NOTE
***My nephew, Sir Herbert Stephen, has kindly sent me the enclosed note in regard to my brother's life in Ireland.
L. S.
In 1869 my father took for the long vacation a house called Dromquina, on the northern bank of the Kenmare River, about three miles from Kenmare. The 'river' is an arm of the sea, something like forty miles long, and at Dromquina, I suppose, not above half a mile wide. He had heard of the place by reason of his friend, Mr. Froude, living at that time at Lord Lansdowne's house, Derreen, in Killmakalogue Harbour, about fifteen miles lower down on the opposite shore. In a thickly populated country this would not constitute a near neighbourhood, but we made excursions to Derreen, either in a boat or in Mr. Froude's yacht, several times in the course of the summer. It is in the neighbourhood of the Kenmare River and Bantry Bay that Mr. Froude laid the scene of 'The Two Chiefs of Dunboy.'
Dromquina stands close to the water's edge, and we had several boats and the services of some half-dozen fishermen at our command. My father had learnt to row at Eton, and during this summer he always took an oar—and did good service with it—upon our frequent excursions on the water. I remember, by the way, that many years later, after he had been for some time a judge, he was one day rowing in a boat with a party of friends on the Thames, and was much gratified by my telling him what hard work I had found it, while steering, to keep the boat straight, because he pulled so much harder than the man who was rowing bow, a sturdy athlete, twenty years his junior, but no waterman.
He liked the life at Dromquina so much that in 1873, after his return from India, he took the Bishop of Limerick's house, Parknasilla, in Sneem Harbour, just opposite Derreen. That year, if I remember right, he took some shooting, to which we had to drive a considerable distance. In one year or the other I went out shooting with him two or three times. I do not think he ever had any shooting later: though, considering how little practice he can have had, he was a decidedly good shot. The country was rough, and the bags, though not heavy in quantity—we were lucky if we saw ten brace of grouse—presented a rather extensive variety of kind. During these two summers my father indulged himself freely in his favourite amusement of taking long walks, but also did a good deal of rowing and sailing. He had had my brothers and me taught to swim in a previous summer at the sea-side, and at Dromquina decided that we ought to be able to swim confidently in our clothes. In order to test our possession of this accomplishment, he one day took us out himself in a boat, and told me to sit on the gunwale, after which he artfully engaged me in conversation until he saw that I was not expecting my plunge, when he suddenly shoved me overboard. We all passed the ordeal with credit.
In 1873 he meditated building a house on the Kenmare River, but in the course of that summer he went to visit Sir John Strachey, who was then living at Anaverna House, at Ravensdale in County Louth. The Stracheys left it not long after, and we went there for the first time in 1875. Some years later my father took a lease of it, and there he spent every long vacation till 1891 inclusive, and the greater part of 1892.
For this place my father in particular, as well as his family generally, had from the first a strong affection. The house stands rather high, on the extreme southern slope of the Mourne Mountains, just within the border of the county of Louth and the province of Leinster. Behind and above the house to the north, the 'mountains' (moors varying in height from 1,000 to 2,700 feet) stretch for many miles, enclosing the natural harbour known as Carlingford Lough. Southwards there is a view across a comparatively level plain as far as the Wicklow Mountains, just beyond Dublin, and about sixty miles away. The sea is visible at no great distance on the east, and on fine days we could always see the Isle of Man, about eighty miles to the north-east, from any of several hill-tops within an hour's walk of the house. My father was therefore able to take to his heart's content the long walks that had always been his favourite amusement. He also devoted himself with the greatest enthusiasm to the improvement of the house and grounds. For many years before the Stracheys' short tenancy it had been unoccupied, and the grounds—of which there were about seventy acres—were at first very much overgrown, especially with laurels, which, when neglected, grow in that country in almost disgusting luxuriance. My father therefore occupied himself a good deal with amateur forestry, and became, considering that he first turned his attention to the subject at the age of forty-six, a rather expert woodsman. A good deal of tree-felling was necessary, both in the interest of the trees and for the improvement of the views from the house and its immediate neighbourhood. My father had a Canadian axe, given to him by Frederick Gibbs, of which he was extremely fond, and with which he did a great deal of work. He was never reduced to cutting down a tree merely for exercise, but always first satisfied himself with much care that its removal would be an improvement. Another point in his wood-cutting that I always admired was that, when the more amusing part of the operation—which is cutting the tree down—was over, he invariably took personally his full share of the comparatively uninteresting work of sawing up the trunk, and disposing in an orderly manner of the branches. He also took great pains to cut his trees as close to the ground as possible, so as not to sacrifice the good timber at the butt, or leave a tall or ragged stump to disfigure the ground afterwards.
Another labour in which he took much interest was the making of paths through a little wood running up the hill-side behind the house, and the engineering of a stream which descended through it, and, being flooded two or three times every year, required a good deal of management, the more so as the house was supplied by it with water through an artificial streamlet made for the purpose. In these pursuits my father was always assisted by the village post-master, an old man named Morton, of picturesque appearance and conversation, and the consultations between the two used to be full of interest. Morton spoke with a strong brogue, and combined several other pursuits with that of post-master, the universality of his aptitudes making him an interesting companion, and my father had a great regard for him. He died a few months ago, being then, I believe, over eighty years of age.
Another out-door amusement that my father enjoyed was shooting at a mark with a Snider rifle. The nature of the grounds made it easy to get a safe hundred yards' range within three minutes' walk of the front door, and three or four hundred yards by going a little farther. We practised in this way pretty often, and I think the judge was, on the whole, a better shot than any of his sons. In the year 1883 the household was increased, a good deal to my father's annoyance, by two policemen. At the Liverpool summer Assizes he had tried a gang of dynamiters, I think for treason-felony. They, or most of them, were convicted and sentenced to long terms of penal servitude. Some of my father's friends, not understanding that if anybody wanted to murder him it was quite as likely to be done, and quite as easy to do, in England as in Ireland, and perhaps entertaining the fantastic idea that the population of Louth had more regard for dynamiters than the population of London, suggested to the Irish Government that he was in some danger. The only thing that could be done was to order police protection, and this Sir George Trevelyan did. Accordingly two constables took up their abode in a room which happened to be available in the stable-yard, and mounted guard all day over the hall-door, following my father wherever he went during the day. Though their continued escort troubled him a good deal, there was no escape from it, and he got used to it to some extent. He made great friends with the men personally—like other people, he had the highest admiration for the force to which they belonged—and sometimes challenged them to a shooting match, either with their own rifles or with his, and was much gratified when he got the better of them.