Fifty-One Years of Victorian Life Part 2

[Sidenote: THE GROSVENOR FAMILY]

One more Grosvenor aunt must be remembered, my mother's youngest sister Theodora. I have heard that my grandmother was greatly distressed at the loss of her fourth daughter, Evelyn, who died as a child, although there were seven surviving sisters, therefore when another girl-baby arrived she called her Theodora--the gift of G.o.d. Certainly she was greatly attached to the child, and I fancy that the little Theodora was given much more spoiling and freedom than her elder sisters. She was very lively and amusing, and being the only daughter left unmarried when my grandfather died--in 1869--she became her mother's constant companion. When she ultimately married a brother of Lord Wimborne's she and Mr. Merthyr Guest continued to live with my grandmother, who endowed them with a large fortune. Mr. Guest died some years ago, but Aunt Theodora still lives--and has one daughter.

My grandfather was a quiet old gentleman as far as I recollect him--he is somehow a.s.sociated in my mind with carpet slippers and a diffident manner. He was what they call of a "saving" disposition, but I really believe that he was oppressed with his great wealth, and never sure that he was justified in spending much on himself and his family. When he became a thorough invalid before his death he was ordered to take certain pills, and in order to induce him to do so my grandmother would cut them in two and take half herself. After his death his halves were discovered intact done up with red tape!

During his lifetime I stayed with my parents once or twice at the old Eaton Hall, before my uncle (the first Duke) built the present Palace. It was a nice, comfortable house. I have heard, from a neighbour who recollected the incident, that when it was being built the workmen employed would chisel rough representations of each other's features in the gargoyles which formed part of the decoration. I suppose that was done in ancient times by the men who built the churches and colleges of those days.

My grandparents besides these numerous daughters had four sons--two, both named Gilbert, died, one as a baby, the other, a sailor, as a young man.

The late Duke was my G.o.dfather and always very kind to me, particularly when, after my marriage, I stayed on more than one occasion at the new Eaton. I never knew a man more anxious to do all he could for the people about him, whether in the country or on his London property. He had very much the feeling of a patriarch and loved nothing better than to have about him the generations of his family. It was a complicated family, as he married first his own first cousin, Constance Leveson-Gower, and after her death the sister of his son-in-law Lord Chesham, husband of his second daughter Beatrice. I cannot quite unravel it, but somehow he was brother-in-law to his own daughter. The youngest son, Richard, a quaint, amusing man, was created Lord Stalbridge.

Having said so much of my mother's family, I think I should mention the two sisters of my father whom I have hitherto omitted. One was his second sister, Emma--a typical and excellent maiden aunt. She was princ.i.p.ally noted for being my sister Agnes's G.o.dmother and feeling it her duty to hear her Catechism--but neither Agnes nor any of us minded; in fact I remember--I suppose on some wet Sunday--that we all insisted on sharing the Scripture lesson and were given figs in consequence. The third sister was Caroline, twin with Augusta, but very different, for whereas Aunt Gussie was delicate and nervous, not to say irritable, Aunt Car was slow and substantial. She ended with marrying when no longer very young an old cousin of my father's, a clergyman, Lord Saye and Sele, who had actually baptized her early in life. She made him an excellent wife; she had numerous step-children, though none of her own. Looking back on these Early Victorian uncles and aunts with their various wives and husbands, I cannot but claim that they were good English men and women, with a keen sense of duty to their tenants and neighbours rich and poor. Of course they varied immensely in character and had their faults like other people, but I cannot recall one, either man or woman, who did not try to act up to a standard of right, and think I was fortunate to have been brought up among them.

[Sidenote: UNCLES AND AUNTS]

In my younger days I had also living several great-uncles and aunts on both sides, but the only one whom I can spare time and s.p.a.ce to mention here is my Grandfather Leigh's sister, Caroline Lady East. When she was young Mr. East fell in love with her and she with him, but he was an impecunious youth and my great-grandparents would not permit the marriage.

Whereupon he disguised himself as a hay-maker and contrived an interview with his lady-love in which they exchanged vows of fidelity. Then he went to India, where he remained eleven years, and returned to find the lady still faithful, and having acc.u.mulated a sufficient fortune married her.

They had a nice little country house on the borders of Oxfords.h.i.+re and Gloucesters.h.i.+re, and, though they had no children, were one of the happiest old couples I ever knew. My great-aunt died in 1870, but Uncle East lived till over ninety and went out hunting almost to the end--so eleven years of India had not done him much harm. He stayed with us at Middleton after my marriage when old Lord Abingdon was also a guest. Lord Abingdon must have been over seventy at the time, but a good deal younger than Sir James. They had known each other in youth and were quite delighted to meet again, but each confided separately to my husband and myself that he had thought that the other old fellow was dead. However, they made great friends, and in token of reunion Lord Abingdon sent his servant to cut Uncle East's corns!

To return to my recollections of my own girlhood. I think that it must have been in 1864 that I had a bad attack of chicken-pox which temporarily hurt my eyes and left me somewhat weak. Either in that autumn or the following one my parents took me to the Isle of Arran and left me there for a time with a maid--while they accompanied my brother Gilbert back to school. I loved the Isle of Arran, and was only disturbed by the devotion of a child-niece of the landlady's who would follow me about everywhere.

The only way of escape was to go--or attempt to go--into the mountains of which she was afraid, knowing that there were giants there.

I must not omit one honour which I enjoyed in 1865. My mother took me to see my Aunt Macclesfield, who was in Waiting at Marlborough House when His present Majesty was born. My aunt welcomed us in the Princess of Wales's pretty sitting-room hung with a kind of brocade with a pattern of roses.

The baby was then brought in to be admired, and to my gratification I was allowed to hold the little Prince in my arms. I did not then realise that in after years I could claim to have nursed my King.

Shortly afterwards we used to hear a good deal of the American Civil War.

We were too young to have much opinion as to the rival causes, but there was a general impression conveyed to our minds that the "Southerners were gentlemen." Some time after the war was over, in December 1868, Jefferson Davis, the Southern (Confederate) President, came to stay at Stoneleigh.

He was over in Europe on parole. We were told that he had been in prison, and one of my younger brothers was anxious to know whether we "should see the marks of the chains." We had a favourite old housemaid who was preparing his room, and we imparted to her the thrilling information of his former imprisonment. Her only response was "Umph, well, I suppose he won't want these silver candlesticks." A large bedroom was being prepared for him, but she considered that silver candlesticks were only for ladies, and that presidents and prisoners were not ent.i.tled to such luxuries.

He proved to be a benevolent old gentleman who impressed my cousins and myself by the paternal way in which he addressed any elder girl as "daughter."

After this--but I cannot remember the particular years--we went in the autumn to Land's End, The Lizard, and Tintagel, and also had villas at Torquay and Bournemouth respectively, but our experiences were too ordinary to be worthy of record. I think I was about seventeen when I went with my parents to Vichy, where my father drank the waters--and we went on to some beautiful Auvergne country. This was my last excursion abroad with my parents before I married.

[Sidenote: CONFIRMATION]

In 1867 I was confirmed. The church which we attended was in Park Street.

It has since been pulled down, but was then regarded as specially the church of the Westminster family. My grandparents sat in a large pew occupying the length of the gallery at the west end of the church. We had a pew in the south gallery with very high sides, and my early recollections are of sitting on a dusty red ha.s.sock from which I could see little but the woodwork during a very long sermon. One Sunday when I was approaching years of discretion the clergyman gave out notice of a Confirmation, with the usual intimation that Candidates should give in their names in the Vestry. My mother told me to do this accompanied by my younger brother (Gilbert) as chaperon. The clergyman seemed a good deal surprised, and I rather fancy that I was the only Candidate. He was an old man who had been there for a long time. He said that he would come and see me at my parents' house, and duly arrived at 37 Portman Square. I was sent in to my father's sitting-room for the interview, and I believe that he was more embarra.s.sed than I was, for I had long been led to regard Confirmation as the proper sequence to learning my Catechism and a fitting step in religious life. The clergyman somewhat uneasily remarked that he had to ascertain that I knew my Catechism, and asked me to say it. This I could have done in my sleep, as it had for years formed part of my Sunday instruction. When I ended he asked after a slight pause whether I knew why the Nicene Creed was so called. This was unexpected pleasure. I had lately read Milman's _Latin Christianity_ to my mother, and should have enjoyed nothing better than delivering to my pastor a short lecture on the Arian and Athanasian doctrines. When I began it, however, he hastily cut me short, saying that he saw that I knew all about it--how old was I?

"Seventeen and a half." "Quite old enough," said he, and told me that he would send me my ticket, and when I went to the church someone would show me where to sit. This ended my preparation as far as he was concerned. I believe he intimated to my parents that he would see Miss Leigh again, but in practice he took care to keep clear of the theological _enfant terrible_.

I was duly confirmed on May 31st, by Dr. Jackson, Bishop of London. I feel sure that my mother amply supplied any lacunae left by the poor old clergyman. No doubt in those days Preparation for Confirmation was not regarded as seriously as at present, but I do not think that mine was quite typical, as some of my contemporary cousins underwent a much more serious course of instruction.

[Sidenote: "COMING OUT"]

That autumn I began to "come out" in the country. We went to a perfectly delightful ball at the Shaw-Stewarts' at Ardgowan, where the late Duke of Argyll--then Lord Lorne--excited my admiration by the way he danced reels in Highland costume. Thence my brother and I went to Hans Hall to the coming-of-age of my cousin Charles Adderley, now Lord Norton. The whole country-side swarmed to the festivities, and one party unable to obtain any other conveyance chartered a hea.r.s.e. Miss Ferrier, in her novel _The Inheritance_, makes one of her female characters arrive at a country house, where she was determined to be received, in a hea.r.s.e--but she was even more gruesome than my cousin's guests as she accompanied the corpse!

The following year (1868), May 12th, I was presented--Princess Christian held the Drawing-Room on behalf of the Queen, who still lived in retirement as far as social functions were concerned. She, however, attended this Drawing-Room for about half an hour--receiving the entree.

Her devotion to the Prince Consort and to his memory was unparalleled. No doubt the fact that she had practically never had anyone with whom she could a.s.sociate on equal terms until her marriage had a good deal to do with it. I know of a lady whom she summoned to sit with her when the Prince Consort was being carried to his funeral on the ground that she was a widow and could feel for her, and she said that her shudders when the guns went off were dreadful, and that she seemed unable to realise that here for the first time was something that she could not control.

To return to my entry in the world. Naturally I went during 1868 and the three or four succeeding years to the b.a.l.l.s, dinners, and garden parties usual in the course of the season. The "great houses" then existed--they had not been pulled down or turned into public galleries and offices.

Stafford House, Grosvenor House, Northumberland House, and others entertained in royal style, and there were Garden Parties at Argyll Lodge and Airlie Lodge on Campden Hill, at Syon, and at Chiswick, then in possession of the Duke of Devons.h.i.+re.

In those days there was still a sort of question as to the propriety of waltzing. Valses and square dances were danced alternately at b.a.l.l.s, and a few--but very few--girls were limited to the latter. Chaperones were the almost invariable rule and we went back to them between the dances.

"Sitting-out" did not come in till some years later. In the country, however, there was plenty of freedom, and I never remember any restriction on parties of girls and young men walking or rowing together without their elders. By the time I came out my brother Gilbert (Gilly) was at Harrow and Dudley and Rupert at Mr. Lee's Private School at Brighton. My special charge and pet Rowland was still at home, and the youngest of the family Cordelia a baby.

Dudley and Rupy were inseparable. Duddy delicate, Rupy st.u.r.dy and full of mischief into which he was apt to drag his elder brother. I had to look after them, and see that they accomplished a few lessons in the holidays--no light task, but I was ready for anything to keep off holiday tutors and, I am afraid, to retain my position as elder sister. Love of being first was doubtless my besetting sin, and my good-natured younger brothers and sisters accepted my rule--probably also because it was easier than that of a real grown-up person. My mother had bad health, and my father took it for granted that it was my business to keep the young ones as far as possible out of mischief. As for my sister Agnes, she was always a saint, and I am afraid that I was a tyrant as far as she was concerned.

Cordelia was born when I was over sixteen and was always rather like my child. Rowland was just seven when her arrival delighted the family, and his first remark when he heard that he had a little sister was "I wonder what she will think of my knickerbockers"--to which he had lately been promoted. Boys wore little tunics with belts when they first left off baby frocks, and sailor suits were not introduced when my brothers were children.

[Sidenote: IRELAND]

My next special recollection is of a visit to Ireland which I paid in company with my parents, Gilbert, and Agnes in August 1869. We crossed in the _Leinster_ and duly lionised Dublin. I kept a journal during this tour in which the sights of the city are duly noted with the remark, after seeing the post office, that we "made the various observations proper to intelligent but tired travellers."

The country--Bray, Glendalough, and the Seven Churches seem to have pleased us much better. I do not know whether the guides and country people generally are as free with their legends now as they were fifty years ago, but they told us any amount of stories to our great satisfaction. Brough, the guide at the Seven Churches, was particularly voluble and added considerably to the tales of St. Kevin given in the guide-book. St. Kevin, as recounted by Moore in his ballad, pushed Kathleen into the Lake when she would follow him. I remember that Brough was much embarra.s.sed when I innocently asked _why_ he did this. However, he discreetly replied: "If your honourable father and your honourable mother want you to marry a gentleman and you don't like him, don't push him into the water!" Excellent advice and not difficult to follow in a general way. When St. Kevin was alive the skylark used to sing early in the morning and waken the people who had been up late the night before at a wedding or merrymaking. When the Saint saw them looking so bad he asked, "What's the matter?" On hearing that the lark would not let them get any sleep, he laid a spell that never more should lark sing above that lake. This encouragement of late hours seems rather inconsistent with his general asceticism. St. Kevin was more considerate to a blackbird than to the laverock. The former once laid her eggs on his extended hand, and he kept it held out until she had had time to build her nest in it and hatch her young.

Brough was even better acquainted with fairies than with saints. He knew a man at Cork named Jack M'Ginn, a wool-comber, who was carried away by the fairies for seven years. At the end of that time he accompanied them to a wedding (fairies like weddings). There was present a young lady whom the fairies wanted to make sneeze three times, as if they could do so and no one said "G.o.d bless her" they could take her away. So they tickled her nose three times with horse-hair, but as they were withdrawing it the third time Jack cried out in Irish "G.o.d bless her." This broke the spell, and Jack fell cras.h.i.+ng down amongst the crockery, everyone ran away, and he arose retransformed to his natural shape.

Another acquaintance of Brough's--a stout farmer--met one evening three fairies carrying a coffin. Said one, "What shall we do for a fourth man?"

"Switch the first man who pa.s.ses," replied the second. So they caught the farmer and made him carry it all night, till he found himself in the morning nearly dead not far from his own door. Our guide enjoined us to be sure, if fairies pa.s.sed us in the air, to pick some blades of gra.s.s and throw them after them, saying "Good luck to you good folk": as he sagely remarked, a civil word never does harm. As more prosaic recollections, Brough told us of the grand fights at Glendalough, when the young men were backed up by their sisters and sweethearts. The etiquette was for a young woman to take off her right stocking, put a stone in it and use it as a weapon, "and any woman who fought well would have twenty young farmers wanting to marry her."

[Sidenote: KILLARNEY]

We stopped at Cork, whence we drove to see Blarney Castle and its stones.

In those days, and probably still, there were two, one called the Ladies'

Stone, which we three children all kissed, and another suspended by iron clamps from the top of the Castle, so that one had to lie down and hold on to the irons with one's body partly over an open s.p.a.ce--rather a break-neck proceeding, particularly in rising again. Only Gilly accomplished this. The railway to Glengariff then went as far as Dunmanway, whence it was necessary to drive. We slept at the Royal Hotel where we arrived in the evening, and to the end of my life I never shall forget the beauty of Bantry Bay as we saw it on waking next morning with all its islands mirrored in purple shadows. But the whole drive to Killarney, and above all the Lakes as they break upon your sight, are beyond description. We saw it all in absolutely glorious weather--possibly rare in those regions, but certainly the Lakes of Killarney impressed me then as more beautiful than either the Scottish or the English Lakes because of their marvellous richness of colour. After fifty years, and travels in many lands, I still imagine that they are only excelled in _colour_ by the coral islands of the Pacific; but of course the Irish Lakes may dwell in my memory as more beautiful than they really are, as I saw them first when I had far fewer standards of comparison. Anyhow, they were like a glorious dream. We spent some enchanting days at Killarney and saw all the surrounding beauties--the Gap of Dunloe with the Serpent Lake in which St. Patrick drowned the last snake in Ireland (in a chest into which he enticed the foolish creature by promising to let it out again), Mangerton, the highest mountain in Ireland but one, and Carrantuohill, the highest of all, which my brother and sister and I were allowed to ascend on condition that the guide would take good care of us. However, when out of our parents' sight he found that he was troubled with a corn, and lay down to rest, confiding us to a ponyman who very nearly lost us in a fog.

The ponies could only approach the base, the rest was pretty stiff climbing.

[Sidenote: THE O'DONOGHUES]

The Upper, the Middle, and the Lower Lake are all lovely, but the last was particularly attractive from its connection with the local hero--the Great O'Donoghue, whose story we gleaned from our guides and particularly a boy who carried our luncheon basket up Mangerton. He was a magician and had the power of taking any shape he pleased, but he ended by a tremendous leap into the Lake, after which he never returned to his home. Once every seven years, however, between six and seven on May Day morning, he rides from one of the islands in the Lower Lake to the opposite sh.o.r.e, with fairies strewing flowers before him, and for the time his Castle also reappears. Any unmarried man who sees him will marry a rich wife, and any unmarried woman a rich husband. Our boatman pointed out an island where girls used to stand to see him pa.s.s, but no one ever saw him except an old boatman, and he had been married a long time, so the apparition did not help him. No O'Donoghue has ever been drowned since the hero's disappearance. We heard two different versions of the cause of the tragedy. Both attributed it to his wife's want of self-control. One related that the husband was in the habit of running about as a hare or a rabbit, and as long as she did not laugh all went well, but when he took this flying leap into the water she burst into a fit of laughter and thereby lost him permanently. Our boy guide's story was more circ.u.mstantial and more dramatic. According to him, the O'Donoghue once turned himself into an eel, and knotted himself three times round Ross Castle, where he lived (a super-eel or diminutive castle!). This frightened the lady dreadfully, and he told her that if she "fritted"

three times on seeing any of his wonders she would see him no more. Some time after he turned himself into a goose and swam on the lake, and she shrieked aloud, thinking to lose him. Finally he brought out his white horse and told her that this was her last chance of restraining her fears.

She promised courage and kept quiet while he rode straight up the Castle wall, but when he turned to come down she fainted, whereupon, horse and all, he leapt into the water. The boy also declared that in the previous year he was seen by two boatmen, a lady and a gentleman, another man, and some "company," whereupon the lady fainted--recalling the lady of O'Donoghue, it was the least she could do. In the lower Lake may still be seen rocks representing the chieftain's pigeons, his spy-gla.s.s, his books containing the "Ould Irish," and his mice (only to be seen on Sundays after prayers). In the Bitter Lake, which was pointed out to us from a distance, is the fairy-island where he dances with the fairies.

[Sidenote: MYTHS AND LEGENDS]

The O'Donoghue in his lifetime had his frivolous moments. He once changed a number of fern fronds into little pigs, which he took to the fair at Killarney and sold to the jobbers. They looked just like other pigs until the purchasers reached some running water. As we all know, running water dissolves any spell, and the pigs all turned back into little blades of fern. As testimony to the authenticity of this tale the water was duly shown to us. The O'Donoghue, however, knew that the jobbers would not remain placid under the trick, so he went home and told his maid to say, if anyone asked for him, that he had gone to bed and to sleep and could only be wakened by pulling his legs. The jobbers arrived, received the message, went in and pulled his legs, which immediately came off! Off they ran in alarm, thinking that they had killed the man, but the good O'Donoghue was only having his fun with them, so called them back and returned their money. We picked up a good deal of fairy-lore during our sojourn in the south of Ireland, and I record it as it may have pa.s.sed away during the past half-century. The driver who took us to the Gap of Dunloe told me that in his mother's time a woman working in the fields put down her baby. While she was out of the way the steward saw the fairies change it for a fairy-baby who would have been a plague to her all her life. So as the child was crying and shrieking he stood over it and declared that he would shoot the mother or anyone else who should come near it, and as no one came to comfort it the fairies could not leave their baby to cry like that, so they brought back the stolen child and took away their own. That steward was such a man of resource that one cannot help wis.h.i.+ng that he were alive to deal with the Sinn Feiners of the present day. Another piece of good advice which we received was, if we saw a fairy (known by his red jacket) in a field to keep an eye fixed on him till we came up with him--then to take away his purse, and each time we opened it we should find a s.h.i.+lling. I regret to say that I never had the opportunity, but the guide, remarking my father's tendency to give whenever asked, observed that he thought his lords.h.i.+p had found a fairy purse. It is a commonplace to notice the similarity of folk-lore in many lands pointing to a common origin, but it is rather curious to compare the tale of the O'Donoghue with that of the Physicians of Myddfai in South Wales. Only in that the husband, not the wife, caused the final tragedy.

The fairy-wife, rising from the Lake, warns her mortal husband that she will disappear for ever if he strikes her three times. Long years they live in happiness, but thrice does he give her a slight blow to arouse her from unconventional behaviour at a christening, a wedding, and a funeral respectively. Thereupon she wends her way to the Lake and like a white cloud sinks into its waters. She leaves her sons a legacy of wisdom and healing skill, and from time to time a shadowy form and clear voice come to teach them still deeper knowledge.

From the south of Ireland we went to the north, but I regret to say were not nearly so fascinated by the loyal Ulsterman as by the forthcoming sons of the south. Nevertheless we enjoyed the wild scenery of Lough Sw.i.l.l.y and the legends connected with Dunluce Castle and the Giant's Causeway. Among the tales of Dunluce was that of a banshee whose duty it is (or was) to keep clean one of the rooms in the ruin. The old man who showed us over declared that she did not always properly fulfil her task. She is supposed to be the spirit of a cook who fell over the rocks into the water and reappears as a tall woman with red hair. The place of cook must have been a rather trying one in ancient days, for the kitchen pointed out to us was on the edge of a precipice and we were told that once when a good dinner was prepared the attendants let it all fall into the sea! It was not, however, explained whether this was the occasion on which the like fate befell the cook. Possibly she died in a frantic effort to rescue it.

[Sidenote: THE GIANT BENADADDA]

The Giant's Causeway was very interesting. We first entered Portcorn Cave, which has fine colours and a great deal of froth said to have been caused by the giant's washerwoman was.h.i.+ng a few collars there. The giant in question was called Fin MacCoul, and at the same time there lived another Giant in Scotland called Benadadda. Wis.h.i.+ng to pa.s.s backwards and forwards, the two agreed that Fin should pave a way of columns and Benadadda should work it. Hence Fingal's Cave--_gal_ or _gael_ meaning "the stranger"--presumably the name was given in compliment to the future guest. But the two champions found the work harder than they had expected, and Benadadda sent to tell Fin that if he did not make haste he must come over and give him a beating. Fin returned that he was not to put himself out, but to come if he pleased. Soon after Fin rushed in crying out to his wife, "Goodness gracious! he's coming. I can't face that fellow!" And he tumbled into bed.

Soon Benadadda walked in. "Good day, ma'am. Ye're Mrs. McCoul?"

"Yes, sir; I percave you are Benadadda?"

"I am ma'am. Is Fin at home?"

"He's just gone into the garden for a few vegetables, but he'll be back directly. Won't ye take a cheer?"