Part 18 (2/2)

”Foreign affairs seem quiet all over Europe; I am not behind the scenes, but I know that the diplomatists expect no early disturbance.

The Czar would scarcely indulge in the pleasing pastime of baiting his Jews, if he looked forward to wanting a loan. Besides, he hates soldiering, and takes some interest in finance. The German Emperor has been making a fool of himself, which is nothing new; he delivered a speech the other day, in which he praised the beer-swilling and duelling of German students as being the most effective influences to keep up the true German character! He is an energetic young savage, and that is the best one can say.”

It should be remembered that the Czar who indulged in ”the pleasing pastime of Jew baiting” was not the luckless Nicholas II so brutally murdered--a victim, say some, to the baited Jews--but his father, Alexander III, whom he succeeded in 1894.

[Sidenote: THE EX-KAISER]

In July Lord Derby refers to the visit of the German Emperor at the beginning of the month:

”He has been ramping up and down, seeing everything, questioning everybody, intent on making the most of his time, and keeping all the world in the condition of fuss and bustle which is the element in which he lives. It is almost too soon to judge the effect of his visit. I should say that he was popular rather than otherwise; not from his manners, which are queer and rather blunt; but there is a certain simplicity about him which pleases, as when he told the Windsor people, in answer to an address, that he had come 'to see his grandmamma, who had always been kind to him.' He had a good reception in the city, though not so enthusiastic as the press makes out. There was about as much interest shown in his state entry as in an ordinary Lord Mayor's Show. He is understood to be well satisfied, and the visit has given people a subject to talk about, which they were beginning to want. None now lasts longer than a week. By that time, journalistic enterprise has said whatever is to be said, and the public grows weary. I am afraid one effect of this German visit will be to put the French in a bad humour, though with no good reason. But that cannot be helped.”

Lord Derby seems to have been somewhat rea.s.sured, as in August, after touching on home affairs, he writes:

”The other event is more important: the visit of the French fleet to Portsmouth, where it has been reviewed by the Queen, and civilities of every kind have been exchanged. I call the matter important, because the visit of the German Emperor made a great feeling of soreness in France, and led to endless talk about England having joined the anti-gallican alliance. All that nonsense is ended by the courtesy shown to French officers: and the relations of the two countries, if not absolutely cordial, are again comfortable. The business was well managed and does credit to the people in Downing Street.”

Lord Derby continued to send most interesting news, but unfortunately some of his later letters are missing, and alas! he died in the spring of 1893, so I never saw my kind and constant friend again.

[Sidenote: LORD DERBY'S POEM]

I never saw the following lines published. They were given me by Lady Galloway, who told me that Lord Derby believed that he had composed them, as he could not remember having heard or read them when he woke with them in his mind. She wrote down what he said with regard to them.

”Lines made, as I believe, in sleep, in the course of a dream, in which some fellow-student had asked me to complete a poem which he was sending in:

”We judge but acts--not ours to look within: The crime we censure, but ignore the sin: For who tho' versed in every legal art Can trace the mazes of the human heart, Allow for nature, training, faults of race And friends.h.i.+ps such as make us brave or base, Or judge how long yon felon in his cell Resisted, struggled--conquered ere he fell?

Our judgments skim the surface of the seas, We have no sounding-line for depths like these.

Jan. 1893, 5 to 7 a.m.”

One or two imperfect lines follow. The idea recalls Burns's ”Address to the Unco' Guid”:

”Then at the balance let's be mute, We never can adjust it; What's done we partly may compute, But know not what's resisted.”

Lord Derby, however, goes deeper into the springs of action. Verses composed in sleep are by no means uncommon, but apart from Coleridge's ”Kubla Khan,” are perhaps seldom as consecutive as these.

CHAPTER XII

FURTHER AUSTRALIAN IMPRESSIONS--NEW ZEALAND AND NEW CALEDONIA

Lady Galloway came out to us towards the end of 1891, and in January she accompanied us on one of our amusing expeditions. This time it was about three days' tour through a hilly--indeed mountainous country. The hills in Australia do not, as a rule, attain great height; it is because they are so ancient in the world's history that they have been worn down by the storms of ages and the ravages of time. We went, however, to open another range of caverns of the same kind as the Jenolan Caves. These, the Yarrangobilly Caves, had been explored, and to a certain extent excavated, within more recent years, and were now to be made accessible to tourists.

Mr. Dibbs and other officials and Members of Parliament, notably some Labour Members, came also; and a mixed mult.i.tude, said to amount to about five hundred people in all, took part more or less in what was called ”The Governor's Picnic.”

[Sidenote: YARRANGOBILLY CAVES]

These did not follow us all through the hills, but camped in the valley near the caves. Here a comic incident occurred. For the first part of the tour we were in one district, for the last in another, but somehow in the middle we fell between two stools. In Number One and Number Three we were entertained by hosts who displayed the usual lavish hospitality, and all the way we were conveyed by kindly charioteers, and accompanied by a splendid voluntary mounted escort, but in Number Two, the valley near the caves, something had gone wrong. A wooden hut with several rooms had been prepared for our reception, but no food! It was a sort of debatable ground, and either through misunderstanding or, as was hinted, through local jealousy, it was n.o.body's business to act host on the border land.

The poor Premier and other officials were desperate when they discovered our plight, and in the end Dibbs possessed himself of one of the troopers'

swords and rushed off to a party of picnickers who were innocently sitting down to enjoy the supper which they had brought with them, asking what they meant by eating cold mutton while the Governor and his party were dest.i.tute!

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