plied to take people through the flood. Most houses have
had their cellars full of water, and Sabbatarian Cambridge
had to work all Sunday as if it were a week-day."

This summer an incident occurred, the recollection of
which always afforded the greatest amusement to Mrs. J. The
troupe of the Comedie Fran^aise (among them J.'s great
friend Delaunay) was acting in London, and J. of course
went to most of their performances. Now J., as is well known,
never took the faintest interest in any form of sport, except
hunting. Consequently he was rather nonplussed w^hen
Delaunay asked to be taken to a cricket match. Nothing
daunted, however, J. carried him off to " Lord's " to see the
Oxford and Cambridge match. Those who sat near them
were much amused at J.''s efforts in his fluent French to explain
the game of cricket (of which he was profoundly ignorant) to
his P'rench friend.

In the summer of the following year (1880) J. and Mrs. J.,

^ British public.



i^o y, in his T^rime

accompanied by Mr. Lionel Cust, went to see the Ober
Ammergau Passion Play. Mr. Cust has described their tour
in Chapter X.

In 1880 J. commenced his official connection with the
Cambridge Amateur Dramatic Club, commonly known as the
A.D.C., of which he had been elected an honorary member
as far back as 1861. In 1880 the club celebrated the 25th
anniversary of its foundation by a dinner, at which the Prince
of Wales, afterwards King Edward the Seventh, presided,
followed by a very successful performance in the Club Theatre.
Unfortunately the social and dramatic successes of the evening
were somewhat marred by the consequent financial disasters,
the deficit amounting to over <£200. At a General Meeting
of the Club to consider what should be done it was decided
to have a permanent Graduate Treasurer. On the proposition
of the Hon. J. Wallop, seconded by Mr, Chisendale-Marsh,
J. was elected to the post, which he held till 1901, when he
handed over the accounts into the capable hands of Mr. Walter
Durnford. He was then elected Perpetual Vice-President,
and in that capacity remained on the Committee until his
death. Though J.'s life-long devotion to the stage made
all he did for the A.D.C. a labour of love, still his services
to the Club were many and varied. As far back as 1870 he
saved the Club from threatened suppression by the authorities.
He personally interviewed tutors of colleges and drafted the
rules under which they consented to countenance the continued
existence of the Club. In 1882 he arranged as Treasurer
for the purchase of the Club Rooms and pledged his private
credit to enable the scheme to be carried through. Twice J.
appeared in the role of author, and at all times he was ready
to give his assistance whether as Stage Manager in the Theatre
or as private coach in his house, as scene-painter, as prompter,
or as property man. lint it must never be forgotten that
everything he did for the A. B.C. he did in a simple and
unostentatious way. As Mr. Tatham writes in his article in
the Fasciculus : " Mr. Clark's influence is not to be looked for




-v^^



(t T "



J



Circa 1880

â–  photogi.



l.«.'tU



. . f'OTTl â–  '.^

nown as the

iary member

ir back a nrated the 25 th

versary ol r, at wbi'ch the Pniiv;>^

''3S, afterwards : enth, presided,

u' Club Theatre.

^ of the evening

.ncial disasters,

eneral Meeting

â– â– '- ^ 'i! ue uone it was decided

' "ive -^ r. On the proposition

«»f the ! ., .vir. Chisendale-Marsh,

J- ^^'35 V:,. h^!d till 1901, when he

li" ^ ;j hands of ^,Tr. Walter

Ti\n'\ then elected P'-rpetual ident.

Committee until his

devotion to the stage made

*^1 *' 'ir of love, still his services

to tl i varied. As far back as 1870 he

eatened si
ed tut





burer




iiib private




.. Twice; J.




,.. M , ready


—


- -leatre


•jue-pa'


ionipter,


never


ten that




iple and




iu




»r




\







(.(. T "



J

Circa 1880



From a photograph by A. G. Dew-Smith, M. A.



The ^.D.C, 131

in written records, for it has always been quiet and unassuming.
Its strength will be found in the recollection of those who
have known him and its success in the life and prosperity
of the Club."

The following letter from Mrs. J.'s graphic pen to her
eldest sister, Mrs. Maxwell Fox, recalls vividly what many
must remember in an A.D.C. week or a Greek-play week
at 1 Scroope Terrace and afterwards at Scroope House.
At such times all the resources of the establishment were
put at the disposal of the actors; the house and often
J.''s rooms at the Museum were packed with scenery, pro-
perties, costumes, etc. Everyone caught the enthusiasm,
and everyone behaved as if the fate of the University,
if not of the Universe, depended on the success of the
play. Yet a friend who arrived in the midst of all the
confusion and excitement remembers going round the garden
with J. to cut flowers for the dinner table and finding him
amongst his many other avocations busy making a cross to
send to one of his assistants at the Museum who had lost a
child and was burying it that afternoon. This was charac-
teristic of his never-failing thoughtfulness in little things which
so endeared him to his friends of all degrees : —



'O'



1 Scroope Terrace,

\7th November 1881.

"I must send you a playbill, by which you will see the
names at any rate of the actors. Delicate Ground had
to be left out of the performance last night, as when it
was played the first night the curtain did not fall till
after 12 o^clock !— by which hour all the men ought to be
in College ! The omission is rather hard on M. Beylard,
who had taken a great deal of trouble with his part.
The School for Scandal was a wonderful success, especi-
ally — marvellous to say — the Lady Teazle, played by a
young fellow called Manners who has only lately joined
the Club. He really looked a lovely girl in the becom-
ing costume of the time : blue satin train over white



132 y> in his T?^ime



satin, embroidered with pearls, and large blue satin hat.
I lent him my Saint Esprit as an ornament ! We had
a comic scene on the Monday, when both Mrs. Candour
and Lady Teazle appeared here to request me to have
their petticoats lengthened for them. The variety of
good offices one performs in Cambridge social life is very
amusing : one day to lend my bed-table to a man whom
I never heard of before but who had been disabled at
football, the next to turn dressmaker to the A.D.C. — To
return to Lady Teazle : she had the advantage of a small
figure and a soft voice, but what surprised one more
was her grace of movement and gesture in the drawinof-
room scenes and the real pathos to which she rose after
the screen falls, and the contrast is brought home to
her between her husband and her so-called lover. I hear
that she is proud (and justly so) of the smallness both
of her waist and feet. Agnes ^ and I are going again
to-morrow afternoon, when Delicate Ground will also
be plaved. Mr. Milner Gibson as Mrs. Candour was
very amusing, and gave the proper emphasis to the old
scandal-monger''s — ' they do say,' etc. I hope you are
interested in this rather long story, but you know the
A.D.C. is a great event in our quiet annual chronicle.
I was rather provoked not to have been present last
nis^ht when J. was called before the curtain and received
quite an ovation. He quite deserved it, for he has worked
hard at the scenery, and thanks to him and Mr. 0"'Connor,^
who said he would have returned to scene-painting for
no one else but J., it was quite charming with all the
accessories of costume and furniture as perfect as they
could be made. It is true that we have hardlv enoup-h
chairs to seat our guests at dinner — all our Chippendale
dining-room chairs having migrated to the A.D.C, and
most of tlie Louis Quinze chairs in the drawing-room,
ditto ! but one must make these little sacrifices gladly
where the drama is concerned. After the performance
on Wednesday we went to supper at Mr. Mihier Gibson"'s
— the Mrs. Candour of the play. Here comes Willy :
' Mamma, something dreffnl has happened : Toby has
fallen down and broke his back leg ! "" I am relieved
to find that Toby is a china dog in which Willy invested

' .Miss Allies Mellish, cousin of Mrs. J.
* The well-known sceue-paiuter.



The Paris Mail 133

at the bazaar and added to what he calls his ' maggery ""
of beasts."

Early in 1881 J. had a very unpleasant experience in the
Paris mail, an account of which he published in the Pall
Mall Gazette. Here is his narrative addressed to Mrs J. : —

Hotel St. Romain, Rue St. Roch,

\_Wednesday ,^ Idth January 1881.

" I hope you have not been anxious about not hearing
from me. I couldn't write, and I couldn't telegraph, at
least not till to-day, your cause. I left London on Monday
evening by the mail, and reached this this morning at 3 a.m.,
having been thirty-one hours en route! May I never have
such an experience again ! First, we were late in getting
to Dover, having to stop frequently to test the soundness
of the wheels owing to the frost, then the passage took
three hours instead of one and a half, because first it was
exceedingly rough, secondly, the company had chosen to
put on one of their oldest and smallest boats, and thirdly
because from sheer laziness they did not put the luggage
into the hold at starting. After half an hour's kicking
about it got loose, a heavy sea having struck the vessel,
and we had to heave to en pleine mer to put it down. Of
course it all got wet, and it's a mercy it was not washed
into the sea. I remained on my back in the cabin, and
slept a good deal, but had the passage lasted fifteen
minutes more I should have been ill like most of the
others. We left Calais at 2 a.m. an hour late, and at 4.15
came to a sudden stop. The engine was too weak, and
the driver too cowardly to face the snow, for as a train
passed us ])resently going down, there was evidently no
reason for his stopping when he did. It was blowing a
hurricane; the gusts shook the carriage, and the snow
penetrated through the chinks and crannies, and lay in
heaps in the corners. No one came to tell us where we
were, or offer any consolation. When day broke we woke
up, five of us, two Frenchmen and three English, and
conversed wearily till eight, when Papa's curiosity induced
him to leave the carriage and seek the guard's van. I
could hardly stand for the wind, nor see for more than a
yard for the mist of snow. Two engines had been sent
up from Etaples, but they could not move us, and the



134 y* ^^^ ^^^ T^rime



men said we might be there for any length of time. This
was pleasant. At about 10.30 a peasant brought us
some milk and bread, and sugar (blessed man). At 12
the storm cleared a bit, and we found that there was a
big drift ahead of us, filling all the shallow cutting in
which we were. A few peasants were working away at
our end, and we could see more at the opposite end
doing the same. But alas ! the snow and wind began
again in a few minutes, and they had to stop work. At
last at 2 P.M. the weather really cleared up, and we could
see a villao;e at no orreat distance. Thither we determined
to repair, especially as the Conducteur declared that we
should probably not be able to move till noon to-day. So
we set off across the snow, and found a decent Public
where Madame made us excellent soup with bread in it.
We were told that the cure would take us in, so we set
off for his house. On our way we met his servant, coming
to bid us welcome. We found the cure a delightful
fellow, with a fine frank countenance and evidently a
strong taste for hospitality, for he was laying the cloth
and setting the table with his own hands, and dispensing
wine to his guests who had already arrived. By 4 p.m.
the dinner was ready, when, just as we were going to sit
down, the officials of the post attached to the train came
up to say the line was clear and that go we must. It was
very provoking, but we thought we ought to go, so after
a glass or two of excellent champagne, and a mouthful of
bread, off we set. We found that a detachment of soldiers
had been sent off from Abbeville and had done much
already towards clearing the line, and that a big engine
was expected every moment to complete the work. It was
a grand sight to see the great machine, covered with iron
plates, come tearing through the drifts, and pile them up
on each side. Then a fire was liorhted under our wretched
engine, to thaw it, and being made fast to the other, we
started at last, at 5.15. We reached Amiens, going slowly,
at 8.45, where we got an excellent dinner, and then started
for Paris at 9. '30. The company thought proper to attach
second and third class carriages to our train, so that we
stopped frequently, and finally reached Paris at 3 a.m. I am
rather tired, but have not caught cold, strange to relate."

J. always felt certain that he missed a very succulent repast



Le Tuy 135

on this occasion, and used to tell the story of, I believe, this
same cure, who elicited from his housekeeper in Confession
that she had stolen a partridge for her own consumption out
of his larder. "Comment Pas tu done mange, ma fille?" he
demanded. " Je Tai mange froid, mon pere." "" Si encore tu
en avait fait un salmi ! "

In the spring of 1882 J. made an excursion into the centre
of France, Clermont Ferrand, the Puj-de-D6me, Mont Dore,
Le Puy, etc. I have only room to quote one letter to his
wife, describing the last-named place : —

Hotel de L'Europe, Le Puy, Thursday.

"... This is the most wonderful place I have ever seen
in all my travels. Imagine a wide amphitheatre of hills,
covered with verdure, then in the middle a huge rock,
some 600 feet higli,^ crowned by a colossal statue of the
Virgin, and on a sort of step half-way up, the Cathedral,
below which are the houses and steep streets of the old
town. At a lesser distance from this rock there is a
second, not so high, but far steeper, up which you climb
by stairs. On the top is a Church dedicated to St.
Michael. The modern town is in the plain below. The
Cathedral is very fine, a Romanesque choir and transepts,
with a nave which has twice been added to. You go up
to the west door by a flight of steps, which conducted to
the oldest facade, and when they wanted to lengthen it
they had to increase the space available by throwing
arches over these steps, so that you now walk up under
lofty arcades, and finally land in the Church at a little
east of the middle of the Nave. The style is very curious.
The squares into which the nave is divided are each
covered by a dome, like St. Mark's, all of stone; and
outside a vei'y pretty eff'ect of colour is produced by
alternating the grey lava with white stone."

The terrible tragedy of Frank Balfour's death in the Alps,
towards the end of July 1882, overwhelmed J., as indeed it
overwhelmed all Balfour's friends. During the thirty years

1 My recollection is that J. here rather oversteps the reality and that
his description is a little too highly coloured.



136 y. in his Trime



wliich have since elapsed Cambridge has lost many men of
the highest distinction, but never, in my experience, has the
University shown evidence of suffering from so irretrievable,
so crushing a blow. It was not only that Balfour was leading
the world in his special subject, nor was it alone his intellectual
gifts which attracted around him the best men of his day, but it
was the fact that he had in the highest degree that indefinable
(juality, charm. He won all our hearts, and his kindness and
thought for others was ceaseless. I have heard that he
had given up deer-stalking, his favourite sport, and taken to
Alpine climbing, because he had a feeling that it was hardly
right to kill deer just for the sake of sport. It is characteristic
of him that a few days before the accident he had sent a
cheque for £\50 to one of his brothers, "to be given to the
guide's family in case of an accident, which, however, is
extremely improbable.*" Mrs. J. was away from home, and
J. wrote the sad news to her as follows : —

1 ScROOPE Terrace, Cambridge,
28/-d July 1882.

"7 P.M. — All other matters have been put completely
out of my mind by a terrible piece of news which has just
reached us. Frank Balfour has been taken away from us
by an accident of some sort — unexplained — in the Alps,
)iear Courmayeur. This is all that can be extracted from
a telegram which was sent to the Master this after-
noon. I was crossing the court at 6.30 when I met
Watts, the head man in the College office, who told me
of it. . . .

" 1 can't realise that Frank is gone in the least. I
suppose it will come upon me more acutely to-morrow.""

There are many other letters from and to J. during these
sad days, but they are too sacred to quote. J.'s sympathy
especially went out to Michael Foster, who had done so much
to help Balfour in every way, and whose favourite pupil Balfour
was, and again to Adam Sedgwick, Balfour's Demonstrator,
who for many months was absolutely crushed by the blow.



Fra?ik T^alfour 137

" I feel I must see all I can of Adam, and try and keep him
from moping," J. writes in a letter to his wife.

In the autumn there was a large and influential meeting
in the Lecture Room of Zoology and Comparative Anatomy
to discuss a memorial to Balfour. The University was well
represented. Professor Henry Smith came from Oxford,
Professor Huxley and Professor Ray Lankester from London,
and Professor Williamson from Manchester. Many eloquent
speeches were made, and these were afterwards got together
by J. in a pamphlet. I quote a few lines of Professor
Humphry's speech : —

" One could scarcely yet realise that he who had shown so
great love for the large subjects of his own work and so great
ability in solving its difficulties ; he who might be called the
teacher of Europe in his own particular subject ; . . . should
have passed away before attaining anything like maturity ;
that he who had shown his attachment to this University,
and had clung to it in spite of the alluring attractions of
Edinburgh and Oxford, clung to it by virtue of his attach-
ment to the place, to his friends, and, above all, to the man
who had brought him forward, who had encouraged him in
every effort — he meant to Dr. Michael Foster; — that he had
been swept away from them by the treacherous precipices of
an Alpine gorge. Again he would say, one could scarcely
realise it. But alas! so it was, and, so far as he could judge,
Cambridge had had, in his time, no greater loss, though its
losses had been great and heavy. Whewell, Sedgwick, Hens-
low, Maxwell and many others had passed away, but he be-
lieved that never had there been in his time, or perhaps at any
preceding time, such a loss to Cambridge as that of Balfour."

It was agreed to found a fund to commemorate the name
of Balfour, and Mr. Alfred Newton, Professor of Zoology and
Comparative Anatomy, moved this resolution : —

" That the proceeds of the Fund be applied : (1) to establish
a Studentship, the holder of which shall devote himself
to original research in Biology, especially Animal



138 y» 171 his T^riine

Morphology ; (2) to further, by occasional grants of
money, original research in the same subject."

J. was, as usual, appointed treasurer, and told the meeting
that he would inaugurate his office by stating that the family
of the late Professor Balfour had expressed their intention of
giving H^SOOO to the memorial, to which sum Dr. Michael
Foster proposed to add X-'IOOO, which Professor Balfour had
bequeathed to him for any scientific purpose to which he
might think proper to apply it. There was, therefore, .f 4000
in hand to start with.

In the October Term of 1882 the first Greek Play, the A^ax
(the genesis of which Mr. Cust has described elsewhere), was
performed, and J. served on the Committee as Secretary and
Treasurer. Not only did he hold these offices until his death,
but he was also the Stage Manager of five plays, i.e. Kumenides^
1885; (Edlpus Tyrannus, 1887; /on, 1889; Wasps, 1897;
and Agamemnon, 1900. Even this does not exhaust the list
of J.'s activities in respect of Greek Plays. In the earlier
productions not only were the dresses made and fitted on in
J.'s house, but the tickets were balloted for there. On
17th November 1885, Mrs. J. records, '■'• Eumenides ballot for
tickets went on from 11.30 a.m. to 11.30 p.m.," and when the
performances began she notes that on the first three days they
asked 19 people to luncheon, 21 to dinner, and 30 to supper.
On the last two days of the performances she seems to have
stopped trying to count the number of their guests !

This year Mrs. Clark, senior, and J. presented Trinity
College with a bust of Professor Clark, and gave a replica of it
to the Museum of Zoology. The following year J, began to
write a series of sketches of Cambridge men for the Church
Qua7ierli/ Review. They ultimately included Bishop Thirlwall,
Dr. Whewell, E. H. Palmer the Orientalist, and Lord Houghton;
these with others were republished in 1900 under the title of
Old Friends at Cambridge ami Elsewhere. jMost were vivid
sketches drawn from life, and were illustrated from J.'s



fAntiquariaiJ Interests 139

almost inexhaustible fund of knowledge of the inner life of the
University. He was also responsible for the Catalogue of the
very interesting exhibitions of University and College portraits
held in the Fitzwilliam Museum in the May terms of 1884 and
1885. J. had in 1883 been invited to serve on the council of
the Oxford Historical Society, and gratefully accepted the invita-
tion. The same year he became President of the Cambridge
Antiquarian Society and was re-elected in 1884. During his
tenure of office the University provided " a place in which we
can hold our meetings," and the Society made over, under
certain conditions, its collections and its library to the Univer-
sity. As J. most truly said when laying down the offiqe in
1885, "In securing Baron Anatole von Hiigel as Cui'ator, we
have obtained the services of a gentleman in whom knowledge
and enthusiasm are happily blended." He also referred to the
wonderful casts of sculptured stone-work from Central America
which Mr. Maudslay was giving the University, and to the
collections of Sir Arthur Gordon.^ It was only in 1912 that
by the indefatigable efforts of Baron von Hiigel these collections
were at length adequately housed. J.'s retiring address was
on Libraries.

In January 1888 he was admitted to the Fellowship of the
Society of Antiquaries, a distinction he really valued.

In 1887 Mr. Coutts Trotter, Vice-Master of Trinity,
died. He had for years been a great power in the University,
and had taken an active share with J. and many others in
developing the Science School. At the time of his death he
was President of the Cambridge Philosophical Society, and J.
was chosen to succeed him. During his term of office J. read
a paper on the skeleton of the Rhytina, Steller''s sea-cow from
Bering Island, now an extinct genus of the rare order Sirenia,
which he had recently acquired for the Museum of Zoology.
In his valedictory address when retiring from office in 1890
J. gave a detailed and exhaustive history of the Society, and
from this I have drawn in the last two chapters of this book.
^ Later tlie first Lord Staumore.



14.0 y, 171 his Tri



rime

On 2nd March 1883, Mrs. J. records in her diary : " House
upside down, preparing for the first dinner given by J. to
the ' Family.' " This is a select and very ancient dining club
which in those days still drank to the "King over the water,"
i.e. the finger-bowls. J., when I became a member of the
club, acted as Secretary and most carefully preserved the
menus and the names of those dining.

The summer of 1884 was very hot, and the heat markedly
affected the health of J.'s mother ; and it was soon definitely
settled that he and his family should move into Scroope
House to look after her. The following entry occurs in Mrs.
J.'s diary on 4th March 1885: "Slept for the first time at
Scroope House." Mrs. Clark, senior, was growing old and was,
I believe, glad to hand over the management of her household,
always to her a matter of some difficulty, into younger hands.
It was about this time that I used to go from time to time to
Scroope House to play backgammon with her, and although I
doubt if she ever quite clearly understood who I was, she was
uncommonly quick with the dice and held firmly to " the rigour
of the game." J. was then, as ever, an enthusiastic gardener,