It was a pleasant, unsophisticated little island; a place of fresh breezes, and red cliffs with great sweeping surges breaking against them; a place of sunshine, and huge expanses of pale dappled sky.
Lady Maxse told me that it was impossible for any one to picture the unutterable dreariness of Heligoland in winter; when little Government House rocked ceaselessly under the fierce gales, and the whole island was drenched in clouds of spindrift; the rain pounding on the window-panes like small-shot, and the howling of the wind drowning all other sounds. She said that they were frequently cut off from the mainland for three weeks on end, without either letters, newspapers, or fresh meat, as the steamers were unable to make the passage. There was nothing to do, nowhere to go, and no one to speak to. It must have been a considerable change for any one accustomed to the life of careless, easy-going, glittering Vienna in the old days. Even Sir Fitzhardinge confessed that during the winter gales he had frequently to make his way on all fours from the stairs from the Underland to Government House, to avoid being blown over the cliffs. Lady Maxse hung an extra pair of pink muslin curtains over every window in Government House, to shut out the sight of the wintry sea, but the angry, grey and white rollers of the restless North Sea asserted themselves even through the pink muslin.
I am glad that I saw this wind-swept little rock whilst it was still a scrap of British territory. When my time came for leaving Brunswick, I was genuinely sorry to go. I confess that I liked Germany and the Germans; I had been extremely well treated, and had got used to German ways.
The teaching profession were only then sowing broadcast the seed which was to come to maturity thirty years later. They were moulding the minds of the rising generation to the ideals which find their most candid exponent in Nietzsche. The seed was sown, but had not yet germinated; the greater portion of Germany in 1875 was still un-Prussianised, but effect followed cause, and we all know the rest.
CHAPTER VII
Some London beauties of the "seventies"—Great ladies—The Victorian girl—Votaries of the Gaiety Theatre—Two witty ladies—Two clever girls and mock-Shakespeare—The family who talked Johnsonian English—Old-fashioned tricks of pronunciation—Practical jokes—Lord Charles Beresford and the old Club-member—The shoe-less legislator—Travellers' palms—The tree that spouted wine—Celyon's spicy breezes—Some reflections—Decline of public interest in Parliament—Parliamentary giants—Gladstone, John Bright, and Chamberlain—Gladstone's last speech—His resignation—W.H. Smith—The Assistant Whips—Sir William Hart-Dyke—Weary hours at Westminster—A Pseudo-Ingoldsbean Lay.
The London of 1876 boasted an extraordinary constellation of lovely women. First and foremost came the two peerless Moncreiffe sisters, Georgiana Lady Dudley, and Helen Lady Forbes. Lady Dudley was then a radiant apparition, and her sister, the most perfect example of classical beauty I have ever seen, had features as clean-cut as those of a cameo. Lady Forbes always wore her hair simply parted in the middle, a thing that not one woman in a thousand can afford to do, and glorious auburn hair it was, with a natural ripple in it. I have seldom seen a head so perfectly placed on the shoulders as that of Lady Forbes. The Dowager Lady Ormonde and the late Lady Ripon were then still unmarried; the first, Lady Leila Grosvenor, with the face of a Raphael Madonna, the other, Lady Gladys Herbert, a splendid, slender, Juno-like young goddess. The rather cruelly named "professional beauties" had just come into prominence, the three great rivals being Mrs. Langtry, then fresh from Jersey, Mrs. Cornwallis West, and Mrs. Wheeler. Unlike most people, I should myself have given the prize to the second of these ladies. I do not think that any one now could occupy the commanding position in London which Constance Duchess of Westminster and the Duchess of Manchester (afterwards Duchess of Devonshire) then held. In fact, with skirts to the knee, and an unending expanse of stocking below them, it would be difficult to assume the dignity with which these great ladies, in their flowing Victorian draperies, swept into a room. The stately Dutchess of Westminster, in spite of her massive outline, had still a fine classical head, and the Duchess of Manchester was one of the handsomest women in Europe. London society was so much smaller then, that it was a sort of enlarged family party, and I, having six married sisters, found myself with unnumbered hosts of relations and connections. I retain delightful recollections of the mid-Victorian girl. These maidens, in their airy clouds of white, pink, or green tulle, and their untouched faces, had a deliciously fresh, flower-like look which is wholly lacking in their sisters of to-day. A young girl's charm is her freshness, and if she persists in coating her face with powder and rouge that freshness vanishes, and one sees merely rows of vapid little doll-like faces, all absolutely alike, and all equally artificial and devoid of expression. These present skimpy draperies cause one to reflect that Nature has not lavished broadcast the gift of good feet and neat ankles; possibly some girls might lengthen their skirts if they realised this truth.
In the "seventies" there was a wonderful galaxy of talent at the old Gaiety Theatre, Nellie Farren, Kate Vaughan, Edward Terry, and Royce forming a matchless quartette. Young men, of course, will always be foolish, up to the end of time. Nellie Farren, Kate Vaughan and Emily Duncan all had their "colours." Nellie Farren's were dark blue, light blue, and white; Kate Vaughan's were pink and grey; Emily Duncan's black and white; the leading hosiers "stocked" silk scarves of these colours, and we foolish young men bought the colours of the lady we especially admired, and sat in the stalls of the Gaiety flaunting the scarves of our favourite round our necks. As I then thought, and still think, that Nellie Farren was one of the daintiest and most graceful little creatures ever seen on the stage, with a gaminerie all her own, I, in common with many other youths, sat in the stalls of the Gaiety wrapped in a blue-and-white scarf. Each lady showered smiles over the footlights at her avowed admirers, whilst contemptuously ignoring those who sported her rival's colours. One silly youth, to testify to his admiration for Emily Duncan, actually had white kid gloves with black fingers, specially manufactured for him. He was, we hope, repaid for his outlay by extra smiles from his enchantress.
Traces of the witty early nineteenth century still lingered into the "seventies," "eighties," and "nineties." Lady Constance Leslie, who is still living, and the late Lady Cork were almost the last descendants of the brilliant wits of Sydney Smith and Theodore Hook's days. The hurry of modern life, and the tendency of the age to scratch the surface of things only, are not favourable to the development of this type of keen intellect, which was based on a thorough knowledge of the English classics, and on such a high level of culture as modern trouble-hating women could but seldom hope to attain. Time and time again I have asked Lady Cork for the origin of some quotation. She invariably gave it me at once, usually quoting some lines of the context at the same time. When I complimented her on her wonderful knowledge of English literature of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, she answered, "In my young days we studied the 'Belles Lettres'; modern women only study 'Belle's Letters,'" an allusion to a weekly summary of social events then appearing in the World under that title, a chronicle voraciously devoured by thousands of women. When the early prejudice against railways was alluded to by some one who recalled the storms of protest that the conveyance of the Duke of Sussex's body by train to Windsor for burial provoked, as being derogatory to the dignity of a Royal Duke, it was Lady Cork who rapped out, "I presume in those days, a novel apposition of the quick and the dead." A certain peer was remarkable alike for his extreme parsimony and his unusual plainness of face. His wife shared these characteristics, both facial and temperamental, to the full, and yet this childless, unprepossessing and eminently economical couple were absolutely wrapped up in one another; after his death she only lingered on for three months. Some one commenting on this, said, "They were certainly the stingiest and probably the ugliest couple in England, yet their devotion to each other was very beautiful. They could neither of them bear to part with anything, not even with each other. After his death she was like a watch that had lost its mainspring." "Surely," flashed Lady Constance Leslie, "more like a vessel which had lost her auxiliary screw." The main characteristic of both Lady Cork and Lady Constance Leslie's humour was its lightning speed. It is superfluous to add, with these quick-witted ladies it was never necessary to EXPLAIN anything, as it is to the majority of English people; they understood before you had finished saying it.