
 
 294 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 a youngster, as quite the natural playmate of child- 
 hood. It ran something like this : 
 
 " O mother, I told him the hornet would sting him, 
 Which he in his hand from the garden was bringing." 
 
 Perhaps it comes in a poem by the Misses Taylor. 
 I have searched for it in vain in Mr. Lucas's " Book 
 of Verses for Children " ; a charming collection, in 
 which I am glad to see a return to the old-fashioned 
 strait-laced children's poems. Parents had grown 
 too shy of Struwelpeter, and the prompt and awful 
 fate of the wicked in the " Cautionary Stories " of 
 Elizabeth Turner, forgetting that children can purge 
 their passions by these, as their elders by " Hamlet " 
 or " Macbeth." Here, for instance, is a couple of 
 stanzas on " Repentance," not in Mr. Lucas, which 
 do more for a baby's morals than calling upon him 
 to hear sermons : 
 
 " 'Tis not enough to say 
 
 ' I'm sorry and repent,' 
 And then go on from day to day 
 Just as you always went. 
 
 Repentance is to leave 
 
 The sins you did before, 
 And show that you in earnest grieve 
 
 By doing them no more." 
 
 How clean and incisive it is " Just as you always 
 went " ! 
 
 IO//T. I have been giving my household lately 
 an address now and again upon patriotism, taking
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 295 
 
 occasion by any stimulating report from India. 
 This morning I learn that the garden-boy has 
 walked into Reading to enlist. [ Of course I am 
 willing to spare his services to the country, but I 
 should have preferred his giving me warning in the 
 ordinary way, so that I might look out for a sub- 
 stitute. But that, I know, would have been con- 
 trary to local etiquette, which directs that when a 
 boy takes his hand from the plough, he should go 
 off to the depot without looking back. No doubt, 
 if young men spoke of their intention beforehand, 
 fathers and mothers would in most cases exert 
 pressure to keep them at home. This secret en- 
 listing presents a curious parallel to the usual mode 
 of joining the Church of Rome a resemblance of 
 which I can imagine the late Cardinal Newman 
 making very effective use. 
 
 - I have been reading lately the poems of that 
 forgotten worthy and patriot, Edmund Waller, 
 whose name is known to young ladies as the 
 author of " Go, lovely rose." His patriotism was 
 of that finer sort which is above party. He was 
 the cousin of Hampden and related to Cromwell, 
 and was employed by Parliament to negotiate with 
 Charles ; the negotiation became known as "Waller's 
 plot to seize London for the King," for which 
 adventure he was fined .10,000 and banished. 
 His panegyric oil Cromwell is a fine piece of writ- 
 ing, finer than his welcome to Charles II., as that
 
 296 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 monarch did not fail to point out to him. He 
 comes to mind now as the writer of some spirited 
 verses to the King on the English Navy : 
 
 " We are most happy who can fear no force 
 But winged troops or Pegasean horse. 
 'Tis not so hard for greedy foes to spoil 
 Another nation as to touch our soil. 
 Should Nature's self invade the world again 
 And o'er the centre spread the liquid main, 
 Thy power were safe, and her destructive hand 
 Would but enlarge the bounds of thy command ; 
 Thy dreadful fleet would style thee lord of all 
 And ride in triumph o'er the drowned ball." 
 
 Dr. Johnson called these lines "so noble, that 
 it were almost criminal to remark the mistake 
 of ' centre ' for ' surface/ or to say that the 
 empire of the sea would be worth little if it were 
 not that the waters terminate in land." By 
 " centre " Waller means the earth as centre of 
 the universe. 
 
 I came on a curious passage in a letter of Mrs. 
 Waller's to her banished son about the marriage of 
 his daughter. She wishes to know what dowry he 
 is prepared to give. " I am not in hast to mary 
 hir, she is yong enough to stay, but the danger is 
 if she should catch the small poxe or hir beauty 
 should change, it would be a great lose to hir." 
 Everybody is familiar with the frequent references 
 to smallpox in the letters and memoirs of the 
 seventeenth century. Pepys is full of it ; but I
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 297 
 
 have never met a passage that brings so keenly 
 home to one the nearness of the risk. 1 
 
 nth. I went up to town to see my tailor, and 
 called in at my hatter's to have a mourning band 
 removed. The shopman remonstrated : " Hat- 
 bands are fashionable just now, sir." " Oh," I said, 
 "you refer to Court mourning." "Oh dear no, 
 sir ; hatbands have been fashionable all this 
 season." So it seems young gentlemen still, as in 
 Shakespeare's time, can be sad as night only for 
 wantonness ! 
 
 My sister Charlotte was in distress at having to 
 change her butler, and she fancied the new man 
 had already begun to take liberties. " So," said 
 she, " I gave him a lesson last night. He did not 
 offer me cheese at dinner ; so I said, ' John, where 
 is the cheese ? ' 'I thought you did not take 
 cheese, ma'am.' 4 Bring it.' And when he 
 brought it, I said, l No, thank you.' I don't think 
 he will forget." Charlotte told me she was glad to 
 observe that more attention was being paid to 
 heraldry. " I hate to see widows prancing about 
 with their husbands' crests on their harness."/ 
 
 I searched for a wedding present for K. .1 saw 
 a lovely Sheffield-plated urn, which I would have 
 
 1 Would it not be possible for an Anti-anti-Vaccination Society to 
 issue a small pamphlet containing select passages from our older 
 literature about small-pox as it used to be ? Copies might be sent to 
 All magistrates for free presentation to the conscientious, who come 
 before them to swear under the new Act (2ist August 1898).
 
 298 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 bought if I were not certain she would confuse it 
 with electro-plate. If I were only a little older I 
 could be eccentric, like the lady who, according 
 to the papers, gave a brooch with " Granny " in 
 diamonds. There would be some fun in that ; the 
 expectant grandchild would be in such a delicious 
 quandary. Odi et amo. My own dear grandmother 
 was almost too eccentric at the time of our mar- 
 riage ; she had promised us our house linen, and 
 talked so much about it beforehand that she came 
 to think she had given it, and would not be un- 
 deceived. 
 
 i'2th. I walked with the vicar, who told me 
 some anecdotes of an ordination examination. The 
 best was this : The question was, " State what you 
 know of Christianity in Britain before Augustine ? " 
 and the answer, " Before the coming of Julius 
 Caesar, B.C. 55, there was practically no Christianity 
 in Britain." The " practically " is good. On our 
 walk we met the stationmaster of a neighbouring 
 village, who gave me a military salute with his 
 right hand and raised his left three inches to the 
 vicar. " Why does he treat you to such maimed 
 rites ? " I asked. " It puzzles me," said the vicar, 
 " as it is neither Saturday nor Monday. On these 
 days he is full of the sermon he has delivered or is 
 to deliver at Bethel, and smiles on me as a fellow- 
 augur. But on other days he gives me his full 
 courtesy as one of his masters, the general public."
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 299 
 
 At the station we heard that the good man had 
 resigned his position on the railway to devote him- 
 self to the cure of souls. 
 
 We talked of the " Golden Treasury." I thought 
 Mr. Palgrave's " Lectures on Landscape in Poetry " 
 a much better book ; but it did not hit an especi- 
 ally happy moment, like the " Golden Treasury," 
 and would never be popular, as the public does 
 not care for criticism. The changes in the various 
 editions of the "Treasury " are an interesting study. 
 It was originally issued in 1861. Sidney was not 
 recognised until 1883, nor was Cowper's "Cast- 
 away," his finest poem. In 1891 appeared for the 
 first time Coleridge's " Kubla Khan," Vaughan's 
 "They are all gone into the world of light," 
 Marvell's " Picture of little T. C.," and " Nymph 
 and Fawn," and ten poems of Campion, besides 
 Habington, Lord Essex, Greene, Lord Rochester, 
 Norris of Bemerton, and Lyte, all hitherto unrepre- 
 sented, and all unnecessary. The defect of the 
 book as a selection is that beginning with an aver- 
 sion to anything eccentric, which justifiably ex- 
 cluded Donne, it lapsed too often into a tolerance 
 of the commonplace. There is an extravagant 
 over-proportion of matter from Wordsworth (who 
 has forty-three poems), Campbell, Scott, Moore, 
 and the minor Scotch poets. To point the moral 
 more clearly, additions to the long tale of Words- 
 worth were made room for by excisions from
 
 300 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Shelley. "A Widow Bird" and "Life of Life" 
 disappeared in 1891. The representation of several 
 poets notably Blake, Keats, Campion, Carew is 
 really misrepresentation. But when all deduc- 
 tions are made, the book must be reckoned to have 
 thoroughly deserved its success. 
 
 i$th. Curiosity is a well-marked trait in most 
 of the higher mammals. The new trees I have 
 planted this season, some red oaks and a maple 
 (Schwedleri), have been objects of careful investiga- 
 tion to the cows and horses, and our new bowling- 
 green is exciting just as much interest among our 
 own species. Some of the neighbours make a 
 circuit, as they can, to the front door, by way of 
 'the garden, in order to inspect it ; some indeed, 
 having inspected, forget to proceed to the front 
 
 door. In the village it is spoken of as 's new 
 
 pond. I have a tenderness for curiosity, holding 
 with Coleridge that it is at the root of all philosophy 
 and all science. I remark, however, that the per- 
 sons most curious about my affairs are the most 
 reticent about their own. I suppose this is only a 
 particular example of the general law that a habit 
 of spending rarely coexists with a habit of getting. 
 
 Three weeks of fine weather have finished the 
 excavation ; the turf has been rolled down the 
 sides, and we are now waiting for the brick paths 
 to be made before putting in the bulbs. And we 
 shall probably have to .wait -till spring. For the
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 301 
 
 big house that is building at for the gentle- 
 man from town, in addition to spoiling all our 
 roads by the daily passage of traction engines, has 
 engrossed all the local bricklayers. This is excel- 
 lent sport for them, but hard on the casual em- 
 ployer. As a rule, in our part of the country such 
 contracts are liberally construed, and we borrow 
 workmen from each other for an hour or a day ; 
 but the gentleman from town has no knowledge of 
 our primitive ways, and sticks to his pound of flesh. 
 Nor would I blame him, for sometimes a brick- 
 layer will have half-a-dozen jobs going at once. He 
 will half unroof the church, and then go and half 
 buttress the meeting-house ; from this he will be 
 called off to make a pit at the manor or new steyne 
 a well at the vicarage. While he is busy there 
 Tom's bailiff, who is "the Master," will fetch him 
 off to lath and plaster a cottage wall ; and when 
 that is done he will work gently round the other 
 jobs, with an occasional new one interspersed. 
 Perhaps I may be able to get my friend X., w r ho 
 is an amateur bricklayer, to put in a day with the 
 trowel when he is tired of the gun. 
 
 Eugenia, who suddenly perverted from Mrs. 
 Earle to Mr. Inigo Thomas, has been insisting of 
 late that we must have peacocks on the terrace, 
 like those in his drawing of Risley Hall. 1 I do not 
 like peafowl as gardeners, nor does Brown ; but I 
 
 1 See " The Formal Garden in England." By Blomfield and Thomas.
 
 302 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 must allow that those Eugenia has begged from 
 her grandmother have given us little trouble so far. 
 Not that they have remained on the terrace in the 
 graceful attitudes illustrated in Mr. Thomas's picture, 
 but that they have taken themselves off altogether 
 to Tom's farm, where they adorn the great central 
 midden. Once a day Brown fetches them home, 
 one under each arm, and at once they begin a 
 stately march back again. I think after this I shall 
 believe, what people often tell one, that no quality 
 is so mistakenly imputed as pride. 
 
 The fall of the leaf has revealed on many trees 
 the encroachments of ivy, and I have been walk- 
 ing round the place with a knife. It is curious 
 that, notwithstanding all the home truths that 
 foresters and poets tell of the ivy, it should be still 
 allowed in so many parks to hurt and disfigure 
 the elms. Tom unkindly says that when on 
 an estate you see ivy having its own way, it is 
 at once a sign and a symbol that the lady rules 
 the manor. 
 
 i6th. Sophia overheard the following dialogue 
 at a registry office : 
 
 Lady. Are you Church of England ? 
 
 Maid. No, ma'am. 
 
 Lady. Roman Catholic ? 
 
 Maid. No, ma'am. 
 
 Lady. Wesleyan, perhaps ? 
 
 Maid. No, ma'am.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 303 
 
 Lady. May I ask, then, what you are ? 
 
 Maid. Please, ma'am, I belong to the church at 
 Caversham. 
 
 This individualising tendency is an English 
 instinct, and accounts not only for the existence 
 of the Church of England, but also for the two 
 hundred and odd sects tabulated in Whitaker. 
 The last time Disestablishment was in the air, 
 I was told by an old fellow that he would like 
 
 the church disestablished at P , but not at 
 
 S . 
 
 1 8^. "Conventions are the rudimentary organs 
 of duties. The duty of brotherly love dwindles 
 into the convention of leaving one's visiting-card 
 at a neighbour's house, just as the old-fashioned 
 duty of burning one's enemy dwindled into burn- 
 ing his name on a piece of paper. In particular, 
 the duty of ' visiting the sick ' survives in the con- 
 vention of ' calling to inquire,' and, if the sick are 
 persons of importance, writing your name in a 
 book for the press to copy." These sombre reflec- 
 tions, which I have written in my " Pilgrim's Scrip," 
 were suggested by a visit I have just paid to my 
 sister, who is recovering from a slight illness. I 
 found at the house a young and fashionable lady, 
 engaged in making apologies for her mother, who 
 was a near neighbour, and " had been so much 
 occupied all the week with her housekeeping, and 
 to-day was so busy arranging her flowers, that she
 
 304 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 had really found no time to call." I was greatly 
 tickled. It was plain the maternal conscience was 
 so far instructed as to have heard of the duty of 
 visiting the sick, but not so far as to understand 
 that if a thing was a duty at. all, time must be found 
 for it. As to any useful object that a visit might 
 serve, it was out of her horizon. The duty, in 
 short, was merely a convention. In the course of 
 conversation with the elegant daughter, I assured 
 her that not visiting the sick, so far from needing 
 any apology, was the only rational course to pursue. 
 The phrase " to visit," I explained, does not mean 
 "to make a call," but "to take care of;" and I 
 pointed out how opposed it is to the principles of 
 medical science to go into the same room with a 
 person suffering from any infectious disease, such 
 as a cold. " In our village," I said, "we reconcile 
 religion and science by leaving little vessels of 
 tisane at each other's doors, and hurrying away as 
 fast as possible." As a matter of fact I am myself 
 a little old-fashioned, both in my science and my 
 religion, and I continue to pay visits even to people 
 who have colds ; only I make a point of not doing 
 it as a duty ; because, so far as I can see, the only 
 object of such a visit is to cheer the spirits of your 
 patient, which it fails to do so soon as it is per- 
 ceived you are calling from conscientious motives. 
 I find that the best way to raise a person's cheer- 
 fulness, if the ailment be only slight, is to take a
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 305 
 
 gloomy view of it. People hate to have it assumed 
 that they are better, or even to be asked if they 
 are better ; they hate, if they have broken a tendon 
 in a bicycling accident, to be told how easily it 
 might have been a bone ; or if on the top of this 
 they have taken influenza, to be congratulated on 
 the rest in bed, which is just what the leg required. 
 And indeed to play the superior person with an 
 invalid is really to steal from him the moral advan- 
 tage of his situation. He knows what bright side 
 there may be to the case better than you do, but 
 he is feeling the dark side, and what he asks is a 
 little sympathy ; and when, having enjoyed that, 
 it is time to waive it away and erect himself above 
 the calamity, why, the moral advantage lies with 
 him, as it should. 
 
 2oth. I was looking this morning at the fine 
 colour everywhere, bright in the foreground, and 
 fading into a fairy-like distance ; and I was groping 
 round my mind for some fit expression of that 
 fairy world, when there leapt to memory the 
 familiar line 
 
 " 'Tis distance lends enchantment to the view." 
 
 I believe this is the first time I have realised 
 what the poet meant by " enchantment." At this 
 rate, before I die I may be able to appreciate "To 
 be or not to be." I have been reading " Hamlet " 
 lately, and trying to recover the sharpness of first 
 
 u
 
 306 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 impressions, How strange and unlike anything 
 else in literature is the " Ghost beneath, Swear ! " 
 Shakespeare must have enjoyed it as a new thrill ; 
 and Hamlet's queer speeches and hysteria in that 
 scene must have been more puzzling to his audience 
 then than now. They must have been set down 
 purely for the self-indulgence of Shakespeare him- 
 self indeed, like half Hamlet says. One of the 
 best things said yet about " Hamlet " is to be found 
 in a back number of the Pall Mall Gazette, by " An 
 Old Playgoer," who was Matthew Arnold. "Shake- 
 speare created ' Hamlet ' with his mind running on 
 Montaigne, and placed its action and its hero in 
 Montaigne's atmosphere and world. What is that 
 world ? It is the world of man viewed as a being 
 ondoyant et divers, balancing and indeterminate, the 
 plaything of cross-motives and shifting impulses, 
 swayed by a thousand subtle influences, physio- 
 logical and pathological. Certainly the action and 
 the hero of the original ' Hamlet ' story are not 
 such as to compel the poet to place them in this 
 world and no other ; but they admit of being 
 placed there ; Shakespeare resolved to place them 
 there, and they lent themselves to his resolve. 
 The resolve once taken to place the action in the 
 world of problem, the problem became brightened 
 by all the force of Shakespeare's faculties, of 
 Shakespeare's subtlety. ' Hamlet ' thus comes at 
 last to be not a drama followed with perfect com-
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 307 
 
 prehension and profoundest emotion, which is the 
 ideal for tragedy, but a problem soliciting inter- 
 pretation and solution" (October 23, 1884). 
 
 Let me jot down here a question proposed to be 
 set in a college examination : " From the characters 
 of Polonius, Laertes, and Ophelia, deduce that of 
 Mrs. Polonius." 
 
 24/7?. Middle-aged men like myself are often 
 haunted by the notion that in some factitious way 
 they can raise the value of the libraries they leave 
 behind them. The most childlike method I ever 
 
 heard of was that of my neighbour at , who 
 
 wrote across the title-page of every volume, "This 
 is a scarce and valuable work." But his device did 
 not take in the local tradesmen who assisted at the 
 auction. If a man is a poet or painter, and is 
 sure of dying before his boom is over, let him write 
 his name in every book. Else " the eftest way " is 
 to buy a book-plate of Mr. Sherborn. Annotation 
 tends to depreciation ; I know it well ; but no bad 
 habit so grows upon a man. To-day I made two 
 entries in my copy of Bacon's " Essays " to No. 
 xlix., Of Suitors. On the words " Timing of suits is 
 the principal," I say : " If you know a great person 
 to have something against you, of which in con- 
 sideration of your services he is loth to speak, 
 make your request then, as he will probably grant 
 it as a cover to his complaint." On the rule 
 iniquum petas ut cequum /eras, which might be ren-
 
 308 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 dered, " Ask more than your due to get your own," 
 I note that an Oxford scholar of my acquaintance, 
 if he wished a valuable book to be taken from the 
 Bodleian Library into the Radcliffe Reading-room 
 that he might continue reading it after the library 
 was closed, used to begin by asking leave for some 
 unique manuscript, and when that was refused, a 
 book somewhat less valuable, coming gradually 
 down a scale and being refused with less emphasis, 
 until he reached the book which alone he wanted, 
 when he would say, "At least you can have no 
 objection to my taking this." 
 
 In Lamb's essay which he entitles " Detached 
 Thoughts on Books," he makes several strictures as 
 to the form, folio or octavo, in which certain works 
 should be read. On this I comment : " I knew a 
 clergyman once ('tis true he was also a baronet), 
 who used to read his Thomas a Kempis in a Bodoni 
 folio, and a vellum paper copy at that ; a truly 
 magnificent way of despising the world." One 
 notices that Lamb cares nothing for first editions 
 as such ; he even pooh-poohs the first folio of 
 Shakespeare, a copy of which my fingers still tingle 
 from handling. What would he have thought of a 
 young lad whom I heard ask at a bookseller's for 
 "Three Men in a Boat" (or some such title), 
 adding, " I should prefer it in a first edition ! " 
 What would he have said, too, of the folk who put 
 handsome volumes into handsome book-cases, and
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 309 
 
 leave them there for a quarter of a century without 
 removing the auction tickets ! 
 
 261/1. I heard to-day a story from the Educa- 
 tion Office. An inspector was asked why he had 
 charged so much for his fare between two places 
 when as the crow flies it was only so many miles. 
 He replied, " I do not ride a crow." 
 
 29^/2. The sale at Sotheby's of some letters 
 written by Sir Philip Francis has revived an ancient 
 controversy. I once knew an old gentleman living 
 at Windsor, who thought he had discovered a satis- 
 factory proof of the Franciscan authorship of the 
 " Letters of Junius." He would take his victim 
 with great solicitude into St. George's Chapel and 
 point to a tablet erected to the memory of the 
 Anglo-Saxon scholar Francis Junius ; and then 
 would proceed to a demonstration how on certain 
 days Francis must have been in the chapel, and 
 must have seen the tablet, and so doubtless adopted 
 the name. " But why," I once protested, " need 
 he have gone so far in search of his pseudonym as 
 Windsor ? Why could he not have borrowed it 
 from the address on his own letters Philip Francis, 
 Junior, Esq. ? He could always have alleged, if 
 the point were brought home to him, that the name 
 must refer to Junius Brutus." 
 
 December yd. I have had another letter from 
 my young journalist friend asking for advice in his 
 matrimonial difficulties. His wife comes of a stock
 
 310 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 not much given to the contemplative life, but full of 
 practical energy, which in her case has not large 
 resources of physical strength to draw upon. The 
 consequence is that when she herself is weary with 
 much coming and going, the sight of her husband 
 calmly driving a quill irritates her nerves and is apt 
 to cause a discharge. I have ventured to suggest 
 a homoeopathic remedy : that a writing-table be 
 provided for the dear lady as handsome a one as 
 means will afford and that she be persuaded to 
 attempt a novel. This should act as a counter- 
 irritant for overworked feelings, and might at the 
 same time tend to create a respect for the labour 
 of literature. The servants might be encouraged, 
 for the first few days, to burst into the room with 
 messages from the butcher and baker and candle- 
 stick-maker, whenever she was quietly settled to 
 work, and in this way create an understanding of 
 the conditions necessary for the practice of letters. 
 The other symptoms were, I fear, beyond my skill 
 to prescribe for. " What can I do when dear X v 
 after an outburst which reduces me to pulp, wonders 
 why I am so glum ; or, if I am a little silent at 
 meals, stimulates me by a ' Why don't you say 
 something ? ' a question which at once makes my 
 mind a blank." The only thing to do in this case, 
 I feel sure, would be to put the matter as delicately 
 as possible before the lady herself. I suggested 
 making her a present of an album, in which from
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 311 
 
 time to time some ideal Chloris or Lalage might 
 be blamed for similar betises, or, better, praised for 
 their absence. To open the volume, I sent the 
 following pieces, the first in the manner of Waller, 
 the second in that of Donne : 
 
 "TO CCELIA. 
 
 " Coelia, I wonder and admire 
 
 That though a short hour since you frowned, 
 Chiding, as Boreas were your sire, 
 So chill the gust, so fierce the sound ; 
 
 Now bright as sunshine and as fair 
 Your halcyon l face does soothe and bless, 
 
 As with a mild engaging air 
 
 You question of my pensiveness. 
 
 So the other Heaven, her anger spent, 
 
 Emerges from the cloudy tent 
 
 Suddenly splendid and serene, 
 
 As no disfiguring storm had been. 
 
 For her 'tis past, for men not so ; 
 
 Whose ways long weeks are choked with snow." 
 
 The second piece might be entitled "To his 
 contrarious mistress, who bade him talk." 
 
 " If our souls are the hemispheres 
 
 Of one vast world, our love, it is but fate 
 That the same sun should light and dark create, 
 Thy smiles accompany my tears ; 
 
 And if to bright 
 
 Night turn at last, day cannot but turn night, 
 While the earth's revolution makes the years. 
 
 1 I am aware that Waller would have accented " halcyon " on the 
 penultimate.
 
 312 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 As the same vocable ' Let be ' 
 
 Both ' fiat ' is and ' finis ' ; both the call 
 
 That wakes the spring and hush that shuts up all ; 
 
 So fares it, Love, with thee and me ! 
 So thy meant yea 
 Sounds in my willing heart a chilling nay ; 
 
 Thoughts bud not out, shake not their petals free." 
 
 i$th. The judgment of the House of Lords in 
 Allen v. Flood has been rapturously welcomed by 
 all trades unions, and not least by the honourable 
 order of baronets, now on strike. It is believed 
 in well-informed circles that many will now resign 
 their positions if any further increase is made in 
 their number. Every one must allow that the 
 baronets have been in some respects hardly used ; 
 but as ancient philologers derive their title from 
 the Greek {3apv$ (heavy), and more modern ones 
 from the root of the verb to bear, it would look as 
 if they were born to sorrow. They complain that 
 King James, to whom they owe their foundation, 
 promised for himself and his heirs that the whole 
 number of baronets should never exceed two hun- 
 dred, and should gradually decrease as the first 
 creations became extinct ; whereas there are now 
 no less than eight hundred. If a sufficient number 
 take advantage of the new decision to throw up 
 their patents, this grievance would at once be 
 remedied. But that, of course, would not bind 
 the future action of the Crown. Might not a peti- 
 tion be presented urging the Queen to follow her
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 313 
 
 ancestor's example and create a new order, leaving 
 the baronets to the distinction and extinction they 
 desire ? It is true that King James pledged himself 
 and his successors to create no new dignity below 
 a baron, but very little regard has been paid to 
 his other pledges, and this deserves no more 
 respect ; or, if it does, it would be possible to 
 create a degree equal to baronet with a somewhat 
 different title, such as baiiwcle, allowing it the same 
 honourable particle Sir for prefix. 
 
 Another complaint made is, that many of the 
 recent creations are of people who have risen to 
 fortune in commerce, whereas English etiquette 
 allows no trading for gentlefolk below the rank of 
 marquis. But such a complaint rests upon a mis- 
 conception of the original purpose of the order. 
 The first instructions to the commissioners do cer- 
 tainly require candidates to have had at least a 
 grandfather, but they lay much more stress on 
 the amount of their incomes ; and in the original 
 patent hardly a word is said about blood, and a 
 good deal about wealth. This is how it runs : 
 
 " James, by the grace of God, &c., greeting. 
 Whereas among the other cares of sovereignty 
 with which our mind is constantly exercised, that 
 neither is the least nor of least moment, the plan- 
 tation of our kingdom in Ireland, and chiefly of 
 Ulster, a large and famous province of the same 
 kingdom, which now under our government and
 
 314 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 by our arms being happily subdued, we endeavour 
 so to establish that so great a province should 
 more and more flourish not only in the true 
 practice of religion, civil humanity, and probity 
 of manners, but also in an affluence of riches and 
 abundance of all things which contribute either 
 to the ornament or happiness of the commonweal ; 
 . . . and whereas it is intimated unto us, on the 
 part of certain of our faithful subjects, that they are 
 most ready as well with their persons as their fortunes 
 to promote this our royal undertaking, WE moved with 
 a desire of accomplishing so holy and wholesome 
 a work, and fondly regarding such generous inclina- 
 tions and minds so addicted to our service and the 
 public good, have resolved with ourselves to be 
 wanting in nothing which may reward the afore- 
 said good will of our subjects, or excite a spirit 
 and alacrity in others to perform their parts, and 
 furnish their expenses upon this occasion; therefore, 
 weighing and considering with ourselves that virtue 
 and industry are cherished and supported by 
 nothing more than by honour, and that all the 
 splendour and amplitude of honour and dignity 
 take their rise from a King, as from a fountain, to 
 whose high prerogative it properly belongs to erect 
 and institute new titles of honour and dignity, as 
 he from whom the old ones flowed ; we have 
 thought proper (the service of the commonwealth 
 and the exigence of the times so requiring) to
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 315 
 
 reward neiv merits with new ensigns of dignity ; 
 and therefore of our certain knowledge and mere 
 motion we have ordained, erected, constituted, and 
 created a certain state, degree, dignity, name, and 
 title of Baronet within this our kingdom of Eng- 
 land, for ever to endure," &c. The patent then 
 goes on to say that A. B., " who with a generous 
 and liberal mind gave and yielded to us a relief 
 and supply ample enough to maintain and support 
 thirty men in our foot forces in our said kingdom 
 of Ireland for three entire years," shall " by these 
 presents " be raised, appointed, and created a 
 Baronet. 
 
 The price, that is to say, of the first baronetcies 
 was ^1095. Application was to be made any 
 Wednesday or Friday afternoon at Whitehall, and 
 the sooner the better, as there were only a limited 
 number to be disposed of ; and to quiet scoffers, 
 " because there is nothing of honour, or of value, 
 which is known to be sought or desired, be the 
 motives never so good, but may receive scandal 
 from some, who wanting the same good affection 
 to the public, or being in other considerations 
 incapable, can be contented, out of envy to those 
 that are so preferred, to cast aspersions and impu- 
 tations upon them, as if they came by this dignity 
 for any other consideration but that which con- 
 cerneth this so public and memorable a work," 
 the commissioners were to allow the new baronet
 
 316 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 ;to take an oath that he had not paid for his dignity 
 more than the market price. 
 
 It is interesting, in view of the recent agitation, 
 to notice that within a year of the establishment 
 of the order, the baronets were out on strike, 
 owing to precedence being accorded over them to 
 the younger sons of viscounts and barons. 
 
 The present list of complaints is a long one. 
 Besides those I have noticed, one of the most in- 
 teresting is the protest of the Home Rule baronets 
 against being compelled to bear the " bloody hand " 
 of Ulster. 
 
 2oth. I notice in the magazines that there has 
 been a discussion about the reality of " dowsing " or 
 discovering water by the divining rod. One wonders 
 how the fact can be in debate when it is a lucrative 
 profession. Mr. M., who is the only "dowser" I 
 have seen, is generally accurate in his estimate of 
 the depth at which water will be found, so much 
 so that he is ready to contract for the required well 
 on the simple understanding " no water, no money." 
 I have a friend, not in the " dowsing " line of busi- 
 ness, who experiences very curious sensations when 
 he crosses water I do not mean in a boat even 
 in the dark when the water is not visible. And 
 everybody knows how averse those sensitive 
 .creatures donkeys are to crossing a stream. 
 
 A lady who " has read with interest my remarks 
 on the need of comforting the sick by taking a
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 317 
 
 gloomy view of their condition," writes to tell me 
 that it was her invariable custom when her late 
 husband was at all seriously indisposed to read the 
 Burial Service to him ! I confess I was thinking 
 of minor ailments. 
 
 2 is/. There is no contagion so inevitable as that 
 of ideas ; and therefore when an idea once which 
 is seldom gets into our village it spreads. The 
 current idea at the present moment is garden im- 
 provement. The vicar is anxious to formalise the 
 vicarage garden, and as it was made about two 
 centuries ago, it would not be difficult to reduce it 
 to its old lines. But one thing is indispensable, 
 and that is time ; and I warn the vicar that before 
 the yew hedges are grown the Church will be dis- 
 established. Being a man of faith, he will probably 
 reject my advice, which is to plant privet instead. 
 Privet is as susceptible to the knife as yew, and if 
 my memory serves me it was the material, accord- 
 ing to Du Bartas, of the hedges in the Garden of 
 Eden. They were clipped, too, according to the 
 same authority, in the extreme of the fashion 
 
 "In satyrs, centaurs, whales, and half-men-horses." 
 
 There is, however, an even chance that nothing 
 will be done at all. For the lady of the vicarage, 
 who has her own garden gods, one of whom is by 
 name Robinson, has discovered in the early chap- 
 ters of his sacred work an attack upon formalists.
 
 318 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Eugenia was shown, when she last called, a passage 
 where her own idols, Messrs. Blomfield and Thomas, 
 were spoken of as no better than they should be. 
 This is the inevitable consequence of making a 
 religion of what is purely a matter of taste. Mr. 
 Robinson appeals to nature. But weeds are as 
 natural as flowers. A lawn left to nature would 
 soon become a meadow. A hedge left to nature 
 would become monstrous and useless because per- 
 vious. A well-grown yew-tree is undoubtedly a 
 beautiful object, but a yew clipped intelligently is 
 quite as beautiful, and if a tree will clip it is not 
 unnatural to clip it. A garden given up to 
 " topiary " work, such as Levens, is dull enough ; 
 but nothing could be finer or more majestic (say) 
 than the green court at Canons Ashby (Sir H. 
 Dryden's), with its double line of cone-clipped 
 yews, each ten feet in diameter. I suppose they 
 are two hundred years old ; in which case glorious 
 John may have seen them planted, when he visited 
 at his uncle's ; Richardson, at any rate, must have 
 speculated on their chances of survival to a green 
 old age, for he was a frequent guest. But Mr. 
 Robinson, I presume, would not deign a glance at 
 such deplorable distortion. 
 
 2.2nd. In all our digging the treasure-trove was 
 nil) but to-day in cutting down an ancient hedge 
 we came upon a set of quoits. Quoits would in 
 old days have been as common a game at the farm
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 319 
 
 as bowls were at the vicarage, 1 or cock-fighting in 
 the churchyard. I am not, as a rule, lucky in 
 finding things, not having long sight, and not 
 having contracted the Mammon-like habit of walk- 
 ing with my eyes on the ground. One hears such 
 marvellous tales of things being found after many 
 days by their losers, that one half fancies the fairies 
 may have something to do with the whole process. 
 Is not this, for instance, a Puckish trick ? An old 
 friend of mine, who lived in Manchester, lost the 
 stone out of his signet ring, and found it in the 
 street, but not until he had had another engraved. 
 Sometimes the fairy is more kind. I know of a 
 lady who has a bad habit of dropping a ring as 
 she gets into her carriage to go out to dinner, and 
 always finds it when she reaches home. The gift, 
 as one would expect, sometimes runs in families. 
 P.'s father found a gold coin (Roman) ; he himself 
 found a silver shilling of Edward VI.; and his 
 infant son recently picked up a halfpenny in copper, 
 or, as the police say, " bronze." Now, I suppose, 
 the virtue will have departed from the fairy-gift. 
 It is interesting to observe that this familiar scale 
 of metals is, therefore, not merely human and con- 
 ventional, but has a validity in the ideal world. 
 As Sophia and I approach nearer to our golden 
 
 1 Cf. Costard of Sir Nathaniel: "There, an't shall please you; a 
 foolish mild man ; an honest man, look you, and soon dashed ! He 
 is a marvellous good neighbour, faith; and a very good bowler." 
 (" Love's Labour's Lost," v. 2, 587.)
 
 320 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 wedding, I see more and more reason for empha- 
 sising its genuinely metallic aspect. It is a pure 
 fiction of the poets, and bears its refutation on its 
 face, that the so-called golden age was the age 
 before the discovery of gold. But this is to digress ; 
 I was speaking of finds. My esteemed friend and 
 
 neighbour, the late rector of , told me he once 
 
 found in a newly ploughed field a coin he could 
 not identify. It was of pewter, and bore a trireme 
 on one side and on the other a head. He kept it 
 for years in his cabinet, and exhibited it from time 
 to time to many antiquaries, who all pronounced 
 it unique. One day he saw some little boys in his 
 own parish playing with new coins precisely similar. 
 They were called " dumps " and came from Bir- 
 mingham. 
 
 It is rather unkind of the reporters to say that 
 the skull of Voltaire, recently exhumed, was recog- 
 nised by its sneer, for skulls have no choice. And 
 Voltaire was always so emaciated, that his sneer 
 was probably the natural sneer of his skull. Still 
 it suited his temper admirably ; as his friend, Dr. 
 Young (the author of " Night Thoughts "), put it, 
 referring to their controversy on the merits of the 
 Sin and Death episode in " Paradise Lost " : 
 
 " You are so witty, profligate, and thin, 
 At once we think you Milton, Death, and Sin." 
 
 It is extraordinary how Englishmen of all classes 

 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 321 
 
 have lost the taste and the capacity for keeping 
 festivals. To turn over the pages of " Brand's 
 Popular Antiquities " is to lose oneself in a foreign 
 land ; one wonders how our forefathers, who 
 practised all these elaborate customs, found time 
 to do anything else. We still deck our houses and 
 churches with evergreens at Christmas, but among 
 evergreens we do not discriminate. The beautiful 
 carol of the contest between the holly and ivy, 1 first 
 printed by Ritson from a MS. of Henry VI.'s reign, 
 would be unmeaning to us ; at least I know I was 
 asked to save all the ivy I had stripped off my trees 
 to help decorate the church. But quotations given 
 in Brand from churchwardens' accounts show that 
 ivy was used for church decoration as early as the 
 sixteenth century; in 1656 we have mention of 
 yew, and in 1734 of cypress. Probably it saved 
 trouble to fetch branches into church from the 
 churchyard. But what becomes of the symbolism ? 
 January 1st, 1898. "Semper ego auditor tantum, 
 nunquamnc reponam ? " Am I to be besieged with 
 New Year's greetings and not return the compli- 
 ment ? Christmas cards I will never send : no, 
 not even in revenge ; and I have a hope the 
 custom may soon die now that hospitals and foreign 
 missions (as I am informed) have declined any 
 
 1 " Nay, ivy, nay ; it shall not be, I wis ; 
 
 Let holly have the mastery, as the manner is. 
 Holly stand in the hall, fair to behold ; 
 Ivy stand wilhout the door, she is full sore a-cold," &c. 
 
 X
 
 322 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 longer to relieve the British household of its last 
 year's hoard. Perhaps this accounts for the new 
 form they are taking. Instead of " herald angels " 
 (who really, the Vicar tells us, ought not to be 
 "herald angels" at all, but a "welkin"), and in- 
 stead of the merry hunter out with the hounds in a 
 hard frost, the postman now brings the good wishes 
 of Mr. and Mrs. Jones embossed in gold with a 
 smudgeograph of the new baby. But this must 
 surely be the beginning of the end. The New Year 
 seems to offer greater scope to the fancy. One friend 
 signalises the season with a Pindarique Ode of his 
 own compounding ; another with a calendar of his 
 particular saints and worthies ; another and this 
 is what has haunted me with a text by way of 
 motto. As the New Year approaches I find myself 
 uneasily forecasting whether it shall be Carlyle, or 
 Sir Thomas Browne, or Ruskin, that must guide 
 my pained steps through the fresh year of grace, 
 and whether the motto will be printed in violet or 
 magenta. 1 
 
 To-night I gave a little feast to the village hand- 
 bell ringers. The talk was very interesting ; but 
 all I remember was a literary judgment on Shake- 
 speare. Somebody praised "The Merchant of 
 Venice," but P. dissented. He thought poor old 
 
 1 The postman has resolved the doubt. It is Bacon, and in scarlet, 
 as befits a Lord Chancellor. This year my mind is to "move in 
 charity, rest in providence, and turn upon the poles of truth." It 
 makes me giddy to think of it.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 323 
 
 Shylock very hardly used. His favourite play was 
 " Hamlet." There was no favouritism in that. 
 Shakespeare killed a man on one side and then 
 killed one on the other ; gave this fellow a slap in 
 the face, and then that other a punch in the ribs. 
 For insight this is worthy of G. B. S. 
 
 4/A. I noted some weeks ago l the departure of 
 my garden-boy for the crusades, but by an over- 
 sight I did not record his return. I went for my 
 usual stroll round the garden after breakfast three 
 days later, and found the young hopeful digging 
 away as if nothing had happened. " Good morn- 
 ing, Sidney " (every boy here is Sidney who is not 
 Albert Edward) ; " we have missed you these three 
 days." " Yes, sir." " What has happened to you ?" 
 " Went to enlist, sir." " Well, why have you come 
 back again ? " " Wouldn't have me, sir." William, 
 who is himself in the reserve, told me in confidence, 
 " he expected as how he were too meek-hearted 
 like." All the old soldiers in the neighbourhood 
 who have served in India are much in request now 
 for legends of the Pathans. I bought the New 
 Year's editions of those invaluable works "Whit- 
 aker," " Hachette " (for Sophia), and " Who's He." 
 I feel sure that a comparison of " Whitaker " with 
 " Hachette," if one had leisure to make it, would 
 throw light on some fundamental differences in 
 
 1 November loth.
 
 324 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 genius between the two peoples. It might even 
 account for the Dreyfus case. 
 
 6th. I went to look at the lambs. Did anybody 
 in England ever see a shepherd playing upon a 
 pipe ? My experience of shepherds is that they 
 are what we call in Berkshire " drew " men, sombre 
 spirits, given perhaps to psalmody on Sundays, but 
 not likely on working- days to " fool away the light " 
 with pipe and tabor, or any other combination of 
 instruments. Somehow the hideous structures, like 
 bathing-machines, with corrugated iron roofs, which 
 roam our wintry meadows like the wheeled house 
 of the Scythian on the wide steppe, seem an unfit 
 tabernacle for any spirit of song. It would be 
 unimaginable in the background (say) of that lovely 
 little Raphael drawing of a shepherd boy with a 
 bagpipe which Mr. Mackail printed for a frontis- 
 piece to his version of the " Eclogues," or of the 
 flute-player by Campagnola reproduced in the 
 " Pageant " for last year. Nor do I find that our 
 shepherd's sons incline to take at all a more 
 romantic view of their father's calling. The eldest, 
 who is still at school, hopes in time to be a butcher, 
 and on his holidays dons a blue apron and goes 
 round for orders. Still the old pastoral convention, 
 though unreal, has its charm, and I would not 
 willingly lose a single Hobbinol or Cuddy from 
 any " Shepherd's kalendar " of them all. 
 
 gth. I picked out of the twopenny box at 's a
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 325 
 
 volume which I have found more entertaining than 
 I expected. It was " The Secretary's Vade-mecum," 
 a letter-writer of the year 1697. The book was 
 strange to me, but from internal evidence I should 
 judge that it has been reprinted, for not a few 
 letters that appear in the daily papers seem to be 
 studied from its pages. The letters of the knight 
 who corresponds with Mr. Farrow about the 
 money-lending among ironmasters are undoubtedly 
 modelled upon the " Letters Comminatory," which 
 (as the book says) " must be written full of Resent- 
 ments of Injury, in an angry, passionate Stile, to 
 terrific the Person to a submission." One of them 
 accordingly begins : " Ungracious offspring of an 
 infernal brood, whom Heaven permitted for a 
 plague, and the Earth nourished as a peculiar 
 mischief," &c. Mr. K., again, who writes to the 
 Bishop of London about ritual questions, has, I 
 should say, perused with no little profit the " letters 
 mandatory or Commanding in which you expect to 
 have your will absolutely obey'd." Besides these, 
 there are letters accusatory, excusatory, reprobatory, 
 petitionary, letters of advice, and " mixed letters," 
 of all of which, and especially of the last, the press 
 affords daily examples. 
 
 Nor are there wanting specimens in every style 
 of that very important branch of correspondence 
 which deals with the art and mystery of love- 
 making. We are offered " a letter of address from
 
 326 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 a gentleman to a lady " with " the answer in a 
 doubtful manner ; " perhaps the volume would 
 be of more practical use to-day, in view of Sir 
 F. Jeune's court, if it were the gentleman's letters 
 that were in the " doubtful manner." There is 
 one, however, that opens ominously and, as it 
 were prophetically, with the words, " My breach of 
 promise," &c. In a higher key we have one from 
 a passionate lover to his mistress beginning " Gra- 
 cious object of my pleasing thoughts, and mistress 
 of my affection ; " another in the pastoral style to 
 a " fair nymph," and " a plain country-letter " from 
 " Honest John" to "Honest Joan." A curious side- 
 light is thrown on manners by a letter of intro- 
 duction from a gentleman recommending a friend 
 to a lady as " her servant for life." But the gem 
 of the collection is " a letter to a lady much grieved 
 for the impairing of her beauty by the small-pox." 
 It should even make an anti-vaccinationist shudder 
 to know that a letter on this topic was considered 
 useful in a " vade-mecum." * The consolation for 
 the ravages of the " inexorable distemper " is not 
 very consoling. 
 
 " What if some dimples are impressed by the Disease ! 
 / 'enus's Beauty consisted, to her Praise, as Poetical Gayness sets 
 it forth, in that particular, though not happening by the same 
 Means. Observe the Face of Heaven, when the numerous 
 Hoast of Stars stud it over with Seeds of Light, how beautiful 
 
 1 See page 297.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 327 
 
 and gay it represents itself to our admiring Eyes? So your 
 Face, adorn'd or studded o'er with little Rounds indenting it 
 make it lovely and desirable," &c. 
 
 The book includes some specimens of Caroline 
 or perhaps it would be more accurate to say 
 Low Dutch banter and repartee, and a collection 
 of songs as far out of the present taste as the 
 banter. One, however, is interesting, not for its 
 merits, poetical or linguistic, but as showing how 
 early our literature was captured by the Scots siren. 
 
 " When anent your Love you came, 
 
 Ah, Sawney ! were you true, 
 What though I seem to frown and gloom, 
 
 I ne'er could gang from you. 
 Yet still my Tongue, do what I can, 
 
 With muckle Woe denies ; 
 Wae's me, when once I'se like a man, 
 
 It boots not to be wise." 
 
 I'jth. Should not the excited behaviour of the 
 Parisian students give pause to the gentlemen who 
 are for departing from the wisdom of our ancestors 
 by setting up a university in the capital ? The 
 head masters of our public schools met not long 
 ago in solemn session, and denounced the new 
 degree that Oxford and Cambridge are granting 
 for cricket and football ; those ancient universities 
 having at last adopted the discipline of Plato 
 (whom they have long praised with their mouth), 
 and admitted Gymnastics to be a recognised branch 
 of education. Tom is much excited over the deci- 
 sion, and hopes we may at length get back to the
 
 328 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 fine old fortifying curriculum of the Magi, which, 
 if we may credit Herodotus, comprehended only 
 three items, riding, speaking the truth, and drawing 
 the (short) bow. Tom is never tired of pointing 
 to the Clarendon building in Oxford as a crying 
 instance of the deference we pay to the wishes of 
 pious founders ; Clarendon having left his bequest 
 to endow a riding-school. I am not sure that 
 some defence might not be made for the Oxford 
 authorities in the matter, since Oxford hardly 
 needs a riding-school so long as it has Shotover. 
 Moreover, both Oxford and Cambridge have acces- 
 sible rivers (of sorts) on which to practise rowing ; 
 and they have playing fields. But London is in a 
 different case ; and the present demonstrations in 
 Paris should convince sensible people that no new 
 charter ought to be granted to London till a 
 guarantee has been given for a sound training in 
 athletics. Let our present Lord Chancellor found 
 a riding professorship. We do not want under- 
 graduates parading Pall Mall and Piccadilly shouting 
 an English version of " Conspuez Zola." Spitting 
 (apart from its unpleasantness) must be, except 
 perhaps in a vacuum, a miserable form of exercise. 
 i&th. A letter to the Times very happily parallels 
 the Dreyfus case for muddle-headedness with the 
 trial in " Alice." l 
 
 1 The parallel has since been drawn still closer by the flinging of 
 inkpots in the Chamber^ ' -,".'-.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 329 
 
 i()th. In looking down the list of deaths (I 
 find, as I advance in years, I look at the deaths 
 before the marriages : the births are of no interest 
 to anybody) I saw the name of Mr. Dodgson 
 ( tc Lewis Carroll "), who was in everybody's mouth 
 yesterday. The Standard, however, vouchsafes no 
 obituary notice ; but as Mr. Dodgson resented 
 nothing so much as a hint that he was interested 
 in any but mathematical literature, perhaps this is 
 taking the correct line. I once committed the 
 indiscretion of confounding the humourist with 
 the don, and was properly snubbed. An Oxford 
 bookseller had told me that Mr. D. was extremely 
 nice about the printing of his " Alices," and that 
 every copy not up to his ideal was withheld from 
 sale and given to the poor. I, coveting some of 
 these for our village children, and being in Oxford, 
 sent a note to Christ Church asking if I had been 
 accurately informed, and received in reply the 
 following printed circular, which is now among 
 my most cherished possessions : 
 
 " Mr. C. L. Dodgson is so frequently addressed by strangers 
 on the quite unauthorised assumption that he claims, or at any 
 rate acknowledges, the authorship of books not published under 
 his name, that he has found it necessary to print this, once for 
 all, as an answer to all such applications. 
 
 " He neither claims, nor acknowledges, any connection with 
 any 'pseudonym,' or with any book not published under his 
 own name. 
 
 " Ch. Ch., Oxford. '
 
 330 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 23rd. The influenza is with us. What im- 
 presses me about the disease is, that it picks out 
 the strongest people as though it were a spirit of 
 compensation. One of Tom's labourers, originally 
 a navvy, and perhaps the toughest man in the 
 place, is now tottering about with a stick like a 
 grandfather. Another sign of discretion is that it 
 spares at least in our neighbourhood the doc- 
 tors and the parsons. There is a droll story (one 
 of those which hurt some people with much laugh- 
 ing, while others see nothing to laugh at) in a 
 book called " Random Recollections," by the Rev. 
 George Huntington, which I have had lent me, of 
 a parson whom Mr. H. saw hanging as far as he 
 could out of a window in the top storey of a house 
 to avoid infection, while he read the office of 
 "Visitation of the Sick." The clergy one reads 
 about in these pages are delightful old gentlemen, 
 of whom the type is as extinct as the dodo. 
 Amongst them my favourite is an old Canon Wray. 
 " I heard him tell the Dean that he thought four 
 thousand a year a most desirable income, with 
 which any one might be content. ' You have 
 enough,' he said, 'for your necessities and a few 
 luxuries. No man need wish for more.' " This is 
 quite in the temper of Cowley, who says in his 
 essay " Of Greatness " : 
 
 "When you have pared away all the Vanity, 
 what solid and natural contentment does there
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 331 
 
 remain which may not be had with five hundred 
 pounds a year ? Not so many servants or horses, 
 but a few good ones, which will do all the business 
 as well ; not so many choice dishes at every Meale, 
 but at several meals all of them, which makes them 
 both the more healthy and the more pleasant ; not 
 so rich garments, nor so frequent changes, but as 
 warm and as comely and so frequent change too 
 as is every jot as good for the Master though not 
 for the Tailor or Valet de Chamber ; not such a 
 stately Palace, nor guilt rooms, or the costliest 
 sorts of Tapestry, but a convenient brick-houss, 
 with decent Wainscot and pretty Forest-work 
 hangings. Lastly (for I omit all other particulars? 
 and will end with that which I love most in both 
 conditions), not whole Woods cut in walks, nor 
 vast Parks, nor Fountain, or Cascade-gardens, but 
 herb, and Flower, and fruit-gardens, which are 
 more useful, and the water every whit as clear and 
 wholesome, as if it darted from the breasts of a 
 marble Nymph, or the Urn of a River-God." 
 
 I used to wonder at Cowley's moderation in 
 fixing the ideal income at five hundred pounds a 
 year, until I reflected that the purchasing power 
 of money was in his day five or six times what 
 it is now. 
 
 2$>th. I am sorry to see the Standard, for whose 
 criticism of life I have great respect, laying down 
 to-day as a truth of experience that a person who
 
 332 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 has suffered great sorrows is braced by them to 
 bear little worries. " A man who has known what 
 it is to lose a wife is not so likely to worry over 
 the loss of a portmanteau ; and one who has had 
 to go without food for a couple of days will keep 
 his temper though the soup be cold or the joint 
 burnt to a cinder." This is in the high pulpit 
 manner, and conceals a not very subtle fallacy. 
 The play upon the word " loss " reminds me of 
 Johnson's famous epigram 
 
 " If a man who ' turnips ' cries, 
 Cry not when his father dies, 
 'Tis a proof that he would rather 
 9 Have a turnip than his father." 
 
 The fact is, man is a social animal, and when 
 something goes wrong, his inbred integrity at 
 once impels him to inquire, " Whom can I blame 
 for this ? " Now, when he " loses " a wife, mis- 
 using that word in the ordinary way, there is 
 usually no question of blaming any one, and his 
 indignation is not wasted. But when he " loses " 
 a portmanteau, there is an almost inexhaustible 
 series of objects for his indignation to lighten and 
 thunder round his servants at home, his hackney- 
 coachman, the railway officials, his fellow-travellers, 
 and so forth. Similarly, for his two days' hunger 
 probably no one is in fault ; but for the wasted 
 victuals there is the offending cook. And the very 
 condition of his patience under the one set of cir-
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 333 
 
 cumstances is the condition of his wrath under the 
 other I mean his high sense of duty. Surely, my 
 deaf Standard, it is only your indifferent Radical, 
 bred in the mistaken doctrine of laissez-faire, who 
 tolerates the incapacity of his servants, whether 
 public or private. Edward Fitz-Gerald was fond 
 of quoting a passage from Wesley's journal, which 
 garnishes the Standard's doctrine with an amusing 
 anecdote. "A gentleman of large fortune, while 
 we were seriously conversing, ordered a servant to 
 throw some coals on the fire. A puff of smoke 
 came out. He threw himself back in his chair 
 and cried out, ' Oh, Mr. Wesley, these are the crosses 
 I meet with every day.' " Now, allowing a little* 
 touch of exaggeration in the expression, due per- 
 haps to the " serious conversation " that was inter- 
 rupted, I cannot see the gentleman to be as absurd 
 as he is represented. My experience is that masters 
 who pass over gaucheries because they seem too 
 trifling to complain of are worse and worse served. 
 Who does not know the domestic who never comes 
 into a room without leaving an open door to 
 retreat by, and advances to your chair with a note 
 or a card like the Spirit of the North Pole with all 
 the Arctic winds in " her tempestuous petticoat " ? 
 Who does not know the domestic who forgets to 
 attend to the drawing-room fire till the moment 
 before dinner is done, and you come in to find it 
 black and cold ? And if I resent such want of
 
 334 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 consideration, I shall not find myself less able to 
 bear the next fit of the gout, or the next fall in 
 
 the stock-market, or the next variation of 's 
 
 undisciplined temper. 
 
 February is/. It has been found convenient to 
 name the peacocks, so I have called them " Thomas" 
 and " Love." To induce them to stay at home, I 
 was advised to give them company, and accordingly 
 I bought some guinea-fowls birds, as I think, of 
 singularly beautiful plumage. In Berkshire we 
 call them gallinis, which, oddly enough, was the 
 name of a dancing-master who, some time last 
 century, ran away with one of Lord Abingdon's 
 daughters and came to live in Berkshire. Gallinis 
 are apt to be wild, and have a trick of wandering 
 far afield and laying their eggs (your eggs) in your 
 neighbour's preserve ; but these were warranted 
 home-keeping, and so they have proved. But I 
 could sometimes wish they would visit other places. 
 At night they roost in the old oak, and about 
 twelve o'clock begin their lugubrious recitative 
 
 "vexing the ethereal powers 
 With midnight matins at uncivil hours." 
 
 The doctor, who lives at the other end of the 
 village, tells me he finds them of service in keeping 
 him from falling asleep again after he has been 
 called up, and I cannot but be glad that my loss 
 should in any way subserve another's gain. But
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 335 
 
 peacocks or no peacocks, doctor or no doctor, 
 those birds must die. 
 
 yd. I saw an amusing scene this afternoon at 
 our railway station. My companion X., who is a 
 keen grammarian, fell a-laughing at a sentence on 
 the notice-board, which is certainly Lindley Murray 
 " a little scratched." It runs : " If passengers are 
 desirous of leaving luggage or parcels under the 
 charge of the Company, they must themselves take, 
 or see them taken to and deposited in, the cloak- 
 room." Looking round for some one to share his 
 glee (I being engaged at the ticket office), X. spied 
 the local postman, and began showing him the 
 absurdity of the thing ; but the postman could see 
 no absurdity. "They must themselves take," says 
 X. ; " take what ? " " Why, take the luggage," says 
 the postman. " It doesn't say so," says X. " Yes, 
 it does," says the postman. " Well, where are they 
 to take ? " says X. " Why, to the cloak-room," 
 says the postman. " It doesn't say so," says X. 
 " Yes, it does," says the postman. After this dia- 
 logue in the manner of Sterne they were both 
 very red ; but X.'s indomitable spirit would not 
 give way, and the postman became every moment 
 more convinced he was being made a fool of. 
 Happily the train soon solved the situation by 
 ambling in. Public inscriptions have been of 
 interest to me from very early years. I recollect 
 that my first letter to a newspaper was to point
 
 336 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 out the misplacement of an apostrophe in a notice 
 board of the South Coast Railway. But things 
 that interest me have never interested editors, and 
 my first letter fared no better than my last. There 
 is a notice hanging in our village post-office to the 
 effect that " Postmasters are neither bound to give 
 change nor authorised to demand it." This seems 
 to the unofficial mind to lead to an impasse. If I 
 present a half-sovereign for a five-shilling postal 
 order, and the postmaster has no small silver, what 
 is to happen ? He says, " I am not bound to give 
 change ; " to which I retort, " Nor are you autho- 
 rised to demand it." But a notice that gave me 
 more pleasure even than this was one sent round 
 when the telegraph wires were first brought to us ; 
 it was so non-committal : "After January ist tele- 
 grams will be dealt with at this office." There were 
 no idle tradesmanlike promises about promptitude 
 or accuracy, or even about the transmission of the 
 messages. They would be " dealt with " ; I pre- 
 sume, on the merits. 
 
 6th. "Verbum non amplius" influenza. 
 
 nth. It has been a fairly mild attack, and I 
 have not grudged a few days in bed, still less a 
 few days of convalescence ; for as there is no 
 infectious peeling in influenza, I have had no 
 scruple in ordering a variety of light literature 
 from the circulating library. " Send something 
 cheerful," I said. At the top of the heap came
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 337 
 
 " Weeping Ferry." I remembered a passage in 
 Herrick, where Charon says 
 
 " Thou and I'll sing to make these dark shades merry, 
 Who else with tears would doubtless drown my ferry." 
 
 So I took heart, hoping Charon if it was Charon's 
 ferry might still be in the mood for a song. 
 Well, I am not going to dethrone " Esther Van- 
 homrigh " ; but I am confirmed in my opinion 
 that Mrs. Woods is one of the very few writers 
 of to-day who write English. After "Weeping 
 Ferry " I read " The King with Two Faces " a 
 story that has justly become popular. And then 
 I read Mr. Wells's " Certain Personal Matters." 
 Mr. Wells's uncle is a very old friend, and I was 
 gratified to make the acquaintance of his aunt 
 Charlotte, with whose taste for mahogany I sym- 
 pathise. Then, being deeply interested in the 
 Scotch, I fell back on Chambers's new " Biographi- 
 cal Dictionary," for this dictionary includes all the 
 Scotsmen who ever lived, with just a sprinkling of 
 Medes and Elamites, like slaves in the triumphal 
 chariot, to avert the evil eye. There are some 
 interesting stories of Bright in Mrs. Simpson's 
 " Many Memories " ; it is vastly entertaining to 
 see how a tribune, who was never weary of bully- 
 ing the country gentry, appealed to all the gods 
 when it was proposed to interfere with his own 
 omnipotence by Factory Acts. 
 
 Y
 
 338 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 . The doctor told me this morning an 
 anecdote which may interest psychologists. He 
 had been attending for some considerable period 
 a country parson, and, according to a fashion now 
 becoming antiquated, attending him gratis. When 
 in due course the parson died, his widow wrote to 
 inquire how much the doctor would allow her for 
 the medicine bottles. When I recalled Words- 
 worth's lines 
 
 " Alas ! the gratitude of men 
 Hath oftener left me mourning" 1 
 
 the doctor observed, first, that Wordsworth was 
 not in medical practice, and secondly, that he says 
 nothing about women. In regard to the first 
 point, I believe it is a fact that country doctors 
 find great difficulty in collecting their fees ; and in 
 regard to the second, as gratitude depends upon 
 imagination, it may well be that women, having 
 less imagination than men, are less grateful. The 
 doctor told me " intermittent heart " is a not 
 uncommon female ailment. Sophia, to whom I 
 communicated the anecdote, will have it that it 
 makes nothing against women in general, but only 
 against a particular species with sharply defined 
 
 1 i7//z. In defence of the maligned sex I should like to record a 
 case of gratitude in a woman that left me a little mournful. I had sent 
 Charlotte a book for her birthday last autumn, and at breakfast to-day 
 she said: "Oh, thank you for that delightful book you sent me." 
 "Oh," I said, "what was it?" "Dear me," said C,, "I have quite 
 forgotten."
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 339 
 
 virtues and defects, the country parsoness. But 
 for this lady I would very gladly hold a brief, even 
 against Sophia. It is easy enough to caricature 
 her as a sort of ogress fattening up the peasant on 
 beef-tea and milk puddings to make a meal for 
 her husband ; for, no doubt, she is often as keen 
 a partisan as Mr. Arch himself, or the gentlemen 
 who go round the villages in red vans making fun 
 of her and her blankets, or the amiable celibates 
 who point the finger at her in Socialist church 
 magazines. But let her be ill and have to leave 
 home for a month, as sometimes happens to our 
 good " Vicaress," and hear the clamour of the 
 village mothers ! 
 
 i6th. I came up to Charlotte's for a few days. 
 There are two flies, trifling and absurd, which yet 
 somewhat mar the ointment of my infrequent visits 
 to town. The first is that the ancient doorkeeper 
 at my club is too often off duty, leaving his place 
 to a buttons who insults me by asking my name ; 
 the other, that my friends become indignant if I 
 do not pay visits. Now, as some of them reside 
 as far north as the Regent's Park, and others as 
 far south as Chelsea, to pay calls I must either 
 run the risk of bronchitis in a hansom, or of 
 asthma in the Underground Railway. Of the two 
 on this occasion I dreaded asthma least, and have 
 in consequence spent much time on the Inner 
 Circle of that inferno. I observed there that
 
 34 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 ladies never open a carriage-door (for fear, I pre- 
 sume, of soiling their gloves), but wait until a 
 door opens from within and then make a rush for 
 it. If they are a party of six, and the compart- 
 ment is already full, while others are empty, this 
 makes no difference ; nor does it concern them if 
 the carriage they invade is one where men are 
 smoking. In fact, I saw yesterday a posse of 
 ladies carry by assault a smoking-carriage, from 
 which one man had alighted, all the rest beating a 
 sullen retreat into the adjoining compartment. I 
 should judge that if a person had time to spend 
 and could breathe the atmosphere, he would glean 
 a rich harvest of humours there below the streets. 
 In my short journey to-day I saw a man who 
 turned his hat the front side to the back when he 
 got in, and reversed it again when he got out ; I 
 saw another who took down the number of the 
 carriage in case of accidents ; and a third who 
 was " the very model " of an old Leech picture 
 with Dundreary whiskers. Perhaps one might find 
 down there buried examples of all the forgotten 
 fashions. 
 
 I'jth. To the Millais Exhibition. Many of the 
 pictures are old friends or old enemies, but one 
 which I had never seen before fascinated me. It 
 was the portrait of an elderly lady, much wrinkled, 
 with a parrot ; and suggested nothing so much as 
 that picture of which Mr. Anstey tells in "The
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 341 
 
 Fallen Idol," into which Chalanka, the wicked 
 image, got himself painted as an accessory, and 
 then transferred his features to the sitter. It would 
 be interesting to know who the sitter was, and 
 whether the picture has a romantic history. As it 
 is against my principles to enrich the Academy, I 
 forbore to purchase a catalogue. One great charm 
 of the exhibitions at Burlington House is that they 
 may appeal to more than one sense ; when the 
 eye is satisfied with seeing, the ear may take its 
 turn of pleasure. The waifs and strays of conver- 
 sation that have from time to time reached me 
 without any deliberate eavesdropping, although 
 never so delightful as those recorded in "Voces 
 Populi " for a jest lives in the ear even more than 
 on the lips have often been as interesting as the 
 pictures, and quite as artless. This morning the 
 first words to fix my attention were these : " Do 
 you know, I feel quite sure it is coming on ; Mary 
 is down with it and the nurse ; and if I had not 
 pledged myself to bring you here to-day I should 
 have stayed in bed. However, I shall turn in as 
 soon as I get home." I felt I was intruding on 
 domestic mysteries, and moved away to the farther 
 end of the room. Then, while I was looking at 
 the beautiful dove-coloured picture of Mr. Ruskin 
 in a prospect of rocks and waterfalls, two young 
 ladies stationed themselves in front of me, and 
 began to discuss a sister art. Said A. : "I see
 
 34 2 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 that the Poet-laureate is about to give up writing 
 in the Standard, in order to devote more time to 
 the Muses." Said B. : "Oh, who is the Poet- 
 laureate ? " A. : " For shame, Sylvia ; what igno- 
 rance ! His name is Alfred Austin. Isn't it strange 
 that both he and Tennyson should have been 
 called Alfred ? and so many poets, too, are called 
 Austin. There is Alfred Austin, and Austin Dobson, 
 and" (after a pause) "Jane Austin. 1 It is rather 
 a poetical name, don't you think ? " B. : " Yes, 
 dear. But we always take the Standard at home, 
 and I have never seen any poetry in it." A. : " Oh 
 no ; that's just it. The Poet-laureate has not 
 had time to write any poetry yet, because he has 
 had to write the Standard. But now he's going 
 to begin. You see, the Poet-laureate in these 
 days has to be such a political person. My father 
 said, when Mr. Austin was appointed, that it was 
 a happy return to the sound Conservative prin- 
 ciples that prevailed in Mr. Shadwell's time ; 
 and he hoped the Government, with their large 
 
 1 Besides these, there was a William Austin of Lincoln's Inn, who 
 wrote three capital Christmas carols ; and a Samuel Austin, of whose 
 " steropegeretick poetry" that sadly misnamed poet, Flatman, wrote 
 
 " The beetles of our rhimes shall drive full fast in 
 The wedges of your worth to everlasting, 
 My much Apocalyptiqu' friend, Sam. Austin." 
 
 The father of this Samuel and the son of this William were also poets, 
 and probably the "Dictionary of Biography" would extend the list. 
 All these, not excepting Jane, seem wortliy scions of the great saint 
 and rhetorician whose name they bear.
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 343 
 
 majority, would have the courage to make the 
 post a genuinely party one, so that Sir Lewis 
 Morris might come in when Mr. Austin went out." 
 B. : " Oh yes, I do so hope he will. I do so dote 
 on his wall-papers. But who was Mr. Shadwell ? " 
 A. : " Oh, Sylvia, do look at the marvellous strati- 
 fication of these rocks," &c. 
 
 This conversation has given me, what I very 
 much wanted, a subject for a paper due at the Lit. 
 and Phil. ; it shall be " Poetry and Politics : their 
 Mutual Relations and Antipathies." I know at 
 least one anecdote that will be useful in illustra- 
 tion. Young was on a steamer with the 
 
 late William Morris, who very much took to him, 
 and after some days revealed to the youngster 
 
 that he was a poet. " Oh ! " replied , not to 
 
 be outdone, " so is my grandfather." " And who 
 is he ? " asked Morris. " The D. of A-g-11." Morris 
 turned on his heel and had nothing more to say 
 to the poor lad. 
 
 Pursuing for a moment the subject of poets' 
 names, would it be fair to say that the recurrence 
 of the patronymic particle " -son " in so many 
 poets' names to-day points to a certain absence of 
 Apollonian inspiration, as who should say terrce 
 filii? I but throw out the suggestion for what it 
 is worth ; at any rate, a poet whose own name is 
 pontifical has found a good deal of appropriateness 
 in the names of th> " Poetae Majores."
 
 344 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 " For I must think the adopting Muses chose 
 
 Their sons by name, knowing none would be heard 
 
 Or writ so oft in all the world as those : 
 
 Dan Chaucer, mighty Shakespeare, then for third 
 
 The classic Milton, and to us arose 
 
 Shelley with liquid music in the word." 1 
 
 i8//z. To Her Majesty's Theatre. All plays 
 deserving the name were written to be acted, and 
 so it is not wonderful that even at this date we 
 gain new lights on Shakespeare from any decent 
 representation. To-night I gathered without diffi- 
 culty why they killed Caesar. His nose, his walk, 
 his voice, his false emphasis, deserved each a several 
 murder. The only wonder is that he was ever 
 tolerated till the third act ; and, indeed, at Her 
 Majesty's he is got rid of in the second. The 
 gentleman who played Brutus was often excellent 
 in a rhetorical way ; and how rare it is to find an 
 actor whose rhetoric is tolerable. I remember him 
 in Hotspur, when he was even better. The only 
 speech he gave really ill was the orchard soliloquy, 
 which he recited as if Brutus had made up his mind 
 before he began to think. And so, indeed, he had. 
 And that may have been the actor's subtle mean- 
 ing. Still, he should put the stress on the em- 
 phatic words in the argument. Cassius, too, was 
 quite presentable. What a pathetic figure he is, 
 
 1 Another poet is said to be writing an epic which opens thus 
 
 " Ye nine, with whom upon Parnassus romp, 
 The sons of Wat, of David, and of Thomp."
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 345 
 
 with his affection for Brutus and desire to be loved 
 back again ! the one human spot in his con- 
 spirator's nature which yet ruins the whole by 
 making him, time after time, sacrifice his better 
 judgment to his idol. And so that prig of para- 
 gons, his brother-in-law, is allowed to spoil the 
 conspiracy by sparing Antony, and, worse, by 
 letting him speak in the forum, and then spoil 
 the campaign by bad generalship both in the 
 council and in the field ; while, to crown all, 
 his colleague has to submit to the charge of 
 peculation at the same moment that he is asked 
 for money 
 
 " I did send to you for gold to pay my legions, 
 For I can raise no money by vile means ; " 
 
 and when he tries to explain, is lectured on his bad 
 temper. Of course, it is all retribution. Cassius 
 wanted a moral cloak for his plot, and Brutus 
 supplied what 'was necessary 
 
 " He covered, but his robe 
 Uncovered more." 
 
 Lucius seemed preoccupied most of the time in 
 rehearsing for private theatricals ; I should guess 
 that he was practising the part of Ariel, for he 
 skipt and tript about in an airy, fairy manner, not 
 like any, even the most soaring, human boy that 
 ever wore buttons. Antony necessarily lacked
 
 346 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 the one characteristic of Antony genius ; but its 
 absence was amply atoned for by the excellent 
 coaching of the crowd, so that his oration came 
 off just as well as if it had been the real thing. 
 By the way, I could not help thinking how useful 
 it would be to Parliamentary candidates if their 
 audiences could in the same way be taught their 
 proper responses. Julius Caesar had not been seen 
 on the stage for many years, and one incidental 
 result of the revival has been an enlargement of the 
 repertoire of journalists. One comes on lines and 
 half-lines now in the most unexpected places. It 
 was only at the beginning of the year that a certain 
 journal celebrated the solemn season by asking 
 distinguished people for mottoes, and Sir Edwin 
 Arnold chose the desolate speech of Brutus 
 
 " O that a man might know 
 The end of this day's business ere it come ! 
 But it sufficeth that the day will end* 
 And then the end is known." 
 
 On which a contemporary, whom I will not name, 
 commented thus : " We wonder from which of his 
 fathom-deep Buddhist books Sir Edwin Arnold 
 disinterred this cheery chirp." 
 
 In reading to-day the preface to Dryden's 
 "Absalom and Achitophel," I was amused to find the 
 Tories referred to as Anti-Birminghams. "The 
 longest chapter in Deuteronomy has not curses
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 347 
 
 enough for an Anti-Birmingham." Thus does 
 history repeat itself at least in the country dis- 
 tricts where we look upon Liberal Unionists as 
 neither flesh, fowl, nor good red-herring. 
 
 igth. My friend S., who is the incarnation of 
 hospitality, makes a point of arranging a little dinner 
 when I am in town. Being a person of reserved 
 manners, and ignorant of the town interests of the 
 hour, I sometimes find myself a little embarrassed 
 for topics of table talk. On this occasion my 
 blushes were saved by the generosity of my neigh- 
 bour, an actor of distinction, who at once put me 
 at ease by asking how I liked him in his new part. 
 S. had warned me that it was against etiquette to 
 confess to an actor that you had not seen him, 
 and so I replied : " Oh, amazingly ! it seemed to 
 me to revive the best traditions of the stage." 
 "Ah, then," said he, "you didn't care for my last 
 piece ! " " On the contrary," I replied, " those 
 were the classical traditions I referred to ; " and I 
 bowed, thinking that compliment could no further 
 go, and that I had done all that could be expected 
 of me. But my interlocutor resumed : " Classical, 
 did you say ? I should have called the play 
 romantic myself." "But surely," said I, "there 
 is a ne plus ultra, even in the romantic drama, that 
 we may speak of as classical." He looked dubious, 
 and I mopped my face. I feared I had been laying 
 it on with a trowel, but I saw that more was
 
 348 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 expected. If I had only been told what his last 
 pieces were ! Still, a risk had to be run, and I 
 proceeded : " It is remarkable, when one looks at 
 the pictures in the Garrick Club, how inferior in 
 grace and dignity and how immature in conception 
 they appear when compared with the renderings 
 of the same parts to which we are accustomed." 
 He looked mollified, and assented. "As far as 
 Shakespeare and Sheridan and other Elizabethans 
 are concerned, that no doubt is so ; but, you see, 
 they didn't act Jones and Pinero, and so such a 
 comparison can hardly be made." "Well, no," I 
 said, " not in particulars ; but we can judge the 
 general style very well, and eke out our observation 
 by the criticisms that have come down to us 
 on which you have only to consult Mr. Joseph 
 Knight and, without wishing to flatter, I should 
 say that there are one or two actors to-day who 
 combine a learning and polish due to study in 
 the best schools with a spontaneity and verve 
 that are altogether of our own time." "Two, 
 did you say ? " inquired he. " No," I said ; 
 " I was exaggerating one." By this time I did 
 not know if it was I who was smoking or the 
 soup. 
 
 In the country one has few opportunities of 
 meeting these children of nature. Occasionally 
 one sees an individual or a company at the rail- 
 way stations, and then it is curious to note how
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 349 
 
 instinctively they treat the platform as a stage, and 
 take up the important positions on it. I wonder 
 if acting now is as lucrative a profession as it was 
 under Elizabeth. Shakespeare, we are told, got 
 nothing to speak of for his plays, but made his 
 fortune as an actor ; and Alleyne, another actor, 
 after providing for his family, founded Dulwich 
 School. Another curious point about actors is 
 that they should not be content with their own 
 names, like painters and writers, but take names 
 (the ladies especially) that belong to other people. 
 Is there no property in names ? 
 
 2 is/. It was to be positively the last dance 
 before Lent, and positively we must go ; and when 
 Sophia is positive, it boots not that there are 
 higher degrees of comparison. I suppose, if a 
 man has a grown-up daughter, he must not repine 
 if the privilege now and then entails a twenty-mile 
 drive on a winter's night. Happily the season is 
 clement, though the sky this morning looks as if 
 it could snow if it would. I feel more resigned 
 to my fate since I read in Saturday's Literature 
 a poem by the famous Rabbi ben Ezra, called 
 " Sursum Cauda," in which that learned gentle- 
 man maintains, with a fine adaptation of Oriental 
 fatalism to Western social life, that man, being but 
 a grasshopper, must hop 
 
 " Nunc pede libero 
 Pulsanda tellus."
 
 35 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 Or, as the Rabbi has it 
 
 " No matter what the flight, 
 Nor where the feet alight, 
 To leap and pause and leap is all our human care." 
 
 Our old vicar used to have an unreasonable 
 prejudice against dancing, based on the story of 
 King Herod and John Baptist ; but, as I once 
 told him, no dancing I had ever seen in Berk- 
 shire houses was good enough to make the on- 
 looker swear rash oaths, though I allowed that a 
 bad performance had sometimes that effect upon 
 other performers. Moreover, if any reliance can 
 be placed on the evidence of a very old window in 
 Lincoln Cathedral, Herodias's daughter danced 
 upon her head ; which was, to say the least of 
 it, not pretty manners. It shows how skin-deep 
 the boasted Herodian Hellenism really was, that 
 Herod took such a barbarian exhibition for fine 
 art. The true Greek gentleman would have been 
 disgusted ; for Herodotus tells the story of a 
 certain Hippocleides who thought to show his 
 cleverness at a banquet by dancing on his head 
 among the plates and dishes, a proceeding which 
 so disgusted his future father-in-law that he at 
 once broke off the match. 
 
 2$rd. The Zola case has come to its inevitable 
 conclusion, and Englishmen must be forgiven if 
 they think it more than ever to their credit that
 
 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 351 
 
 they are not as these Frenchmen. English soldiers 
 are often, and perhaps justly, charged with con- 
 tempt for civilians ; but as a rule they confine 
 themselves to generalities, as when the Commander- 
 in-Chief says in his " Pocket-Book " that a soldier's 
 profession is the only one that could not be as well 
 followed by his grandmother. But in this amazing 
 trial the service has been swaggering over the Bar, 
 over men of letters, and, oddly enough too, over 
 dentists. " You bring against us," said General 
 de Pellieux, shaking with fury, " foreigners and 
 dentists." The contempt for foreigners was once 
 supposed to be a peculiar mark of the barbarous 
 free-trading Englishman, and it is interesting to 
 find it in the civilised and cosmopolitan French. 
 The contempt for dentists is a more interesting 
 symptom. It looks like a survival from feudal 
 days, when the only surgeon was the barber, who, 
 like the corn-cutter, exercises what is still held to 
 be a menial function. The conduct of the judge 
 has been censured no less than that of the generals ; 
 but on a closer view it deserves some praise. For 
 what has he done ? While preserving his own 
 roof by apparent concessions to the mob, he has 
 allowed all manner of things to come out in evi- 
 dence that ostensibly he was hushing up. We in 
 England do not know the terror of a Parisian mob ; 
 our own roughs, though individually ferocious, 
 seem somehow to exude a saving humour when
 
 352 PAGES FROM A PRIVATE DIARY 
 
 they collect in masses. The fact is, one nation 
 can never understand another. This conclusion 
 was forced upon me last spring, when I was in 
 Paris. I was sitting down near the Arc de 
 Triomphe, and on the same seat was a gentleman 
 whom I took to be French. He was intently 
 watching a long queue of people taking omnibus 
 tickets. Suddenly he burst out, in the English 
 tongue, " What fools these people are ! " He 
 could understand taking tickets for the railway 
 before getting into the carriage, but it was clear 
 that no one but a fool would take a ticket for an 
 omnibus till he was well inside. Well, that is 
 roughly one's feeling about French justice that 
 it is probably all right for Frenchmen. 
 
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