Chapter II: George Wyndham’s Irish Land Bill, 1902 (2)

“This memorandum I am to copy out and send in my own handwriting to Redmond, and in such a way as not to compromise George more than is necessary on account of the great risk. ‘Chamberlain,’ he said, ‘is sure to cross-question me as to my having had any direct communications with the Irish Party, or come to terms with them. It must be kept absolutely secret.’ I told him how dangerous a man I knew Chamberlain to be, and how he had ruined all his rivals and opponents at Birmingham in times past. It is certain that the great danger for the bill lies in him. Yet Michael Davitt is publishing in Dublin the tale that Chamberlain is the author of the whole Land policy, and that he means to go on and give some sort of Home Rule in the autumn. This, no doubt, was once Chamberlain’s policy in 1885, and he will find it difficult to oppose it openly now, but his jealousy of George’s success may make him oppose it secretly, and he will be without scruple. The truth of the matter is that the Land Bill is supported now in the Cabinet by Arthur Balfour and the Tories. It is opposed by the Liberal Unionists. Chamberlain has held an ominous silence since his return from South Africa. I should not be surprised if at the last moment he should join Rosebery in betraying the bill. I was congratulating George on his having so far conciliated everybody. ‘Wait a little,’ he said, ‘there will be opposition enough presently.’

“I went home at once and sent off a copy of George’s memorandum to Redmond, changing only George’s ‘I’s’ into ‘We’s,’ as if by any chance it should fall into wrong hands it would be less personally compromising. I could not get any answer from George about the King’s visit.

“_7th April._—Lunched with Victor and Pamela Lytton in their new house in Queen Anne’s Gate. They have made it very pretty, and are expecting very shortly a son and heir. Victor goes almost daily to listen to the debates in the House of Commons, feeling cut off from a political career by being in the Lords. He is looking older and his face has grown longer. I see in him a certain likeness now to his grandfather, the novelist.

“_9th April._—To ‘Homewood’ to see Edith Lytton in her new cottage. She took me over Knebworth, which is not at all changed since last I was there some fifteen years ago—in the autumn of 1887, when I had been campaigning in Ireland, and went down there to introduce George Wyndham to Lytton. The house is a perplexing combination of good and bad taste—true _bric-à-brac_ and sham—I am afraid mostly sham. What it wants is whitewash and white paint. But Edith was shocked at my saying so. Her own cottage is nice, the work of her son-in-law Lutyens.

“_20th April._—I have been in bed with influenza, my fever taking the form of my puzzling myself with the clauses of George’s Bill and the Dublin Convention.

“_25th April._—On Thursday, 23rd, John Redmond came to see me and gave me an account of how he had managed the Convention at Dublin. Davitt had given much trouble at first, but had come to terms when he found the Convention so much against him. Sexton was still a considerable danger, as he was clean against the bill, and if he insisted on returning to Parliament might make things very difficult, as he was the only financier they had among them. But when the question of his re-entering Parliament was moved at the Convention there was such strong opposition that it had been with difficulty Redmond had been able to prevent an open quarrel. Sexton was ‘a queer fellow,’ but of immense ability. He and the Archbishop, and Davitt and, if they could get him, John Dillon, when he returned from Egypt, would make a very strong combination. He thought I should do well to see Dillon on his arrival in London, and tell him what the dangers were. ‘Dillon,’ he said, ‘has great confidence in your opinion.’

“About George, Redmond said, the great thing was for him to show a conciliatory attitude at the Second Reading in regard to amendments generally, and not to put his foot down on particular ones, whatever he might do in Committee afterwards. He also urged that Kilbride should be released from prison before the second reading, as his case was one that would be made the ground of a strong attack.

“Yesterday George came to see me. I told him about Kilbride, and he will release him on the plea of ill-health. He will also adopt as conciliatory a tone as he dares about the amendments. But he said the danger from his own friends was by no means over; Chamberlain was cunning and unscrupulous, and would trip him up if he could get an opportunity. If he gave him any opening he would wreck the bill, getting at Arthur Balfour and telling him it was impossible the thing should go on.

“There has been a ‘disaster’ in Somaliland, which I hope may satisfy our people—a dozen of our young blood-letters who made the war for their amusement cut up, with the wretched natives they commanded. There never was less reason for any war than this, not even a reason of possible gold, only the lust of a rampage. If the whole of our military staff could be made to bite the dust, the world would be a happier place. But they won’t be satisfied. War is the new form of sport all are wild to enjoy.

“_28th April._—George has sent me a confidential note with a new message for Redmond. He has got a ‘touch of influenza,’ which Sibell tells me is really nothing but a cold, an excuse for his staying indoors and keeping himself quiet for next week, when the second reading of his Bill comes on. Redmond, under the circumstances of his illness, had proposed to call on him in Park Lane, but he can’t see him there, and he wants me to be his medium of communication in discussing the amendments with Redmond. I have sent Redmond word that it is important I should see him at once, but so far have received no answer, and time presses.

“_30th April._—Redmond came to-day. He tells me John Dillon is back from Egypt, very much opposed to the Bill. He does not want a reconciliation with the landlords, or anything less than their being driven out of Ireland. He will not, however, do anything ‘shabby’ in opposing the Bill. But it makes the situation more difficult. Sexton is ‘bitterly opposed,’ and has the ‘Freeman’ to back him and Archbishop Walsh. ‘O’Brien and I,’ he said, laughing, ‘have risked a great deal in taking the attitude we did at the Convention.’ I asked him what view American opinion took. He said ‘They don’t understand the Land Question there nor the Bill, and they will take the view we take.’ Such being the case, there are certain points Redmond _must_ press at the Second Reading, the chief of which is the withdrawal of the 30 and 40 per cent. limit of reductions; but he will not insist upon an augmentation of the bonus, though in reality the twelve millions will not prove enough. He is to send me a memorandum, however, this afternoon from the House of Commons, for he is not himself well enough up in the Land Bill to put it down on paper without consultation. He will also be happy to see George here either to-morrow or Saturday.

“_1st May._—Redmond’s memorandum has come. In sending it he says, after asking for Kilbride’s release from gaol:

“‘Yesterday the matter was raised at the meeting of the Irish party, and I feel sure that some very decisive action must be taken if his imprisonment continues much longer, and I cannot conceive why his continued imprisonment should be apparently deliberately placed in our path by the Government. I hope you will be able to send me good news on this point, and should our friend desire to see me I can keep any appointment you may make for to-morrow or Saturday.’”

The memorandum itself is long and technical, and though interesting at the moment, I omit it here. It concludes: “I confine myself to the points I consider vital to the success of the Bill. If there was a certainty of satisfaction on these particulars (even though it should not be considered advisable to make a declaration publicly on the second reading debate), it would make it possible for us to avoid a contentious attitude towards the Bill, and allay a growing apprehension in Ireland (30th April, 1903).”

“To-day I went to see George. Dermot (Lord Mayo) was in the house with him, so I was shown upstairs to the drawing-room, and there we talked. He told me there had been a new Cabinet Council, at which his enemies, Chamberlain and the rest, had raged, and he had been obliged to give a promise that he would give no pledges whatever to the Irish Party before the Second Reading, nor hold any communication with them, so I was to consider what he told me as casual talk, and if I repeated it to Redmond it must be merely my impression of his views—no message.”

“N.B. This is almost identical with old Gladstone’s reservation when I asked him for a message of sympathy with Arabi in 1882. Nevertheless George gave me pencil and paper, and I wrote notes at his dictation, though he made me also many explanations, which I did not write. The long and the short of the thing is that he will concede a number of points in Committee, though he can make no pledge to do so on the second reading. We were more than an hour over this.

“On my return home I sent at once for Redmond, who came to Chapel Street in the course of the afternoon, and I read over my notes to him, and told him all I could remember of George’s talk. On the whole he is satisfied with it, and I am convinced all will go well. It has been a great satisfaction to me to manage this matter.

“_2nd May._—Spent the morning writing a letter to the ‘Times’ about Somaliland. This exhausted me, as I am still very weak, so weak that I could not sit out the Irish play, to which I went in the afternoon. The first piece was a terrible infliction, called ‘The Hour Glass,’ by Yeats—a stupid imitation of that dull old morality, ‘Everyman,’ which bored me so much last year. What Yeats can mean by putting such thin stuff on the stage I can’t imagine. It was not even well acted, for Yeats had drilled his actors to imitate Irving and other English mediocrities. They talked pompous stage English, and were not allowed their natural Irish accent. I felt inclined to get up and protest that we had not come to the Irish Literary Society for that. I was indignant, too, but it exhausted my little strength. I was determined, however, to hear Lady Gregory’s piece, ‘Twenty-five,’ and was rewarded, for it is quite the most perfect little work of art and the most touching play I have ever seen acted. Only it made me weep in my weak state. I could not stay on for the final piece, ‘Kathleen na Houlihan.’ So I went home. I expect to see unbounded praise of the ‘Hour Glass’ in the London papers.

“_May 3rd (Sunday)._—William O’Brien came unexpectedly to see me and I talked the Land Bill over with him. I hope he will be prudent in what he says on the second reading, but he seems determined to press for an all round reduction of 15 per cent., which George told me was one of the most dangerous points, as Chamberlain is lying in wait to demand a withdrawal of the Bill if the twelve million limit is threatened, also, George believes, Hicks-Beach. While we were talking and I was impressing on O’Brien George’s conversion on the Irish question, who should come in but Percy Wyndham. ‘I see the world is very small,’ said O’Brien, ‘and perhaps I had better be off,’ and off he went. He was to have sent Dillon to me, but this morning I have had a note from him saying he thinks it might have an awkward effect if the suggestion of his calling came from him. (They had quarrelled.) Percy had been told that O’Brien was with me and was much _intrigué_ about him. Percy, though immensely interested in George’s success, is too old a Tory to like the Bill, and prophesies all kinds of trouble for Ireland in the future. As to myself I have written as follows to Redmond:

“‘I see you are asking subscriptions for the Irish Parliamentary Fund. I have much pleasure in sending you £50. You have done such admirable service during the past year as Leader of the Opposition, in place of the half-hearted and unintelligent gentlemen who sit on the Liberal Front Bench, that all lovers of Liberty here have come to look upon the Irish Party as its sole reliable support. Also I need not say how warmly I sympathize with your triumph in having brought our Government to the position where it stands to-day, of having abandoned its secular policy of governing Ireland in the interests of the English “garrison.”

“‘I look upon the new Land Bill, if as I hope it passes the second reading, as the first piece of quite honest legislation for Ireland which will have been carried through Parliament in my recollection, and the certain prelude, however little the Government may have it in their minds, some day of Home Rule. In a few years you will have the present Landlords, who will be still considerable Land-owners in their demesnes, all with you as enthusiastic Irishmen; and then, with the country united for Home Rule, Home Rule must come.

“‘Therefore I wish, as always, more power to your elbow.’

“_5th May._—John Dillon came to see me early and gave me his views of the situation very frankly. He spoke last night in support of the Bill, but he tells me that but for loyalty to his party he should be inclined to oppose it in Committee and vote against it on the third reading. His view is that it is useless trying to get the landlord class on the side of Nationalism, that they would always betray it when the pinch came, that the land trouble is a weapon in Nationalist hands, and that to settle it finally would be to risk Home Rule, which otherwise _must_ come. For this reason he was opposed to the Conference with the landlords, and was opposed now in principle to the Bill. He should, however, of course, support it, since it had been decided to do so, for the one thing for Ireland was union in the Parliamentary Party. As long as that was maintained they commanded the situation in the House of Commons, and no matter what party was in power it would have to be their servant. We then discussed the prospects of a change of Government. He said that Rosebery would certainly be in the next Cabinet, probably at the head of it; that though he was thoroughly contemptible as a politician, he held them all through social influences. Harcourt was sick, perhaps dying; Campbell-Bannerman was weak; Morley had no power of leadership. Rosebery quite recently had made advances to Lloyd George, the most able of the Radicals, and Lloyd George had responded. To him, Dillon, it was a matter of indifference which of them was leader, or who became Prime Minister. The Liberal Party could not help itself and would be obliged to give Home Rule. All that was wanted in Ireland was patience and to keep the Parliamentary party together. United they had nothing to fear, even from their worst enemy, Chamberlain. I told him I thought there was a chance of Chamberlain heading a new Unionist schism, and that if he came into power on these lines with the popularity he had acquired by his imperialistic antics he would disfranchize Ireland and perhaps govern her as a Crown Colony. He did not think there was any fear of this, but I still think there is a remote danger.

“We also discussed Somaliland, on which Dillon also spoke a day or two ago in the House. Dillon has more statesmanship, I think, than any of them, having a wider experience and a better knowledge of history. His cynical view of the English parliament is fully justified. All the same, I think he is wrong about the Land Bill, as I believe it will prove a great step to Home Rule. But I agree with him that, whether or not it passes, the next Government that comes into power must do the Irish bidding. O’Brien is to speak to-day.

“_6th May._—The debate is going capitally. O’Brien spoke with moderation and on the lines I pressed on him, especially as to the finality of the Bill as a land settlement. He was followed by Grey, who to our surprise has supported the Bill warmly. On Monday Arthur Balfour made an admirable speech in support of it, and Grey’s was on the same lines. The Tory opposition has cooled down. I look upon the second reading as assured. George will, I think, be obliged to agree to the Irish demands on most of the amendments in Committee, and barring accidents, the thing is safe. Chamberlain seems to have made up his mind to a glum silence. He had his own Transvaal fish to fry to-day.

“_10th May._—George’s Bill has passed the second reading triumphantly by 417 to 26. I believe the biggest vote on record.

“_14th May._—Chapel Street. Margaret Sackville came to lunch with me and talk over her plan of an Irish magazine to be called ‘The Celt’ she is trying to start. I have given her some verses for it, and have promised some prose.

“_16th May._—To the Academy, where the most remarkable thing is Sargent’s portrait of Cromer. Sargent has a genius for seeing and reproducing the base passions of his sitters; and here is Cromer with bloated cheeks, dull eyes, ruby nose, and gouty hands, half torpid, having lunched heavily. Truly my quarrel with him is avenged. The newspapers complain that, instead of our ‘glorious Pro-Consul,’ Sargent has given them nothing but a full-fed obstinate Indian official.

“Found Lady Z. at home. She has enjoyed her German visits and a lunch with the Emperor William. She found him an enormous talker without being exactly a good talker. He talks about everything, sometimes well, sometimes stupidly in a random, ill-balanced way. She says the Germans—I suppose she means the German officials and aristocracy—laugh at him for his wild utterances and constant mistakes; but he gives them no time to complain, passing with extraordinary energy from one thing to another, so that his blunders are forgotten; and they like him, and are in a sort of way proud of him, as a remarkable personality who fixes the attention of the world.

“_17th May._—A letter from Redmond about the maximum reductions, asking that the Government should declare its intention about it. He writes:

“_15 May_ 1903.

“‘MY DEAR BLUNT.—I duly received your letter. I am handing it and the proposed question to my brother, and asking him to look after the matter. I cannot do so myself as I am going to Ireland on Sunday for a few days.

“‘About the Land Bill. The crux still is the question of the maximum reduction, and I have very great misapprehensions on this matter. If the Government persists in keeping in the maximum reductions there will undoubtedly be a very bitter conflict on the very first clause of the Bill in Committee with possible recriminations between the representatives of the landlords and the tenants.

“‘This would undoubtedly spread to Ireland, and the present unanimity of opinion, which in my view alone makes it possible to carry the Bill, may entirely disappear. The retention of this maximum reduction is really a small matter, and the Government ought in my opinion seriously to consider the responsibility of again raising a conflict between classes in Ireland threatening the whole future as well as the passage of this Bill. The Ulster members are all of our way of thinking, and I cannot conceive any valid reason why the Government should stand by this maximum. I take the very gravest possible view of the situation, and I do hope that before it is too late the Government will make a concession on this matter which will enable the Bill to be passed without conflict, and which will preserve the good feeling which at present exists in Ireland.

“‘I hope you will be able to press these views with vigour.

“‘Very truly yours,

“‘J. REDMOND.’

“_20th May._—I have been at Newbuildings since Saturday enjoying the new oak leaves, and the bluebells. This morning I came up to London and went at once to see George, to whom I showed Redmond’s letter. In return he read me one he had received from Dunraven in precisely the opposite sense, declaring the resolve of the Conference of Landlords to fight any attempt to withdraw the maximum clause, and to get it reinserted by the Lords if the Commons amended it. He told me the situation. On Saturday Chamberlain went to Birmingham, and made a speech about the corn duty, contradicting all that Arthur Balfour had just said. I feared that this meant a revolt on Chamberlain’s part, and a bid for leadership. But George assured me it was not so. ‘Chamberlain,’ he said, ‘is an impulsive fellow, and, now he has blown his steam off, he has come back pleased with himself and in a better temper. I am not afraid any longer of his wrecking my bill. He will leave it alone. It is quite impossible, however, that we should give up the maximum limit. The landlords won’t stand it, and the Lords would put it back if we did.’ He then wrote me a memorandum to show Redmond as an answer to his letter. ‘He is getting fussy,’ he said. Armed with this I went on at once to Redmond, and caught him at home before he went out to the House. The result is shown in the following letter:

“37, CHAPEL STREET, _May 20_, 1903.

“‘DEAR GEORGE.—I saw Redmond at twelve, and explained to him the situation, with the help of the notes you gave me. Also I expressed my personal view that the maximum was not worth fighting about. He said that he also personally thought its importance had been exaggerated. But such was not the view taken in Ireland, where it had been much worked up in the press, or by most of his colleagues; public opinion had gone too far for him to be able to control it. It was largely the fault of the Conference landlords, Dunraven and Mayo, who till the other day had agreed with him to a withdrawal of the limit, and then for some unexplained reason had suddenly turned round. The difference between them would now have to be fought out on the floor of the House. It would be so, as far as he personally was concerned, without acrimony, but by others, he feared, with bitterness. He did not seem to think much of the reference to the House of Lords. Within the last fortnight I have talked with others of the Irish members, and I fear there is no doubt of there being a growing section among them indifferent, if not hostile to the Bill. It seems to be the general opinion that unless the tenants specially affected are given easier terms than the Bill provides there will be new combinations against purchase.

“‘Such is my impression of the situation. It will be a pity, having got so far, if the concordat ends in a new quarrel, but, if what Redmond tells me of Dunraven’s sudden change from agreement to disagreement is accurate, it is hardly Redmond’s fault.

“‘W. S. B.’

“To this I got a brief note from George. ‘I am not pessimistic.’ Neither for that matter am I. I don’t believe the maximum point is a very serious one, and, even if there should be a new quarrel between the Nationalists and the Dunraven Landlords, it won’t stop the bill, which has gone too far now to be upset. Chamberlain was the only real danger.

“_3rd June._—Newbuildings. Prince Scherbátoff came down to see the horses, and I went over with him to Crabbet. He is an extremely well informed man, and gave me an excellent account of the way the emancipation of the Russian peasantry is working out. He is himself a very large landowner, and cultivates 30,000 acres of land with 4,000 yoke of oxen. The peasants work their own land mostly on the communal system, preferring it. This the officials have been trying to alter, but the Emperor has just issued a decree confirming the peasants in their rights. There is a rule that they are unable to sell, or mortgage their land, which protects them against the usurers. All this is very analogous to what is proposed for Ireland, and I have promised to take him to see George who will be pleased to hear his account.

“_5th June._—Margaret Sackville came to Chapel Street with her friend Katharine Horner to talk about ‘The Celt.’ I urged her to put her own name to the little venture as its only possible chance of success.

“_11th June._—The great Ministerial crisis is over for the moment, and Chamberlain has been reduced to silence. The Government got a vote last night of 425 against 28, the whole Opposition and the Irish Party voting with them, against Chaplin and the Protectionists.

“_13th to 15th June._—At Newbuildings—a very delightful party. Margaret Sackville, Katharine Horner,[2] who is a very pretty and clever girl of sixteen, and a writer of poetry, and is quite charming, the Poet Laureate and Meynell. The P. L. was in his best form, and Meynell amused us all with his anecdotes of Dizzy and other heroes.

“_17th June._—Looked in at Belgrave Square where I found Madeline just back from the House of Commons, much excited about the Irish debate in Committee. This was stormy, and things are ticklish for the Bill. She was enthusiastic about the speaking of the Irish members, especially Redmond’s. George had looked up twice to the Ladies’ Gallery when it was over. She takes it as a sign he is satisfied.

“_18th June._—To George in Belgrave Square where he is staying, and we walked together to the Irish Office. He told me the situation, and the danger there was from Chamberlain and from the landlords—and complained that the Nationalists had not kept to their agreement at the Landlords’ Conference. However, he considers the worst risks over now. ‘My position,’ he said, ‘is that of peace-maker in the Cabinet, of trying to persuade everybody that they all have really the same opinion—at any rate until my Bill is through. I take no side on the Preferential Tariff question till this is safe, being a practical politician.’ All the same, he says, it will be very necessary for him to have a talk soon with Redmond, and he says it had better be at my house. He will let me know more in a day or two.

“_19th June._—A letter from Redmond saying that affairs are very critical for the Bill, and that, unless George Wyndham adopts a more conciliatory attitude, the Bill will be wrecked. I went at once to Belgrave Square and found George preparing a speech he had to make in the evening. I explained to him the danger, especially of Dillon’s attitude towards the Bill, and he agreed to meet Redmond at my house on Tuesday morning at 11.15. I hope they may patch up their difference, as it would be ruinous now for all concerned if the Bill falls through.

“_21st June (Sunday)._—Mesaoud is sold to the Kleniewsky Stud in Poland for £240, a small price. But his going there will be an advantage to him and an advertisement to us. I have been calculating the price at which we have sold his stock, sons and daughters, and it amounts to over 5,000 guineas for 40 animals. We purchased him as a yearling colt for £50.

“_22nd June._—Messrs. Boyes and Collier, English farmers from Basutoland, came to see the Stud. They are much impressed with our mares, and in raptures over the four stallions, especially Seyal and Nejran. Boyes has a commission to buy two for the Basutoland Government. They are violent anti-Boers, and spoke with contempt of the natives. They complained that the English colonists everywhere were being starved out, while the Boers lived on, on rubbish, and prospered.

“_23rd June._—On coming up to London this morning I found George already established in Chapel Street with his red official despatch box arranging his papers. He told me he had had a regular Irish Parliament, consisting of Lords and Commons, debating Clause I of his Land Bill for the last day or two, which was a beginning of Home Rule. Redmond joined us in five minutes, and they set to work at once on Clause I, George expounding his views of a possible compromise. He had drafted an amendment which he thought would obviate delay in the sales, but Redmond preferred Duke’s amendment, and to something of this George in the end agreed. I was much struck with the lawyer-like ability both showed in seizing points as they rose, and developing them. The discussion was carried on in all possible good humour, and much personal sympathy. The contrast between the men was striking, though both were in their way good Irish types—for George is far more Irish than English—George gesticulating a good deal with his hands, and very eager, Redmond sitting with his hand nursing his great double chin seriously, but expanding from time to time in genial smiles when the points of agreement were reached. Both were intensely anxious to come to an understanding and carry the Bill, the real difficulty lying in the vacillation of the landlords, who are most of them too stupid to understand the Bill, and whose only firmness is obstinacy.

“The final agreement was that George should adopt the Duke amendment, or something like it, as his own; that Redmond should express his satisfaction with it, and his belief that it would be accepted as satisfactory in Ireland; and that no other amendment should be pressed to a division. Redmond next brought up the evicted tenants question, and here, too, they came, after some fencing, to an amicable agreement. Both talked of the political situation with the greatest frankness. George announced the release of McHugh, which Redmond already knew of, and he complimented George on having saved Kilbride’s life by arresting him, inasmuch as Kilbride was drinking himself to death, and had now come out of gaol a sober and serious character. And so, at the end of about three quarters of an hour, they shook hands, and Redmond departed. George stopped a few minutes to talk it over with me in great delight, and then was off to his Cabinet Council at twelve. This I felt was an historic event, as I saw George into his hansom at the door with his red box—a great day for Chapel Street! We consider the Bill safe.

“Later I went to Belgrave Square, where Madeline made me stop and dine alone with her and George. It was one of the most amusing dinners I ever remember, just us three, George in tearing spirits, having spent the day in a series of encounters of a hair’s-breadth kind. He described the Cabinet Council as _très accidenté_, and then he had had a tussle with the Duke of Abercorn and a number of the most violent landlord extremists, and then one with Dunraven, Mayo, and the rest,—and had succeeded in persuading them all round. As the dinner proceeded he became more and more eloquent, romancing almost like a schoolboy about his political career, describing the dexterities with which he had piloted his ship in the past, and what was to be his future. To us it was all delightful, and we hope it may all turn out true. George has in him the fire of genius, and whether as leader of the Conservative party, or of Irish Home Rule he will be equally conspicuous, and as superior to any English party leader as Disraeli was in his day. Then he rushed off back to the House to finish drafting his plans for to-morrow.

“_24th June._—I lunched in Mount Street, and having met there the Poet Laureate went later to his box at His Majesty’s Theatre to see his play, ‘Flodden Field’—a piece of melodrama absurdly acted, which was followed by an adaptation of Kipling’s story, ‘The man who was.’ This last was painful, too painful, in my view, for the stage, though the acting was good. Margaret Sackville was with us.

“_25th June._—The papers announced George’s safe passage of the Irish Land Bill Clause I through the House; and there are amusing comments about ‘secret arrangements’ of the quarrel. Anyhow it seems to have been a great Irish triumph, and all Irish parties have been embracing each other.

“Frank Lascelles came to lunch with me in order to meet George, and we had a pleasant talk with Lady Windsor as fourth.

“Gorst is being married this afternoon to an heiress named Rudd. I did not go to it, though I sent a wedding gift. The Khedive arrived in London yesterday, and is staying with the King’s millionaire, Cassel, in Grosvenor Square.

“_27th June._—A letter has come from Brewster Bey, saying that the Khedive would like to visit the stud at Crabbet to-morrow. Sunday is an inconvenient day to have chosen, as there are next to no trains. So I have had to order a special one, and telegraph all over the place in preparation. Caffin fortunately was here to-day, and I was able to arrange a programme with him.

“_28th June (Sunday)._—A piping hot day, so we drove over to Crabbet early to make the necessary arrangements. We had all the horses dressed and got ready. The house was looking lovely, and, the tenants being away, we had it all to ourselves. Then Judith and Neville arrived from Rake, and with them Marsh, and we lunched at Caxtons, and were lying out to cool in the little lane behind when a telegram arrived. Before I read it I guessed what it must be about. The Khedive in consequence of ‘unforeseen circumstances’ could not come, professes his ‘profound regret,’ etc. It is quite clear that the King has prevented him. My only wonder is that he was allowed to propose it. So we have had our trouble for nothing.

“_29th June._—A letter has come from Brewster confirming his yesterday’s telegram. The Khedive wishes to impress on me the fact that ‘the circumstances which _prevent_ his coming _are_ altogether beyond his control,’ and reiterates his ‘profound regret,’ and assures me that if it had been possible to come His Highness would surely have come. The absence of all definite reason given, either of indisposition or other engagement, together with the use of the present tense, ‘prevent his coming,’ quite clearly indicates a permanent prohibition, and my only doubt is whether it is the Foreign Office or the King that has interfered. I feel pretty certain, however, that it cannot have been a lesser personage than the King himself, acting through Cassel—for the Khedive would hardly be such a goose as to be frightened by Lord Lansdowne, and he is under Cassel’s charge, and Cassel is the King’s man. However, I am determined to get at the truth of it, and am writing to Brewster to say that ‘knowing as I do the kindly feeling His Highness has for so many years entertained towards me, and remembering the distressing circumstances of his political position, I hold him in no way responsible for the slight offered me, that I thank him for the honour intended, and cordially accept the expression of his regret for an act of discourtesy foreign to his nature, and which only pressure from the very highest quarter could have forced upon him, a quarter to which I, too, owe obedience.”

“This will, I think, draw the whole truth from him, for he cannot leave my letter unanswered without admitting that it is in reality the King who forbade him. If it is not the King, he will make haste to explain what other personage it was. In either case I shall arrive at the facts.

“_30th June._—There is an account in to-day’s papers of a banquet given last night by the King to the Khedive, with a long list of the guests. Here are all the officials who for the last ten years have been worrying the Khedive’s life out of him at Cairo, thirty or forty of them, Rodd, Lane, Talbot, and the rest. Also an uncle of Lord Lansdowne’s with Rodd again. This is intended to impose upon the world, and persuade the British public that the Khedive is England’s devoted servant.

“_1st July._—That other high and mighty prince, Athrobold Charles Stuart de Modena, _alias_ William Brown, the coachman’s son at Frimley and ex- footman, has been brought before the Winchester Assizes. The charges of felony, which would have necessitated a public inquiry into his past life, were at the last moment withdrawn by the Crown, and he was allowed to plead guilty to a misdemeanour only, that of marrying Lady Russell under a feigned name. This looks as if there had been a desire to screen the other noble ladies he befooled.

“_4th July._—Our annual Crabbet Sale, but most of the fine ladies from London failed to come, only 300 persons sitting down to luncheon in the tent. The speeches were good, Cunninghame Graham proposing my health. Redmond and Dillon were both there, and I sat between Mrs. Redmond and Caroline Grosvenor.”

[N.B. This was our last public sale at Crabbet.]

“_8th July._—To London and lunched with Ameer Ali, who talked to me about a scheme of a Mohammedan University for India as an original idea of his own. We also discussed George Curzon. George Wyndham told me the other day that it is settled that Curzon comes back to England at the end of the year. He will cease to be Viceroy, for a Viceroy may not leave India. But if the Tories are still in office six months later, he will be reappointed for a new term.

“_9th July._—Saw George this morning in Belgrave Square, where he was still in bed, having been up late getting the last clauses of his Land Bill through Committee. He was very triumphant.

“_11th July._—George writes me confidentially (9th July, 1903):

‘The sections interested in the Sugar Convention, Education, and the Tariff proposals seek to “blackmail” the Government over the Land Bill by delaying it to extract time for _their_ favourite questions. Unfortunately, some whose advice may be taken, want Education to go to the Lords before the Land Bill. The only way to defeat this accidental chance combination of _opposite_ interests is to press on not only Report, but also the Third Reading of the Land Bill. . . . The question resolves itself into this—can Report be finished on Friday, 17th, to Monday, 20th? If so, by a _coup de main_ we might get Tuesday, 21st, afternoon sitting, for the Third Reading. . . . If this plan succeeds I _know_ that the Land Bill will be driven over at least to the 27th-31st, with the result that it will not reach the Lords before Monday, 3rd August.

‘All the above is no doubt gibberish to you. But as you have taken so deep an interest in the fortunes of the Land Bill, I _wish_ you to know exactly how the matter stands. You might like to see me on Tuesday morning with anyone else who takes a deep interest in the fortunes of the Bill. At any rate I felt impelled to acquaint you with the situation, etc.’

“_13th July._—Henley is dead. I got a note from George on Saturday telling me he was very ill, but the end has been sudden. About Henley’s relations with Stevenson, Meynell, who was with me to-day, was again eloquent. He knew the Henleys well, having been godfather to the daughter that died, and he says that Henley’s anger against Stevenson was of old date, from at least the time of Stevenson’s marriage. He could not forgive him for having forsaken the Bohemian convivial ways Henley delighted in, and, though he constantly received money help from Stevenson afterwards, always resented his conversion to respectability. He considers Henley’s attack upon his friend an unpardonable offence. I confess I do not like Henley, though I have tried to like him for George’s sake. But he is both physically and intellectually repugnant to me. He has the bodily horror of the dwarf, with the dwarf’s huge bust and head and shrunken nether limbs, and he has also the dwarf malignity of tongue and defiant attitude towards the world at large. Moreover, I am quite out of sympathy with Henley’s deification of brute strength and courage, things I wholly despise. Thus I could never feel at my ease with him, and George’s affection for him has always seemed to me a puzzle.

“_14th July._—To London early, and found notes in Chapel Street from both George and Redmond, who have met elsewhere and arranged about the Third Reading of the Bill. George and Sibell at Belgrave Square were just starting in black for Henley’s funeral. They wanted me to go with them, but I excused myself. I never go to funerals or wish anyone to go to mine.

“At four Miss Cornelia Sorabje called to talk about some Indian affair which interested her. She came clad in an orange garment after the fashion of ladies in her own country, which became her well. She has been a very pretty woman, though now I imagine thirty, with an exceedingly sweet voice, and I gave her tea.

“_20th July._—George goes to-night to Ireland with the King, leaving Arthur Balfour to pilot his Land Bill through its Third Reading to- morrow. I asked his mother whether the King had had anything to do, as the Irish believe, with the bringing in of the Land Bill, and she said, ‘Nobody at all, I believe, except George.’

“It is probably an exaggeration that the King bears the Nationalists any great goodwill, though he is less bitter than was the late Queen.

“_30th July._—A note from George; he is just back from Ireland, where he has been with the King, and says that all has gone off excellently well so far. There is no chance now of the Lords amending the Bill, and it is certain to become law.

“Afterwards for a walk with Percy in the Park. We found Philip Currie there in a bath chair, unable to use his legs, and so being wheeled about. Later I lunched with him and Angelina in Princes Gate. [This was the last time to my sorrow I saw either of them.]

“At my club to-day I found myself faced at a little distance by an old fogey whose features I seemed to know, and by degrees made out that he was Victor Drummond, my fellow _attaché_ once at Athens. I had not seen him since we said good-bye at the Piræus in 1860, yet I recognized him and he me. Another ancient, too, there, was Horace Rumbold. All these I remember young and gay, and all are tottering to their graves.

“_4th Aug._—It has been announced that a new Pope has been elected, Cardinal Sarto, from Venice, who has taken the name of Pius X. Pope Leo died a fortnight ago after a prolonged agony, which was made more horrible for us by the daily accounts of the surgical experiments used to prolong his life, so that at last the poor old man became like a nightmare on the public mind, and all rejoiced that he was dead.

“Of Pope Leo my recollection is a very intimate one, and still extremely vivid. It was in the Spring of 1886 when, after my failure at the Camberwell election, I was sick alike of the affairs of the world and of the vain pursuit of happiness. I went to Rome as on a pilgrimage, with the vague hope that perhaps I might there recover my lost faith in supernatural things and end my days in piety. I had many friends among the resident clergy, including Monsignor Stonor and Cardinal Howard, among the Pope’s household, and Father Lockhart, head of the Rosminians, to whom I had been introduced by Cardinal Manning, Prior Glyn, and other of the Irish hierarchy; and a little programme of holy pleasures had been sketched out for me, and I was determined to open my mind wide to the influences of the place, that my soul might have its full chance. It was thus predisposed that I arrived at Rome. I made a general confession of my sins, and if I had been unmarried, I should have attempted to join some religious order as a desperate protection against my own unbelief. As it was I indulged dreams of living as _custode_ to some church of the many churches in and about Rome. It was in this mood that Monsignor Stonor suggested that I should have an audience with the Pope, and he without difficulty procured me one. I had brought my old diplomatic uniform with me, I know not with what prevision, and it was in that dress that I went to the Vatican, where I was received by the Papal household with marked distinction. They thought, I believe, that I had some diplomatic mission, for Pope Leo was highly interested in the idea of a renewal of diplomatic relations with our Foreign Office, and so I was admitted to the most private of private audiences. Be this as it may, my reception by His Holiness was of a kind which surprised and touched me almost to bewilderment when I heard the door shut behind me, and I found myself absolutely alone with one so nearly divine, if there was divinity anywhere to be found on Earth. The vision that I saw before me was that of a little old man of wonderful dignity, clad in white and seated on a low throne, his face pale, but lit with luminous dark eyes, which seemed to hold all knowledge of this world and the other, the figure of a Saint, and at the same time of one who knew the world, and, strange to say, reminding me of that wonderful figure of Voltaire seated in his chair at the Theatre Français, for the attitude was the same, bending towards me with a look of inquiring kindliness. When I had kissed his feet he raised me up, though I continued kneeling, and on his invitation spoke to him about Ireland. What he then said has been already related (see my ‘Land War in Ireland’), but what I have not said and what I cannot here altogether say is, that the personal interest he seemed to take in me, for he continued to hold my left hand with his own right hand and to press it to his knee, gave me the courage to speak of my own spiritual affairs as in a confessional, and to ask his help. He could not give me all I asked, but when I left him it was in tears. I had been with him for over twenty minutes, and the chamberlains, when I found myself outside the audience chamber, cast on me eyes of reproval for having been so long, and they seemed to guess to such little public purpose.

“_6th Aug._—Newbuildings. Mohammed Abdu arrived from Egypt yesterday with his brother Hamouda, and I drove them to-day to Crabbet and back, calling at Forest Cottage on our way, where I found Button with his mother and his wife, and his beautiful little daughter Daphne. He told me much that was interesting of the new Pope, Cardinal Sarto, while he was Patriarch at Venice, where Button has been for some time living. He spoke also of our King Edward, who has come to be looked upon abroad as the greatest diplomatist of the day, and how French opinion has been quite converted by him to friendliness with England. At his Paris club, Button, who had previously been treated coldly as an Englishman, was received the other day as he passed through almost with demonstrations.

“Mohammed Abdu sat with me during our drive on the coachbox, I driving my four Arabs, and we had much conversation on Egyptian affairs.

“_9th Aug. (Sunday)._—I have had an interesting time these last few days with the Mufti, and to-day, walking in Newbuildings Wood, we had a long talk about religion. I asked him especially as to his belief in angels and spirits. About these, though not denying their existence, he said ‘No one has seen them, nor is it possible to know anything about them. About God, too, it is impossible to know.’ I asked him about a future life. In this he believes, and that there will be a happy and an unhappy state, but in what way he does not know. He does not believe in _eternal_ punishment.

“We have talked also about the events of 1882, and he has read through the papers I have here connected with Arabi’s trial, and urges me strongly to publish a history of that time. My difficulty, however, is that my most important documents are letters written by persons still living who might and probably would object, while without them it would be impossible to put forward an irrefutable exposure of our English intrigues. There is nothing personal in these letters, and they are quite fair historical documents, and must some day see the light, and it ought to be soon. Lastly, we have discussed the actual state of justice in Egypt, as to which the Editor of the ‘Manchester Guardian’ has asked me to give him information. This I shall now be able with the Mufti’s help to supply.

“_10th Aug._—With Mohammed Abdu to Brighton to see Herbert Spencer. (It was especially to see Spencer that he had come to England, as he held him to be a great philosopher, and had translated his volume on education into Arabic. I had written to Spencer to explain this and propose a visit.) Spencer sent his carriage, and his secretary, Mr. Troughton, to meet us at the Brighton station. We found the old man in bed in his back drawing-room at Percival Terrace, where he has been bedridden since April. The stroke he had then has not affected his mind, and we found him quite lucid in his ideas as well as strong in voice, but he is terribly thin, and his hand is a mere skeleton’s. He received us for a short time before luncheon, and again at three o’clock. At first he tried talking French, but very deliberately and looking for his words, and soon dropped into English, which I translated to Abdu. He lamented the disappearance of ‘right’ from the range of modern politics in Europe, and denounced the Transvaal war as an outrage on humanity. ‘There is coming,’ he said, ‘a reign of _force_ in the world, and there will be again a general war for mastery, when every kind of brutality will be practised.’