Lydia Maria Gurney - "Things Mother Used To Make"

W. C. Green - "The Book of Good Manners"

Jack London - "The Red One"

George Gissing - "Thyrza"

The Days Before Yesterday

L >> Lord Frederic Hamilton >> The Days Before Yesterday




The Commissioner's old Khansama had very strict ideas as to how a
"Sahib's" dinner should be served. He insisted on decorating the
table with rhododendron flowers, and placing on it every night
four dishes of Moradabad metal work containing respectively six
figs, six French plums, six dates, and six biscuits, all reposing
on the orthodox lace-paper mats, and the moment dinner was over he
carefully replaced these in pickle-jars for use next evening. We
would have broken his heart had we spoiled the symmetry of his
dishes by eating any of these. It takes a little practice to
master bills of fare written in "Kitmutar English," and for
"Irishishtew" and "Anchoto" to be resolved into Irish-stew and
Anchovy-toast. Once when a Viceroy was on tour there was a roast
gosling for dinner. This duly appeared on the bill-of-fare as
"Roasted goose's pup." In justice, however, we must own that we
would make far greater blunders in trying to write a menu in Urdu.

The Kumaon district is beautiful, not unlike an enlarged Scotland,
with deep ravines scooped out by clear, rushing rivers, their
precipitous sides clothed with dense growths of deodaras. In the
early morning the view of the long range of the snowy pinnacles of
the Himalayas was splendid. I learnt a great deal from wise old
Colonel Erskine with his intimate knowledge of the workings of the
native mind, and of the psychology of the Oriental.

There is something very touching in the fidelity of Indian native
servants to their employers. Lady Lansdowne returned to India
eighteen years after leaving it, for the marriage of her son (who
was killed in the first three months of the war) to Lord Minto's
daughter, and I accompanied her. One afternoon all the pensioned
Government House servants who had been in Lord Lansdowne's
employment arrived in a body to offer their "salaams" to my
sister. They presented a very different appearance to the
resplendent beings in scarlet and gold whom I had formerly known,
for on taking their pension they had ceased troubling to dye their
beards, and they were merely dressed in plain white cotton. These
grey-bearded, toothless old men with their high, aquiline features
(they were nearly all Mohammedans), flowing white garments and
turbans, might have stepped bodily out of stained-glass windows.
They had brought with them all the little presents (principally
watches) which my sister had given them; they remembered all the
berths she had secured for their sons, and the letters she had
written on their behalf. An Oriental has a very long memory for a
kindness as well as for an injury done him. Lady Lansdowne, whose
Hindustani had become rather rusty, began feverishly turning over
the pages of a dictionary in an endeavour to express her feelings
and the pleasure she experienced in seeing these faithful
retainers again: she wept, and the old men wept, and we all
agreed, as elderly people will, that in former days the sun was
brighter and life altogether rosier than in these degenerate
times. Before leaving, the old servants simultaneously lifted
their arms in the Mahommedan gesture of blessing, with all the
innate dignity of the Oriental; it was really a very touching
sight, nor do I think that the very substantial memento of their
visit which each of them received had anything to do with their
attitude: they only wished to show that they were "faithful to
their salt."

It is difficult to determine the age of a native, as wrinkles and
lines do not show on a dark skin. Dark skins have other
advantages. One of the European Examiners of Calcutta University
told me that there had been great trouble about the examination-
papers. By some means the native students always managed to obtain
what we may term "advance" copies of these papers. My informant
devised a scheme to stop this leakage. Instead of having the
papers printed in the usual fashion, he called in the services of
a single white printer on whom he could absolutely rely. The white
printer had the papers handed to him early on the morning of the
examination day, and he duly set them up on a hand-press in the
building itself. The printer had one assistant, a coolie clad only
in loin-cloth and turban, and every time the coolie left the room
he was made to remove both his loin-cloth and turban, so that by
no possibility could he have any papers concealed about him. In
spite of these precautions, it was clear from internal evidence
that some of the students had had a previous knowledge of the
questions. How had it been managed? It eventually appeared that
the coolie, taking advantage of the momentary absence of the white
printer, had whipped off his loin-cloth, SAT DOWN ON THE "FORM,"
and then replaced his solitary garment. When made to strip on
going out, the printing-ink did not show on his dark skin: he had
only to sit down elsewhere on a large sheet of white paper for the
questions to be printed off on it, and they could then easily be
read in a mirror. The Oriental mind is very subtle.

This is no place to speak of the marvels of Mogul architecture in
Agra and Delhi. I do not believe that there exists in the world a
more exquisitely beautiful hall than the Diwan-i-Khas in Delhi
palace. This hall, open on one side to a garden, is entirely built
of transparent white marble inlaid with precious stones, and with
its intricate gilded ceilings, and wonderful pierced-marble
screens it justifies the famous Persian inscription that runs
round it:

"If heaven can be on the face of the earth,
It is this, it is this, it is this."

I always regret that Shah Jehan did not carry out his original
intention of erecting a second Taj of black marble for himself at
Agra, opposite the wonderful tomb he built for his beloved Muntaz-
i-Mahal; probably the money ran out. Few people take in that the
dome of the Taj, that great airy white soap-bubble, is actually
higher than the dome of St. Paul's. The play of fancy and
invention of Shah Jehan's architects seems inexhaustible. All the
exquisite white marble pavilions of Agra palace differ absolutely
both in design and decoration, and Akbar's massive red sandstone
buildings make the most perfect foil to them that could be
conceived.

Lucknow is one of the pleasantest stations in India, with its ring
of encircling parks, and the broad, tree-shaded roads of its
cantonments, but the pretentious monuments with which the city is
studded will not bear examination after the wonders of Agra and
Delhi. The King of Oude wished to surpass the Mogul Emperors by
the magnificence of his buildings, but he wished, too, to do it on
the cheap. So in Lucknow stucco, with very debased details,
replaces the stately red sandstone and marble of the older cities.

In 1890 after a long day's sight-seeing in Lucknow, in the course
of which we ascended the long exterior flight of steps of the
great Imambarah on an elephant (who proved himself as nimble as a
German waiter in going upstairs), Lady Lansdowne and I were taken
to the Husainabad just as the short-lived Indian twilight was
falling. On passing through its great gateway I thought that I had
never in my life seen anything so beautiful. At the end of a long
white marble-paved court, a stately black-and-white marble tomb
with a gilded dome rose from a flight of steps. Down the centre of
the court ran a long pool of clear water, surrounded by a gilded
railing. On either side of the court stood great clumps of
flowering shrubs, also enclosed in gilded railings. At the far
end, a group of palms were outlined in jet black against that
vivid lemon-coloured afterglow only seen in hot countries;
peacocks, perched on the walls of the court, stood out duskily
purple against the glowing expanse of saffron sky, and the
sleeping waters of the long pool reflected the golden glory of the
flaming vault above them.

In the hush of the evening, and the half-light, the scene was
lovely beyond description, and for eighteen years I treasured in
my mind the memory of the Husainabad at sunset as the vision of my
life.

On returning to Lucknow in 1906, I insisted on going at once to
revisit the Husainabad, though I was warned that there was nothing
to see there. Alas! in broad daylight and in the glare of the
fierce sun the whole place looked abominably tawdry. What I had
taken for black-and-white marble was only painted stucco, and
coarsely daubed at that; the details of the decoration were
deplorable, and the Husainabad was just a piece of showy,
meretricious tinsel. The gathering dusk and the golden expanse of
the Indian sunset sky had by some subtle wizardry thrown a veil of
glamour over this poor travesty of the marvels of Delhi and Agra.
So a long-cherished ideal was hopelessly shattered, which is
always a melancholy thing.

We are all slaves to the economic conditions under which we live,
and the present exorbitant price of paper is a very potent factor
in the making of books. I am warned by my heartless publishers
that I have already exceeded my limits. There are many things in
India of which I would speak: of big-game hunts in Assam; of near
views of the mighty snows of the Himalayas; of jugglers and their
tricks, and of certain unfamiliar aspects of native life. The
telling of these must be reserved for another occasion, for it is
impossible in the brief compass of a single chapter to do more
than touch the surface of things in the vast Empire, the origin of
whose history is lost in the mists of time.





CHAPTER XI


Matters left untold--The results of improved communications--My
father's journey to Naples--Modern stereotyped uniformity--Changes
in customs--The faithful family retainer Some details--Samuel
Pepys' stupendous banquets--Persistence of idea--Ceremonial
incense--Patriarchal family life--The barn dances--My father's
habits--My mother--A son's tribute--Autumn days--Conclusion.

I had hoped to tell of reef-fishing in the West Indies; of surf-
riding on planks at Muizenberg in South Africa; of the extreme
inconvenience to which the inhabitants of Southern China are
subjected owing to the inconsiderate habits of their local devils;
of sapphire seas where coco-nut palms toss their fronds in the
Trade wind over gleaming-white coral beaches; of vast frozen
tracts in the Far North where all animate life seems suspended; of
Japanese villages clinging to green hill-sides where boiling
springs gush out of the cliffs in clouds of steam, and of many
other things besides, for it has been my good fortune to have seen
most of the surface of this globe. But all these must wait until
the present preposterous price of paper has descended to more
normal levels.

I consider myself exceptionally fortunate in having lived at a
time when modern conveniences of transport were already in
existence, but had not yet produced their inevitable results. It
is quite sufficiently obvious that national customs and national
peculiarities are being smoothed out of existence by facilities of
travel. My father and mother, early in their married life, drove
from London to Naples in their own carriage, the journey occupying
over a month. They left their own front door in London, had their
carriage placed on the deck of the Channel steamer, sat in it
during the passage (what a singularly uncomfortable resting-place
it must have been should they have encountered bad weather!), and
continued their journey on the other side. During their leisurely
progress through France and Italy, they must have enjoyed
opportunities of studying the real life of these countries which
are denied the passengers in a rapide, jammed in amongst a
cosmopolitan crew in the prosaic atmosphere of dining and sleeping
cars, and scarcely bestowing a passing glance on the country
through which they are being whirled. Even in my time I have seen
marked changes, and have witnessed the gradual disappearance of
national costumes, and of national types of architecture. Every
capital in Europe seems to adopt in its modern buildings a
standardised type of architecture. No sojourner in any of the big
modern hotels, which bear such a wearisome family likeness to each
other, could tell in which particular country he might happen to
find himself, were it not for the scraps of conversation which
reach his ears, for the externals all look alike, and even the
cooking has, with a greater or less degree of success, been
standardised to the requisite note of monotony. Travellers may be
divided into two categories: those who wish to find on foreign
soil the identical conditions to which they have been accustomed
at home, and those searching for novelty of outlook and novelty of
surroundings. The former will welcome the process of planing down
national idiosyncrasies into one dead level of uniformity of type,
the latter will deplore it; but this, like many other things, is a
matter of individual taste.

The ousting of the splendid full-rigged ships by stumpy, unlovely
tramp-steamers in the Hooghly River, to which I have already
referred, is only one example of the universal disappearance of
the picturesque. In twenty-five years' time, every one will be
living in a drab-coloured, utilitarian world, from which most of
the beauty and every scrap of local colour will have been
successfully eliminated. I am lucky in having seen some of it.

I have also witnessed great changes in social habits. I do not
refer so much to the removal of the rigid lines of demarcation
formerly prevailing in English Society, as to the disappearance of
certain accepted standards. For instance, in my young days the
possibility of appearing in Piccadilly in anything but a high hat
and a tail coat was unthinkable, as was the idea of sitting down
to dinner in anything but a white tie. Modern usage has common
sense distinctly on its side. Again, in my youth the old drinking
customs lingered, especially at the Universities. Though
personally I have never been able to extract the faintest
gratification from the undue consumption of alcohol, my friends do
not seem to have invariably shared my tastes. I am certain of one
thing: it is to the cigarette that the temperate habits of the
twentieth century are due. Nicotine knocked port and claret out in
the second round. The acclimatisation of the cigarette in England
only dates from the "seventies." As a child I remember that the
only form of tobacco indulged in by the people that I knew was the
cigar. A cigarette was considered an effeminate foreign
importation; a pipe was unspeakably vulgar.

In my mother's young days before her marriage, the old hard-
drinking habits of the Regency and of the eighteenth century still
persisted. At Woburn Abbey it was the custom for the trusted old
family butler to make his nightly report to my grandmother in the
drawing-room. "The gentlemen have had a good deal to-night; it
might be as well for the young ladies to retire," or "The
gentlemen have had very little to-night," was announced according
to circumstances by this faithful family retainer. Should the
young girls be packed off upstairs, they liked standing on an
upper gallery of the staircase to watch the shouting, riotous
crowd issuing from the dining-room. My father very rarely touched
wine, and I believe that it was the fact that he, then an Oxford
undergraduate, was the only sober young man amongst the rowdy
troop of roysterers that first drew my mother to him, though he
had already proposed marriage to her at a children's party given
by the Prince Regent at Carlton House, when they were respectively
seven and six years old. My father had succeeded to the title at
the age of six, and they were married as soon as he came of age.
They lived to celebrate their golden wedding, which two of my
sisters, the late Duchess of Buccleuch and Lady Lansdowne, were
also fortunate enough to do, and I can say with perfect truth that
in all three instances my mother and her daughters celebrated
fifty years of perfect happiness, unclouded save for the gaps
which death had made amongst their children.

Students of Pepys' Diary must have gasped with amazement at
learning of the prodigious quantities of food considered necessary
in the seventeenth century for a dinner of a dozen people. Samuel
Pepys gives us several accounts of his entertainments, varying,
with a nice sense of discrimination, the epithet with which he
labels his dinners. Here is one which he gave to ten people, in
1660, which he proudly terms "a very fine dinner." "A dish of
marrow-bones; a leg of mutton; a loin of veal; a dish of fowl;
three pullets, and two dozen of larks, all in a dish; a great
tart; a neat's tongue; a dish of anchovies; a dish of prawns, and
cheese." On another occasion, in 1662, Pepys having four guests
only, merely gave them what he modestly describes as "a pretty
dinner." "A brace of stewed carps; six roasted chickens; a jowl of
salmon; a tanzy; two neats' tongues, and cheese." For six
distinguished guests in 1663 he provided "a noble dinner." (I like
this careful grading of epithets.) "Oysters; a hash of rabbits; a
lamb, and a rare chine of beef, Next a great dish of roasted fowl
cost me about thirty shillings; a tart, fruit and cheese." Pepys
anxiously hopes that this was enough! One is pleased to learn that
on all three occasions his guests enjoyed themselves, and that
they were "very merry," but however did they manage to hold one
quarter of this prodigious amount of food?

The curious idea that hospitality entailed the proffering of four
times the amount of food that an average person could assimilate,
persisted throughout the eighteenth century and well into the
"seventies" of the nineteenth century. I remember as a child, on
the rare occasion when I was allowed to "sit up" for dinner, how
interminable that repast seemed. That may have been due to the
fact that my brother and I were forbidden to eat anything except a
biscuit or two. The idea that human beings required perpetual
nourishment was so deep-grounded that, to the end of my father's
life, the "wine and water tray" was brought in nightly before the
ladies went to bed. This tray contained port, sherry and claret, a
silver kettle of hot water, sugar, lemons and nutmeg, as well as
two large plates of sandwiches. All the ladies devoured wholly
superfluous sandwiches, and took a glass of wine and hot water
before retiring. I think people would be surprised to find how
excellent a beverage the obsolete "negus" is. Let them try a glass
of either port, sherry, or claret, with hot water, sugar, a
squeeze of lemon, and a dusting of nutmeg, and I think that they
will agree with me.

A custom, I believe, peculiar to our family, was the burning of
church incense in the rooms after dinner. At the conclusion of
dinner, the groom-of-the-chambers walked round the dining-room,
solemnly swinging a large silver censer. This dignified thurifer
then made the circuit of the other rooms, plying his censer. From
the conscientious manner in which he fulfilled his task, I fear
that an Ecclesiastical Court might have found that this came under
the heading of "incense used ceremonially."

My father had one peculiarity; he never altered his manner of
living, whether the house was full of visitors, or he were alone
with my mother, after his children had married and left him. At
Baron's Court, when quite by themselves, they used the large
rooms, and had them all lighted up at night, exactly as though the
house was full of guests. There was to my mind something very
touching in seeing an aged couple, after more than fifty years of
married life together, still preserving the affectionate relations
of lovers with each other. They played their chess together
nightly in a room ninety-eight feet long, and delighted in still
singing together, in the quavering tones of old age, the simple
little Italian duets that they had sung in the far-off days of
their courtship. As his years increased, my father did not care to
venture much beyond the circle of his own family, though as
thirteen of his children had grown up, and he had seven married
daughters, the two elder of whom had each thirteen children of her
own, the number of his immediate descendants afforded him a fairly
wide field of selection. In his old age he liked to have his five
sons round him all the winter, together with their wives and
children. Accordingly, every October my three married brothers
arrived at Baron's Court with their entire families, and remained
there till January, so that the house persistently rang with
children's laughter. What with governesses, children, nurses and
servants, this meant thirty-three extra people all through the
winter, so it was fortunate that Baron's Court was a large house,
and that there was plenty of room left for other visitors. It
entailed no great hardship on the sons, for the autumn salmon-
fishing in the turbulent Mourne is excellent, there was abundance
of shooting, and M. Gouffe, the cook, was a noted artist.

Both my father and mother detested publicity, or anything in the
nature of self-advertisement, which only shows how hopelessly out
of touch they would have been with modern conditions.

My father was also old-fashioned enough to read family prayers
every morning and every Sunday evening; he was very particular,
too, about Sunday observance, now almost fallen into desuetude, so
neither the thud of lawn-tennis racquets nor the click of
billiard-balls were ever heard on that day, and no one would have
dreamed of playing cards on Sunday.

It would be difficult to convey any idea of the pleasant family
life in that isolated spot tucked away amongst the Tyrone
mountains; of the long tramps over the bogs after duck and snipe;
of the struggles with big salmon; of the sailing-matches on the
lakes; of the grouse and the woodcocks; of the theatrical
performances, the fun and jollity, and all the varied incidents
which make country life so fascinating to those brought up to it.

It was the custom at Baron's Court to have two annual dances in
the barn to celebrate "Harvest Home" and Christmas, and to these
dances my father, and my brother after him, invited every single
person in their employ, and all the neighbouring farmers and their
wives. Any one hoping to shine at a barn-dance required
exceptionally sound muscles, for the dancing was quite a serious
business. The so-called barn was really a long granary,
elaborately decorated with wreaths of evergreens, flags, and
mottoes. The proceedings invariably commenced with a dance
(peculiar, I think, to the north of Ireland) known as "Haste to
the Wedding." It is a country dance, but its peculiarity lies in
the fact that instead of the couples standing motionless opposite
to one another, they are expected to "set to each other," and to
keep on doing steps without intermission; all this being, I
imagine, typical of the intense eagerness every one was supposed
to express to reach the scene of the wedding festivities as
quickly as possible. Twenty minutes of "Haste to the Wedding" are
warranted to exhaust the stoutest leg-muscles. My mother always
led off with the farm-bailiff as partner, my father at the other
end dancing with the bailiff's wife. Both my father, and my
brother after him, were very careful always to wear their Garter
as well as their other Orders on these occasions, in order to show
respect to their guests. Scotch reels and Irish jigs alternated
with "The Triumph," "Flowers of Edinburgh," and other country
dances, until feet and legs refused their office; and still the
fiddles scraped, and feet, light or heavy, belaboured the floor
till 6 a.m. The supper would hardly have come up to London
standards, for instead of light airy nothings, huge joints of
roast and boiled were aligned down the tables. Some of the
stricter Presbyterians, though fond of a dance, experienced
conscientious qualms about it. So they struck an ingenious
compromise with their consciences by dancing vigorously whilst
assuming an air of intense misery, as though they were undergoing
some terrible penance. Every one present enjoyed these barn-dances
enormously.

My father was an admirable speaker of the old-fashioned school,
with calculated pauses, an unusual felicity in the choice of his
epithets, and a considerable amount of gesticulation. The veteran
Lord Chaplin is the last living exponent of this type of oratory.
Although my father prepared his speeches very carefully indeed, he
never made a single written note. He had a beautiful speaking
voice and a prodigious memory; this memory, he knew from
experience, would not fail him. An excellent shot himself both
with gun and rifle, and a good fisherman, to the end of his life
he maintained his interest in sport and in all the pursuits of the
younger life around him, for he was very human.

It is difficult for a son to write impartially of his mother. My
mother's character was a blend of extreme simplicity and great
dignity, with a limitless gift of sympathy for others. I can say
with perfect truth that, throughout her life, she succeeded in
winning the deep love of all those who were brought into constant
contact with her. Very early in life she fell under the influence
of the Evangelical movement, which was then stirring England to
its depths, and she throughout her days remained faithful to its
tenets. It could be said of her that, though, in the world, she
was not of the world. Owing to force of circumstances, she had at
times to take her position in the world, and no one could do it
with greater dignity, or more winning grace; but the atmosphere of
London, both physical and social, was distasteful to her. She had
an idea that the smoke-laden London air affected her lungs, and,
apart from the pleasure of seeing the survivors of the very
intimate circle of friends of her young days, London had few
attractions for her; all her interests were centred in the
country, in country people, and country things. Although deeply
religious, her religion had no gloom about it, for her
inextinguishable love of a joke, and irrepressible sense of fun,
remained with her to the end of her life, and kept her young in
spite of her ninety-three years. From the commencement of her
married life, my mother had been in the habit of "visiting" in the
village twice a week, and in every cottage she was welcomed as a
friend, for in addition to her gift of sympathy, she had a memory
almost as tenacious as my father's, and remembered the names of
every one of the cottagers' children, knew where they were
employed, and whom they had married. With the help of her maid, my
mother used to compound a cordial, bottles of which she
distributed amongst the cottagers, a cordial which gained an
immense local reputation. The ingredients of this panacea were one
part of strong iron-water to five parts of old whisky, to which
sal-volatile, red lavender, cardamoms, ginger, and other warming
drugs were added. "Her Grace's bottle," as it was invariably
termed, achieved astonishing popularity, and the most marvellous
cures were ascribed to it. I have sometimes wondered whether its
vogue would have been as great had the whisky been eliminated from
its composition. In her home under the Sussex downs, amidst the
broad stretches of heather-clad common, the beautiful Tudor stone-
built old farm-houses, and the undulating woodlands of that most
lovable and typically English county, she continued, to the end of
her life, visiting amongst her less fortunate neighbours, and
finding friends in every house. Her immense vitality and power of
entering into the sorrows and enjoyments of others, led at times
to developments very unexpected in the case of one so aged. For
instance, a small great-nephew of mine had had a pair of stilts
given him. The boy was clumsy at learning to use them, and my
mother, who in her youth, could perform every species of trick
upon stilts, was discovered by her trained nurse mounted on stilts
and perambulating the garden on them, in her eighty-sixth year,
for the better instruction of her little great-grandson. Again,
during a great rat-hunt we had organised, the nurse missed her
ninety-year-old charge, to discover her later, in company with the
stable-boy, behind a barn, both of them armed with sticks,
intently watching a rat-hole into which the stable-boy had just
inserted a ferret.

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