It was partly because she had so many guests of this kind that she made it an absolute rule that none of her servants were to receive gratuities from visitors,—a rule that some of the visitors disliked extremely, and even refused to submit to. Such cases sometimes led to an amusing breeze of correspondence of which the following is a sample:
“Sir,
Well acquainted as I am with your many and great iniquities, I confess that I did not expect you wantonly to abuse our humble hospitality by deliberately inciting our household to rebellion against constituted authority as distinctly announced to you by written warning on the mantel-piece.[[150]] Manifold as are the notorious vices of the Conservative mind, I had supposed it to have some slight reverence for law, national or domestic. In future I shall know better.
Sir, the humble but incorruptible member of my household whose integrity you sought to corrupt, begs me to re-inclose to you the accompanying lucre (2s. 6d.), of whose history you so falsely pretended yourself ignorant, and as I see no reason why I should be impoverished in consequence of your evil doings, I request you to repay me on your return from the continent the commission charged by H.M. Government (viz. ½d.) upon the enclosed remittance.
I am Sir,
Yours more in sorrow than in anger,
S. J.-B.”
The postal order was indignantly returned, with a request to do what she liked with it, so she at once sent it to the London Society for Women’s Suffrage, directing the secretary to forward the receipt to her refractory Conservative guest!
Notwithstanding this, and other differences of opinion, he paid many more visits to her house, and for the future contrived usually, at least, to elude her vigilance.
She used to consult him in all sorts of legal difficulties, and he replied with unfailing patience.