One of the most interesting of the Dover episodes was our hiring of “Broome Hall” for the South-Eastern District manœuvres in the following September. The Castle was too far away for working them from there, so this fine old Elizabethan mansion, being in the very centre of the theatre of “war,” became our headquarters. There we entertained Lord Wolseley and his staff as the house-party. Other warriors and many civilians whose lovely country houses were dotted about that beautiful Kentish region came in from outside each day, and for four days what felt to me like a roaring kind of hospitality went on which proved an astonishing feat of housekeeping on my part. True, I was liberally helped, but to this day I marvel that things went so successfully. Everything had to be brought from the Castle—servants in an omnibus, batterie de cuisine, plate, linen and all sorts of necessary things, in military waggons, for the house had not been inhabited for a long while. All the food was sent out from Dover fresh every day, by road—no village near. The house had been palatially furnished in the old days, but its glory was much faded and so ancestral was it that it possessed a ghost. A pathetic interest attaches to “Broome” to-day, and I should not know it again in its renovated beauty. Lord Kitchener restored it to more than its pristine lustre, I am told.
The morning start each day of all these generals (Sir Evelyn Wood was one of them) from the front door for the “battle” was a pleasing sight for me, with the strong cavalry escort following. After the gallant cavalcade had got clear I would follow in the little victoria with friends, hoping in my innermost heart that I was leaving everything well in hand behind me for the hungry “Cocked Hats” on their return.
On March 30th, 1897, I had a glimpse of Gladstone. We were on the pier to receive a Royalty, and the “Grand Old Man” was also on board the Calais boat. He was the last to land and was accompanied by his wife. He came up the gangway with some difficulty, and struck me as very much aged, with his face showing signs of pain. I had not seen him since he sat beside me at a dinner at the Ripons’ in 1880, when his keen eye had rather overawed me. He was now eighty-eight! The crowd cheered him well, but the old couple were past that sort of thing, and only anxious to seek their rest at “Betteshanger,” a few miles distant, whither Lord Northbourne’s carriage whirled them away from public view.
And now comes the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria. I think my fresh impressions written down at the time should be inserted here as I find them. Too much national sorrow and suffering brought to us by the Great War, and too many changes have since blurred that bright picture to allow of posthumous enthusiasm for its chronicling to-day. Were I to tone down that picture to the appearance it has to me at the present time it would hardly be worth showing.
“June 22nd, 1897.—Jubilee Day. I never expected to be so touched by what I have seen of these pageants and rejoicings, and to feel so much personal affection for the Queen as I have done through this wonderful week. Thinking of other nations, we cannot help being impressed with the way in which the English have comported themselves on this occasion—the unanimity of the crowds; the willingness of every one concerned; all resulting in those huge pageants passing off without a single jar. My place was in the courtyard of the Horse Guards; Will’s place was on his big grey before St. Paul’s, at Queen Anne’s statue, to keep an eye on things. I had an effective view of the procession making the bend from Whitehall into the courtyard, and out by the archway into the parade ground. This gave me time to enjoy the varied types of all those nationalities whose warriors represented them, as they filed past at close quarters. But we had five hours of waiting. These hours were well filled up for me, so continually interested in watching the movements of the troops as they took up their positions for receiving the procession and saluting the Queen. I think in the way of perfect dress and of superfine, thoroughbred horseflesh, Lord Lonsdale’s troop of Cumberland Hussars was as memorable a group as any that day. They wore the ‘sling jacket,’ only known to me in pictures and old prints of the pre-Crimean days, and to see these gallant-looking crimson pelisses in reality was quite a delightful surprise.
“The sun burst through the clouds just as the guns announced to us that the Queen had started from Buckingham Palace on her great round by St. Paul’s at 11.15. So we waited, waited. Presently some one called out, ‘Here’s Captain Ames,’ and, knowing he was the leader, we nimbly ran up to our seats. It seemed hardly credible that the journey to St. Paul’s and the ceremony there, and the journey homewards could have occupied so comparatively brief an interval. I think the part of the procession which most delighted me was the cohort of Indian cavalry, and then the gorgeous bunch of thirty-six princes, each in his national dress or uniform. These rode in triplets. You saw a blue-coated Prussian riding with a Montenegrin on one side and an Italian bonneted by the absurd general’s helmet now in vogue on the other. Then came another triplet of a Persian, whose breast was a galaxy of diamonds flashing in the sun, an Austrian with fur pelisse and busby (poor man, in that heat), and the brother of the Khedive, wearing the familiar tarboosh, riding a little white Arab. Then followed an English Admiral in the person of the Duke of York, a Japanese mannikin on his right, and a huge Russian on his left, and so on, and so on—types and dresses from all the quarters of the globe in close proximity, so that one could compare them at a glance. The dignified Indian cavalry were superb as to dress and puggarees, but the faces were stolid, very unlike the keen, clean-cut Arab types which so charmed me in Egypt and Palestine. There certainly were too many carriages filled with small Germans. Then came the colonial escort to the Queen’s carriage. As they came on and passed before us I do not exaggerate when I say that there seemed to pass over them an ever-deepening cloud-shadow, as it were, from the white Canadians riding in front, through ever-deepening shades of brown down to the blackest of negroes, who rode last. What an epitome of our Colonial Empire! Then, finally, before the supreme moment, came Lord Wolseley, the immediate forerunner of the Royal carriage. He looked well and gallant and youthful. Then round the curve into the courtyard the eight cream-coloured horses in rich gala harness of Garter-blue and gold! So quick was the pace that I dared not dwell too long on their beauty for I was too absorbed in the Queen during that precious minute. There she was, the centre of all this! A little woman, seated by herself (I had not time to see who sat facing her) with an expressionless pink face, preoccupied in settling her bonnet, which had got a little crooked, as though nothing unusual was going on, and that was the last I saw of her as she passed under the dark archway, facing homeward.
“June 26th.—Off from Dover at 2 a.m. for Southampton, by way of London, to see the culminating glory of the Jubilee—the greatest naval review ever witnessed. At eight we left Waterloo in one of the ‘specials’ that took holders of invitation cards for the various ocean liners that had been chartered for the occasion. Our ship was the P. and O. Paramatta, and very pleased I was on beholding her vast proportions, for I feared qualms on any smaller vessel. There were meetings on board with friends and a great luncheon, and general good humour and complacency at being Britons. The day cleared up at 10.30, and only a slight haze thinly veiled the mighty host of the Channel Fleet as we slowly steamed towards it along the Solent. Gradually the sun shone fully out and the day settled into steady brilliance.
“Well, I have been so inflated with national pride since beholding our naval power this day that if I don’t get a prick of some sort I shall go off like a balloon. Let us be exultant just for a week! We won’t think of the ugly look of India just now and all the nasty warnings of the bumptious Kaiser and the rest of it. We can’t while looking at Britannia ruling the waves, as we are doing to-day. Five miles of ships of war five lines deep! When all these ships fired each twenty-one guns by divisions as the Prince of Wales steamed up and down the lines, and the crews of each vessel in turn gave such cheers as only Jack Tar can give, it was not the moment to threaten us with anything. I shall never forget the aspect of this fleet of ours, black hulls and yellow funnels and ‘fighting tops’ stretching to east and west as far as the eye could reach and beyond, the mellow sunlight full upon them and the slowly-rolling clouds of smoke that wrapped them round with mystery as their countless guns thundered the salute! Myriads of flags fluttered in the breeze, the sea sparkled, and in and out of those motionless battleships all manner of steam and sailing craft moved incessantly, deepening by the contrast of their hurry the sense one had of the majestic power contained in those reposing monsters.... Every one is saying, ‘And to think that not a single ship has been recalled from abroad to make up this display!’ We are all very pleased, and have the good old Nelson feeling about us.” On June 28th the Queen held her Jubilee Garden Party in the Buckingham Palace grounds. There we looked our last on her.
I took four of the children, in August, to Bruges, that old city so much enjoyed by me in my early years. I was charmed to see how carefully all the old houses had been preserved, and, indeed, I noticed that a few of them, vulgarly modernised then, were now restored to their original beauty. How well the Belgians understand these things! Seventeen years after this date the eldest of the two schoolboys I had with me was to ride through that same old Bruges as A.D.C. to the general commanding “The Immortal 7th Division,” which, retiring before the German hordes, was to turn and help to rend them at Ypres.
In 1898 I exhibited a smaller picture than usual—“The Morrow of Talavera,” which was very kindly placed at the Academy—and I began a large Crimean subject, “The Colours,” for the succeeding year. I had some fine models at Dover for this picture. In making the studies for it I had an interesting experience. I wanted to show the colour party of the Scots Guards advancing up the hill of the Alma in their full parade dress—the last time British troops wore it in action—Lieutenant Lloyd Lindsay carrying the Queen’s colour. It was then he won the V.C. Lord Wantage (that same Lloyd Lindsay), now an old man, but full of energy, when he heard of my project, conducted me to the Guards’ Chapel in London, and there and then had the old, dusty, moth-eaten Alma colours taken down from their place on the walls, and held the Queen’s colour once more in his hand for me to see. I made careful studies at the chapel, and restored the fresh tints which he told me they had on that far-away day, when I came to put them into the picture. I was in South Africa when the Academy opened in the following spring.