1869 HENRY AUSTIN BRUCE the Cabinet of 1880, and that his official life was closed, seemed to make no difference to him at all. He was ready ever afterwards to take any public work that came to him, and to do it with all his old earnestness and zeal. And when the testing time came in 1886, and so many took the opportunity of venting their spite for what they considered past want of appreciation or neglect, he went on his way as calmly and as faithfully as if he had never been a member of a Cabinet, or had any claim to high office; and this is all the more remarkable because the bill whose failure damaged his reputation, and probably led to his exclusion, would now, I suppose, be admitted by every one to have been a wise measure which would have placed the Licensing question on a sound. footing that would have lasted our time, at all events." CHAPTER X 1870 Our Thursday Dinners at Downing Street-Anecdote of Mr. Gladstone-Massacre of Englishmen by Greek Brigands-Death of General Grey - Instances of Mr. Gladstone's AbsorptionCockburn and Bethell-Death of Lord Clarendon : Mr. Hammond's Forecast-The Education Bill: Forster's Speech-Mr. Gladstone's Thoughts of Retirement-His Criticism of Veterans -Death of My Father: Mr. Gladstone's Letter-Holidays at Walmer: Lord Granville's Chef — Mr. Gladstone at the Play : His Dislike of Scriptural Allusions-Practical Jokes at Walmer -Mr. Gladstone and Tobacco-His Tricks of Gesture: the Dean of Windsor's Remonstrance Sir William Gull-Loss of The Captain Death of My Mother-Anecdote of Appleton, the Office-Keeper-Visits to Ranston-Whyte Melville and Bob Grimston. AFTER a few visits I returned early to my work in Downing Street, which became every day more absorbing; and when the session began we instituted Thursday dinners, to which Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone always came. John Bright, Panizzi, then Head of the British Museum, Lord and Lady Granville, Wolverton, Frederick Leveson-Gower, Sir Reginald Welby, Bobsy Meade, and others often dined with us, and Mr. Gladstone was always at his best, talking with an animation and fluency peculiar to him, on all that was going on in the House of Commons, and his old recollections. He once told us that in 1849 he was crossing the Campagna on his way to Rome, when the diligence in which he was trav 1870 DEATH OF GENERAL GREY elling came to a broad and shallow stream. The driver made all the passengers alight, saying the vehicle could not be taken across unless they got down, and having deposited his human freight, the horses were whipped. up and the diligence taken to the other side. Now it happened that although there was a full complement of passengers, Mr. Gladstone was the only man among them, the other travellers being the wives of French officers belonging to the Army of Occupation on their way to join their husbands. The task of taking them across the stream thus fell entirely on Mr. Gladstone, who, equal to the emergency, carried them to the other side one by one, an act courteously acknowledged by the husbands on the following day, who all called to thank him for the assistance rendered. Lord Charles Russell, who was then Sergeant-at-Arms, had given my wife a seat of her own in his gallery, and we constantly returned after dinner to the House and sat out the debates. In April, 1870, when staying at Latimer, I got a telegram telling me of the Greek massacre, by brigands, of poor Freddy Vyner, Lady Ripon's brother. The party had been taken by surprise, and it was arranged that one of them should return and procure the ransom. The lot had fallen on him, but he had generously waived it in favor of Lord Muncaster, who was a married man. The brigands had made it a condition that he was to return alone, but the Greek government sent soldiers with him, at sight of whom the brigands fled, first murdering Freddy Vyner and his companion, George Herbert. I received a sad letter from Mr. Gladstone deploring the disaster, and immediately returned to town. Soon after, to our great grief, died General Grey. During Lady Caroline Barrington's long absence at Court my wife had lived in his house before her marriage, and he had been not only an uncle, but the kindest friend to us both. When private secretary to Sir Charles Wood at the India Office, I had always found him most trusting and open in all matters, and they were many, in which I had been brought into contact with him. He had been to the Queen the frankest and ablest adviser, and had worked with a never-flagging energy in her service. Somebody at his deathbed said, "Killed by overwork." "No," said Dr. Gull, "that is very commonly thought and said, but for one man that dies from too much work ten will die from too little." Last year Mr. Gladstone had gone with Lord Granville and George Glyn to the Derby, and this year we were all to have gone again, and Lord Granville was to drive us to meet his horses somewhere on the route and ride to Epsom; but at the last moment Mr. Gladstone was detained, and I, of course, did not go. He showed his thought and consideration for me by writing me a letter imploring me to go without him, but I did not. obey him in this instance. One evening Mr. Gladstone was dining with us, and was very indignant at the proposal that the government should pay the costs of the Overend & Gurney trial; he rehearsed almost the words he should utter on the subject. I did not go back with him to the House, but was told his speech, later on in the evening, was one of the most brilliant he had ever delivered. It was on one of his hardest-worked days in Downing Street, during the discussion on Mr. Gladstone's Irish Land Bill in 1870, that he was anxious to see Lord Dufferin on the subject, but the day passed without his having the opportunity. I suggested that he should dine with us, and that I should get Dufferin to meet him; he readily agreed, and I warned my wife that we 1870 COCKBURN AND BETHELL should have a really agreeable dinner, and that she should recollect all she heard on what was the most interesting question of the moment. Mr. Gladstone was the first to arrive, and then Dufferin, who had just come from Dublin, told us of the horrid crossing he had had, and how everybody was sea-sick, and on this subject the conversation was continued throughout the whole of the dinner, while the Land Bill was never mentioned. As another instance of Mr. Gladstone's absorption in the topic of the moment, I may mention that he wrote to the solicitor to the Newcastle estates, of which he was trustee, appointing an hour for their meeting-fixing on eleven o'clock as his only spare hour. One of the trustees arrived a little before the time, and when the solicitor arrived they were discussing whether the myth of Helen of Troy could be connected in any way with the history of the Virgin Mary. The discussion was continued till twelve o'clock, when Mr. Gladstone had to go to another appointment, and the business of the Newcastle Trust had to be postponed. This reminds me of a story I heard of Sir Alexander Cockburn and Bethell. Sir Alexander had a bill on which it was necessary to obtain Bethell's opinion-he could never get it. At last Bethell asked him down to the country to discuss it; the evening passed and no allusion was made to the bill. On the following morning they went out shooting, and Bethell shot his keeper. In the evening Cockburn returned to town, never having alluded to his bill. When taken to task at an interview with Mr. Gladstone and the Attorney and Solicitor General, Cockburn stated that he had never had an opportunity of discussing the subject with the Attorney-General. "My dear Cockburn," said Bethell, in his softest voice, "do you not recollect our thorough discussion of |