Punch (98.1890)

January 11, 1890.]

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

21

STATESMEN AT HOME.

DCXLI. Earl Granville, K.G., at Walmer Castle.

-i.i

(Us

S you step out of the railway carriage
that has brought you at leisurely
speed to Deal, you cannot help
thinking of another arrival that,
at the time, created even more

you both arrive at the same town!

As you walk down Beach Street,
reading the Commentaries, which
you have brought down in your
coat-tail x>ocket, you recognise the
"plain and open shore" which
jC^Sts^''*^^ JLUJmJ Cjssar describes as being reached

«iz__- after passing the cliffs of Dover.

Here he landed, now many years ago, and your host who, eager for your coming,
even now stands on the top of the great round tower that dominates his castle-
home, can look upon the very spot on which the Conqueror stepped ashore.
Presently he takes you to see the marks of the intrenchment, plainly visible to
this day. With heightened colour and dramatic gesture the belted Earl tells
nc!w> on the fourth night after the arrival of the Roman fleet, that great storm
which ever comes to Britain's aid in Buch emergencies, arose, wrecking j. Cesar's
g i??tst' an<* driving them far up the shingly beach.

n 5 ^at 's to De done now ? " Cjssas's quartermaster asked.
Done?" said j. Cesar in the colloquial Latin of the day. " Why, haul
the fleet up on to the beach."

anil ° bought the ships ashore ; Cesar intrenched them within a camp,
na remained there till the weather improved. Your host presses upon your
acceptance a handful of soil from the tumuli.

PTai-.fSiV ot may nave pressed it," he says, as you, with a perhaps
to tarn ™ apPearanoe of pleasurable interest, pocket the dust, being careful
your homewwd inswe out as soon as you are beyond sight of the castle on

fi nrf l™^3^0111 vrdh UP abruptly under the shadow of the antient castle, you
Jpp^wff profress stopped by a fosse, across which is haughtily flung
a sixteenth-century drawbridge. Hhsi the Eighth, in a rare moment of
leisure from domestic affairs, built Walmer Castle for the defence of the coast.
\ ou are much struck with the architectural design, which resembles in some
degree a mass of blancmange turned out of a mould. Four round lunettes of
stone, wearily worked by bands now cold, stand four-square to all the winds
that blow. In the middle is a great round tower, with a cistern on the top, and
underneath an arched cavern which you are pleased to learn is bomb-proof. As
you cross the drawbridge, you feel bound to admit that the prospect is not
inviting. It seems as if you were going to prison instead of to visit, at his
marine residence, one of the most courtly and (peradventure) the most hospitable
noblemen of his age. The severe stonework frowns upon you; the portholes
stare, and you almost wish that, regardless of expense, you had kept your
hansom waiting. _

But all uneasiness vanishes as you cross the reverberating stone floor, and
pass into the apartments fronting the sea. You feel as if you had journeyed
into a new world, a sunnier clime. Your host, with outstretched hand, welcomes
you to Walmer, and makes kindly inquiries as to the incidents of your journey.

"It is, I expect, very cold in London," he says, with his genial smile ; " you
will find it Walmer here." _

You protest that varieties of temperature are of very inconsiderable concern

to you, and, throwing yourself on the walnut couch by
the recess window, daintily draped with orange-and-
blue chintz, you gaze forth on the varied scene without.
The stately ships go on to their haven under the hill;
the ever-changing procession presses on, homeward or
outward bound; and, beyond, the unbroken, treacherous
barrier of the Goodwin Sands. ,

" It's strange you should choose that place," your host
says, in his soft, liquid tones; "that was the favourite
corner of a former predecessor in the honourable oince 1
now hold. In the first year of this century, as you know,
William Pitt was Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports,
and, tradition says, used, when he came down here, to sit
at that very window by the hour, gazing across the Downs
towards the coast of France, where his great enemy was
preparing for a descent on the British coast."

Naturally pleased by this coincidence, you endeavour
to make your eyes flash as you look across the sea (you
remember to have read somewhere that Pitt had " an
eagle eye ; " perhaps two, but only one is mentioned);
try and think what Pitt looked like generally, and what
he did with his arms, which you finally decide to fold
across your chest, though conscious that you more
resemble Napoleon" crossing the Alps than the Great
Commoner sitting at his drawing-room window in
Walmer Castle.

Your host is pardonably proud of his Arboretum,
which he has set out on the roof where, in Tudor times,
the cistern flaunted the breeze. Here, bared to the
winter sun, droops the long fronds of the Fucus spun-
giosus nodosus. Close by is a specimen of that rare
attention on the part of the in- plaat the Fucus Bealensis pedicularis rubrifolio. Here,
habitants. You bent on a visit,to ; too is the jRhamnoides fruetifera foliis satiris, rarely
ntJ v f d Warden °* ^e seen so far north. Here, coyly hang the narrow leaves
Unque Ports, arrive from land- of the 8{lene conoidea . and here, slowly rocking in the
ward. J uirus Cesar came by sea. ' s.S.W. wind, is the sand willow (Salix arenaria). You
And yet, so narrow is the world, j fancy tnat somewhere you have seen a finer Sippqphae
vs° JeoU-rTen* £s m^vements, ! rhamnoides, but the JDianthus cariophyllus, with its

' pleasant smell of cloves, well deserved the look of appre-
ciation which your host bends upon it. Here, too, are
the Geranium maritinum, and the wallflower-scented
Hottonia palustris and even the humble Brassica oleracea.

"I have gathered them all in this district myself,"
your host says, opening the violet velvet smoking-jacket
(for which he has exchanged the warlike garb he usually
wears at Walmer) and casually displaying the belt that
marks his earldom.

You would like to ask whether a belted Earl ever wears
braces, but whilst you are thinking of how so delicate
a question may be framed, Granville, George, Leveson-
Gower, Earl Granville, Knight of the Garter and Lord
Warden of the Cinque Ports, relates, with that never
failing flow of natural humour which so greatly endears
him to Lord Salisbury, the story of his chequered
career, since he left Christchurch, Oxford, now more than
half a century ago and became Attache to the Embassy
at Paris. The narrative which is full of point, agreeably
occupies the time up to half-past one, when the beating
of a huge drum announces luncheon. You make a feint
of at once leaving, and Lord Granville, with that
almost excessive politeness which distinguishes him,
hesitates to oppose your apparent inclination.

As you pass out, skirting the piece of old ordnance
dragged from the sea in 1775, near the Goodwin Sands,
by some fishermen who were sweeping for anchors in the
Gull-stream, you reach the conclusion, that politeness
may sometimes be carried too far. "Deale," notes
Leland, in his interesting Itinerary, "is half a myle
fro the shore of the sea, a Einssheher village iii myles or
more above Sandwich." That is all very well for Deal;
but a gentleman of healthy habits, who left London at
ten o'clock this morning would, as the afternoon advances,
certainly not be so much as three miles above a sandwich
if it were offered.

Pleased with this quaint conceit, in which there is
peradventure some little humour, you drop in at a
confectioner's, and fortify yourself with a nineteenth-
century bun, with which you trifle whilst the train
tarries.

A Sporting Correspondent, who says "he isnt in
the know," asks "what we think of Garter for the
Derby ? " A word to the wise is sufficient. Garter
rhymes to "Starter." The Motto of the Garter is,
Honi soit qui mal y pense. We have spoken.__