To the world at large, Wentworth Dilke was a vastly more important person than the old antiquary and scholar. After his services in organizing the Great Exhibition of 1851, he declined a knighthood and rewards in money; but he accepted from the French Government a gift of Sèvres china; from the King of Saxony, the Collar of the Order of Albertus Animosus; from the King of Sweden and from the Prince Consort, medals; and from Queen Victoria, a bracelet for his wife. These remained among the treasures of 76, Sloane Street. But he acquired something far more important in the establishment of friendly relations with persons of mark and influence all over the Continent; for these relations were destined to be developed by Charles Dilke, then a pretty-mannered boy, who was taken everywhere, and saw, for instance, in 1851, the Duke of Wellington walk through the Exhibition buildings on a day when more than a hundred thousand people were present. He could remember how the Duke's 'shrivelled little form' and 'white ducks' 'disappeared in the throng which almost crushed him to death' before the police could effect his rescue.
Wentworth Dilke's association in the Prince Consort's most cherished schemes had brought him on a footing of friendship with the Royal Family; and on July 25th, 1851, his wife wrote that the Queen had come over and talked to her in the Exhibition ground. Long afterwards, when the pretty- mannered boy had grown into a Radical, who avowed his theoretical preference for republican institutions, Queen Victoria said that "she remembered having stroked his head, and supposed she had stroked it the wrong way."
[Illustration: Sir Charles as a child from the miniature by Fanny Corbin.]
CHAPTER II
EDUCATION
The earliest memory that Sir Charles Dilke could date was 'of April 10th, 1848, when the Chartist meeting led to military preparations, during which I' (a boy in his fifth year) 'saw the Duke of Wellington riding through the street, attended by his staff, but all in plain clothes.' In 1850 'No Popery chalked on the walls attracted my attention, but failed to excite my interest'; he was not of an age to be troubled by the appointment of Dr. Wiseman to be Archbishop of Westminster. In 1851 he was taken to a meeting to hear Kossuth.
From this year—1851—date the earliest letters preserved in the series of thirty-four boxes which contain the sortings of his vast correspondence. There is a childish scrap to his grandfather, and a long letter from the grandfather to him written from Dublin, which lovingly conjures up a picture of the interior at Sloane Street, with 'Cousin' (Miss Folkard) stirring the fire, 'Charley-boy' settling down his head on his mother's lap, and 'grandmamma' (his mother's mother, Mrs. Chatfield) sitting in the chimney-corner.
For the year 1852 there are no letters to the boy; it was the time of his mother's failing health, and he was journeying with his grandfather all over England, 'reading Shakespeare, and studying church architecture, especially Norman.' It was a delightful way of learning history for a quick child of nine:
'We followed Charles II. in his flight, and visited every spot that has ever been mentioned in connection with his escape—a pilgrimage which took me among other places to my future constituency of the Forest of Dean. We went to every English cathedral, and when my grandfather was at work upon his Pope investigations, saw every place which was connected with the history of the Carylls.' [Footnote: John Caryll suggested to Pope the idea of the "Rape of the Look"; and many of the poet's letters were written to his son, a younger John Caryll. They were an ancient and distinguished Roman Catholic family, devoted partisans of, and centres of correspondence with, the exiled Stuarts.]
Mr. Dilke combined his desire to instruct the child with the frankest interest in his play. Here, for instance, is a letter to Charles of October 15th, 1853: