Chapter IV: Front Matter (4)

“That I am quite unable to do,” said the Student.

“It is,” said the Devil, “a series of satirical remarks upon the frailties and follies of others--and yet he is a journalist!”

The Death of the Comic Author

A Comic Author of deserved repute was lodging at the beginning of this month in a house with broken windows, in a court off the Gray’s Inn Road.

He had undertaken to produce a piece of Humorous Fiction to the length of 75,000 words.

The Comic Author, a man of experience (for this was his forty-seventh book), had sat down to begin his task. He calculated how long it would last him. He was good for 1500 words a day, if they were short words, and even when doom or accident compelled him to the use of long ones he could manage from 1163 to 1247.

The specification was lucid and simple. There was to be nothing in the work that could offend the tenderness of the patriot nor the ease of good manners, let alone the canons of decency and right living. A powerful love interest which he was compelled under Clause VII of his contract to introduce immediately after each of the wittiest passages had been deftly woven into the fabric, and (as was clearly laid down in Clause IX) no matter already published might appear in those virgin pages. If any did so, be sure it was so veiled by the tranposition of phrases and other slight changes of manner as to escape the publisher’s eye.

So far so good. But upon the 13th of August, a day of great beauty, but of excessive heat, the Comic Author, sitting at his desk, was struck by Apollo, the God and patron of literary men.

It was the custom of the Comic Author, who was a teetotaler and a vegetarian, to wear a soft shirt entirely made of wool and devoid of a collar, which ornament, he was assured by Members of the Faculty, exercised a prejudicial effect upon the health. It was equally his custom to compose his famous periods with his back turned to the light. This habit he had also adopted at the dictation of the Faculty, who had proved to him beyond possibility of refutation that the human eye is damaged by nothing more than by reading or writing with one’s face towards the window. With his back, therefore, to the window in his room (it was unbroken), it was the Comic Artist’s wont to sit at a plain and dirty small deal table and express his mind upon paper, his head reposing upon his left hand, his fountain pen grasped firmly in his right, and his lips and tongue following the movement of his nib as it slowly crawled over the page before him.

The Comic Author (again under the impulse of the Faculty) kept his hair cut short at the back; to cut it short all over was more than his profession would allow. You have, then, the Comic Author sitting at his desk with his back to the unbroken window, his neck exposed from the shortness of hair and the absence of collar, under the brilliant light of the 13th of August.

A fourth condition must now be considered: by some physical action never properly explained, glass, though it may act as a screen to radiant heat, will also store and intensify the action of sunlight. So that anything placed immediately beneath it upon a bright day will (it is notorious) suffer or enjoy an effect of heat far greater than that discoverable upon its outer side. The common greenhouse is a proof of this. The Comic Author was therefore in a situation to receive the full power of Apollo. It took the form of a sunstroke, and with his story uncompleted, nay, in the midst of an unfinished phrase, he fell helpless.

His Landlady, summoning a neighbour to her aid (for the charwoman never stayed after ten o’clock, and it was already noon), dragged him to his room and sent for the parish doctor, who, after a brief examination of the patient, declared him to be in some danger; but the poor fellow was not so far gone as to forget his obligations, and he murmured a few words which, after some difficulty, they understood to be the address of the publisher whom he would not for worlds have disappointed. Imagining this address to be in some way connected with a pecuniary advantage to herself, the Landlady sent to it immediate word of his accident, and within half an hour a motor-car of surpassing brilliance and immense power was purring at the door. From this vehicle descended in a gentlemanly but commanding manner One who seemed far too great for the humble lodging which he entered. And the Doctor, leaving his patient for a moment, was pleased to receive the visitor in a lower room, while the Landlady, who was also interested in the event, listened with due courtesy in the passage without.

The Publisher (for it was he) learned with increasing concern the desperate position of the Comic Author, and while he was naturally chiefly concerned with the financial loss the little accident might involve, it should be remembered to his credit that he made inquiries as to the state of the patient and even asked whether he suffered physical pain. Upon hearing that the Comic Author, though fuddled by cerebral congestion, did undoubtedly suffer the Visitor’s brow perceptibly darkened; he pointed out to the Doctor that if this accident had but happened ten days later it would have had consequences much less serious to himself.

The Doctor was eager to point out that the fault was none of his. He had come the moment he had heard of the case, and, moreover, sunstroke was a disease which betrayed itself by no premonitory symptoms. He assured the Publisher that if the Comic Author’s survival could in any way be of service to the firm he would do everything in his power to save his life.

The Publisher replied, a little testily, that the value of the Comic Author’s survival would entirely depend upon the talent remaining to him after his recovery, and pointed out what the Doctor had overlooked, that a sensational death, if it received due recognition from the Press, often caused the works of the deceased to sell for a week or more with exceptional rapidity.

He next asked whether the Comic Author had not left manuscripts, and the Landlady was pleased to bring him not only all that lay upon the deal table, but much more beside, and all his private correspondence as well, which she found where she had often perused it, in various receptacles of her lodger’s room.

The Publisher upon receiving these seemed to feel his position less acutely, and sending the sheets out at once to his secretary in the car (with instructions that those stories or sketches hitherto unpublished should be carefully noted) he resumed his conversation with the medical man. He was first careful to ask how long cases of this sort when they proved fatal commonly endured, and expressed some relief at hearing that certain benignant exceptions had lingered for several days. He was further assured that lucid intervals might be counted on, and in general he discovered that the lines upon which the story had been intended to proceed might be recovered from the lips of the dying man before he should exchange the warm and active existence of this world for the Unknown Beyond.

He re-entered his motor-car, therefore, with a much lighter heart, promising to send an Expert Stenographer who should take down the last and necessary instructions from the lips of Genius. The motor-car then left that court off the Gray’s Inn Road where the tragedy was in progress, and swept westward to the larger atmosphere of St. James’s.

At this point again, when the activity and decision of one master brain seemed to have saved all, Fate intervened. The Expert Stenographer, having lacked regular employment for nearly eighteen weeks, was so overjoyed at learning the news and the price attached to his immediate services, that he could not resist cheerful refreshment and conversation with friends in celebration of the occasion. He reached the Gray’s Inn Road, therefore, somewhat late in the day; he was further delayed by a difficulty in discovering the house with broken windows which had been indicated to him, and when he entered it was to receive the unwelcome news that the Comic Author was dead.

The Doctor, whose duties had already for some hours called him to other scenes where it was his blessed mission to alleviate human suffering, was not present to confirm the sad event, and the Expert Stenographer, who could not believe that he had been baulked of so unexpected a piece of fortune, insisted upon proof which the Landlady was unable to afford. He even sat for some few moments by the side of the Poor Lifeless Clay in the vain hope that some further indication as to the general trend of the book might fall from the now nescient lips. But they were dumb.

How many consequent misfortunes depended upon this untoward accident the reader may easily guess. The Landlady, to whom the Comic Author had owed thirty shillings for a month’s rent and service, was in a very natural anxiety for some days, an anxiety which was increased by the discovery that her former lodger had no friends, while his few relatives seemed each to have, in their own small way, claims against him of a pecuniary nature.

His dress clothes, upon which she had confidently counted, turned out to belong to a costumier of the neighbourhood, who loudly complained that he had had no notice of this intempestive demise, and was at least a sovereign out of pocket by so awkward a conjunction; nor was he appreciably relieved when it was pointed out to him that the suit would at least carry no contagious disease.

The Stenographer, as I have already indicated, lost the remuneration dependent upon his Expert Services, and was further at the charge of the refreshment which he had foolishly consumed in anticipation of that gain.

The Doctor, indeed, was not disappointed, for he had expected nothing, but by far the worst case was that of the generous and wealthy man who had been at all the risk of advertising, partly printing, and already ordering the binding of the work which he now found himself at a loss to produce.

There is no moral to this simple story: it is one of the many tragedies which daily occur in this great city, and from what I know of the Comic Author’s character, he would have been the last to have inflicted so much discomfort had it in any way depended upon his own volition; but these things are beyond human ordinance.

On certain Manners and Customs

I was greatly interested in the method of government which I discovered to obtain in the Empire of Monomotapa during my last visit there. I say “during my last visit” because although, as everyone knows, I have repeatedly travelled in the more distant provinces of that State, I had never spent any time to speak of in the capital until I delayed there last month for the purpose of visiting a friend of mine who is one of the State Assessors. He was good enough to explain to me many details of their Constitution which I had not yet grasped, and I conceive it--now that I have a full comprehension of it--to be as wise a method of governing as it is a successful one.

I must first put before the reader the elements of the matter. Every citizen in Monomotapa takes a certain fixed rank in the State; for the inhabitants of that genial clime have at once too much common sense and too strict a training to talk nonsense about equality or any other similar metaphysical whimsey. Every man, therefore, can precisely tell where he stands in relation to his fellows, and all those heart-burnings and jealousies which are the bane of other States are by this simple method at once exorcised. Moreover, the method by which a man’s exact place is determined is simplicity itself, for it reposes upon his yearly revenue; and there is a gradually ascending scale from the poorest, whose revenue may not amount from all sources to more than 40 Tepas a month, to the Supreme Council, the wealthier members of which may have as much as 10,000,000 Tepas a month, or even more. There is but one drawback to this admirably practical and straightforward way of ordering the State, which is that by a very ancient article of their religion the Monomotapians are each forbidden to disclose to others what the state of their fortunes may be. It is the height of impertinence in any man, even a brother, to put questions upon the matter; all documents illuminating it are kept strictly secret, and though religious vows and binding oaths are very much disliked among this people, yet one is rigidly observed, which is that forbidding the divulgence by a bank of the sums of money entrusted to it by its clients. Certain rash spirits have indeed proposed to destroy the anomaly and either to make some other standard arrange the order of society (which is unthinkable) or else to allow questions of money to be freely debated, and the incomes of all to be matter of public comment.

Now, like many excellent and rational attempts at religious or social reform, these propositions must wholly fail in practice. As for setting up some other standard than that of wealth by which to decide the importance of one’s fellow citizens, the Monomotapians very properly regard such a proposal as fantastic to the point of buffoonery. Nor, to do them justice, do those who propose the scheme seriously intend this part of it. They rather put it forward to emphasise the second half of their programme, which has much more to be said for it. But here a difficulty arises of a sort that often upsets the calculations of idealists, namely, that however much you change the laws you can with more difficulty change the customs of the people, and though you might compel all banking accounts to be audited, or even insist upon every man making a public return of his income, yet it is certain that the general opinion upon this matter would result, in practice, in much the same state of affairs as they now have. Men would devise some other system than that of banks; their returns would be false, and there would be a sort of general unconscious conspiracy among all to support fraud in this matter.

My host next explained to me the manner in which laws are made among the Monomotapians and the manner in which they are administered. It seems that by a fundamental rule of their Constitution no law may be passed in less than twenty-five years, unless it can be proved to have its origin in terror.

If indeed those who are the wealthiest and therefore the most important in the State can prove to the satisfaction of all that they have gone blind with panic, then indeed the passage of a law is permitted even in a few hours. Thus, when a certain number of young gentlemen had so far forgotten their good breeding as to torture by way of sport considerable numbers of the poorer classes, one of these in his turn, oblivious to the rules of polite behaviour, so far forgot himself as to strike his young master in the face. It was under these circumstances, when the greater part of the governing classes had fled abroad, or were closely locked in behind their doors, that the “Tortures Restrictions Bill” was passed; but this haste was even then regarded as somewhat indecent, and it would have been thought more honourable to have discussed the matter for at least two days. Nominally, however, affairs of real importance cannot be legislated upon, as I have said, in less than twenty-five years. It is customary for the Monomotapians first to wait until some neighbouring State has attempted a particular reform. When that reform has been working for some years, if it be successful in its working, the wealthier Monomotapians begin to talk about it according to set rules. And it is again a fundamental point in their Constitution that one-half of those who so debate must be for, the other half against the proposed change. The discussion is carried on by some seventy or eighty men, of whom two-thirds at least must possess a fortune of at least 1000 Tepas a month, but it is customary to mix among them one or two men of exceptional poverty, as this is imagined in some way or other to please the Gods. The middle class, on account of their intolerable habit of referring to learned books and to the results of their travel, are very properly excluded. These, then, debate for a term of years, and when they are weary of it they will very often begin to debate again. Meanwhile the institution or the reform upon which their discussion has turned will have taken root in those foreign countries which it is their pride to copy, and they can at last be certain that in following suit Monomotapa will have nothing to lose. When all this is decided a certain number of men are set apart, the poorer of whom are given a sum of money and the wealthier certain titles on condition that they vote in favour of the change; while another body of men are set apart and rewarded in a precisely similar manner for giving a pledge of the opposite sort. But great care is taken that the first body shall be slightly larger than the second, for by an unexplained decision of their priests the force of a law depends upon the margin between the two bodies so chosen. These electors once named are put into an exceedingly narrow passage in which it would be difficult for any very stout person to move at all. At the end of the passage doors still narrower open upon the street, the door upon the left being used to record affirmative, that upon the right negative votes. The whole mass, which consists of near a thousand men, is then kindly but firmly pushed by Assistants of the King (as they are called) until its last member has been squeezed through one of the two doors. This process is immensely popular among the Monomotapians, who will gather in crowds to cheer the wretched men whom avarice or ambition has devoted to so pleasant a task. And when they have come out, covered with sweat and perhaps permanently affected in their hearts by the ordeal, they are very often granted civic honours by their fellow-townsmen over and above the sums of money or titles which they have already received. With such frenzied delight do the Monomotapians regard this singular practice that even women have lately petitioned to be permitted to join in the scrimmage. This they will undoubtedly be granted in cases where they can prove a certain wealth, for, indeed, there is no reason why an exercise of this sort should be confined to one sex. But it is understood that a certain part of the women of Monomotapia, many of them also wealthy, are willing to pay money to prevent such a result, and if this indeed be the case a very curious situation, almost unknown in the annals of Monomotapia, will arise; for since all government is in the hands of the rich, it is necessary that the rich should act together in serious affairs of State. And what on earth will happen when one section of the wealthy, whether men or women, are opposed to the actions of another section, it would indeed be difficult to determine. Nor are the older men and the more experienced without grave misgivings as to the issue of such an unprecedented conflict.

I cannot conclude without telling you briefly the manner in which their Kings are elected, for it reflects in every detail at once the originality and the wisdom of this people.

There are in Monomotapa some three or four hundred public halls in which is conducted the national sport, which consists in competitions between well-known talkers as to who can talk the longest without exhaustion, and it rapidly becomes known, through well-developed agencies of information as well as by public repute, which individuals have attained to the greatest proficiency in this regard. Sometimes in the remotest province will arise a particular star, but more often it is in the Metropolis or its neighbourhood that your really great talkers can be found; a man in the tradition of that great King of the last century who upon one occasion talked the clock round and was in reward for that feat permitted to hold the Kingship for three terms in succession.

When by a process of elimination the two strongest talkers have been discovered, they are brought to the capital, set up upon a stage before a vast audience of Assessors (of which my friend, as I have told you, was one), and begin talking one against the other with great rapidity, starting at a signal made by an official who is paid for this duty a very high salary indeed. It may well be imagined that the interest in the struggle grows keen after the first few hours have passed. The panting breath, the discoloured cheeks, the drooping attitude of either competitor, call forth cheers of encouragement from his supporters and even murmurs of sympathy from his numerous judges. At last, it may be in the sixth or the seventh hour, one of the two goes groggy--if I may so express myself--he falters in his words, perhaps repeats himself, passes his hand to his forehead or takes a drink of gin (which, from its resemblance to water, is greatly favoured in these contests). Such signals of distress are the beginning of the end. His successful rival, straining himself to one last effort, will pour out a great string of sentences of an approved pattern, dealing as a rule with the glories and virtues of those who have listened to him, of their ancestry, and their hold upon the Monomotapian State, and as the defeated competitor falls lifeless to the floor this successful fellow is crowned amid the applause of the vast assembly. I was at the pains to ask whether it was necessary that these long harangues should make sense, for it seemed to me that this added labour would very materially handicap many men who might otherwise possess all the physical requirements of victory, and I was free to add that it would seem to me, at least, as a foreigner, very foolish to weigh down some fine athlete worthy of the Crown by demanding of him the rare characteristics of the pedant. I was relieved to hear that there was no obligation as to the choice of words used or the order in which they were to be pronounced, saving that they must be words in the vulgar tongue. But it seems, oddly enough, that the trainers in this sport after generations of experience have discovered that the competitors actually suffer less fatigue if they will repeat certain set and ritual phrases than if they take refuge in mere gibberish, just as men marching in step are said to suffer less fatigue than men marching at ease. So at least I was assured, but my insufficient acquaintance with the Monomotapian tongue forbade me to make certain upon the matter.

The Statesman

“HÔTEL DE FERRAS, PARIS, _August 1, 1846_.

“My dear Father,--I got in here last night, after a very painful and tiresome journey, at eleven o’clock. At least it was eleven o’clock by Calais time, but they are so careless in this country about their clocks that it would be very difficult to say what the right time really was were I not able to consult the excellent chronometer which you and Mamma were so kind as to give me after my success in the Schools at Oxford this summer. I confess to the childishness of having rung the chimes in it five or six times during the night to while away the tedium of the journey in the Diligence from Beauvais. Beauvais contains a really remarkable cathedral, but it is unfinished. I notice, indeed, that many of the buildings undertaken by the French remain in an incomplete condition. The Louvre, for instance (which is so near this hotel, and the roofs of which I can see from my window), would be a really fine building if it were completed, but this has never been done, and the total effect is very distressing. I fancy it is the numerous wars, in which the unhappy people have been engaged at the caprice of their rulers, which have led to such deplorable inconsequence. You have often warned me not to judge rashly upon a first impression, but I confess the people seem to me terribly poverty-stricken, especially in the country districts, where the children may often be seen hobbling about in rough _wooden_ shoes, without stockings to their feet. I say no more. I hope, dear Papa, that when Parliament meets I shall be returned from Italy, and that I shall be able to follow your action in the House of Commons. You know how ardently I attend to the great struggle for Free Trade, to the attainment of which, as of every form of Righteousness, you have ever trained my early endeavours.

“I am, your affectionate son,

“JO. BILSTED.”

“HÔTEL DE FERRAS, _January 15, 1853_.

“My dear Julia,--I write you a hurried note to tell you that I have left behind me, at Number Eleven, my _second beaver hat_. It is in the hatbox in the white cupboard on the landing outside the nursery door. Do not send anything else with it, as you were imprudent enough to do last time I asked you to despatch luggage; the Customs are very particular, and it is important for me just now, amid all these political troubles, not to have what the French call ‘histoires.’ I have really nothing to tell you more as to the condition of affairs, nor anything to add to the brief remarks in my last letter. Were I not connected by business ties with the Continent nothing should tempt me to this kind of journey again. The train service is ridiculously slow, and there is a feeling of distress and ill-ease wherever one goes. It is truly amazing to me that any people, however stunted by centuries of oppression, should tolerate the form of government which has been recently set up by brute force in this unhappy country! Meanwhile, though everyone discusses politics, nothing is _done_, and the practical things of life are wholly neglected. The streets still remain the narrow, ill-lit thoroughfares which would be a disgrace to a small English provincial town, and the Army, so far as any civilian can judge, is worthless. The men slouch about with their hands in their pockets; the Cavalry sit their horses very badly; and even the escort of the ‘Emperor’ would look supremely ridiculous in any other surroundings. I have little doubt that if horse racing were more thoroughly developed the Equine Race would improve. As it is, the horses here are deplorable. I hope to persuade M. Behrens, who is one of the few sensible and clear-sighted men I have met during this visit, to accept our proposals, and I will write you further on the matter.

“Your affectionate husband,

“JO. BILSTED.

“P.S.--I somewhat regret that you have accepted the invitation to the Children’s Party. However, I never interfere with you in these matters. I must, however, positively forbid your taking little Charles, who, though he is eldest, suffers, I fear, from a weak heart, inherited from your dear mother. I hope to return this day fortnight.”

“HÔTEL DE FERRAS, _July 15, 1870_.

“My dear Julia,--It was a matter of great regret to me that you should have been compelled to leave Paris a few days before myself; but I shall follow to-morrow, and hope to be at Number Eleven by Thursday at the latest. You will then have learned the terrible truth that war has been finally declared. Nothing could have more deeply _im_pressed and _op_pressed me at the same time. The overwhelming military power which in better hands and under a proper guidance might have been turned to such noble uses is to be hurled against the insecure combination of German States which have recently been struggling, perfectly rightly in my opinion, to become One Great Nation; for I make no doubt that the lesser States will throw in their lot with Prussia: a menace to one is a menace to all. I write from the bottom of my heart (my dear Julia), when I say that I am convinced that after the first triumphs of this Man of Blood our own Government will speak with no uncertain voice, and will defend the new German people against the aggressor. It was sufficiently intolerable that his Italian policy should have been framed before our eyes, without intervention, and that the unity of that ancient land should be deferred through his insolence. I have not borne to visit Rome since the hateful presence of a foreign garrison was established there. I will even go so far (perhaps against your own better judgment) as to raise the matter in Parliament, but I greatly fear that the House will not be sitting when the most drastic action is needed. However, I repeat what I have said; I am confident in the ultimate Righteousness of our intervention. I am therefore confident that we shall not allow the further expansion of this Military Policy.

“As I write the garish, over-lit façades of this luxurious Babylon, its broad, straight streets, with their monotonous vulgar splendour, and the swarms of the military all round, fill me with foreboding. It would be a terrible thing if this very negation of True Civilisation and Religion were to triumph, and I am certain that unless we speak boldly we ourselves shall be the next victim. But we _shall_ speak boldly.... My faith is firm.

“Your affectionate husband,

“JO. BILSTED.

“P.S.--I am glad that Charles has got through his examination successfully. I hope he clearly understands that I have no intention of letting him be returned for Pensbury until a year has elapsed.”

“HÔTEL DE FERRAS, _April 1, 1886_.

“My dear Charles,--It was a filial thought in you to send a letter which would reach me upon my sixtieth birthday, and believe me that, speaking as your father, I am not insensible to it.

“I wish you could come and see your mother and me if only for a few hours, but I know that your Parliamentary duties are heavier than ever; indeed, life in the House of Commons is not what it used to be! In my time it was often called ‘the best club in Europe.’ Alas, no one can say that now! Meanwhile your mother and I are very happy pottering about our old haunts in Paris; but you have no idea, my dear Charles, how changed it all is! You can, of course, remember the Second Empire as a child, but to your mother and me, who were so intimate with Paris during its most brilliant period, there is something tragic in the sight of this great capital since the awful chastisement of fifteen years ago. We ought not, of course, to judge foreign nations too harshly, but after no inconsiderable experience of Parliamentary life I cannot but have the most gloomy forebodings as to the future of this nation. There seems no settled policy of any kind. Yesterday I attended a debate in the Chamber, but the various speakers articulated so rapidly that I was not able to follow them with any precision. It is surely an error to pour out torrents of words in this fashion, and I cannot believe there is any mature thought behind it at all. I regret to say that the practice of duelling, though denounced by all the best thought in the country, is still rife, and nowhere do occasions for its exercise arise more frequently than in the undisciplined political life of this capital. One must not, however, look only on the dark side; there are certainly some very fine new buildings springing up, especially in the American quarter towards the Arc de Triomphe. Of course your mother and I keep to the old Hôtel de Ferras. We are at an age now when one does not easily change one’s habits, but it seems to me positively dingy compared with some of these new great palaces. It is a comfort, however, to deal with people who know what an English banknote is, and who will take an English cheque, and who can address one properly on the outside of an envelope. It amused your dear mother to see how quickly they seized the new honour which her Majesty has so graciously conferred upon me.

“Your affectionate father,

“JO. BILSTED.”

“HÔTEL DE FERRAS, _October 19, 1906_.

“My dear Charles,--I cannot tell you how warmly I agree with your last letter upon the state of Europe. I am an old man, I have seen many men and things, and I have been particularly familiar with foreign policy ever since I first entered the House of Commons, now nearly fifty years ago, but rarely have I known a moment more critical than the present. My one comfort lies in the fact that in spite of the divisions of Party, the heart of the nation is still sound, and the leaven of common sense in the electors will save us yet. I feel a shade of regret sometimes to think that the division no longer retains its old name; I should like to feel that, father and son, we had held it for three generations, but though the name has changed, the spirit of the place is the same.... I beg you to mark my words; I may say without boasting that I have rarely been wrong in my judgment of foreign affairs. When one sees things here one sometimes trembles for the future.

“This Hotel is not at all what it was. It is ill-kept and damp, and I shall not return to it.

“Expect me in London before the end of the week.

“PENSHURST.”

[Lord Penshurst died shortly after his return to London. He was
succeeded by his son Charles, second Baron, but the Division is still
represented by a member of the family in the person of Mr. George
Bilstead, his second son, the husband of Mrs. Bilstead, and author of
_The Coming Struggle in the Balkans_.]

The Duel

In the year 1895 of blessed memory there was living in the town of Paris at the expense of his parents a young English gentleman of the name of Bilbury; at least, if that were not his name his name was so nearly that that it doesn’t matter. He spoke French very well, and had for his age (which was twenty-four) a very good working acquaintance with French customs. He was popular among the students with whom he associated, and it was his especial desire not to seem too much of a foreigner on the various occasions when French life contrasts somewhat with that of this island. It was something of a little mania of his, for though he was patriotic to a degree when English history or English habits were challenged, yet it made him intolerably nervous to feel exceptional or eccentric in the town where he lived. It was upon this account that he fought a duel.

There happened to be resident in the town of Paris at the same time another gentleman, whose name was Newman; he also was young, he also was English, but whereas Mr. Bilbury was by genius a painter, Mr. Newman was by vocation an engineer. And while Mr. Bilbury would spend hours in the studio of a master whom (in common with the other students) he despised, Mr. Newman was continually occupied in playing billiards with his fellow students of engineering in the University. And while Mr. Bilbury was spending quite twelve hours a day in finding out how to make a picture look like a thing if you stood a long way off from it (which is the end and object of his school in Paris), Mr. Newman had already acquired the art of making a billiard ball come right back again towards the cue after it had struck its neighbour. Mr. Bilbury had learned how to sing in chorus with the other students songs relating in no way to pictorial excellence; Mr. Newman had learned to sing those songs peculiar to students of engineering, but relating in no way to applied physics. In a word, these two young gentlemen had never met.

But one day Mr. Bilbury, going arm-in-arm with three friends towards the river, met upon the pavement of the Rue Bonaparte Mr. Newman in much the same posture, but accompanied by a rather larger bodyguard. It would have been astonishing to anyone little acquainted with the temper of students in the University, and indeed it _was_ astonishing both to Mr. Newman and to Mr. Bilbury, though they had now for some months been acquainted with the inhabitants of that strange corner of the universe, to see how this trifling incident provoked an altercation which in its turn degenerated into a vulgar quarrel. Each party refused to give way to the other, and the members of each began comparing the members of the other to animals of every kind such as the pig, the cow, and even certain denizens of the deep. In the midst of the hubbub Mr. Bilbury, not to be outdone in the racy vigour of youth, shouted at Mr. Newman (who for all he knew might have been a Russian revolutionary or a man from St. Cyr) an epithet which he had come across in the contemporary literature of the capital, and which he imagined to be of common exchange among the merry souls of the University. To his surprise--nay, to his alarm--a dead silence followed the use of this very humble and ordinary word. Mr. Newman, to whom it was addressed, was not indeed ignorant of its meaning (for it meant nothing in particular and was offensive), but was astonished at the gravity of those round him when the little epithet had been uttered. With a sense of surprise now far exceeding that of Mr. Bilbury he saw his companions draw themselves up stiffly, take off their eccentric felt hats with large sweeping gestures, and march him off as stiff as pokers, leaving the Bilbury group solemn with the solemnity of men who have a duty to perform.

That duty was very quickly accomplished. The eldest and most responsible of the three friends told Bilbury very gently but very firmly that there could be no issue but one to the scene which had just passed.

“I am not blaming you, my dear John,” he said kindly (Mr. Bilbury’s name was John), “but you know there can be only one issue.”

Meanwhile Mr. Newman’s friends, after maintaining their strict and haughty parade almost the whole length of the Rue Bonaparte, broke silence together, and said: “It is shameful, and you will not tolerate it!” To which Mr. Newman replied by an assurance that he would in no way fall beneath the dignity of the situation.

More than this neither Mr. Bilbury nor Mr. Newman knew, but they both went to bed that night much later than either intended, and each felt in himself a something of what Ruth felt when she stood among the alien corn, or words to that effect.

And next morning each of them woke with the knowledge that he had some terrible business on hand with some ass of a foreigner who had got excited, or, to be more accurate, had suddenly stopped being excited for wholly incomprehensible reasons at a particular moment in a lively conversation. Both Mr. Newman and Mr. Bilbury were, I say, in this mood when there entered to Mr. Newman in his room in the Rue des Ecoles (which he could ill afford) two of his friends of the night before, who said to him very simply and rapidly that it would be better for them to act as his seconds as the others had chosen them as most fitted. To this Mr. Newman murmured his adhesion, and was about to ask anxiously whether he would soon see them again, when, with a solemnity quite out of keeping with their usual good-fellowship, they bowed in a ritual manner and disappeared.

Meanwhile a similar scene was taking place in the little fourth-floor room which Mr. Bilbury occupied, and Mr. Bilbury, somewhat better acquainted with the customs of the University, dismissed his two friends with a little speech and awaited developments.

Before lunch the thing was arranged, and Mr. Newman, who was waiting in a rather hopeless way for his friends’ return, was informed at about twelve o’clock that all was settled; it was to be at the end of the week, up in Meudon, in a field which belonged to one of his friends’ uncles. “We are less likely to be disturbed there,” said the friend, “and we can carry the affair to a satisfactory finish.” Then he added: “It has a high wall all round it.”

“But,” said the other second, interrupting him, “since we have chosen pistols that will not be much good, for the report will be heard.”

“No,” said the first second in a nonchalant manner, “my uncle keeps a shooting gallery and the neighbours will think it a very ordinary sound. You had,” he explained courteously to Mr. Newman, “the choice of weapons as the insulted party, and we chose pistols of course.”

“Of course,” said Mr. Newman, who was not going to give himself away upon details of this kind.

“The other man’s seconds,” went on Mr. Newman’s friend genially, “wanted swords, but we told them that you couldn’t fence; besides which, with amateurs nothing ever happens with swords. And then,” he continued, musing, “if the other man is really good you’re done for, whereas with pistols there is always a chance.”

To Mr. Bilbury, equally waiting for the luncheon hour in some gloominess of soul, the same tale was told, _mutatis mutandis_, as they say in what is left of the classical school of the University. His adversary had chosen pistols. “And you know,” said one of his seconds to Bilbury sympathetically, “he had the right of choice; technically he was the insulted party. Besides which, pistols are always better if people don’t know each other.”

The other second agreed, and was firmly of the opinion that swords were only for intimate friends or politicians. They also mentioned the field at Meudon, but with this difference that it became in their mouths the ancient feudal property of one of their set, and they were careful to point out that the neighbours were all Royalists, devotedly attached to the family, and the safest and most silent witnesses in the world.

For the remaining days Mr. Bilbury and Mr. Newman were conducted by their separate groups of friends, the first to a shooting gallery near Vincennes, the second to a shooting gallery near St. Denis. Their experiments were thus conducted many miles apart: and it was just as well. It was remarkable what an affluence of students came as the days proceeded to see the exercise in martial sport of Mr. Newman. At first from fifty to sixty of the students with one or two of the pure mathematicians and three or four chemists comprised the audience, but before the week was over one might say that nearly all the Applied Physics and Positive Sciences of the University were crowding round Vincennes and urging Mr. Newman to accurate and yet more accurate efforts at the target. At St. Denis the number of artists increased in a similar proportion, and to these, before the week was ended, were added great crowds of poets, rhetoricians, and even mere symbolists, who wore purple ties and wigs. These also urged Mr. Bilbury to add to his proficiency; and sometimes that principal himself would shudder to see a long-haired and apparently inept person with a greenish face pick up a pistol with dreadful carelessness and put out the flame of a candle at a prodigious distance with unerring aim.

When the great day arrived two processions of such magnitude as gave proof of the latent wealth of the Republic crawled up the hill to Meudon. The occasion was far too solemn for a trot, and two men at least of those present thought several times uncomfortably about funerals. I must add in connection with funerals that a large coffin was placed upon trestles in a very conspicuous part of the field, into which each party entered by opposite wooden gates which, with the high square wall all round, quite shut out the surrounding neighbourhood. The two groups of friends (each over a hundred in number), all dressed in black and most of them in top-hats, retired to opposite corners of the field, nor was there any sign of levity in either body in spite of their youth; the four seconds, who were in frock-coats and full of an unnatural importance, deposited upon the ground between them a very valuable leather case which, when it was opened, discovered two perfectly new pistols of a length of barrel inordinate even for the use of Arabs, let alone for civilised men. These two were loaded in private and handed to either combatant, and Mr. Bilbury and Mr. Newman, having been directed each to hold the pistol pointed to the ground, were set apart by either wall while the seconds proceeded to pace the terrain. Mr. Newman remembered the cricket pitches of his dear home which perhaps he would never see again; Mr. Bilbury could think of nothing but a tune which ran in his head and caused him grave discomfort.

When the ceremony of the pacing was over the two unfortunate gentlemen were put facing each other, but twisted, with the right side of the one turning to the corresponding side of the other, so as to afford the smallest target for the deadly missiles; and then one of the seconds who held the handkerchief retired to some little distance to give the signal.

It was at this juncture, as Mr. Newman and Mr. Bilbury stood with their pistols elevated towards heaven, and waiting for the handkerchief to drop, each concentrated with a violent concentration upon the emotions of the moment, that a prodigious noise of hammering and shouting was heard at one of the doors of the enclosure, and that three gentlemen--the one wearing a large three-coloured sash, the like of which neither Mr. Bilbury nor Mr. Newman had ever seen--entered, and ordered the whole party to desist in the name of the law. So summoned, the audience with the utmost precipitation climbed over the wall, forced itself through the gates, and in every manner at its disposal vanished. And the gentleman with the tri-coloured sash, sitting down in the calmest manner upon one of the trestles and turning the coffin over by way of making a table, declared himself a public officer, and took notes of all that had occurred. It was interesting to see the businesslike way in which the seconds gave evidence, and the courtesy with which the two principals were treated as distinguished foreigners by the gentleman with the three-coloured sash. He was young, like all the rest, amazingly young for a public official of such importance, but collected and evidently most efficient. When he had done taking his notes he stood up in a half-military fashion, ranged Mr. Newman and Mr. Bilbury before him, and very rapidly read out a series of legal sentences, at the conclusion of which was a fine of one hundred francs apiece, and no more said about the matter. Mr. Bilbury and Mr. Newman were astonished that attempted homicide should cost so little in this singular country. They were still more astonished to discover that etiquette demanded a genial reconciliation of the two combatants under such circumstances, and they were positively amazed to find after that reconciliation that they were compatriots.

It was their seconds who insisted upon standing the dinner that evening. The whole incident was very happily over save for one passing qualm which Mr. Bilbury felt (and Mr. Newman also) when he saw the gentleman, whom he had last met as the tri-coloured official of the Republic, passing through the restaurant singing at the top of his voice and waving his hand genially to the group as he went out upon the boulevard.

But they remembered that in democracies the office is distinguished from the man. Luckily for democracies.

On a Battle, or “Journalism,” or “Points of View”

“_The art of historical writing is rendered the less facile in
expression from I know not what personal differences which the most
honest will admit into their record of events, and the most observant
wilt permit to colour the picture proceeding from their pens._”
(Extract from the Judicious Essay of a Gentleman in Holy Orders,
author of _A History of Religious Differences_.)