Page:The Story of the House of Cassell (book).djvu/281

 at any attempt at realizing the united wrath of six hundred hungry men."

Gradually the beanfeast lost its popularity, and after 1894 was abandoned. It was successfully revived under the new management in 1909, when the venue was Hastings. Mr. Farlow Wilson, who had been the head and front of the function in the old days, was now present as the chief supporter of the new General Manager. A full sixty years had sped since he first became connected with the House, and the enthusiasm with which he was greeted showed that his popularity was unabated. The celebration was continued year by year, until the war came to put a stop to all such festivities. The scene of the last gathering was Dover; the time, July, 1914. There were great warships in the harbour, but no one had any inkling that they were so soon to be put into fighting trim. An inseparable accompaniment of the beanfeast was the appearance of the Wayzgoose Gazette, a lively sheet which left the reader in no doubt as to the literary superiority of the printing and reading departments to the authors and journalists who provided them with work.

For some years, in the 'nineties, there was also an annual staff dinner, but, like the wayzgoose, it fell through in the depressing days when the House was battling with adverse winds. This, too, was revived under the new management, as soon as the good ship had "rounded Cape Horn," but with a notable difference: the festivity was now graced by the presence of scores of lady members of the staff. When Sir Arthur Spurgeon came to La Belle Sauvage there was not a girl or woman on either the clerical or the editorial staff, but that state of things was soon changed, and now these staffs include considerably more than a hundred of the more ornamental sex. As in the old days, after the revival a paper, called the Cassellite, was produced for distribution at the dinner. It was not precisely a dull print, but in punning power it was always inferior to the Wayzgoose Gazette. At the