Part 6 (1/2)

In this kind of hospitality there was no great expense Peoplewhen they were alone, and their way of living when they had coreeable soht down a basket of fish or a barrel of oysters from London; and, if one had no deer of one's own, the arrival of a haunch froathering of local gastronomers And in matters other than meals life went on verywith you or whether you were alone The guests drove and rode, and walked and shot, according to their tastes and the season of the year They were carried off, hbourhood--ruined castles, restored cathedrals, faht be a picnic or a croquet-party; in winter a lawn-meet or a ball But all these entertainments were of the most homely and inexpensive character There was very little outlay, no fuss, and no display

But now an entirely different spirit prevails People see quietly and happily in their country hoe Warrington, hen Pen gushed about the country with its ”long, cals,” brutally replied, ”Devilish long, and a great deal too calm

I've tried 'em” People of that type desert the country sientleman who stood for Matthew Arnold in _The New Republic_, and who, after talking about ”liberal air,” ”sedged brooks,” and ”rass,” admitted that it would be a dreadful bore to have no other society than the Clergyman of the parish, and no other topics of conversation than Justification by Faith and the measles They do not care for the country in itself; they have no eye for its beauty, no sense of its atmosphere, no memory for its traditions It is onlyand boisterous house-parties; and when, from one cause or another, these resources fail, they are frankly bored, and long for London They are no longer content, as our fathers were, to entertain their friends with hospitable siarized by the worshi+p of the Golden Calf that, unless people can vie with alien millionaires in the suhtful phrase,--they prefer not to entertain at all An emulous ostentation has killed hospitality All this is treason to a high ideal

Whatever tends to make the Home beautiful, attractive, romantic--to associate it with the ideas of pure pleasure and high duty--to connect it not only with all that was happiest, but also with all that was best, in early years--whatever fulfils these purposes purifies the fountain of national life A home, to be perfectly a hon of the dead” It should animate those ell in it to virtue and beneficence, by re them of what others did, ent before thes Thank God, such a home was mine

FOOTNOTES:

[19] Henry Scott Holland

[20] Anna Maria, duchess of Bedford, died in 1857

VII

LONDON

”O'er royal London, in luxuriant May, While la crept the day

Hoamester steals; Home from the ball flash jaded Beauty's wheels; From fields suburban rolls the early cart; As rests the Revel, so awakes the Mart”

_The New Ti, in the last chapter, ruous reenial current of , I know not what, reminded me of the occasion when Mrs Bardell and her friends made their memorable expedition to the ”Spaniards Tea-Gardens” at Hahed Mrs Rogers; ”I almost wish I lived in it always” To this Mr Raddle, full of syot nobody to care for the, the country is all very well The country for a wounded spirit, they say” But the general verdict of the coreat deal too lively and sought-after, to be content with the country”; and, on second thoughts, the lady herself acquiesced I feel thatin coers ”My spirit” (and my body too) had been ”wounded” by Oxford, and the country acted as both a poultice and a tonic But , and could not be pere in the vast wilderness”

of Woburn Park, or dwell for ever in the ”boundless contiguity of shade”

which obliterates the line between Beds and Bucks

I was very careful to observe the doctor's prescription of total idleness, but I found it was quite as easily obeyed in London as in the country For three or four months then, of every year, I forsook the Home which just now I praised so lavishly, and applied myself, circumspectly indeed but with keen enjoyment, to the pleasures of the town

”_One look back_”--What was London like in those distant days, which lie, say, between 1876 and 1886?

Structurally and visibly, it was a ravian stucco; the ”Baker Streets and Harley Streets and Wie family of plain children, with Portland Place and Portman Square for their respectable parents,”[21] were still unbroken by the red brick and terra-cotta, white stone and green tiles, of our e The flower-beds in the Parks were less brilliant, for that ”Grand old gardener,” Mr Harcourt, to e are so much indebted, was still at Eton Piccadilly had not been widened The Arches at Hyde Park Corner had not been re-arranged Glorious Whitehall was half occupied by shabby shops; and labyrinths of slusway and Shaftesbury Avenue

But, though London is now a much prettier place than it was then, I doubt if it is as socially ed Queen Victoria invested her occasional visits to her Capital with a glamour which it is difficult to explain to those who never felt it Of beauty, stature, splendour, and other fancied attributes of Queenshi+p, there was none; but there was a dignity which can neither be described nor imitated; and, when her subjects knelt to kiss her hand at Drawing Room, or Levee, or Investiture, they felt a kind of sacred ahich no other presence could inspire

It was, of course, one of the elements of Queen Victoria's mysterious power, that she was so seldom seen in London In the early days of her hood she had resigned the command of Society into other hands; and social London, at the time of which I write, was dominated by the Prince of Wales Just at this enuinelyEdward VII, it would scarcely become me to describe his influence on Society when first I moved in it

So I borrow the words of an anonymous writer, who, at the tienerally admitted to know the subjects of which he discoursed

”The Social Ruler of the English realm is the Prince of Wales I call hi to society and to ceren The Englishin a state of commission Most of its official duties are performed by the Queen It is the Prince of Wales who transacts its ceremonial business, and exhibits to the masses the embodiment of the h House, there would be no Court in London