The M’Korio Delta Development Company had been but an idea. That idea had even seemed, for some months, to languish, when the accession of Mr Burden’s reputation, his Faith (which had made the formation of the syndicate possible), and, for that matter, his twenty-five thousand pounds, though they were but the outward sign of inward spiritual things, lent to the whole adventure body and life. Its aspect changed; it became concrete, as it were: a thing to be named, handled, criticised, combated, defended with passionate enthusiasm; a national Force in Being.
THE REV. CHARLES GAPWORTHY, B.A.
(FROM A BLOCK VERY KINDLY LENT BY “THE ST LAZARUS HYS HOSTEL MAGAZINE; A REVIEW OF SOCIAL PROGRESS”)
Mr Barnett was the first to sacrifice himself in the cause for which so many in the end laid down their all. He left the Edgeware Road, and took a considerable mansion overlooking the Park, convenient to the Twopenny Tube, possessing a southern aspect, and so near to the Marble Arch as to boast nobility of site. He thought it his duty (and the future has proved him wise) to hire a carriage with two horses, men in livery, and a box at the Opera: nor did he hesitate to ensure to the daily papers, even to those with whose editors he was intimate, a fixed contract of advertisement, in return for which, as the courtesy of journalism demands, certain of his doings were published, and commentary upon others omitted.
If it be true, as Canon Cone has so beautifully put it in his Christmas sermon on Kingdom, that “we can serve England better with our heads than with our hearts,” most nobly did Mr Barnett serve her.
His dinners, the principal of which were given weekly upon Fridays, when Parliament was resting from its labours and before the well-earned week-end had begun, his dinners, I say, recruited their guests with a peculiar discretion. Rarely did more than twenty sit down together, never, even when that number was exceeded, did men or cooking of inferior value weaken the effect of the meal.
Gatherings less formal distinguished or enlivened the remaining evenings, saving that of the Sabbath, which, in fine contrast to so many around him, Mr Barnett remembered to keep it holy.
His suggestions were an inspiration, not only to the young men whom he had launched into our world of Letters, but to a multitude who had hitherto known him only by repute, and who, in spite of the legendary difficulty of approaching so great a man, were introduced to him in batches—before lunch, at tea times, and (by appointment) in the early morning.
By a happy coincidence, the very force of things seemed to fight upon his side. “The stars in their courses,” as Canon Cone, careless of political opposition,[9] magnificently put it, “fought for,” the tradition of which Mr Barnett was but a part, however distinguished.
Men influenced by Mr Barnett in no way; men who had never met him, were caught by the flame of his genius.