Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 2.djvu/485

 .28. ii.i) K .9, urn,.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

479

0n Uoohs,

Cr^nl Victorians : Memories and Personalities. By T. H. S. Escott. (T. Fisher Unwin, 12s. Qd.

net.)

MB. ESCOTT from an early age has had the advan- tage of knowing most of those who had influence during the Victorian era ; and his memory extends back to the days of that very High Church- man Phillpotts of Exeter, who predicted that " Peel's apostasy over Catholic Emancipation would surely be followed by vengeance from on high." Among other early memories we find ' The Duke of Wellington at a School Treat,' and Mr. Escott says that " the feature that impressed me even more than the historic aquiline nose was the beautiful, very round, very large blue eyes, which seemed to take in everything at a glance." Before the party broke up, a clerical voice gave

out something the refrain

between a song and a hymn, with

God bless the squire and all his rich relations, And keep us poor people in our proper stations.

" By all means," grimly murmured the Duke as a chorus. " if it can be done."

Another boyish reminiscence was his breaking bounds and rushing off to the hustings at Tiverton to hear Palmerston chaff his champion heckler, Rowcliffe, the butcher, who, as some may yet remember, appeared at all Tiverton elections in butcher's costume, " with certain articles of cutlery dangling from his side." Bowcliffe, of course, has been immortalized by Punch. " Pam " thoroughly enjoyed the fun ; indeed, some play- fully accused him of being in conspiracy with Rowcliffe. Years afterwards Mr. Escott visited Palmerston' when he was Prime Minister, in Downing Street, and was struck by the arrange- ment by which the inkpot was placed on a table xiiiie three or four yards distant from the writing desk at which he stood. Every fresh dip of the pen thus involved a series of pedestrian exercises. Palmerston told him that he " believed in getting whatever exercise one can ; and one can do a mile in one's room as well as in the street."

Mr. Escott records that on a fine afternoon in the summer of 1875, as he was walking in Rich- mond Park, he " caught sight of a little old gentleman seated on a spacious wicker chair under the veranda of Pembroke Lodge." This turned out to be Earl Russell. Escott was met by Sir Henry Calcraft, who offered to take him in and introduce him, and he found Froude, Lecky, Hooker of Kew Gardens, and Ca.rlyle already there. Kiissell said to him, " I recollect your uncle," and, pointing to a medal, he said : " There is ;i memorial of a cause in which I had his co- operation, though in his time nothing came of il." The medal contained the inscription:

Have we not one Father ? Hath not one God created us ?

Before Carlyle left, he led Mr. Escott to a corner <>f the veranda, and gave him a few words entirely to bin !..-< If : " You may hear it said of me that I am cross-grained and disagreeable. Dinna believe it. Only let me have my own way exactly in everything, with all about me precisely what I

your name, let me tell you I met some one bearing it, maybe your father, on board the steamer by which some time ago I was voyaging to Scotland, t was Sunday ; we had a little religious service on deck. He read from the Church of England Prayer Book, delivered a short and sensible discourse, leaving me, like others, with the feeling that the English Establishment is the best thing of its kind out."

Tennyson had been introduced to Mr. Escott by his old friend Henry Sewell Stokes, and while the Laureate was on a visit to Stokes at Tniro, he would frequently meet " the great man, then in a remarkable vigorous middle age, conspicuous chiefly for his brilliantly jet-black eyes and dense crop of hair to match." Tennyson's favourite walk was on the banks of the Fa'l. and he would often stroll up to Mr. Escott, and they would both watch the fishermen repairing their boats. Tennyson on one occasion took out a pocket

edition of the ' Odyssey,' and opened it at the description of Ulysses constructing his raft, and turned to the operations then in progress before him. Then, with the Greek classic in one hand, and the other pointing to the details of the boat- tinkering, he mouthed out, in his deep-chested sing-song, the features of their industry common to the Cornish tribes and their Homeric prototypes. Their next meeting was in Sir James Knowles's suburban garden, where the poet was sitting with Browning in a little tent on the lawn. He still retained his picturesque appearance, with all the added impressiveness of years, and wore his old slouch felt hat and capacious cloak.

Another memory is of that " clever and kindly Irishman," W. McCullagh Torrens, "who had long shared the social life of St. Stephen's with Palmerston, and had so caught his phrases that the terse sayings often attributed to Palmerston himself were really those of Torrens." It was Torrens, not Palmerston, who said to Patrick O'Brien, " Eh, Pat, if it weren't for the whisky we'd have you in the Cabinet." Torrens died April ?6, 1894, from a hansom cab accident, and not long previous to this he had been our genial companion at the annual Readers' Dinner.

Towards the close of his reminiscences Mr. Escott reminds his readers that next year will witness the centenary of Blacku-ood. This will be in April, when, we feel sure, ' N. & Q.' will wish for it a second centenary. It seems only the other day when, on the 4th of February, 1899, we congratulated Maga on its thousandth number.

Mr. Escott has given us a book full of plea. -ant reading; his descriptions of his friends are so vivid that they are truly word-portraits. Facing the title-page is an excellent likeness of the author.

THE December number of The Fortniiiht/i/ Review contains a dozen weighty articles upon as man> aspects of war, government, and inter- national relations. The names of Sir Frederick Pollock, Mr. R. Crozier Long, Mr. Archibald Hurd, Mr. Sidney Low, Mr. J. D. Whelpl. Mr. J. K. Kennedy, and Mr. Laurence Jerroid are both familiar to readers of this review, and wont to raise expectations justified by previous experience of their counsels. With 'them are those redoubtable anonymities, Auditor T.mtum and Politicus ; and between them all they have collected a great store of facts and wisdom, whi< h.

wish.," ml a Mmnii i <>i plca-jmter creature does not however, is not within our scope. Two articles And now," he said, " that I have heard ' only and even these not exclusively deal with

live.