1883 ROYALTIES ON BOARD He said: "Oh, a regular; let me introduce you to him; he is a nephew of the King." I asked him to come and see the Pembroke Castle, but he said his military studies and duties gave him no time; he had to serve three years as a private. We were all invited to dine at the Palace on the following day; but happily it was decided that only six should go, so Arthur Lyttelton, Herbert Gladstone, and Miss C. Gladstone, Miss Tennant, and I, after having seen Copenhagen all the morning, dined with Gosling and his pretty daughters at Tivoli, where we had an excellent dinner, charming music, and then went to his apartments to hear music again till near twelve o'clock, when we joined the party from the Palace at the quay and re-embarked with them. Sir Donald Currie gave us a pleasant account of the dinner at the Palace, where he was charmed at the cleverness and simplicity of the royal family-the dinner, the wine, etc. We heard that the whole party was coming to luncheon on board on the following day. Next morning we all went ashore again and bought crockery, flowers, etc., and got back by one o'clock to see the royalties come aboard, which was a lovely sight; they came in great state barges from the Russian and Danish yachts which were in the harbor-forty-one in all. The party included the Czar and Czarina and Czarowitz of Russia, and, I think, a younger brother; the Czar, a magnificent man in uniform, the Czarowitz, a thorough Tartar-looking face, but a jolly boy; the King and Queen of Denmark-she must have been very prettythe Crown Prince and Princess and their son; the King and Queen of Greece and their children; the Princess of Wales and Prince Eddie and his sisters; Princess Mary of Hanover, Prince John of Glücksburg, etc. Never was there such an assembly of royalties on a ship before. They had not been on board three minutes when the Czar had disappeared, having, as I afterwards ascertained, got hold of the engineer and gone to examine every part of the ship and her machinery. Andrew Cockerell and Miss Knollys were in waiting on the Princess of Wales, and reproached me for not having gone to dinner at the Palace last night. All the foreign Ministers in Copenhagen were there also. I had been busy with Mrs. Vivian, at Sir Donald Currie's request, in trying to arrange where all the royalties should sit at luncheon, but I avoided going down myself. The Czar said he would rather be King of Denmark with its peasant proprietors than Czar of All the Russias; he was an object of immense interest to me as being so personally great the other royalties were surrounded by constitutions, ministries, public opinion, etc., but he could go to war to-morrow if he liked of his own motion. At lunchcon Mr. Gladstone in a few words proposed the health of the King and Queen of Denmark, the King thanking him in English; he then proposed the health of the Czar and Czarina, the Emperor returning thanks in French. I kept in the background, but the Princess of Wales spoke to me and introduced me to the King of Greece. After luncheon it was proposed that Tennyson should read something, and on his saying that "one man could lead a horse to the water, but ten could not make him drink," the Princess of Wales said, "Oh, but I can," and led him up to the little smoking-room, where, surrounded by all these crowned heads, with his great wideawake on his head, he read the "Grandmother." As soon as the royalties had disembarked we got under way and left the harbor amid the cheers and salutes of the Russian and Danish men-of-war, the sailors manning the yards. We took some time warping our ship out, and only caught sight of the Danish yacht steaming into 1883 HOMEWARD VOYAGE Elsinore as we passed by in the gloaming.. The weather and glass were somewhat threatening, but we got through the windy zone and steamed under a glorious moon across the North Sea, arriving in the Thames on the evening of the 19th-after sighting the low-lying lands of Yarmouth, and the fishing fleet off the Dogger Bank-and ran up till about eight or nine o'clock, when we anchored, meaning to get to Gravesend early on the next morning, but a heavy fog kept us still until ten o'clock, when we ventured up, passing some emigrant ships, the occupants of which cheered us, off Gravesend and Tilbury Fort, where we landed and had a great reception. On reaching Downing Street I went to try to get Lord Granville to come with Mr. Gladstone to Wanborough; but he was away, so our party fell through and I went alone, to find Lady Grey there. Our cruise had in every way been a marvel of success. It had done Mr. Gladstone and all of us great good as far as health was concerned, and our visit to Copenhagen was full of interest. I felt very grateful to everybody, and everybody felt very grateful to Miss Tennant, who had really been the life and soul of the whole party. To describe her to those who never came under her charm would be far beyond my power, while those who knew and loved her would never consider any description of her as adequate. She was a woman of the greatest genius I had ever come across possessing a marvellous vitality and a heart full of the real enthusiasm of humanity, and large enough to hold the entire world. She was not of very striking beauty, but had a soft, appealing, and almost pathetic look of sympathy with those she talked to. Those who have read her unpublished stories can alone speak of their charm and pathos. When shortly after our cruise she said she was coming to Wanborough, I deeply regretted having praised her and spoken of her in a way which in another's eyes could not but be extravagant. My wife was not a woman given to sudden and violent friendships, but Miss Laura came and conquered her, as she had conquered all she ever met, and my praises became only a faint echo of what my wife thought of her. Soon after my return we had a pleasant visit from Lord Granville and Mrs. Stephenson, the latter for a good long time. In October we went to Walmer, which was, as usual, pleasant; the Russian and Danish Ministers were there, and one night Sir Evelyn Wood came, on his way back to Egypt. He talked a great deal, and was full of praise of the Egyptian soldiers and contempt for their officers, who, he said, were the first to run at Tel-el-Kebir. CHAPTER XVIII 1884 Mr. Gladstone on Free-trade and Protection - Anecdotes of Lord Lytton-General Gordon's Mission to the Soudan-Meeting at the War Office-Gordon's Demand for Zebehr-Lord Acton's Library-Panizzi's Last Days-Conversations with Mr. Morley and Lord Acton-Mr. Gladstone's Portrait at Somerset House -Funeral of the Duke of Albany-Lord Lyons and George Sheffield - Conversations with Lord Granville - Cabinets and Gossip-Earthquake in London-Lord Granville at Wanborough -Mr. Gladstone on Seceders-Letters from Sir Erskine May and Sir John Lambert-Anecdote of Bishop Percy and Mr. Justice Maule-Mr. Gladstone on Lord Randolph Churchill-Liberals Improved as Speakers by Secession-Mr. Gladstone's HeightDynamite Explosions in London - Mr. Browning's Story of Ruskin Mr. Gladstone's View of Froude's Carlyle - Tenniel on the Punch Cartoons - Charles Clifford's Recollections of Rogers and the Grevilles Hallam Tennyson's Wedding-A Thursday Breakfast with Mr. Gladstone-The Lords and the Franchise-Death of Lady Halifax-Welby's Suggested Inscription for Mr. Gladstone's Bust-Miss Tennant and her Sister visit Wanborough-Lord Northbrook's Mission to Egypt-His Quixotic Loyalty - Mr. Gladstone and Abraham HaywardDeath of Lord Ampthill. ON January 2d, Mr. Gladstone, Frederick LevesonGower, Eddie Hamilton, Henry Keppel, and Lord Morton dined with us. Mr. Gower told us when free-trade was carried, Lord George Bentinck bet him £20 protection would be re-enacted within two years. Mr. Gladstone said that was not so absurd a bet at the time |