“The clergyman here has only the care of three hundred souls, so he keeps three hundred chickens, and is often able to supplement his income by getting fifty pounds for a cock.
“An oak avenue leads to the church, being a remnant probably of the Forest of Arden, of which there are many traces still, but such an avenue is very rare. The late storm had blown down several fine trees. ‘How strange it is,’ said Lord Norton, ‘that amid the thousand—the million—theories that science has put forth, there should be none about the wind: it is one of the many incidental proofs of the truths of the Bible, that our Saviour saw this when he spoke of—“The wind bloweth where it listeth,” &c.
“‘Those who say that as to religion we know nothing, do not recognise that half religion is instinct (every one has the instinct that there is a God), and the other half what Pascal calls “the submission of reason.”’
“Lord Norton used to know very well Ellis the shoemaker, who devoted himself to the reformation of boys. He said, ‘I do not take them to make shoes only; I take them to give them a conscience.’ He said, ‘Many people say that the boys are fools, but they are philosophers. They reason at night. I overhear them; I hear them reasoning as to whether there is a God.’ There was one boy especially who denied this, who laughed at all who believed. One day this boy was given a parcel to take to Sir Moses Montefiore. Now the boys may steal, but however much they do that, when they are entrusted with anything, they are most tenacious to fulfil their trust. This boy only knew of Sir Moses by his popular name of ‘the King of the Jews,’ and all day long he asked his way to him in vain. He could not find him anywhere. Evening closed in, and he was faint with hunger and fatigue. He was quite sinking, but at the last gasp cried, ‘O God, if there be a God, help me.’
“Immediately a policeman rushed at him. ‘What have you got there, you young rascal? What’s in that parcel?—something you’ve been stealing, I suppose?’—‘No, ‘taint; it’s a parcel for the King of the Jews, and I can’t find him.’—‘Why, you young fool,’ said the policeman, shaking him, ‘it’s Sir Moses Montefiore you mean: I can show you where to find him.’
“That night the boys were philosophising as usual, declaring that there was no God, there couldn’t be, when the boy who had taken the parcel shouted, ‘Stop that rubbish, you fellows; there is a God, and I know it: and as for you, you’re just as much able to judge of God as a worm is to judge of me.’”
“Dec. 2.—A walk amidst the remnants of the Forest of Arden led to much talk about trees. ‘When Gladstone meets any one new,’ said Lord Norton, ‘his first thought is, “What does he know? what can I get out of him?” When he met Lord Leigh, he had heard of Stoneleigh, that it possessed some of the finest oaks in England; so, when he sat down by him, he began at once, “Lord Leigh, have you any theory as to the age of oaks?”—“Yes, certainly I have; I possess several myself that are above a thousand years old.”—“And how do you know that is so?” said Gladstone. “Well,” said Lord Leigh, “I have several that are called ‘Gospel Oaks,’ because the old Saxon missionaries used to preach under them more than eight hundred years ago, and they would not be likely to choose a young oak to preach under: we may suppose that they chose an oak at least two hundred years old.”—“Well, that is a very good reason,” said Gladstone.’
“Lord Norton had lately been with Gladstone to Drayton, full of Peel relics, and with the wonderful collection of portraits which Sir Robert brought together. All the heads of Government, from Walpole to the Peel Administration, are represented. The pistols are preserved with which Peel intended to fight O’Connell at Calais, but O’Connell’s wife prevented it by giving notice and getting him arrested at Dover.
“While talking of hunting as conducive to the manliness of Englishmen, Lord Norton said, ‘When I was hunting with Charlie Newdigate, a boy almost naked, not quite, came out of a coal-pit, and on a donkey, without saddle or bridle, hunted with us all day, not going over the hedges, but through them. Newdigate was delighted. “That’s the stuff English heroes are made of,” he said, and he had a long talk with the boy afterwards, and explained to him all about the field, &c.... In Northumberland there was a boy who would ride one of his father’s bulls. His father cut him off at last, and would have nothing more to do with him. ‘I’m not a bad father,’ he said, ‘and I don’t mind his riding my bull, but when he takes him out with the hounds it’s too much.’”
“The Deanery, Llandaff, Dec. 7.—Lord Robert Bruce told me the facts of Lord Llanover’s ghost story. As Sir Benjamin Hall and he were riding in the Park in London, Sir Benjamin distinctly saw Lord Rivers, who was an intimate friend of his, and he saw him vanish. He went to his club immediately afterwards, and told what he had seen, and before he left the club a telegram was brought in announcing that Lord Rivers was dead. Afterwards Sir Benjamin Hall went to Mrs. Hanbury Leigh, and told her what had happened, adding, ‘You know this must mean something; it must mean that I am myself to die within the year;’ and so he did.