[[5]] "'Tis said that when upon a rocky shore The salt sea billows break with muffled roar,
And, launched in mad career, the thundering wave
Leaps booming through the weedy ocean cave;
Each tenth is grander than the nine before.
And breaks with tenfold thunder on the shore.
Alas! it is so on the sounding sea;
But so, O England, it is not with thee!
Thy decuman is broken on the shore:
A peer to him shall lave thee never more!"
The text of the whole poem is given in [Appendix I].
[[6]] The particulars of this whimsical incident in Bute's university career have been kindly furnished by Mr. Algernon Turnor, C.B., who was his contemporary at Christ Church. It was he who rode—though not to victory—the steeplechaser mentioned in the text. Mr. Turner married in 1880 Lady Henrietta Stewart, one of Bute's early playmates and companions at Galloway House.
[[7]] Eugene Vicomte de Vogüé, whom Bute wrongly styles "Comte" in his diary, was a few months his junior. One of the most brilliant and charming men of his generation, he was in turn soldier, diplomatist, politician, and littérateur. He became a member of the Academy in 1888 and died in 1910. He published books and articles on a great variety of subjects, all marked with the profoundly religious feeling which characterised him.
CHAPTER III
RELIGIOUS INQUIRIES—RECEPTION POSTPONED—COMING OF AGE
1867, 1868
A well-meaning person thought well to compile and publish, some years ago, a volume in which a few distinguished Roman Catholics, and a great number of mediocrities, were invited to describe the process and motives which led them "to abandon" (as some cynic once expressed it) "the errors of the Church of England for those of the Church of Rome." Lord Bute, who was among the many more or less eminent people who received and declined invitations to contribute to this symposium, was certainly the last man likely to consent to recount his own religious experiences for the benefit of a curious public. It is, therefore, all the more interesting that in a copy of the book above referred to, belonging to one of his most intimate friends,[[1]] was preserved a memorandum in Bute's writing, which throws an interesting light on some, at least, of the causes which were contributory to his own submission to the Roman Church.