it was friday morning, the 5th of june, 1915, and the young and popular prime minister was busied in the inaugural ceremony of the wardenship of the court of dowry.
repton or no repton, the place must be filled. demaine was back and demaine must be there on the front bench before there was an explosion.
the inaugural ceremony which introduces a statesman to the wardenship of the court of dowry, technically called “l’acceptance,” in strict constitutional practice requires the presence of at least three persons, the outgoing warden (technically the dischargee), the incoming warden (technically the discoverer) and the sovereign; but since gherkin had, in spite of his eccentric radicalism, raised the office to its present position, the outgoing warden could be represented by proxy, though such a substitution was rarely made since it eliminated the quaint custom of the “braise”—one hundred pounds one hundred shillings one hundred pence, and a new brass farthing specially[278] minted for the occasion, the whole in a silver-gilt case, and handed over to the outgoer, to be regarded with historic respect and some one of its coins to be kept as an heirloom.[5]
but dolly, as he considered the situation on the friday morning, friday the 5th of june, 1915, could see no way out of it; he must simply tell lady repton briefly, and best by telephone, that she must not dream of her husband’s appearing at court, even with a keeper, and that it would be necessary for the repton household to forego the hundred sovereigns, the hundred shillings, the hundred pence and the new brass farthing specially minted for the occasion (the whole in a silver-gilt case), rather than have a scandal.
it was friday, and he was glad to remember it, a private members’ day. there were no questions. there was all saturday and sunday before him. he would arrange for the inauguration the very next week. he was already advised that the officials had been permitted by the highest authority, in view of demaine’s recent privations when he was blown out to sea in the little boat, treacherously abandoned by the foreign vessel and rescued by the willing hands, etc., to omit the final accolade with the ebony cudgel which had now for so many generations formed the last and most picturesque feature of the ritual.
he took up his telephone and asked the next[279] room to put him on to the reptons. he held the receiver while a servant told him that his message should be immediately communicated, and then in a few seconds, heard, to his great astonishment, not the tremulous tones of maria, but the masterly voice of sir charles, as incisive and direct as of old, saying, “what is it?” in the tone of a man who must come at once to business and has many things to do.
“oh!” cried dolly into the machine, quite taken aback. “that’s you, repton, is it?”
“yes, of course,” came the answer shortly. “well?”
“oh nothing. are you feeling better?”
“i don’t know what you mean.” this in restrained, quite unmistakable tones. “my headache’s gone, if that’s what you mean.”
“ye-es,” said the prime minister, wondering what on earth to say. “yes.... oh it’s gone, has it?”
“yes it has; i’ve told you that already.” then after a pause, “look here, i’m really very busy. i’ve got three men here about that absurd concession. you gave me a free hand, and i can’t wait. hope i’m not rude. it’s really very kind to ask after my health. you’ll be in the house at twelve?” and the telephone suddenly rang off.
dolly was in a stupor; he did what he always did, when things perplexed him: he sent for edward.
“edward,” he said, “that cracked dissenter has[280] got three men in his house and is talking about the oil concession to them! oh lord!”
the prime minister was evidently frightened and troubled, but he did not seem less frightened and more troubled than the occasion warranted. he couldn’t make repton out: there seemed to be another change.
edward answered simply: “why that makes three more who know,—that’s all.”
“do get a taxi,” said the prime minister, “and see what you can do.” and he waited anxiously till edward returned.
“well?” said dolly as he entered.
“well!” said edward. “he wasn’t very polite, but—but—are you quite sure that you weren’t worried when you saw him on tuesday?”
“worried,” said dolly, “i should think i was!”
“well that’s what i mean,” said edward a little uneasily. “didn’t you ... didn’t you perhaps exaggerate a little?”
“exaggerate!” said dolly, jumping up with all his youthful vigour, and looking for the moment less than forty-eight in his excitement, “why man alive, he was wearing a huge great easter lily in his buttonhole, and he tried to wrestle with the butler in the hall!”
“yes, but you know,” said edward, “there’s gaiety in everybody, and it comes out now and——”
“oh gaiety be blasted!” interrupted dolly. “the man was raving!”
[281]“well, they wouldn’t certify him anyhow,” said edward, “and he’s not raving now! he’s as sane as a waxen image, and as sharp as an unexpected pin. i’m glad i’m not doing business with him to-day.”
“look here,” protested the prime minister. “if he wasn’t off, why did he stay at home like a prisoner all wednesday, with lady repton preventing any one seeing him? and what was he doing all yesterday, thursday? why didn’t he come down to the house, eh, if he wasn’t off?”
“i didn’t say he wasn’t ill,” said edward blandly. “i only said there might have been some exaggeration.”
“oh very well,” ended the prime minister wearily, “oh very well!”
edward came to a swift decision and telephoned first to the moon then to the capon privately that “it was all right about repton; there’d been a mistake.” his chief went out on the duties of the day.
yet another change of plan! more bother! he would have to go through with the peerage now! he went gloomily down to the house of commons and learned that charles repton was already in his place, stiff, groomed and regular upon the treasury bench.
dolly came in nervously and shook hands with him.
sir charles took his hand rather coldly; he did[282] not see why a couple of days’ headache which no one had heard about should be made the excuse for so much public affection. it emphasised the thing. and he sat through the first hour of the debate looking as if he would have been just as well pleased to be made less fuss about. “anyhow,” he thought to himself by way of consolation, “i shall be rid of it next week,” and his mind turned in an equable fashion to his taking his seat in the upper house and to what his first business there might be.
as he was so thinking george mulross demaine came in quietly by one of the side doors. as he entered there was a little subdued cheering from those who remembered the announcement of his approaching appointment. it flurried him a little. he sat down and tried to forget it, while the debate maundered on.
in the lobbies repton continued to suffer somewhat from occasional congratulations on his return to health. he did not easily understand them, and he was a trifle gruff in his replies. he was going into the library for a little peace when a messenger put a note into his hand; it was from the duke of battersea.
“more fuss!” he thought, but he went immediately with his stiff, upright gait to where that great financier was waiting for him, and he greeted him warmly enough.
the duke, like the business man he was, was very brief and to the point. he congratulated charles[283] repton not (thank heaven!) on having got rid of the slight headache which seemed to have filled the thoughts of too many people, but upon the great accession the upper house was to receive, and then the duke having said so much went on to what he really had to say, his pronunciation marred only by that slight lisp which ill-natured reports so constantly exaggerated. sir charles repton (he said) would remember the very disgraceful case of the editor of the islington hebdomadal review?
charles repton tried to remember, but could not.
well, it wath the cathe of the man who had very properly got twenty yearth of the betht for thaying that he could reveal how old ballymulrock had got his peerage ... a dithgratheful cathe! there wath blackmail behind it!
yes, charles repton could remember now, and he smiled a grim smile as he considered the peculiar ineptitude of that particular convict. why old ballymulrock was the seventh in the title, he had nothing a year, he was a doddering old bachelor of eighty-seven, he had got it by a fluke from a half-nephew, and it was only an irish elective peerage at that! the convict had pleaded a misprint! what a fool! yes, sir charles repton could remember the case. what about it? “i’m not going to take any action to save him,” he said sharply, “if that’s what you want: he deserved all he got! if you want some one get birdwhistlethorpe; isaacs that was: he knows north london.”
[284]“noh, noh, noh,” said the aged duke of battersea in alarm, “you mithunderthand me!” and he went on to tell the outgoing warden that they were determined to bring this sort of thing before the house of lords in a resolution. would he move?
“i don’t see what i’ve got to do with it,” said repton shortly.
the duke smiled as he had smiled years ago, when he produced lord benthorpe’s paper and brought that now forgotten personage to heel. had sir charles seen what the moon had been saying that very day?
no, sir charles hadn’t. he supposed it was about the oil concessions. he paid no attention to the moon. but edward’s telephone to the moon and the capon had borne dreadful fruit. each editor had thought to have regained his freedom.
the duke of battersea’s smile grew more portentous; he discovered a cutting in the inner pocket of a coat which somehow or other always looked greasy upon him, and as sir charles read it, his face darkened.
“it’s pretty scandalous,” he said as he laid it down. for the leader in the moon gave it to be understood in no very roundabout way that there had been a deal over repton’s peerage.
“the capon’th worth, far worth!” insinuated the duke of battersea.
“is it?” said sir charles, “indeed!”
[285]“yeth, indeed yeth,” said the aged duke, putting the paper forward as though over a counter; and sir charles repton could not forbear to read it. it certainly was worse; it simply said point blank that the burmah oil concession was the price of repton’s promotion to the upper house. and the passage ended with these words:
“we have no desire to add to a domestic affliction which no friend of the government regrets more sincerely than we do ourselves, and we are willing to believe that the unfortunate gentleman, who we fear can never again take his old place in public life, was himself quite innocent of any such dealing; but ambitions other than his own may have been concerned in this matter, and the giving of permanent legislative power to a man who now notoriously can no longer take part in active public life, does but add to the scandal.”
that decided him! he would nip off that headache legend at once, and sharply!
“yes,” he said, “i’ll move as soon as you like, and the sooner the better.” he did not say it as though he was granting a favour; and it was easy to see that the duke was a little afraid of him:—
after a pause during which the two men rose to part, the old gentleman suggested that methlinghamhurst should speak after him.
[286]“messlingham who?” said repton, puzzled. the name was unfamiliar to him.
“no, not methlinghamhurtht! methlinghamhurtht,” said the duke of battersea, rather too loud. “methlinghamhurtht!”
sir charles shook his head, still puzzled. “i daresay he’s all right,” he said all starch.
“you know,” said the duke of battersea, craning forward in a confidential way, “clutterbuck that wath.”
“oh! clutterbuck! yes, i remember. well? can he speak?”
“not very well,” hesitated the duke of battersea, “but you know he wanted....”
“i really don’t care,” said sir charles moving away. “anyhow i’ll do it.”
the duke was profuse in his thanks.
charles repton returned to the house of commons. another message!
“the prime minister begged to see sir charles repton:” really there was no end to the number of people wanting to see him that day! charles repton went towards dolly’s room with such muscles showing upon his face as would have made any one afraid to say another word about the headache,—but it was not of the headache, at least not of that directly, that dolly had to speak.
“repton,” he said apologetically and in some dread, “i’m afraid i made arrangements for a[287] proxy next week—i mean for l’acceptance you know.”
“oh you did!” said sir charles, really nettled. “you might have asked me first i think!”
“well, you see,” began his unfortunate chief,—
“as a fact i don’t see,” said repton drily, “but i suppose you’ve put it right. i’ve written to say i should be there.”
“oh yes, certainly, certainly,” said dolly hurriedly, “i’ve changed it.” as a fact he’d done nothing of the kind and was wondering what he should say to the proxy. “certainly!”
“all right,” said charles repton moving towards the door. “that’s all, i suppose?”
“yes, that’s all,” said dolly, with perhaps a hundred more things to say. “i’ll see that you get notice of the exact hour.”
“of course,” said charles repton briefly, and he shut the door quietly but firmly behind him.
the inaugural ceremony, though shorn for some years of the backward entrance which was its most picturesque feature, and now (though not as a precedent) of the accost with the ebony cudgel, was impressive enough. the silver-gilt case with the three hundred and one specially minted coins had been put into charles repton’s seisin by the symbol of the flask of palm oil, and was already on its way to his house; the tinkling shoes had been rapidly put on and off, and demaine had sworn fealty for sergeanty[288] in ponthieu and the seniory of lucq, and all the embroglio was done.
lord repton (for he was content with that simple title—in the manor of giggleswick) was present for the first time upon the red benches, awaiting the moment for the debate upon the resolution in which he was to open and move.
in the house of commons george mulross demaine, who for the last few days had been coaching steadily in the duties of his post, and especially in the really difficult technicalities of replying to questions, was reading his notes for the last time in the comfortable room assigned to his office, and repeating to himself in a low tone the words he had so carefully committed to memory. edward was with him to give him courage; and he needed such companionship.
at last he was summoned.
the house was very full for question-time, for it was known or suspected that something of importance would take place that day. the full nature of the crisis had been understood by very few, but the disappearance of demaine and his return, his terrible adventures in the fishing-boat, his night at sea, the dastardly action of the foreign crew, and the heroic succour which had ultimately reached him were public property.
the silent and little known young member whose disappearance from the benches under the gallery would never have been noticed, was half a hero[289] already in the popular mind, and had become particularly dear to his colleagues during the anxious moments when he was believed to be lost, and when the press of london had worked that mystery for all it was worth.
the house of commons knows a man.
there was, therefore, loud and hearty cheering, which, according to the beautiful tradition of our public life, was confined to no one part of the assembly, when, that happy friday, george mulross entered rapidly from behind the speaker’s chair, stumbled over the outstretched foot of the admiralty, his second uncle by marriage, and took his seat for the first time among his new colleagues upon the treasury bench.
the prime minister accompanied him. congratulations suitable to the occasion were to be seen in the gestures of those in his immediate neighbourhood, and he himself wore the blest but sickly smile of a man who is about to be hanged but who is possessed of a fixed faith in a happy eternity.
only one question was set down to him; he had read it and re-read it; he had read and re-read the typewritten answer which mr. sorrel had furnished him and which he had now got by heart beyond, he hoped, the possibility of error. the questioner had chivalrously offered to withdraw his query in deference to the fatigues and anxieties through which the new warden of the court of dowry had so recently passed, but the prime minister, though appreciative of that offer, rather determined that his dear young[290] relative should win his spurs; and trivial as the subject was, question no. 31 was by far the most important upon the paper for most of those present.
it concerned (of course) the wreck which still banged about, the sport of wind and wave, upon the royal sovereign shoals. this aching tooth of empire had cropped up again in yet another aspect. the member for harrowell, a landowner upon that coast, wanted to know whether it was not a fact that large planks studded, he was ashamed to say, with long rusty nails, had not drifted shorewards from the wreck and grievously scratched such persons as were indulging in mixed bathing just off the popular and rapidly rising seaside resort which lay a little east by north of the wretched derelict.
question no. 29 was answered, question 30 was answered. demaine’s ordeal had come.
he heard a low mumbling noise some distance down the benches which he would never have taken to be the single word “thirty-one” had not his mother’s half-sister’s husband the chancellor of the exchequer given him a sharp dig in the ribs with his elbow and jolted him onto his feet. his hands shook like a motor car at rest as he began his reply.
“i have nothing to tell my right honourable gentleman—i mean my honourable gentleman....” here there was a pause, painful to all present with the exception of one ribald fellow who cackled twice and then was silent.... “i have nothing to add,” george mulross began again with a lump in his throat, “in[291] reply to my honourable friend—to what my predecessor said in reply to a similar” (another pause) ... “oh,—question—upon the tenth of this month.”
he had read all of it out now, anyhow, and he sat down, a trifle unsteadily, feeling for the seat.
“arre we to onderrstand,” boomed the voice of the inevitable fanatic, “that the carrgo of gin is yet aboorrd...?”
“hey! what?” said demaine over his shoulder, with a startled air.
“get up and ask for notice,” whispered a colleague very hurriedly. “get up and say ‘i must ask for notice of that question.’ say ‘i must ask for notice of that question.’ get up quick.”
demaine got up, took hold of the box, turned his back upon the questioner and looking full at the harmless and startled opposition said, not without menace:
“i must ask for a notice of that question”—and sat down.
there were a few more sympathetic cheers and all was well. the warden of the court of dowry was launched upon his great career.
meanwhile, beyond the central hall, lord repton of giggleswick was rising for the first time among his peers.
that house also was full and was prepared to give the spare towering figure and the stoical face a sympathetic hearing, for the recognition of a man who had served his country so faithfully and so well[292] and who had recently suffered a temporary malady of so distressing a nature was universal and sincere.
the house of lords knows a man.
lord repton, even as plain sir charles, had always been an admirable parliamentary speaker: not only quick at debate but with a grave and lucid delivery which, coupled with his intimate grasp of detail and the sense of balanced judgment behind his tone, made his one of the most effective voices in our public life.
it would be difficult to say by what art he contrived to give in that large assembly the impression of speaking as quietly as though he were in a private room, and yet so managed that every word of his—every syllable,—was heard in every corner of the house.
in the peeresses’ gallery women in mauve, heliotrope, eau-de-nil, crapaud mort, and magenta, made a brilliant scheme of colour.
the lords, who upon occasions of privilege are by custom robed, gave to the splendid place the deeper tone of red plush and white pelts with small black tails which is otherwise reserved for such great occasions of state as the opening of parliament, the coronation, an impeachment or a replevin at large; at the bar a crowd of commoners pressed, many of whom recognised in the faces before them those of brothers, fathers, first cousins, debtors, creditors and clients in business. it was an animated and an impressive scene, and the audience, large as it was,[293] would doubtless have been larger but for an unfortunate blunder by which the eton and harrow match and a particularly interesting rehearsal of the mizraim dance were both fixed for that very afternoon.
as it was, the two hundred or more peers present were finely representative of all that is best and worst in the national life. the aged duke of battersea had made a point not only of coming but of speaking upon such an occasion; the bishops had turned up in full force, and the colonial peers, now happily added to the ancient house, were remarkable not only for their strict attention to this historic business, but for their somewhat constrained attitudes: not one was absent from his seat.
the report of a speech, however excellent, is but a dull reflection of the original, as all may judge who consider the contrast between the entrancing rhetoric which daily holds spellbound the house of commons and the plain prose appearing in the morning papers.
it would ill repay the reader for the courtesy and charm she has shown throughout the perusal of these pages, were i to inflict upon her a mere verbatim transcript of lord repton’s famous harangue. but the gist of it well merits record here, not only because it did much to kill a poisonous spirit which had till then been growing in english journalism—but also because it was in itself a typical and splendid monument of the things that build up the soul of a great man.
[294]he began in the simplest manner with a review of what had determined some of them to bring forward this resolution. it needed no reiteration upon his part, and indeed the matter was so painful that the mere recalling of it must be made as brief as possible.
“it has been suggested that places in that house are acquired by process of purchase.
“there, in plain english, is the accusation.”
he would remark in passing that the cowards and slanderers—he did not hesitate to use strong language—(and even the sanctity of the precincts could not check a murmur of approval), the cowards and slanderers who brought forward that general accusation, dared not make it particular.
“in one case,” he said, turning gravely to the place where he expected to see but was disappointed not to see the very aged frame of lord ballymulrock, “in one case which referred to a peer whose health i am distressed to say has made it impossible for him to be present upon this occasion” (a protest from an exceedingly old man who sat folded up on high—it was bally himself!), “in one case a direct accusation has been made.... melords, you know the issue. an appeal still lies, and it is not for me to deal with a matter which is sub judice; but apart from that case, these anonymous hacks who have for so long corrupted or attempted to corrupt the public mind in respect to this house, confine themselves to generalities upon which the law can take no hold.”
[295]it was upon this very account that the general resolution of which he had spoken had been framed, and he would pass at once from the unsavoury recollection of such acts, to that part of his argument which he thought would have most weight with his fellow-subjects.
“this house, including the more recent creations, the colonial peers, and the ex-officio additions with which a recent—and in my opinion a beneficent reform—has recruited it, still numbers less than fifteen hundred men. of these the ex-officio members, the lords spiritual” (and he bowed to the bishop of shoreham, who was deaf) “the elected members from the britains overseas (among whom i am glad to see present the nerbuddah yah) between them account for no less than forty-two. two hundred and eighty” (he quoted from a paper in his hand) “are imbeciles, minors or permanent invalids; somewhat over fifty are for one reason or another incapacitated from attendance at their debates; ten are in gaol.”
“now, melords,” he continued, “of the eleven hundred remaining—they are roughly eleven hundred,—what do we find? we find”—emphatically striking his right-hand fist into his left-hand palm,—“we find no less than five hundred and twelve to be the sons of their fathers—or in some other way direct heirs: ninety-eight to have succeeded to their titles from collaterals of the first or of the second degree; sixteen to have succeeded[296] in some more distant manner; eleven to owe their position to the revival of ancient tenures; the claims of six to have been recently proved through the female line; and one by warranty and novel disseizin. what remains?”
he looked round the eager assembly before him with an attitude of the head dignified but wonderfully impressive.
“melords, i ask again, what remains? less than four hundred men, the representatives of all the chief energies of our national life. we have here the great champions of industry, the great admirals of our fleets, the great generals of our armies—and i am happy to include the salvation army, (the head of that great organisation lifted his biretta)—men who have distinguished themselves in every conceivable path of public life, who have loyally served their country and many of whom after such service are still honourably poor.”
at this phrase which was evidently the approach to his peroration, many peers who had hitherto been sitting with their knees apart, crossed one leg over the other; some few who, on the contrary, had had their legs crossed, uncrossed them and reposed both feet upon the floor; more than one took the opportunity to recline his head upon his right hand, and the most venerable member of the bench of bishops coughed in a manner that would have wrung a heart of stone.
when these slight interruptions were over, lord[297] repton of giggleswick found it possible to proceed. he showed by a strict process of inquiry how those to whom the abominable suggestion might conceivably apply, could not by any stretch of the imagination amount to eighty in number.
“less than eighty men, melords, in an assembly of fifteen hundred! hardly five per cent.—hardly, if i may use a bold metaphor, thirteen pence in the pound! it is by this proportion alone, even did these detestable falsehoods contain—which they do not—a grain of truth, that our whole body is forsooth to be judged! but, melords, who are these eighty men, if i do not insult them by permitting my argument to approach their names?
“i will not cite my own case; my public career is open for any man to examine, and i think i know the temper of my own people too well to delay upon that score. but there are around me others perhaps (i know not) more sensitive, or less experienced in the petty villainies of the world, than am i, who may have thought themselves especially marked out.
“i ask, against which of them could such an accusation be levelled by name, without the certitude of such a result in any court of justice as would silence the mouth of the libeller for many years? is it, melords, the man to whom we owe the great reservoir at sing yan? is it that world-famous englishman who by his organising ability, his untiring industry and his knowledge of men, has[298] built up the united sausage company’s emporiums throughout the length and breadth of the land?
“i might extend the list indefinitely: melords, to no one of these, to no one member of this house i venture to say, can words of this kind be addressed without their falsity being apparent almost without need for proof.
“i repeat in the words of burke, ‘no, no, no, a thousand times no.’ i am not ashamed to recall the glorious phrase with which these walls echoed to the voice of ephraim ten years ago: ‘give me such principles as these and i will trample them into the dust beneath my feet!’”
having said so much, lord repton sat down, and it is a tribute to the fire and the conviction of the man that a young heiress of african origin but recently married, who had been listening intently from the peeresses’ gallery throughout the latter part of the speech, gave a low moan and fainted clean away.
her young form was borne down to the buttery by a strong posse of attendants where the air from the terrace soon revived her. i mention the incident only as a signal proof of the oratorical powers that had illumined repton’s great career.
after such an effort lord methlinghamhurst necessarily somewhat palled, especially as an imperfection in his diction, failing eyesight and a certain loss of memory compelled him to make long and uncomfortable pauses over the large printed slip[299] which he held in his hand, but it was over at last, and the duke of battersea rose amid the evident interest of such as remained to hear him, no less than five of whom were concerned with himself in the anapootra ruby mines.
the great financier did well to interpose upon such an occasion. his lisp, with which the house was now familiar, was the only impediment to a sincere and vigorous piece of english. there was not a word which the most exuberant would presume to add, nor one which the most fastidious would dare to erase.
the proceedings had occupied something close upon three-quarters of an hour, and the senate, unused to such delays, was impatient to pass to the vote, when, to the universal horror of that hall, ballymulrock tottered to his feet. there was almost a stampede. luckily the aged man was as brief as he was inaudible. it was a couple of squeaks, several mutters, and a collapse. they proceeded to put the question.
the peers flocked back again to their places in great numbers; others stood ready for the lobbies—but there was no need.
it was one of those rare moments when many hundreds of hearts, to quote a wild and lovely poem, beat as one; and with a silent unanimity which eye-witnesses declare to have formed the most impressive sight since the first great review of specials upon salisbury plain, the resolution was adopted.
[300]thus was destroyed, let us hope for ever, what was rapidly growing to be a formidable legend and one that would have undermined the security of the state and the honour of our public life in the eyes of rival nations.
it was not the least of the services which charles repton had rendered to the state, and as we raise our grateful hats to providence for the recovery that made his action possible, let us not forget the genius of the young canadian doctor who was the author of that miraculous moment in a story of a thousand years.
the private members’ time was ended. the house sat on upon the broadening of the streets bill, the intense unpopularity of which rendered it especially urgent.
when the house of commons rose, near midnight, dolly and dimmy went out together by the door of the private rooms into the cool air and there in the courtyard were the glowing lamps of mary’s motor car. she beckoned them and they got in.
“you got to come to supper to-night,” she said mysteriously. “they’ll all be there.”
dimmy was agreeable. dolly tried to plead something but she shut him up, and after them in single file raced through london half a dozen taxis and cars and broughams all making in a stream for st. james’s.
it made such a supper-party as mary smith alone in london could gather!
her sister-in-law, with the leader of the opposition,[301] and his brother; his right-hand man who had been chancellor in the last administration; his nephew, the postmaster general; dolly himself; dolly’s brother-in-law, the secretary for india; his little nephew’s wife’s cousin at the board of trade, and his stepmother’s brother at the admiralty, sat down,—and so did dimmy, who was there without his wife, and also, i regret to say, without a stud, or rather without the head of a stud, in his shirt; for somehow it had broken off.
but the reader will have but an imperfect picture of that jolly table if she imagines that it was a mere family party.
our public life is a larger thing than that! of the five members of the two front benches who were not connected by marriage, two were present: the minister for education who could draw such screamingly funny things on blotting-paper, and beagle, back two days before from berlin, who could imitate a motor car with his mouth better than any man in europe. and there also, by a sort of licence, was the duke of battersea, brought by charlie fitzgerald and his wife.
they had already sat down when william bailey, whom no one had invited, came ponderously and good-humouredly in, affected to stare at the duke, and made a place for himself as far as possible from that controller of hemispheres, who was in his usual chair on mary smith’s right hand, with bulbous baggy eyes for none but her.
[302]william bailey smiled all that evening and smiled especially at dimmy—but he remained very silent; when, a little before two, they began to make a move, he had not said a dozen words—and dimmy was exceedingly grateful.
nay, his friendship extended further: he saw demaine as they all got up from table nervously stuffing a corner of the cloth in mistake for his handkerchief into his trousers pocket.
“look out, dimmy!” he said.
dimmy jumped, and the tablecloth jumped with him, and then a crash—a great crash of broken glass, and the falling of candles.
mary smith was very nearly annoyed, but on such an occasion she forgave him.
north of the park, for now two hours, lord repton of giggleswick had slept an easy sleep.
[303]
on
the pseudological functions
of
caryll’s ganglia
a pamphlet
which the reader need not read. it is quite as easy to understand the book without it.
extract from a lecture delivered, for a grossly insufficient fee, by a professor of great popular reputation at the royal institution on january 26th, 1915:—
“the review of comparative biology in its october issue contained a short and modest paper over the name of henry upton which is destined to influence modern thought more profoundly than anything that has appeared since lux mundi or the origin of species. henry upton has been taken from us. or, to use a phrase consecrated by his own reverent quotation of it, he has ‘passed beyond the veil,’ he has crossed the bar; but short as the time is since this brief essay was given to the world, his name is already famous.
[304]“you will have heard the echoes of passionate discussions upon his famous theory; it is my business this afternoon to put before you in clear and popular language that you can easily understand, what that theory was; and when i have done so i make no doubt that you will see why it has been thought so transcendently important.
“briefly, henry upton declared himself finally convinced that between man and the simius gabiensis there existed a differentiation so marked as to destroy all possibility of any recent common origin for the two species.
“when i add that simius gabiensis is but the technical name for the ringtailed baboon of our childhood you will at once appreciate what a revolution such a pronouncement must work if it can be sustained: and it has been sustained!
“it is common knowledge and will be familiar to the youngest child in this room that the ringtailed baboon is the highest of the anthropoids, and the one nearest approaching the majesty of the human species—homo sapiens; and if between him and ourselves the link of affinity prove far removed, it seems indeed as though the whole edifice of modern biology and of modern thought itself will fall to the ground.
“the superficial differences to be discovered between a cleanly and well-bred gentleman and the ringtailed baboon are common property: the beard in the anthropoid is not so clearly defined as in the allied organism of man, but covers the whole face;[305] the superciliary arch is more prominent, the diaphragm tessarated and refulgent, while the cardiac aneries are at once paler and less vasculate in form: the rings upon the tail are of course peculiar to the simian, and almost universally absent in the human species, while the speech of the latter is far more complex and articulate than that of the former.
“but i need not detain this cultured audience with considerations quite unworthy of physical science. all the weight of real evidence pointed to the close relationship between the two types, and it was a commonplace of the classroom that in all fundamentals the two animals betrayed an ancestor less remote than that of the dog and the wolf. now, since henry upton’s work appeared, we are certain that that ancestor is more remote than the ancestor of the hippopotamus and the jersey cow, and probably more remote than that of the mongoose and the great auk.
“in every text-book we read (and we believed the statement) that between a really poor man and the highest specimens of our race lay a gulf wider than that which separated the former from the ringtailed baboon and even from the gorilla and the barbary ape. to-day all that is gone!
“now let me turn to the evidence. briefly, again, henry upton proved that caryll’s ganglia were not, as had been imagined, unimportant or useless organs, but were organically necessary to the full conduct of man.
[306]“it had of course been known since caryll first described and mapped these ganglia, that they were present in man and absent in all other animals. but they were not unique in this, and the obscure part which they seemed to play in our economy attracted little attention from the student. suddenly these humble agglutinations of organic matter were lifted into the blaze of fame by an englishman whose name will not perish so long as our civilisation endures. for henry upton showed that in these ganglia lay the capital distinction between man and his congener; if i, myself, for instance, differ in any way from ‘pongo’ in regent’s park, it is to caryll’s ganglia, under providence, that i owe the privilege.
“henry upton was not the man to proceed upon a priori reasoning, or to state as a conclusion what was still a bare hypothesis. he had suspected the truth ten years before committing it to print: they were ten years of anxiety, nay, of agony, during which a bolder or less scrupulous man might snatch from him the merit of prior discovery; but he felt it was his duty to science to continue the vast labour and the patient research, until he could speak once and for all.
“upton tabulated in all the enormous number of 57,752 recorded experiments. he first noted the comparative sizes of the ganglia, in children and adults, in women and in men, showing them to be larger in men than in women, and in children rudimentary before the seventh year. he next proved[307] that in certain professions, notably in those of the money-lender, the solicitor and the politician, hypertrophy of the ganglia was to be discovered. the conclusions to which this pointed will soon be evident. his theory already began to take shape. luckily for english science, this great man was possessed of private means. he organised a staff of enthusiastic young workers who occupied themselves in treading upon the toes of people in omnibuses, sitting upon top hats, asking direct questions of slight acquaintances concerning their financial affairs, and coughing violently and with long, uninterrupted spasms at the most exciting moments of melodramatic plays. the result was in each case tabulated, and in over 5·08 per cent. of the cases it was possible with care to discover the position of the ganglia in those who responded to the stimuli. without a single exception the importance of the ganglia varied directly with the self-restraint exercised against such stimuli. those who struck out, swore, or in any other way betrayed immediate violence, were found to possess small and sometimes partially atrophied c. g’s. those who protested sullenly or confined themselves to angry glances were normal; those who contained themselves as though nothing had happened, invariably possessed ganglia of a large and peculiarly healthy type, while those who actually expressed enjoyment and begged for a repetition of the performance had ganglia of so astonishing a size as to cause protuberances on either[308] side of the head, for caryll’s ganglia lie (as most of you probably know) a little south-east and by east of the aural cavity.
“it might by this time have seemed sufficiently proved that caryll’s ganglia were the seat of all that restraint and balance upon which human society depends; but upton was not satisfied until he had clinched the process of proof by a negative experiment upon animals:—and here let me point out in passing that had certain well-meaning fanatics their own way, this great revelation would never have been made. the horse, the pig, the common house-fly, the bee, the dog and the wild goose, to give but a few examples, were severally tested, and in each case it was discovered that a clout, a fillip, or any other simple stimulus was at once responded to. in no case was a trace of caryll’s ganglia to be found.
“you all know the end!
“the essay was printed, upton’s name had already flown to the utmost corners of the globe, when he read in some obscure narrative of travel that the little armadillo that can sleep without a pillow, though possessing no ganglia, was capable of the same balance and restraint as man, could control himself under all but the most violent stimuli, conceal his most poignant necessities, and smile in the presence of death.
“upton was a scientist of the scientists. one single exception and he would retract from his[309] position. he sailed for the amazon, interviewed the armadillo, but at the first pin he thrust into the fleshy portion of the animal’s steaks, a little below the armoured belt, it belied the false report by turning savagely round and biting off his head. his remains were reverently brought home to london. he lies in westminster abbey, the last and perhaps the greatest of martyrs to scientific truth.
“if henry upton’s immortal achievement seems for a moment to have broken down the very keystone in the arch of social progress, and to have made null the whole structure of biological truth; if it leaves man no longer propped up by a knowledge of cousinship and brotherhood with the beasts of the field, but all alone, an exile upon earth, nevertheless we must take courage. the bishop of shoreham has told us (etc., etc., etc.).”
printed by
morrison & gibb limited
edinburgh
