Of all the theatrical performances, I enjoyed most “The Sorcerer”, the first of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas. Gilbert was already a household word with us through our devotion to his “Bab Ballads.” His play, “Pygmalion and Galatea”, had already made a hit, but it was through his partnership with Arthur Sullivan that he won his great popularity. Those were the palmy days of light opera. Offenbach was still sung all over the world, and the vogue for the Gilbert and Sullivan operas in all the English-speaking countries was something phenomenal. These melodious operettas, bubbling over with clean, wholesome English fun, deserved all the popularity they enjoyed. To this day I never miss an opportunity of hearing the revivals that from time to time take place. The latest of these, a performance of “Pinafore” given at Newport, by the American sailors during the Great War, gave me hardly less pleasure than the original production I witnessed on my second visit to London in 1878.
Considering how much of fun there was during my first London season, I remember with some surprise how often we went to church. I heard some admirable sermons from Dean Vaughan at the church of the Temple, and have a confused memory of having stayed and dined with the Templars in a great hall, upon mighty roasts of beef under vast pewter covers, gooseberry fool, and enormous strawberries. We often went to service at Westminster Abbey to hear Dean Stanley preach. The beauty of his English was like the architecture of a Doric temple. He had a fine intellectual head and a face of great power and sweetness. We were at his house more than once: we met there Mr. Seeley, the author of “Ecce Homo”, a book published anonymously a few years before, which had made a deep impression. We also heard Moncure Conway and Stopford Brooke. Conway, who was an American, was then preaching for the South Place Religious Society. He was an old friend, and I remembered him well at Green Peace. Though he and my mother did not agree on matters theological, they were good friends, and we went several times to his house in Hammersmith. He was a large, striking-looking man, with a great head and an assertive personality: very aggressive both in and out of the pulpit, but warm-hearted and stimulating. He did not like to be classed with Christians, though he had started as a Methodist minister and later joined the Unitarians. His congregation were plain people, many of them working men of socialistic tendencies.
Stopford Brooke was at this time the most popular of the liberal Church of England preachers. To hear him it was necessary to go very early to secure a seat. The service was low church in character, and had a vested choir of girl choristers. Stopford Brooke’s English was more vigorous and not quite so silvery as Dean Stanley’s; his doctrine was warm, human, Christian. These three men, Dean Stanley, Stopford Brooke, and Moncure Conway, represented the three degrees of liberal religious thought in England. The Dean lived and died a dignitary of the established church. Of Stopford Brooke Unitarians said what they said about Phillips Brooks, “He belongs with us.” Shortly after Brooke himself realized where he belonged, left the Church of England and became a Unitarian.
We heard a service at the Greek Church, where the dark papa, in his gorgeous white satin robes embroidered with gold, reminded me of my brother-in-law, Anagnos. One Saturday morning we went to the Hebrew Synagogue, places being reserved for us in the women’s gallery. The men put on a sort of shawl as they entered the pews and kept their hats on through the service. Their opening prayer ran somewhat in this fashion:
“I thank thee, Oh, God, that thou hast not made me a woman!”
We met that remarkable old man, Sir Moses Montefiori, at the Rothschilds’. He talked a great deal with my mother of his plan for repatriating the Hebrews in Jerusalem. I was rather afraid of him and of Sir Anthony, who was, I think, his brother-in-law. While they were extremely courteous in their manner, I was aware of a certain mental attitude that I resented; it was so subtle that to-day I despair of analyzing it, but it seemed to me that as they spoke to me they were repeating silently that contemptuous prayer of the Synagogue.
One of the pleasantest houses where we were made to feel at home was that of the Lyulph Stanleys in Harley Street. Mr. Stanley had lately married Maisie, the beautiful daughter of Sir Lothian Bell, the great ironmaster. They had been at our house in America on their wedding journey, and Mr. Stanley at an earlier visit had foregathered with my mother, who had a great esteem and affection for him. The Stanleys, one of the great Liberal families, have always been considered exceptionally original and clever. Our friend Lyulph had already begun his lifelong fight for higher education, and was the leading member of the London School Board, on which he served for more than twenty laborious years. His sister, Lady Amberley, had very advanced views for those days: his elder brother had settled in Constantinople and taken so thoroughly to the ways of that place that it was said he had embraced the religion of Islam. A third brother, Algernon, soon after this became a priest of the Roman Church. He was handsome, with the typical Stanley beauty,—golden hair and beard, delicate rose and white skin, brilliant blue eyes. I admired Algernon’s appearance very much, and one day was startled at meeting him shorn of his golden beard and locks, wearing the dress of a Catholic priest.
“How did your mother feel about your conversion?” my mother asked him.
“I really don’t know,” was the answer. “With one child an atheist and another a Mohammedan, she ought to be pleased to have at least one Christian in her family!”
Rosamond Stanley (Lady Carlisle) was the sister of Lyulph and Algernon Stanley. The last time I was in England our friend Lyulph had succeeded to the title of Lord Stanley, but I remember him best in those early days when we were all young.