Therefore when I joined my train I settled down and went fast asleep, so fast, that I did not awake to change at Manuel Junction. I did awake at Falkirk, the next station, and there found that the next train back to Bo’ness would not get me there much before nine o’clock, my lecture being fixed for eight. Knowing that Falkirk was not far from Bo’ness by road, I then begged the stationmaster to tell me where I could get a “masheen,” as a wheeled vehicle is called up here, to take me the nine miles, and how much the charge was likely to be. For all reply he waved his hand in a lordly manner towards a row of cabs ranged outside the station, and I, as it was then 6.30 o’clock and I felt that I had no time to lose, immediately interviewed a cabman. But no inducement that I could offer up to £2 had any effect upon the frozen stolidity of those men, I could get nothing out of them but a surly “No.”
So at last I had to wire to the secretary, informing him of the state of affairs, and saying that I could not hope to reach him before nine o’clock. Of course I got no answer and when I arrived the little platform was crowded with what would have been my audience, reinforced by all the loafers and bad boys in the town. For the only time in my life I was booed and hissed, but I feel grateful that nobody threw anything or I should certainly have been pelted also. This, though unpleasant, did not hurt me so much as the attitude of the secretary. He did not actually call me a liar, but he said that though several lecturers, notably Mary Kingsley, had missed that Manuel connection before, none had ever experienced any difficulty in getting a masheen to bring them from Falkirk. Drivers were always eager to take the job, besides, there was a posting-house opposite the station, and the fare was 10s. In vain I told him my experience, his only reply was, “It’s verra strange.” And his look said quite plainly, “You are telling me lies.” In the end I was compelled to make a journey from London some months later to give that lecture, the expenses of which left me with a slight balance on the wrong side when I had received my fee.
As a set off to this decidedly unpleasant experience I shortly afterwards paid a visit to Penicuik, and became the guest of Mr. S. R. Crockett. The whole of that visit is like a blissful dream, for verily I never enjoyed myself more. The big genial novelist, then in the heyday of his prosperity, was an ideal host and even outdid his countrymen in his efforts to make his guest happy. But of all the delights of that happy three days one experience stands out, salient, from the rest. It was Mr. Crockett’s prayer at family worship on the night of my arrival. As a general rule I dread to hear extempore prayer, having often suffered many things from men who either maundered or preached or raved and foamed and pounded for long periods of time and assumed that they were praying! But that prayer was in my mind all that a prayer ought to be and as a proof of this it is the only one, out of the many thousands I have heard and mostly writhed under, that I joyfully and gratefully remember. Only a few days ago I heard that my good friend and host of that occasion had passed away from us in the fullness of his powers and manhood. And though I only forgathered with him once I have an aching sense of irreplaceable loss.
Following hard upon the heels of that came another delightful experience, a lecture at Fettes College, when I had the privilege of making the acquaintance of Dr. Heard, the headmaster, whose guest I was. That acquaintance deepened into friendship, second of the many headmasters whom it has been my fortunate lot to know and love and about whom I hope to fill many pages. But on the very threshold of the subject I must pause to note my astonishment, not that some headmasters relegate the duty of showing hospitality to some person other than themselves, but that any headmaster dares to invite such strangers as lecturers and entertainers must be, to stay with him at all.
For I have heard such stories, not told in malice, but sadly, and with an obvious effort to gloss over the worst features, as have made me redden with shame, stories that have fully explained to me the aloofness with which I have sometimes been regarded where I was not known. Stories of hospitality abused, of persistent and vehement begging, of equally persistent touting for employment, backed by assurances that without that particular engagement the wheels would come right off the applicant’s carriage—how can men, expecting to be received and treated as gentlemen, and never expecting in vain, be guilty of such behaviour? But then I have known tradesmen who, upon receiving an order upon the fulfilment of which they have been promptly paid, immediately proffer a request for a substantial loan. This, I suppose, would be on the ground that a man who would pay lawful demands like that must have more money than he knew what to do with, and must also be somewhat easy in his hold upon that money.
Now the gentry whom I have hinted at as abusing the confidence of headmaster hosts would undoubtedly be indignant at being classed with tradesmen, but if there be any truth in the grand old adage, noblesse oblige, they are far more culpable. But I hold that the average tradesman’s standard is higher than theirs and with less reason.
My visit to Fettes, following as it did upon the beautiful experience of Penicuik, went far to confirm me in my opinion that the lecturer’s life was a charming one, the people were all so pleasant, so eager to make one happy and comfortable. Moreover, it was a delight to address the lads. Of course it was impossible to tell how they would have received the lecture had they been perfectly free agents, but that is one of those things about which it is well never to show too much curiosity. All one could do, and that was certainly obligatory in the highest sense, was to give them one’s best and make it as interesting as possible; as I have before hinted, that is, to allow no suspicion of “swot” to creep in under the disguise of an entertainment.
But undoubtedly it is a little difficult sometimes to hold the attention of the very youngest boys, whose minds are often incapable of sustained effort. Occasionally this is manifested to the lecturer in a startling manner, as the following experience of mine at a preparatory school at West Drayton will show. I was speaking upon “Romance and Reality at Sea,” amid an ominous quiet on the part of my very juvenile audience which gave me the uneasy consciousness that I was often outside their depth. A lecturer can always tell whether his audience be with him or not, whatever be their ages or conditions. Suddenly there broke from the boys a spontaneous peal of laughter, so ringing, so universal that I almost fancied hysteria had seized upon them, and wondered whether I was to blame. I could not imagine anything I had said causing such an outburst. I stood facing the roaring lads waiting for the merriment to subside and puzzled beyond belief, until I suddenly turned and looked at the screen and the mystery was at once cleared up.
A full-rigged sailing ship was being shown, and walking across her maintopmast stay was a fly magnified to the size of an eagle. It had evidently got into the condenser somehow, and finding it warm moved about pretty briskly, but, of course, never out of the picture. It had obviously come as a sweet boon, a heavenly relief from boredom, and the children had welcomed it thus uproariously in consequence. And I regret to say that neither my eloquence nor the commands of the masters availed to restore the youngsters’ attention. So we presently gave it up as a bad job, at which announcement the laughter burst forth again as if irrepressible.
I leave any moral that may be drawn from this episode to those whose interest it is to seek it, I have no concern with the matter now beyond relating facts and uttering the platitude that it is unwise to expect too much from young boys.