Chapter II

But to what was all this tending, and to what condition had the Lawn-Tennis players brought the Great Western State which they inhabited?

A monarch on the throne, whose age alone prevented her from casting in her lot with an aristocracy of wealth and learning, who had already commenced to narrow life within the limits of the twelve-yard court!!

A gentler sex, forsaking the sacred duties of domesticity that they might lend grace and elegance to the all-prevailing pastime!!

A degraded peasantry, living but to delineate on level lawns the bounds past which England’s greatest and noblest born must not propel the gyrating sphere!!

A rustic generation, rising but to collect for their oppressors the distant-driven ball, and developing into manhood merely to tend and trim the smooth-shaven Lawn-Tennis ground, which had now become a necessary adjunct alike to glebe and manor!!

It was an age of Lawn-Tennis!!

“My prophetical instincts tell me,” said Retiarius, as he and his friends were waiting for the nets to be arranged,――“My prophetical instincts tell me that the great coming stroke will be the volley.”

“Why, so?” said Sphairistikos.

“It is as yet,” replied he, “only half-developed. A nation young in Lawn-Tennis has much to learn; much to forget. My impression is that the volley, properly understood, will convulse the future.”

“I believe in service for my part,” remarked Sphairistikos,――“Secure your first stroke. Demoralize first, win afterwards; I would borrow from the great nation which gave us Tennis, and say, ‘Ce n’est que le premier pas qui coûte.’”

“But I am looking to a distant future,” continued Retiarius. “We shall see great changes. There will be hereditary volleyers. The theories of Darwin must prevail. Volleyers will play with volleyers. The pastimes of a country lead to its courtships. It has always been so. A generation of volleyers will rise up who will volley from the service-line as accurately as their grandfathers have done from the nets.”

“What news from Afghanistan?” asked a fair player, who was putting on her shoes.

“Fifteen, the Government loses,” replied a Tennis-steeped youth; “they have served two faults,――one into Afghanistan; one into Zululand.”

“Bother Afghanistan,” said another damsel in short petticoats, “I want the scoring question settled.”

But the attendants now announced that the courts were ready.

“Fifteen, I win.”

“Fifteen, all.”

And so on, and on, and on, the adversaries played, with constantly- varying fortunes, till another day was nearly done, and they were once more compelled to surrender before the flickering blaze of a vanishing sun.

From _Tennis Cuts and Quips_. Edited by Julian Marshall. London. Field and Tuer.

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It was known that Lord Beaconsfield had drawn many of the characters in _Endymion_ from prominent members of society, and much curiosity was felt as to the identification of these individuals. _Notes and Queries_ published a conjectural list of them, but it must be borne in mind that Lord Beaconsfield was sufficiently cautious not to paint his portraits too distinctly like his originals, in fact some of his puppets represent two or three individuals merged into one

Endymion Benjamin Disraeli
Zenobia Lady Jersey
Berengaria (Lady Montfort) Hon. Mrs. Norton
Agrippina Queen Hortense
Adriana Neufchatel Lady Burdett Coutts
The Neufchatels The Rothschilds
Col. Albert (Prince Florestan) Napoleon III
Lord Roehampton Lord Palmerston
Myra Roehampton Empress Eugenie
Enoch Craggs Co-operation.
Lord Montfort The late Lord Hertford
Lord Rawchester Earl Granville
Earl of Beaumaris The late Earl of Derby
Mr. Bertie Tremaine Lord Houghton
Count of Ferroll Prince Bismarck
Nigel Penruddock Cardinal Manning
Mr. Ferrars (the grandfather) Rt. Hon. George Rose
George Waldershare Mr. George Smythe (afterwards
Lord Strangford)
Job Thornberry Richard Cobden
Mr. Vigo Mr. Poole
Mr. Jorrocks Mr. Milner Gibson
Hortensius Sir W. Vernon Harcourt
Sidney Wilton Sidney Herbert
Mr. Sainte Barbe W. M. Thackeray
Mr. Gushy Charles Dickens
Topsy Turvy _Vanity Fair_
Scaramouch _Punch_

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A curious story of a plagiarism is related of Disraeli in the Life of Mr. Abraham Hayward, Q.C., who was formerly on the staff of the _Morning Chronicle_.

Early in the “fifties,” Mr. Disraeli made sundry depreciatory remarks on the speeches of military members of Parliament, classing them contemptuously as effusions of “the military mind.” The men of the _Morning Chronicle_ replied to Mr. Disraeli’s attack on the intellect of soldiers by printing a translation of a magnificent eulogium on the Maréchal de St. Cyr by M. Thiers, setting forth the qualities necessary to a military commander. Mr. Disraeli was evidently struck by the brilliancy of the counter hit, for a few years later, when the Duke of Wellington died, he interpolated the translation, _errors and all_, in the oration which as leader of the House of Commons it was his duty to deliver on the death of that great general. The old writers of the _Chronicle_ secured the insertion of the speech and the translated passage in the _Globe_. Mr. Disraeli’s friends made every attempt to explain away the plagiarism till an article in _Fraser’s Magazine_, written by Mr. Hayward, showed clearly that the passage was not even taken from the French original, but directly from the translation which appeared in the _Morning Chronicle_. Mr. Hayward was very proud of this article of his, in which he also handled Mr. Disraeli’s “Revolutionary Epick” very roughly.

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THE WOMAN IN TIGHTS.

_By Wilkie Collins._

The narrative commenced by Walter Heartbright, teacher of jig-dancing, of Fulwood’s-rents, Holborn. This is a story of what a woman’s impatience can procure, and what a man’s irresolution can achieve. If the law were not such a blundering battering-ram the events which fill these pages might have merited its attention. I live with my mother, who keeps a general shop. Events alter my life. I go to Cumberland to attend on a gentleman. The story continued by Mr. Bearly, Gummeridge House, Cumberland: I am all self, etchings, and nerves. Why? I know not. Perhaps Laura knows, or Sir Pursefull. I am asked to make a statement. Aided by a galvanic battery I make it. Laura has gone on the stage. I am worried. Why should I be? I give it up. Thank you. Don’t bang. Send Heartbright here. I would see him dance. Statement by Hester Teecloth, cook at Count Bosco’s: I remember a lady being brought to our house last June. She came in a temper and a brougham. She was laid on the sofa. She looked wildlike, and kept shouting “There they go, millions of ’em.” When the doctor saw her he winked at the count and whispered, “Delicious trimmings,” but the poor thing was plainly dressed. That’s all I know. Heartbright finishes the story: We are to be married in a week’s time. Laura’s faculties have returned. Mr. Bearly and his nerves have found Nirvana. Sir Pursefull was drowned while showing off a lifebelt of his own invention. Bosco is in an asylum. His time is occupied in plucking green mice from his beard, and chirruping to pink canaries which he fancies he sees on the wall. My mother, always of a retiring disposition, has given up business. I am heir of Gummeridge House. Thus it ends.

WILLIAM EVISON ROSE.

_The Weekly Dispatch._ February 25, 1883.

In this parody competition the compositions were limited to 300 words, a regulation which sadly hampered the competitors.

In Bret Harte’s _Sensation Novels Condensed_, there is a parody of Wilkie Collins, called “No Title.”

THE LUCK OF TORY CAMP.

_By Bread Tart._

There was commotion in Tory Camp. Outside a rude cabin waited an excited crowd, headed by Solly, a stalwart digger, with a Raphael face and profusion of dark beard, whose duel with Harden Bill, the Rad-Dog Woodcutter, was still talked of with bated breath. The name of a woman was on every lip, a name familiar in the camp――Poll Icy. The less said of her the better; no better than she should be perhaps; half foreign, half Ingin; but yet the only woman in camp, and now in woman’s direst extremity. Suddenly an excited Celestial joined the group. “Lemme investigate, John,” said he; “me Pal-Mal, me washee-washee dirty linen, me go see her.” “Scoot, you dern skunk!” thundered Solly; “none but a down-east johnny-cake ’ud trust you with any woman nowadays.” At that moment a wail, feeble, yet sufficient to quell the laughter that greeted Solly’s sally, announced a birth in Tory Camp.… Little Randy, or the Luck――for by these names the frolicsome miners had christened the infant (in beer)――grew and throve, and soon became a power in the camp. His childish jokes with Sairey Gamp, his nurse, were the delight of the brawny getters of gold from quartz (s), and even Solly smiled when the Luck “tackled the old ’un,” which he did when Harden Bill visited the camp now and then. “Rastled with Bill’s little finger, the derned little cuss,” roared Solly; “rastled with it, dern my skin.”

The winter of 1885 will long be remembered in California. One night Tea-Pot Gulch and Rad-Dog Fork leaped suddenly over their banks, and descended in ruin upon Tory Camp. When morning dawned the Luck lay lifeless in Solly’s arms, and Harden Bill smiled grimly as he watched the strangely assorted pair floating quietly towards the Sea of Oblivion.

J. C. ROSE.

_The Weekly Dispatch._ September 13, 1885.

There is a parody on Bret Harte’s prose in _The Shotover Papers_ (Oxford, 1874) entitled _His Finger_, but it is not sufficiently characteristic to merit reprinting.

MR. MIDSHIPMAN BREEZY.
A NAVAL OFFICER.

_By Captain Marryat, R.N._