MR PLOWDEN. From an unpublished sketch. 1910.
CHAPTER X
THE CHURCH AND THE VARSITIES—PARSONS OF MANY CREEDS AND DENOMINATIONS
Dean Wellesley.—Dr. James Sewell.—Canon Ainger.—Lord Torrington.—Dr. Goodford.—Dr. Welldon.—Dr. Walker.—The Van Beers' Supper.—The Bishop of Lichfield.—Rev. R. J. Campbell.—Cardinal Vaughan.—Dr. Benson, Archbishop of Canterbury.—Dr. Armitage Robinson.—Varsity athletes.—Etherington-Smith.—John Loraine Baldwin.—Ranjitsinhji.—Mr. Muttlebury.—Mr. Rudy Lehmann.
Parsons of different creeds and denominations have been represented in Vanity Fair from time to time—Anglicans, Romans, Wesleyans, Congregationalists and others. My method with a clerical subject is to go to his church and watch him in the pulpit, but it is not always easy to catch a Bishop, because he has not, so to speak, a home of his own. I remember making an excursion to St. Botolph's to study the Bishop of Kensington, only to find he was not preaching there that day but at St. George's, Camden Hill. Back west I went and after the sermon I waited outside the vestry door. Presently the Bishop came out, bag in hand, and walked down the hill. I hastened on ahead with the intention of doubling back and securing a good near view, but he turned into the Tube Station. I followed and secured a seat opposite him, and made the mental notes which resulted in the cartoon which was published very shortly afterwards in Vanity Fair.
Now and again I have been put to considerable trouble in stalking my man. I remember particularly well the peculiar circumstances under which I studied Dean Wellesley of Windsor, who was rather an eccentric looking old gentleman. I was staying at Windsor, in the Winchester Tower, with some friends who were officially connected with the Castle, and I learned that my best chance of seeing the Dean would be in the early morning when he was in the habit of taking a constitutional around the Round Tower about 7.30 a.m. I welcomed the opportunity, rose early and went out. The Dean was already on the scene pacing to and fro in the snow, supporting himself by an umbrella in one hand and a walking-stick in the other. I did not follow him in an obtrusive manner, but after pacing round two or three times, I must have attracted his attention, for I feel sure he had never seen any other individual taking such an odd constitutional at that hour. But of course he could not suspect my object. As he walked, I looked at him carefully, and especially observed his hat which, I had been informed, would be turned down according to the direction of the wind. On this occasion, it was turned up in front, although I am sure that in walking round the Tower he must have been kept busy on such a cold and windy morning. In due time the caricature (which I always regard as one of my best) was published. Through the medium of my father, who was a very old friend of the Dean, I heard that he was very annoyed at the caricature.
Some time after, I was walking with my father in the High Street at Windsor when we met the Dean!