years ago in the county of kent a gentleman of means, culture and lineage begged me to make the acquaintance of a certain neighbour of his who dwelt in a little cottage called (by the wrath of god) "the hollies"—and, indeed, a holly-tree of no small size, but one only, grew beside his door. this cottage was cubical in formation with the exception of the roof, which was a pyramid, and it was built of brick with the exception of the roof, which was of slate. its name, "the hollies," was painted outside upon the gate. this is all i have to say about the cottage.
the man who dwelt within it came that very evening to dine at the squire's, and was what you will call obviously a gentleman. he was not a gentleman in any cryptic or mystical sense; he was not the adumbration of a gentleman; he was not the platonic idea of a gentleman; he was not the gentleman used loosely as a term for a good man; he was not rich; he spoke perfectly; he was very stupid. much more than this, he was a prophet.
the learned have observed (or at least the only[pg 64] ones among them who count have persistently observed) that it is in the nature of barbaric peoples to accept whatever is told them with sufficient assurance, conviction and simplicity, but especially if it regard the future. on this account (the learned say) he who will prophesy with flame shall certainly among barbarians become a founder. now it is sufficiently certain that this type of man, so successful among the primitive, and perhaps also among the decayed, continues through all ages and in all societies, though varying perhaps in proportion, and certainly varying enormously in the source of his information according to the generation in which he lives, is here to-day; and this man was one of him.
at first i did not know in what a presence i stood—or rather sat—for he was very modest, if indeed it be modest to make no noise in the eating of soup, to frown heavily, and never to speak a word. there were but three of us there, the squire, myself, et rex meus the prophet. having seen little of the world i much desired to hear what he would say; although he was still what politicians call young he seemed old to me, because he had a full beard, and because life had already wearied him, a thing incomprehensible to boys. the squire watched him with a good deal of admiration and of fear, until at last he said, "there won't be any war." here let me tell you that these words were pronounced in the year 1888, and a little before the bursting of the spring upon the kentish weald.
[pg 65]
nor was there one. there was no war about that time.
those who read these lines, i am quite certain, will find them a shock. we live in a time when war is so struck with doom that it is putting on speed, as it were, to make a fine ending. war is out of our manners; we can tolerate it no more. every year is a new reconciliation, and a new treaty in the federation of all mankind except those who have neglected their armament, and in general we are forgetting war. but there have been wars, and of some calibre—hefty and noisy wars since you and i were boys. now in 1888 there was no war. so the prophet was right.
the squire was interested and humble, and being a plain man he asked why there would be no war, for it was imagined at that moment by eight or nine newspaper men that some war or other was going to break out; but what war i forget after such a lapse of time. the prophet was a true prophet, by which i do not mean that he prophesied truth, but only that he was in keeping with all that i have ever read of his breed; he shook his doormat of a head and wagged his beard, smiling, as bearded men do, with the eyes only, and would give no reasons; and, indeed, there was no war. but as the dinner went on he talked of other things; he prophesied a parliament in dublin "within ten years," and, new as i was to the world, i could but note how much of his conversation worked within fixed frames and limits,[pg 66] as should beseem a prophet. some things were going to happen "within five years," some "within twenty years," some—and the leap was indeed splendid—"within fifty years." among these last i dimly remember was the spread of a universal language, which i think he called "anglo-saxon"; and there was something or other about the birth-rate which escapes me now, but which i can remember to have appalled me at the time, for it was a destruction of all i loved and revered in europe.
the dinner went on, and as he got more food and wine into him he prophesied less—for fasting is the mother of prophecy. he was still assertive, he was still sure; his talk was still of public men, of continents, of armies, of battle and of sudden death, but the future entered less into it, and the present more. he became not so much a prophet, but, if i may use the word quite gently, more of a liar. i can remember vividly now, after so many years, how he stood in the hall of that great house, all wrapped up to go through the park to "the hollies." i looked at his large frame and masterful demeanour. i remembered all that he had said, both of things distant from me and of things to come, and i admired such eyes in the brain.
it was ten years before i met him again. i am wrong—it was nine. i met him upon a steamboat in the north sea, and he remembered me. we looked over the side of the ship and talked about[pg 67] america and spain. as to the chance of war he waved it all away with his hand. it might come or it might not [the truth was, it was too near for his type of vision], but what would come after, whether the war was fought or not, was quite clear. "america," he said, "would learn that she could fight a european power." it seems that having learnt this, all sorts of things would happen, and there would be banging and bingeing to some tune. the earning of one's living, the weight and dullness which come upon the mind from seeing too many places and knowing too many men, left my impression less vivid. for, as it says in the song—
ki moulte y resve mainte a vu:
ki pleure trop a trop vescu.
but anyhow there remains to me the impression of that conflict between the old world and the new which i was destined to experience, and which i in no way desired. he had been following french politics also, and he told me—not by way of prophecy, but as a revelation of inner truth—why it was that germany had not declared war upon france and taken paris in the autumn of the preceding year. i talked to him, therefore, of the 75mm. gun. he did not shirk it. he talked of it as one who knew; and as i heard him my mind grew aged. i left him in a port of holland after luncheon, and the last i remember of him on that occasion was a slight gesture of his from the wrist only (for he was a[pg 68] dignified man) explaining how all that i saw, the port, the shipping, the docks, everything, would be german "within ten years."
i met him again several times in the succeeding waves of our century. i met him just before the boer war, and a little after colenso. he prophesied only upon one matter upon these occasions, and that was the length of the conflict, which, with an exact discrimination, he invariably placed within "six months" of the day upon which he addressed me, and the third time he assured me of this thing was in the month of february 1902, and that time he was right.
since then i have met him continually, for he knows less people than he used to do, and he has fallen into a routine of old friends. the squire is dead, and he only goes down to "the hollies" now and again. it is his pleasure still to foresee. the war over, he bought consols. he was careful to explain that he was no fool. they were at 97. they would fall, of course; he was not buying for immediate rise. in part of this anticipation he was not disappointed, but in another part he was. he was in a fume for some little time about an approaching war with russia upon the frontiers of india, and again he would return to that recurrent theme of his life, the destruction of all limitrophous civilisations by the organised might of germany. but his chief concern was the march of china upon europe, which, as he clearly foresaw, could not be long delayed.[pg 69] "that," he said, with a sort of christian enthusiasm, "would bind us all together once more!"
whether it be a labour to prophesy or no, his hair had certainly grown white in the pursuit of his vocation, and when i last saw him (which was a little after the epiphany in rugby station, waiting for the train to carlisle) we spent ten minutes together, and he told me with unabated gladness that war would break out in the balkans "when the snow melted." i asked him at what time this change came about in the balkans, but he did not know.
