Part 26 (2/2)

I have other recollections of Lord Kitchener at Osterley, though I cannot exactly date them. One Sunday some of us had been to church, and on our return found George Peel extended in a garden chair, looking positively white with anxiety. He confided to us that Kitchener and M. Jusserand of the French Emba.s.sy had been marching up and down near the Lake at the bottom of the garden violently discussing Egypt and Fashoda, and he was afraid lest the Englishman should throw the Frenchman into the Lake--which, considering their respective sizes, would not have been difficult. They certainly parted friends, and Kitchener mentions in one of his letters: ”I saw Jusserand in Paris, but he said nothing to me about his engagement. I must write to him.”

[Sidenote: KITCHENER AND MRS. BOTHA]

Another meeting which took place at one of our garden parties was with Mrs. Louis Botha. I was walking with the General when I saw her coming down the steps from the house. He and I went forward to meet her, and it was really touching to see the evident pleasure with which she responded to the warm greetings of her husband's former opponent. She, like her husband, knew the generous nature of the man.

Lord Kitchener certainly knew what he wanted even in little things, but even he could not always get it.

Just when he was appointed to the Mediterranean Command (which I am sure that he had no intention of taking up) he came down to see us one afternoon, and amused himself by sorting our Chinese from our j.a.panese china, the latter kind being in his eyes ”no good.” Tired of this, he suddenly said, ”Now, let us go into the garden and pick strawberries.”

”But,” said I, ”there are no strawberries growing out-of-doors in May.”

”Oh,” he exclaimed, ”I thought when we came to Osterley we _always_ picked strawberries.” Fortunately I had some hot-house ones ready at tea.

At King Edward's Durbar at Delhi Lord Kitchener's camp adjoined that of the Governor of Bombay, Lord Northcote, with whom we were staying. He arrived a day or two after we did, came over to see us, and took me back to inspect the arrangements of his camp, including the beautiful plate with which he had been presented. He was extremely happy, and most anxious to make me avow the superiority of his establishment to ours, which I would not admit. At last in triumph he showed me a fender-seat and said, ”Anyhow, Lady Northcote has not a fender-seat.” But I finally crushed him with, ”No, but we have a billiard-table!”

I must allow that there was a general suspicion that all would not go smoothly between two such master minds as his and the Viceroy's. Those are high politics with which I would not deal beyond saying that the impression of most people who know India is that the power ultimately given to the Commander-in-Chief was well as long as Lord Kitchener held it, but too much for a weaker successor in a day of world-upheaval.

The last time I saw him was in the July before the Great War, when he came down to tea, and talked cheerfully of all he was doing at Broome Park, and of the trees he intended to plant, and how I must come over from Lady Northcote's at Eastwell Park and see his improvements. He certainly then had no idea of what lay before him. In a last letter written from the War Office (I think in 1915, but it is only dated ”25th”) he speaks of trying to motor down some evening, but naturally never had time.

The final tragedy ended a great life, but he had done his work.

CHAPTER XVI

THE DIAMOND JUBILEE--INDIA--THE Pa.s.sING OF THE GREAT QUEEN

I realise that in the foregoing pages I have dwelt more on foreign lands than on our own country. This only means that they offered more novelty, not that England was less interesting to my husband and myself.

The great Lord Shaftesbury used to say that his was a generation which served G.o.d less and man more. I trust that only the latter half of this dictum has proved true, but certainly throughout Queen Victoria's reign men and women seemed increasingly awake to their duty to their fellows and particularly to children.

Without touching on well-known philanthropic movements, I should like to mention one, unostentatious but typical of many others--namely, the ”Children's Happy Evenings a.s.sociation,” founded by Miss Ada Heather-Bigg and inspired throughout its existence by the energy of her sister, Lady Bland-Sutton. This was the pioneer Society for organised play in the Board, now ”County,” Schools. It owed much to the work of many of my friends, and was specially fortunate in the personal interest of its patron, now Queen Mary. Though the exigencies of the new Education Act compelled it to cease its voluntary work after the Great War, during thirty years it brought happiness into the lives of thousands of poor children.

To return to our Osterley experiences.

We had one specially interesting Sunday in June 1895. Among others staying with us from Sat.u.r.day to Monday were Lord and Lady George Hamilton and Sir Stafford and Lady Northcote. Mr. Arthur Balfour came down on Sunday to dine and spend the night, and he and Lord George were busy with a game of lawn tennis on the garden front of the house. Several of us were in another part of the grounds under the cedars overlooking the Lake, enjoying the fine warm afternoon.

All at once a very hot and dusty figure appeared through the little gate near the portico and revealed itself as Schomberg--commonly called ”Pom”--McDonnell, then Lord Salisbury's Private Secretary. I went to meet him, offering tea, dinner, or whatever hospitality he preferred. All he would say in breathless and very serious tones was, ”Give me an egg beat up in brandy and find me Arthur Balfour.”

The desired refreshment and the statesman were produced in due course. It appeared on further inquiry that Mr. McDonnell had bicycled from Hatfield to London in search of Mr. Balfour, and not finding him in Carlton Gardens had pursued him to Osterley. Such were the exigencies of pre-motor days.

The interview over, the messenger retreated as swiftly as he had come.

We were not allowed to know the message till next morning when the papers came with the thrilling announcement, ”Resignation of the Government”! Mr.

Balfour said to me, ”I might quite well have told you, but Pom was so very determined that I should not.”

The only recipient of the secret was Lord George Hamilton.

When Mr. Balfour returned to the lawn-tennis ground he said very quietly to Lord George between the sets, ”The Government have resigned”; and then continued his game as if nothing had happened.

[Ill.u.s.tration: GROUP AT MIDDLETON PARK, CHRISTMAS, 1904

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