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Title: Hugh - Memoirs of a Brother
Author: Benson, Arthur Christopher, 1862-1925
Language: English
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HUGH
Memoirs of a Brother
by
ARTHUR CHRISTOPHER BENSON
Fifth Impression
_But there is more than I can see,
And what I see I leave unsaid,
Nor speak it, knowing Death has made
His darkness beautiful with thee._
[Illustration: _From Copyrighted Photo by Sarony, Inc., New York_
ROBERT HUGH BENSON
IN 1912. AGED 40
In the robes of a Papal Chamberlain.]
Longmans, Green, and Co.
Fourth Avenue & 30th Street, New York
1916
PREFACE
This book was begun with no hope or intention of making a formal and
finished biography, but only to place on record some of my brother's
sayings and doings, to fix scenes and memories before they suffered from
any dim obliteration of time, to catch, if I could, for my own comfort
and delight, the tone and sense of that vivid and animated atmosphere
which Hugh always created about him. His arrival upon any scene was
never in the smallest degree uproarious, and still less was it in the
least mild or serene; yet he came into a settled circle like a freshet
of tumbling water into a still pool!
I knew all along that I could not attempt any account of what may be
called his public life, which all happened since he became a Roman
Catholic. He passed through many circles--in England, in Rome, in
America--of which I knew nothing. I never heard him make a public
speech, and I only once heard him preach since he ceased to be an
Anglican. This was not because I thought he would convert me, nor
because I shrank from hearing him preach a doctrine to which I did not
adhere, nor for any sectarian reason. Indeed, I regret not having heard
him preach and speak oftener; it would have interested me, and it would
have been kinder and more brotherly; but one is apt not to do the things
which one thinks one can always do, and the fact that I did not hear him
was due to a mixture of shyness and laziness, which I now regret in
vain.
But I think that his life as a Roman Catholic ought to be written fully
and carefully, because there were many people who trusted and admired
and loved him as a priest who would wish to have some record of his
days. He left me, by a will, which we are carrying out, though it was
not duly executed, all his letters, papers, and manuscripts, and we
have arranged to have an official biography of him written, and have
placed all his papers in the hands of a Catholic biographer, Father C.
C. Martindale, S.J.
Since Hugh died I have read a good many notices of him, which have
appeared mostly in Roman Catholic organs. These were, as a rule, written
by people who had only known him as a Catholic, and gave an obviously
incomplete view of his character and temperament. It could not well have
been otherwise, but the result was that only one side of a very varied
and full life was presented. He was depicted in a particular office and
in a specific mood. This was certainly his most real and eager mood, and
deserves to be emphasized. But he had other moods and other sides, and
his life before he became a Catholic had a charm and vigour of its own.
Moreover, his family affection was very strong; when he became a
Catholic, we all of us felt, including himself, that there might be a
certain separation, not of affection, but of occupations and interests;
and he himself took very great care to avoid this, with the happy result
that we saw him, I truly believe, more often and more intimately than
ever before. Indeed, my own close companionship with him really began
when he came first as a Roman Catholic to Cambridge.
And so I have thought it well to draw in broad strokes and simple
outlines a picture of his personality as we, his family, knew and loved
it. It is only a _study_, so to speak, and is written very informally
and directly. Formal biographies, as I know from experience, must
emphasise a different aspect. They deal, as they are bound to do, with
public work and official activities; and the personal atmosphere often
vanishes in the process--that subtle essence of quality, the effect of a
man's talk and habits and prejudices and predispositions, which comes
out freely in private life, and is even suspended in his public
ministrations. It would be impossible, I believe, to make a presentment
of Hugh which could be either dull or conventional. But, on the other
hand, his life as a priest, a writer, a teacher, a controversialist, was
to a certain extent governed and conditioned by circumstances; and I can
see, from many accounts of him, that the more intimate and unrestrained
side of him can only be partially discerned by those who knew him merely
in an official capacity.
That, then, is the history of this brief Memoir. It is just an attempt
to show Hugh as he showed himself, freely and unaffectedly, to his own
circle; and I am sure that this deserves to be told, for the one
characteristic which emerges whenever I think of him is that of a
beautiful charm, not without a touch of wilfulness and even petulance
about it, which gave him a childlike freshness, a sparkling zest, that
aerated and enlivened all that he did or said. It was a charm which made
itself instantly felt, and yet it could be hardly imitated or adopted,
because it was so entirely unconscious and unaffected. He enjoyed
enacting his part, and he was as instinctively and whole-heartedly a
priest as another man is a soldier or a lawyer. But his function did not
wholly occupy and dominate his life; and, true priest though he was, the
force and energy of his priesthood came at least in part from the fact
that he was entirely and delightfully human, and I deeply desire that
this should not be overlooked or forgotten.
A. C. B.
Tremans, Horsted Keynes,
_December_ 26, 1914.
CONTENTS
I
HARE STREET PAGES
Garden--House--Rooms--Tapestry--Hare
Street Discovered--A Hidden Treasure 1-14
II
CHILDHOOD
Birth--The Chancery--Beth 15-24
III
TRURO
Lessons--Early Verses--Physical Sensitiveness--A
Secret Society--My Father--A Puppet-Show 25-41
IV
BOYHOOD
First Schooldays--Eton--Religious Impressions--A
Colleger 42-51
V
AT WREN'S
Sunday Work--Artistic
Temperament--Liturgy--Ritual--Artistic Nature 52-65
VI
CAMBRIDGE
Mountain--climbing--Genealogy--Economy--Hypnotism--The
Call--My Mother--Nelly 66-81
VII
LLANDAFF
Dean Vaughan--Community Life--Ordained Deacon 82-88
VIII
THE ETON MISSION
Hackney Wick--Boys' Clubs--Preaching--My
Father's Death 89-99
IX
KEMSING AND MIRFIELD
Development--Mirfield--The
Community--Sermons--Preaching 100-113
X
THE CHANGE
Leaving Mirfield--Considerations--Argument--
Discussion--Roddy--Consultation 114-129
XI
THE DECISION
Anglicanism--Individualism--Asceticism--A
Centre of Unity--Liberty and Discipline--
Catholicism--The Surrender--Reception--Rome 130-151
XII
CAMBRIDGE AGAIN
Llandaff House--Our Companionship--Rudeness--The
Catholic Rectory--Spiritual Direction--
Mystery-Plays--Retirement 152-167
XIII
HARE STREET
Ken--Engagements--Christmas--Visits 168-175
XIV
AUTHORSHIP
The Light Invisible--His Books--Methods of
Writing--Love of Writing--The Novels 176-187
XV
FAILING HEALTH
Illness--Medical advice--Pneumonia 188-195
XVI
THE END
Manchester--Last Illness--Last Hours--Anxiety--Last
Words--Passing on 196-208
XVII
BURIAL
His Papers--After-Thoughts--The Bond of Love 209-215
XVIII
PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS
Courage--Humour--Manliness--Stammering--
Eagerness--Independence--Forward 216-230
XIX
RETROSPECT
Boyhood--Vocation--Independence--Self-Discipline 231-240
XX
ATTAINMENT
Priesthood--Self-Devotion--Sympathy--Power--Energy 241-252
XXI
TEMPERAMENT
Courtesy--Chivalry--Fearlessness--Himself 253-261
INDEX 263-265
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Robert Hugh Benson in 1912, aged 40.
In the Robes of a Papal Chamberlain _Frontispiece_
_From copyrighted Photo by Sarony, Inc., New York._
Hare Street House _Facing page_
From the front, 1914 2
From the garden, 1914 4
The Master's Lodge, Wellington College, 1868 16
Robert Hugh Benson and Beth at the Chancery,
Lincoln, in 1876, aged 5 20
The Three Brothers, 1882 44
Robert Hugh Benson in 1889, aged 17. As
Steerer of the _St. George_, at Eton 48
Robert Hugh Benson in 1893, aged 21. As an
Undergraduate at Cambridge 68
Mrs. Benson 76
Robert Hugh Benson in 1907, aged 35 158
At Hare Street, 1909 168
Hare Street, in the Garden, July 1911 174
Robert Hugh Benson in 1910, aged 39 184
At Tremans, Horsted Keynes, December, 1913 188
Bishop's House, Salford 200
The Calvary at Hare Street, 1913 208
Robert Hugh Benson in 1912, aged 40 250
Robert Hugh Benson in 1912, aged 41 258
"Then said _Great-heart_ to Mr. _Valiant-for-Truth_, Thou hast
worthily behaved thyself. Let me see thy Sword. So he shewed it
him. When he had taken it in his hand, and looked thereon a while,
he said, _Ha, it is a right Jerusalem Blade!_"
_The Pilgrim's Progress._
HUGH
I
HARE STREET
How loudly and boisterously the wind roared to-day across the low-hung,
cloud-smeared sky, driving the broken rack before it, warm and wet out
of the south! What a wintry landscape! leafless trees bending beneath
the onset of the wind, bare and streaming hedges, pale close-reaped
wheat-fields, brown ploughland, spare pastures stretching away to left
and right, softly rising and falling to the horizon; nothing visible but
distant belts of trees and coverts, with here and there the tower of a
hidden church overtopping them, and a windmill or two; on the left, long
lines of willows marking the course of a stream. The road soaked with
rain, the grasses heavy with it, hardly a human being to be seen.
I came at last to a village straggling along each side of the road; to
the right, a fantastic-looking white villa, with many bow-windows, and
an orchard behind it. Then on the left, a great row of beeches on the
edge of a pasture; and then, over the barns and ricks of a farm, rose
the clustered chimneys of an old house; and soon we drew up at a big
iron gate between tall red-brick gateposts; beyond it a paling, with a
row of high lime trees bordering a garden lawn, and on beyond that the
irregular village street.
From the gate a little flagged pathway leads up to the front of a long,
low house, of mellow brick, with a solid cornice and parapet, over which
the tiled roof is visible: a door in the centre, with two windows on
each side and five windows above--just the sort of house that you find
in a cathedral close. To the left of the iron gate are two other tall
gateposts, with a road leading up to the side of the house, and a yard
with a row of stables behind.
Let me describe the garden first. All along the front and south side of
the house runs a flagged pathway, a low brick wall dividing it from the
lawn, with plants in rough red pots on little pilasters at intervals. To
the right, as we face the door, the lawn runs along the road, and
stretches back into the garden. There are tall, lopped lime-trees all
round the lawn, in the summer making a high screen of foliage, but now
bare. If we take the flagged path round the house, turn the corner, and
go towards the garden, the yew trees grow thick and close, forming an
arched walk at the corner, half screening an old irregular building of
woodwork and plaster, weather-boarded in places, with a tiled roof,
connected with the house by a little covered cloister with wooden
pillars. If we pass that by, pursuing the path among the yew trees, we
come out on a pleasant orchard, with a few flower-beds, thickly
encircled by shrubs, beyond which, towards the main road, lies a
comfortable-looking old red-brick cottage, with a big barn and a long
garden, which evidently belongs to the larger house, because a gate in
the paling stands open. Then there is another little tiled building
behind the shrubs, where you can hear an engine at work, for electric
light and water-pumping, and beyond that again, but still connected with
the main house, stands another house among trees, of rough-cast and
tiles, with an open wooden gallery, in a garden of its own.
[Illustration: _Photo by Bishop, Barkway_
HARE STREET HOUSE
FROM THE FRONT 1914
The room to the left of the door is the dining room, with Hugh's bedroom
over it. To the right of the door is the library.]
In the orchard itself is a large grass-grown mound, with a rough wooden
cross on the top; and down below that, in the orchard, is a newly-made
grave, still covered, as I saw it to-day, with wreaths of leaves and
moss, tied some of them with stained purple ribbons. The edge of the
grave-mound is turfed, but the bare and trodden grass shows that many
feet have crossed and recrossed the ground.
The orchard is divided on the left from a further and larger garden by a
dense growth of old hazels; and passing through an alley you see that a
broad path runs concealed among the hazels, a pleasant shady walk in
summer heat. Then the larger garden stretches in front of you; it is a
big place, with rows of vegetables, fruit-trees, and flower-borders,
screened to the east by a row of elms and dense shrubberies of laurel.
Along the north runs a high red-brick wall, with a big old-fashioned
vine-house in the centre, of careful design. In the corner nearest the
house is a large rose-garden, with a brick pedestal in the centre,
behind which rises the back of the stable, also of old red brick.
[Illustration: _Photo by Bishop, Barkway_
HARE STREET HOUSE
FROM THE GARDEN 1914
The timbered building on the left is the Chapel; in the foreground
is the unfinished rose-garden.]
But now there is a surprise; the back of the house is much older than
the front. You see that it is a venerable Tudor building, with pretty
panels of plaster embossed with a rough pattern. The moulded brick
chimney-stacks are Tudor too, while the high gables cluster and lean
together with a picturesque outline. The back of the house forms a
little court, with the cloister of which I spoke before running round
two sides of it. Another great yew tree stands there: while a doorway
going into the timber and plaster building which I mentioned before has
a rough device on it of a papal tiara and keys, carved in low relief and
silvered.
A friendly black collie comes out of a kennel and desires a little
attention. He licks my hand and looks at me with melting brown eyes, but
has an air of expecting to see someone else as well. A black cat comes
out of a door, runs beside us, and when picked up, clasps my shoulder
contentedly and purrs in my ear.
The house seen from the back looks exactly what it is, a little old
family mansion of a line of small squires, who farmed their own land,
and lived on their own produce, though the barns and rick-yard belong to
the house no longer. The red-brick front is just an addition made for
the sake of stateliness at some time of prosperity. It is a charming
self-contained little place, with a forgotten family tradition of its
own, a place which could twine itself about the heart, and be loved and
remembered by children brought up there, when far away. There is no sign
of wealth about it, but every sign of ease and comfort and simple
dignity.
Now we will go back to the front door and go through the house itself.
The door opens into a tiny hall lighted by the glass panes of the door,
and bright with pictures--oil paintings and engravings. The furniture
old and sturdy, and a few curiosities about--carvings, weapons, horns of
beasts. To the left a door opens into a pleasant dining-room, with two
windows looking out in front, dark as dining-rooms may well be. It is
hung with panels of green cloth, it has a big open Tudor fireplace, with
a big oak settle, some china on an old dresser, a solid table and
chairs, and a hatch in the corner through which dishes can be handed.
Opposite, on the other side of the hall, a door opens into a long low
library, with books all round in white shelves. There is a big grand
piano here, a very solid narrow oak table with a chest below, a bureau,
and some comfortable chintz-covered chairs with a deep sofa. A perfect
room to read or to hear music in, with its two windows to the front, and
a long window opening down to the ground at the south end. All the books
here are catalogued, and each has its place. If you go out into the hall
again and pass through, a staircase goes up into the house, the walls of
it panelled, and hung with engravings; some of the panels are carved
with holy emblems. At the foot of the stairs a door on the right takes
you into a small sitting-room, with a huge stone fireplace; a big window
looks south, past the dark yew trees, on to the lawn. There are little
devices in the quarries of the window, and a deep window-seat. The room
is hung with a curious tapestry, brightly coloured mediæval figures
standing out from a dark background. There is not room for much
furniture here; a square oak stand for books, a chair or two by the
fire. Parallel to the wall, with a chair behind it filling up much of
the space, is a long, solid old oak table, set out for writing. It is a
perfect study for quiet work, warm in winter with its log fire, and
cool in summer heat.
To the left of the staircase a door goes into a roughly panelled
ante-room which leads out on to the cloister, and beyond that a large
stone-flagged kitchen, with offices beyond.
If you go upstairs, you find a panelled corridor with bedrooms. The one
over the study is small and dark, and said to be haunted. That over the
library is a big pleasant room with a fine marble fireplace--a boudoir
once, I should think. Over the hall is another dark panelled room with a
four-post bed, the walls hung with a most singular and rather terrible
tapestry, representing a dance of death.
Beyond that, over the dining-room, is a beautiful panelled room, with a
Tudor fireplace, and a bed enclosed by blue curtains. This was Hugh's
own room. Out of it opens a tiny dressing-room. Beyond that is another
large low room over the kitchen, which has been half-study,
half-bedroom, out of which opens a little stairway going to some little
rooms beyond over the offices.
Above that again are some quaint white-washed attics with dormers and
leaning walls; one or two of these are bedrooms. One, very large and
long, runs along most of the front, and has a curious leaden channel in
it a foot above the floor to take the rain-water off the leads of the
roof. Out of another comes a sweet smell of stored apples, which revives
the memory of childish visits to farm storerooms--and here stands a
pretty and quaint old pipe-organ awaiting renovation.
We must retrace our steps to the building at the back to which the
cloister leads. We enter a little sacristy and vestry, and beyond is a
dark chapel, with a side-chapel opening out of it. It was originally an
old brew-house, with a timbered roof. The sanctuary is now divided off
by a high open screen, of old oak, reaching nearly to the roof. The
whole place is full of statues, carved and painted, embroidered
hangings, stained glass, pendent lamps, emblems; there is a gallery
over the sacristy, with an organ, and a fine piece of old embroidery
displayed on the gallery front.
This is the house in which for seven years my brother Hugh lived. Let me
recall how he first came to see it. He was at Cambridge then, working as
an assistant priest. He became aware that his work lay rather in the
direction of speaking, preaching, and writing, and resolved to establish
himself in some quiet country retreat. One summer I visited several
houses in Hertfordshire with him, but they proved unsuitable. One of
these possessed an extraordinary attraction for him. It was in a bleak
remote village, and it was a fine old house which had fallen from its
high estate. It stood on the road and was used as a grocer's shop. It
was much dilapidated, and there was little ground about it, but inside
there were old frescoes and pictures, strange plaster friezes and
moulded ceilings, which had once been brightly coloured. But nothing
would have made it a really attractive house, in spite of the curious
beauty of its adornment.
One day I was returning alone from an excursion, and passed by what we
call accident through Hare Street, the village which I have described. I
caught a glimpse of the house through the iron gates, and saw that there
was a board up saying it was for sale. A few days later I went there
with Hugh. It was all extremely desolate, but we found a friendly
caretaker who led us round. The shrubberies had grown into dense
plantations, the orchard was a tangled waste of grass, the garden was
covered with weeds. I remember Hugh's exclamation of regret that we had
visited the place. "It is _exactly_ what I want," he said, "but it is
_far_ too expensive. I wish I had never set eyes on it!" However, he
found that it had long been unlet, and that no one would buy it. He
might have had the pasture-land and the farm-buildings as well, and he
afterwards regretted that he had not bought them, but his income from
writing was still small. However, he offered what seems to me now an
extraordinarily low sum for the house and garden; it was to his
astonishment at once accepted. It was all going to ruin, and the owner
was glad to get rid of it on any terms. He established himself there
with great expedition, and set to work to renovate the place. At a later
date he bought the adjacent cottage, and the paddock in which he built
the other house, and he also purchased some outlying fields, one a
charming spot on the road to Buntingford, with some fine old trees,
where he had an idea of building a church.
Everything in the little domain took shape under his skilful hand and
ingenious brain. He made most of the tapestries in the house with his
own fingers, working with his friend Mr. Gabriel Pippet the artist. He
carved much of the panelling--he was extraordinarily clever with his
hands. He painted many of the pictures which hang on the walls, he
catalogued the library; he worked day after day in the garden, weeding,
rowing, and planting. In all this he had the advantage of the skill,
capacity, and invention of his factotum and friend, Mr. Joseph Reeman,
who could turn his hand to anything and everything with equal energy and
taste; and so the whole place grew and expanded in his hands, until
there is hardly a detail, indoors or out-of-doors, which does not show
some trace of his fancy and his touch.
There were some strange old traditions about the house; it was said to
be haunted, and more than one of his guests had inexplicable experiences
there. It was also said that there was a hidden treasure concealed in or
about it. That treasure Hugh certainly discovered, in the delight which
he took in restoring, adorning, and laying it all out. It was a source
of constant joy to him in his life. And there, in the midst of it all,
his body lies.
II
CHILDHOOD
I very well remember the sudden appearance of Hugh in the nursery world,
and being conducted into a secluded dressing-room, adjacent to the
nursery, where the tiny creature lay, lost in contented dreams, in a
big, white-draped, white-hooded cradle. It was just a rather pleasing
and exciting event to us children, not particularly wonderful or
remarkable. It was at Wellington College that he was born, in the
Master's Lodge, in a sunny bedroom, in the south-east corner of the
house; one of its windows looking to the south front of the college and
the chapel with its slender spire; the other window looking over the
garden and a waste of heather beyond, to the fir-crowned hill of
Ambarrow. My father had been Headmaster for twelve years and was
nearing the end of his time there; and I was myself nine years old, and
shortly to go to a private school, where my elder brother Martin already
was. My two sisters, Nelly and Maggie, were respectively eight and six,
and my brother, Fred, was four--six in all.
And by a freak of memory I recollect, too, that at breakfast on the
following morning my father--half-shyly, half-proudly, I
thought--announced the fact of Hugh's birth to the boys whom he had
asked in, as his custom was, to breakfast, and how they offered
embarrassed congratulations, not being sure, I suppose, exactly what the
right phrase was.
Then came the christening, which took place at Sandhurst Church, a mile
or two away, to which we walked by the pine-clad hill of Edgebarrow and
the heathery moorland known as Cock-a-Dobbie. Mr. Parsons was the
clergyman--a little handsome old man, like an abbé, with a clear-cut
face and thick white hair. I am afraid that the ceremony had no
religious significance for me at that time, but I was deeply
interested, thought it rather cruel, and was shocked at Hugh's
indecorous outcry. He was called Robert, an old family name, and Hugh,
in honour of St. Hugh of Lincoln, where my father was a Prebendary, and
because he was born on the day before St. Hugh's Feast. And then I
really remember nothing more of him for a time, except for a scene in
the nursery on some wet afternoon when the baby--Robin as he was at
first called--insisted on being included in some game of tents made by
pinning shawls over the tops of chairs, he being then, as always,
perfectly clear what his wishes were, and equally clear that they were
worth attending to and carrying out.
[Illustration: _Photo by Hills & Saunders_
THE MASTER'S LODGE, WELLINGTON COLLEGE, 1868
The room to the left of the porch is the study. In the room above it
Hugh was born.]
Then I vividly recall how in 1875, when we were all returning _en
famille_ from a long summer holiday spent at Torquay in a pleasant house
lent us in Meadfoot Bay, we all travelled together in a third-class
carriage; how it fell to my lot to have the amusing of Hugh, and how
difficult he was to amuse, because he wished to look out of the window
the whole time, and to make remarks on everything. But at Lincoln I
hardly remember anything of him at all, because I was at school with my
elder brother, and only came back for the holidays; and we two had
moreover a little sanctum of our own, a small sitting-room named Bec by
my father, who had a taste for pleasant traditions, after Anthony Bec,
the warlike Bishop of Durham, who had once been Chancellor of Lincoln.
Here we arranged our collections and attended to our own concerns,
hardly having anything to do with the nursery life, except to go to tea
there and to play games in the evening. The one thing I do remember is
that Hugh would under no circumstances and for no considerations ever
consent to go into a room in the dark by himself, being extremely
imaginative and nervous; and that on one occasion when he was asked what
he expected to befall him, he said with a shudder and a stammer: "To
fall over a mangled corpse, squish! into a pool of gore!"
When he was between four and five years old, at Lincoln, one of his
godfathers, Mr. Penny, an old friend and colleague of my father's at
Wellington College, came to stay at the Chancery, and brought Hugh a
Bible. My mother was sitting with Mr. Penny in the drawing-room after
luncheon, when Hugh, in a little black velvet suit, his flaxen hair
brushed till it gleamed with radiance, his face the picture of
innocence, bearing the Bible, a very image of early piety, entered the
room, and going up to his godfather, said with his little stammer:
"Tha-a-ank you, Godpapa, for this beautiful Bible! will you read me some
of it?"
Mr. Penny beamed with delight, and took the Bible. My mother rose to
leave the room, feeling almost unworthy of being present at so sacred an
interview, but as she reached the door, she heard Mr. Penny say: "And
what shall I read about?" "The De-e-evil!" said Hugh without the least
hesitation. My mother closed the door and came back.
There was one member of our family circle for whom Hugh did undoubtedly
cherish a very deep and tender affection from the time when his
affections first awoke--this was for the beloved Beth, the old family
nurse. Beth became nurse-maid to my grandmother, Mrs. Sidgwick, as a
young girl; and the first of her nurslings, whom she tended through an
attack of smallpox, catching the complaint herself, was my uncle,
William Sidgwick, still alive as a vigorous octogenarian. Henry
Sidgwick, Arthur Sidgwick, and my mother were all under Beth's care.
Then she came on with my mother to Wellington College and nursed us all
with the simplest and sweetest goodness and devotion. For Hugh, as the
last of her "children," she had the tenderest love, and lavished her
care, and indeed her money, on him. When we were all dispersed for a
time after my father's death, Beth went to her Yorkshire relations, and
pined away in separation from her dear ones. Hugh returned alone and
earlier than the rest, and Beth could bear it no longer, but came up
from Yorkshire just to get a glimpse of Hugh at a station in London as
he passed through, had a few words with him and a kiss, and gave him
some little presents which she thought he might like, returning to
Yorkshire tired out but comforted. I have always thought that little
journey one of the most touching and beautiful acts of love and service
I have ever heard of. She was nearly eighty at the time.
[Illustration: _Photo by R. Slingsby, Lincoln_
ROBERT HUGH BENSON AND BETH
AT THE CHANCERY, LINCOLN
IN 1876. AGED 5]
In early days she watched over Hugh, did anything and everything for
him; when he got older she used to delight to wait on him, to pack and
unpack for him, to call him in the mornings, and secretly to purchase
clothes and toilet articles to replace anything worn out or lost. In
later days the thought that he was coming home used to make her radiant
for days before. She used to come tapping at my door before dinner, and
sit down for a little talk. "I know what you are thinking about, Beth!"
"What is it, dear?" "Why, about Hugh, of course! You don't care for
anyone else when he is coming." "No, don't say that, dear--but I _am_
pleased to think that Master Hugh is coming home for a bit--I hope he
won't be very tired!" And she used to smooth down her apron with her
toil-worn hands and beam to herself at the prospect. He always went and
sat with her for a little in the evenings, in her room full of all the
old nursery treasures, and imitated her smilingly. "Nay, now, child!
I've spoken, and that is enough!" he used to say, while she laughed for
delight. She used to say farewell to him with tears, and wave her
handkerchief at the window till the carriage was out of sight. Even in
her last long illness, as she faded out of life, at over ninety years of
age, she was made perfectly happy by the thought that he was in the
house, and only sorry that she could not look after his things.
Beth had had but little education; she could read a little in a
well-known book, but writing was always a slow and difficult business;
but she used slowly to compile a little letter from time to time to
Hugh, and I find the following put away among the papers of his Eton
days and schoolboy correspondence:
Addington Park,
[? _Nov._ 1887] _Tuesday._
Dearest,--One line to tell you I am sending your Box
to-morrow Wednesday. I hope you will get it before tea-time. I
know you will like something for tea, you can keep your cake for
your Birthday. I shall think about you on Friday. Everybody has
gone away, so I had no one to write for me. I thought you would
not mind me writing to you.--Dearest love from your dear
Beth.
The dear Beth lived wholly in love and service; she loved just as she
worked, endlessly and ungrudgingly; wherever Beth is, she will find
service to render and children to love; and I cannot think that she has
not found the way to her darling, and he to her.
III
TRURO
We all went off again to Truro in 1877, when my father was made Bishop.
The tradition was that as the train, leaving Lincoln, drew up after five
minutes at the first small station on the line, perhaps Navenby, a
little voice in the corner said: "Is this Truro?" A journey by train was
for many years a great difficulty for Hugh, as it always made him ill,
owing to the motion of the carriage.
At Truro he becomes a much more definite figure in my recollections. He
was a delicately made, light-haired, blue-eyed child, looking rather
angelic in a velvet suit, and with small, neat feet, of which he was
supposed to be unduly aware. He had at that time all sorts of odd
tricks, winkings and twitchings; and one very aggravating habit, in
walking, of putting his feet together suddenly, stopping and looking
down at them, while he muttered to himself the mystic formula, "Knuck,
Nunks." But one thing about him was very distinct indeed, that he was
entirely impervious to the public opinion of the nursery, and could
neither be ridiculed nor cajoled out of continuing to do anything he
chose to do. He did not care the least what was said, nor had he any
morbid fears, as I certainly had as a child, of being disliked or mocked
at. He went his own way, knew what he wanted to do, and did it.
My recollections of him are mainly of his extreme love of argument and
the adroitness with which he conducted it. He did not intend to be put
upon as the youngest, and it was supposed that if he was ever told to do
anything, he always replied: "Why shouldn't Fred?" He invented an
ingenious device which he once, and once only, practised with success,
of goading my brother Fred by petty shafts of domestic insult into
pursuing him, bent on vengeance. Hugh had prepared some small pieces of
folded paper with a view to this contingency, and as Fred gave chase,
Hugh flung two of his papers on the ground, being sure that Fred would
stop to examine them. The ruse was quite successful, and while Fred was
opening the papers, Hugh sought sanctuary in the nursery. Sometimes my
sisters were deputed to do a lesson with him. My elder sister Nelly had
a motherly instinct, and enjoyed a small responsibility. She would
explain a rule of arithmetic to Hugh. He would assume an expression of
despair: "I don't understand a word of it--you go so quick." Then it
would be explained again: "Now do you understand?" "Of course I
understand _that_." "Very well, do a sum." The sum would begin: "Oh,
don't push me--don't come so near--I don't like having my face blown
on." Presently my sister with angelic patience would show him a
mistake. "Oh, don't interfere--you make it all mixed up in my head."
Then he would be let alone for a little. Then he would put the slate
down with an expression of despair and resignation; if my sister took no
notice he would say: "I thought Mamma told you to help me in my sums?
How can I understand without having it explained to me?" It was
impossible to get the last word; indeed he used to give my sister
Maggie, when she taught him, what he called "Temper-tickets," at the end
of the lesson; and on one occasion, when he was to repeat a Sunday
collect to her, he was at last reported to my mother, as being wholly
intractable. This was deeply resented; and after my sister had gone to
bed, a small piece of paper was pushed in beneath her door, on which was
written: "The most unhappiest Sunday I ever spent in my life. Whose
fault?"
Again, when Maggie had found him extremely cross and tiresome one
morning in the lessons she was taking, she discovered, when Hugh at
last escaped, a piece of paper on the schoolroom table, on which he had
written
"Passionate Magey
Toodle Ha! Ha!
The old gose."
There was another story of how he was asked to write out a list of the
things he wanted, with a view to a birthday that was coming. The list
ended:
"A little compenshion goat, and
A tiny-winy train, and
A nice little pen."
The diminutives were evidently intended to give the requirements a
modest air. As for "compenshion," he had asked what some nursery animal
was made of, a fracture having displayed a sort of tough fibrous
plaster. He was told that it was made of "a composition."
We used to play many rhyming games at that time; and Hugh at the age of
eight wrote a poem about a swarm of gnats dancing in the sun, which
ended:
"And when they see their comrades laid
In thousands round the garden glade,
They know they were not really made
To live for evermore."
In one of these games, each player wrote a question which was to be
answered by some other player in a poem; Hugh, who had been talked to
about the necessity of overcoming some besetting sin in Lent, wrote with
perfect good faith as his question, "What is your sin for Lent?"
As a child, and always throughout his life, he was absolutely free from
any touch of priggishness or precocious piety. He complained once to my
sister that when he was taken out walks by his elders, he heard about
nothing but "poetry and civilisation." In a friendly little memoir of
him, which I have been sent, I find the following passage: "In his early
childhood, when reason was just beginning to ponder over the meaning of
things, he was so won to enthusiastic admiration of the heroes and
heroines of the Catholic Church that he decided he would probe for
himself the Catholic claims, and the child would say to the father,
'Father, if there be such a sacrament as Penance, can I go?' And the
good Archbishop, being evasive in his answers, the young boy found
himself emerging more and more in a woeful Nemesis of faith." It would
be literally _impossible_, I think, to construct a story less
characteristic both of Hugh's own attitude of mind as well as of the
atmosphere of our family and household life than this!
He was always very sensitive to pain and discomfort. On one occasion,
when his hair was going to be cut, he said to my mother: "Mayn't I have
chloroform for it?"
And my mother has described to me a journey which she once took with him
abroad when he was a small boy. He was very ill on the crossing, and
they had only just time to catch the train. She had some luncheon with
her, but he said that the very mention of food made him sick. She
suggested that she should sit at the far end of the carriage and eat her
own lunch, while he shut his eyes; but he said that the mere sound of
crumpled paper made him ill, and then that the very idea that there was
food in the carriage upset him; so that my mother had to get out on the
first stop and bolt her food on the platform.
One feat of Hugh's I well remember. Sir James McGarel Hogg, afterwards
Lord Magheramorne, was at the time member for Truro. He was a stately
and kindly old gentleman, pale-faced and white-bearded, with formal and
dignified manners. He was lunching with us one day, and gave his arm to
my mother to conduct her to the dining-room. Hugh, for some reason best
known to himself, selected that day to secrete himself in the
dining-room beforehand, and burst out upon Sir James with a wild howl,
intended to create consternation. Neither then nor ever was he
embarrassed by inconvenient shyness.
The Bishop's house at Truro, Lis Escop, had been the rectory of the rich
living of Kenwyn; it was bought for the see and added to. It was a
charming house about a mile out of Truro above a sequestered valley,
with a far-off view of the little town lying among hills, with the smoke
going up, and the gleaming waters of the estuary enfolded in the uplands
beyond. The house had some acres of pasture-land about it and some fine
trees; with a big garden and shrubberies, an orchard and a wood. We were
all very happy there, save for the shadow of my eldest brother's death
as a Winchester boy in 1878. I was an Eton boy myself and thus was only
there in the holidays; we lived a very quiet life, with few visitors;
and my recollection of the time there is one of endless games and
schemes and amusements. We had writing games and drawing games, and
acted little plays.
We children had a mysterious secret society, with titles and offices and
ceremonies: an old alcoved arbour in the garden, with a seat running
round it, and rough panelling behind, was the chapter-house of the
order. There were robes and initiations and a book of proceedings. Hugh
held the undistinguished office of Servitor, and his duties were mainly
those of a kind of acolyte. I think he somewhat enjoyed the meetings,
though the difficulty was always to discover any purpose for which the
society existed. There were subscriptions and salaries; and to his
latest day it delighted him to talk of the society, and to point out
that his salary had never equalled his subscription.
There were three or four young clergy, Arthur Mason, now Canon of
Canterbury, G. H. Whitaker, since Canon of Hereford, John Reeve, late
Rector of Lambeth, G. H. S. Walpole, now Bishop of Edinburgh, who had
come down with my father, and they were much in the house. My father
Himself was full of energy and hopefulness, and loved Cornwall with an
almost romantic love. But in all of this Hugh was too young to take much
part. Apart from school hours he was a quick, bright, clever child,
wanting to take his part in everything. My brother Fred and I were away
at school, or later at the University; and the home circle, except for
the holidays, consisted of my father and mother, my two sisters, and
Hugh. My father had been really prostrated with grief at the death of my
eldest brother, who was a boy of quite extraordinary promise and
maturity of mind. My father was of a deeply affectionate and at the same
time anxious disposition; he loved family life, but he had an almost
tremulous sense of his parental responsibility. I have never known
anyone in my life whose personality was so strongly marked as my
father's. He had a superhuman activity, and cared about everything to
which he put his hand with an intensity and an enthusiasm that was
almost overwhelming. At the same time he was extremely sensitive; and
this affected him in a curious way. A careless word from one of us, some
tiny instance of childish selfishness or lack of affection, might
distress him out of all proportion. He would brood over such things,
make himself unhappy, and at the same time feel it his duty to correct
what he felt to be a dangerous tendency. He could not think lightly of
a trifle or deal with it lightly; and he would appeal, I now think, to
motives more exalted than the occasion justified. A little heedless
utterance would be met by him not by a half-humourous word, but by a
grave and solemn remonstrance. We feared his displeasure very much, but
we could never be quite sure what would provoke it. If he was in a
cheerful mood, he might pass over with a laugh or an ironical word what
in a sad or anxious mood would evoke an indignant and weighty censure. I
was much with him at this time, and was growing to understand him
better; but even so, I could hardly say that I was at ease in his
presence. I did not talk of the things that were in my mind, but of the
things which I thought would please him; and when he was pleased, his
delight was evident and richly rewarding.
But in these days he began to have a peculiar and touching affection for
Hugh, and hoped that he would prove the beloved companion of his age.
Hugh used to trot about with him, spudding up weeds from the lawn. He
used, when at home, to take Hugh's Latin lessons, and threw himself into
the congenial task of teaching with all his force and interest. Yet I
have often heard Hugh say that these lessons were seldom free from a
sense of strain. He never knew what he might not be expected to know or
to respond to with eager interest. My father had a habit, in teaching,
of over-emphasising minute details and nuances of words, insisting upon
derivations and tenses, packing into language a mass of suggestions and
associations which could never have entered into the mind of the writer.
Language ought to be treated sympathetically, as the not over-precise
expression of human emotion and wonder; but my father made it of a
half-scientific, half-fanciful analysis. This might prove suggestive and
enriching to more mature minds. But Hugh once said to me that he used to
feel day after day like a small china mug being filled out of a
waterfall. Moreover Hugh's mind was lively and imaginative, but fitful
and impatient; and the process both daunted and wearied him.
I have lately been looking through a number of letters from my father to
Hugh in his schooldays. Reading between the lines, and knowing the
passionate affection in the background, these are beautiful and pathetic
documents. But they are over-full of advice, suggestion, criticism,
anxious inquiries about work and religion, thought and character. This
was all a part of the strain and tension at which my father lived. He
was so absorbed in his work, found life such a tremendous business, was
so deeply in earnest, that he could not relax, could not often enjoy a
perfectly idle, leisurely, amused mood. Hugh himself was the exact
opposite. He could work, in later days, with fierce concentration and
immense energy; but he also could enjoy, almost more than anyone I have
ever seen, rambling, inconsequent, easy talk, consisting of stories,
arguments, and ideas just as they came into his head; this had no
counterpart in my father, who was always purposeful.
But it was a happy time at Truro for Hugh. Speaking generally, I should
call him in those days a quick, inventive, active-minded child, entirely
unsentimental; he was fond of trying his hand at various things, but he
was impatient and volatile, would never take trouble, and as a
consequence never did anything well. One would never have supposed, in
those early days, that he was going to be so hard a worker, and still
less such a worker as he afterwards became, who perfected his gifts by
such continuous, prolonged, and constantly renewed labour. I recollect
his giving a little conjuring entertainment as a boy, but he had
practised none of his tricks, and the result was a fiasco, which had to
be covered up by lavish and undeserved applause; a little later, too, at
Addington, he gave an exhibition of marionettes, which illustrated
historical scenes. The puppets were dressed by Beth, our old nurse, and
my sisters, and Hugh was the showman behind the scenes. The little
curtains were drawn up for a tableau which was supposed to represent an
episode in the life of Thomas à Becket. Hugh's voice enunciated, "Scene,
an a-arid waste!" Then came a silence, and then Hugh was heard to say to
his assistant in a loud, agitated whisper, "Where is the Archbishop?"
But the puppet had been mislaid, and he had to go on to the next
tableau. The most remarkable thing about him was a real independence of
character, with an entire disregard of other people's opinion. What he
liked, what he felt, what he decided, was the important thing to him,
and so long as he could get his way, I do not think that he troubled his
head about what other people might think or wish; he did not want to
earn good opinions, nor did he care for disapproval or approval; people
in fact were to him at that time more or less favourable channels for
him to follow his own designs, more or less stubborn obstacles to his
attaining his wishes. He was not at all a sensitive or shrinking child.
He was quite capable of holding his own, full of spirit and fearless,
though quiet enough, and not in the least interfering, except when his
rights were menaced.
IV
BOYHOOD
He went to school at Clevedon, in Somersetshire, in 1882, at Walton
House, then presided over by Mr. Cornish. It was a well-managed place,
and the teaching was good. I suppose that all boys of an independent
mind dislike the first breaking-in to the ways of the world, and the
exchanging of the freedom of home for the barrack-life of school, the
absence of privacy, and the sense of being continually under the
magnifying-glass which school gives. It was dreadful to Hugh to have to
account for himself at all times, to justify his ways and tastes, his
fancies and even his appearance, to boys and masters alike. Bullying is
indeed practically extinct in well-managed schools; but small boys are
inquisitive, observant, extremely conventional, almost like savages in
their inventiveness of prohibitions and taboos, and perfectly merciless
in criticism. The instinct for power is shown by small boys in the
desire to make themselves felt, which is most easily accomplished by
minute ridicule. Hugh made friends there, but he never really enjoyed
the life of the place. The boys who get on well at school from the first
are robust, normal boys, without any inconvenient originality, who enjoy
games and the good-natured rough and tumble of school life. But Hugh was
not a boy of that kind; he was small, not good at games, and had plenty
of private fancies and ideas of his own. He was ill at ease, and he
never liked the town of straggling modern houses on the low sea-front,
with the hills and ports of Wales rising shadowy across the mud-stained
tide.
He was quick and clever, and had been well taught; so that in 1885 he
won a scholarship at Eton, and entered college there, to my great
delight, in the September of that year. I had just returned to Eton as a
master, and was living with Edward Lyttelton in a quaint, white-gabled
house called Baldwin's Shore, which commanded a view of Windsor Castle,
and overlooked the little, brick-parapeted, shallow pond known as
Barnes' Pool, which, with the sluggish stream that feeds it, separates
the college from the town, and is crossed by the main London road. It
was a quaint little house, which had long ago been a boarding-house, and
contained many low-coiled, odd-shaped rooms. Hugh was Edward Lyttelton's
private pupil, so that he was often in and out of the place. But I did
not see very much of him. He was a small, ingenuous-looking creature in
those days, light-haired and blue-eyed; and when a little later he
became a steerer of one of the boats, he looked very attractive in his
Fourth of June dress, as a middy, with a dirk and white duck trousers,
dangling an enormous bouquet from his neck. At Eton he did very little
in the way of work, and his intellect must have been much in abeyance;
because so poor was his performance, that it became a matter of
surprise among his companions that he had ever won a scholarship at all.
[Illustration: _Photo by Elliott & Fry_
THE THREE BROTHERS, 1882
E. F. Benson A. C. Benson R. H. Benson
at Marlborough. at Cambridge. at Mr. Cornish's School at Clevedon.
Aged 15. Aged 21. Aged 11.]
I have said that I did not know very much about Hugh at Eton; this was
the result of the fact that several of the boys of his set were my
private pupils. It was absolutely necessary that a master in that
position should avoid any possibility of collusion with a younger
brother, whose friends were that master's pupils. If it had been
supposed that I questioned Hugh about my pupils and their private lives,
or if he had been thought likely to tell me tales, we should both of us
have been branded. But as he had no wish to confide, and indeed little
enough to consult anyone about, and as I had no wish for sidelights, we
did not talk about his school life at all. The set of boys in which he
lived was a curious one; they were fairly clever, but they must have
been, I gathered afterwards, quite extraordinarily critical and
quarrelsome. There was one boy in particular, a caustic, spiteful, and
extremely mischief-making creature, who turned the set into a series of
cliques and parties. Hugh used to say afterwards that he had never known
anyone in his life with such an eye for other people's weaknesses, or
with such a talent for putting them in the most disagreeable light. Hugh
once nearly got into serious trouble; a small boy in the set was
remorselessly and disgracefully bullied; it came out, and Hugh was
involved--I remember that Dr. Warre spoke to me about it with much
concern--but a searching investigation revealed that Hugh had really had
nothing to do with it, and the victim of the bullying spoke insistently
in Hugh's favour.
Hugh describes how the facts became known in the holidays, and how my
father in his extreme indignation at what he supposed to be proved, so
paralysed Hugh that he had no opportunity of clearing himself. But
anyone who had ever known Hugh would have felt that it was the last
thing he would have done. He was tenacious enough of his own rights, and
argumentative enough; but he never had the faintest touch of the
savagery that amuses itself at the sight of another's sufferings. "I
hate cruelty more than anything in the whole world," he wrote later;
"the existence of it is the only thing which reconciles my conscience to
the necessity of Hell."
Hugh speaks in his book, _The Confession of a Convert_, about the
extremely negative character of his religious impressions at school. I
think it is wholly accurate. Living as we did in an ecclesiastical
household, and with a father who took singular delight in ceremonial and
liturgical devotion, I think that religion did impress itself rather too
much as a matter of solemn and dignified occupation than as a matter of
feeling and conduct. It was not that my father ever forgot the latter;
indeed, behind his love for symbolical worship lay a passionate and
almost Puritan evangelicalism. But he did not speak easily and openly of
spiritual experience. I was myself profoundly attracted as a boy by the
æsthetic side of religion, and loved its solemnities with all my heart;
but it was not till I made friends with Bishop Wilkinson at the age of
seventeen that I had any idea of spiritual religion and the practice of
friendship with God. Certainly Hugh missed it, in spite of very loving
and earnest talks and deeply touching letters from my father on the
subject. I suppose that there must come for most people a spiritual
awakening; and until that happens, all talk of emotional religion and
the love of God is a thing submissively accepted, and simply not
understood or realised as an actual thing.
Hugh was not at Eton very long--not more than three or four years. He
never became in any way a typical Etonian. If I am asked to say what
that is, I should say that it is the imbibing instinctively of what is
eminently a fine, manly, and graceful convention. Its good side is a
certain chivalrous code of courage, honour, efficiency, courtesy, and
duty. Its fault is a sense of perfect rightness and self-sufficiency, an
overvaluing of sport and games, an undervaluing of intellectual
interests, enthusiasm, ideas. It is not that the sense of effortless
superiority is to be emphasized or insisted upon--modesty entirely
forbids that--but it is the sort of feeling described ironically in the
book of Job, when the patriarch says to the elders, "No doubt but ye are
the people, and wisdom shall die with you." It is a tacit belief that
all has been done for one that the world can do, and that one's standing
is so assured that it need never be even claimed or paraded.
[Illustration: _Photo by Hills & Saunders_
ROBERT HUGH BENSON
IN 1889. AGE 17
As Steerer of the _St. George_, at Eton.]
Still less was Hugh a typical Colleger. College at Eton, where the
seventy boys who get scholarships are boarded, is a school within a
school. The Collegers wear gowns and surplices in public, they have
their own customs and traditions and games. It is a small, close, clever
society, and produces a tough kind of self-confidence, together with a
devotion to a particular tradition which is almost like a religious
initiation. Perhaps if the typical Etonian is conscious of a certain
absolute rightness in the eyes of the world, the typical Colleger has a
sense almost of absolute righteousness, which does not need even to be
endorsed by the world. The danger of both is that the process is
completed at perhaps too early a date, and that the product is too
consciously a finished one, needing to be enlarged and modified by
contact with the world.
But Hugh did not stay at Eton long enough for this process to complete
itself. He decided that he wished to compete for the Indian Civil
Service; and as it was clear that he could not do this successfully at
Eton, my father most reluctantly allowed him to leave.
I find among the little scraps which survive from his schoolboy days,
the following note. It was written on his last night at Eton. He says:
"_I write this on Thursday evening after ten. Peel keeping passage._"
"Peel" is Sidney Peel, the Speaker's son. The passages are patrolled by
the Sixth Form from ten to half-past, to see that no boy leaves his room
without permission. Then follows:
_My feelings on leaving are--
Excitement.
Foreboding of Wren's and fellows there.
Sorrow at leaving Eton.
Pride as being an old Etonian.
Certain pleasure in leaving for many trivial matters.
Feeling of importance.
Frightful longing for India.
Homesickness._
_DEAR ME!_
It was characteristic of Hugh that he should wish both to analyse his
feelings on such an occasion, and to give expression to them.
V
AT WREN'S
Hugh accordingly went to Mr. Wren's coaching establishment in London,
living partly at Lambeth, when my family were in town, and partly as a
boarder with a clergyman. It was a time of hard work; and I really
retain very few recollections of him at all at this date. I was myself
very busy at Eton, and spent the holidays to a great extent in
travelling and paying visits; and I think that Christmas, when we used
to write, rehearse, and act a family play, was probably the only time at
which I saw him.
Hugh went abroad for a short time to learn French, with a party of
Indian Civil Service candidates, and no doubt forgot to write home, for
I find the following characteristic letter of my father's to him:
Lambeth Palace, S.E., _30th June_ 1889.
My dearest Hughie,--We have been rather mourning about
not hearing one word from you. We _supposed_ all would be right as
you were a large party. But _one_ word would be so easy to those
who love you so, who have done all they could to enable you to
follow your own line, against their own wishes and affection!
We hope at any rate you are writing to-day. And we have sent off
"Pioneers and Founders," which we hope will both give you happy
and interesting Sunday reading, and remind you of us.
Mr. Spiers writes that you are backward in French but getting on
rather fast.
I want you now at the beginning of this cramming year to make two
or three Resolutions, besides those which you know and have
thought of often and practised:
1. To determine never to do any secular examination work on
Sundays--to keep all reading that day as fitting "The _Lord's_
Day" and the "Day of Rest."
I had a poor friend who would have done very well at Oxford, but
he would make no difference between Sunday and other days. He
worked on just the same and in the Examination _itself_, just as
the goal was reached, he broke down and took no degree. The
doctors said it was all owing to the continuous nervous strain. If
he had taken the Sundays it would just have saved him.
Lord Selborne was once telling me of his tremendous work at one
time, and he said, "I never could have done it, but that I took my
Sundays. I never would work on them."
2. We have arranged for you to go over to the Holy Communion one
day at Dinan. Perhaps some nice fellow will go with you--Mr.
Spiers will anyhow. Tell us _which_ Sunday, so that we may all be
with you [Greek: en pneumati].
Last night we dined at the Speaker's to meet, the Prince and
Princess of Wales. It was very interesting. The Terrace of the
House of Commons was lighted with electric light. A steamer went
by and cheered!
The Shah will fill London with grand spectacles, and I suppose his
coming will have much effect on politics--perhaps on _India_ too.
All are well.--Ever your most loving father,
Edw. Cantuar.
I am going to preach at the Abbey to-night.
Hugh failed, however, to secure a place in the Indian Civil Service, and
it was decided that he should go up to Trinity College, Cambridge, and
read for classical honours.
Up to this date I do not think that anything very conscious or definite
had been going on in Hugh's mind or heart. He always said himself that
it astonished him on looking back to think how purely negative and
undeveloped his early life had been, and how it had been lived on
entirely superficial lines, without plans or ambitions, simply taking
things as they came.
I think it was quite true that it was so; his emotions were dormant,
his powers were dormant. I do not think he had either great affections
or great friendships. He liked companionship and amusement, he avoided
what bored him; he had no inclinations to evil, but neither had he any
marked inclinations to what was good. Neither had any of his many and
varied gifts and accomplishments showed themselves. I used to think
latterly that he was one of the most gifted people I had ever seen in
all artistic ways. Whatever he took up he seemed able to do, without any
apprenticeship or drudgery. Music, painting, drawing, carving,
designing--he took them all up in turn; and I used to feel that if he
had devoted himself to any one of them he could have reached a high
excellence. Even his literary gifts, so various and admirable, showed
but few signs of their presence in the early days; he was not in the
least precocious. I think that on the whole it was beneficial to him
that his energies all lay fallow. My father, stern as his conception of
duty was, had a horror of applying any intellectual pressure to us. I
myself must confess that I was distinctly idle and dilettante both as a
boy at Eton and as a Cambridge undergraduate. But much as my father
appreciated and applauded any little successes, I was often surprised
that I was never taken to task for my poor performances in work and
scholarship. The truth was that my eldest brother's death at Winchester
was supposed partly to have been due to his extraordinary intellectual
and mental development, and I am sure that my father was afraid of
over-stimulating our mental energies. I feel certain that what was going
on in Hugh's case all the time was a keen exercise of observation. I
have no doubt that his brain was receiving and gaining impressions of
every kind, and that his mind was not really inactive--it was only
unconsciously amassing material. He had a very quick and delighted
perception of human temperament, of the looks, gestures, words,
mannerisms, habits, and oddities of human beings. If Hugh had been born
in a household professionally artistic, and had been trained in art of
any kind, I think he would very likely have become an accomplished
artist or musician, and probably have shown great precocity. But he was
never an artist in the sense that art was a torment to him, or that he
made any sacrifice of other aims to it. It was always just a part of
existence to him, and of the nature of an amusement, though in so far as
it represented the need of self-expression in forms of beauty, it
underlay and permeated the whole of his life.
The first sign of his artistic enthusiasm awakening was during his time
in London, when he conceived an intense admiration for the music and
ceremony of St. Paul's. Sir George Martin, on whom my father had
conferred a musical degree, was very kind to him, and allowed Hugh to
frequent the organ-loft. "To me," Hugh once wrote, "music is the great
reservoir of emotion from which flow out streams of salvation." But this
was not only a musical devotion. I believe that he now conceived, or
rather perhaps developed, a sense of the symbolical poetry of religious
rites and ceremonies which remained with him to the end. It is true to
say that the force and quality of ritual, as a province of art, has been
greatly neglected and overlooked. It is not for a moment to be regarded
as a purely artistic thing; but it most undoubtedly has an attraction
and a fascination as clear and as sharply defined as the attraction of
music, poetry, painting or drama. All art is an attempt to express a
sense of the overwhelming power of beauty. It is hard to say what beauty
is, but it seems to be one of the inherent qualities of the Unknown, an
essential part of the Divine mind. In England we are so stupid and so
concrete that we are apt to think of a musician as one who arranges
chords, and of a painter as one who copies natural effects. It is not
really that at all. The artist is in reality struggling with an idea,
which idea is a consciousness of an amazing and adorable quality in
things, which affects him passionately and to which he must give
expression. The form which his expression takes is conditioned by the
sharpness of his perception in some direction or other. To the musician,
notes and intervals and vibrations are just the fairy flights and dances
of forms audible to the ear; to the painter, it is a question of shapes
and colours perceptible to the eye. The dramatist sees the same beauty
in the interplay of human emotion; while it may be maintained that
holiness itself is a passionate perception of moral beauty, and that the
saint is attracted by purity and compassion, and repelled by sin,
disorder, and selfishness, in the same way as the artist is attracted
and repelled by visible charm and ugliness.
Ritual has been as a rule so closely annexed to religion--though all
spectacular delights and ceremonies have the same quality--that it has
never been reckoned among artistic predilections. The aim of ritual is,
I believe, a high poetry of which the essence is symbolism and mystery.
The movement of forms solemnly vested, and with a background of
architecture and music, produces an emotion quite distinct from other
artistic emotions. It is a method, like all other arts, through which a
human being arrives at a sense of mysterious beauty, and it evokes in
mystical minds a passion to express themselves in just that way and no
other, and to celebrate thus their sense of the unknown.
But there has always been a natural terror in the religious mind of
laying too much stress on this, or of seeming to encourage too much an
æsthetic emotion. If the first business of religion is to purify life,
there will always be a suspicion of idolatry about ritual, a fear of
substituting a vague desire for beauty for a practical devotion to right
conduct.
Hugh wrote to me some years later what he felt about it all:
"... Liturgy, to my mind, is nothing more than a very fine and
splendid art, conveying things, to people who possess the
liturgical faculty, in an extraordinarily dramatic and vivid way.
I further believe that this is an art which has been gradually
brought nearer and nearer perfection by being tested and developed
through nineteen centuries, by every kind of mind and nationality.
The way in which it does, indisputably, appeal to such very
different kinds of people, and unite them, does, quite apart from
other things, give it a place with music and painting.
* * * * *
"I do frankly acknowledge Liturgy to be no more than an art--and
therefore not in the least generally necessary to salvation; and I
do not in the least 'condemn' people who do not appreciate it. It
is only a way of presenting facts--and, in the case of Holy Week
Ceremonies, these facts are such as those of the Passion of
Christ, the sins of men, the Resurrection and the Sovereignty of
Christ."
* * * * *
I have laid stress upon all this, because I believe that from this time
the poetry and beauty of ritual had a deep and increasing fascination
for Hugh. But it is a thing about which it is so easy for the enemy to
blaspheme, to ridicule ceremonial in religion as a mere species of
entertainment, that religious minds have always been inclined to
disclaim the strength of its influence. Hugh certainly inherited this
particular perception from my father. I should doubt if anyone ever knew
so much about religious ceremonial as he did, or perceived so clearly
the force of it. "I am almost ashamed to seem to know so much about
these things," I have often heard him say; and again, "I don't ever seem
able to forget the smallest detail of ritual." My father had a very
strong artistic nature--poetry, sculpture, painting, architecture,
scenery, were all full of fascination to him--for music alone of the
arts he had but little taste; and I think that it ought to be realised
that Hugh's nature was an artistic one through and through. He had the
most lively and passionate sensibility to the appeal of art. He had,
too, behind the outer sensitiveness, the inner toughness of the artist.
It is often mistakenly thought that the artist is sensitive through and
through. In my experience, this is not the case. The artist has to be
protected against the overwhelming onset of emotions and perceptions by
a strong interior fortress of emotional calm and serenity. It is certain
that this was the case with Hugh. He was not in the least sentimental,
he was not really very emotional. He was essentially solitary within; he
attracted friendship and love more than he gave them. I do not think
that he ever suffered very acutely through his personal emotions. His
energy of output was so tremendous, his power of concentration so great,
that he found a security here from the more ravaging emotions of the
heart. Not often did he give his heart away; he admired greatly, he
sympathised freely; but I never saw him desolated or stricken by any
bereavement or loss. I used to think sometimes that he never needed
anyone. I never saw him exhibit the smallest trace of jealousy, nor did
he ever desire to possess anyone's entire affection. He recognised any
sign of affection generously and eagerly; but he never claimed to keep
it exclusively as his own.
VI
CAMBRIDGE
Hugh went then to Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1890. He often talked
to me in later days about his time there as an undergraduate. He found a
number of his Eton contemporaries up there, and he had a very sociable
time. A friend and contemporary of his at Trinity describes him as
small, light, and boyish-looking. "He walked fast, and always appeared
to be busy." He never cared much about athletics, but he was an
excellent steerer. He steered the third Trinity boat all the time he was
at Cambridge, and was a member of the Leander club. He was always
perfectly cool, and not in the smallest degree nervous. He was,
moreover, an excellent walker and mountain-climber. He once walked up to
London from Cambridge; I have climbed mountains with him, and he was
very agile, quick, surefooted, and entirely intrepid. Let me interpolate
a little anecdote of an accident at Pontresina, which might have been
serious. Hugh and I, with a practised Alpine climber, Dr. Leith, left
Pontresina early one morning to climb a rock-peak. We were in a light
carriage with a guide and porter. The young horse which drew us, as we
were rattling down the high embanked road leading to Samaden, took a
sharp turn to the right, where a road branched off. He was sharply
checked by the guide, with the result that the carriage collided with a
stone post, and we were all flung out down the embankment, a living
cataract of men, ice-axes, haversacks, and wraps. The horse fortunately
stopped. We picked ourselves ruefully up and resumed our places. Not
until we reached our destination did we become aware that the whole
incident had passed in silence. Not one word of advice or recrimination
or even of surprise had passed anyone's lips!
But Hugh's climbing was put a stop to by a sharp attack of heart-failure
on the Piz Palù. He was with my brother Fred, and after a long climb
through heavy snow, he collapsed and was with difficulty carried down.
He believed himself to be on the point of death, and records in one of
his books that the prospect aroused no emotion whatever in his mind
either of fear or excitement, only of deep curiosity.
While he was an undergraduate, he and I had a sudden and overwhelming
interest in family history and genealogy. We went up to Yorkshire for a
few days one winter, stayed at Pateley Bridge, Ripon, Bolton Abbey,
Ripley, and finally York. At Pateley Bridge we found the parish
registers very ancient and complete, and by the aid of them, together
with the printed register of Fountains Abbey, we traced a family tree
back as far as to the fourteenth century, with ever-increasing evidence
of the poverty and mean condition of our ancestral stock. We visited the
houses and cradles of the race, and from comfortable granges and
farmsteads we declined, as the record conducted us back, to hovels and
huts of quite conspicuous humility and squalor. The thermometer fell
lower and lower every day, in sympathy with our researches. I remember a
night when we slept in a neglected assembly-room tacked on to a country
inn, on hastily improvised and scantily covered beds, when the water
froze in the ewers; and an attempt to walk over the moors one afternoon
from Masham into Nidderdale, when the springs by the roadside froze into
lumpy congealments, like guttering candles, and we were obliged to turn
back; and how we beguiled a ten-mile walk to Ripon, the last train
having gone, by telling an enormous improvised story, each taking an
alternate chapter, and each leaving the knots to be untied by the next
narrator. Hugh was very lively and ingenious in this, and proved the
most delightful of companions, though we had to admit as we returned
together that we had ruined the romance of our family history beyond
repair.
[Illustration: _Photo by Elliott & Fry_
ROBERT HUGH BENSON
IN 1893. AGED 21
As an Undergraduate at Cambridge.]
Hugh did very little work at Cambridge; he had given up classics, and
was working at theology, with a view to taking Orders. He managed to
secure a Third in the Tripos; he showed no intellectual promise
whatever; he was a very lively and amusing companion and a keen debater;
I think he wrote a little poetry; but he had no very pronounced tastes.
I remember his pointing out to me the windows of an extremely
unattractive set of ground-floor rooms in Whewell's Court as those which
he had occupied till he migrated to the Bishop's Hostel, eventually
moving to the Great Court. They look down Jesus Lane, and the long,
sombre wall of Sidney Sussex Garden. A flagged passage runs down to the
right of them, and the sitting-room is on the street. They were dark,
stuffy, and extremely noisy. The windows were high up, and splashed with
mud by the vehicles in the street, while it was necessary to keep them
shut, because otherwise conversation was wholly inaudible. "What did you
do there?" I said. "Heaven knows!" he answered. "As far as I can
remember, I mostly sat up late at night and played cards!" He certainly
spent a great deal of money. He had a good allowance, but he had so much
exceeded it at the end of his first year, that a financial crisis
followed, and my mother paid his debts for him. He had kept no accounts,
and he had entertained profusely.
The following letter from my father to him refers to one of Hugh's
attempts to economise. He caught a bad feverish cold at Cambridge as a
result of sleeping in a damp room, and was carried off to be nursed by
my uncle, Henry Sidgwick:
Addington Park, Croydon,
_26th Jan._ 1891.
Dearest Hughie,--I was rather disturbed to hear that you
imagined that what I said in October about not _needlessly
indulging_ was held by you to forbid your having a fire in your
bedroom on the ground floor in the depth of such a winter as we
have had!
You ought to have a fire lighted at such a season at 8 o'clock so
as to warm and dry the room, and all in it, nearly every
evening--and whenever the room seems damp, have a fire just
lighted to go out when it will. It's not wholesome to sleep in
heated rooms, but they must be dry. A _bed_ slept in every night
keeps so, if the room is not damp; but the room must not be damp,
and when it is unoccupied for two or three days it is sure to get
so.
_Be sure_ that there is a good fire in it all day, and all your
bed things, _mattress and all_, kept well before it for at _least_
a _whole day before you go back from Uncle Henry's_.
How was it your bed-maker had not your room well warmed and dried,
mattress dry, etc., before you went up this time? She ought to
have had, and should be spoken to about it--_i.e._ unless you told
her not to! in which case it would be very like having no
breakfast!
It has been a horrid interruption in the beginning of term--and
you'll have difficulty with the loss of time. Besides which I
have no doubt you have been very uncomfortable.
But I don't understand why you should have "nothing to write
about" because you have been in bed. Surely you must have
accumulated all sorts of reflective and imaginative stories there.
It is most kind of Aunt Nora and Uncle Henry--give my love and
thanks to both.
I grieve to say that many many more fish are found dead since the
thaw melted the banks of swept snow off the sides of the ice. It
is most piteous; the poor things seem to have come to the edge
where the water is shallowest--there is a shoal where we generally
feed the swans.
I am happy to say the goldfish seem all alive and merry. The
continual dropping of fresh water has no doubt saved them--they
were never hermetically sealed in like the other poor things.
Yesterday I was at Ringwould, near Dover. The farmers had been up
all night saving their cattle in the stalls from the sudden
floods.
Here we have not had any, though the earth is washed very much
from the hills in streaks.
We are--at least I am--dreadfully sorry to go to London--though
the house is very dull without "the boys."
All right about the books.--Ever your loving father,
Edw. Cantuar.
Hugh was much taken up with experiments in hypnotism as an
undergraduate, and found that he had a real power of inducing hypnotic
sleep, and even of curing small ailments. He told my mother all about
his experiments, and she wrote to him at once that he must either leave
this off while he was at Cambridge, or that my father must be told. Hugh
at once gave up his experiments, and escaped an unpleasant contretemps,
as the authorities discovered what was going on, and actually, I
believe, sent some of the offenders down.
Hugh says that he drifted into the idea of taking Orders as the line of
least resistance, though when he began the study of theology he said
that he had found the one subject he really cared for. But he had
derived a very strong half-religious, half-artistic impression from
reading John Inglesant just before he came up to Cambridge. He could
long after repeat many passages by heart, and he says that a
half-mystical, half-emotional devotion to the Person of Our Lord, which
he derived from the book, seemed to him to focus and concentrate all his
vague religious emotions. He attended the services at King's Chapel
regularly, but he says that he had no real religious life, and only
looked forward to being a country clergyman with a beautiful garden, an
exquisite choir, and a sober bachelor existence.
It was on an evening walk at Addington with my mother that he told her
of his intention to take Orders. They had gone together to evensong at a
neighbouring church, Shirley, and as they came back in the dusk through
the silent woods of the park, he said he believed he had received the
call, and had answered, "Here am I, send me!" My mother had the words
engraved on the inside of a ring, which Hugh wore for many years.
By far the closest and dearest of all the ties which bound Hugh to
another was his love for my mother. Though she still lives to bless us,
I may say this, that never did a mother give to her children a larger
and a wiser love than she gave to us; she was our playmate and
companion, but we always gave her a perfectly trustful and unquestioning
obedience. Yet it was always a reasonable and critical obedience. She
never exacted silent submission, but gave us her reasons readily. She
never curtailed our independence, or oppressed us with a sense of
over-anxiety. She never demanded confidence, but welcomed it with
perfect, understanding.
The result of this with Hugh was that he came to consult her about
everything, about his plans, his schemes, his books, his beliefs. He
read all his writings aloud to her, and deferred much to her frankly
critical mind and her deeply human insight. At the time when he was
tending towards Rome, she accompanied him every step of the way, though
never disguising from him her own differences of opinion and belief. It
was due to her that he suspended his decision, read books, consulted
friends, gave the old tradition full weight; he never had the misery of
feeling that she was overcome by a helpless distress, because she never
attempted to influence any one of us away from any course we thought it
right to pursue. She did not conceal her opinion, but wished Hugh to
make up his own mind, believing that everyone must do that, and that the
only chance of happiness lies there.
[Illustration: _Photo by H. Walter Barnett, 12 Knightsbridge, S.W._
MRS. BENSON
MAY, 1910]
There was no one in the world whom he so regarded and admired and loved;
but yet it was not merely a tender and deferential sentiment. He laid
his mind open before her, and it was safe to do that, because my mother
never had any wish to prevail by sentiment or by claiming loyalty. He
knew that she would be perfectly candid too, with love waiting behind
all conflict of opinion. And thus their relation was the most perfect
that could be imagined, because he knew that he could speak and act with
entire freedom, while he recognised the breadth and strength of her
mind, and the insight of her love. No one can really understand Hugh's
life without a knowledge of what my mother was to him--an equal friend,
a trusted adviser, a candid critic, and a tender mother as well. And
even when he went his own way, as he did about health and work, though
she foresaw only too clearly what the end might be, and indeed what it
actually was, she always recognised that he had a right to live as he
chose and to work as he desired. She was not in the least blind to his
lesser faults of temperament, nor did she ever construct an artificial
image of him. My family has, I have no doubt, an unusual freedom of
mutual criticism. I do not think we have ever felt it to be disloyal to
see each other in a clear light. But I am inclined to believe that the
affection which subsists without the necessity of cherishing illusions,
has a solidity about it which more purely sentimental loyalties do not
always possess. And I have known few relations so perfect as those
between Hugh and my mother, because they were absolutely tender and
chivalrous, and at the same time wholly candid, natural, and open-eyed.
It was at this time that my eldest sister died quite suddenly of
diphtheria. I have told something of her life elsewhere. She had
considerable artistic gifts, in music, painting, and writing. She had
written a novel, and left unpublished a beautiful little book of her own
experiences among the poor, called _Streets and Lanes of the City_. It
was privately printed, and is full of charming humour and delicate
observation, together with a real insight into vital needs. I always
believe that my sister would have done a great work if she had lived.
She had strong practical powers and a very large heart. She had been
drawn more and more into social work at Lambeth, and I think would have
eventually given herself up to such work. She had a wonderful power of
establishing a special personal relation with those whom she loved, and
I remember realising after her death that each of her family felt that
they were in a peculiar and individual relation to her of intimacy and
confidence. She had sent Hugh from her deathbed a special message of
love and hope; and this had affected him very much.
We were not allowed to go back at once to our work, Fred, Hugh, and
myself, because of the possibility of infection; and we went off to
Seaford together for a few days, where we read, walked, wrote letters,
and talked. It was a strange time; but Hugh, I recollect, got suddenly
weary of it, and with the same decision which always characterised him,
said that he must go to London in order to be near St. Paul's. He went
off at once and stayed with Arthur Mason. I was struck with this at the
time; he did not think it necessary to offer any explanations or
reasons. He simply said he could not stand it, quite frankly and
ingenuously, and promptly disappeared.
VII
LLANDAFF
In 1892 Hugh went to read for Orders, with Dean Vaughan, who held the
Deanery of Llandaff together with the Mastership of the Temple. The Dean
had been a successful Headmaster of Harrow, and for a time Vicar of
Doncaster. He was an Evangelical by training and temperament. My father
had a high admiration for him as a great headmaster, a profound and
accomplished scholar, and most of all as a man of deep and fervent
piety. I remember Vaughan's visits to Lambeth. He had the air, I used to
think, rather of an old-fashioned and highly-bred country clergyman than
of a headmaster and a Church dignitary. With his rather long hair,
brushed back, his large, pale face, with its meek and smiling air, and
his thin, clear, and deliberate voice, he gave the impression of a
much-disciplined, self-restrained, and chastened man. He had none of the
brisk effectiveness or mundane radiance of a successful man of affairs.
But this was a superficial view, because, if he became moved or
interested, he revealed a critical incisiveness of speech and judgment,
as well as a profound and delicate humour.
He had collected about himself an informal band of young men who read
theology under his direction. He used to give a daily lecture, but there
was no college or regular discipline. The men lived in lodgings,
attended the cathedral service, arranged their own amusements and
occupations. But Vaughan had a stimulating and magnetic effect over his
pupils, many of whom have risen to high eminence in the Church.
They were constantly invited to meals at the deanery, where Mrs.
Vaughan, a sister of Dean Stanley, and as brilliant, vivacious, and
witty a talker as her brother, kept the circle entranced and delighted
by her suggestive and humorous talk. My brother tells the story of how,
in one of the Dean's long and serious illnesses, from which he
eventually recovered, Mrs. Vaughan absented herself one day on a
mysterious errand, and the Dean subsequently discovered, with intense
amusement and pleasure, that she had gone to inspect a house in which
she intended to spend her widowhood. The Dean told the whole story in
her presence to some of the young men who were dining there, and
sympathised with her on the suspension of her plans. I remember, too,
that my brother described to me how, in the course of the same illness,
Mrs. Vaughan, who was greatly interested in some question of the Higher
Criticism, had gone to the Dean's room to read to him, and had suggested
that they should consider and discuss some disputed passage of the Old
Testament. The Dean gently but firmly declined. Mrs. Vaughan coming
downstairs, Bible in hand, found a caller in the drawing-room who
inquired after the Dean. "I have just come from him," said Mrs.
Vaughan, "and it is naturally a melancholy thought, but he seems to have
entirely lost his faith. He would not let me read the Bible with him; he
practically said that he had no further interest in the Bible!"
Hugh was very happy at Llandaff. He says that he began to read John
Inglesant again, and explored the surrounding country to see if he could
find a suitable place to set up a small community house, on the lines of
Nicholas Ferrar's Little Gidding. This idea was thenceforth much in his
mind. At this time his day-dream was that it should be not an ascetic
order, but rather devotional and mystical. It was, I expect, mainly an
æsthetic idea at present. The setting, the ceremonial, the order of the
whole was prominent, with the contemplation of spiritual beauty as the
central principle. The various strains which went to suggest such a
scheme are easy to unravel. Hugh says frankly that marriage and
domesticity always appeared to him inconceivable, but at the same time
he was sociable, and had the strong creative desire to forth and express
a definite conception of life. He had always the artistic impulse to
translate an idea into visible and tangible shape. He had, I think,
little real pastoral impulse at this, if indeed at any time, and his
view was individualistic. The community, in his mind, was to exist not,
I believe, for discipline or extension of thought, or even for
solidarity of action; it was rather to be a fortress of quiet for the
encouragement of similar individual impulses. He used to talk a good
deal about his plans for the community in these days--and it is
interesting to compare with this the fact that I had already written a
book, never published, about a literary community on the same sort of
lines, while to go a little further back, it may be remembered that at
one time my father and Westcott used to entertain themselves with
schemes for what they called a _Coenobium_, which was to be an
institution in which married priests with their families were to lead a
common life with common devotions.
But I used to be reminded, in hearing Hugh detail his plans, of the case
of a friend of ours, whom I will call Lestrange, who had at one time
entered a Benedictine monastery as a novice. Lestrange used to talk
about himself in an engaging way in the third person, and I remember him
saying that the reason why he left the monastery was "because Lestrange
found that he could only be an inmate of a monastery in which Lestrange
was also Abbot!" I did not feel that in Hugh's community there would be
much chance of the independent expression of the individualities of his
associates!
He was ordained deacon in 1894 at Addington, or rather in Croydon parish
church, by my father, whose joy in admitting his beloved son to the
Anglican ministry was very great indeed.
Before the ordination Hugh decided to go into solitary retreat. He took
two rooms in the lodge-cottage of Burton Park, two or three miles out
of Lincoln. I suppose he selected Lincoln as a scene endeared to him by
childish memories.
He divided the day up for prayer, meditation, and solitary walks, and
often went in to service in the cathedral. He says that he was in a
state of tense excitement, and the solitude and introspection had an
alarmingly depressing effect upon him. He says that the result of this
was an appalling mental agony: "It seemed to me after a day or two that
there was no truth in religion, that Jesus Christ was not God, that the
whole of life was an empty sham, and that I was, if not the chiefest of
sinners, at any rate the most monumental of fools." He went to the
Advent services feeling, he says, like a soul in hell. But matters
mended after that, and the ordination itself seemed to him a true
consecration. He read the Gospel, and he remembered gratefully the
sermon of Canon Mason, my father's beloved friend and chaplain.
VIII
THE ETON MISSION
There were many reasons why Hugh should begin his clerical work at
Hackney Wick, though I suspect it was mainly my father's choice. It was
a large, uniformly poor district, which had been adopted by Eton in
about 1880 as the scene of its Mission. There were certain disadvantages
attending the choice of that particular district. The real _raison
d'être_ of a School Mission is educative rather than philanthropic, in
order to bring boys into touch with social problems, and to give them
some idea that the way of the world is not the way of a prosperous and
sheltered home. It is open to doubt whether it is possible to touch
boys' hearts and sympathies much except by linking a School Mission on
to some institution for the care of boys--an orphan school or a
training ship. Only the most sensitive are shocked and distressed by the
sight of hard conditions of life it all, and as a rule boys have an
extraordinarily unimaginative way of taking things as they see them, and
not thinking much or anxiously about mending them.
In any case the one aim ought to be to give boys a personal interest in
such problems, and put them in personal touch with them. But the Eton
Mission was planted in a district which it was very hard to reach from
Eton, so that few of the boys were ever able to make a personal
acquaintance with the hard and bare conditions of life in the crowded
industrial region which their Mission was doing so much to help and
uplift, or to realise the urgency of the needs of a district which most
of them had never visited.
But if the Mission did not touch the imagination of the boys, yet, on
the other hand, it became a very well-managed parish, with ample
resources to draw upon; and it certainly attracted the services of a
number of old Etonians, who had reached a stage of thought at which the
problem of industrial poverty became an interesting one.
Money was poured out upon the parish; a magnificent church was built, a
clergy-house was established, curates were subsidised, clubs were
established, and excellent work was done there. The vicar at this time
was a friend and contemporary of my own at Eton, St. Clair Donaldson,
now Archbishop of Brisbane. He had lived with us as my father's chaplain
for a time, but his mind was set on parish work rather than
administration. He knew Hugh well, and Hugh was an Etonian himself.
Moreover, my father was glad that Hugh should be with a trusted friend,
and so he went there. St. Clair Donaldson was a clergyman of an
Evangelical type, though the Mission had been previously conducted by a
very High Churchman, William Carter, the present Archbishop of Capetown.
But now distinctive High Church practices were given up, and the parish
was run on moderate, kindly, and sensible lines. Whether such an
institution is primarily and distinctively religious may be questioned.
Such work is centred rather upon friendly and helpful relations, and
religion becomes one of a number of active forces, rather than the force
upon which all depends. High-minded, duty-loving, transparently good and
cheerful as the tone of the clergy was, it was, no doubt, tentative
rather than authoritative.
Hugh's work there lay a good deal in the direction of the boys' clubs;
he used to go down to the clubs, play and talk with the boys, and go out
with them on Saturday afternoons to football and cricket. But he never
found it a congenial occupation, and I cannot help feeling that it was
rather a case of putting a very delicate and subtle instrument to do a
rough sort of work. What was needed was a hearty, kindly,
elder-brotherly relation, and the men who did this best were the
good-natured and robust men with a generic interest in the young, who
could set a clean-minded, wholesome, and hearty example. But Hugh was
not of this type. His mind was full of mystical and poetical ideas of
religion, and his artistic nature was intent upon expressing them. He
was successful in a way, because he had by this time a great charm of
frankness and simplicity; he never had the least temptation to draw
social distinctions, but he desired to find people personally
interesting. He used to say afterwards that he did not really believe in
what involved a sort of social condescension, and, like another incisive
missioner, he thought that the giving up a few evenings a week by
wealthy and even fashionable young-men, however good-hearted and
earnest, to sharing the amusements of the boys of a parish, was only a
very uncomfortable way of showing the poor how the rich lived! There is
no sort of doubt about the usefulness and kindliness of such work, and
it obviously is one of the experiments which may tend to create social
sympathy: but Hugh came increasingly to believe that the way to lead
boys to religion was not through social gatherings, but by creating a
strong central nucleus of Christian instruction and worship; his heart
was certainly not in his work at this time, though there was much that
appealed to him particularly to his sense of humour, which was always
strongly developed.
There was an account he gave of a funeral he had to conduct in the early
days of his work, where, after a large congregation had assembled in the
church, the arrival of the coffin itself was delayed, and he was asked
to keep things going. He gave out hymns, he read collects, he made a
short address, and still the undertaker at the door shook his head. At
last he gave out a hymn that was not very well known, and found that the
organist had left his post, whereupon he sang it alone, as an
unsustained solo.
He told me, too, that after preaching written sermons, he resolved to
try an extempore one. He did so with much nervousness and hesitation.
The same evening St. Clair Donaldson said to him kindly but firmly that
preachers were of two kinds--the kind that could write a fairly coherent
discourse and deliver it more or less impressively, and the kind that
might venture, after careful preparation, to speak extempore; and that
he felt bound to tell Hugh that he belonged undoubtedly to the first
kind. This was curious, because Hugh afterwards became, by dint of
trouble and practice, a quite remarkably distinguished and impressive
preacher. Indeed, even before he left the Church of England, the late
Lord Stanmore, who was an old friend of my father's, said to me that he
had heard all the great Anglican preachers for many years, and that he
had no hesitation in putting my brother in the very first rank.
However his time was very full; the parish was magnificently organised;
besides the clubs there were meetings of all sorts, very systematic
visiting, a ladies' settlement, plays acted by children, in which Hugh
took a prominent part both in composing the libretto and rehearsing the
performances, coaching as many as seventy children at a time.
He went to a retreat given by a Cowley Father in the course of his time
at the Eton Mission, and heard Father Maturin unfold, with profound
enthusiasm and inspiring eloquence, a scheme of Catholic doctrine,
worship, and practice, laying especial stress on Confession. These ideas
began to take shape in Hugh's mind, and he came to the conclusion that
it was necessary in a place like London, and working among the harassed
and ill-educated poor, to _materialise_ religion--that is to say, to fit
some definite form, rite, symbol, and practice to religious emotion. He
thought that the bright, dignified, and stately adjuncts of worship,
such as they had at the Eton Mission, were not adequate to awaken the
sense of the personal and intimate relation between man and God.
In this belief he was very possibly right. Of course the dangers of the
theory are obvious. There is the ultimate danger of what can fairly be
called superstition, that is to say giving to religion a magical kind of
influence over the material side of life. Rites, relics, images tend to
become, in irrational minds, invested with an inherent and mechanical
sanctity, instead of being the symbols of grace. But it is necessary to
risk something; and though the risk of what may be called a sort of
idolatry is great, the risk of not arousing the sense of personal
religion at all is greater still.
Hugh's ordination as a priest followed in 1895; and he then made a full
confession before a clergyman.
In 1896, in October, my father, who had paid a state visit to Ireland,
on his return went to stay with Mr. Gladstone at Hawarden, and died
there in church on a Sunday morning.
I can never forget the events of that terrible day. I received a
telegram at Eton which summoned me to Hawarden, but did not state
explicitly that my father was dead. I met Hugh at Euston, who told me
the fact, and I can recollect walking up and down the half-deserted
station with him, in a state of deep and bewildered grief. The days
which followed were so crowded with business and arrangements, that even
the sight of my father's body, lying robed and still, and palely
smiling, in the great library of the rectory failed to bring home to me
the sense that his fiery, eager, strenuous life was over. I remember
that Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone came to the church with us, and that Hugh
celebrated and gave us the Communion. But the day when we travelled
south with the coffin, the great pomp at Canterbury, which was attended
by our present King and the present King of Norway, when we laid him to
rest in a vault under the north-western tower, and the days of hurried
and crowded business at Addington are still faint and dream-like to me.
My mother and sister went out to Egypt for the winter; Hugh's health
broke down; he was threatened with rheumatic fever, and was ordered to
go out with them. It was here that he formed a very close and intimate
companionship with my sister Maggie, and came to rely much on her tender
sympathy and wise advice. He never returned to the Eton Mission.
IX
KEMSING AND MIRFIELD
The change proved very beneficial to Hugh; but it was then, with
returning health and leisure for reflection, that he began to consider
the whole question of Anglicanism and Catholicism. He describes some of
the little experiences which turned his mind in this direction. He
became aware of the isolation and what he calls the "provincialism" of
the Anglican Church. He saw many kinds of churches and varieties of
worship. He went on through the Holy Land, and at Jerusalem celebrated
the Communion in the Chapel of Abraham; at Damascus he heard with a sort
of horror of the submission of Father Maturin to Rome. In all this his
scheme of a religious community revived. The ceremonial was to be
Caroline. "We were to wear no eucharistic vestments, but full surplices
and black scarves, and were to do nothing in particular."
When he returned, he went as curate to Kemsing, a village in Kent. It
was decided that for the sake of his health his work must be light. The
Rector, Mr. Skarratt, was a wealthy man; he had restored the church
beautifully, and had organised a very dignified and careful musical
service. Hugh lived with him at the vicarage, a big, comfortable house,
with a succession of interesting guests. He had a very happy year,
devoting much attention to preaching, and doing a great deal of work
among the children, for which he had a quite singular gift. He had a
simple and direct way with them, equally removed from both petting and
authoritativeness. His own natural childlikeness came out--and indeed
all his life he preserved the innocence, the impulsiveness, the mingled
impatience and docility of a child more than any man I ever saw.
I remember a conversation I had with Hugh about this time. An offer had
been made to him, through me, of an important country living. He said
that he was extraordinarily happy at Kemsing but that he was too
comfortable--he needed more discipline. He said further that he was
beginning to find that he had the power of preaching, and that it was in
this direction rather than in the direction of pastoral activity that
his life was going to lie.
It was rather a pettish conversation. I asked him whether he might not
perhaps find the discipline he needed in doing the pastoral work which
did not interest him, rather than in developing his life on lines which
he preferred. I confess that it was rather a priggish line to take; and
in any case it did not come well from me because as a schoolmaster I
think I always pursued an individualistic line, and worked hard on my
own private basis of preferences rather than on the established system
of the school. But I did not understand Hugh at this date. It is always
a strain to find one whom one has always regarded as a boy, almost as a
child, holding strong and definitely matured views. I thought him
self-absorbed and wilful--as indeed he was--but he was pursuing a true
instinct and finding his real life.
He then received an invitation to become a mission preacher, and went to
consult Archbishop Temple about it. The Archbishop told him, bluffly and
decisively, that he was far too young, and that before he took it upon
himself to preach to men and women he ought to have more experience of
their ways and hearts.
But Hugh with his usual independence was not in the least daunted. He
had an interview with Dr. Gore, now Bishop of Oxford, who was then Head
of the House of the Resurrection at Mirfield, and was accepted by him as
a probationer in the Community. Hugh went to ask leave of Archbishop
Maclagan, and having failed with one Primate succeeded with another.
The Community of the Resurrection was established by Bishop Gore as an
Anglican house more or less on Benedictine lines. It acquired a big
house among gardens, built, I believe, by a wealthy manufacturer. It
has since been altered and enlarged, but Hugh drew an amusing set of
sketches to illustrate the life there, in which it appears a rueful and
rather tawdry building, of yellow stone and blue slate, of a shallow and
falsetto Gothic, or with what maybe called Gothic sympathies. It is at
Mirfield, near Bradford, in the Calder valley; the country round full of
high chimneys, and the sky much blurred with smoke, but the grounds and
gardens were large, and suited to a spacious sort of retirement. From
the same pictures I gather that the house was very bare within and
decidedly unpleasing, with no atmosphere except that of a denuded
Victorian domesticity.
Some of the Brothers were occupied in definitely erudite work, editing
liturgical, expository, and devotional works; and for these there was a
large and learned library. The rest were engaged in evangelistic mission
work with long spaces of study and devotion, six months roughly being
assigned to outside activities, and six to Community life. The day
began early, the Hours were duly recited. There was work in the morning
and after tea, with exercise in the afternoon. On Saturday a chapter was
held, with public confession, made kneeling, of external breaches of the
rule. Silence was kept from Compline, at ten o'clock, until the next
day's midday meal; there was manual work, wood-chopping, coal-breaking,
boot-cleaning and room-dusting. For a long time Hugh worked at
step-cutting in the quarry near the house, which was being made into a
garden. The members wore cassocks with a leather belt. They were called
"Father" and the head of the house was "Senior" or "Superior."
The vows were simple, of poverty, chastity, and obedience, but were
renewed annually for a period of thirteen months, accompanied by an
expression of an intention, only, to remain in the community for life.
As far as I remember, if a Brother had private means, he was bound to
hand over his income but not his capital, while he was a member, and the
copyright of all books written during membership belonged absolutely to
the Community. Hugh wrote the book of mystical stories, _The Light
Invisible_, at this time; it had a continuous sale, and he used
humorously to lament the necessity of handing over the profits to the
Order, long after he had left it and joined the Church of Rome. The
Brothers were not allowed, I think, to possess any personal property,
and received clothing and small luxuries either as gifts, or purchased
them through orders from the Bursar. Our dear old family nurse, Beth, to
whom Hugh was as the apple of her eye, used to make him little presents
of things that he needed--his wardrobe was always scanty and
threadbare--and would at intervals lament his state of destitution. "I
can't bear to think of the greedy creatures taking away all the
gentlemen's things!"
There was a chapel in the house, of a High Anglican kind, where
vestments and incense were used, and plainsong sung. There were about
fourteen Brothers.
Hugh was obviously and delightfully happy at Mirfield. I remember well
how he used to describe the pleasure of returning to it from a Mission,
the silence, the simplicity of the life, the liberty underlying the
order and discipline. The tone of the house was admirably friendly and
kindly, without gossip, bickering or bitterness, and Hugh found himself
among cheerful and sympathetic companions, with the almost childlike
mirthfulness which comes of a life, strict, ascetic, united, and free
from worldly cares. He spent his first two years in study mainly, and
extended his probation. It illustrates the fact that he was acquainting
himself strangely little with current theological thought that the cause
of his delay was that he was entirely taken aback by a sermon of Dr.
Gore's on the Higher Criticism. The whole idea of it was completely
novel to Hugh, and upset him terribly, so that he thought he could
hardly recover his balance. Neither then nor later had he the smallest
sympathy with or interest in Modernism. Finally he took the vows in
1901; my mother was present. He was installed, his hand kissed by the
Brethren, and he received the Communion in entire hopefulness and
happiness. I was always conscious, in those days, that Hugh radiated an
atmosphere of intense rapture and ecstasy about him: the only drawback
was that, in his rare visits to home, he was obviously pining to be back
at Mirfield.
Then his work began; and he says that refreshed and reinvigorated as
they were before going on a Mission, by long, quiet, and careful
preparation, they used to plunge into their work with ardent and eager
enthusiasm. The actual mission work was hard. Hugh records that once
after a Mission in London they spent four days in interviewing people
and hearing confessions for eleven hours a day, with occasional sermons
interspersed.
At times some of the Brothers went into residence at Westminster, in Dr.
Gore's house--he was a Canon of the Abbey--and there Hugh preached his
only sermon in the Abbey. But he was now devoting himself to Mission
preaching, and perfecting his system. He never thought very highly of
his gift of exposition. "I have a certain facility in preaching, but not
much," he once said, adding, "I have far more in writing." And I have
heard him say often that, if he let himself go in preaching, his
tendency was to become vulgar. I have in my possession hundreds of his
skeleton notes. They consist of the main points of his argument, written
out clearly and underlined, with a certain amount of the texture
indicated, sentence-summaries, epigrammatic statements, dicta, emphatic
conclusions. He attained his remarkable facility by persistent,
continuous, and patient toil; and a glance at his notebooks and
fly-leaves would be the best of lessons for anyone who was tempted to
depend upon fluid and easy volubility. He used to say that, after long
practice, a sermon would fall into shape in a very few moments; and I
remember his once taking carefully written address of my own,
summarising and denuding it, and presenting me with a little skeleton of
its essence, which he implored me to use; though I had not the courage
to do so. He said, too, that he believed that he could teach anyone of
ordinary brain-power and choice of language to preach extempore on these
lines in six months, if only he would rigidly follow his method. His
arguments, in the course of his sermons, did not always seem to me very
cogent; but his application of them was always most clear and effective.
You always knew exactly what he was driving at, and what point he had
reached; if it was not good logic, it was extremely effective logic, and
you seemed to run hand in hand with him. I remember a quite admirable
sermon he preached at Eton at this date--it was most simple and moving.
But at the same time the effect largely depended upon a grace of which
he was unconscious--quaint, naive, and beautiful phrasing, a fine
poetical imagination, tiny word-pictures, and a youthful and impetuous
charm. His gestures at that time were free and unconstrained, his voice
resonant, appealing, and clear.
He used to tell innumerable stories of his sermon adventures. There was
a story of a Harvest Festival sermon near Kemsing, in the days when he
used a manuscript; he found on arriving at the church that he had left
it behind him, and was allowed to remain in the vestry during the
service, writing out notes on the inside of envelopes torn open, with
the stump of a pencil which would only make marks at a certain angle.
The service proceeded with a shocking rapidity, and when he got to the
pulpit, spread out his envelopes, and addressed himself to the
consideration of the blessings of the Harvest, he found on drawing to an
end that he had only consumed about four minutes. He went through the
whole again, slightly varying the phraseology, and yet again repeated
the performance; only to find, on putting on his coat, that the
manuscript was in his pocket all the time.
He used to say that the most nervous experience in the world was to go
into a street or market-place of a town where he was to hold a Mission
with open-air sermons, and there, without accompaniment, and with such
scanty adherents as he could muster, strike up a hymn. By-standers would
shrug their shoulders and go away smiling. Windows would be opened,
figures would lean out, and presently withdraw again, slamming the
casement.
Hugh was always extremely nervous before a sermon. He told me that when
he was about to preach, he did not generally go in for the service, but
remained in the vestry until the sermon; and that he would lie on a sofa
or sit in a chair, in agonies of nervousness, with actual attacks of
nausea, and even sickness at times, until he was summoned, feeling that
he could not possibly get through. This left him after speaking a few
words: but he also maintained that on the rare occasions when he felt
quite confident and free from nervousness, the result was a failure: he
said that a real anxiety as to the effect of the sermon was a necessary
stimulus, and evoked a mental power which confidence was apt to leave
dormant.
X
THE CHANGE
Hugh has himself traced in full detail, in his book _The Confessions of
a Convert_, how he gradually became convinced that it was his duty to
make his submission to the Church of Rome; and I will not repeat the
story here. But I can recall very distinctly the period during which he
was making up his mind. He left Mirfield in the early summer of 1903, so
that when I came home for the summer holidays, he was living there. I
had myself just accepted from King Edward the task of editing Queen
Victoria's letters, and had resigned my Eton mastership. Hugh was then
engaged in writing his book _By What Authority_ with inconceivable
energy and the keenest possible enjoyment. His absorption in the work
was extraordinary. He was reading historical books and any books
bearing on the history of the period, taking notes, transcribing. I have
before me a large folio sheet of paper on which he has written very
minutely hundreds of picturesque words and phrases of the time, to be
worked into the book. He certainly soaked himself in the atmosphere of
the time, and I imagine that the details are correct, though as he had
never studied history scientifically, I expect he is right in saying
that the mental atmosphere which he represented as existing in
Elizabethan times was really characteristic of a later date. He said of
the book: "I fear it is the kind of book which anyone acquainted with
the history, manners, and customs of the Elizabethan age should find no
difficulty in writing." He found many faults subsequently with the
volume, but he convinced himself at the time that the Anglican
post-Reformation Church had no identity or even continuity with the
pre-Reformation Church.
He speaks of himself as undergoing an experience of great unhappiness
and unrest. Undoubtedly leaving the Mirfield Community was a painful
severance. He valued a friendly and sympathetic atmosphere very much,
and he was going to migrate from it into an unknown society, leaving his
friends behind, with a possibility of suspicion, coldness, and
misunderstanding. It was naturally made worse by the fact that all my
father's best and oldest friends were Anglicans, who by position and
tradition would be likely to disapprove most strongly of the step, and
even feel it, if not an aspersion on my father's memory, at all events a
disloyal and unfilial act--as indeed proved to be the case. But I doubt
if these considerations weighed very much with Hugh. He was always
extremely independent of criticism and disapproval, and though he knew
many of my father's friends, through their visits to our house, he had
not made friends with them on his own account--and indeed he had always
been so intent on the life he was himself leading, that he had never
been, so to speak, one of the Nethinims of the sanctuary; nor had the
dependent and discipular attitude, the reverential attachment to
venerable persons, been in the least congenial to him. He had always
rather effaced himself in the presence of our ecclesiastical visitors,
and had avoided the constraint of their dignity. Indeed, up to this time
he had not much gone in search of personal relationships at all except
with equals and contemporaries.
But the ignorance of the world he was about to enter upon was a more
serious factor in his outlook. He knew that he would have to enter
submissively and humbly an entirely strange domain, that he would have
to join a chilly and even suspicious circle--for I suppose a convert to
any new faith is apt to be regarded, until he is fully known, as
possibly weak, indeterminate, and fluctuating, and to be treated with
compassion rather than admiration. With every desire to be sympathetic,
people in conscious possession of security and certainty are naturally
inclined to regard a claimant as bent on acquisition rather than as a
hero eager for self-sacrifice.
Certainly Hugh's dejection, which I think was reserved for his tired
moments, was not apparent. To me, indeed, he appeared in the light of
one intent on a great adventure, with all the rapture of confidence and
excitement about him. As my mother said, he went to the shelter of his
new belief as a lover might run to the arms of his beloved. Like the
soldier in the old song, he did not linger, but "gave the bridle-reins a
shake." He was not either melancholy or brooding. He looked very well,
he was extremely active in mind and in body.
I find the following extract from my diary of August:
"_August_ 1903.--In the afternoon walked with Hugh the Paxhill round.
Hugh is in very good cheerful spirits, steering in a high wind straight
to Rome, writing a historical novel, full of life and jests and laughter
and cheerfulness; not creeping in, under the shadow of a wall, sobbing
as the old cords break; but excited, eager, jubilant, enjoying."
His room was piled with books and papers; he used to rush into meals
with the glow of suspended energy, eat rapidly and with appetite--I have
never seen a human being who ate so fast and with so little preference
as to the nature of what he ate--then he would sit absorbed for a
moment, and ask to be excused, using the old childish formula: "May I
get down?" Sometimes he would come speeding out of his room, to read
aloud a passage he had written to my mother, or to play a few chords on
the piano. He would not as a rule join in games or walks--he went out
for a short, rapid walk by himself, a little measured round, and flew
back to his work. He generally, I should think, worked about eight hours
a day at this time. In the evening he would play a game of cards after
dinner, and would sit talking in the smoking-room, rapidly consuming
cigarettes and flicking the ash off with his forefinger. He was also, I
remember, very argumentative. He said once of himself that he was
perpetually quarrelling with his best friends. He was a most experienced
coat-trailer! My mother, my sister, my brother, Miss Lucy Tait who lives
with us, and myself would find ourselves engaged in heated arguments,
the disputants breathing quickly, muttering unheeded phrases, seeking in
vain for a loophole or a pause. It generally ended by Hugh saying with
mournful pathos that he could not understand why everyone set on
him--that he never argued in any other circle, and he could only entreat
to be let alone. It is true that we were accustomed to argue questions
of every kind with tenacity and even with invective. But the fact that
these particular arguments always dealt with the inconsistencies and
difficulties of ecclesiastical institutions revealed their origin. The
fact was that at this time Hugh was accustomed to assert with much
emphasis some extremely provocative and controversial position. He was
markedly scornful of Anglican faults and mannerisms, and behaved both
then and later as if no Anglicans could have any real and vital belief
in their principles, but must be secretly ashamed of them. Yet he was
acutely sensitive himself, and resented similar comments; he used to
remind me of the priest who said to Stevenson "Your sect--for it would
be doing it too much honour to call it a religion," and was then pained
to be thought discourteous or inconsiderate.
Discourteous, indeed, Hugh was not. I have known few people who could
argue so fiercely without personal innuendo. But, on the other hand, he
was both triumphant and sarcastic. There was an occasion at a later date
when he advanced some highly contestable points as assumptions, and my
aunt, Mrs. Henry Sidgwick, in an agony of rationality, said to him, "But
these things are surely matters of argument, Hugh?" To which Hugh
replied, "Well, you see, I have the misfortune, as you regard it, of
belonging to a Church which happens to know."
Here is another extract from my diary at this time:
"_August_ 1903.--At dinner Hugh and I fell into a fierce argument, which
became painful, mainly, I think, because of Hugh's vehemence and what I
can only call violence. He reiterates his consciousness of his own
stupidity in an irritating way. The point was this. He maintained that
it was uncharitable to say, 'What a bad sermon So-and-so preached,' and
not uncharitable to say, 'Well, it is better than the sickening stuff
one generally hears'; uncharitable to say, 'What nasty soup this is!'
and not uncharitable to say, 'Well, it is better than the filthy pigwash
generally called soup.' I maintained that to say that, one must have
particular soups in one's mind; and that it was abusing more sermons and
soups, and abusing them more severely, than if one found fault with one
soup or one sermon.
"But it was all no use. He was very impatient if one joined issue at any
point, and said that he was interrupted. He dragged all sorts of red
herrings over the course, the opinions of Roman theologians, and
differences between mortal and venial sin, &c. I don't think he even
tried to apprehend my point of view, but went off into a long rigmarole
about distinguishing between the sin and the sinner; and said that it
was the sin one ought to blame, not the sinner. I maintained that the
consent of the sinner's will was of the essence of the sin, and that the
consent of the will of the sinner to what was not in itself wrong was
the essence of sin--_e.g._ not sinful to drink a glass of wine, but,
sinful if you had already had enough.
"It was rather disagreeable; but I get so used to arguing with absolute
frankness with people at Eton that I forget how unpleasant it may sound
to hearers--and it all subsided very quickly, like a boiling pot."
I remember, too, at a later date, that he produced some photographs of
groups of, I think, Indian converts at a Roman Catholic Mission, and
stated that anyone who had eyes to see could detect which of them had
been baptized by the expression of their faces. It was, of course, a
matter which it was impossible to bring to the test; but he would not
even admit that catechumens who were just about to be baptized could
share the same expression as those who actually had been baptized. This
was a good instance of his provocative style. But it was always done
like a game. He argued deftly, swiftly, and inconclusively, but the
fault generally lay in his premisses, which were often wild assumptions;
not in his subsequent argument, which was cogent, logical, and admirably
quick at finding weak points in his adversary's armour. At the same time
he was wholly placable. No one could so banish and obliterate from his
mind the impression of the harshest and fiercest arguments. The
effervescence of his mind subsided as quickly as it arose. And my whole
recollection of the period is that he was in a state of great mental and
spiritual excitement, and that he was experiencing to the full the joys
of combat and action.
While the interest of composition lasted, he remained at home, but the
book was soon done. He was still using the oratory in the house for
celebrations, and I believe that he occasionally helped in the services
of the parish church. The last time I actually heard him preach was at
the previous Christmas, when the sermon seemed to me both tired and
hard, as of one whose emotions were strained by an interior strife.
Among his diversions at this time he painted, on the casement windows of
the oratory, some figures of saints in water-colour. The designs were
quaint, but in execution they were the least successful things he ever
did; while the medium he employed was more apt to exclude light than to
tinge it.
These strange figures became known in the village as "Mrs. Benson's
dolls." They were far more visible from outside than from within, and
they looked like fantastic puppets leaning against the panes. What use
my mother was supposed to make of them, or why she piled her dolls, tier
above tier, in an upper window was never explained. Hugh was very
indignant when their artistic merit was called in question, but later on
he silently effaced them.
The curious intensity and limitation of Hugh's affections were never
more exemplified than in his devotion to a charming collie, Roddy,
belonging to my sister, the most engaging dog I have ever known. Roddy
was a great truant, and went away sometimes for days and even weeks.
Game is carefully preserved on the surrounding estates, and we were
always afraid that Roddy, in his private hunting expeditions, might fall
a victim to a conscientious keeper's gun, which, alas, was doubtless the
cause of his final and deeply lamented disappearance. Hugh had a great
affection for Roddy, and showed it, when he came to Tremans, by keeping
Roddy constantly at his heels, having him to sleep in his room, and
never allowing him out of his sight. For the first day or two Roddy
enjoyed these attentions, but gradually, as the visit lasted, became
more and more restive, and was for ever trying to give Hugh the slip;
moreover, as soon as Hugh went away, Roddy always disappeared for a few
days to recover his sense of independence and liberty. I can see Hugh
now walking about in his cassock, with Roddy at his heels; then they
would join a circle on the lawn, and Roddy would attach himself to some
other member of the family for a little, but was always sternly whistled
away by Hugh, when he went back to his room. Moreover, instead of going
back to the stable to sleep snugly in the straw, which Roddy loved best,
he had to come to the smoking-room, and then go back to sleep in a
basket chair in Hugh's bedroom. I can remember Hugh departing at the end
of his visit, and saying to me, "I know it's no use asking you--but do
try to keep an eye on Roddy! It makes me miserable to think of his
getting into the woods and being shot." But he did not think much about
Roddy in his absence, never asked to take Roddy to Hare Street; nor did
he manifest deep emotion when he finally disappeared, nor make long
lamentation for him. Hugh never wasted any time in vain regrets or
unavailing pathos.
He paid visits to certain friends of my mother's to consult about his
position. He did this solely out of deference to her wishes, but not, I
think, with any hope that his purpose would be changed. They were, I
believe, John Reeve, Rector of Lambeth, a very old and dear friend of
our family, Bishop Wilkinson, and Lord Halifax. The latter stated his
position clearly, that the Pope was Vicar of Christ _jure ecclesiastico_
but not _jure divino_, and that it was better to remain an Anglican and
promote unity so. Hugh had also a painful correspondence with John
Wordsworth, late Bishop of Salisbury, a very old friend of my father's.
The Bishop wrote affectionately at first, but eventually became somewhat
indignant, and told Hugh plainly that a few months' work in a slum
parish would clear his mind of doubt; the correspondence ended by his
saying emphatically that he regarded conversion almost as a loss of
sanity. No doubt it was difficult for one of immense patristic and
theological learning, who was well versed in the historical aspect of
the affair as well as profoundly conscious of the reality of his own
episcopal commission, to enter the lists with a son of his old friend.
But neither sympathy nor harshness could have affected Hugh at this
time, any more than advice to return could alter the position of a man
who had taken a leap and was actually flying through the air.
Hugh then went off on a long bicycle tour by himself, dressed as a
layman. He visited the Carthusian Monastery of St Hugh, near West
Grinstead, which I afterwards visited in his company. He spent a night
or two at Chichester, where he received the Communion in the cathedral;
but he was in an unhappy frame of mind, probably made more acute by
solitude.
XI
THE DECISION
By this time we all knew what was about to happen. "When a man's mind is
made up," says the old Irish proverb, "his feet must set out on the
way."
Just before my brother made his profession as a Brother of the Mirfield
Community, he was asked by Bishop Gore whether he was in any danger of
becoming a Roman Catholic. My brother said honestly, "Not so far as I
can see." This was in July 1901. In September 1903 he was received into
the Church of Rome. What was it which had caused the change? It is very
difficult to say, and though I have carefully read my brother's book,
the _Confessions of a Convert_, I find it hard to give a decisive
answer. I have no intention of taking up a controversial attitude, and
indeed I am little equipped for doing so. It is clear that my brother
was, and had for some time been, searching for something, let us call it
a certainty, which he did not find in the Church of England. The
surprise to me is that one whose religion, I have always thought, ran
upon such personal and individualistic lines, should not have found in
Anglicanism the very liberty he most desired. The distinguishing feature
of Anglicanism is that it allows the largest amount of personal liberty,
both as regards opinion and also as regards the use of Catholic
traditions, which is permitted by an ecclesiastical body in the world.
The Anglican Church claims and exercises very little authority at all.
Each individual Bishop has a considerable discretionary power, and some
allow a far wider liberty of action than others. In all cases,
divergences of doctrine and practice are dealt with by personal
influence, tact, and compromise, and _force majeure_ is invoked as
little as possible. In the last hundred years, during which there have
been strong and active movements in various directions in the Church of
England both towards Catholic doctrine and Latitudinarianism, such
synodical and legal action as has been taken has generally proved to be
a mistake. It is hard to justify the system logically and theoretically,
but it may be said that the methods of the Church have at least been
national, in the sense that they have suited the national temperament,
which is independent and averse to coercive discipline. It may, I
believe, be truly asserted that in England any Church which attempted
any inquisition into the precise doctrine held by its lay members would
lose adherents in large numbers. Of late the influence of the English
Church has been mainly exerted in the cause of social reform, and her
tendency is more and more to condone divergences of doctrine and opinion
in the case of her ministers when they are accompanied by spiritual
fervour and practical activity. The result has certainly been to pacify
the intellectual revolt against religious opinion which was in full
progress some forty years ago. When I myself was at the university some
thirty years ago, the attitude of pronounced intellectuals against
religious opinion was contemptuous and even derisive. That is not the
case now. The instinct for religion is recognised as a vital part of the
human mind, and though intellectual young men are apt at times to tilt
against the travesty of orthodoxy which they propound for their own
satisfaction, there is a far deeper and wider tolerance and even
sympathy for every form of religious belief. Religion is recognised as a
matter of personal preference, and the agnostic creed has lost much of
its aggressive definiteness.
It appears to me that, so far as I can measure the movement of my
brother's mind, when he decided first to take Orders his religion was of
a mystical and æsthetic kind; and I do not think that there is any
evidence that he really examined the scientific and agnostic position at
all. His heart and his sense of beauty were already engaged, and life
without religion would have scented an impossibility to him. When he
took Orders, his experience was threefold. At the Eton Mission he was
confronted by an Anglicanism of a devout and simple kind, which
concentrated itself almost entirely on the social aspect of
Christianity, on the love of God and the brotherhood of man. The object
of the workers there was to create comradeship, and to meet the problems
of conduct which arose by a faith in the cleansing and uplifting power
of God. Brotherly love was its first aim.
I do not think that Hugh had ever any real interest in social reform, in
politics, in causes, in the institutions which aim at the consolidation
of human endeavour and sympathy. He had no philosophic grasp of history,
nor was he a student of the psychology of religion. His instincts were
all individualistic and personal; and indeed I believe that all his life
he was an artist in the largest sense, in the fact that his work was
the embodiment of dreams, the expression of the beauty which he
constantly perceived. His ideal was in one sense a larger one than the
technically artistic ideal, because it embraced the conception of moral
beauty even more ardently than mere external beauty. The mystical
element in him was for ever reaching out in search of some Divine
essence in the world. He was not in search at any time of personal
relations. He attracted more affection than he ever gave; he rejoiced
its sympathy and kindred companionship as a flower rejoices in sunshine;
but I think he had little taste of the baffled suffering which
accompanies all deep human passion. He once wrote "God has preserved me
extraordinarily from intimacies with others. He has done this, not I. I
have longed for intimacies and failed to win them." He had little of the
pastoral spirit; I do not think that he yearned over unshepherded souls,
or primarily desired to seek and save the lost. On the other hand he
responded eagerly to any claim made to himself for help and guidance,
and he was always eager not to chill or disappoint people who seemed to
need him. But he found little satisfaction in his work at the Eton
Mission, and I do not think he would ever have been at home there.
At Kemsing, on the other hand, he had an experience of what I may fairly
call the epicureanism of religion. The influences there were mainly
æsthetic; the creation of a circle like that at Kemsing would have been
impossible without wealth. Beautiful worship, refined enjoyment,
cultivated companionship were all lavished upon him. But he soon tired
of this, because it was an exotic thing. It was a little paradise of a
very innocent kind, from which all harsh and contradictory elements had
been excluded. But this mere sipping of exquisite flavours became to him
a very objectless thing, because it corresponded to no real need. I
believe that if at this time he had discovered his literary gifts, and
had begun seriously to write, he might have been content to remain
under such conditions, at all events for a time. But he had as yet no
audience, and had not begun to exercise his creative imagination.
Moreover, to a nature like Hugh's, naturally temperate and ardent, and
with no gross or sensuous fibre of any kind, there was a real craving
for the bareness and cleanness of self-discipline and asceticism. There
is a high and noble pleasure in some natures towards the reduction and
disregard of all material claims and limitations, by which a freedom and
expansiveness of the spirit can be won. Such self-denial gives to the
soul a freshness and buoyancy which, for those who can pursue it, is in
itself an ecstasy of delight. And thus Hugh found it impossible to stay
in an atmosphere which, though exquisitely refined and quiet, yet
hampered the energy of aspiration and adventure.
And so he came to the Mirfield Community, and for a time found exactly
what he wanted. The Brotherhood did not mainly concern itself with the
organisation of social reform, while it reduced the complications of
life to a spare and rigorous simplicity. The question is, why this life,
which allowed him to apply all his gifts and powers to the work which
still, I think, was the embodiment of his visions, did not completely
satisfy him?
I think, in the first place, that it is probable that, though he was not
conscious of it, the discipline and the subordination of the society did
not really quite give him enough personal freedom. He continued for a
time to hanker after community life; he used to say, when he first
joined the Church of Rome, that he thought he might end as a Carthusian,
or later on as a Benedictine. But he spoke less and less of this as the
years went on, and latterly I believe that he ceased to contemplate it,
except as a possibility in case his powers of speech and writing should
fail him. I believe that he really, thought perhaps unconsciously,
desired a freer hand, and that he found that the community life on the
whole cramped his individuality. His later life was indeed a complete
contrast to anything resembling community life; his constant
restlessness of motion, his travels, his succession of engagements both
in all parts of England as well as in Rome and America, were really, I
do not doubt, more congenial to him; while his home life ultimately
became only his opportunity for intense and concentrated literary work.
But beyond and above that lay the doctrinal question. He sums up what he
came to believe in a few words, that the Church of Rome was "the
divinely appointed centre of unity," and he felt the "absolute need of a
Teaching Church to preserve and to interpret the truths of Christianity
to each succeeding generation." Once convinced of this, argument
mattered little. Hugh was entirely fearless, adventurous, and
independent; he had no ambitions in the ordinary sense of the word; that
is to say he made no frontal attack upon promotion or respect. He was
not what is called a "safe" man; he had neither caution or prudence, nor
any regard for average opinion. I do not think he ever gave allegiance
to any personality, nor took any direct influence from anyone. The
various attempts he made to consult people of different schools of
thought, all carefully recorded in his _Confessions_, were made
courteously and deferentially; but it seems to me that any opposition or
argument that he encountered only added fuel to the fire, and aroused
his reason only to combat the suggestions with which he did not
instinctively agree. Indeed I believe that it was his very isolation,
his independence, his lack of any real deference to personal authority,
which carried him into the Church of Rome. One who knew Hugh well and
indeed loved him said to me a little bitterly that he had become a Roman
Catholic not because his faith was strong, but because it was weak.
There was a touch of truth in this. Hugh did with all his heart desire
to base his life upon some impersonal unquestionable certainty; and
where a more submissive mind might have reposed, as a disciple, upon the
strength of a master, Hugh required to repose upon something august,
age-long, overpowering, a great moving force which could not be too
closely or precisely interrogated, but which was a living and breathing
reality, a mass of corporate experience, in spite of the inconsistencies
and irrationalities which must beset any system which has built up a
logical and scientific creed in eras when neither logic nor science were
fully understood.
The fundamental difference between Catholicism and Protestantism lies
ultimately in the old conflict between liberty and discipline, or rather
in the degree to which each is valued. The most ardent lover of liberty
has to admit that his own personal inclinations cannot form a
satisfactory standard of conduct. He must in certain matters subjugate
his will and his inclination to the prevailing laws and principles and
beliefs, and he must sacrifice his private aims and desires to the
common interest, even when his reason and will may not be convinced.
That is a simple matter of compromise, and the sacrifice is made as a
matter of expediency and duty rather than as a matter of emotion. But
there are other natures to whom it is essential to live by emotion, and
to whom it is a relief and delight to submerge their private
inclinations in some larger national or religious emotion. We have seen
of late, in the case of Germany, what tremendous strength is generated
in a nation which can adore a national ideal so passionately that they
can only believe it to be a blessing to other nations to have the chance
given them, through devastation and defeat, of contributing to the
triumph of German ideals. I do not mean that Catholicism is prepared to
adopt similarly aggressive methods. But what Hugh did not find in
Anglicanism was a sense of united conviction, a world-policy, a faith in
ultimate triumph, all of which he found in Catholicism. The Catholic
believes that God is on his side; the Anglican hopes that he is on the
side of God. Among Anglicans, Hugh was fretted by having to find out how
much or how little each believed. Among Catholics, that can be taken for
granted. They are indeed two different qualities and types of faith, and
produce, or perhaps express, different types of character. Hugh found in
the Roman Church the comfort of corporate ideals and corporate beliefs;
and I frankly admit that the more we became acquainted with Catholicism
the more did we recognise the strong and simple core of evangelicalism
within it, the mutual help and counsel, the insistence on reparation as
the proof of penitence, the insight into simple human needs, the
paternal indulgence combined with gentle authoritativeness. All this is
eminently and profoundly Christian. It is not necessary here to say what
the Anglican does not find in it or at what point it seems to become
inconsistent with reason and liberty. But I desire to make it clear
that what Hugh needed was an emotional surrender and a sense of
corporate activity, and that his conversion was not a logical one, but
the discovery of a force with which his spirit was in unison, and of a
system which gave him exactly the impetus and the discipline which he
required.
It is curious to note that Father Tyrell, whom Hugh consulted, said to
him that he could not receive officially any convert into the Church
except on terms which were impossible to persons of reason; and this is
so far true that I do not believe that Hugh's conversion was a process
of either intellect or reason. I believe that it was a deep instinctive
and emotional need for a basis of thought so strong and vivid that he
need not question it. I believe he had long been seeking for such a
basis, and that he was right to accept it, because he did so in entire
simplicity and genuineness. My brother was not sceptical nor analytic;
he needed the repose of a large submission, of obedience to an
impersonal ideal. His work lay in the presentment of religious emotion,
and for this he needed a definite and specific confidence. In no other
Church, and least of all in Anglicanism, could this be obtained. I do
not mean for a moment that Hugh accepted the Catholic faith simply as a
conscious relief; he was convinced frankly and fully that the Church of
Christ could not be a divided society, but must have a continuity of
doctrine and tradition. He believed that to be the Divine plan and
method. Having done this, his duty and his delight were one. He tasted
the full joy of obedience, the relief of not having to test, to
question, to decide; and thus his loyalty was complete, because his
heart was satisfied, and it was easier to him to mistrust his reason
rather than to mistrust his heart. He had been swayed to and fro by many
interests and ardours and influences; he had wandered far afield, and
had found no peace in symbolism uncertain of what it symbolised, or in
reason struggling to reconcile infinite contradictions. Now he rowed no
more against the stream; he had found no human master to serve, and now
he had found a great ancient and living force which could bear him on.
That was, I think, the history of his spiritual change; and of one I am
sure, that no surrender was ever made so guilelessly, so
disinterestedly, and in so pure and simple a mood.
He has told the story of his own reception very simply and impressively.
He wrote to my mother, "It has happened," and I see that he wrote also
just before it to me. I quote from my diary:
"_September 9_, 1903.--Also a note from Hugh, from the Woodchester
Dominican Convent, saying that he thinks he will be received this week,
very short but affectionate. He says he won't attempt to say all that is
in his mind. I replied, saying that I could not wish, knowing how he
felt, the he should do otherwise--and I blessed him in a form of words."
It, may be frankly said that however much we regretted his choice, we
none of us had the slightest wish to fetter it, or to discourage Hugh
from following his true and conscientious convictions. One must
recognise that the sunshine and the rain of God fall in different ways
and at different times upon those who desire to find Him. I do not
wholly understand in my mind how Hugh came to make the change, but
Carlyle speaks truly when he says that there is one moral and spiritual
law for all, which is that whatever is honestly incredible to a man that
he may only at his direst peril profess or pretend to believe. And I
understand in my heart that Hugh had hitherto felt like one out on the
hillside, with wind and mist about him, and with whispers and voices
calling out of the mist; and that here he found a fold and a comradeship
such as he desired to find, and was never in any doubt again. And I am
sure that he soon began to feel the tranquillity which comes from having
taken, after much restlessness and anxiety, a hard course and made a
painful choice.
At first, however, he was deeply conscious of the strain through which
he had passed. He wrote to me in answer to the letter mentioned above:
_Sept. 23_, '03.
... Thank you so very much for your letter. It was delightful to
get it. I can't tell you what happiness it has been through
everything to know that you, as well as the others, felt as you
did: and now your letter comes to confirm it.
There is surprisingly little to say about myself; since you ask--
I have nothing more than the deepest possible conviction--no
emotionalism or sense of relief or anything of the kind.
As regards my plans--they too are tolerably vague.... All the
first week I was with the Dominicans--who, I imagine, will be my
final destination after two or three years.
... I imagine that I shall begin to read Theology again, in view
of future Ordination: and either I shall go to Rome at the
beginning of November; or possibly to Prior Park, near Bath--a
school, where I shall teach an hour a day, and read Theology.
* * * * *
Mamma and I are meeting in London next week. She really has been
good to me beyond all words. Her patience and kindness have been
unimaginable.
Well--this is a dreary and egotistical letter. But you asked me to
write about myself.
* * * * *
Well--I must thank you again for your extreme kindness--I really
am grateful: though I am always dumb about such things when I meet
people.
* * * * *
I remember taking a walk with Provost Hornby at Eton at this date. My
diary says:
"_October_ 1903.--We talked of Hugh. The Provost was very kind and wise.
He said, 'Such a change is a testimony of sincerity and earnestness'; he
went on to tell a story which Jowett told him of Dr. Johnson, who said,
when a husband and wife of his acquaintance went over to Rome, 'God
bless them both.' At the end of the walk he said to me, 'When you write
to your brother, remember me very kindly to him, and give him, as a
message from me, what Johnson said.' This I thought was beautiful--more
than courteous."
I sent this message to Hugh, who was deeply touched by it, and wrote the
Provost an affectionate and grateful letter.
Soon after this he went out to Rome to prepare himself for the Orders
which he received nine months later. My mother went to see him off. As
the train went out of the station, and Hugh was lost to view, my mother
turned round and saw Bishop Wilkinson, one of our dearest friends,
waiting for her. She had told him before that Hugh was leaving by that
train, and had asked him to bear both herself and Hugh in mind. He had
not intruded on the parting, but now he drew my mother's hand into his
arm and said, "If Hugh's father, when he was here on earth, would--and
he would--have always wished him to follow his conscience, how much more
in Paradise!" and then he went away without another word.
XII
CAMBRIDGE AGAIN
Hugh went to the College of San Silvestro in Rome, and there he found
many friends. He said that on first joining the Catholic Church, he felt
like a lost dog; he wrote to me:
Rome, _Nov. 26_, '03.
* * * * *
My own news is almost impossible to tell, as everything is simply
bewildering: in about five years from now I shall know how I felt;
but at present I feel nothing but discomfort; I hate foreign
countries and foreign people, and am finding more every day how
hopelessly insular I am: because of course, under the
circumstances, this is the proper place for me to be: but it is a
kind of dentist's chair.
* * * * *
But he soon parted once and for all with his sense of isolation; while
the splendours of Rome, the sense of history and state and world-wide
dominion, profoundly impressed his imagination. He was deeply inspired,
too, by the sight of simple and and unashamed piety among the common
folk, which appeared to him to put the colder and more cautious religion
of England to shame. Perhaps he did not allow sufficiently for the
temperamental differences between the two nations, but at any rate he
was comforted and reassured.
I do not know much of his doings at this time; I was hard at work at
Windsor on the Queen's letters, and settling into a new life at
Cambridge; but I realised that he was building up happiness fast. One
little touch of his perennial humour comes back to my mind. He was
describing to me some ceremony performed by a very old and absent-minded
ecclesiastic, and how two priests stood behind him to see that he
omitted nothing, "With the look in their eyes," said Hugh, "that you
can see in the eyes of a terrier who is standing with ears pricked at
the mouth of a burrow, and a rabbit preparing to bolt from within."
He came back a priest, and before long he settled at Cambridge, living
with Monsignor Barnes at Llandaff House. Monsignor Barnes was an old
Eton contemporary and friend of my own, who had begun by going to
Woolwich as a cadet; then he had taken orders in the Church of England,
and then had joined the Church of Rome, and was put in charge of the
Roman Catholic undergraduates at Cambridge. Llandaff House is a big,
rather mysterious mansion in the main street of Cambridge, opposite the
University Arms Hotel. It was built by the famous Bishop Watson of
Llandaff, who held a professorship at Cambridge in conjunction with his
bishopric, and never resided in his diocese at all. The front rooms of
the big, two-gabled house are mostly shops; the back of the house
remains a stately little residence, with a chapel, a garden with some
fine trees, and opens on to the extensive and quiet park of Downing
College.
Hugh had a room which looked out on to the street, where he did his
writing. From that date my real friendship with him began, if I may use
the word. Before that, the difference in our ages, and the fact that I
was a very busy schoolmaster only paying occasional visits to home, had
prevented our seeing very much of each other in anything like equal
comradeship. But at the beginning of 1905 I went into residence at
Magdalene as a Fellow, and Hugh was often in and out, while I was made
very welcome at Llandaff House. Hugh had a small income of his own, and
he began to supplement it by writing. His needs and tastes were all
entirely simple. He seems to me, remembering him, to have looked
extremely youthful in those days, smaller in some ways than he did
later. He moved very rapidly; his health was good and his activity
great. He made friends at several of the colleges, he belonged to the
Pitt Club, and he used to attend meetings of an undergraduates' debating
club--the Decemviri--to which he had himself belonged. One of the
members of that time has since told me that he was the only older man he
had ever known who really mixed with undergraduates and debated with
them on absolutely equal terms. But indeed, so far as looks went, though
he was now thirty-four, he might almost have been an undergraduate
himself.
We arranged always to walk together on Sunday afternoons. As an old
member of King's College, I had a key of the garden there in the Backs,
and a pass-key of the college gates, which were locked on Sunday during
the chapel service. We always went and walked about that beautiful
garden with its winding paths, or sat out in the bowling-green. Then we
generally let ourselves into the college grounds, and went up to the
south porch of the chapel, where we could hear the service proceeding
within. I can remember Hugh saying, as the Psalms came to an end
"Anglican double chants--how comfortable and delicious, and how entirely
irreligious!"
We talked very freely and openly of all that was in our minds, and
sometimes even argued on religion. He used to tell me that I was much
nearer to his form of faith than most Anglicans, and I can remember his
saying that the misery of being an Anglican was that it was all so
rational--you had to make up your mind on every single point. "Why not,"
he said, "make it up on one point--the authority of the Church, and have
done with it?" "Because I can't be dictated to on points in which I feel
I have a right to an opinion." "Ah, that isn't a faith!" "No, only a
faith in reason." At which he would shrug his shoulders, and smile. Once
I remember his exhibiting very strong emotion. I had spoken of the
worship of the Virgin, and said something that seemed to him to be in a
spirit of levity. He stopped and turned quite pale. "Ah, don't say
that!" he said; "I feel as if you had said something cynical about
someone very dear to me, and far more than that. Please promise not to
speak of it again."
It was in these days that I first perceived the extraordinary charm of
both mind and manner that he possessed. In old days he had been amusing
and argumentative enough, but he was often silent and absorbed. I think
his charm had been developed by his new experiences, and by the number
of strangers he had been brought into contact with; he had learned an
eager and winning sort of courtesy, which grew and increased every year.
On one point we wholly and entirely agreed--namely, in thinking rudeness
of any kind to be not a mannerism, but a deadly sin. "I find injustice
or offensiveness to myself or anyone else," he once wrote, "the hardest
of all things to forgive." We concurred in detesting the habit of
licensing oneself to speak one's mind, and the unpleasant English trait
of confusing sincerity with frank brutality. There is a sort of
Englishman who thinks he has a right, if he feels cross or contemptuous,
to lay bare his mood without reference to his companion's feelings; and
this seemed to us both the ugliest of phenomena.
[Illustration: _Photo by Russell & Sons_
ROBERT HUGH BENSON
IN 1907. AGED 35]
Hugh saw a good deal of academic society in a quiet way--Cambridge is a
hospitable place. I remember the consternation which was caused by his
fainting away suddenly after a Feast at King's. He had been wedged into
a corner, in front of a very hot fire, by a determined talker, and
suddenly collapsed. I was fetched out to see him and found him stretched
on a form in the Hall vestibule, being kindly cared for by the Master of
a College, who was an eminent surgeon and a professor. Again I remember
that we entered the room together when dining with a hospitable Master,
and were introduced to a guest, to his bewilderment, as "Mr. Benson" and
"Father Benson." "I must explain," said our host, "that Father Benson is
not Mr. Benson's father!" "I should have imagined that he might be his
son!" said the guest.
After Hugh had lived at Llandaff House for a year he accepted a curacy
at the Roman Catholic church at Cambridge. I do not know how this came
about. A priest can be ordained "to a bishop," in which case he has to
go where he is sent, or "on his patrimony," which gives him a degree of
independence. Hugh had been ordained "on his patrimony," but he was
advised to take up ministerial work. He accordingly moved into the
Catholic rectory, a big, red-brick house, with a great cedar in front of
it, which adjoins the church. He had a large sitting-room, looking out
at the back over trees and gardens, with a tiny bedroom adjoining. He
had now the command of more money, and the fitting up of his rooms was a
great delight to him; he bought some fine old oak furniture, and fitted
the walls with green hangings, above which he set the horns of deer,
which he had at various times stalked and shot--he was always a keen
sportsman. I told him it was too secular an ornament, but he would not
hear me.
Canon Scott, the rector, the kindest and most hospitable of men,
welcomed me to the rectory, and I was often there; and our Sunday walks
continued. Hugh became known at once as the best preacher in Cambridge,
and great congregations flocked to hear him. I do not think he had much
pastoral work to do; but now a complication ensued. A good many
undergraduates used to go to hear him, ask to see him, discuss religious
problems with him. Moreover, before he left the Anglican communion, Hugh
had conducted a mission at Cambridge, with the result that several of
his hearers became Roman Catholics. A certain amount of orthodox alarm
was felt and expressed at the new and attractive religious element which
his sermons provided, and eventually representations were made to one
that I should use my influence with Hugh that he should leave Cambridge.
This I totally declined to do, and suggested that the right way to meet
it was to get an Anglican preacher to Cambridge of persuasive eloquence
and force. I did eventually speak to Hugh about it, and he was
indignant. He said: "I have not attempted, and shall not attempt, any
sort of proselytisation of undergraduates--I do not think it fair, or
even prudent. I have never started the subject of religion on any
occasion with any undergraduate. But I must preach what I believe; and,
of course, if undergraduates consult me, I shall tell them what I think
and why I think it." This rule he strictly adhered to; and I do not know
of any converts that he made.
Moreover, it was at this time that strangers, attracted by his sermons
and his books, began to consult him by letter, and seek interviews with
him. In this relation he showed himself, I have reason to know,
extraordinarily kind, sympathetic, and straightforward. He wrote fully
and as often as he was consulted; he saw an ever-increasing number of
inquirers. He used to groan over the amount of time he had to spend in
letters and interviews, and he used to say that it often happened that
the people least worth helping took up the most time. He always gave his
very best; but the people who most vexed him were those engaged in
religious inquiry, not out of any profound need, but simply for the
emotional luxury; and who argued round and round in a circle for the
pleasure of being sympathised with. Hugh was very clear and practical in
his counsels, and he was, I used to think, like a wise and even stern
physician, never influenced by sentiment. It was always interesting to
discuss a "case" with him. I do not mean that he discussed his cases
with me, but I used to ask him how to deal with some intellectual or
moral problem, and his insight seemed to me wonderfully shrewd,
sensible, and clear. He had a masterly analysis, and a power of seeing
alternatives and contingencies which always aroused my admiration. He
was less interested in the personal element than in the psychological;
and I used to feel that his strength lay in dealing with a case
scientifically and technically. Sometimes he had desperate, tragic, and
even alarming cases to deal with; and here his fearlessness and
toughness stood him in good stead. He never shrank appalled before any
moral enormity. He told me once of a series of interviews he had with a
man, not a Catholic, who appealed to him for help in the last extremity
of moral degradation. He became aware at last that the man was insane,
but he spared no pains to rescue him.
When he first began this work he had a wave of deep unhappiness; the
responsibility of the priesthood so overwhelmed him that for a time, I
have learned, he used to pray night after night, that he might die in
his sleep, if it were possible. I saw and guessed nothing of this, but I
think it was a mood of exhaustion, because he never exhibited anything
but an eager and animated interest in life.
One of his pleasures while he was at Cambridge and ever after was the
writing, staging, and rehearsing of little mystery-plays and sacred
scenes for the children of St. Mary's Convent at Cambridge and for the
choir boys of Westminster Cathedral. These he thoroughly enjoyed; he
always loved the companionship of children, and had exactly the right
way with them, treating them seriously, paternally, with a brisk
authority, and never sentimentally. They were beautiful and moving
little dramas, reverently performed. Unhappily I never saw one of them.
Even now I remember with a stab of regret that he came to stay with me
at Cambridge for one of these, and besought me to go with him. But I was
shy and busy, and though I could easily have arranged to go, I did not
and he went off alone. "Can't you really manage it?" he said.
"Pray-a-do!" But I was obdurate, and it gives me pain now to think that
I churlishly refused, though it is a false pathos to dwell on such
things, and both foolish and wrong to credit the dead with remembering
trifling grievances.
But I do not think that his time at the Catholic rectory was a really
very happy one. He needed more freedom; he became gradually aware that
his work lay in the direction of writing, of lecturing, of preaching,
and of advising. He took his own measure and knew his own strength. "I
have _no_ pastoral gift," he once said to me very emphatically. "I am
not the man to _prop_," he once wrote; "I can kindle sometimes, but not
support. People come to me and pass on." Nor was he at ease in the
social atmosphere of Cambridge--it seemed to him bleak, dry,
complacently intellectual, unimaginative. He felt himself what the law
describes as "a suspected person," with vague designs on the spiritual
life of the place.
At first, he was not rich enough to live the sort of life he desired;
but he began to receive larger incomes from his books, and to see that
it would soon be in his power to make a home for himself. It was then
that our rambles in search of possible houses began, while at the same
time he curtailed his own personal expenditure to the lowest limits,
till his wardrobe became conspicuous for its antiquity. This, however,
he was wholly indifferent about; his aim was to put together a
sufficient sum to buy a small house in the country, and there to settle
"for ever," as he used to say. "A small Perpendicular chapel and a
white-washed cottage next door is what I want just now," he wrote about
this time. "It must be in a sweet and secret place--preferably in
Cornwall." Or again, "I want and mean--if it is permitted--to live in a
small cottage in the country; to say mass and office, and to write
books. I think that is honestly my highest ideal. I hate fuss and
officialdom and backbiting--I wish to be at peace with God and man."
This was his dream. The house at Hare Street was the result.
XIII
HARE STREET
I have no doubt at all that Hugh's seven years at Hare Street were the
happiest of his life. He generally had some companion living there--Mr.
Gabriel Pippet, who did much skilful designing and artistic work with
and for him; Dr. Sessions, who managed his household affairs and acted
as a much needed secretary; Father Watt, who was in charge of the
Hormead Mission. At one time he had the care of a little boy, Ken
Lindsay, which was, I think, the greatest joy he ever had. He was a most
winning and affectionate child, and Hugh's love of children was very
great. He taught Ken, played with him, told him stories. Among his
papers are little touching trifles which testify to his love of the
child--a withered flower, or some leaves in an envelope, "flower which
Ken gave me," "leaves with which Ken tried to make a crown," and there
are broken toys of Ken's put away, and little games and pictures which
Hugh contrived for his pleasure, memories of happy days and hours. He
used to talk about Ken and tell stories about his sayings and doings,
and for a time Ken's presence gave a sense of home about Hare Street,
and filled a part of Hugh's heart as nothing else did. It was a pleasure
to see them together; Hugh's whole voice and bearing changed when Ken
was with him, but he did not spoil him in the least or indulge him
foolishly. I remember sitting with Hugh once when Ken was playing about,
and how Hugh followed him with his eyes or listened to Ken's confidences
and discoveries. But circumstances arose which made it necessary that
Ken should go, and the loss of him was a great grief to Hugh--though
even so, I admired the way in which he accepted the necessity. He always
loved what he had got, but did not miss it if he lost it.
[Illustration: AT HARE STREET, 1909
Mr. J. Reeman. Ken. R. H. Benson.]
He made friends, too, with the people of the village, put his chapel at
their disposal for daily use, and had a Christmas festival there for
them. He formed pleasant acquaintances with his country neighbours, and
used to go to fish or shoot with them, or occasionally to dine out. He
bought and restored a cottage which bordered on his garden, and built
another house in a paddock beyond his orchard, both of which were let to
friends. Thus it was not a solitary life at all.
He had in his mind for a long time a scheme which he intended to carry
out as soon as he had more leisure,--for it must be remembered that much
of his lecturing and occasional writing was undertaken simply to earn
money to enable him to accomplish his purposes. This was to found a
community of like-minded people, who desired more opportunity for quiet
devotion and meditation, for solitary work and contemplation, than the
life of the world could afford them. Sometimes he designed a joint
establishment, sometimes small separate houses; but the essence of it
all was solitude, cheered by sympathy and enough friendly companionship
to avoid morbidity. At one time he planned a boys' home, in connection
with the work of his friend Mr. Norman Potter, at another a home of rest
for troubled and invalided people, at another a community for poor and
sensitive people, who "if they could get away from squalor and conflict,
would blow like flowers." With his love of precise detail, he drew up
time-tables, so many hours for devotion and meditation, so many for work
and exercise, so many for sociability.
But gradually his engagements increased so that he was constantly away,
preaching and lecturing; and thus he was seldom at home for more than
two or three days at a time. Thrice he went to Rome to preach courses of
sermons, and thrice he went to America, where he made many friends.
Until latterly he used to go away for holidays of various kinds, a motor
tour in France, a trip to Switzerland, where he climbed mountains; and
he often went to stay with Lord Kenmare at Killarney, where he stalked
deer, shot and fished, and lived an out-of-door life. I remember his
describing to me an incident on one of those visits, how he was
returning from a deer-stalk, in the roughest clothes, when he saw a
little group of people in a by-lane, and presently a message arrived to
say that there was a dying woman by the roadside, and could he go to
her. He went in haste, heard her confession, and gave her absolution,
while the bystanders withdrew to a distance, that no word might be
overheard, and stood bareheaded till the end came.
His engagement-books, of which I have several, show a dangerous
activity; it is difficult to see how any man could have done so much of
work involving so much strain. But he had a clear idea in his mind. He
used to say that he did not expect to have a long life. "Many thanks,"
he wrote to a friend in 1905, in reply to a birthday letter. "I
certainly want happy returns; but not very many." He also said that he
was prepared for a break-down in his powers. He intended to do his work
in his own way, and as much as he could while his strength lasted. At
the same time he was anxious to save enough money to enable him to live
quietly on at Hare Street whatever happened. The result was that even
when he came back from his journeys the time at Hare Street was never a
rest. He worked from morning to night at some piece of writing, and
there were very few commissions for articles or books which he refused.
He said latterly, in reply to an entreaty from his dear friend Canon
Sharrock, who helped him to die, that he would take a holiday: "No, I
never take holidays now--they make me feel so self-conscious."
He was very careful to keep up with his home and his family ties. He
used to pay regular visits to Tremans, my mother's house, and was
generally there at Christmas or thereabouts. Latterly he had a Christmas
festival of his own at Hare Street, with special services in the
chapel, with games and medals for the children, and with presents for
all alike--children, tenants, servants, neighbours, and friends. My
sister, who lately spent a Christmas with him, says that it was more
like an ideal Christmas than anything she had ever seen, and that he
himself, full of eagerness and kindness and laughter, was the centre and
mainspring of it all. He used to invite himself over to Cambridge not
infrequently for a night or two; and I used to run over for a day to
Hare Street to see his improvements and to look round. I remember once
going there for an afternoon and suggesting a stroll. We walked to a
hamlet a little way off, but to my surprise he did not know the name of
it, and said he had never been there. I discovered that he hardly ever
left his own little domain, but took all his exercise in gardening or
working with his hands. He had a regular workroom at one time in the
house, where he carved, painted, or stitched tapestries--but it was all
intent work. When he came to Cambridge for a day, he would collect
books from all parts of the house, read them furiously, "tearing the
heart out of them" like Dr. Johnson. Everything was done thus, at top
speed. His correspondence was enormous; he seldom failed to acknowledge
a letter, and if his advice were asked he would write at great length,
quite ungrudgingly; but his constant writing told on his script. Ten
years ago it was a very distinctive, artistic, finely formed hand, very
much like my father's, but latterly it grew cramped and even illegible,
though it always had a peculiar character, and, as is often the case
with very marked hand-writings, it tended to be unconsciously imitated
by his friends.
[Illustration: _Copyright, C. Chichester_
HARE STREET, IN THE GARDEN
JULY 1911
R. H. Benson. Dr. F. L. Sessions.]
I used to wonder, in talk with him, how he found it possible to stay
about so much in all sorts of houses, and see so many strange people.
"Oh, one gets used to it," he said, adding: "besides, I am quite
shameless now--I say that I must have a room to myself where I can work
and smoke, and people are very good about that."
XIV
AUTHORSHIP
As to Hugh's books, I will here say a few words about them, because they
were a marked part of himself; he put much skill and care into making
them, and took fully as much rapture away. When he was writing a book,
he was like a man galloping across country in a fresh sunny morning, and
shouting aloud for joy. But I do not intend to make what is called an
appreciation of them, and indeed am little competent to do so. I do not
know the conventions of the art or the conditions of it. "Oh, I see,"
said a critical friend to me not long ago in much disgust, "you read a
novel for the ideas and the people and the story." "What do you read it
for?" I said. "Why, to see how it is done, of course," he replied.
Personally I have never read a book in my life to see how it is done,
and what interests me, apart from the book, is the person behind it--and
that is very elementary. Moreover, I have a particular dislike of all
historical novels. Fact is interesting and imagination is interesting;
but I do not care for webs of imagination hung on pegs of fact.
Historical novels ought to be like memoirs, and they are never in the
least like memoirs; in fact they are like nothing at all, except each
other.
_The Light Invisible_ always seemed to me a beautiful book. It was in
1902 that Hugh began to write it, at Mirfield. He says that a book of
stories of my own, _The Hill of Trouble_, put the idea into his
head--but his stories have no resemblance to mine. Mine were archaic
little romances, written in a style which a not unfriendly reviewer
called "painfully kind," an epigram which always gave Hugh extreme
amusement. His were modern, semi-mystical tales; he says that he
personally came to dislike the book intensely from the spiritual point
of view, as being feverish and sentimental, and designed unconsciously
to quicken his own spiritual temperature. He adds that he thought the
book mischievous, as laying stress on mystical intuition rather than
Divine authority, and because it substituted the imagination for the
soul. That is a dogmatic objection rather than a literary objection; and
I suppose he really disliked it because it reminded him later on of a
time when he was moving among shadows. But it was the first book in
which he spread his wings, and there is, I think, a fresh and ingenuous
beauty about it, as of a delighted adventure among new faculties and
powers.
I believe that the most beautiful book he ever wrote was _Richard
Raynal, Solitary_; and I know he thought so himself. Of course it is an
archaic book, and written, as musicians say, in a _mode_. It is easier
in some ways to write a book in a style which is not authentically one's
own, and literary imitation is not the highest art; but _Richard Raynal_
has the beauty of a fine tapestry designed on antique lines, yet
replenished and enriched by modern emotion, like Tennyson's _Mort
d'Arthur_. Yet I am sure there is a deep charm of pure beauty in the
book, both of thought and handling, and I believe that he put into it
the best essence of his feeling and imagination.
As to his historical books, I can feel their vigour and vitality, and
their deft use of old hints and fragments. I remember once discussing
one of them with him, and saying that his description of Queen Elizabeth
seemed to me very vivid, but that it reminded me of a not very authentic
picture of that queen, in spangled crimson and lace, which hung in the
hall at Addington. Hugh laughed, and said: "Well, I must confess that
very picture was in my mind!"
With regard to his more modern stories it is impossible not to be
impressed by their lightness and swiftness, their flashes of beauty and
emotion, their quick rippling talk; but it is hard, at times, not to
feel them to be vitiated by their quite unconscious tendency to
represent a point of of view. They were once called by a malign reviewer
"the most detestable kind of tract," and though this is what the French
call a _saugrenu_ criticism, which implies something dull, boorish, and
provincial, yet it is easy to recognise what is meant. It is not unjust
to resent the appearance of the cultivated and sensitive Anglican,
highly bred and graceful, who is sure to turn out hard and
hollow-hearted, or the shabby, trotting, tobacco-scented Roman Catholic
priest, who is going to emerge at a crisis as a man of inspired dignity
and solemnity. Sometimes, undoubtedly, the books are too intent upon
expunging other forms of religious life, rather than in tracing the
movements of the soul. Probably this was inseparable from the position
Hugh had taken up, and there was not the slightest pose, or desire to
improve the situation about his mind. The descriptions, the
lightly-touched details, the naturalness and ease of the talk are
wholly admirable. He must have been a very swift observer, both of
nature and people, because he never gave the least impression of
observing anything. I never saw him stop to look at a view, or go into
raptures over anything beautiful or picturesque; in society he was
either silent and absorbed, or more commonly extremely animated and
expansive. But he never seemed to be on the look-out for any impressions
at all, and still less to be recording them.
I believe that all his books, with the exception, perhaps, of _Richard
Raynal_, can be called brilliant improvisations rather than deliberate
works of art. "I write best," he once said, "when I rely most on
imagination." The time which elapsed from his conception of an idea to
the time when the book was completed was often incredibly short. I
remember his telling me his first swift thought about _The Coward_; and
when I next asked him about it, the book had gone to the publishers and
he was writing another. When he was actually engaged in writing he was
oblivious of all else, and lived in a sort of dream. I have several
sketches of books which he made. He used to make a rough outline, a kind
of _scenario_, indicating the gradual growth of the plot. That was done
rapidly, and he always said that the moment his characters were
conceived, they began to haunt his mind with emphatic vividness; but he
wrote very fast, and a great quantity at a time. His life got fuller and
fuller of engagements, but he would get back to Hare Street for a day or
two, when he would write from morning to night with a brief interval for
gardening or handicraft, and briefer intervals for meals. He was fond of
reading aloud bits of the books, as they grew. He read all his books
aloud to my mother in MS., and paid careful heed to her criticisms,
particularly with reference to his female characters, though it has been
truly said that the women in his novels are mostly regarded either as
indirect obstacles or as direct aids to conversion.
Mr. Belloc once said, very wisely and truly, that inertia was the
breeding-ground of inspiration. I think, on the whole, that the total
and entire absence of any species of inertia in Hugh's temperament
reacted in a way unfavourably on his books. I do not think they simmered
in his mind, but were projected, hot and smoking, from the fiery
crucible of thought. There seems to me a breathless quality about them.
Moreover I do not think that there is much trace of the subtle chemistry
of mutual relations about his characters. In life, people undergo
gradual modifications, and other people exert psychological effects upon
them. But in Hugh's books the characters are all fiercely occupied in
being themselves from start to finish; they have exhausted moods, but
they have not dull or vacant moods; they are always typical and
emphatic. This is really to me the most interesting thing about his
books, that they are all projections of his own personality into his
characters. He is behind them all; and writing with Hugh was, like so
many things that he did, a game which he played with all his might. I
have spoken about this elsewhere, because it accounted for much in his
life; and when he was engaged in writing, there was always the delicious
sense of the child, furiously and absorbingly at play, about him.
It is said that no artist is ever really interested in another artist's
work. My brothers, Fred and Hugh, my sister and myself would sometimes
be at home together, and all writing books. Hugh was, I think, always
the first inclined to produce his work for inspection; but we had a
tacit convention which was not in the least unsympathetic, not to feel
bound to be particularly interested in each other's books. My books, I
felt, bored Hugh more than his bored me; but there was this advantage,
that when we read each other's books, as we often did, any critical
praise that we could offer was much more appreciated than if we had
felt bound to proffer conventional admiration. Hugh once told me that he
envied my _sostenuto_; but on another occasion, when I said I had
nothing to write about, and feared I had written too many books, Hugh
said: "Why not write a book about having nothing to write about?" It was
good advice and I took it. I can remember his real and obvious pleasure
when I once praised _Richard Raynal_ to him with all my might. But
though he enjoyed praise, it was always rather because it confirmed his
own belief that his work was worth doing. He did not depend in the
smallest degree either upon applause or sympathy. Indeed, by the time
that a book was out, he had generally got another on the stocks, and did
not care about the previous one at all.
[Illustration: ROBERT HUGH BENSON
IN 1910. AGED 39]
Neither do I think that his books emanated from a high artistic ideal. I
do not believe that he was really much interested in his craft. Rather
he visualised a story very vividly, and then it seemed to him the finest
fun in the world to spin it all as rapidly as he could out of his
brain, to make it all alert with glancing life. It was all a personal
confession; his books bristle with his own dreams, his own dilemmas, his
own social relations; and when he had once firmly realised the Catholic
attitude, it seemed to him the one thing worth writing about.
While I write these pages I have been dipping into _The
Conventionalists_. It is full of glow and drama, even melodrama; but
somehow it does not recall Hugh to my mind. That seems strange to me,
but I think of him as always larger than his books, less peremptory,
more tolerant, more impatient of strain. The book is full of strain; but
then I remember that in the old days, when he played games, he was a
provoking and even derisive antagonist, and did not in the least resent
his adversaries being both; and I come back to my belief in the game,
and the excitement of the game. I do not, after all, believe that his
true nature flowed quite equably into his books, as I think it did into
_The Light Invisible_ and _Richard Raynal_. It was a demonstration, and
he enjoyed using his skill and adroitness; he loved to present the
smouldering and flashing of passions, the thrill and sting of which he
had never known. Saved as he was by his temperament alike from deep
suffering and tense emotion, and from any vital mingling either with the
scum and foam or with the stagnancy and mire of life, the books remain
as a brilliant illusion, with much of the shifting hues and changing
glimmer of his own ardent and restless mind rippling over the surface of
a depth which is always a little mysterious as to the secrets it
actually holds.
XV
FAILING HEALTH
Hugh's health on the whole was good up to the year 1912, though he had a
troublesome ailment, long ignored, which gave him a good deal of
malaise. He very much disliked being spoken to about his health, and
accepted no suggestions on the subject. But he determined at the end of
1912, after enduring great pain, to have an operation, which was quite
successful, but the shock of which was considerable. He came down to
Tremans just before, and it was clear that he suffered greatly; but so
far from dreading the operation, he anticipated it with a sense of
immense relief, and after it was over, though he was long unwell, he was
in the highest spirits. But he said after he came back from Rome that he
felt ten years older; and I can recall his coming down to Cambridge not
long after and indulging one evening in an immense series of yawns, for
which he apologised, saying, "I'm tired, I'm tired--not at the top, but
deep down inside, don't you know?"
[Illustration: _Photo by H. Abbott, Lindfield_
AT TREMANS, HORSTED KEYNES
DECEMBER, 1913
A. C. Benson. R. H. Benson. E. F. Benson.
Aged 51. Aged 42. Aged 46.]
But it was not until 1914 that his health really declined. He came over
to Cambridge at the beginning of August, when the war was impending. He
stayed with me over the Sunday; he was tired and overstrained,
complained that he felt unable to fix his mind upon anything, and he was
in considerable depression about the possibility of war. I have never
seen him so little able to throw off an anxiety; but he dined in Hall
with me on the Sunday night, met some old friends, and was full of talk.
He told me later in the evening that he was in much anxiety about some
anonymous menace which he had received. He would not enter into details,
but he spoke very gravely about it. However, later in the month, I went
over with a friend to see him at Hare Street, and found him in cheerful
spirits in spite of everything. He had just got the place, he said,
into perfect order, and now all it wanted was to be left alone. It was a
day of bright hot sunlight, and we lunched out of doors near the chapel
under the shade of the yew trees. He produced a peculiar and pleasant
wine, which he had made on the most scientific principles out of his own
grapes. We went round and looked at everything, and he showed me the
preparation for the last adornment, which was to be a rose garden near
the chapel. We walked into the orchard and stood near the Calvary,
little thinking that he would be laid to rest there hardly two months
later.
The weeks passed on, and at the end of September I went to stay near
Ambleside with some cousins, the Marshalls, in a beautiful house called
Skelwith Fold, among lovely woodlands, with the mountains rising on
every side, and a far-off view down Langdale. Here I found Hugh staying.
He was writing some Collects for time of war, and read many of them
aloud to me for criticism. He was also painting in oils, attempting very
difficult landscapes with considerable success. They stood drying in the
study, and he was much absorbed in them; he also was fishing keenly in a
little trout lake near the house, and walking about with a gun. His
spirits were very equable and good. But he told me that he had gone out
shooting in September over some fields lent him by a neighbour, and had
had to return owing to breathlessness; and he added that he suffered
constantly from breathlessness and pain in the chest and arms, that he
could only walk a few paces at a time, and then had to rest to recover
his breath. He did not seem to be anxious about it, but he went down one
morning to celebrate Mass at Ambleside, refusing the offer of the car,
and found himself in such pain that he then and there went to a doctor,
who said that he believed it to be indigestion.
He sat that morning after breakfast with me, smoking, and complaining
that the pain was very severe. But he did not look ill; and the pain
suddenly left him. "Oh what bliss!" he said. "It's gone, suddenly and
entirely--and now I must go out and finish my sketch."
The only two things that made me feel anxious were that he had given up
smoking to a considerable extent, and that he said he meant to consult
our family doctor; but he was so lively and animated--I remember one
night the immense zest and intensity with which he played a game of
throwing an old pack of cards across the room into the grate--that it
was impossible to think that his condition was serious.
Indeed, I said good-bye to him when he went off, without the least
anticipation of evil. My real hope was that he would be told he had been
overdoing it, and ordered to rest; and a few days later, when I heard
that this was what the doctor advised, I wrote to him suggesting that he
should come and settle at Cambridge for a couple of months, do exactly
what he liked, and see as much or as little of people as he liked. It
seems that he showed this letter to one of the priests at Manchester,
and said, "There, that is what I call a real invitation--that is what I
shall do!"
Dr. Ross-Todd saw him, and told him that it was a neuralgic affection,
"false angina," and that his heart was sound, but that he must diminish
his work. He pleaded to be allowed to finish his imminent engagements;
the doctor said that he might do that, if he would put off all
subsequent ones. This was wisely done, in order to reassure him, as he
was an excitable though not a timid patient. He was at Hare Street for a
day or two, and his trusted servant, Mr. Reeman, tells me that he seemed
ill and out of spirits. The last words he said as he drove away, looking
round the lime-encircled lawn, were, "Ah! the leaves will all be gone
when I come home again."
He preached at Salford on October 4, and went to Ulverston on October 5,
where he conducted a mission. On October 10 he returned, and Canon
Sharrock says that he arrived in great pain, and had to move very
slowly. But he preached again on October 11, though he used none of the
familiar gestures, but stood still in the pulpit. He suffered much after
the sermon, and rested long in a chair in the sacristy. He started to go
to London on the Monday morning, but had to return in the taxi, feeling
too ill to travel. Then followed days of acute pain, during which he no
doubt caught a severe chill. He could not sleep, and he could only
obtain relief by standing up. He wandered restlessly one night about the
corridors, very lightly clad, and even went out into the court. He stood
for two or three hours leaning on the mantelpiece of his room, with
Father Gorman sitting near him, and trying in vain to persuade him to
retire to bed.
When he was not suffering he was full of life, and even of gaiety. He
went one of these afternoons, at his own suggestion, to a cinema show
with one of the priests, but though he enjoyed it, and even laughed
heartily, he said later that it had exhausted him.
He wrote some letters, putting off many of his autumn and winter
engagements. But he grew worse; a specialist was called in, and, though
the diagnosis was entirely confirmed, it was found that pneumonia had
set in.
XVI
THE END
I had spent a long day in London at a business meeting, where we
discussed a complicated educational problem. I came away alone; I was
anxious to have news of my sister, who had that morning undergone a
slight operation; but I was not gravely disquieted, because no serious
complications were expected.
When I reached my house there were two telegrams awaiting me, one to say
that the operation had gone well, the other from Canon Sharrock, of
Salford, to say that my brother was dangerously ill of pneumonia. I
wired at once for a further report, and before it arrived made up my
mind that I must go to him. I waited till the reply came--it was a
little more favourable--went up to London, and caught a midnight train
for Manchester.
The news had the effect which a sudden shock is apt to have, of inducing
a sense of curious unreality. I neither read nor slept, nor even thought
coherently. I was just aware of disaster and fear. I was alone in my
compartment. Sometimes we passed through great, silent, deserted
stations, or stopped outside a junction for an express to pass. At one
or two places there was a crowd of people, seeing off a party of
soldiers, with songs and cheers. Further north I was aware at one time
that the train was labouring up a long incline, and I had a faint sense
of relief when suddenly the strain relaxed, and the train began to run
swiftly and smoothly downwards; I had just one thought, the desire to
reach my brother, and over and over again the dread of what I might
hear.
It was still dark and chilly when I arrived at Manchester. The great
station was nearly empty. I drove hurriedly through dimly-lit streets.
Sometimes great factories towered up, or dark house-fronts shuttered
close. Here there were high steel networks of viaducts overhead, or
parapets of bridges over hidden waterways. At last I came to where a
great church towered up, and an iron-studded door in a blank wall
appeared. I was told this was the place, and pushing it open I went up a
stone-flagged path, among beds of soot-stained shrubs, to where a
lantern shone in the porch of a sombre house. There was a window high up
on the left, where a shaded lamp was burning and a fire flickered on the
ceiling, and I knew instinctively that this was my brother's room. I
rang, and presently a weary-eyed, kindly priest, in a hastily-donned
cassock, appeared. He said at once that my brother was a little better
and was asleep. The doctors were to see him at nine. I asked where I
could go, and he advised a hotel hard by. "We did not expect you," he
said, "or we would have had a room ready, but now I fear we could hardly
make you comfortable."
I went to the hotel, a big, well-equipped place, and was taken to a
bedroom, where I slept profoundly, out of utter weariness. Then I went
down to the Bishop's House again at nine o'clock. By daylight Manchester
had a grim and sinister air. It was raining softly and the air was heavy
with smoke. The Bishop's House stood in what was evidently a poor
quarter, full of mean houses and factories, all of red brick, smeared
and stained with soot. The house itself appeared like a great college,
with paved corridors, dark arches, and many doors. There was a lighted
room like a sacristy, and a faint scent of incense drifted in from the
door which led into the church. Upstairs, in a huge throne-room with a
gilded chair of state and long, bare tables, I met the doctors--Dr.
Bradley, a Catholic, and Professor Murray, a famous Manchester
physician, in khaki uniform, both most gentle and kind. Canon Sharrock
joined us, a tall, robust man, with a beautiful tenderness of manner and
a brotherly air. They gave me a better report, but could not disguise
from me that things were very critical. It was pneumonia of a very
grave kind which had supervened on a condition of overwork and
exhaustion. I see now that they had very little hope of recovery, but I
did not wholly perceive it then.
Then I went with the Canon to the end of the room. I saw two iron
cylinders on the table with brass fittings, and somehow knew that they
contained oxygen.
The Canon knocked, and Hugh's voice said, clearly and resonantly, "Come
in." I found him in bed, in a big library, the Bishop's own room. There
were few signs of illness except a steam-kettle and a few bottles; a
nurse was in the adjoining room. He was unable to speak very much, as
his throat troubled him; but he was full of humour and brightness. I
told him such news as I could think of. He knew that I was very busy,
but was pleased that I had come to see him. He said that he felt really
better, and that I should be able to go back the next day. He said a few
words about a will he had made, but added, "Mind, I don't think I am
going to die! I did yesterday, but I feel really better. This is only
by way of precaution." We talked about a friend of mine in Manchester, a
militant Protestant. "Yes," said Hugh, "he spoke of me the other day as
a 'hell-hound'--not very tactful!" He said that he could not sleep for
long together, but that he did not feel tired--only bored. I was told I
must not stay long with him. He said once or twice, "It's awfully good
of you to have come."
[Illustration: _Photo by Lofthouse, Crosbie & Co._
BISHOP'S HOUSE, SALFORD
The Church on the left is the transept of St. John's Cathedral, Salford,
where Hugh preached his last sermon. The room in which he died was the
Bishop's Library. One of its windows is visible on the first floor to
the left of the porch.]
I went away after a little, feeling very much reassured. He did not give
the impression of being gravely ill at all, he was so entirely himself.
I wrote a few letters and then returned, while he ate his luncheon, a
baked apple--but this was painful to him and he soon desisted. He talked
again a little, with the same liveliness, but as he began to be drowsy,
I left him again.
Dr. Bradley soon came to me, and confessed he felt anxious. "It may be a
long and critical business," he said. "If he can maintain his strength
like this for several days, he may turn the corner--he is a difficult
patient. He is not afraid, but he is excitable, and is always asking for
relief and suggesting remedies." I said something about summoning the
others. "On no account," he said. "It would give him the one impression
we must try to avoid--much depends upon his own hopefulness."
I went back to my hotel, slumbered over a book, went in for a little to
the cathedral service, and came back about five o'clock. The nurse was
not in the room at the moment. Hugh said a few words to me, but had a
sudden attack of faintness. I gave him a little whisky at his own
request, the doctor was fetched, and there followed a very anxious hour,
while various remedies were tried, and eventually oxygen revived him. He
laid his head down on the pillow, smiled at me, and said, "Oh, what
bliss! I feel absolutely comfortable--it's wonderful."
The doctor beckoned me out, and told me that I had better move my things
across to the house and sleep there. "I don't like the look of things
at all," he said; "your place is certainly here." He added that we had
better wait until the morning before deciding whether the others should
be sent for. I moved my things in, and had supper with the priests, who
were very kind to me. They talked much about Hugh, of his gaiety and
humour; and I saw that he had given his best to these friends of his,
and lived with them in brotherly simplicity.
I did not then think he was going to die, and I certainly expected no
sudden change. I ought, no doubt, to have realised that the doctors had
done their best to prepare me for his death; but the mind has an
instinctive way of holding out the shield of hope against such fears.
I was told at this time that he was to be left quiet, so I merely
slipped in at ten o'clock. Hugh was drowsy and resting quietly; he just
gave me a nod and a smile.
The one thing which made me anxious, on thinking over our interviews in
the course of the day was this--that he seemed to have a preoccupation
in his mind, though he had spoken cheerfully enough about various
matters. It did not seem either a fear or an anxiety. It was rather that
he knew that he might die, I now believe, and that he desired to live,
and was thinking about all the things he had to do and wished to do, and
that his trains of thought continually ended in the thought--"Perhaps I
may not live to do them." He wished too, I thought, to reassure himself,
and was pleased at feeling better, and at seeing that I thought him
better than I had expected. He was a sensitive patient, the doctor said,
and often suggested means of keeping up his strength. But he showed no
fear at any time, though he seemed like one who was facing a foe; like a
soldier in the trenches with an enemy opposite him whom he could not
quite discern.
However, I went off to bed, feeling suddenly very tired--I had been for
thirty-six hours almost without sleep, and it seemed to me as if whole
days had passed since I left Cambridge. My room was far away, a little
plain cell in a distant corridor high up. I slept a little; when
suddenly, through the glass window above my door, I saw the gleam of a
light, and became aware that someone was rapidly drawing near in the
corridor. In a moment Canon Sharrock tapped and entered. He said "Mr.
Benson, your brother is sinking fast--he has asked for you; he said, 'Is
my brother anywhere near at hand?' and when I said yes, that you were in
the house, he said, 'Thank God!' Do not lose any time; I will leave the
nurse on the stairs to light you." He went out, and I put on a few
things and went down the great dark arches of the staircase, with a
glimmering light below, and through the throne-room with the nurse. When
I came in I saw Hugh sitting up in bed; they had put a chair beside him,
covered with cushions, for him to lean against. He was pale and
breathing very fast, with the nurse sponging his brow. Canon Sharrock
was standing at the foot of the bed, with his stole on, reading the
last prayers from a little book. When I entered, Hugh fixed his eyes on
me with a strange smile, with something triumphant in it, and said in a
clear, natural voice, "Arthur, this is the end!" I knelt down near the
bed. He looked at me, and I knew somehow that we understood each other
well, that he wanted no word or demonstration, but was just glad I was
with him. The prayers began again. Hugh crossed himself faintly once or
twice, made a response or two. Then he said: "I beg your pardon--one
moment--my love to them all." The big room was brightly lit; something
on the hearth boiled over, and the nurse went across the room. Hugh said
to me: "You will make certain I am dead, won't you?" I said "Yes," and
then the prayers went on. Suddenly he said to the nurse: "Nurse, is it
any good my resisting death--making any effort?" The nurse said: "No,
Monsignor; just be as quiet as you can." He closed his eyes at this, and
his breath came quicker. Presently he opened his eyes again and looked
at me, and said in a low voice: "Arthur, don't look at me! Nurse, stand
between my brother and me!" He moved his hand to indicate where she
should stand. I knew well what was in his mind; we had talked not long
before of the shock of certain sights, and how a dreadful experience
could pierce through the reason and wound the inner spirit; and I knew
that he wished to spare me the pain of seeing him die. Once or twice he
drew up his hands as though trying to draw breath, and sighed a little;
but there was no struggle or apparent pain. He spoke once more and said:
"I commit my soul to God, to Mary, and to Joseph." The nurse had her
hand upon his pulse, and presently laid his hand down, saying: "It is
all over." He looked very pale and boyish then, with wide open eyes and
parted lips. I kissed his hand, which was warm and firm, and went out
with Canon Sharrock, who said to me: "It was wonderful! I have seen many
people die, but no one ever so easily and quickly."
It was wonderful indeed! It seemed to me then, in that moment, strange
rather than sad. He had been _himself_ to the very end, no diminution of
vigour, no yielding, no humiliation, with all his old courtesy and
thoughtfulness and collectedness, and at the same time, I felt, with a
real adventurousness--that is the only word I can use. I recognised that
we were only the spectators, and that he was in command of the scene. He
had made haste to die, and he had gone, as he was always used to do,
straight from one finished task to another that waited for him. It was
not like an end; it was as though he had turned a corner, and was
passing on, out of sight but still unquestionably there. It seemed to me
like the death of a soldier or a knight, in its calmness of courage, its
splendid facing of the last extremity, its magnificent determination to
experience, open-eyed and vigilant, the dark crossing.
[Illustration: THE CALVARY AT HARE STREET, 1913
The grave is to the left of the mound.]
XVII
BURIAL
We had thought that he should be buried at Manchester; but a paper of
directions was found saying that he wished to be buried at Hare Street,
in his own orchard, at the foot of his Calvary. My mother arrived on the
Monday evening, and in the course of Tuesday we saw his body for the
last time, in biretta and cassock, with a rosary in his hands. He looked
strangely young, like a statue carved in alabaster, with no trace of
pain or weariness about him, simply asleep.
His coffin was taken to the midnight train by the clergy of the Salford
Cathedral and from Buntingford station by my brother Fred to his own
little chapel, where it rested all the Thursday. On the Friday the
Cardinal came down, with Canons from Westminster and the choir. A
solemn Requiem was sung. The Cardinal consecrated a grave, and he was
laid there, in the sight of a large concourse of mourners. It was very
wonderful to see them. There were many friends and neighbours, but there
were also many others, unknown to me and even to each other, whom Hugh
had helped and comforted in different ways, and whose deep and visible
grief testified to the sorrow of their loss and to the loyalty of their
affection.
I spent some strange solitary days at Hare Street in the week which
followed, going over from Cambridge and returning, working through
papers and letters. There were all Hugh's manuscripts and notes, his
books of sermons, all the written evidences of his ceaseless energy. It
was an astonishing record of diligence and patient effort. It seemed
impossible to believe that in a life of perpetual travelling and endless
engagements he yet had been able to accomplish all this mass of work.
His correspondence too--though he had evidently destroyed all private
spiritual confidences--was of wide and varied range, and it was
difficult to grasp that it yet represented the work of so comparatively
few years. The accumulation also of little, unknown, unnamed gifts was
very great, while the letters of grief and sympathy which I received
from friends of his, whose very names were unknown to me, showed how
intricate and wide his personal relations had been. And yet he had
carried all this burden very lightly and easily. I realised how
wonderful his power must have been of storing away in his mind the
secrets of many hearts, always ready to serve them, and yet able to
concentrate himself upon any work of his own.
In his directions he spoke of his great desire to keep his house and
chapel as much as possible in their present state. "I have spent an
immense amount of time and care on these things," he said. It seemed
that he had nearly realised his wish, by careful economy, to live at
Hare Street quietly and without anxiety, even if his powers had failed
him; and it was strange to walk as I did, one day when I had nearly
finished my task, round about the whole garden, which had been so
tangled and weed-choked a wilderness, and the house at first so ruinous
and bare, and to realise that it was all complete and perfect, a setting
of order and peace. How insecure and frail the beautiful hopes of
permanence and quiet enjoyment all seemed! I passed over the smooth
lawn, under the leafless limes, through the yew-tree walk to the
orchard, where the grave lay, with the fading wreaths, and little paths
trodden in the grass; by the hazel hedge and the rose-garden, and the
ranked vegetable rows with their dying flower-borders; into the chapel
with its fantasy of ornament, where the lamp burned before the shrine;
through the house, with its silent panelled rooms all so finely ordered,
all prepared for daily use and tranquil delight. It seemed impossible
that he should not be returning soon in joyful haste, as he used to
return, pleased to show his new designs and additions. But I could not
think of him as having any shadow of regret about it all, or as coming
back, a pathetic _revenant_, to the scene of his eager inventiveness.
That was never his way, to brood over what had been done. It was always
the new, the untouched, the untried, that he was in search of. Hugh
never wished that he had done otherwise, nor did he indulge in the
passion of the past, or in the half-sad, half-luxurious retrospect of
the days that are no more. "Ah," I could fancy him saying, "that was all
delightful while it lasted--it was the greatest fun in the world! But
now!"--and I knew as well in my heart and mind as if he had come behind
me and spoken to me, that he was moving rapturously in some new
experience of life and beauty. He loved indeed to speak of old days, to
recall them vividly and ecstatically, as though they were actually
present to him; and I could think of him as even delighting to go over
with me those last hours of his life that we spent together, not with
any shadow of dread or shrinking, but just as it pleased Odysseus to
tell the tale of how he sped down the whirlpool, with death beneath and
death above, facing it all, taking it all in, not cherishing any
delusion of hope, and yet enjoying it as an adventure of real experience
which it was good to have tasted even so.
And when I came to look at some of his letters, and saw the sweet and
generous things which he had said of myself in the old days, his
gratitude for trifling kindnesses and gifts which I had myself
forgotten, I felt a touch of sorrow for a moment that I had not been
even nearer to him than I was, and more in his enlivening company; and I
remembered how, when he arrived to see me, he would come lightly in, say
a word of greeting, and plunge into talk of all that we were doing; and
then I felt that I must not think of him unworthily, as having any
grievance or shadow of concern about my many negligences and coldnesses:
but that we were bound by ties of lasting love and trust, and shared a
treasure of dear memories and kindnesses; and that I might leave his
spirit in its newly found activities, take up my own task in the light
of his vivid example, and look forward to a day when we might be again
together, sharing recollection and purpose alike, as cheerfully and
gladly as we had done in the good days that were gone, with all the
added joy of the new dawn, and with the old understanding made more
perfect.
XVIII
PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS
Hugh was always youthful-looking for his age, light and quick in
movement, intent but never deliberate, passing very rapidly from one
thing to another, impatient of boredom and dullness, always desiring to
do a thing that very minute. He was fair of complexion, with grey-blue
eyes and a shock head of light hair, little brushed, and uncut often too
long. He was careless of appearances, and wore clothes by preference of
great shabbiness. He told me in 1909 that he had only bought one suit in
the last five years. I have seen him, when gardening at Hare Street,
wear a pair of shoes such as might have been picked up in a ditch after
a tramp's encampment. At the same time he took a pleasure of a boyish
kind in robes of state. He liked his Monsignor's purple, his red-edged
cassock and crimson cincture, as a soldier likes his uniform. He was in
no way ascetic; and though he could be and often seemed to be wholly
indifferent to food, yet he was amused by culinary experiments, and
collected simple savoury recipes for household use. He was by far the
quickest eater I have ever seen. He was a great smoker of cheap
cigarettes. They were a natural sedative for his highly strung
temperament. I do not, think he realised how much he smoked, and he
undoubtedly smoked too much for several years.
He was always quick, prompt, and decisive. He had an extraordinary
presence of mind in the face of danger. My sister remembers how he was
once strolling with her, in his cassock, in a lane near Tremans, when a
motor came down the road at a great pace, and Roddy, the collie, trotted
out in front of it, with his back turned to the car, unconscious of
danger. Hugh took a leap, ran up hill, snatched Roddy up just in front
of the wheels, and fell with him against the hedge on the opposite side
of the road.
He liked a degree of comfort, and took great pleasure in having
beautiful things about him. "I do not believe that lovely things should
be stamped upon," he once wrote to a friend who was urging the dangers
of a strong sense of beauty; adding, "should they not rather be led in
chains?" Yet his taste was not at all severe, and he valued things for
their associations and interest as much as he did for their beauty. He
had a great accumulation of curious, pretty, and interesting things at
Hare Street, and took a real pleasure in possession. At the same time he
was not in the least dependent on such things, and could be perfectly
happy in bare and ugly rooms. There was no touch of luxuriousness about
him, and the adornment of his house was one of the games that he played.
One of his latest amusements was to equip and catalogue his library. He
was never very much of a reader, except for a specific purpose. He read
the books that came in his way, but he had no technical knowledge of
English literature. There were many English classics which he never
looked into, and he made no attempt to follow modern developments. But
he read books so quickly that he was acquainted more or less with a wide
range of authors. At the same time he never wasted any time in reading
books which did not interest him, and he knew by a sort of intuition the
kind of books he cared about.
He was of late years one of the liveliest and most refreshing of
talkers. As a boy and a young man he was rather silent than otherwise in
the family circle, but latterly it was just the opposite. He talked
about anything that was in his mind, but at the same time he did not
wish to keep the talk in his own hands, and had an eager and delighted
recognition of his companion's thoughts and ideas.
His sense of humour was unfailing, and when he laughed, he laughed with
the whole of himself, loudly and contagiously, abandoning himself with
tears in his eyes to helpless paroxysms of mirth. There was never the
smallest touch of affectation or priggishness about his attitude, and he
had none of the cautious and uneasy reverence which is apt to overshadow
men of piety. He was intensely amused by the humorous side of the people
and the institutions which he loved. Here are two slight illustrations
which come back to my mind. He told me these two stories in one day at
Tremans. One was that of a well-known Anglican Bishop who attended a
gathering of clergy, and in his valedictory speech said that they would
expect him to make some allusion to the fact that one who had attended
their last meeting was no longer of the Anglican communion, having
joined the Church of Rome. They would all, he said, regret the step
which he had thought fit to take; but they must not forget the serious
fall their poor friend had had from his bicycle not long before, which
had undoubtedly affected gravely his mental powers. Then he told me of
an unsatisfactory novice in a religious house who had been expelled from
the community for serious faults. His own account of it was that the
reason why he was expelled was that he used to fall asleep at
meditation, and snore so loud that he awoke the elder brethren.
Though Hugh held things sacred, he did not hold them inconveniently
sacred, and it did not affect their sacredness if they had also a
humorous side to them. He had no temptation to be easily shocked, and
though he hated all impure suggestiveness, he could be amused by what
may be called broad humour. I always felt him to be totally free from
prudishness, and it seemed to me that he drew the line in exactly the
right place between things that might be funny and unrefined, and things
which were merely coarse and gross. The fact was that he had a perfectly
simple manliness about him, and an infallible tact, which was wholly
unaffected, as to the limits of decorum. The result was that one could
talk to him with the utmost plainness and directness. His was not a
cloistered and secluded temperament. He knew the world, and had no fear
of it or shrinking from it.
He dearly loved an argument, and could be both provoking and incisive.
He was vehement, and hated dogmatic statements with which he did not
agree. When he argued, he used a good deal of gesture, waving his hands
as though to clear the air, emphasising what he said with little sweeps
and openings of his hands, sometimes covering his face and leaning
forwards, as if to gain time for the onset. His arguments were not so
much clear as ingenious, and I never knew anyone who could defend a poor
case so vigorously. When he was strained and tired, he would argue more
tenaciously, and employ fantastic illustrations with great skill; but it
always blew over very quickly, and as a rule he was good-tempered and
reasonable enough. But he liked best a rapid and various interchange of
talk. He was bored by slow-moving and solemn minds, but could extract a
secret joy from pompous utterances, while nothing delighted him more
than a full description of the exact talk and behaviour of affected and
absurd people.
His little stammer was a very characteristic part of his manner. It was
much more marked when he was a boy and a young man, and it varied much
with his bodily health. I believe that it never affected him when
preaching or speaking in public, though he was occasionally nervous
about its doing so. It was not, so to speak, a long and leisurely
stammer, as was the case with my uncle, Henry Sidgwick, the little toss
of whose head as he disengaged a troublesome word, after long dallying
with a difficult consonant, added a touch of _friandise_ to his talk.
Hugh's stammer was rather like a vain attempt to leap over an obstacle,
and showed itself as a simple hesitation rather than as a repetition. He
used, after a slight pause, to bring out a word with a deliberate
emphasis, but it never appeared to suspend the thread of his talk. I
remember an occasion, as a young man, when he took sherry, contrary to
his wont, through some dinner-party; and when asked why he had done
this, he said that it happened to be the only liquid the name of which
he was able to pronounce on that evening. He used to feel humiliated by
it, and I have heard him say, "I'm sorry--I'm stammering badly
to-night!" but it would never have been very noticeable, if he had not
attended to it. It is clear, however, from some of his letters that he
felt it to be a real disability in talk, and even fancied that it made
him absurd, though as a matter of fact the little outward dart of his
head, as he forced the recalcitrant word out, was a gesture which his
friends both knew and loved.
He learned to adapt himself to persons of very various natures, and
indeed was so eager to meet people on their own ground that it seems to
me he was to a certain extent misapprehended. I have seen a good many
things said about him since his death which seem to me to be entire
misinterpretations of him, arising from the simple fact that they were
reflections of his companion's mood mirrored in his own sympathetic
mind. Further, I am sure that what was something very like patient and
courteous boredom in him, when he was confronted with some sentimental
and egotistical character, was interpretated as a sad and remote
unworldliness. Someone writing of him spoke of his abstracted and
far-off mood, with his eyes indwelling in a rapture of hallowed thought.
This seems to me wholly unlike Hugh. He was far more likely to have been
considering how he could get away to something which interested him
more.
Hugh's was really a very fresh and sparkling nature, never insipid,
intent from morning to night on a vital enjoyment of life in all its
aspects. I do not mean that he was always wanting to be amused--it was
very far from that. Amusement was the spring of his social mood; but he
had a passion too for silence and solitude. His devotions were eagerly
and rapturously practised; then he turned to his work. "Writing seems to
me now the only thing worth doing in the world," he says in one of his
letters when he was deep in a book. Then he flung himself into gardening
and handicraft, back again to his writings, or his correspondence, and
again to his prayers.
But it is impossible to select one of his moods, and to say that his
true life lay there. His life lay in all of them. If work was tedious to
him, he comforted himself with the thought that it would soon be done.
He was an excellent man of affairs, never "slothful in business," but
with great practical ability. He made careful bargains for his books,
and looked after his financial interests tenaciously and diligently,
with a definite purpose always in his mind. He lived, I am sure, always
looking forward and anticipating. I do not believe he dwelt at all upon
the past. It was life in which he was interested. As I walked with my
mother about the beautiful garden, after his funeral, I said to her: "It
seems almost too pathetic to be borne that Hugh should just have
completed all this." "Yes," she said, "but I am sure we ought to think
only that it meant to him seven years of very great happiness." That was
perfectly true! If he had been called upon to leave Hare Street to take
up some important work elsewhere, he would certainly not have dwelt on
the pathetic side of it himself. He would have had a pang, as when he
kissed the doorposts of his room at Mirfield on departing. But he would
have gone forward, and he would have thought of it no more. He had a
supreme power of casting things behind him, and he was far too intent on
the present to have indulged in sentimental reveries of what had been.
It is clear to me, from what the doctors said after his death, that if
the pneumonia which supervened upon great exhaustion had been averted,
he would have had to give up much of his work for a long time, and
devote himself to rest and deliberate idleness. I cannot conceive how he
would have borne it. He came once to be my companion for a few days,
when I was suffering from a long period of depression and overwork. I
could do nothing except answer a few letters. I could neither write nor
read, and spent much of my time in the open air, and more in drowsing in
misery over an unread book. Hugh, after observing me for a little,
advised me to work quite deliberately, and to divide up my time among
various occupations. It would have been useless to attempt it, for
Nature was at work recuperating in her own way by an enforced
listlessness and dreariness. But I have often since then thought how
impossible it would have been for him to have endured such a condition.
He had nothing passive about him; and I feel that he had every right to
live his life on his own lines, to neglect warnings, to refuse advice. A
man must find out his own method, and take the risks which it may
involve. And though I would have done and given anything to have kept
him with us, and though his loss is one which I feel daily and
constantly, yet I would not have it otherwise. He put into his life an
energy of activity and enjoyment such as I have rarely seen. He gave his
best lavishly and ungrudgingly. Even the dreadful and tragical things
which he had to face he took with a relish of adventure. He has told me
of situations in which he found himself, from which he only saved
himself by entire coolness and decisiveness, the retrospect of which he
actually enjoyed. "It was truly awful!" he would say, with a shiver of
pleasing horror. But it was all worked into a rich and glowing tapestry,
which he wove with all his might, and the fineness of his life seems to
me to consist in this, that he made his own choices, found out the
channels in which his powers could best move, and let the stream gush
forth. He did not shelter himself fastidiously, or creep away out of the
glare and noise. He took up the staff and scrip of pilgrimage, and,
while he kept his eyes on the Celestial City, he enjoyed every inch of
the way, as well the assaults and shadows and the toils as the houses of
kindly entertainment, with all their curious contents, the talk of
fellow-pilgrims, the arbours of refreshment, until his feet touched the
brink of the river, and even there he went fearlessly forward.
XIX
RETROSPECT
Now that I have traced the progress of Hugh's outer life from step to
step, I will try to indicate what in the region of mind and soul his
progress was, and I would wish to do this with particular care, even it
the risk of repeating myself somewhat, because I believe that his nature
was one that changed in certain ways very much; it widened and deepened
greatly, and most of all in the seven last years of his life, when I
believe that he found himself in the best and truest sense.
As a boy, up to the age of eighteen or nineteen, it was, I believe, a
vivid and unreflective nature, much absorbed in the little pattern of
life as he saw it, neither expansive nor fed upon secret visions. It was
always a decided nature. He never, as a child, needed to be amused; he
never said, "What shall I do? Tell me what to do!" He liked constant
companionship, but he had always got little businesses of his own going
on; he joined in games, and joined keenly in them, but if a public game
was not to his taste, he made no secret that he was bored, and, if he
was released, he went off on his own errands. I do not remember that he
ever joined in a general game because of any sociable impulse merely,
but because it amused him; and if he separated himself and went off, he
had no resentment nor any pathetic feeling about being excluded.
When he went on to school he lived a sociable but isolated life. His
companions were companions rather than friends. He did not, I think,
ever form a romantic and adoring friendship, such as are common enough
with emotional boys. He did not give his heart away; he just took a
vivid and animated interest in the gossip, the interplay, the factions
and parties of his circle; but it was all rather a superficial life--he
used to say that he had neither aims nor ambitions--he took very little
interest in his work and not much interest in games. He just desired to
escape censure, and he was not greedy of praise. There was nothing
listless or dreamy about it all. If he neglected his work, it was
because he found talk and laughter more interesting. No string ran
through his days; they were just to be taken as they came, enjoyed,
dismissed. But he never wanted to appear other than he was, or to be
admired or deferred to. There was never any sense of pose about hint nor
the smallest affectation. He was very indifferent as to what was thought
of him, and not sensitive; but he held his own, and insisted on his
rights, allowed no dictation, followed no lead. All the time, I suppose,
he was gathering in impressions of the outsides of things--he did not
dip beyond that: he was full of quite definite tastes, desires, and
prejudices; and though he was interested in life, he was not
particularly interested in what lay behind it. He was not in the least
impressionable, in the sense that others influenced or diverted him
from his own ideas.
Neither had he any strong intellectual bent. The knowledge which he
needed he acquired quickly and soon forgot it. I do not think he ever
went deeply into things in those early days, or tried to perfect himself
in any sort of knowledge. He was neither generous nor acquisitive; he
was detached, and always rather apt to put his little possessions away
and to forget about them. It was always the present he was concerned
with; he did not deal with the past nor with the future.
Then after what had been not so much a slumber of the spirit as a vivid
living among immediate impressions, the artistic nature began to awake
in him. Music, architecture, ceremony, began to make their appeal felt;
and he then first recognised the beauty of literary style. But even so,
he did not fling himself creatively into any of these things at first,
even as an amateur; it was still the perception of effects that he was
concerned with.
It was then, during his first year at Cambridge, that the first
promptings of a vocation made themselves felt towards the priesthood.
But he was as yet wholly unaware of his powers of expression; and I am
sure that his first leanings to the clerical life were a search for a
quiet and secluded fortress, away from the world, in which he might
pursue an undisturbed and ordered life of solemnity and delicate
impressions of a sacred sort of beauty. His desire for community life
was caused by his decided dislike of the world, of fuss and tedium and
conventional occupations. He was never in the least degree a typical
person. He had no wish to be distinguished, or to influence other minds
or lives, or to gain honour or consideration. These things simply
appeared to him as not worth striving for. What he desired was
companionship of a sympathetic kind and the opportunity of living among
the pursuits he liked best. He never wished to try experiments, and it
was always with a spectacular interest that he regarded the world.
His call was very real, and deeply felt, and he waited for a whole year
to make sure of it; but he found full decision at last.
Then came his first ministerial work at the Eton Mission; and this did
not satisfy him; his strength emerged in the fact that he did not adopt
or defer to the ideals he found about him: a weaker character would have
embraced them half-heartedly, tried to smother its own convictions, and
might have ended by habituating itself to a system. But Hugh was still,
half unconsciously, perhaps, in search of his real life; he did not
profess to be guided by anyone, nor did he ever suspend his own judgment
as to the worth of what he was doing; a manly and robust philanthropy on
Christian lines was not to his taste. His instinct was rather for the
beautiful element in religion and in life, and for a mystical
consecration of all to God. That did not seem to him to be recognised in
the work which he was doing. If he had been less independent, he might
have crushed it down, and come to view it as a private fancy. He might
have said to himself that it was plain that many human spirits did not
feel that more delicate appeal, and that his duty was to meet other
natures on some common ground.
It is by such sacrifices of personal bias that much of the original
force of the world is spoiled and wasted. It may be a noble sacrifice,
and it is often nobly made. But Hugh was not cast in that mould. His
effectiveness was to lie in the fact that he could disregard many
ordinary motives. He could frankly admire other methods of work, and yet
be quite sure that his own powers did not lie in that direction. But
though he was modest and not at all self-assertive, he never had the
least submissiveness nor subservience; nor was he capable of making any
pretences.
Sometimes it seems to happen that men are punished for wilfulness of
choice by missing great opportunities. A nature which cannot compromise
anything, cannot ignore details, cannot work with others, is sometimes
condemned to a fruitless isolation. But it would be wrong to disregard
the fact that circumstances more than once came to Hugh's aid; I see
very clearly how he was, so to speak, headed off, as by some Fatherly
purpose, from wasting his life in ineffectual ways. Probably he might
have worked on at the Eton Mission, might have lost heart and vigour,
might never have discovered his real powers, if he had not been rescued.
His illness at this juncture cut the knot for him; and then followed a
time of travel in Egypt, in the Holy Land, which revived again his sense
of beauty and width and proportion.
And then followed his Kemsing curacy; I have a letter written to me from
Kemsing in his first weeks there, in which he describes it as a paradise
and says that, so far as he can see, it is exactly the life he most
desires, and that he hopes to spend the rest of his days there.
But now I feel that he took a very real step forward. The danger was
that he would adopt a dilettante life. He had still not discovered his
powers of expression, which developed late. He was only just beginning
to preach with effect, and his literary power was practically
undeveloped. He might have chosen to live a harmless, quiet,
beauty-loving life, kindly and guileless, in a sort of religious
æstheticism; though the vivid desire for movement and even excitement
that characterised his later life would perhaps have in any case
developed.
But something stronger and sterner awoke in him. I believe that it was
exactly because the cup, mixed to his taste, was handed to him that he
was able to see that there was nothing that was invigorating about the
potion. It was not the community life primarily which drew him to
Mirfield; it was partly that his power of speech awoke, and more
strongly still the idea of self-discipline.
And so he went to Mirfield, and then all his powers came with a rush in
that studious, sympathetic, and ascetic atmosphere. He was in his
twenty-eighth year. He began by finding that he could preach with real
force and power, and two years later, when he wrote _The Light
Invisible_, he also discovered his gift of writing; while as a little
recreation, he took up drawing, and produced a series of sketches, full
of humour and delicacy, drawn with a fine pen and tinted with coloured
chalk, which are at all events enough to show what he could have done in
this direction.
XX
ATTAINMENT
And then Hugh made the great change of his life, and, as a Catholic,
found his dreams realized and his hopes fulfilled. He found, indeed, the
life which moves and breathes inside of every faithful creed, the power
which supplements weakness and represses distraction, the motive for
glad sacrifice and happy obedience. I can say this thankfully enough,
though in many ways I confess to being at the opposite pole of religious
thought. He found relief from decision and rest from conflict. He found
sympathy and confidence, a sense of corporate union, and above all a
mystical and symbolical devotion embodied in a great and ancient
tradition, which was visibly and audibly there with a movement like a
great tide, instead of a scheme of worship which had, he thought, in
the Anglican Church, to be eclectically constructed by a group or a
circle. Every part of his nature was fed and satisfied; and then, too,
he found in the Roman Catholic community in England that sort of eager
freemasonry which comes of the desire to champion a cause that has won a
place for itself, and influence and respect, but which is yet so much
opposed to national tendencies as to quicken the sense of active
endeavour and eager expectation.
After his quiet period of study and thought in Rome and at Llandaff
House, came the time when he was attached to the Roman Catholic Church
in Cambridge; and this, though not congenial to him, gave him an insight
into methods and conditions; and all the while his own forces and
qualities were learning how to concentrate and express themselves. He
learned to write, he learned to teach, to preach, to speak, to be his
own natural self, with all his delicate and ingenuous charm, in the
presence of a great audience; so that when at last his opportunity came
to free himself from official and formal work, he was able to throw all
his trained faculties into the work which he had at heart. Moreover, he
found in direction and confession, and in careful discussion with
inquirers, and in sympathetic aid given to those in trouble, many of the
secret sorrows, hopes, and emotions of the human heart, so that his
public work was enforced and sustained by his ever-increasing range of
private experience.
He never, however, took whole-heartedly to pastoral work. He said
frankly that he "specialised" in the region of private direction and
advice; but I doubt if he ever did quite enough general pastoral work of
a commonplace and humdrum kind to supplement and fill out his experience
of human nature. He never knew people under quite normal conditions,
because he felt no interest in normal conditions. He knew men and women
best under the more abnormal emotion of the confessional; and though he
used to maintain, if challenged, that penitence was a normal condition,
yet his judgment of human beings was, as a consequence, several times
gravely at fault. He made some unwise friendships, with a guileless
curiosity, and was obliged, more than once, to extricate himself by
summary abandonments.
He wrote of himself once, "I am tired to death of giving myself away,
and finding out too late.... I don't like my tendency to agree with
people wildly; my continual fault has been to put on too much fuel."
Like all sensitive people, who desire sympathetic and friendly
relations, he was apt to discover the best of new acquaintances at once,
and to evoke in them a similarly genial response. It was not till later,
when the first conciliatory impulse had died down, that he discovered
the faults that had been instinctively concealed, and indeed repressed
by his own personal attractiveness.
He had, too, an excessive confidence in his power of managing a critical
situation, and several times undertook to reform people in whom
corruption had gone too far for remedy. He believed in his power of
"breaking" sinners by stern declarations; but he had more than once to
confess himself beaten, though he never wasted time in deploring
failures.
Mr. Meynell, in his subtle essay which prefaces my brother's little book
of poems, speaks of the complete subjugation of his will. If I may
venture to express a different view, I do not feel that Hugh ever
learned to efface his own will. I do not think his temperament, was made
on the lines of self-conquest. I should rather say that he had found the
exact _milieu_ in which he could use his will to the best effect, so
that it was like the charge of powder within the gun, no longer
exploding itself vaguely and aimlessly, but all concentrated upon one
intense and emissive effort. Because the one characteristic of the last
years of his life was his immense enjoyment of it all. He wrote to a
friend not long before the end, when he was feeling the strain upon him
to be heavier than he could bear; after a word or two about the war--he
had volunteered to go to the front as a chaplain--he said, "So I am
staying here as usual; but the incessant demands on my time try me as
much as shrapnel and bullets." That sentence seems to me to confirm my
view that he had not so much sacrificed as devoted himself. He never
gained a serene patience; I have heard him over and over again speak
with a sigh of his correspondence and the demands it made on him; yet he
was always faithful to a relation once formed; and the number of letters
written to single correspondents, which have been sent me, have fairly
amazed me by their range, their freshness, and their fulness. He was
deeply interested in many of the letters he received, and gave his best
in his prompt replies; but he evidently also received an immense number
of letters from people who did not desire guidance so much as sympathy
and communication. The inconsiderate egotism of unimaginative and yet
sensitive people is what creates the burden of such a correspondence;
and though he answered his letters faithfully and duly, and contrived
to say much in short space, yet he felt, as I have heard him say, that
people were merciless; and much of the time he might have devoted to
creative work, or even to recreation, was consumed in fruitless toil of
hand and mind. And yet I am sure that he valued the sense that he could
be useful and serviceable, and that there were many who depended upon
him for advice and consolation. I believe that his widespread relations
with so many desirous people gave him a real sense of the fulness and
richness of life; and its relations. But for all that, I also believe
that his courtesy and his sense of duty were even more potent in these
relations than the need of personal affection. I do not mean that there
was any hardness or coldness about him; but he valued sympathy and
tranquil friendship more than he pursued intimacy and passionate
devotion. Yet in the last year or two of his life, I was both struck and
touched by his evident desire to knit up friendships which had been
severed, and to renew intercourse which had been suspended by his change
of belief. Whether he had any feeling that his life was precarious, or
his own time short, I do not know. He never said as much to me. He had,
of course, used hard words of the Church which he had left, and had said
things which were not wholly impersonal. But, combative though he was,
he had no touch of rancour or malice in his nature, and he visibly
rejoiced in any sign of goodwill.
Yet even so, he was essentially solitary in mind. "When I am alone," he
once wrote, "I am at my best; and at my worst in company. I am happy and
capable in loneliness; unhappy, distracted, and ineffective in company."
And again he wrote, "I am becoming more and more afraid of meeting
people I want to meet, because my numerous deficiencies are so very
apparent. For example, I stammer slightly always and badly at times."
This was, I believe, more an instinctive shrinking from the expenditure
of nervous force than anything else, and arose from the feeling that, if
he had to meet strangers, some brilliancy of contribution would be
expected of him. I remember how he delighted in the story of Marie
Bashkirtseff, who, when she was summoned to meet a party of strangers
who desired to see her, prayed as she entered the room, "Oh God, make me
worth seeing!" Hugh disliked the possibility of disappointing
expectations, and thus found the society of unfamiliar people a strain;
but in family life, and with people whom he knew well, he was always the
most delightful and charming of companions, quick, ready, and untiring
in talk. And therefore I imagine that, like all artistic people, he
found that the pursuit of some chosen train of thought was less of a
conscious effort to him than the necessity of adapting himself, swiftly
and dexterously, to new people, whose mental and spiritual atmosphere he
was obliged to observe and infer. It was all really a sign of the high
pressure at which he lived, and of the price he paid for his vividness
and animation.
Another source of happiness to him in these last days was his sense of
power. This was a part of his artistic nature; and I believe that he
enjoyed to the full the feeling of being able to give people what they
wanted, to enchant, interest, move, and sway them. This is to some
natures a great temptation, because they come to desire applause, and to
hunger for tangible signs of their influence. But Hugh was marvellously
saved from this, partly by a real modesty which was not only never
marred, but which I used to think increased with the years. There is a
story of William Morris, that he could read aloud his own poetry, and at
the end of a fine stanza would say: "That's jolly!" with an entire
freedom from conceit, just as dispassionately as he could praise the
work of another. I used to feel that when Hugh mentioned, as I have
heard him do, some course of sermons that he was giving, and described
the queue which formed in the street, and the aisles and gangways
crowded with people standing to hear him, that he did so more
impersonally than anyone I had ever heard, as though it were a
delightful adventure, and more a piece of good luck than a testimony to
his own powers.
[Illustration: ROBERT HUGH BENSON
IN 1912. AGED 40]
It was the same with his books; he wished them to succeed and enjoyed
their success, while it was an infinite delight to him to write them.
But he had no egotism of a commonplace sort about him, and he never
consciously tried to succeed. Success was just the reverberating echo of
his own delight.
And thus I do not look upon him as one who had bent and curbed his
nature by stern self-discipline to do work of a heavy and distasteful
kind; nor do I think that his dangerous devotion to work was the fierce
effort of a man who would have wished to rest, yet felt that the time
was too short for all that he desired to do. I think it was rather the
far more fruitful energy of one who exulted in expressing himself, in
giving a brilliant and attractive shape to his ideas, and who loved,
too, the varieties and tendencies of human nature, enjoyed moulding and
directing them, and flung himself with an intense joy of creation into
all the work which he found ready to his hand.
XXI
TEMPERAMENT
Hugh never seemed to me to treat life in the spirit of a mystic or a
dreamer, with unshared and secret experiences, withdrawing into his own
ecstasy, half afraid of life, rapt away into interior visions. Though he
had a deep curiosity about mystical experiences, he was never a mystic
in the sense that he had, as great mystics seem to have had, one shell
less, so to speak, between him and the unseen. He lived in the visible
and tangible world, loving beautiful secrets; and he was a mystic only
in the sense that he had an hourly and daily sense of the presence of
God. He wished to share his dreams and to make known his visions, to
declare the glory of God and to show His handiwork. He found the world
more and more interesting, as he came to know it, and in the light of
the warm welcome it gave him. He had a keen and delicate apprehension of
spiritual beauty, and the Mass became to him a consummation of all that
he held most holy and dear. He had recognised a mystical presence in the
Church of England, but he found a supernatural presence in the Church of
Rome; yet he had, too, the instinct of the poet, to translate into form
and substance his inmost and sweetest joy, and to lavish it upon others.
No one dares to speak of great poets and seers as men who have profaned
a mystery by making it known. The deeper that the poet's sense of beauty
is, the more does he thirst to communicate it. It is far too divine and
tremendous to be secretly and selfishly enjoyed.
It is possible, of course, that Hugh may have given to those who did not
see him constantly in everyday familiar intercourse, the sense of a
courteous patience and a desire to do full justice to a claim. Still
more may he have given this impression on social occasions and at
conventional gatherings. Interviews and so-called festivities were apt
to be a weariness to him, because they seemed so great an expenditure of
time and force for very scanty results; but I always felt him to be one
of the most naturally courteous people I have ever seen. He hated to be
abrupt, to repel, to hurt, to wound feelings, to disappoint; yet on such
occasions his natural courtesy was struggling with a sense of the waste
of time involved and the interruptions caused. I remember his writing to
me from the Catholic rectory when he was trying to finish a book and to
prepare for a course of sermons, and lamenting that he was "driven
almost mad" by ceaseless interviews with people who did not, he
declared, want criticism or advice, but simply the luxury of telling a
long story for the sake of possible adulation. "I am quite ready to see
people," he added, "if only they would ask me to appoint a time, instead
of simply flinging themselves upon me whenever it happens to be
convenient to them."
I do not think he ever grudged the time to people in difficulties when
he felt he could really help and save. That seemed to him an opportunity
of using all his powers; and when he took a soul in hand, he could
display a certain sternness, and even ruthlessness, in dealing with it.
"You need not consult me at all, but if you do you must carry out
exactly what I tell you," he could say; but he did grudge time and
attention given to mild sentimentalists, who were not making any way,
but simply dallying with tragic emotions excitedly and vainly.
This courtesy was part of a larger quality, a certain knightly and
chivalrous sense, which is best summed up in the old word "gentleman." A
priest told me that soon after Hugh's death he had to rebuke a tipsy
Irishman, who was an ardent Catholic and greatly devoted to Hugh. The
priest said, "Are you not ashamed to think that Monsignor's eye may be
on you now, and that he may see how you disgrace yourself?" To which,
he said, the Irishman replied, with perhaps a keener insight into Hugh's
character than his director, "Oh no, I can trust Monsignor not to take
advantage of me. I am sure that he will not come prying and spying
about. He always believed whatever I chose to tell him, God bless him!"
Hugh could be hard and unyielding on occasions, but he was wholly
incapable of being suspicious, jealous, malicious, or spiteful. He made
friends once with a man of morbid, irritable, and resentful tendencies,
who had continued, all his life, to make friends by his brilliance and
to lose them by his sharp, fierce, and contemptuous animosities. This
man eventually broke with him altogether, and did his best by a series
of ingenious and wicked letters to damage Hugh's character in all
directions. I received one of those documents and showed it to Hugh. I
was astonished at his courage and even indifference. I myself should
have been anxious and despondent at the thought of such evil innuendoes
and gross misrepresentations being circulated, and still more at the
sort of malignant hatred from which they proceeded. Hugh took the letter
and smiled. "Oh," he said, "I have put my case before the people who
matter, and you can't do anything. He is certainly mad, or on the verge
of madness. Don't answer it--you will only be drenched with these
communications. I don't trouble my head about it." "But don't you mind?"
I said. "No," he said, "I'm quite callous! Of course I am sorry that he
should be such a beast, but I can't help that. I have done my best to
make it up--but it is hopeless." And it was clear from the way he
changed the subject that he had banished the whole matter from his mind.
At a later date, when the letters to him grew more abusive, I was told
by one who was living with him, that he would even put one up on his
chimney-piece and point it out to visitors.
I always thought that he had a very conspicuous and high sort of
courage, not only in facing disagreeable and painful things, but in not
dwelling on them either before or after. This was never more entirely
exemplified than by the way he faced his operation, and indeed, most
heroically of all, in the way in which he died. There was a sense of
great adventure--there is no other word for it--about that, as of a man
going on a fateful voyage; a courage so great that he did not even lose
his interest in the last experiences of life. His demeanour was not
subdued or submissive; he did not seem to be asking for strength to bear
or courage to face the last change. He was more like the happy warrior
"Attired
With sudden brightness, as a man inspired."
[Illustration: ROBERT HUGH BENSON
IN 1912. AGED 41]
He did not lose control of himself, nor was he carried helplessly down
the stream. He was rather engaged in a conflict which was not a losing
one. He had often thought of death, and even thought that he feared it;
but now that it was upon him he would taste it fully, he would see what
it was like. The day before, when he thought that he might live, there
was a pre-occupation over him, as though he were revolving the things he
desired to do; but when death came upon him unmistakably there was no
touch of self-pity or impressiveness. He had just to die, and he devoted
his swift energies to it, as he had done to living. I never saw him so
splendid and noble as he was at that last awful moment. Life did not ebb
away, but he seemed to fling it from him, so that it was not as the
death of a weary man sinking to rest, but like the eager transit of a
soldier to another part of the field.
"Could it have been avoided?" I said to the kind and gentle doctor who
saw Hugh through the last days of his life, and loved him very tenderly
and faithfully. "Well, in one sense, 'yes,'" he replied. "If he had
worked less, rested more, taken things more easily, he might have lived
longer. He had a great vitality; but most people die of being
themselves; and we must all live as we are made to live. It was
Monsignor's way to put the work of a month into a week; he could not do
otherwise--I cannot think of Monsignor as sitting with folded hands."
INDEX
Barnes, Monsignor, 154
Bashkirtseff, Marie, quoted, 249
Bec, Bishop Anthony, 18
Belloc, Mr., 183
Benson, Archbishop (father), 15-17, 20, 46-47, 56, 63, 82, 86, 91, 116;
characteristics, 34-39;
letters quoted, 53-55, 71-74;
ordains his son, 87;
death, 97
---- Mrs. (mother), 19, 28, 74-80, 108, 120, 128, 146, 149-150, 182, 209;
quoted, 31-32, 118-119, 227;
visit to Egypt, 98
---- Fred (brother), 16, 26-27, 34, 68, 80, 184, 209
---- Maggie (sister), 16, 28, 40, 98, 120, 126, 184, 196, 217
---- Martin (brother), 16, 57;
death, 35
---- Nelly (sister), 16, 27, 40;
death, 79-80
Beth (nurse), 20-24, 39, 106;
letter quoted, 23
Bradley, Dr., 200, 201;
quoted, 260-261
_By What Authority_, 114
Carlyle, Thomas, quoted, 147
Carter, Archbishop William, 91
_Confessions of a Convert, The_, 47, 114, 130, 140
_Conventionalists, The_, 186
Cornish, Mr., 42
_Coward, The_, 181
Decemviri _Club_, 156
Donaldson, Archbishop St. Clair, 91, 95
Edward VII; King, 114
Elizabeth, Queen, 179
Eton, influence of, 48-51
---- Mission, 89 seq., 99, 134-136, 236, 238
George V, H. M. King, 98
Gladstone, W. E., 98
---- Mrs., 98
Gore, Bishop, 103, 108-109, 130
Gorman, Father, 194
Halifax, Lord, 128
Hare Street, 168 seq., 189, 193, 210, 227;
village, 12
_Hill of Trouble, The_, 177
Hogg, Sir James McGarel (afterwards Lord Magheramorne), 32
Hormead Mission, 168
Hornby, Provost, 149
House of the Resurrection. _See_ under Mirfield Community
Job, quoted, 49
John Inglesant, 75, 85
Johnson, Dr., quoted, 150, 175
Jowett, B., 150
Kenmare, Lord, 172
Leith, Dr., 67
_Light Invisible, The_, 106, 177, 187, 240
Lindsay, Ken, 168-169
Lyttelton, Edward, 44
Maclagan, Archbishop, 103
Marshall (family), 190
Martin, Sir George, 58
Mason, Canon Arthur, 34, 80, 88
Maturin, Father, 96, 100
Meynell, Mr., 245
Mirfield Community, 103-104, 130, 137, 227, 239
Morris, William, 250
Murray, Prof., 199
Norway, King of, 98
Parsons, Rev. Mr., 16
Peel, Sidney, 50
Penny, Mr., 19
Persia, Shah of, 55
Pippet, Gabriel, 13, 168
Pitt Club, 156
Potter, Norman, 171
Reeman, Joseph, 14, 193
Reeve, Rev. John, 34, 128
_Richard Raynal, Solitary_, 178, 181, 185, 187
Ritual, 60-63
Roddy, _collie_, 126-128, 217
St. Hugh, 17
---- Monastery of, 129
Salford Cathedral, 209
Scott, Canon, 161
Selborne, Lord, quoted, 54
Sessions, Dr., 168
Sharrock, Canon, 173, 196, 199, 205, 207
Sidgwick, Arthur, 20
---- Henry (uncle), 20, 71, 73, 223
---- Mrs. (grandmother), 20
---- Nora (Mrs. Henry Sidgwick) (aunt), 73, 121
---- William (uncle), 20
Skarratt, Rev. Mr., 101
Spiers, Mr., 54-55
Stanmore, Lord, 95
Stevenson, R. L., 121
_Streets and Lanes of the City_, 79
Tait, Miss Lucy, 120
Temple, Archbishop, 103
Tennyson's "Mort d'Arthur," 179
Todd, Dr., Ross, 193
Tyrell, Father, 144
Vaughn, Dean, 81-84
Vaughn, Mrs., 83-85
Victoria, Queen, 114, 153
Wales, Prince and Princess of, 54
Walpole, Bishop G. H. S., 34
Warre, Dr., 46
Watson, Bishop, 154
Watt, Father, 168
Wellington College, 15, 19, 20
Westcott, Bishop, 86
Westminster, Cardinal Archbishop of, 209
Whitaker, Canon G. H., 34
Wilkinson, Bishop, 48, 128, 150
Woodchester Dominican Convent, 146
Wordsworth, Bishop John, 128
Wren, Mr., 52
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