ROBERT WILLIAMS BUCHANAN (1841 - 1901)

Home
Biography
Bibliography

Poetry
Plays
Fiction

Essays
Reviews
Letters

The Fleshly School Controversy
Buchanan and the Press
Buchanan and the Law

The Critical Response
Harriett Jay
Miscellanea

Links
Site Diary
Site Search

MUSTARD AND CRESS

by ‘DAGONET’ (George R. Sims)

 

The Referee (31 August, 1890 - p.7)

dagonetkreutzer

The Referee (15 March, 1891 - p.7)

AT THE TELEPHONE.

     “Hullo! Hullo! Hullo!”
     “Hullo! Who are you?”
     “I’m 7070. Are you Robert Buchanan?”
     “Yes.”
     “I want to speak to you.”
     “Wait a minute. I’m just finishing a letter to the Times on General Booth. Ring me up again.” (Interval.)
     “Hullo! Hullo! Is that you, Bard?”
     “Yes. Excuse me one minute, I’m writing a letter to the Daily Telegraph on Free Trade in Literature.” (Interval.)
     “Hullo! Hullo! Got a minute now?”
     “Just a second—I’m finishing a letter to the St. James’s Gazette on Stead and Dilke. (Interval.)
     “Hullo! my Bride of Love, are you at leisure now?”
     “Not yet, dear boy. I’m just writing a letter to the Daily Chronicle on Zæo’s back and the County Council.” (Interval.)
     “Hullo! you chap that wrote a play round a dog, can I speak to you now?”
     “Half a minute, you demon; I must write a letter to the Pall Mall on Cockney Burlesque.” (Interval.)
     “Hullo! Say, my Sword Shadower, I only want to ask you if you have seen the first number of the Isle of Dogs Indicator and Barking Creek Chronicle.”
     “No. Where’s it published? I’ll send in a letter on ——”
     “O, good-bye, Robert. Everybody says you are a man of letters, and, great Scott! you are!” (7070 rings off.)

___

 

The Referee (12 April, 1891 - p.7)

     When the first copy of “the Bard’s” new book was laid on his table he turned pale at the extreme biliousness of the cover, but when, having adjusted his spectacles, he read “The Coming Terror. Robert Buchanan,” he rushed off to town and stood over Publisher Heinemann brandishing a Scotch dirk until he consented to have the harmless necessary “by” inserted at once, and the first edition called in for the emendation. Fact!

___

 

The Referee (13 December, 1891 - p.7)

     The brightest incident of a gloomy week has been the introduction of Mr. Robert Buchanan to Mr. Justice Hawkins at a small dinner party. The bard, remembering his Echo article, felt a little uncomfortable at first, especially when the host, having introduced them with the words, “I think this is the first time you have met,” Mr. Justice Hawkins replied, “Yes; but I hope it won’t be the last.”

     It took the bard some time to recover his wonted gaiety. When he did he was reckless and slightly hysterical. Just to show he wasn’t frightened, he asked Sir Henry why he didn’t sentence the jury in the Salvation Army case to death after cross-examining them and finding them guilty. The good judge set his teeth, but said nothing. Then the bard asked him if he had been elected a member of the Jockey Club because he had such a quick eye for a case of “roping.” Everybody tittered at this, because nobody saw the joke, and the Buchanan colt thought he was romping home in the very best Manton style when Sir Henry quietly asked him if he was not the author of “A Moment After.” “Yes,” replied the bard; “I am.” “Now, where did you get your idea of what a man feels like after he has been hanged?” asked the great judge. “Well,” replied the author of “The Outcast,” “I cannot say that I have had any personal experience.” “Not yet,” said Sir Henry, smiling. And then there was a solemn silence, only broken by the involuntary exclamation of a clerical guest, “And may the Lord have mercy on your soul!”

[Note: I believe this relates to the case of Charles Grande who was sentenced to 20 years for demanding money with menaces. The sentence was handed down by Justice Hawkins and Buchanan wrote a letter to the Echo criticising him for its harshness.]

___

 

The Referee (21 February, 1892 - p.7)

CORRECTED INTERVIEWS.—No. 1—MR. ROBERT BUCHANAN.

     The current number of Pearson’s Weekly contains a most interesting interview with “Mr. Robert Buchanan, Poet, Novelist, and Dramatist.” But I find no mention of the real master of the genial Bard’s delightful home—Hector, the big black dog. Hector is responsible for a good deal of his master’s reputation for eccentricity—that is to say, his tail is. Being a tall dog, his tail wags just above the level of the study table, and whisks a good deal of MS. in various directions. Hector’s tail once whisked a private letter of the Bard’s into “The Outcasts,” and it wasn’t till the first edition was sold out that the accident was discovered. Several of the Buchanan letters to the Echo have included much irrelevant matter which has been whisked into the “copy” by Hector’s tail, and a good deal that was never intended for publication has found its way into print through the havoc created on the poet’s well-littered table by this faithful animal.

     Another point which has escaped the interviewer is that Robert Buchanan wears a white waistcoat all the year round—not the same waistcoat, but always a white one. During the present blizzard there has been no more cheerful sight in all London than the broad expanse of the Bard’s snowy bosom at the second-floor window of “Merkland.” Belated wayfarers, blowing their fingers, see that white waistcoat, and think of happy summers in the far-off years. Little starved sparrows spy it out, and perch on the window-sill and chirrup to it cheerily. By the white waistcoat and the simple flower in the button-hole ye shall at all times know the beamingest bard of all Bohemia—the literary giant with the heart of a little child. Bees have been known to settle on the Bard’s “button-hole” at a time when the London General Omnibus Company had ceased business on account of the weather.

     “The Buchanan Ballads,” price one shilling, will be on all the bookstalls next week. The poet wanted to call them “The Bob Ballads.” They are dedicated to Squire Bancroft Bancroft.

     The author of “God and the Man” is a great sportsman. Once every year he goes to his preserves at Leighton Buzzard for a fortnight, and comes home with an Ostend rabbit which he says he has shot. He has had many narrow escapes in his reckless pursuit of game. Some years ago in Ireland he shot a wild duck while he was standing on the edge of a cliff. The duck fell on his head and knocked him backwards, giving him a fall of nearly twenty feet. This duck, stuffed, now stands in a glass case in the poet’s drawing-room. It was while he was narrating the facts connected with it to Mr. Herbert Spencer that that distinguished philosopher playfully dubbed the author of “The Coming Terror” “Buchananias.”

[Note: Buchanan’s interview in Pearson’s Weekly is available here.]

___

 

The Referee (6 March, 1892 - p.7)

     At the great Augustus’s Shrove Tuesday Ball at Covent Garden there were high jinks and sounds of revelry by night, and the gayest reveller of them all was a big, broad-shouldered, burly being in full Highland costume, and made up to represent the late Rob Roy (Robert the Red, surnamed Macgregor), but masked. He performed the wildest feats, and went through a whole series of Highland games at intervals, to the intense delight of the gay and giddy throng; and when he put down two swords and did a mad, wild dance, the limelight operators turned a flood of glory on him that would have delighted the heart of General Booth.

     Nobody could find out who Rob Roy was. Sir Augustus himself was baffled. The “braw Hielander” danced with all the prettiest girls, and promenaded during the intervals between the dances with a fair one on each arm. In the supper-room he presided at a table crowded with joyous spirits of both sexes, and the merry magnums succeeded each other with lightning rapidity. At supper he unmasked, and the huge crowd was hushed to solemn silence. “Now we shall see who he is,” said everybody, and the cavaliers held their ladies up to see over the heads of the mob. Sir Augustus, who had become blocked in a doorway, went so far as to climb up on to Mr. Lathom’s back in order to get a good view of the mysterious masker. But the crowd was doomed to disappointment. When Rob Roy removed his mask it was discovered that his face was so artfully made up that recognition was impossible; and then the mystery deepened.

     After supper, when the fun grew fast and furious, the burly Highlander once more drew the eyes of all men—and women—unto him by a series of saltatory feats which would have secured applause at the Moulin Rouge on a fête night. And the wild Scotch cry which he uttered ever and anon in the mirthful madness of the moment was taken up by the entire company, and became the cry of the evening, and “Ta-ra-ra Boom-de-ay” was heard no more. By common consent the masked Highlander was proclaimed the King of the Revels, and low comedians who had been rehearsing their effects for a fortnight crept unnoticed to quiet corners and ate their hearts out with jealousy and rage, while Sir Augustus buttonholed the hero of the hour at every possible opportunity and made him fabulous offers for next year’s pantomime at Drury Lane.

     When daylight broke and the gay crowd of revellers had departed, an attendant going round to cover up the house came suddenly upon a burly masker, fast asleep in a private-box. It was Rob Roy Macgregor, O. His sleep was gentle as that of a tired child, and a beautiful expression of love for all mankind was on his placid features. “I beg pardon, sir,” said the attendant, “but we’re closing the house, and everybody has gone.” Rob Roy opened his eyes, stared, murmured, “Dear me, I must have fallen asleep,” and then, taking from his pocket a pair of spectacles, he put them on, and strolled quietly out in the broad light of day. At that moment Sir Augustus Harris was stepping into his brougham. Rob Roy caught sight of him. “O, ’Gus,” he said, “you might give me a lift as far as the Swiss Cottage.” And then Sir Augustus for the first time recognised the merry masker, the joyous reveller, the man who had been the life and soul of the great Carnival Ball at Covent Garden. Robert the Red was Robert Buchan—— On second thoughts, I don’t think I will betray the braw Hielander’s incognito. He might not like it.

[The above item drew the following comment from The Yorkshire Evening Post of 7th March, 1892:

     Mr. George R. Sims has been telling us about Shrove Tuesday Ball at Covent Garden, and of the mysterious Highlander who “performed the wildest feats, and went through a whole series of Highland games at intervals, to the intense delight of the gay and giddy throng,” but never revealed his identity. Even at supper, when he unmasked, Rob Roy’s face was made-up so that recognition was impossible. After supper he was proclaimed King of the Revels, and Sir Augustus “made him fabulous offers for next year’s pantomime at Drury Lane.” In the morning the masher turned out to be good and gentle Robert Buchanan, the slayer of critics, the pessimistic poet, the regenerator of mankind.

     At least so says George R.: but ’tis a merry joker and not to be trusted. Fancy staid Buchanan rigged up in kilts and doing the sword dance! This must be a metaphorical allusion to Robert’s literary habit of dancing over naked swords.]

___

 

The Referee (13 March, 1892 - p.7)

     The second volume of the Buchanan Ballads for the People is, I hear, to be dedicated to Arthur Roberts. The Bard went to see “Blue-eyed Susan” the other evening, and he has done nothing ever since but rave about the marvellous impersonation of Captain Crosstree. He tells everyone that it is the best bit of genuinely comic acting that he has seen on the stage for years. He has written a poem on Arthur Roberts; he has sent Arthur Roberts a copy of “The Outcasts,” “with the author’s sincerest admiration”; he gives imitations of Arthur Roberts at private parties, and has once or twice seriously alarmed his friends and guests invited to meet the moralist of the age by bursting out suddenly into fits of hysterical laughter without any apparent cause. When he comes to himself he explains that he was thinking of Arthut Roberts.

     The Bard calls it “being banged about the head with the bladder of a jester.” Excellent! Bard—excellent!

arthurroberts

[Arthur Roberts on wikipedia.]

___

 

The Referee (8 May, 1892 - p.7)

     In the days of his youth Bard Buchanan published a lovely volume of verse and called it “The Book of Orm.” Since the nobbling of the Derby favourite there have been several inquiries for this work at the libraries by sporting readers under a slight misapprehension.

     The Bard is spending a brief holiday on the waters of the Welsh Harp in a pirate craft which he has had specially fitted up. Up to the present he has been favoured with very little bloodshed, but a good deal of Slaughter. The Bard, needing some soothing influence, has taken his own composer with him.

[Note: Orme, the racehorse, has a page on wikipedia.]

___

 

The Referee (3 July, 1892 - p.7)

     It is good sometimes to get away from politics, to forget there is such a thing as a general election, to leave the British empire to take care of itself, and to commune with Nature in quiet woodland ways. One day this week I took my excellent friend the Scotch Bard and English Reviewer with me for a trip into the country. We had both been hard at work consuming the midnight oil in barn gallons, and our medical advisers said that a day’s rest and fresh air was imperative. So at an early hour we packed ourselves up comfortably in the Dagonet car (there wasn’t much room to spare) and turned the head of the fiery untamed Faust Up to Date towards the Surrey shore.

     All went well as far as Barnes, though every now and then, when Faust did an extra Buffalo Billy war-dance at a grating or a sewer-pipe, I saw the Bard looking round furtively for a nice soft piece of roadway where the stones were not all laid down point upwards. The roadway to Hammersmith is up everywhere. Being the height of the London season, Bayswater and Kensington are both in the hands of the steam-roller authorities, and stopped for traffic. To get from Regent’s Park to Hammersmith you have to go off the main road four times, and at least two miles out of the way. At Barnes we had a slight accident. The Bard’s side of the car went down in a rut, and he had to crawl over the sides on his hands and knees before we could get it out. But that was a trifle, and we quite enjoyed sitting on a drain pipe and smoking cigarettes while a neighbouring coach-builder pot the wheel right.

     At Richmond, at the Talbot, Herr Grünhold had prepared us an excellent lunch. Both being dyspeptic and out of sorts we didn’t want a heavy meal, so we just had a sole à la Normande, a poulet sauté Marengo, an omelette soufflé, some maids of honour, and a bottle of Koch fils; and then the ponies had been changed, Sir Hugo was at the door, and away we hied to Esher.

     At Esher we halted at the Bear, where the excellent Mr. Tod Pullen dispenses hospitality in a straw hat and brown boots. Here I had the pleasure of introducing the Bard to Sandown Park and the rabbits. The author of “God and the Man” disappointed me. I expected him to burst out into lovely poems on the scenery, instead of which he cried aloud that he had only two regrets. One was that he hadn’t a gun to shoot the rabbits, and the other that there were no bookmakers present with whom he could have a bet. These poets are very disappointing when you see them close to!

     At the Bear, having lunched well only an hour previously, and being dyspeptic and out of sorts, we ate nothing, but the proprietor insisted upon our having bottles of champagne and huge cigars, and biscuits and strawberries and cream, and cups of tea and some home-made strawberry jam. We did; but when he wanted to take us into old Esher churchyard and show us tombs we both respectfully declined, and had the pony put to and made for London again at full speed, leaving the Guildford coach to play its merry music on the horn in the far distance. And so to Richmond, where we had just one “apricot bowl,” and then home and dinner, and after that we both somehow fell fast asleep (it must have been the air), and when I woke up it was ten o’clock, and the Bard was yawning and trying to make up his mind whether he should go to the Pav., the Tiv., or the ’Bra, to finish up the evening. He eventually decided that he would drop in and smoke a cigar with the excellent Sam Adams at the Troc.

     I am a quiet, domesticated, middle-aged man, who loves to spend his evenings at home with a good book, an affectionate dog, and a nice fat cat in front of the fire. So I let the Bard wander forth into the night alone, with his hat a little on one side and a merry twinkle in his roguish eye. But I took down from my book-case “The Poems of Robert Buchanan,” and, yielding myself up to the poet’s spell, I sat entranced far into the night. And so ended the brief but happy holiday of the Bard and
                                                                                                                                       DAGONET.

___

 

The Referee (10 July, 1892 - p.7)

     It is not often that one sees two distinguished novelists acting together in the evening bill, but in “Ned’s Chum,” Mr. Christie Murray’s successful play at the Globe, both he and his brother, Mr. henry Murray, are at present appearing. Christie Murray made his reputation some time ago, but for Henry Murray this is, I believe, a new departure. As a member of the New Zealand Mounted Police Mr. Henry Murray fairly took the audience by storm, and, though he had only two lines to speak, he made the character stand out in the boldest possible relief. It is not every novelist who can walk about the antipodes in jackboots and spurs and his own moustache with elegance at the first time of asking, but Mr. henry Murray was as much at ease in his big boots as though he had been born in them

     “Novelists and journalists who have taken to the stage” would be by no means a bad subject for a magazine article. It is not generally known that Mr. Robert Buchanan, in addition to having been a theatrical manager, has in his time played many parts in the regular evening bill. Mr. Buchanan made his first appearance as an actor some years ago at the Standard Theatre in a play written by himself, and scored enormously in a low-comedy part. There is a bit of the Admirable Crichton about the Highland minstrel. He could at a pinch write and produce a play, compose the music, paint the scenery, and sustain any male character in it in which “waist” was not an absolute necessity.

     I don’t like to say anything about myself, especially in these times of intense political excitement, when the poll, the whole poll, and nothing but the poll is the cry of a nation in travail; but I myself have been upon the public stage and played a part. My first appearance was at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane, under the management of the present lessee. The play was “Pluck,” written by my old friend Mr. Henry Pettitt, and I had a big scene with poor Harry Jackson. I came on with him in the crowd in the great bank wrecking scene, and he pushed me forward and encouraged me to throw a stone at the plate-glass windows. I threw up the engagement at once because they took the wrong cue for the limelight, and followed me about the stage with it. When I objected to have the limelight on me, I was informed that I should never do for a leading man, and I abandoned the profession for ever.

___

 

The Referee (17 July, 1892 - p.7)

     Last Saturday that ever was one of Britain’s best and bravest Bards lured me away in triumph to Southend-on-Sea. I had been to Southend once before many years ago, but I was unfortunate. I arrived in the middle of a band and banner fète, and as all that I could see over the people’s heads was a few miles of mud and far away beyond reach of the naked eye a small puddle which I was told was the Thames, I fled. Over and over again, when the Bard has begged me to sojourn with him for a while in Southend, I have pleaded my past experience and begged to be excused. But he has always indignantly protested against my view of his favourite seaside resort, declaring that I was prejudiced, and that I had never given the place a fair chance; and so last Saturday I yielded to his persuasions, and with an anxious heart surrendered myself to his guidance, and, placing my hand confidingly in his, allowed him to lead me like a lamb to the slaughter, or rather to Southend-on-Sea.

     I went, I saw, and Southend conquered. Not at first. No, it was a gradual process—a very gradual process indeed. In the first place, when I arrived at the Lyric Club and asked respectfully for the Bard, and while I waited in the hall amused myself by studying “Bradshaw,” I was a little alarmed to find that our particular train took two hours to get from Fenchurch-street to its destination. However, when the Bard came down, beaming in a blue serge suit, a white waistcoat, brown boots, and an enormous cabbage rose, he looked so elated at the idea of a trip to Southend that I didn’t like to offer any remarks of a wet-blankety character. And even when the hall porter, after we had managed to squeeze into a hansom, proceeded to pile on top of us a telescope, a photographic apparatus, a set of golf-sticks, a butterfly net, and the manuscripts of seventeen plays, which the Bard was under contract to finish for managers in various parts of the world by Monday morning; and a set of Indian clubs, without which the Bard, since he has taken to athletics, never stirs from home, I said nothing, although I thought a great deal.

     It was a weary journey to Southend, even after we got through the ’buses and blocks, and found ourselves at that delightfully æsthetic railway-station, Fenchurch-street. We started with a train full of respectable married men taking home salmon and soles and other delicacies of the ocean in rush bags, and we hadn’t been on the road ten minutes before our carriage would have been an excellent understudy for Billingsgate Market on a hot day. But the Bard beamed, and kept thrusting his magnificent head out of window, looking with such eager childlike glee for the first signs of Southend, that still I held my tongue (and my nose) and tried to look as if I was thoroughly enjoying myself. But when I felt something cold dripping down the back of my neck, and, looking up, I discovered that it came from one of the fish-bags deposited in the net above me, I was obliged to utter a word of remonstrance. The gentleman to whom the fish belonged apologised, I am bound to say, in the handsomest manner possible. “Oh, I beg your pardon,” he said; “I forgot I asked them to put a bit of ice in the bag,” and therewith he removed the fish from above my head, and put it on the floor, where it gradually made for itself a small lake and diffused a delicate aroma through the carriage which at once convinced me that the ice was by no means an unnecessary precaution.

     We passed Barking Creek and various other delightful spots upon the Thames, at all of which gentlemen with something nice for Sunday’s dinner alighted, and then we sped onward towards places where a few blades of green grass made a wild struggle to grow through the black earth, while hungry cows (or oxen, or heifers, or bulls, or whatever they were, I never know one from the other) stood patiently waiting for their dinner to appear above the ground. These places, I was informed, were the far-famed Essex marshes. Presently the Bard, who, reckless of coal-dust for the eye, and railway arches for the skull, kept his head steadily out of window, uttered a cry of triumph, and exclaimed, drawing a deep breath, “I can smell it—can’t you?” “Smell what,” said I. “The sea,” said the Bard. I looked reproachfully at the bag of salmon lying on the floor, and I replied, “No, old friend, I can’t; but I can smell the fish!”

     We reached Southend at last. It is only just the other side of London, but we were over two hours getting there, and then declining the courteous offers of several amphibious beings—half sailor, half luggage porter—to carry our impedimenta, we took a fly and steered our course towards the Royal Hotel.

     Here the house was said to be full, but the manager, evidently recognising the world-famous Highland minstrel by his white waistcoat, begged us to wait a while, and he would see what he could do; and presently he signed to us to follow him, and we moved off in a procession of which the following are the details corrected up to date. The manager, going first, and exclaiming at all the dark corners, “Mind the steps!”; two chambermaids, in smiles and snowy caps, with “This way, if you please, sir!” at intervals; the head waiter, with a silver candlestick; your humble servant, with the butterfly net and the telescope; the boots, with the portmanteaux; the boy in buttons, with the photographic apparatus and golf-sticks; two junior waiters, with the seventeen manuscripts of the Bard’s unfinished plays, forty-six acts in all, in a clothes-basket, and in the rear the Bard himself, smiling benignantly upon the world at large and colliding continually in the semi-obscurity and spectacles with protruding dinner-waggons, coalscuttles, sofas, and cases of impossible fish with which it is the fashion in English hotels to furnish any passage which is rather narrow and not too well lighted.

     The manager was determined that we should be accommodated, but it took him some time to arrange. There was one set of rooms let to a very aged couple who couldn’t possibly in the course of nature live very long, but of course we couldn’t wait for them, being due back in London on Monday. Then there were two nice rooms which had been taken by telegram by a gentleman who was coming from Liverpool-street by the Great Eastern Railway, and we pointed out to the manager that there was no saying when he might arrive by that line. There was no doubt that every room was full, and so we all sat down on the luggage on a landing and held a council of war, and an idea suddenly came to the manager. There was a lovely sitting-room and two bed-rooms on the first floor taken by two mathematicians in weak health, who had come down to Southend to work out an abstruse calculation—something to do with the exact distance between the top of the monument and the outer edge of the ring of Saturn. He had guaranteed them absolute quiet and freedom from disturbing influences. Suppose ——

     Five minutes afterwards a boy with a concertina, a lady with a trumpet, and a blind man with one arm and an organ drawn by a fast-trotting donkey, struck up “Ta-ra-ra Boom-de-ay” all together in front of the open window of that sitting-room, and before they had got half through the tune a troop of nigger minstrels, relying for their musical effects principally upon the bones, came hurrying up, and obliged the company with “Knocked ’em in the Old Kent-road,” encouraged by showers of coppers from an upper window of the Royal Hotel. And ten minutes later “the pink sitting-room and Nos. 5 and 17” were vacant, and the Highland Minstrel and the Cockney Caroller were comfortably ensconced beneath the hospitable roof of the Royal Hotel (Limited).

     I got my first view of Southend when the tide was out, and that view was not inspiriting. It consisted mainly of Thames mud, which, though exceedingly healthy in those parts, is apt to grow monotonous. But when the tide came in there was a change of scene worthy the Messrs. Gatti at the Adelphi’s best. It being Saturday night, the wise men (and lads and lasses as well) of the East had come down in their thousands to disport themselves at their favourite watering-place, and the fun was fast and furious; but in five minutes you can leave the shooting galleries, the side shows, the nigger minstrels, the donkey rides, and the razzle dazzles behind, and then all is peaceful and beautiful as a dream. On Saturday evening it was as much as I could do to dissuade the Bard from buying a bucket and a spade, and I had no peace until I had consented to have a donkey-ride with him; but on Sunday he waxed a little more sedate, and took me far away over the beautiful Essex country to Hadleigh Castle, to Rayleigh, to Rochford, and last but not least to Hamlet Court, the beautiful old house where for a year or two he lived a quiet country life, and wrote some beautiful poetry, which the world will never thoroughly let die.

     We had a long moonlight stroll by the water side on Saturday, and when midnight boomed out across the lonely lea I began to feel romantic, and when I saw a far-away look came into the Poet’s eyes and his lips begin to move I made sure that he was composing a beautiful poem, and was going to give me an impromptu specimen of the glorious thoughts that had been born in his brain that night. He turned slowly towards me in all his bardlike beauty, and I frantically sought for a lead pencil in order that I might jot down his observations on my shirt-cuff, and so preserve them to posterity. And then he said, slowly and deliberately, “I wonder if we shall be too late to get any whisky when we get back to the Hotel.”

     I shall have to go to Southend again before I attempt to do it justice. At present I have only space to record the fact that away from the busy corner it is a singularly peaceful and beautiful spot, and that at the busy corner you see more young fathers and mothers and more first babies than at any other seaside place round the coast. We had many pleasant adventures at Southend, and we left at an unearthly hour on Monday morning, the Highland Minstrel in his hurry to catch the train leaving a garment beneath his pillow, and only discovering his carelessness when the Boots of the Royal rushed frantically up the street after him, shouting “Hi, sir! hi! you’ve forgotten this!” while “this,” grasped in Boots’s hand, fluttered bravely in the morning breeze.

*          *         *

     Everybody was at Sandown on Friday, and many inquiries were made for the particular poison on which Orme won the ten thousand for the poor duke in such gallant style. Among the gallant crowd of sportsmen who were wagering wildly on the nod I detected Mr. E. S. Willard, with all his blushing American honours fresh upon him; Mr. Henry Arthur Jones carefully studying character among the bookies, and jotting down Mr. Alec Harris’s remarks in a note-book; Mr. Robert Buchanan, in a new tall hat, Mr. Charles Cartwright, and a strong dramatic contingent. We all cheered wildly for Orme, but we didn’t cheer the duke because we remembered Ormonde.

___

 

The Referee (7 August, 1892 - p.7)

     Clever Mr. Asquith, who lives next door to Robert Buchanan, and owes the Bard a tennis-ball, is to move the vote of no confidence on behalf of the Gladstonians. We know what the Separatists will Asquith, but we don’t know yet what the House will Answerwith.

___

 

The Referee (19 September, 1892 - p.7)

     The cholera scare, so far as London is concerned, is over, but it seems to have caught on pretty severely in New York. It is impossible not to sympathise with the unfortunate passengers on the Atlantic liner who have had such a hostile reception in the land of the brave and the free. Reading about the treatment of the passengers on the ill-fated Normannia, the lively imagination conjures up quite a wonderful vision of what might happen if only this weird American notion were carried to its logical conclusion. One sees a second Flying Dutchman cruising the stormy seas of the world, and seeking in vain for a hospitable shore. Captain Vanderdecken did put into harbour now and then and take a walk on land, or Wagner would never have been able to give him a duet with the fair-haired Senta. But a Flying Dutchman with the cholera on board would be quite another matter is the ideas of the Fire Islanders became general. Driven away from one harbour, the ill-fated vessel would seek another only to meet with the same cry, “You shall not land your passengers.” It is a fascinating idea, and Mr. Robert Buchanan might use it in the second volume of “The Outcasts” which he is shortly to give us. If he wants a little humorous relief, he will always be able to use Miss Lottie Collins, who was on board the Normannia with “Ta-ra-ra Boom-de-ay.”  “Ta-ra-ra Boom-de-ay,”  wandering over the trackless seas of the world and seeking in vain for an opportunity of making itself heard, would bring our Highland minstrel’s new Vanderdecken absolutely up to date.

___

 

The Referee (23 October, 1892 - p.7)

acrostic

The Referee (6 November, 1892 - p.7)

     The bank-note story of the D. T. is excellent. A gentleman, after settling on Monday at one of the sporting clubs, took a cab to the Bank of England to deposit his money. When he got there he found he was a fifty-pound note short. He at once went back to the restaurant where he had lunched, but failed to find the note there. He then went out, hailed a hansom, intending to drive to Scotland-yard, and when he got in, there was the fifty-pound note lying on the seat. He had taken the same hansom in which he had been driven to the bank. A coincidence, certainly, but nothing to some coincidences that have happened to friends of mine.

     The brothers Gatti had a huge dog who used to appear in “Storm-Beaten” at the Adelphi. When the play was over the dog went to the Adelaide Gallery, and was well known at the front door in the Strand. But he had a sore back, and when people patted him on it he would snap. Little boys and artful youths got to know this, and would pat the dog, get bitten, and then send in demands to the Fratelli for compensation. The Fratelli stood it like lambs for a long time, but when claims for life pensions began to come in at the rate of four a day, the illustrious Signor Agostino said to the illustrious Signor Stefano, “Brother, we must find this dog a new home;” so they sent him to a friend who was going to Manchester.

     The dog arrived safely at the station, but when a porter went to take him out he suddenly managed to snap his chain and fled. Some time afterwards “Storm Beaten” started on a tour round the provinces. The first town it was played at was Manchester. On Monday morning the company arrived and went straight to the theatre. They rehearsed, and just as they got to the place where the dog comes on, a huge Mount St. Bernard dashed through the stage door and on to the boards. It was the lost dog. He must have been wandering about Manchester, and seen that “Storm Beaten” was going up, and he immediately offered himself for his old part.

     This is quite true. Either of the Brothers Gatti will tell you so if you ask them. But you will say this is only a dog story—where does the coincidence come in?  I will tell you. People began to pat his sore back again, and the result was that, as he had the Messrs. Gatti’s name and address on his collar, claims for compensation soon began to arrive by every post at the Adelaide Gallery. The brothers were dumfounded. They hadn’t heard of the dog for a week. The friend hadn’t told them of the loss, fearing they would be worried about it. They telegraphed down to the manager of the provincial company, asking if it was true that the dog was there and biting people. The manager wired back yes, the dog was—but he thought the Gattis knew it. More astonishment at the Adelaide Gallery, and an investigation, and at last the mystery was solved. The manager had actually written to the Gattis asking them if they would send their dog down to take his old part two days before the dog walked in of his own accord, and everybody presumed he had been delivered at the stage door by a porter. I think this is quite as wonderful as the story of the bank-note.

___

 

The Referee (8 January, 1893 - p.7)

     Bard Buchanan’s “The Wandering Jew—a Christmas Carol” is a splendid piece of work, but it touches on rather dangerous ground, and, less skilfully and reverently handled, might have shocked a good many people. To present the Founder of Christianity wandering belated about modern London on Christmas Eve and entering into confidential conversation with the Bard himself is bringing the sacred story “up to date” with a vengeance. Yet never for a moment does this wild, weird, daring fantasy border on the blasphemous.

     Mr. Buchanan is so bold and vigorous a writer, and so generally fearless when he grips the pen—he is so given to sitting down to his desk with a war-whoop, that one cannot but marvel at the self-restraint which he has exercised in “The Wandering Jew.” It is quite a new trait in his character. When some time ago, one summer’s evening, as we lingered by the sea and talked of more things than are dreamt of in your philosophy, Horatio, he mentioned the subject of this poem to me, and spoke of it with bated breath. I fancied from what he told me that he was going to bring the central figure of Christianity face to face with everyday scenes of modern life, and I thought it was a magnificent idea, and that Robert Buchanan was the one poet of our day who could handle it firmly and yet delicately. He has done so, but the result would have been even more striking had he felt sufficient confidence in his powers to bring the Founder of Christianity face to face with the men, the manners, and the life of the capital of Christian England at the end of the nineteenth century.

     A deeply religious man who had also the faculty of poetic expression might, without a touch of irreverence, imagine for us the gentle Nazarene of whom we so diligently profess to be the devout followers contemplating a meeting of the Salvation Army, a great debate in the House of Commons, a popular race meeting, a fashionable wedding, a great prize-fight, a Society function, a tame-deer hunt, a general election, a meeting of the unemployed, a music-hall entertainment, a performance of Ibsen at the Independent Theatre, or a fancy fair held under the immediate patronage of the clergy. We know what the carpenter’s son thought of the manners and customs of his own day; we know in what simple and direct language He held forth to his followers, making every little incident of everyday life an object-lesson in faith and morality; is it blasphemous to ask ourselves what the Founder of Christianity would think of the faith He founded after it had stood the wear and tear of nineteen centuries? We read and reverence what He thought of Jerusalem nearly two thousand years ago; might we not, without irreverence, try and imagine what He would think of London to-day?

     Here, surely, is a noble task for a great poet who has not only deep religious feeling, but a knowledge of the world. And yet, perhaps, the boldest singer might well shrink from touching such a mighty theme. No honest Christian could believe for a moment that our modern civilisation is in harmony with the teaching of the New Testament. The farther we advance along the road of what we are pleased to call civilisation, the farther we leave Christianity behind us. The eyes of Truth that look out over the world to-day can see Christ but as a dim, receding figure barely outlined in the far-off haze, and in years to come of the faith He founded only the legend will remain.

     We shall hand that legend down for centuries yet to come; we shall call ourselves Christians, and we shall make it our boast that we follow the Christian faith. But we shall do nothing of the sort—we have ceased to do so already. If we were true Christians, following in the letter and spirit the gospel of Christ, we could not continue for a single day to tolerate the methods, the environments, or the consequences of our modern civilisation. We have only to imagine Christ a living presence in our midst to-day—to think of Him taking once again the form of man and mixing as freely with the inhabitants of London as he did with those of Jerusalem—to see how utterly opposed to His doctrines much that we accept as “Christian” to-day has already become.

___

 

The Referee (9 July, 1899 - p.11)

dagdreyfusthumb

The Referee (27 May, 1900 - p.11)

     Peacocks’ feathers came down in price for the second night of St. Pancras Carnival. “Two a penny ticklers” was the cry of the hawkers who lined the streets. One merchant, finding trade slack towards midnight, christened them

Old Kruger’s Touch ’em Ups,”

and offered them for the price that a single one cost on Mafeking Night. The “tickler” is an improvement on the squirt filled with dirty water and known in the trade as “All the jolly fun” or “Get your own back,” but after being tickled with them in the ear, on the top of the nose, on the back of the neck, and on the cheek for three hours without a moment’s cessation on Friday I fled from the scene of the carnival and sat down in a quiet corner and rubbed my face for twenty minutes. The tickling and the catch phrase

They’re There

repeated by everybody, everywhere, every half-minute, got on my nerves and broke them down.

     The St. Pancras Carnival was a great show. It was in many ways artistic, it was certainly effective, and the armoured trains were a dramatic finish to the “four miles” of procession. The behaviour of the crowd while the big show was passing was admirable. But for all that I hope that the

Peacocks’ Feather Nose-Ticklers

will not be permanently popular. If there is anything in the superstition, ill-luck must have been carried into thousands of homes this week. I am a firm believer in the evil influence of the peacocks’ feather. I could give dozens of instances from my personal knowledge. It is probably because the feather is unlucky that it has been put on the streets as a cheap weapon of assault for jubilations, Bank Holidays, and carnivals.

     In this week’s “Sphere” there is a short story, “The Peacocks’ Feather,” by Robert Buchanan. The dramatic author whose identity Mr. Buchanan thinly veils is the late Charles Reade. Reade had

Two Plays Wrecked,

as he believed, by peacocks’ feathers being used on the stage. Some years ago a drama was in rehearsal at a West End house. The scenes were not set until the dress rehearsal. To everyone’s horror it was then discovered that the artist had painted some peacocks’ feathers over the mantelpiece in a farmhouse interior. The author instantly turned to the artist and exclaimed, “Whether this play is

Good, Bad, or Indifferent,

those feathers have settled it. It will be a dead failure.” The prognostication proved absolutely correct. If Mr. William Telbin, the celebrated scenic artist, were appealed to, he would doubtless remember the incident. He was the artist. But you must not conclude

Because I Tell The Story

that the author was——[But if you did conclude you would be right.—EDITOR.]——
                                                                                                                                             DAGONET.

___

 

The Referee (28 October, 1900 - p.9)

     It was with the greatest regret that I learned of the serious illness of my old friend and collaborator, Mr. Robert Buchanan. All of us who have known and loved “the Bard” hope sincerely he may be spared to the world for many years. By a curious coincidence, this evening, at the Little Portland-street Chapel, Regent-street, the Rev. H. S. Perris will deliver a lecture on “Robert Buchanan and the Shadow of the Sword.” And this lecture was announced many weeks ago.

___

 

The Referee (16 June, 1901 - p.1)

     “It is good to be alive,” I said to myself last Monday as I breathed the clear, exhilarating air and strode along the sunny street. Suddenly my eyes fell upon the newspaper placards:

“Death of Lord Wantage.
“Death of Sir Walter Besant.
“Death of Robert Buchanan.”

Two of the great dead were my intimate friends of many years, men with whom I had spent some of the happiest days of my life.

     Once, long years ago, Robert Buchanan. then a stranger to me, sent me a charming and sympathetic letter. He drew my attention to an article be bad written in the “Contemporary,” in which he had said many kindly things of the “Dagonet Ballads,” which were written for the REFEREE in its early days. Years afterwards I was associated with the poet-playwright on a series of dramas. and there commenced a friendship and close companionship which relieved the monotony of toil with many bright and happy hours.

     As a mattes of fact, only his most intimate friends knew

The Real Robert Buchanan,

for only those who saw him and heard him when the pan was laid aside knew what a world of gentle pity and human sympathy lay concealed under the rugged exterior of this literary Crusader. Men who did not know him hated him; men who knew him loved him. I have seen him soothe the grief of a strong man with the tenderness of a woman. I have known him, when the world was ringing with his fierce attacks upon a great reputation, take a poor brother of the pen by the hand and succour him with a delicacy that was a lesson in Christian charity.

     When he fought he never pinked with the rapier. He brought the claymore crashing down upon his antagonist’s skull. Of some of his furious attacks on public men he repented. But while he was fighting he always believed that his cause was just, and that the enemy was a villain. He was always St. George, and the other party was always the Dragon, whose destruction was demanded in the interests of the community.

     Speaking of him elsewhere I have said that he worked in the clouds and came down to Mother Earth for his relaxation. Sometimes the change in his mood was almost grotesque. I left him one night absorbed

In a Poet’s Dream of a New Redemption,

and met him the next morning backing horses with a Bank Holiday crowd at Kempton Park. I have seen him lost in an almost tearful ecstasy as the twilight descended on one of Nature’s solitudes, and I have sat by his side as he roared at the antics of a music-hall knockabout. Soon after he had written those wondrous lines in which a voice from Heaven called him by name as he wandered over Hampstead Heath at eventide, he was masquerading at Covent Garden in the black gown and hood of a Brother of the Misericordia.

     I have read what has been written of him now that he is dead. There is a good deal of

The Four Cross-Roads Interment

about his obituary notices. I think his failings have been emphasised and his virtues slurred. Many of his critics deny him greatness and belittle his genius. But since the giants of poetry fell, where has there been one who touched a nobler harp? That be occasionally laid it aside to brawl with rival Bards in no way alters the quality of the music that he made.

___

 

A memorial to Robert Buchanan was erected over his grave and there was an unveiling ceremony in 1903. George Sims did attend but did not linger, so here’s the relevant extract and the link will take you to the rest of his account of his visit to Southend.

The Referee (2 August, 1903 - p.11)

     Last week I went to Southend-on-Sea to assist at the unveiling of

The Memorial to Robert Buchanan.

Mr. T. P. O’Connor, who, with Miss Harriett Jay, performed the ceremony, delivered a sympathetic address which dealt largely with the tragic side of Buchanan’s life story. After the address I slipped away, for I wanted to get back to London under favourable circumstances. I have travelled from Southend to London late on Saturday night twice. That is sufficient for any many who likes to choose his own company and his own musical entertainment.

___

 

The Referee (26 September, 1909 - p.11)

     In the days when Robert Buchanan lived at Maresfield-gardens, Mr. Asquith was his next-door neighbour, and the poet’s principal garden occupation on a summer’s afternoon was throwing back the ball that young Master Asquith has hit with misdirected energy. Many a time and oft would a bright young face appear above the garden wall what time the Bard was musing in metre, and a cheery voice would exclaim, “Please will you give me my ball?” The poet would go foraging among his flowers till he found it. Then he would hand it back with a merry twinkle in his Highland eyes.
     I always smile when I give back the balls that come over into the private enclosure in which I take my daily exercise, but there has arrived in my neighbourhood a cloud which occasionally ruffles the consistent calmness of my brow.

Diabolo

has reappeared, and the children who play it are not all experts. I say nothing of having, when in the park, to jump aside every now and then to avoid the crown of my hat being smashed in by a spool descending from a giddy height. But I did resent being shouted at the other afternoon through my study window in the following terms: “Please, Sir, my diabolo’s lodged on your roof. Will you go up and throw it down to me?”

___

 

Finally,two more accounts of visits to Southend in the ‘Mustard and Cress’ column. Both contain brief mentions of Robert Buchanan, so I’ve added those extracts here, and have added links to the complete pages.

The Referee (26 June, 1910 - p.13)

     I was at Southend just after Buchanan Day had been celebrated in the sunny churchyard where the poet sleeps his dreamless sleep. When I visited the grave I found it covered with beautiful wreaths freshly laid there by friends and admirers who cherished the poet’s memory.

Robert Buchanan

lived for some time at Southend at Hamlet Court, which was at one time the residence of Edwin Arnold, who gave us “The Light of Asia.” In the years gone by I spent more than one pleasant week-end with Robert Buchanan at Southend. We wrote a portion of “The English Rose” there, and it was he who first showed me the beauties of the Essex country.

     Last week, when I was at the Palace Hotel, I had planned two excursions—one across the sunny stretch of water and by the estuary of the Medway to Dickens land, and the other to Canvey Island, of which Buchanan was never tired of talking. But the Fates willed it otherwise, and I had to return to town. But I am going to make another motor trip to the Essex shore directly, and this time I mean to get to Canvey Island.

___

 

The Referee (31 March, 1912 - p.13)

     I paid a pious pilgrimage to the grave of my ever-regretted companion and collaborator, Robert Buchanan, who lies with those he loved best on earth—his young wife and his gentle, white-haired mother—in the little churchyard by the sea. Ah, me! How long it seems since he and I wandered the bright wonder-way of life together!

_____

 

Back to Buchanan and the Press

 

Home
Biography
Bibliography

 

Poetry
Plays
Fiction

 

Essays
Reviews
Letters

 

The Fleshly School Controversy
Buchanan and the Press
Buchanan and the Law

 

The Critical Response
Harriett Jay
Miscellanea

 

Links
Site Diary
Site Search