Often I thought his ideas ridiculous: once or twice I thought that he himself must be mad; but even then I admired his splendid enthusiasm and his engaging frankness. Occasionally I said to him, "If you were ever to get your way, you would make the Press a wonderful thing, no doubt; but you would make the Pressman the best-hated creature in the Universe." At this he would burst into a roar of laughter, in which I was constrained to join. "I see, you think I"m crazy," he said once. "Well, not crazy, perhaps, but distinctly eccentric. You will come all right, however, when you have had a little experience." Thus, in my blind belief in my own superior experience and wisdom, I thought and spoke. Many a time since then I have recalled that long night"s talk when I have recognised in some daring development of modern journalism one of the many schemes which Stead then flashed before my eyes. We had talked--or, rather, he had talked--for hours after getting home from work. I was far from being weary of his conversation, but I knew that the night had pa.s.sed, and I rose and drew aside the curtains. Never shall I forget the look of amazement that overspread Stead"s face when the sunshine streamed into the room. "Why, it is daylight!" he exclaimed, with an air of bewilderment. "I never sat up till daylight in my life before."
This was my first knowledge of one of the most remarkable and brilliant journalists of my time. We parted with, I think, mutual feelings of regard and goodwill, feelings which I, at least, have never lost. I recognised my visitor from the first as a man of remarkable gifts, of something that came near to genius. I recognised, too, his honesty and sincerity, though I had, even then, forebodings as to what might be the consequences of his impetuous ardour and reckless defiance of old customs and conventions.
After this, I heard a good deal from Stead during his remarkable editorship of the _Northern Echo_, nor was I long in discovering that he was really determined to put what I regarded as his wild theories of journalism into practice. Of course, it took time to enable him to make his personality felt in the little paper he edited, but he took care to keep me acquainted with all that he was doing. Whenever an article of special interest appeared in the _Echo_ I received a copy of it, marked with a blue pencil by Stead. At the end of twelve months from his first engagement as editor, he wrote to me asking if I would give him my opinion in writing of his work during the year, and the capacity he had shown as a journalist. With great willingness I wrote to express my high opinion, not only of his ability, but of his growing apt.i.tude as an editor. Back in a few days came a reply from this extraordinary man. It was to tell me that he had shown my letter to the proprietor of the _Northern Echo_, Mr. Bell, and on the strength of it had succeeded in obtaining an increase of salary, an increase which I am sure was fully deserved. For two years, if I remember aright, he went through this formality. I am confident that Mr. Stead himself, if he should read these lines, will not make any objection to my revelation of these little episodes in his early career. I have told them because, whilst they are so thoroughly characteristic of the man, they are not in any way derogatory to his reputation.
By-and-by, however, a change took place in our relationship. Stead was rapidly working his way to the front, and some of the means which he employed did not commend themselves to my judgment. For example, he was in the habit of sending marked copies of any article he wrote on political questions to the statesmen or other public men to whom he had chanced to refer. I had always been very sensitive myself as to this practice, regarding it as an attempt to force oneself upon the notice of public men in a way that was not consistent with an editor"s independence, to say nothing of his dignity.
I may have been wrong in my view. Certainly I have known other journalists besides Stead who adopted his practice, and I have no right to sit in judgment upon any of them. But my personal view was that an editor ought to say honestly what he thought for the benefit of the readers of his journal, and that he ought neither to obtrude his own individuality upon those readers, nor to seek to come into close contact with the men whose actions it was his duty to criticise. Long before this period in my life I had laid down a rule for myself which I have consistently observed ever since. This was that I would never seek an introduction to any public man, or bring under his personal notice anything that I had written. Stead took another course, and though I could no longer regard him as a _protege_ of my own, I did not like it, and I daresay I did not conceal my feelings from him. But he could well afford to treat my disapproval with contempt, for his policy answered even beyond his own expectation. The fact that his paper was a very small one, published in a small town, gave, I have no doubt, additional zest to his very acute and intelligent criticisms of public affairs. Mr. Bright, if I remember rightly, was the first public man of eminence who drew attention to the articles in the _Northern Echo_, and he very soon afterwards received a visit from the enterprising editor. Then Stead, carrying still further his theory of a journalist"s duties, sought interviews with others among the foremost men of the time.
Carlyle was one of those who succ.u.mbed to his fascinations, and when Carlyle one day referred to him in conversation as "that good man Stead,"
the fact quickly became known to the public. Mr. Forster was another of Stead"s earlier heroes and friends, and by-and-by the young editor at Darlington became known to a considerable circle of prominent persons.
Thus was the New Journalism born. To me, as an Old Journalist, it is not a thing with which I can pretend to have much sympathy, but I must acknowledge its brightness, its alertness, its close grip of actualities, and its rapid and remarkable success. I need hardly say that it was no longer necessary for the editor of the _Northern Echo_, the friend of many of the distinguished personages of the day, to seek my testimony as to his value to his employer. He quickly became recognised for what he was--a journalist of exceptional capacity and of great originality and daring.
Differences upon political questions drove us further apart, however, than any question of the ethics of editorial conduct. The Eastern Question, of which I have already spoken, excited Stead greatly, and he distinguished himself not so much by the vehemence of his attacks upon the unspeakable Turk, as by his uncompromising championship of Russia and her policy in South-Eastern Europe. It was not a popular line to take, but Stead followed it with something like enthusiasm. It was at this time that he fell under the influence of Madame Novikoff, who, whether accredited or unaccredited, was generally regarded as the unofficial representative of Russia in this country. She was, and is, a lady of great talent and plausibility, and she undoubtedly exercised at one time an extraordinary amount of influence over many distinguished British politicians. I am not prepared to say that Stead took his inspiration upon Russian politics solely from Madame Novikoff; but at any rate he never wrote anything in the _Northern Echo_ in those days of which that lady could not heartily approve, and thus he made another powerful and enthusiastic friend in the political society of our time.
Years afterwards, somewhere in the "nineties, I happened to sit beside Madame Novikoff at a luncheon party in Mayfair. "I believe you know my great friend, Stead?" she said, by way of opening our conversation at the table. I told her I had known him for many years. "And what do you think of him?" she asked, with an air of innocent curiosity that sat well upon her guileless countenance. "Is he not wonderful? I think him, for my part, one of the greatest men alive. What do you think?" I replied, in a more restrained spirit, that I thought him extremely able, and that he had certainly accomplished some wonderful achievements as a journalist.
"Ah!" said Madame Novikoff, with an air of quickened curiosity, "you think that? Now tell me what, in your opinion, is his most wonderful achievement." I told her that I thought it was his success in championing the cause of a certain lady. (The story has nothing to do with this narrative, but it was a _cause celebre_ in which Stead employed the methods of the New Journalism in order to secure justice for a woman who had been gravely wronged.) No sooner had I explained myself to Madame Novikoff than that lady"s face fell. "Ah, I am sorry to hear you say that. That was not his greatest achievement. But Stead has always been ready to go crusading at a woman"s bidding." Madame Novikoff must have known what she was talking about.
Among the leading politicians of the North in those days was my old friend and fellow-townsman, Joseph Cowen, of Newcastle. He had been to some extent alienated from Mr. Gladstone and from the Liberal party by disappointment, but he still called himself a Liberal, and there was no reason to doubt that his political instincts were sound, and that he might again become one of the Liberal leaders of the North. He took, as he had always taken, a strong line with regard to Russia, which he looked upon as the parent of Continental despotism and the traditional enemy of human freedom. Mr. Stead, full of zeal for the cause represented by Madame Novikoff, made a series of vehement and persistent attacks upon Cowen because of his views regarding Russia and the Eastern Question generally. One day he sent me one of his marked papers containing a particularly impa.s.sioned onslaught upon the member for Newcastle. I considered that he had invited comment by sending me this article, and I wrote to him to expostulate with him on the line he was taking, pointing out that Cowen, who was a very sensitive man, was not unlikely to be driven out of the party if these attacks were persisted in, and that his loss would be a serious one to the Liberalism of the North of England. I don"t think I said anything particularly harsh in this letter, which was in my opinion justified by my relations both with Cowen and with Stead.
The rejoinder was not what I had expected. It came in the shape of an immensely long article in the _Northern Echo_ ent.i.tled, if I remember aright, "The Editor of the _Leeds Mercury_ and Mr. Cowen."
In this article something I had written about Cowen in the _Mercury_--I forget what--was held up to ridicule, and was compared with my private sentiments regarding the member for Newcastle as they had been gleaned by Mr. Stead in that night-long conversation under my roof, of which I have spoken in this chapter. Needless to say, my talk was not faithfully remembered or accurately represented. That, in itself, was a small matter, but the ill.u.s.tration thus afforded me of the practical working of the New Journalism was not altogether a pleasant one, and for some years after this episode there was a distinct coolness between Mr.
Stead and myself. The incident arouses no bitterness now. Mr. Stead honestly believed that he was ent.i.tled to use my frank _obiter dicta_ for the purpose of correcting what he regarded as my public errors. I was not the last and by no means the greatest sufferer from this theory on the part of the founder of the New Journalism; but, as having been in some small degree a sufferer at his hands, I am, perhaps, the better able to bear testimony to his absolute honesty of intention, and to his unfailing conviction that in even his greatest indiscretions he was acting under the justification of a high moral purpose.
In the spring or summer of 1880 I received a note from John Morley, who had by this time become editor of the _Pall Mall Gazette_. It was to inform me that he had secured a notable man from my part of the world to a.s.sist him in his editorial duties. He was Mr. Stead of Darlington, and Morley wished to know my opinion of him. My reply did not please Mr.
Morley; for while I told him how highly I admired Mr. Stead"s abilities, I warned him that he would need to be watched closely, as he was a man of such extreme views and of such daring originality in his manner of conducting a journal that, if he were not kept under strict control, he might at any moment seriously commit the newspaper with which he was connected. At the time Morley took this warning with a very bad grace, plainly implying that he thought that my feeling with regard to Mr. Stead was founded on the fact that he was a more real Liberal than myself. But there came a time when the distinguished politician and man of letters acknowledged that my hint had been only too fully justified.
One day in 1879 William Edward Forster came into my room at the _Mercury_ office. For some time he had been in the habit of calling at intervals to have a chat with me. I believe that each of us was secretly rather afraid of the other. I had for years regarded him with a strong feeling of admiration, and I looked confidently to him as the man who, when Mr. Gladstone in the fulness of time retired from public life, would take his place and become the recognised leader of the great forces of English Liberalism. I had supported him with unfaltering loyalty both in his educational policy and at the time when his name was put forward in the candidature for the leadership of the party in 1875, and I found myself in strong sympathy with his views on those foreign and colonial questions on which I could take sides neither with the Little England nor with the Jingo school. Forster"s visit was chiefly for the purpose of chatting over the prospects of the Liberal party, but incidentally our conversation turned upon Mr. Stead. "He has one great fault," said Forster, "and that is that he does not mix with other people." Certainly Forster had every reason to think well of Mr. Stead, for he was his loyal friend and admirer in those dark days when few were found to speak well of the member for Bradford.
It was in 1881 that Forster became the target of the missiles of that section of the Liberal party which in those days followed Mr.
Chamberlain. Mr. Chamberlain"s followers were naturally anxious that their hero should arrive at the summit of his ambition, and Mr. Forster was the man who stood most directly in his path. I do not wish to allege that there were not real differences of opinion between Mr. Forster and Mr. Chamberlain, though when one remembers the subsequent history of the latter it is difficult to understand his constant antagonism to Forster, the founder of the Imperial Federation movement, and the first Liberal Imperialist. But whatever his motives might be, Mr. Chamberlain"s dislike of Forster was obvious to everyone. He had powerful means of making that dislike felt. The caucus in those days was absolutely under his thumb, and at a sign from him more than half the Liberal a.s.sociations in the country were inclined to pa.s.s any resolution that he was pleased to suggest to them. The _Pall Mall Gazette_ became virtually his mouthpiece, and one read it as much in those days to ascertain the thoughts of Mr. Chamberlain as those of its distinguished editor. In the Cabinet he had secured one or two valuable allies, over whom, by virtue of his great abilities, he exercised an extraordinary influence. In the House of Commons the most active wing of the Radical Party was, with certain notable exceptions, devoted to him. He was the man to whom they looked as their leader, and as the future chief of a Radical Administration.
In the winter of 1881-2 all the forces controlled by the caucus were employed in the work of disparaging and weakening Mr. Forster. The latter was engaged in his almost hopeless struggle with the disaffected cla.s.ses in Ireland--in other words, with four-fifths of the nation. I have told elsewhere the story of Mr. Forster"s public career, and it is not necessary that I should enter into any defence of his Irish administration here. But this I must say, that at a time when he was beset with difficulties of the most formidable and distressing kind, and when he had a right to expect the loyal support at least of his own colleagues in the Cabinet, he found himself exposed to intrigues and cruel side-attacks that still further embarra.s.sed him, and that fatally weakened his hands. As the winter pa.s.sed the storm artificially raised against him increased in violence. All the animosities of Birmingham were let loose upon his head. The old cries of trimmer and traitor were again raised against him. The Liberal Press, with hardly an exception, took its cue from the _Pall Mall Gazette_, whilst the organs of the Conservative party naturally felt under no obligation to defend him from the misrepresentations and innuendoes of his formidable foes in his own party.
I do not think I exaggerate when I say that it was only in the columns of the _Leeds Mercury_ that he was consistently and steadily defended.
It was a labour of love on my part thus to stand by a man for whom I entertained so great and affectionate an admiration, and who was, as I conceived, being so cruelly ill-treated by those of the same political household as himself. It was said at the time that Forster inspired the _Leeds Mercury_, and that the articles defending him which I published were really written by himself. In the interests of honourable journalism, and of Mr. Forster"s reputation, I must state the actual facts. I was, as I have already said, on terms of personal friendship with him, and I was in the fullest sympathy with his Irish policy; but from the moment when he became Chief Secretary until he retired from that office, Forster held no communication with me, either direct or indirect.
I never saw him, and he never wrote to me, nor did I address a single word to him. This was characteristic of Forster"s high sense of public duty. He was too proud and too high-spirited to try to enlist any man"s sympathies, or to secure any newspaper advocacy. Men spoke of him as a clever wire-puller who could manufacture a spurious public sentiment in his own favour. How little they knew him! If he had chosen to resort to those arts with which his a.s.sailants were so familiar he might have won the support of many tongues and pens. He preferred, then as always in his public career, to devote himself with a single-minded purpose to the performance of his duty, leaving the consequences to take care of themselves. It was in this way that it came to pa.s.s that his only defender in the Press in those dark and troublous days was a little-known journalist in Yorkshire.
For my part, I look back with pride and deep satisfaction to the line which I then took, and from which I never swerved. It was not a successful line. Mr. Forster"s enemies were too powerful for him, and, as everybody knows, he became their victim. But there are better things in this world than success, and I am more content to have been Forster"s a.s.sociate in his unmerited fall than I would have been to share in the personal triumph which Mr. Chamberlain gained over him. Although complaint was made, when my "Life" of Forster appeared, that I had made too full a revelation of Cabinet secrets, the fact remains that a good deal of truth has still to come out with regard to his resignation of office in 1882. I do not propose to lift the veil here, but it is well known that an ingenious trap was laid for him, and that, with characteristic confidence in the good faith of his fellow-men, he walked unsuspectingly into it. His resignation, it will be remembered, was due to his refusal to accept as satisfactory a letter written by Mr. Parnell, in which he undertook, if he were released from Kilmainham, to give certain a.s.sistance to the Government in putting down outrages in Ireland.
Forster would willingly have accepted Mr. Parnell"s word as a gentleman that he would exert himself to this end, but he was not prepared to accept the skilfully framed words in which Mr. Parnell sought to convey the impression that was desired whilst avoiding all personal responsibility in the matter. Those who wish to know how Mr. Forster was jockeyed out of office must learn the history of Parnell"s letter, and how and by whom the sentences were devised which seemed acceptable to the sanguine temperament of Mr. Gladstone, but which Forster, with his closer knowledge of the situation, regarded as wholly unsatisfactory. The time has not yet come for the story to be told, but when the precise facts are revealed they will be found to throw a curious light upon this episode.
Forster"s resignation was a great personal blow to me. It was a blow also both to his personal friends and admirers in Yorkshire, and to a large section of politicians who knew him to be an upright and single-minded man, struggling with all his might to maintain order in Ireland and to preserve the unity of the United Kingdom. There was, however, one further step that was possible that would have immeasurably increased our mortification. This was the appointment of Mr. Chamberlain as Forster"s successor. Mr. Chamberlain"s friends confidently expected that the appointment would be made, and for a day or two it seemed certain that this would be the case. I saw a member of the Government who was the confidential friend of Mr. Gladstone, and told him that if Mr.
Chamberlain were to be appointed, the _Leeds Mercury_, and all whom it could influence in Yorkshire would at once enter upon a most strenuous and thorough-going opposition to the new Irish policy. I was told in reply that, whatever Mr. Chamberlain himself might have expected, Mr.
Gladstone had not for a single moment contemplated his appointment to the vacant post, and that his choice had fallen in another quarter.
The Leeds Liberal Club resolved to invite Forster to a complimentary dinner, in order that he might have the a.s.surance that there was one great city, at least, in which he retained the confidence and grat.i.tude of his party. I wrote to Forster to convey this intimation to him, and had a reply, in which he asked me to meet him in London. On Friday, May 6th, 1882, the appointment of Lord Frederick Cavendish as Irish Secretary was announced in Parliament, and the writ moved for his re-election after taking office. The next night, about 11 o"clock, I was sitting in the morning-room at the Reform Club, talking to the late Mr. William Summers, then member for Huddersfield. There were but few men in the room, though amongst those few were one or two Irish members, including Mr. Shaw, who had been Chairman of the Home Rule party in the House of Commons until he was superseded by Mr. Parnell. We had all been reading the telegrams on the board in the hall announcing the enthusiastic reception of the new Lord Lieutenant, Earl Spencer, and the new Secretary, Lord Frederick Cavendish, in Dublin. I was discussing with Summers the meaning of the new departure and of the success of Forster"s a.s.sailants, when the old hall-porter of the club burst into the room, and in a state of great agitation announced to us that a message had been received at the Carlton Club stating that the Lord Lieutenant and the Chief Secretary had been a.s.sa.s.sinated. I cannot describe the mingled amazement, horror, and incredulity with which the news was received, but I remember well the extreme distress shown by Mr. Shaw and the other Irish members. "This is the end of Ireland!" cried Mr. Shaw, with tears in his eyes. For some time most of us steadily refused to believe the story, for no authentic news could be gathered respecting it; but, as time pa.s.sed, the Reform Club was besieged with inquiries from the other clubs in Pall Mall, the members of which naturally supposed that authentic news would be procurable at the Ministerial club. At last someone came in who had been at Lord Frederick"s house in Carlton House Terrace, and he brought the dreaded confirmation of the story. The Lord Lieutenant, it is true, had not been attacked, but Lord Frederick had been killed, and with him Mr.
Burke, the Under-Secretary. A shudder ran through the crowd when we were told that the vile deed had been done with knives.
Inside the club there was now a large a.s.semblage of members, although it was past midnight. Men came into the club, too, on that eventful night who were not members, but who were moved by an irrepressible anxiety to learn the truth as to what had happened. Among these I remember Abraham Hayward, Q.C., the essayist and Society rattle, who, characteristically enough, proclaimed to us all the fact that the gentleman who accompanied him was my Lord So-and-so. But it was outside the club that I witnessed the most extraordinary scene I ever saw in London. Rumours of the tragedy had spread through the clubs, but the tidings had not reached the streets. The clubs, as by a common impulse, emptied themselves, and the members with one accord flocked to the Reform. On the broad pavement in Pall Mall some hundreds of men, nearly all in evening dress, were cl.u.s.tered together, discussing in low tones the horrible event, of which, as yet, the details were wholly unknown. On the roadway a hundred cabs were gathered, their drivers evidently bewildered by the unwonted spectacle, and wondering what had brought together in the stillness of the early Sunday morning this unwonted crowd.
Suddenly, as I looked upon the scene from the steps of the club, I saw the crowd fall back on either hand, opening a narrow lane through it.
Along this lane, with bent head, came Lord Hartington, brother of one of the murdered men, pa.s.sing from the newly-made house of mourning in Carlton House Terrace to his home at Devonshire House. No one ventured to speak to him, but every hat was lifted in token of silent sympathy. It was a memorable, never-to-be-forgotten night. Years afterwards I heard from Sir William Harcourt himself an account of how the news first reached London. There was a big Ministerial dinner party, if I remember rightly, at Lord Northbrook"s; Mr. Gladstone was there, and so was Sir William Harcourt, then Home Secretary. Dinner was nearly over when Mr.
(now Sir) Howard Vincent, who at that time held a high post at Scotland Yard, arrived and demanded an immediate interview with the Home Secretary. To Sir William he showed the official telegram that had just been received, all other messages having been stopped by the authorities in Dublin. It was decided, after a consultation, that nothing was to be said until the ladies had left the dinner table, and that then the news was to be broken to Mr. Gladstone, who, apart from all other reasons for feeling the tragedy, had the additional one of a close relationship with Lady Frederick Cavendish. Mr. Gladstone, though deeply moved, was then, as always, master of his emotions, and it was he who at once went to Carlton House Terrace to break the dreadful tidings to his niece, Mrs.
Gladstone accompanying him on the errand.
There was little sleep that night for any of us who had heard the news before retiring to rest. The next day was such a Sunday as I never remember to have seen in London before or since. The newspapers spread the tidings far and wide. In numberless cases men first learned the news as they were going to church. They turned aside in scores, and hurried down to Pall Mall to learn the latest particulars of a tragedy that was instantly recognised as being one that affected the nation as a whole.
From early morning until late at night the fine hall of the Reform Club was crowded with members, and with friends who came to inquire for further news. In the forenoon a strange thing happened. Mr. Forster, the man whose life the villains who struck down Lord Frederick Cavendish and Mr. Burke had chiefly sought, and who had pa.s.sed through perils so terrible that even now the recollection of them raises a shudder, came into the club. He was besieged at once by a host of members, but breaking away from them, he came to me, and taking me by the arm, led me to one of the seats in the hall. Instantly, and as it seemed instinctively, the great crowd of men formed in a semicircle around us, out of earshot, but gazing with wondering and sympathetic eyes upon the man who had escaped so cruel a fate.
I remember the first words that Forster spoke to me. "They may say what they like," he said, "but it is Mr. Parnell who has done this. He is the man who sowed the seed of which this is the fruit." And then he talked of the victims, of Lord Frederick, so gentle, kindly, honourable in all the relations of life, and of Burke, "the most loyal man," he declared, "who ever served the Crown." Indeed, at the moment he seemed to feel the death of poor Burke more acutely than that of Lord Frederick, and he was full of the idea that if he himself had been in Ireland the lives of both would have been saved. "I shall go back to Ireland," he said to me presently. "They must want someone to manage pressing affairs, and I shall tell Mr. Gladstone that I am at his service." He went straight from the club to Downing Street, and saw Mr. Gladstone--who, unlike most other men in London, had been to church that morning. He made the offer, one in every respect n.o.ble and magnanimous as well as courageous; but it was not accepted. The bitterness of party pa.s.sion which had been aroused by the events that culminated in his own resignation had not yet sufficiently subsided to render such a step possible, and Forster, to my keen regret, was not permitted to have this fresh opportunity of showing that unfailing fearlessness in the face of danger which was one of his most eminent characteristics.
On the following day the adjournment of the House of Commons was moved by Mr. Gladstone in a speech which betrayed his grief and emotion. That evening a certain Irish Tory member was dining out, and he told the following story to a party in which there were women as well as men. "I was crossing St. James"s Park after the rising of the House this afternoon, when I saw Mr. Gladstone walking in front of me. For the first time in my life I felt sorry for the fellow, for I knew what a terrible blow this affair must have been to him. I said to myself, "Well, there was no playacting in his speech this afternoon, at all events. The fellow really felt what he said." Can you conceive, then, my indignation when on getting to the top of the steps at the Duke of York"s column I saw him lurking behind the column talking to an abandoned woman?"
A lady who was present at the dinner-party, and who was a great admirer of Mr. Gladstone, thought it her duty to write to him, and tell him the charge that had been made against him. She did not mention the name of her informant, but merely stated the facts that had been reported to her.
She received an immediate reply, on a postcard. It was as follows:--"The presence of ---- was not unperceived on the occasion to which you refer; but the conversation he has reported to you was not of the nature he imagined, and possibly desired." The voice of slander often pursued Mr.
Gladstone, but the reply which he gave to this particular accusation was recognised, even by his enemies, as complete and conclusive. All through his life Mr. Gladstone was filled with pity for the outcasts of the streets, and whenever he could hold out a helping hand to them he did so with a fearlessness that was characteristic of his courage--the courage of the pure in heart.
I must turn aside from the Irish tragedy to speak of a small agitation, in which I and other persons were concerned at the time, that had a certain connection, not with the Phoenix Park murders, but with the events that led up to them. Two of Mr. Chamberlain"s brothers had been nominated as candidates for the Reform Club. It was, perhaps, unfortunate for them that they came up for election in this spring of 1882, when there was much hostility towards Mr. Chamberlain himself on the part of many Liberals, who believed that he was intriguing in order to drive Mr.
Forster out of the Cabinet. At all events, the two candidates were black-balled, and great was the ferment that arose in consequence. In Birmingham the action of the Reform Club was regarded as an outrageous insult not only to Mr. Chamberlain himself, but to that section of the Liberal party to which he then belonged. "The good people of Birmingham are simply furious," wrote Mr. Chamberlain to his friend, Mr. Peter Rylands, M.P., "and they even talk of marching upon London," It was an astounding a.s.sertion, but really Mr. Chamberlain"s organs in the Birmingham Press dealt with the black-balling of his brothers in such a fashion as almost to warrant the expectation that Pall Mall would be invaded, and the Reform Club sacked, if it did not repent in dust and ashes of the affront it had offered to the leader of Birmingham Radicalism. Nothing less would suit Mr. Chamberlain and his friends, as an atonement for the misdeeds of the club, than such an alteration in the rules as would deprive the members of the power of black-balling candidates by transferring elections from the club at large to a special election committee.
I was present at the meeting of the club at which a resolution to this effect was proposed by Lord Hartington. The meeting was held only a couple of days before the Phoenix Park tragedy. It was largely attended, and many distinguished persons were present. "I saw the whole Cabinet crowded into the gla.s.s and bottle room," said George Augustus Sala, in speaking of the scene afterwards. Sala himself took a prominent part in the proceedings, for, provoked by a speech from Mr. Bright, in which he had denounced black-balling as an odious and ungentlemanly practice, Sala delivered himself of an impa.s.sioned oration in which he a.s.serted that there was no right more sacred in the eyes of every true-born Englishman than the right to black-ball anyone he pleased at a club election. I remember Lord Granville"s attempt to reply to Sala"s sweeping a.s.sertion, but judging by the cheers, it was the essayist, rather than the earl, who had the sympathy of the members. Lord Hartington"s resolution was carried by a small majority, and a ballot of the whole club was demanded, to settle the question finally. When this ballot took place, it was seen that the feeling of the club as a whole was distinctly adverse to the proposed change of rules, and Lord Hartington"s resolution was rejected by a large majority. The rejection was due in part, at least, to the feeling which Mr. Chamberlain had inspired among the moderate Liberals.
Shortly afterwards, Mr. Chamberlain resigned his membership of the club, and the question of an alteration of the rules fell to the ground.
The Phoenix Park tragedy confirmed many persons in the belief that Forster had been right, and the rest of the Government wrong, with regard to Irish policy. In Yorkshire we felt keenly on the subject, and in the _Leeds Mercury_ I lost no opportunity of vindicating my friend from the attacks which a section of the advanced Radicals, who claimed Mr.
Chamberlain as their leader, made upon him. The result was to bring about a strained state of the relations between myself and the official leaders of the Liberal party. Leeds had given the Government its most signal victory in the General Election of 1880. It was felt in the Cabinet to be a serious thing that the _Leeds Mercury_, and with it no inconsiderable section of the Liberal electors, regarded Mr. Forster"s supersession with indignation, and by some influential member of the Government a proposal was made to crush the _Mercury_, and prove that it did not really represent Liberal opinion in Leeds, by convening a meeting of the Liberal a.s.sociation for the purpose of expressing confidence in the Irish policy of the Ministry. It was an absurd device, and it failed, as it deserved to do. Although we were very angry at the treatment which Mr. Forster had received, we were perfectly loyal to Liberal principles and to the leadership of Mr. Gladstone. There was no need, therefore, to ask us to testify to our confidence in Ministers. But the men who had succeeded in driving Mr. Forster from office desired to complete their work by bringing his defenders into open contempt, and they thought that they would accomplish this by means of a meeting of Liberal electors in Leeds which should prove to the world that the editor of the _Leeds Mercury_ represented n.o.body but himself in his championship of Forster"s cause.
They put pressure upon the a.s.sociation to summon a meeting, which was duly held. It turned out to be a demonstration in favour of Forster rather than the Government, and the attempt to crush independence of opinion in the Liberal ranks was thus signally foiled. I do not know who the member of the Cabinet was who was responsible for this manoeuvre, but whoever he may have been--and I have my suspicions upon that point--he had little reason to congratulate himself upon the result of his strategy. For a time the incident caused a certain degree of coldness between myself and my Liberal friends on the executive of the Liberal a.s.sociation. Sir James Kitson and I had worked together so harmoniously in raising up a united party in Leeds that this partial breach between us was rather painful. Happily it did not last long. I stood to my own opinions, and for the future our local Liberal leaders were content that, whilst supporting them in every matter upon which I was in agreement with them, I should not be attacked for maintaining my absolute independence on those questions on which I took a line of my own. No further attempts were made, I need scarcely add, to intimidate the _Mercury_ by means of public meetings in Leeds, nor do I think I suffered in the long run in the estimation of friends from whom I then differed, by the steps I took to vindicate my character, both as a responsible journalist and as an independent critic of public affairs.
Naturally I was drawn closer to Forster by the fact that I was thus const.i.tuted his representative and champion in the Press, and I became a somewhat frequent visitor at his delightful but unpretentious residence on the banks of the Wharfe at Burley. It was on my first visit to him after his resignation that an incident took place which touched me deeply. I was sitting with his and my old friend, Canon Jackson, of Leeds, in the library after breakfast. Forster, of whose blunt manner I have already spoken, came into the room. For some time he walked up and down without speaking, and was apparently somewhat troubled. Suddenly he turned to Jackson and asked him if he would go out of the room. When the Canon had gone Forster closed the door behind him, took another turn up and down the apartment, and then, speaking with evident difficulty, said to me, "I cannot let you leave this house without letting you know what I feel with regard to all that you have done for me. When n.o.body else dared to say a word in my favour in public during that terrible time in Ireland, you were always ready to defend me from attack. I needed defending, Heaven knows! My colleagues left me absolutely alone; they left me to take my own way, just as if I had been the Czar of Russia. I was attacked, as you know, both in England and Ireland, by the papers and public men of all parties. I knew I had very powerful enemies who were determined to make the worst of everything I did, and none of my own colleagues defended me. You can never know what a comfort it was to me at that time to know that I had one staunch friend in the Press, and that the dear old _Leeds Mercury_ would always judge me fairly and try to make the public see the truth. G.o.d bless you!"
I do not know whether he or I was the more deeply moved by this sudden and most unexpected outburst of feeling from a man who, as a rule, stubbornly concealed the sensitiveness of his nature and the warmth of his heart under a rugged and at times almost forbidding exterior. I do not pretend to have deserved what he said, but the words he uttered sank into my heart, never to be forgotten. Henceforth the censures of a caucus and the sneers of those superior critics who derided me as the victim of an absurd prejudice in favour of a statesman who had fallen, were as less than nothing to me.
CHAPTER XV.
THE FIRST LIBERAL IMPERIALIST.
Forster a Pioneer of Liberal Imperialism--His Political Courage--His Unfortunate Manner--His Home Life--Intrigues in the Cabinet--The Plots against Forster"s Life--Reaction in his Favour--Forster and Lord Hartington--The Former"s Grief for Gordon--Forster and Lord Rosebery--Mr.
Stead and the _Pall Mall Gazette_--His Responsibility for the Gordon Imbroglio.
I should like to dwell upon my visits to Forster at his own home at Wharfeside, and to describe the frank, wholesome talk which I had there on many different occasions with the master of the house; but the talk was private, I made no notes of it at the time, and it is better that I should make no attempt to recall it now. This, however, I will say, in justice to Forster himself. During all my intercourse with him I never heard him utter a harsh word or give expression to an unworthy sentiment.
No public man of his day was more cruelly misunderstood by his contemporaries. It had become a sort of tradition among the followers of Mr. Chamberlain, and among others who ought to have known better, that Forster was not even a genuine Liberal. He was supposed to be a trimmer and a time-server, and all manner of ign.o.ble jealousies were attributed to him. I know, not only from many repeated conversations with him, but from acts of his which never reached the public, how deep and genuine was his faith in Liberal principles, how exalted and far-extended his belief in the application and development of those principles. He was the first man of eminence to attempt to bring home to the mind of the nation the greatness of its Imperial duties and responsibilities. It was he who, in the days when he was a discarded Minister, sowed the seed which is now bringing forth fruit in the shape of that unity of the Empire for which others, who came but yesterday into the field, are, with a great flourish of trumpets, claiming the credit.
The man who was scornfully described as "the great trimmer" was the most absolutely fearless man in political life I have ever known. I remember his coming to me when the question of extending Household Suffrage to the residents in the counties was first being broached in Parliament. He told me that he meant to move a resolution extending the measure to Ireland.
No other statesman of importance had at that time suggested such a step, whilst Lord Hartington had openly denounced it. I implored him to leave such a measure, which was certain to be unpopular with that section of the party which had been most favourable to him, to somebody else. "You have suffered enough already for Ireland," I said. "Let somebody else knock his head against this stone wall." "Who else will do it?" he replied. "The thing is right, and it must be done. As for your stone wall, I have never been afraid of being the first man over a fence."
Trimmer, indeed! As for his alleged jealousy of the men who were treading on his heels, I can only say that I never heard a syllable from his lips which gave countenance to this charge against him. Always frank and outspoken, he was at the same time invariably generous in his judgments upon his colleagues and his rivals. Rancour he never cherished, and he could forgive those who had injured him far more freely than most men I have known.
I have spoken of his manner. This was, I think, his great misfortune.
Again and again he offended men who were brought into contact with him by his bluntness of speech, and by his disregard of the mere niceties of deportment. I have heard him denounced as "a heartless ruffian" by someone who had suffered from an apparent lack of courtesy on his part.