But I didn't forget that I had still to win his heart, so when a pause came, I remarked quietly, 'I wonder, Mr. Hutton, if you could help me to one of my ambitions. I knew Carlyle well, but I also admire Cardinal Newman immensely, though I've never had the joy of meeting him. Would it be too much to ask you for an introduction to him?'
He promised at once to help me. 'Though I don't know him intimately,' he added reflectively, 'still, I can give you a word to him. But how strange that you should admire Newman!'
'The greatest of all the Fathers,' I cried enthusiastically. 'The sweetest of all the Saints!'
'First rate,' exclaimed Hutton. 'That might be his epitaph. With that tongue of yours, you don't need any introduction; I'll just cite your words to him, and he'll be glad to see you. 'The greatest of all the Fathers,'' he repeated. 'That may indeed be true, but surely St. Francis of Assisi is 'the sweetest of all the Saints?'' I nodded, smiling. Hutton was right, but I felt that I must not outstay my welcome, so I took my leave, knowing I had made a real friend in dear Holt Hutton.
About this time I wrote an article in the Spectator which won for me the acquaintance and praise, if not the friendship, of T. P. O'Connor, M. P., a very clever and agreeable Irishman who stands high among contemporary journalists. He has met most of the famous men of his time, but has hardly ever written of the indicating figures; the second and third rate pleasing him better. So far as I know, he has never even tried to study or understand any great man in the quirks of character or quiddities of nature that constitute the essence of personality. He has written for the many about their gods- Hall Caine and Gosse, Marie Corelli and Arnold Bennett, Conrad and Gilbert Frankau-and has had his reward in a wide popularity. But in the early eighties he was still young with pleasing manners and the halo about his head of possible achievement.
Now for Froude and his dinner, which had I known it, was to flavour my experience with a sense of laming, paralysing defeat.
Before dinner Froude introduced me to Mr. Chenery, the editor of The Times, and at table put me on his left. When the dinner was almost over, he presented me to the score of guests by saying that Carlyle had sent him a letter, asking him to help me in my literary career and praising me in his high way. He (Froude) had read some of my poems and had assured himself that Carlyle's commendation was well deserved; he then read one of my sonnets to let his guests judge. 'Mr. Harris,' he added, 'tells me that he has begun writing for the Spectator, and most of us know that Mr. Hutton is a good, if severe, critic.'
To say I was pleased is nothing: almost every one drank wine with me or wished me luck with that charming English bonhomie which costs so little and is so ingratiating.
As we rose to go to the drawing-room for coffee, I slipped into the hall to get my latest sonnet from my overcoat. I might be asked to read a poem, and I wanted my best. How easily one is flattered to folly at seven and twenty!
When I reached the drawing-room door, I found it nearly closed and a tall man's shoulders almost against it. I did not wish to press rudely in, and as I stood there I heard the big man ask his companion what he thought of the poetry.
'I don't know; why should you ask me?' replied his friend, in a thin voice.
'Because you are a poet and must know,' affirmed the tall man.
'If you want my opinion,' the weak voice broke in, 'I can only say that the sonnet we heard was not bad. It showed good knowledge of verse form, very genuine feeling, but no new singing quality, not a new cadence in it.'
'No poet, then?' said the tall man.
'Not in my opinion!' was the reply.
The next moment the pair moved away from the door and I entered; with one glance I convinced myself that my stubborn critic was Austin Dobson, who assuredly was a judge of the technique of poetry. But the condemnation did not need weighting with authority; it had reached my very heart because I felt it, knew it to be true. 'No new singing quality, not a new cadence in it'; no poet then; a trained imitator. I was hot and cold with self- contempt.
Suddenly Mr. Froude called me. 'I want to introduce you,' he said, 'to our best publisher, Mr. Charles Longman, and I'm glad to be able to tell you that he has consented to bring out your poems immediately; and I'll write a preface to them.'
Of course I understood that 'good kind Froude,' as Carlyle had called him, was acting out of pure goodness of heart; I knew too that a preface from his pen would shorten my way to fame by at least ten years. But I was too stricken, too cast down to accept such help.
'It's very, very kind of you, Mr. Froude!' I exclaimed, 'And I don't know how to thank you, and Mr. Longman too, but I don't deserve the honour. My verses are not good enough.'
'You must allow us to be the judge of that,' said Froude, a little huffed, I could see, by my unexpected refusal.
'Oh, please not,' I cried. 'My verses are not good enough; really, I know; please, please give them back to me!' He lifted his eyebrows and handed me the booklet. I thanked him again, but how I left the room I have no idea. I wanted to be alone, away from all those kind, encouraging, false eyes, to be by myself alone. I was ashamed to the soul by my extravagant self-estimate.
I took a cab home and sat down to read the poems. Some of them were poor and at once I burned them, but after many readings three or four still seemed to me good and I resolved to keep them; but I could not sleep. At last, in a fever, I heard the milkman with his cans and knew it was seven o'clock. I had lost a precious night's sleep. I flung myself out of bed and burnt the last four sonnets, then got into bed again and slept the sleep of the just till past noon. I awoke to the full consciousness that I was not a poet; never again would I even try to write poetry, never. Prose was all I could reach, so I must learn to write prose as well as I could and leave poetry for more gifted singers.
Renewed hope came with physical exercise. After all, I had done a good deal in my first month or so. I had steady work on the Spectator; Hutton paid me three pounds for each paper, and I took care to write at least one every week and often two. Escott gave me more and more work on the Fortnightly, and after I had told him of Froude's dinner in my honour, he invited me to dine at his home in Brompton and I got to know his wife and pretty daughter.
Chapman too invited me to his house in Overton Square, and I began to know quite a number of more or less interesting folk.
CHAPTER IX
How does love come first to a man? Romance writers all agree that love comes as a goddess in blinding light, or ravishment of music or charm of scenery, but always crowned, always victorious. Mine is a plain unvarnished tale; love befell me in those first months in London in a most commonplace way, and yet I'll swear with Shakespeare that my love … was as fair As any she belied with false compare.
I was earning some five or six pounds a week and living quietly in Bloomsbury near the British Museum. I had occasion to call on someone in a boarding-house in the same district who had sent an article to the Fortnightly. I was shown into a parlour on the ground floor by the untidy maid and told that the lady would be down soon.
While waiting, a girl was shown in and also asked to wait. She came towards me where I was standing by the window and took my breath. Every detail of her appearance in the strong light is printed in my memory, even the shade of blue of the cloak she was wearing. She was rather tall, some five feet five, and walked singularly well, reminding me of Basque and Spanish girls I had seen, who swam rather than walked-a consequence, I had found out, of taking short even steps from the hips. Her eyes met mine fairly and passed on: long hazel eyes of the best, broad forehead, rather round face, good lips, firm though small chin; a lovely girl, I decided, with a mane of chestnut hair brightened with strands of gold. She was well, though not noticeably dressed, the long blue cloak and her apparent self-possession giving her rather the air of a governess. I resolved to speak to her. 'Waiting is weary work,' I began with a smile.
