Unfortunately, it is not everybody who will put into writing, with the simple manliness of Mr. Bunting, the very high opinion of me which they must inevitably have formed. Even George Leghorn has proved a disappointment. But in his case I am inclined to think there was a misunderstanding.
I asked him to send his opinion of me as I thought of making a book. He replied on a postcard: "Don"t approve of women in the profession, and you"d better cut it out. It"s hard enough for a man bookmaker to sc.r.a.pe a living, with everybody expecting the absurd prices quoted in the press."
Many of the contemporary testimonials that I have received are so cautiously framed and so wanting in warmth that I decline to make any use of them. I have always hated cowardice. I have the courage of my opinions. Why cannot others have the same.
However, I have through my sister Chlorine succeeded in securing the opinions of some of the greatest in another century. I can only say that they confirm my belief in her powers as a medium, and in her wonderful system of wireless telephony.
The first person that I asked her to ring up was Napoleon. She had some difficulty in getting through. He spoke as follows:
"Yes, I am Napoleon. Oh, that"s you, Chlorine, is it?... Quite well, thank you, but find the heat rather oppressive.... You want my opinion of your sister Marge? She is wonderful--wonderful! Tell her from me that if I had but married her when I was a young man, I am confident that Wellington would have met his Waterloo."
I think he would have liked to say more, but unfortunately the receiver fused. I think it showed such nice feeling in him that he spoke English.
Poor Chlorine knows no French.
After the apparatus had been repaired, Chlorine got into communication with Sir Joshua Reynolds. She said that his voice had a fruity ceremoniousness, and I wish I could have heard it. But I have not Chlorine"s gift of mediumship. Sir Joshua said:
"The more I see of your sister Marge, the more I regret the time that I spent on Mrs. Siddons, who was also theatrical; my compliment that I should go down to posterity on the hem of her garment was not ill-turned, but she is more likely to go down to posterity as the subject of my art. Why, even Romney would have been good enough for her.
Could I but have painted Marge, my fame had been indeed immortal. Who"s President?... Well, you surprise me."
To prevent any possibility of incredulity, I may add that I wrote those words down at the time, added the date and address, and signed them; so there can be no mistake.
But far more interesting is the important and exclusive communication which Chlorine next received. It was only after much persuasion that I got her to ring him up; she said it was contrary to etiquette. However, she at last put through a call to Sir Herbert Taylor, who kindly arranged the matter for us.
He--not Sir Herbert--showed the greatest readiness to converse. Chlorine says that he spoke in a quick staccato. He was certainly voluble, and this is what he said:
"What, what, what? Want my opinion of marriage, do you, Miss Forget-your-name? I had a long experience of it. Estimable woman, Charlotte, very estimable, and made a good mother, though she showed partiality. If I"d had my own way though--between ourselves, what, what?--I should have preferred Sarah. More lively, more entertaining.
Holland would have been pleased. But it couldn"t be done. Monarchs are the servants of ministers now. Never admitted that doctrine myself.
Kicked against it all my life. Ah, if North had been the strong man I was! But as to marriage....
"What, what? You said "Marge"--not "marriage"--your sister Marge? You should speak more clearly. Get nearer the receiver--age plays havoc with the hearing. Fine woman, Marge, and you can tell her I said so. Great spirit. Plenty of courage. Always admired courage. If I were a young man and back on earth again, I might do worse, what, what?"
And then I am sorry to say he changed the subject abruptly. He went on:
"What"s this about King Edward potatoes? Stuff and nonsense! I knew all about potatoes. Grew them at Windsor. Kew too. Wrote an article about them. Why can"t they name a potato after me? What?"
Here Chlorine interposed: "Do you wish for another three minutes, sir, or have you finished?"
I hoped he would say, "Don"t cut us off," but, possibly from habits of economy, he did not. I have not given his name, for fear of being thought indiscreet, but possibly those who are deeply read in history may guess it.
It is the greatest tribute but one that I have ever received, and I think brings me very nearly up to the level of my Great Example. If I could only feel that for once I had done that, I could fold my little hands and be content.
But it is not quite the greatest tribute of all. The greatest is my own self-estimate of me myself. It demands and shall receive a chapter all to itself. Wipe your feet, take off your hat, a.s.sume a Sunday expression, and enter upon it reverently.
After all, the gift of seeing ourselves as others see us is not to be desired. In your case for certain it would cause you the most intense depression. Even in my own case I doubt if it would give me the same warm, pervading glow of satisfaction that obtain from a more Narcissan procedure.
By the way, ought one to say "self-estimate" or "self-esteem"? What a silly girl I am! I quite forgot.
SEVENTH EXTRACT
SELF-ESTIMATE
More trouble. Determined to give an estimate of myself based on the best models, I turned to the pages of my Great Example, and ran into the following sentence:
"I do not propose to treat myself like Mr. Bernard Shaw in this account."
Does this mean that she does not propose to treat herself as if she were Mr. Bernard Shaw? It might. Does it mean that she does not propose to treat herself as Mr. Bernard Shaw treats her? It is not impossible.
What one wants it to mean is: "I do not propose to treat myself as Mr.
Bernard Shaw treats himself." But if she had meant that, she would have said it.
I backed away cautiously, and, a few lines further on, fell over her statement that she has a conception of beauty "not merely in poetry, music, art and nature, but in human beings." No doubt. And I have a conception of slovenly writing not merely in her autobiography, but in its seventeenth chapter.
I had not gone very much further in that same chapter before I was caught in the following thicket:
"I have got china, books, whips, knives, matchboxes, and clocks given me since I was a small child."
If these things were given her since she was a small child, they might have been given her on the day she wrote--in which case it would not have been remarkable that she still possessed them. The nearest way out of the jungle would be to subst.i.tute "when" for "since." But it is incredible that she should have thought of two ways of saying the same thing, let them run into one another, and sent "The Sunday Times" the mess resulting from the collision.
She must be right. Mr. Balfour said she was the best letter-writer he knew. With generous reciprocity she read Mr. Balfour"s books and realized without external help "what a beautiful style he wrote."
And for goodness sake don"t ask me how you write a style. You do it in precisely the same way that you cook a saucepan--that is, by the omission of the word "in."
Yet one more quotation from the last column of the last extract:
"If I had to confess and expose one opinion of myself which might differentiate me a little from other people, I should say it was my power of love coupled with my power of criticism."
No, never mind. The power of love is not an opinion; and in ending a sentence it is just as well to remember how you began it. But I absolutely refuse to let my simple faith be shaken. She records the bones that she has broken, but John Addington Symonds told her that she retained "_l"oreille juste_." Her husband said she wrote well, and he must know. Besides, am I to be convinced in my penultimate chapter that anything can be wrong with the model I have followed? Certainly not. It would be heartbreaking.
Besides, the explanation is quite simple. When she wrote that last instalment in "The Sunday Times," the power of criticism had gone to have the valves ground in.
I will now ask your kind attention for my estimate of me, Marge Askinforit, by myself.
There is just one quality which I claim to have in an even greater degree than my prototype. She is unlike real life--no woman was ever like what any woman supposes herself to be--but I am far more unlike real life. I have more inconsistency, more self-contradiction, more anachronism, more impossibility. In fact, I sometimes feel as if some fool of a man were just making me up as he went along.
And the next article? Yes, my imagination.
I have imagination of a certain kind. It has nothing to do with invention or fancy. It is not a mental faculty at all. It is not physical. Neither is it paralysis, b.u.t.terscotch, or three spades re-doubled. I should so much like to give some idea of it if I had any. Perhaps an instance will help.
I remember that I once said to the Dean of Belial that I thought the naming of a Highland hotel "The Light Brigade" showed a high degree of imagination.
"Half a moment," said the Dean. "I think I know that one. No--can"t get it. Why was the hotel called that?"
"Because of its terrific charges."