In the beginning of September, my friend Harry Lee came to Holmhurst as usual for his autumn holidays, and, with the wish of giving him change and pleasure, I took him with me for a fortnight to Holland. We saw the whole of that little country, and enjoyed several of the places very much, especially the so-thoroughly Dutch Dort; quiet Alkmaar, with its charming old weigh-house; and Zwolle, with its fine old gateway. But the tour is not one which leaves much interest behind it. There is such a disadvantage in not being able to understand what people say, and all the Dutch we had anything to do with were so unaccommodating, so excessively grasping and avaricious. Besides, all my luggage, registered through to Brussels, disappeared and could not be traced, so that I had the odd experience of traversing a whole country with nothing more than a comb and a tooth-brush. Two months afterwards the luggage arrived quite safe at Holmhurst, covered with labels, quite intact, having made a long tour by itself quite in a different direction from the one we took, and without any explanation or any expense.[378]
Journal.
“Babworth Hall, Notts, Oct. 7, 1882.—I have been spending four pleasant days with kind Mrs. Bridgeman Simpson, to meet old Lady Westminster,[380] who is the most winning, courteous, and charming of old ladies, finding something pleasant to say to every one, putting every one at their ease, and possessing that real dignity of simplicity which is so indescribably charming. On Wednesday I went with her to Clumber, where we saw the new and very ugly hall, with Italian artists putting down a mosaic pavement.
“Yesterday we went by appointment to Welbeck, arriving by the darksome tunnel, more than two miles long, upon which the late Duke spent £60,000, and £60,000 more apiece upon banking up (and spoiling) his sheet of water with brick walls and building a gigantic riding-school. The house itself stands well, considering the ugliness of the park, and is rather handsome. We were shown through a long suite of rooms containing a good many treasures, the most interesting being a glorious old chest of metal, in which the Bentincks, who came over with William III., brought over their jewels. In the last room we found Lady Bolsover, the Duke’s stepmother.
“The house, vast as it is, has no staircase worth speaking of. The late Duke lived almost entirely in a small suite of rooms in the old part of the house. He inherited the peculiarity of his mother, who would see no one, and he always hid himself. If he gave permission to any one to visit Welbeck, he always added, ‘But Mr. So-and-so will be good enough not to see me’ (if they chanced to meet). He drove out, but in a black coach like a hearse, drawn by four black horses, and with all the blinds down; and he walked out, but at night, with a woman, who was never to speak to him, and always to walk exactly forty yards in front, carrying a lanthorn. When he went to London, it was in a closed brougham, which was put on a railway truck, and which deposited him at his own house at Cavendish Square, his servants all being ordered out of the way: no one ever saw him go or arrive. When he needed a doctor, the doctor only came to the door, and asked questions through it of the valet, who was allowed to feel his pulse.
“The Duke’s mania for a hidden life made him build immense suites of rooms underground, only approachable by a common flight of steps leading to a long tunnel, down which the dinner is conveyed from the far-distant kitchen on a tramway. From a great library one enters a billiard-room capable of holding half-a-dozen billiard-tables. A third large room leads to an enormous ball-room, which can contain 2000 people. The approach to this from above is by means of a gigantic hydraulic drop, in which a carriage can be placed, or twenty persons can be accommodated—the guests being thus let down to the ball-room itself. A staircase through the ceiling of one of the rooms, which is drawn up by a windlass, leads hence to the old riding-school, which is lighted by 1000 jets of gas. Hence a tunnel, 200 yards long, leads to a quadrangular piece of ground, unbuilt upon, but excavated in preparation for a large range of bachelor’s rooms, smoking rooms, and nurseries, to cover four acres of ground. Another tunnel, three-quarters of a mile long, leads thence to the stables, cow-houses, and dairies, like a large village. At the Duke’s death there were ninety-four horses in the stables, only trained for exercise or feeding. Beyond the stables is a large riding-school, in which there are 8000 jets of gas, an exercising ground under glass, with a gallop on straw and sawdust for a quarter of a mile. Close by is an enormous garden, of which six acres are used for strawberry beds, every alternate row being glazed for forcing the plants. Alongside of this is a glazed wall a quarter of a mile long. The garden is about thirty acres in extent, and requires fifty-three men. In the late Duke’s time there were forty-five grooms and helpers in the stables. The cow-houses are palaces, with a covered strawyard attached, and are surrounded by hydraulic screens, which are let down or raised according to the wind. There were eighty keepers and underkeepers.