When we arrived in Italy some of our English and American friends said, “You will find Rome dreadfully changed!”
Having known it in the seventies, I welcomed the changes that had brought comfort and health to the modern capital. The old Rome was all there, if you only knew how to look for it!
King Umberto, whom I had seen take the oath of office sixteen years before, reigned at the Quirinal with Queen Margherita, and Leo the Thirteenth at the Vatican. Francesco Crispi, the last of the great figures of the Risorgimento, was prime minister and ruled Italy with a firm hand, while Cardinal Rampolla, strong and astute, was the Pope’s Secretary of State.
Mr. Wayne MacVeagh was American ambassador and Larz Anderson first secretary of embassy. The British Embassy in the old Villa Torlonia close by the Porta Pia was a far more attractive meeting place than the American. We had pleasant relations with both American and English diplomats; of the latter I remember most distinctly Lord Currie, who came to Rome from Constantinople. I had known Lady Currie in London when she was Mrs. Singleton, writing under the pseudonym of Violet Fane.
I first met her at a dinner given for my mother by Edmund Yates at the Star and Garter at Richmond. She was gay and handsome then, and I remember her keeping up a brilliant running fire of talk with Louis Jennings and W. H. Mallock. She was graver now, but kept the charm that had made her one of the most sought after women in London.
She still wrote occasionally and was always an omnivorous reader. She often read books for her busy husband. A propos of this, she told me a story of their Constantinople days. Lord Currie had given her a life of the Sultan, recently published in England. Was it interesting? he asked her one day. “Yes,” she said, “but”—and got no further, “people of importance” interrupting. They dined that night with the Sultan; during the dinner the conversation flagging, Lord Currie had a happy inspiration. “Sire,” he said, “an interesting book has just appeared about yourself!” Lady Currie made a frantic effort to reach his foot under the table.
“Ah!” said the Sultan. “I should like to see that book!”
“You shall have my copy!” exclaimed the Ambassador.
The Sultan’s parting words were, “I will send for the book in the morning.” When they were in the carriage Lady Currie said to her husband:
“The book you recommended to the Sultan opens with this sentence, ‘A more loathsome toad than the Sultan Abdul Hamid I never saw!’”