FROM YOUTH TO AGE.
[A Confidential Correspondence between Eminent Personages.) “ Immortal Age beside immortal Youth,
And all I was in aBhes.”—Tithonus.
No. TV.—From Mr. Robert Lowe, M.P. for Sydney, N. S. TV. (1849), to Viscount Sherbrooke.
Mr DEAR SHERBROOKE,
Little did I dream -when, thirty years ago, I sat in the Colonial Council of Sydney and rasped men older than myself, that I should ever come to address you seated in the House of Lords at Westminster. It is a far cry from New South Wales to the Peers’
Robing Room, from the Colonies to a Coronet; hut I don’t suppose that any will grudge you the advance. It is very remarkable, my dear Bob, (excuse this lapse into familiarity, but when we’re among ourselves, we ’re glad enough to throw aside the trammels of our state)—a curious thing that, considering all the hard knocks you have given in your time, there are no people lurking round corners with the intent to fetch you one for your nob.
I like to think of this, and so do you, dear Bob, cynic as you are. caring, as you say. for no one’s opinion. It all comes of the general conviction, that whatever you’ve done, whether right or wrong, has
been honestly done. You’ve never crawled on your hands and knees for any man’s favour, whether Peer or, that still more .important
personage, the Work
ing Man. You’d face an angry mob in Palace
Yard with as little fear as you have, in times past, confronted an angry crowd in the House of Commons; or, what has been harder to
bear, the reproaches of men whose opinion and good-will you value.
You’ve always been straightforward and plucky, standing to your guns even at moments
when there was some.danger that they might burst and make an end of you, with all your quips and cranks and classical oddities.
In political life you never had but one strong passion, and that was animosity, not untinctured with contempt, for Dizzy. He paid you back in your own coin, and next to snubbing a deputation, there were few things that raised your spirits to the pitch of exhilaration reached in prospect of a tussle with Dizzy. It was, 1 know, a little sad for you to leave your old companions and the scene of many battles, for the gilded quietude of the Upper House. You’re a man of the people, Bob, with all your aristocratic tendencies, which have always been rather scholarly than snobbish. But, of course,
you couldn’t join a Government pledged further to extend the suffrage, and it would not do to have you, old war-horse though you be, stalled on a back bench below the Gangway. You took a Peerage,
not because you particularly wanted it, but because it was, on the whole, the best thing possible for your friends. And now you sit mute, if not muzzled, on the back benches, amid a score of elderly mediocrities whose pretensions to be born legislators you secretly despise.
1 ’m sorry for you. Bob, but not ashamed, which is something to be said by so old and intimate a friend. You have fought your light and have sheathed your sword. But as you sit in the dimly lighted chamber, you have many memories of bright forays, and of a life well and honourably spent in the service of yourself and your country. That you may live long to enjoy the rest which you ve earned if you don’t enjoy, is the wish of your early and still devoted friend, Robert Lowe.
No. Y.—From Vernon Harcourt, Q.C. (Home Circuit, 1866), to the Home Secretary.
My dear Sir William,
It is a little odd to me to address you thus, not so much in respect of the title as of the name. We began life as “ Vernon,” and. did very well except at the liar. But we always were fond of an alias, and I dare say your new connection with the Police has strengthened the tendency. Whether as “Vernon Harcourt,”
“ Historicus,” or “ Sir William,” there’s no mistaking our identity wherever it presents itself. The only time; I am in a little doubt about myself is when I find under your signature, or uttered in your voice, sumo personal panegyric on Gladstone. Is it true what I hear, that, on being knighted, you elected to be known as “Sir
William,” out of compliment to your great leader ? If so, all I can say is that you are surprisingly changed. Why, my dear Vernon— I mean Sir William—do you forget some passages, alike in private
speech and ,in public address, bearing on the same subject ? At least you can’t forget, for it is written down in Hansard, how, when just
after the)General Election of 1874, Gladstone appearing hopelessly under the water, we
turned upon him, as he sat in dejected retire
ment at the end of the front Opposition bench, and belaboured him as in later days you have
belaboured Parnell.
Don’t you remember how delighted the Con
servatives were, how they cheered and laughed, and how Dizzy sat looking across the
table to see how Glad
stone stood it P
Of course, we made a mistake then, generalising a little too quickly, after our fashion. We thought Gladstone was played out.
that he was down, and might safely be kicked, which in truth seemed to be the case. He had a few months earlier taken us into his Go
vernment, and made us a Knight. If he had won at the General Election, naturally things would have been different. We acted then for the best, and 1 ’m bound to say you’ve now boldly grasped the nettle. No one listening to you as, with tears in your voice, you protest the humblest devotion to our great and glorious leader, will
think that you ’re the same man who performed that little scene in the House of Commons, now seven years old. Some men with such memories would be silent on this particular point, but that would be at best a commonplace way of meeting the difficulty. i ours is characteristically bolder, and likely to be successful.
What are you going to do next, Vernon P Is it the Woolsack or Gladstone’s place when it’s empty? I’m much younger than you, and it’s only because I’ve passed off so far as one exceptionally wise, that I venture to offer you my advice, which is to go for the Woolsack. I don’t think you would, do for the House of Commons.
You ’re smart and clever, and amuse the House with sometimes admirable imitations of Dizzy’s style. The House wants to be amused above all things, next to being guided. But that is an imperative distinction, and our volatile temperament and tendency to overestimate ourselves, sometimes lead us to guide parties into
I cannot conceive you Premier, or even Leader of the House of Commons; but to see you Lord Chancellor would, be exquisite, far
away the best and completest joke you ever made.x.How well you would look in the robes 1 How touching to see you repressing the youthful ardour of Lord Denman, or hinting that Stratueden and Campbell was getting a little wide of the mark ! And then to think of you presiding in the Appellate Court, nominally and actually the Chief Legal Luminary! Bo go for the Woolsack, Vernon. The House of Lords rises early, has long recesses, ana in time you wouia be able, with your great quickness, to pick up a little law.
Always yours admiringly,
Vernon Harcourt.
“HOUND THE WOULD YACHTING.
OUND THE WORLD YACHTING.—Notice.—The latest oppor
tunity for JOINING the steam yacht CEYLON at Tort Said is by Overland Mail, Dec. 9,—Apply, &c.
—we’despatched ourman with a billet—it sounds murderous, but it isn’t. He shan’t embark on the
Ceylon, and mix with the other illustrators and the pressgang on board. No. We have bought him a yacht all to himself; a twentytonner—
A wunner
Twenty-tonner—
and provided him with a Captain and Crew. A twenty-tonner only requires two men, so one is the Captain, and the other the Crew. If any dispute arises, our Corre
spondent must settle it; but we have suggested that they should take it ton and turn about, and so play fair. One man can be; Captain on .Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and the other on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Sun
day, as a dies non—both can be Captains. One can be a lost- Caiitain. the other a Pillar-Captain, or any other term they like to
[A Confidential Correspondence between Eminent Personages.) “ Immortal Age beside immortal Youth,
And all I was in aBhes.”—Tithonus.
No. TV.—From Mr. Robert Lowe, M.P. for Sydney, N. S. TV. (1849), to Viscount Sherbrooke.
Mr DEAR SHERBROOKE,
Little did I dream -when, thirty years ago, I sat in the Colonial Council of Sydney and rasped men older than myself, that I should ever come to address you seated in the House of Lords at Westminster. It is a far cry from New South Wales to the Peers’
Robing Room, from the Colonies to a Coronet; hut I don’t suppose that any will grudge you the advance. It is very remarkable, my dear Bob, (excuse this lapse into familiarity, but when we’re among ourselves, we ’re glad enough to throw aside the trammels of our state)—a curious thing that, considering all the hard knocks you have given in your time, there are no people lurking round corners with the intent to fetch you one for your nob.
I like to think of this, and so do you, dear Bob, cynic as you are. caring, as you say. for no one’s opinion. It all comes of the general conviction, that whatever you’ve done, whether right or wrong, has
been honestly done. You’ve never crawled on your hands and knees for any man’s favour, whether Peer or, that still more .important
personage, the Work
ing Man. You’d face an angry mob in Palace
Yard with as little fear as you have, in times past, confronted an angry crowd in the House of Commons; or, what has been harder to
bear, the reproaches of men whose opinion and good-will you value.
You’ve always been straightforward and plucky, standing to your guns even at moments
when there was some.danger that they might burst and make an end of you, with all your quips and cranks and classical oddities.
In political life you never had but one strong passion, and that was animosity, not untinctured with contempt, for Dizzy. He paid you back in your own coin, and next to snubbing a deputation, there were few things that raised your spirits to the pitch of exhilaration reached in prospect of a tussle with Dizzy. It was, 1 know, a little sad for you to leave your old companions and the scene of many battles, for the gilded quietude of the Upper House. You’re a man of the people, Bob, with all your aristocratic tendencies, which have always been rather scholarly than snobbish. But, of course,
you couldn’t join a Government pledged further to extend the suffrage, and it would not do to have you, old war-horse though you be, stalled on a back bench below the Gangway. You took a Peerage,
not because you particularly wanted it, but because it was, on the whole, the best thing possible for your friends. And now you sit mute, if not muzzled, on the back benches, amid a score of elderly mediocrities whose pretensions to be born legislators you secretly despise.
1 ’m sorry for you. Bob, but not ashamed, which is something to be said by so old and intimate a friend. You have fought your light and have sheathed your sword. But as you sit in the dimly lighted chamber, you have many memories of bright forays, and of a life well and honourably spent in the service of yourself and your country. That you may live long to enjoy the rest which you ve earned if you don’t enjoy, is the wish of your early and still devoted friend, Robert Lowe.
No. Y.—From Vernon Harcourt, Q.C. (Home Circuit, 1866), to the Home Secretary.
My dear Sir William,
It is a little odd to me to address you thus, not so much in respect of the title as of the name. We began life as “ Vernon,” and. did very well except at the liar. But we always were fond of an alias, and I dare say your new connection with the Police has strengthened the tendency. Whether as “Vernon Harcourt,”
“ Historicus,” or “ Sir William,” there’s no mistaking our identity wherever it presents itself. The only time; I am in a little doubt about myself is when I find under your signature, or uttered in your voice, sumo personal panegyric on Gladstone. Is it true what I hear, that, on being knighted, you elected to be known as “Sir
William,” out of compliment to your great leader ? If so, all I can say is that you are surprisingly changed. Why, my dear Vernon— I mean Sir William—do you forget some passages, alike in private
speech and ,in public address, bearing on the same subject ? At least you can’t forget, for it is written down in Hansard, how, when just
after the)General Election of 1874, Gladstone appearing hopelessly under the water, we
turned upon him, as he sat in dejected retire
ment at the end of the front Opposition bench, and belaboured him as in later days you have
belaboured Parnell.
Don’t you remember how delighted the Con
servatives were, how they cheered and laughed, and how Dizzy sat looking across the
table to see how Glad
stone stood it P
Of course, we made a mistake then, generalising a little too quickly, after our fashion. We thought Gladstone was played out.
that he was down, and might safely be kicked, which in truth seemed to be the case. He had a few months earlier taken us into his Go
vernment, and made us a Knight. If he had won at the General Election, naturally things would have been different. We acted then for the best, and 1 ’m bound to say you’ve now boldly grasped the nettle. No one listening to you as, with tears in your voice, you protest the humblest devotion to our great and glorious leader, will
think that you ’re the same man who performed that little scene in the House of Commons, now seven years old. Some men with such memories would be silent on this particular point, but that would be at best a commonplace way of meeting the difficulty. i ours is characteristically bolder, and likely to be successful.
What are you going to do next, Vernon P Is it the Woolsack or Gladstone’s place when it’s empty? I’m much younger than you, and it’s only because I’ve passed off so far as one exceptionally wise, that I venture to offer you my advice, which is to go for the Woolsack. I don’t think you would, do for the House of Commons.
You ’re smart and clever, and amuse the House with sometimes admirable imitations of Dizzy’s style. The House wants to be amused above all things, next to being guided. But that is an imperative distinction, and our volatile temperament and tendency to overestimate ourselves, sometimes lead us to guide parties into
I cannot conceive you Premier, or even Leader of the House of Commons; but to see you Lord Chancellor would, be exquisite, far
away the best and completest joke you ever made.x.How well you would look in the robes 1 How touching to see you repressing the youthful ardour of Lord Denman, or hinting that Stratueden and Campbell was getting a little wide of the mark ! And then to think of you presiding in the Appellate Court, nominally and actually the Chief Legal Luminary! Bo go for the Woolsack, Vernon. The House of Lords rises early, has long recesses, ana in time you wouia be able, with your great quickness, to pick up a little law.
Always yours admiringly,
Vernon Harcourt.
“HOUND THE WOULD YACHTING.
Directly we saw the following notice— R
OUND THE WORLD YACHTING.—Notice.—The latest oppor
tunity for JOINING the steam yacht CEYLON at Tort Said is by Overland Mail, Dec. 9,—Apply, &c.
—we’despatched ourman with a billet—it sounds murderous, but it isn’t. He shan’t embark on the
Ceylon, and mix with the other illustrators and the pressgang on board. No. We have bought him a yacht all to himself; a twentytonner—
A wunner
Twenty-tonner—
and provided him with a Captain and Crew. A twenty-tonner only requires two men, so one is the Captain, and the other the Crew. If any dispute arises, our Corre
spondent must settle it; but we have suggested that they should take it ton and turn about, and so play fair. One man can be; Captain on .Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and the other on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Sun
day, as a dies non—both can be Captains. One can be a lost- Caiitain. the other a Pillar-Captain, or any other term they like to