The Honourable Sir Charles Murray, K.C.B.: A Memoir

Front matter

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Preface

.It is sometimes said, perhaps not without reason, that in these days we are over-fond of compiling biographies, and that a man ought to have touched a definite degree in the scale of achievement, distinction, or merit before the public are invited to peruse his memoirs. It may be so, though some difficulty might be found in fixing that degree. It is not probable that the world is too full as yet of personal annals. He who is most grateful to Tacitus for the too brief narrative of his fatherin-law, CnsBUS Julius Agricola, and for the light which it throws on the extension of the empire of Rome, as well as for the information it conveys of personal traits and social habits, will be most apt to sigh over the absence of all record concerning consuls and generals less famous than

I

VI PREFACE.

Agricola, but perhaps of integrity and energy not inferior to his.

The British Empire, far exceeding that of Imperial Borne in extent and population, possesses many characteristics in common with it, and British rulers have many lessons to learn, even at this day, from Roman precedents. The personal characters and habits of the men charged with the conduct of our affairs at foreign Courts have a vital bearing on the stability of our empire : when one of these has united to the office of diplomatist the parts of scholar, traveller, courtier, and sportsman; when he has added to the natural advantage of birth in one of the oldest houses of our aristocracy, a charm of manner and conversation which endeared him to all his acquaintance ; when he has lived far beyond the average human span in constant intercourse with the most cultivated minds of his country, and maintained throughout the high ideal of a Christian gentleman, — then I think that no apology will be exacted for preparing a brief record of his years.

It must be confessed that this has been attempted under many disadvantages. Sir Charles Murray, like many of us who have less to record, sometimes began to keep a journal, but seldom persevered for more than a few days. In vain his

PREFACE. Vll

friends urged him in later life to undertake writing out the reminiscences with which his mind was so plentifully stored. It was not till he had passed fourscore years that at Lady Murray's earnest request he was persuaded to commit to paper a personal narrative. The book is now before me — a promising quarto — alas ! all but the first twenty pages remain blank. In the last year of his life, when penmanship had become too great an effort, he was induced to begin afresh, dictating the record to his niece. This also came to no good: it is perhaps the noblest natures which have least taste for autobiography — talking of themselves.

Unwilling that the events of such a good and actively useful life should pass utterly into oblivion, Lady Murray has committed to me the task of gathering out of the scattered papers which remain something like a connected narrative. In attempting this I have been confronted with the great disability of not having known personally the subject of the memoir, nor has it been possible to repair this in any appreciable degree by the help of Sir Charles's most intimate friends, nearly all of whom have passed away. To some of those who knew him in his later years — his Son, Mr Charles Murray, M.P., Mr Reginald Smith, and Mr Reginald Lucas

Vlll PREFACE.

— I am indebted for much assistance, and offer sincere thanks. But no writer ever felt more keenly than I do that —

" None can truly write his single day, And none can write it for him upon earth/'

Such as it is, this sketch of Sir Charles Murray's

long life is offered in the hope that it may afford

interest, not only from his own character and work,

but from his association with leading men and a

distant past.

HEEBERT MAXWELL

MONREITH, 1898.

Contents

CHAPTER L

LINEAGE, PARENTAGE, AND EARLY DATS (1806-1822).

The House of Moray— Childhood— Samuel Rogers — Letters from S. Bogero — The home at Qlen Finart — Paris after Waterloo ....... 1

Chapter II

The journey to Eton from Dunmore was a formidable affair for young Charles, who x never, to the end of his life, succeeded in going to sleep in a carriage. The fastest travelling from Dunmore to London occupied three days and two nights, and, on account of his inveterate sleeplessness in a coach, the boy was generally sent by the Leith smack to the Thames. In Edinburgh he was taken in charge by his father's estate agent, Mr Tait, and formed a close friendship with his two sons, of whom the second afterwards became Archbishop of Canterbury.

Eton boys of to-day perhaps do not realise the ease of transit they enjoy — eight hours from London to Edinburgh in a saloon furnished like a boudoir — though they may regard somewhat en-

ETON. 37

viously the large inroads which the old-fashioned travelling sometimes made on the school-time. On one occasion the smack in which Charles, bound for school, embarked at Leith, was blown over to the coast of Norway, and it was a fortnight before she landed him again, not in London, but in Leith !

Notwithstanding such impediments as this to consecutive study, Charles Murray acquired a pretty turn for Latin verses, the making of which was really nearly all a boy could learn at Eton in Keate's day. Sometimes the exercises were varied by practice in English verse ; and once a-week an afternoon was devoted to what was called an extempore, though the subject was set at 2 p.m. and the lines (which were not to exceed four) had not to be shown up till two hours later. On one occasion the subject set was Horace's Insanire omnes. On this a very shy, quiet boy, whom nobody suspected of capacity for a joke, sent in the following stanza : —

" Old Horace says 'All men are mad/ And so they are, I think. Egad ! Sorely the man must be a fool Who sends his son to Eton school/'

Charles's elder brother, Lord Fincastle, was also

at Eton, but afflicted with great shyness, especially with ladies. Charles, who never suffered from that complaint, has left on record his device for curing him. The two lads were at a party in the house of Sir Michael Shaw Stewart in Edinburgh, a town which was famous for gaiety in the early part of the century.

" I wished to make him known to a very pretty young lady, with whom I was myself talking, and I hit upon a device for removing the usual formality of an introduction. Accordingly, before performing that ceremony, I said to my brother,

'Miss is very pleasant in conversation, but

she is very deaf;' and a few minutes afterwards I went across to her and asked her if she would let me introduce my brother. Upon her saying that it would give her very great pleasure, I said, ' I should warn you that he is very deaf.' After this I performed the introduction, and went to the farther part of the room to watch the result. As I expected, I saw him approach his mouth to her ear and shout out something, probably an insignificant remark. She was startled, but in making her reply also put her mouth very near to his ear, and shouted a few words in answer. Both seemed very much surprised, but before long one had occasion to say, c You needn't talk so loud, I'm not deaf.' ' Oh, I'm very glad to hear it, but my brother told me you were very deaf.' Then she said to him, * He told me the same of you ! ' The result was a hearty laugh, the absence of all

EDINBURGH SOCIETY. 39

shyness, and in a few minutes they were laughing at the mischief-maker, who had obtained his object."

Edinburgh society, though small, was very lively, and the literary activity of certain coteries has perhaps had no parallel in a town of equal size. Jeffrey had steered the 'Edinburgh Review* to a brilliant position ; Lockhart and John Wilson between them had launched 'Blackwood's Magazine' to the attack, with a memorable display of fireworks ; the Waverley Novels, not yet avowed by their author, were confidently attributed to one hand after another. Charles Murray preserved notes of some of the incidents which amused him at the time. Some of the stories invite repetition, though this may possibly not be the first time they have appeared in print: —

" A certain Scottish peer had long desired to obtain the honour of the Order of the Thistle, one of which happened to be then vacant. For a considerable time he canvassed all the persons whom he thought likely to have it in their power to assist him in attaining his object. He was very sanguine of success; but while the Law Court was sitting at Edinburgh, of which Harry Erskine was a member, intelligence came in to the effect that Lord S. had been unsuccessful. As soon as the report was read to the assembled advocates, Harry Erskine wrote two lines on a slip of paper and threw it over the table to one of his brother-advocates. The two lines proved to be in reference to Lord S. as follows : —

" ' When he heard the thing was settled, Not being thistled he was nettled.' 1

"There were some amusing incidents occurred when, between the year 1820-30, King George IV. took it into his head to pay a visit to Edinburgh, and, by way of rendering himself popular, he dressed himself in full Highland costume on the occasion of his receiving the Provost and the Bailies in state. These worthies had been informed that, after the reading of their loyal address and receiving his Majesty's gracious reply, they were to retire, kissing hands as they withdrew. Accordingly they defiled, as they went out, kissing their own hands to their astonished Sovereign."

1 Another impromptu by Henry Erskine is preserved in these notes. A case on which Erskine was engaged was being tried by Lord Gringletie, who, in mitigation of the offence of which the defendant was accused, referred to the force of circumstances under which he had acted, and more than once quoted the proverb, "Necessity has no law." Erskine passed a slip of paper to his neighbour with these lines pencilled on it: —

" Necessity and Cringaltie are suited to a tittle,— Necessity has no law, and Cringaltie has little."

The English equivalent to this story may be found in Samuel Bogers's 'Table-Talk ' : "Dunning (afterwards Lord Ashburton) was stating the law to a jury at Guildhall, when Lord Mansfield interrupted him by saying, ' If thai be law, Til go home and burn my books.' 'My lord, 1 replied Dunning, 'you had better go home and read them' I"

LORD ELDON. 41

Bang George's visit was the cause of some inconvenience to Lord and Lady Dunmore. Queen Anne had bestowed on the first Earl of Dunmore a suite of apartments in Holyrood Palace, which had remained in the family as a possession by what Scottish lawyers call " tacit relocation " ever since. On this occasion the king, probably with an eye to future sojourns in the Scottish capital, caused the apartments of the Duke of Hamilton, Hereditary Keeper of the Palace, to be added to the royal suite, and bestowed on the Duke the rooms previously occupied by the Dunmores.

The new house at Dunmore had just been completed from the designs of Wilkins of Cambridge, who was also the architect of Lord Rosebery's new house at Dalmeny. At the last-named place constant sociable gatherings took place, at which many Edinburgh and other notables assembled from time to time. Among these appears the name of Lord Chancellor Eldon, then a very old man, whose pleasantries seem to have been rather of the bludgeoning, Johnsonian type.

" One of the numerous Dundases — well known in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh — had the preceding year exhibited a collection of pictures which he had lately purchased in Germany, previous to their being transferred to his private residence.

It happened that one of the guests at Lord Rosebery's table mentioned his intention of visiting the Continent for the purpose of making some addition to his own collection of paintings, and he asked Lord Eldon if he could give him any suggestions as to where he had better begin his search. Lord Eldon replied, ' I think he had better go to Dusseldorf.' 'And why to Dusseldorf?' said the inquirer. ' I think you might find something good there, as our friend Dundas went there last year and bought all the d d trash in the place.' "

This Mr Dundas shared the passion which distinguished James IV. for amateur dentistry. It was said that whenever his wife engaged a new housemaid or kitchenmaid, Dundas used to offer her a sovereign to be allowed to draw one of her teeth.

"Lady Rosebery, who was a sister of Lord Lichfield's, a handsome person, and an excellent hostess, was very fond of playing the harp as an accompaniment when singing. One favourite song — a Russian air with Russian words — she played and sang so frequently that I can remember the words to this day. On one occasion when she was singing it a Russian attache, who happened to be sitting next to me, whispered to me, ' Does Lady Rosebery understand Russian ? ' I replied, c Certainly not ; but why do you ask me ? ' * Because,' said he, ' the words she is singing are most atrociously improper. Somebody ought to tell her.'

FONTHILL. 43

"I need scarcely add that I took the earliest opportunity of doing so, and the song was never repeated."

Much of Charles Murray's early recollection is connected with Hamilton Palace and visits to his uncle there. The Duke of Hamilton 1 impressed him as a fine specimen of the old grand school, retaining not only the manners of a bygone court but some of the peculiarities in dress. He continued to wear .a wig, tied with a ribbon behind, long after that fashion had been discarded.

" Of the Duchess I hardly trust myself to write, so gifted she was with talents of various kinds, but most of all in music. She had a magnificent voice of three perfect octaves, and her scientific knowledge of music was as remarkable as was her intuitive feeling. I may add that many of her gifts above alluded to were inherited from her father, William Beckford of Fonthill Abbey, one of the most extraordinary men in some respects that it has been my chance to meet in life. Before he was twenty he had written in French, and published, the oriental novel of ' Vathek/ which was for many years to be found in almost every drawing-room in England or France. Some literary pirate having published — of course without authority — a translation of it, Beckford published his English version of it. In respect of music I do

1 Ninth duke, died in 1619.

not know whether he ever knew a single note, but I have often seen him sit down at the piano and play a succession of the wildest and most extravagant unpremeditated compositions.

"I remember on one occasion an article had lately appeared in one of the magazines describing the nature of the sovereign succession in Thibet, and how the spirit of the dying ruler was supposed to pass into the body of his successor. Beckford, taking the bass and sitting beside his daughter at the piano, said in French (which he always spoke to her), ' Now, Susan, we'll suppose that the Grand Lama is just dead, and that his spirit has passed into the body of a little child. Now we'll have the scene.'

"A remarkable performance ensued. There they sat at the piano together, the father and the still beautiful daughter, whose face, like her sotd, was all music, he making the most grotesque faces in the world, as he suggested in a single word the successive changes of his piece — she playing the tenor and he the accompaniment on the bass notes of the instrument. First was a solemn dirge for the death of the old lama — then a march intended to describe the procession of grave senators and sages to the assembly where the successor to the deceased prince was to be proclaimed — then a solemn strain describing the discussions and divinations of the assembly — then a grand chorus announcing the result and the proclamation of the infant successor. All this was improvised without any other guide than an occasional glance at one another, while their duet,

WILLIAM BECKFORD. 45

expressive of a whole series of incidents, continued without a hitch. Presently Beckford, breaking off, remarked to his daughter, ' A present, k toi ! ' Upon which, after a solemn pause, she began a soft solo in the treble, which she presently accompanied with her voice, singing, ' Le Grand Lama vient de dire ta-ta!' 1

"I may here add a humorous little story that the Duchess herself related to me, connected with her girlish days at Fonthill Abbey. There were several peacocks and peahens that used to promenade about the lawns and terraces adjoining the house, and her father took it into his head to learn and practise in a back-room of the house the shrill cry of a peacock. He knew that when the peacock on one side screamed loud, another peacock on the opposite side of the house generally screamed in defiance. One morning, when he felt pretty sure that he had learnt his lesson correctly, he went out, and hiding behind a cedartree, he gave his peacock cry : to his great delight, the peacock on the opposite side of the lawn screamed defiantly. Immediately after this, which occurred just before breakfast, he came into the breakfast-room, saying with triumph to his daughter —

" ' And, Susan, the other peacock answered me!'

1 " In the evening Beckford would amuse us by reading one of his unpublished works ; or he would extemporise on the pianoforte, producing the most charming and novel melodies (which, by the bye, his daughter, the Duchess of Hamilton, can do also)." — Rogers's Table-Talk, p. 217.

" To his great annoyance, instead of congratulating him on his success, his daughter only burst into a loud fit of laughter. Bather provoked at this, he said —

" * Well, I think you might have congratulated me!'

"And then, though still hardly able to speak for laughing, she said —

" ' Why, papa, / was the peacock that answered you!"'

Lord Eldon figures characteristically in these reminiscences of Hamilton Palace. Phrenology was a fashionable craze for some years, and among those most bitten with it was a neighbouring laird, Mr Hamilton of Dalzell, 1 a very old gentleman. Sitting opposite to Lord Eldon one night at dinner, and fixing his eyes on the great lawyer, Hamilton suddenly asked him —

" Have you ever read Dr Spurzheim's two great volumes on phrenology ? "

"No, sir," replied Lord Eldon, "and I'd be ashamed to own it if I had."

Which cast rather a damp over the discussion in which Hamilton was burning to engage.

" In the earlier part of this century the article" which we call the ' dessert-spoon ' was not known in Scotland : the two houses in which it was first

1 Father of the present Lord Hamilton of Dalzell.

NEIGHBOURS AT HAMILTON. 47

introduced were Hamilton and Dalkeith. Before that, there was no spoon known between the tablespoon and the teaspoon. Bearing this in mind, we proceed to the following incident. A rough country squire, dining for the first time at Hamilton, had been served in the second course with a sweet dish containing cream or jelly, and with it the servant handed him a dessert-spoon. The laird turned it round and round in his great fist and said to the servant —

" ' What do you gie me this for, ye d d fule ?

Do ye think ma mooth has got any smaller since a lappit up my soup ? '

" At one of these dinners there was a Russian prince, whose name I forget, and who sat on the right hand of the Duchess. At the close of the first course a servant brought round a plate on which were a dozen little square pieces of toast with a delicate morsel, apparently of meat, upon each, which he elicited from the Duchess to consist of the inside of a woodcock, and considered a great delicacy. Unconscious that the plate was to go round, he took it from the hands of the servant, placed it before him, and deliberately ate up the whole of it, saying that he found it excellent; but he ascertained that the delicate meat upon the toast was not termed in polite circles the ' stomach/ but was called the ' trail/ Whether that particular dish or any other disagreed with his digestion I know not, but it happened that the same night, a little before midnight, the Duke heard the footsteps of his guest walking up and down in the passage adjoining the rooms in which they both slept. The Duke lit a candle, opened his door, and went up to his guest, and inquired whether he was suffering any pain ? and the latter replied —

" ' Yes, I have got a very bad pain in my trail. 9 "

Walter Scott was one of the acquaintances whom Charles Murray made at Hamilton. He left the poem Cadzow Castle as a memento of his visit, little dreaming, perhaps, how famous the whole neighbourhood was to become by his pen. 1 Henfy Brougham and Chief- Justice Denman are others of note whose names appear.

" It was during one of these visits to Hamilton, Brougham and Denman being both guests at the time, that my uncle asked me to go over to Lanark and show them an establishment that was then making a great sensation in Scotland. I allude to the Educational Institution of the well-known Mr Owen. He was one of those visionary individuals who held that the human mind and human character in childhood were perfectly free from vice of any kind, and that a careful education could mould the youth of both sexes into a state of perpetual innocence. The establishment was upon a large

1 Cambusnethan, in the immediate neighbourhood of Hamilton, is the original of Tillietudlem Castle in ( Old Mortality.' The crowds of tourists who visit it at this day take their tickets, not for Cambusnethan, but for Tillietudlem — perhaps an unrivalled instance of the power of a novelist to influence the prosaic details of railway management

SPORT IN ABRAN. 49

scale; and the pupils, boys and girls, took their lessons together between the ages of seven and x seventeen. Owen was a plausible fellow, and described his system and his course with great volubility to the two distinguished lawyers above mentioned. I watched them during the interview, and I could see that Brougham listened to his explanations with considerable interest, while Denman d d Mr Owen from the first as a complete

humbug. I regret to be obliged to add that a few years later the fact of half-a-dozen of the girl pupils proving enceinte caused Mr Owen to be driven out of the place by the indignant population. I may add that, curiously enough, I found the same charlatan, Owen, in the United States, conducting a school near Philadelphia, but I never heard any more of his success or failure."

Shooting, in the first quarter of the century, had not become the arduous, semi-professional business with which we are familiar ; nevertheless, Charles Murray used to bring out his flintlocked " Joe Manton " with as much pride and as much confidence that it was a perfect firearm, as any modern youth can feel in his two or three hammerless breechloaders fitted with ejectors and all the latest improvements. Nowhere had he a finer field for its exercise than in the Isle of Arran, that princely possession of the Dukes of Hamilton, and space must be found for his eulogy on a gamekeeper of the old school : —

"The kennels, which contained somewhere between fifteen and twenty pointers and setters, were under the charge of old George Croll, whom I have always considered the most perfect dogbreaker I ever knew. The greater part of his system of dog-breaking was done in the kennels themselves, which were admirably clean and roomy. The whip seemed to me to be almost unknown in his system, and when he opened the door and entered, the dogs all flocked round him, wagging their tails with joy and affection. But the moment he raised his arm pointing upwards, every dog lay down immediately in the spot where he was, and when he let them out for a run, whether they ran near or far, as soon as he whistled and beckoned, every dog immediately lay down where he was. There was one dog whose remarkable sagacity has remained imprinted indelibly on my memory. It was a small smooth pointer, called c Peter'; of course it had been exercised with the other dogs along the roads or the sea-shore, but it had never smelt a grouse or been taken out on the hills till the day that George Croll took him out with me to see what he would do. I may mention that rain had been falling and the ground was wet, and consequently most of the birds were on foot. We had scarcely been on the moor five minutes before we saw Peter going very slowly forward and trembling with excitement. George Croll encouraged and patted him, but could hardly get him to advance, and at last he said to me, ' The birds have been here, but they are on foot, and running before us/ With difficulty we persuaded

THE OLD STYLE. 51

Peter to go on, his master patting him all the time, and after a few minutes the covey rose, out of shot, before us. This was a very hard trial. We continued our walk over the moor, and then Peter, after a few turns to the right and left in search of a fresh scent, came again to a point ; the same thing recurred, the birds were restless, and got up out of shot. Peter seemed to think that the birds were making fools of us, but he went off to the right as fast as possible, described al halfmoon till he got three or four hundred yards in front of us, and then came slowly traversing the ground towards us. Thus, if there were any birds, Peter had got them between him and us, and, sure enough, he had out-manoeuvred the grouse, for he had got them between. They rose and came over my head, and I killed a brace — the first grouse that ever had been shot to Peter."

It is vain to sigh for the old leisurely kind of shooting. Men with breechloaders cannot be got to give a dog time to exercise his wits : they walk on without a pause after a shot, and the dogs, which have the same faculties and sagacity as of yore, have no chance of bringing them into play. But it is pleasant to get a glimpse of moorland sport as it was before the days of flurry and big

Chapter III

After leaving Eton in 1822 Charles Murray spent two years at a private tutor's preparing for Oxford. It was to this tutor, the Rev. Mr Hichings, vicar of Sunninghill, that he gratefully ascribed the strong love for the classics which he maintained through life. But the reminiscences which he began to put together in 1892 had been carried little further than his school-days when he died in 1895. A few notes of his life at Sunninghill, a few stories of his college companions, and still fewer of his own doings at Oriel College, Oxford, form the only semblance of a consecutive narrative of the time after he ceased to be an alumnus of the redoubtable Dr Keate at Eton. The only fellow -pupil at Sunninghill of whom

AT A PRIVATE TUTOB'S. 53

he has left any mention is Henry Hope of the Deepdene. 1

" He was a good sort of lad, quick-tempered, and very ugly, owing to a large, ill-shaped mouth. For some time I took to calling him Boccaccio, which rather pleased him, as he knew it to be the name of a distinguished author ; but on one unlucky day he took up an Italian dictionary that happened to be lying on the table, and in turning over the leaves he came to ' Boccacda — a wide, ugly mouth.' In a moment of rage he threw at my head a beautifully bound book that he was reading: I ducked my head, and the poor book went into the fireplace behind my chair. This did not improve his temper ; but the incident had no further consequences, except that I never called him by the great Italian's name again."