The Days Before Yesterday Part 11

Rideau Hall had two open-air skating-rinks in its own grounds, two imposing toboggan-slides, and a covered curling-rink. The "roaring game" is played in Canada with very heavy straight-sided iron "stones,"

weighing from 50 to 60 lbs. As the ice in a covered rink can be constantly flooded, it can be kept in the most perfect order, and with the heavy stones far greater accuracy can be attained than with the granite stones used in Scotland. The game becomes a sort of billiards on ice. The Rideau Hall team consisted of Lord Lansdowne himself, General Sir Henry Streatfield, a nephew of mine, and one of the footmen, who seemed to have a natural gift as a curler. Our team were invincible in 1888. At a curling-match against Montreal in 1887, a long-distance telephone was used for the first time in Canada. Ottawa is 120 miles distant from Montreal, and a telephone was specially installed, and each "end" telephoned from Rideau Hall to Montreal, where the result was shown on a board, excitement over the match running high. Montreal proved the victors. On great occasions such as this, the ice of the curling-rink was elaborately decorated in colours.

It was very easily done. Ready-prepared stencils, such as are used for wall-decoration, were laid on the ice, and various coloured inks mixed with water were poured through the stencil holes, and froze almost immediately on to the ice below. In this fas.h.i.+on complicated designs of roses, thistles and maple-leaves, all in their proper colours, could be made in a very short time, and most effective they were until destroyed by the first six "ends." When the Governor-General's time in Canada expired and he was transferred to India, the curlers of Canada presented him with a farewell address. Lord Lansdowne made, I thought, a very happy reply. Speaking of the regret he felt at leaving Ottawa, and at severing his many links of connection with Canada, he added that, bearing in view the climate of Bengal, he did not antic.i.p.ate much curling in India, and that he would miss the "roaring game"; in fact, the only "roaring game" he was likely to come in contact with would probably take the unpleasant form of a Bengal tiger springing out at him. Lord Lansdowne went on to say, "Let us hope that it will not happen that your ex-Governor-General will be found, not pursuing the roaring game, but being pursued by it."

From skating daily, most of the Government House party became very expert, and could perform every kind of trick upon skates. Lord and Lady Lansdowne and their two daughters, now d.u.c.h.ess of Devons.h.i.+re and Lady Osborne Beauclerk, could execute the most complicated Quadrilles and Lancers on skates, and could do the most elaborate figures.

Once a week all Ottawa turned up at Rideau Hall to skate to the music of a good military band. Every year in December a so-called ice-palace was built for the band, of clear blocks of ice. Once given a design, ice-architecture is most fascinating and very easy. Instead of mortar, all that is required is a stream of water from a hose to freeze the ice-blocks together, and as ice can be easily chipped into any shape, the most fantastic pinnacles and ornaments can be contrived. Our ice-palace was usually built in what I may call a free adaptation of the Canado-Moresque style. A very necessary feature in the ice-palace was the large stove for thawing the bra.s.s instruments of the band. A moment's consideration will show that in the intense cold of a Canadian winter, the moisture that acc.u.mulates in a bra.s.s instrument would freeze solid, rendering the instrument useless. The bandsmen had always to handle the bra.s.s with woollen gloves on, to prevent getting burnt.

How curious it is that the sensation of touching very hot or very cold metal is identical, and that it produces the same effect on the human skin! With thirty or more degrees of frost, great caution must be used in handling skate-blades with bare fingers if burns are to be avoided.

The coldest day I have ever known was New Year's Day 1888, when the thermometer at Ottawa registered 41 degrees below, or 73 degrees of frost. The air was quite still, as it invariably is with great cold, but every breath taken gave one a sensation of being pinched on the nose, as the moisture in the nostrils froze together.

The weekly club-dances of the Ottawa Skating Club were a pretty sight.

They were held in a covered public rink, gay with many flags, with garlands of artificial flowers and foliage, and blazing with sizzling arc-lights. These people, accustomed to skates from their earliest childhood, could dance as easily and as gracefully on them as on their feet, whilst fur-m.u.f.fled mothers sat on benches round the rink, drinking tea and coffee as unconcernedly as though they were at a garden-party in mid-July instead of in a temperature of zero. An "Ottawa March" was a great inst.i.tution. Couples formed up as though for a country dance, the band struck up some rollicking tune, the leader shouted his directions, and fifty couples whirled and twirled, and skated backwards or forwards as he ordered, going through the most complicated evolutions, in pairs or fours or singly, joining here, parting there, but all in perfect time. Woe betide the leader should he lose his head! A hundred people would get tangled up in a hideous confusion, and there was nothing for it but to begin all over again.

It is curious that in countries like England and Prance, where from the climatic conditions skating must be a very occasional amus.e.m.e.nt, there is a special word for the pastime, and that in Germany and Russia, where every winter brings its skating as a matter of course, there should be no word for it. "Skate" in English, and patiner in French, mean propelling oneself on iron runners over ice, and nothing else; whereas in German there is only the clumsy compound-word Schlittschuh-laufen, which means "to run on sledge shoes," and in Russian it is called in equally roundabout fas.h.i.+on Katatsa-na-konkach, or literally "to roll on little horses," hardly a felicitous expression. As a rule people have no word for expressing a thing which does not come within their own range of experience; for instance, no one would expect that Arabs, or Somalis, or the inhabitants of the Sahara would have any equivalent for either skating or tobogganing, nor do I imagine that the Eskimo have any expression for "sunstroke" or "heat-apoplexy," but one would have thought that Russians and Germans might have evolved a word for skating.

Apropos of Eskimo, I once heard a missionary describe the extraordinary difficulty he had found in translating the Bible into Eskimo. It was useless to talk of corn or wine to a people who did not know even what they meant, so he had to use equivalents within their powers of comprehension. Thus in the Eskimo version of the Scriptures the miracle of Cana of Galilee is described as turning the water into BLUBBER; the 8th verse of the 5th chapter of the First Epistle of St. Peter ran: "Your adversary the devil, as a roaring Polar BEAR walketh about, seeking whom he may devour." In the same way "A land flowing with milk and honey" became "A land flowing with whale's blubber," and throughout the New Testament the words "Lamb of G.o.d" had to be translated "little Seal of G.o.d," as the nearest possible equivalent. The missionary added that his converts had the lowest opinion of Jonah for not having utilised his exceptional opportunities by killing and eating the whale.

Fired by the example of the builders of the ice-palace on the rink at Rideau Hall, I offered to build for the Lansdowne children an ice-hut for their very own, a chilly domicile which they had ardently longed for. As it is my solitary achievement as an architect, I must dwell rather lovingly on the building of this hut. The professional ice-cutters were bringing up daily a large supply of great gleaming transparent blocks from the river, both for the building of the band-house and for the summer supply of Rideau Hall, so there was no lack of material. On the American continent one is being told so constantly that this-and-that "will cut no ice," that it is satisfactory to be able to report that those French-Canadians cut ice in the most efficient fas.h.i.+on. My sole building implement was a kettle of boiling water. I placed ice-blocks in a circle, pouring boiling water between each two blocks to melt the points of contact, and in half an hour they had frozen into one solid lump. I and a friend proceeded like this till the ice-walls were about four feet high, s.p.a.ces being left for the door and windows. As the blocks became too heavy to lift, we used great wads of snow in their stead, melting them with cold water and kneading them into shape with thick woollen gloves, and so the walls rose. I wanted a snow roof; had we been mediaeval cathedral builders we might possibly have fas.h.i.+oned a groined and vaulted snow roof, with ice ribs, but being amateurs, our roof perpetually collapsed, so we finally roofed the hut with grooved-and-tongued boards, cutting a hole through them for the chimney. We then built a brick fire-place, with mantelpiece complete, ending in an iron chimney. The windows were our great triumph. I filled large j.a.panned tea-trays two inches deep with water and left them out to freeze. Then we placed the trays in a hot bath and floated the sheets of ice off. They broke time and time again, but after about the twentieth try we succeeded in producing two great sheets of transparent ice which were fitted into the window-s.p.a.ces, and firmly cemented in place with wet snow. Then the completed hut had to be furnished. A carpenter in Ottawa made me a little dresser, a little table, and little chairs of plain deal; I bought some cooking utensils, some enamelled-iron tea-things and plates, and found in Ottawa some crude oleographs printed on oil-cloth and impervious to damp. These were duly hung on the snow walls of the hut, and the little girls worked some red Turkey-twill curtains for the ice windows, and a frill for the mantelpiece in orthodox south of England cottage style. The boys made a winding tunnel through the snow-drifts up to the door of the hut, and Nature did the rest, burying the hut in snow until its very existence was unsuspected by strangers, though it may be unusual to see clouds of wood-smoke issuing from an apparent snow-drift. That little house stood for over three months; it afforded the utmost joy to its youthful occupiers, and I confess that I took a great paternal pride in it myself. Really at night, with the red curtains drawn over the ice windows, with the pictures on its snow walls, a lamp alight and a roaring log fire blazing on the brick hearth, it was the most invitingly cosy little place. It is true that with the heat the snow walls perspired freely, and the roof was apt to drip like a fat man in August, but it was considered tactful to ignore these details. Here the children entertained their friends at tea-parties, and made hideous juvenile experiments in cookery; here, too, "Jerusalem the Golden" was prepared. It was a simple operation; milk and honey were thoroughly mixed in a bowl, the bowl was put out to freeze, and the frozen ma.s.s dipped into hot water to loosen it; "Jerusalem the Golden" was then broken up small, and the toothsome chips eagerly devoured. Those familiar with the hymn will at once understand the allusion.

Sir John Macdonald, the Prime Minister, was very often at Government House, and dined there perpetually. When at the Petrograd Emba.s.sy, I was constantly hearing of Sir John from my chief, Lord Dufferin, who had an immense admiration for him, and considered him the maker of the Dominion, and a really great statesman. I was naturally anxious to meet a man of whom I had heard so much. "John A.," as he was universally known in Canada, had a very engaging personality, and conveyed an impression of having an enormous reserve of latent force behind his genial manner. Facially he was reminiscent of Lord Beaconsfield, but there was nothing very striking about him as an orator: his style was direct and straightforward.

The Houses of Parliament at Ottawa are a splendid pile of buildings, and though they may owe a great deal to the wonderful site they occupy on a semicircular wooded bluff projecting into the river, I should consider them one of the most successful group of buildings erected anywhere during the nineteenth century. All the details might not bear close examination, but the general effect was admirable, especially that of the great circular library, with its conical roof. In addition to the Legislative Chambers proper, two flanking buildings in the same style housed various Administrative departments. Seen from Rideau Hall in dark silhouette against the sunset sky, the bold outline of the conical roof of the library and the three tall towers flanking it gave a sort of picturesque Nuremberg effect to the distant view of Ottawa, The Parliament buildings proper were destroyed by an incendiary during the war, but the library and wings escaped.

Everything in the House of Commons was modelled accurately on Westminster. The Canadian Parliament being bi-lingual, French members addressed the Speaker as "Monsieur l'Orateur," and the Usher of the Black Rod of the Senate became "l'Huissier de la Verge Noire." To my mind there was something intensely comical in addressing a man who seldom opened his mouth except to cry, "Order, order," as "Monsieur l'Orateur." A Frenchman from the Province of Quebec seems always to be chosen as Canadian Speaker. In my time he was a M. Ouiment, the TWENTY-FIRST child of the same parents, so French Canadians are apparently not threatened with extinction. I heard in the House of Commons at Ottawa the most curious peroration I have ever listened to.

It came from the late Nicholas Flood Davin, a member of Irish extraction who sat for a Far-Western const.i.tuency. The House was debating a dull Bill relating to the lumber industry, when Davin, who may possibly have been under the influence of temporary excitement, insisted on speaking. He made a long and absolutely irrelevant speech in a voice of thunder, and finished with these words, every one of which I remember: "There are some who declare that Canada's trade is declining; there are some who maintain that the rich glow of health which at present mantles o'er Canada's virgin cheek will soon be replaced by the pallid hues of the corpse. To such pusillanimous propagandists of a preposterous pessimism, I answer, Mr. Speaker with all confidence, never! never!" As a rhetorical effort this is striking, though there seems a lack of lucidity about it.

In the Canadian House of Commons there are a number of little pages who run errands for members, and fetch them books and papers. These boys sit on the steps of the Speaker's chair, and when the House adjourns for dinner the pages hold a "Pages' Parliament." One boy, elected by the others as Speaker, puts on a gown and seats himself in the Speaker's chair; the "Prime Minister" and the members of the Government sit on the Government benches, the Leader of the Opposition with his supporters take their places opposite and the boys hold regular debates. Many of the members took great interest in the "Pages'

Parliament," and coached the boys for their debates. I have seen Sir John Macdonald giving the fourteen-year-old "Premier" points for his speech that evening.

All-night sittings were far rarer at Ottawa than with us, and const.i.tuted quite an event. Some of us went into the gallery at 5 a.m.

after a dance, to see the end of a long and stormy sitting. The House was very uproarious. Some member had brought in a cricket-ball, and they were throwing each other catches across the House. To the credit of Canadian M.P.'s, I must say that we never saw a single catch missed.

When Sir John rose to close the debate, there were loud cries of, "You have talked enough, John A. Give us a song instead." "All right," cried Sir John, "I will give you 'G.o.d save the Queen.'" And he forthwith started it in a l.u.s.ty voice, all the members joining in. The introduction of a cricket-ball might brighten all-night sittings in our own Parliament, though somehow I cannot quite picture to myself Mr.

Asquith throwing catches to Sir Frederick Banbury across the floor of the House of Commons.

I was once in the gallery of the South African Parliament at Capetown, after the House had been sitting continuously for twenty hours. The Speaker had had a stool brought him to rest his legs on, and was fast asleep in his chair, with his wig all awry. Dutch farmer members from the Back-Veld were stretched out at full length on the benches in the lobbies, snoring loudly; in fact, the whole place was a sort of Parliamentary Pullman Sleeping-car. That splendid man, the late General Botha, told me that late hours in Parliament upset him terribly, as he had been used all his life to going early to bed. Though the exterior of the Capetown Parliament buildings is nothing very wonderful architecturally, the interior is very handsome, and quite surprisingly s.p.a.cious.

The Governor-General gave two evening skating and tobaggoning parties at Rideau Hall every winter. He termed these gatherings his "Arctic Cremornes," after the then recently defunct gardens in London, and the parties were wonderfully picturesque. In those days, though the fas.h.i.+on now has quite disappeared, all members of snow-shoe and tobogganing clubs, men and women alike, wore coloured blanket-suits consisting of knickerbockers and long coats, with bright-coloured stockings, sash, and knitted toque (invariably p.r.o.nounced "tuke"). The club colours of course varied. Rideau Hall was white with purple stockings and "tuke,"

and red sash. Others were sky-blue, with scarlet stockings and "tuke,"

or crimson and black, or brown and green. A collection of three hundred people in blanket-suits gave the effect of a peripatetic rainbow against the white snow. For the "Arctic Cremorne" the rinks were all fringed with coloured fairy-lamps; the curling-rink and the tea-room above it were also outlined with innumerable coloured electric bulbs, and festoons of j.a.panese lanterns were stretched between the fir trees in all directions. At the top of the toboggan slides powerful arc-lamps blazed, and a stupendous bonfire roared on a little eminence. The effect was indescribably pretty, and it was pleasant to reflect how man had triumphed over Nature in being able to give an outdoor evening party in mid-winter with the thermometer below zero. The gleaming crystals of snow reflecting the coloured lamps; the Bengal lights staining the white expanse crimson and green, and silhouetting the outlines of the fir trees in dead black against the burnished steel of the sky; the crowd of guests in their many-coloured blanket-suits, made a singularly attractive picture, with a note of absolute novelty in it; and the crash of the military band, the merry whirr of the skates, and the roar of the descending toboggans had something extraordinarily exhilarating about them in the keen, pure air. The supper-room always struck me as being pleasingly unconventional. Supper was served in the long, covered curling-rink, where the temperature was the same as that of the open air outside, so there was a long table elaborately set out with silver-branched candlesticks and all the Governor-General's fine collection of plate, but the servants waited in heavy fur-coats and caps. Of course no flowers could be used in that temperature, so the silver vases held branches of spruce, hemlock, and other Canadian firs.

The French cook had to be very careful as to what dishes he prepared, for anything with moisture in it would freeze at once; meringues, for instance, would be frozen into uneatable cricket-b.a.l.l.s, and tea, coffee, and soup had to simmer perpetually over lamps. One so seldom has a ball-supper with North Pole surroundings. We had a serious toboggan accident one night owing to the stupidity of an old Senator, who insisted on standing in the middle of the track, and the Aides-de-Camps' room was converted into an operating theatre, and reeked with the fumes of chloroform. The young man had bad concussion, and was obliged to remain a week at Rideau Hall, whilst the poor girl was disfigured for life.

Whilst on the subject of ball-suppers, there was a curious custom prevailing in Lisbon. Most Portuguese having very limited means, it was not usual to offer any refreshments whatever to guests at dances; but when it was done, it took the form of a "tooth-pick-supper" (souper aux curedents). Small pieces of chicken, tongue, or beef were piled on plates, each piece skewered with a wooden toothpick. The guests picked these off the plate by the toothpick, and nibbled the meat away from it, eating it with slices of bread. This obviated the use of plates, knives and forks, most Portuguese families having neither sufficient silver table-plate for an entertainment nor the means to hire any.

There was another reason for this quaint custom. Some Portuguese are--how shall we put it?--inveterate souvenir-hunters. The Duke of Palmella, one of the few rich men in Portugal, gave a ball whilst I was in Lisbon at which the supper was served in the ordinary fas.h.i.+on, with plates, spoons, knives and forks. It was a matter of common knowledge in Lisbon that 50 per cent. of the ducal silver spoons and forks had left the house in the pockets of his Grace's guests, who doubtless wished to preserve a slight memento of so pleasant an evening.

In a certain Balkan State which I will refrain from naming, the inhabitants are also confirmed souvenir-hunters. At a dinner-party at the British Legation in this nameless State, one of the Diplomatic ladies was wearing a very fine necklace of pearls and enamel. A native of the State admired this necklace immensely, and begged for permission to examine it closer. The Diplomat's wife very unwisely unfastened her pearl necklace, and it was pa.s.sed around from hand to hand, amidst loud expressions of admiration at its beautiful workmans.h.i.+p. At the end of dinner the Diplomatic lady requested that her necklace might be returned to her, but it was not forthcoming; no one knew anything about it. The British Minister, who thought that he understood the people of the country, rose to the occasion. Getting up from his chair, he said with a smile, "We have just witnessed a very clever and very amusing piece of legerdemain. Now we are going to see another little piece of conjuring." The Minister walked quietly to both doors of the room, locked them, and put the keys in his pocket. He then placed a small silver bowl from the side-board in the centre of the dinner-table, and continued: "I am now going to switch off all the lights, and to count ten slowly. When I have reached ten, I shall turn on the lights again, and hey presto! Madame de--'s necklace will be found lying in that silver bowl!" The room became plunged in darkness, and the Minister counted slowly up to ten. The electric light blazed out again, there was no necklace, but the silver bowl had vanished!

I have enjoyed the exceptional experience of having inspected many convents in Canada, even those of the most strictly cloistered Orders.

By long-established custom, the Governor-General's wife has the right to inspect any convent in Canada on giving twenty-four hours' notice, and she may take with her any two persons she chooses, of either s.e.x.

My sister was fond of visiting convents, and she often took me with her as I could speak French. We have thus been in convents of Ursulines, Poor Clares, Grey Sisters, and in some of those of the more strictly cloistered Orders. The procedure was always the same. We were ushered into a beautifully clean, bare, whitewashed parloir, with a highly polished floor redolent of beeswax. There would be hard benches running round the parloir, raised on a platform, much after the fas.h.i.+on of raised benches in a billiard-room. In the centre would be a chair for the Reverend Mother. We then made polite conversation for a few minutes, after which coffee (usually compounded of scorched beans, with no relation whatever to "Coffea Arabica") was handed to us, and we went over the convent. It was extremely difficult for two Protestants to find any subject of conversation which could interest a Mother Superior who knew nothing of the world outside her convent walls, nor was it easy to find any common ground on which to meet her, all religious topics being necessarily excluded, I had noticed that the nuns made frequent allusions to a certain Marie Alacoque. Misled by the similarity of the sound in French, I, in my ignorance, thought that this referred to a method of cooking eggs. I learnt later that Marie Alacoque was a French nun who lived in the seventeenth century, and I discovered why her memory was so revered by her co-religionists. It was easy to get a book from the Ottawa Library and to read her up, and after that conversation became less difficult, for a few remarks about Marie Alacoque were always appreciated in conventual circles. The convents were invariably neat and clean, but I was perpetually struck by the wax-like pallor of the inmates. The elder nuns in the strictly cloistered Orders were as excited as children over this unexpected irruption into their convent of two strangers from the world outside, which they had left for so long. They struck me as most excellent, earnest women, and they delighted in exhibiting all their treasures, including the ecclesiastical vestments and their Church plate. They always made a point of showing us, as an object of great interest, the flat candlestick of bougie that the Cardinal-Archbishop had used when he had last celebrated Pontifical High Ma.s.s in their chapel. In one strictly cloistered convent there was a high wooden trellis across the chapel, so that though the nuns could see the priest at the altar through the trellis-work, he was unable to see them. In the Convent of the Grey Sisters at Ottawa we found an old English nun who, in spite of having spent thirty-five years in a French-Canadian convent, still retained the strong c.o.c.kney accent of her native London. She was a cheery old soul, and, with another old English nun, had charge of the wardrobe, which they insisted on showing me. I was gazing at piles of clothing neatly arranged on shelves, when the old c.o.c.kney nun clapped her hands. "We will dress you up as a Sister," she cried, and they promptly proceeded to do so. They put me on a habit (largest size) over my other clothes, chuckling with glee meanwhile, and I was duly draped in the guimpe, the piece of linen which covers a nun's head and shoulders and frames her face, called, I believe, in English a "wimple," and my toilet was complete except for my veil, when, by a piece of real bad luck, the Reverend Mother and my sister came into the room. We had no time to hide, so we were caught. Having no moustache, I flattered myself that I made rather a saintly-looking novice, and I hid my hands in the orthodox way in my sleeves, but the Mother Superior was evidently very much put out. The clothes that had come in contact with my heretical person were ordered to be placed on one side, I presume to be morally disinfected, and I can only trust that the two old nuns did not get into serious trouble over their little joke. I am sorry that my toilet was not completed; I should like to have felt that just for once in my life I had taken the veil, if for five minutes only.

In the "eighties" the city of Montreal spent large sums over their Winter Carnival. It attracted crowds of strangers, princ.i.p.ally from the United States, and it certainly stimulated the retail trade of the city. The Governor-General was in the habit of taking a house in Montreal for the Carnival, and my brother-in-law was lent the home of a hospitable sugar magnate. The dining-room of this house, in which its owner had allowed full play to his Oriental imagination and love of colour, was so singular that it merits a few words of description. The room was square, with a domed ceiling. It was panelled in polished satinwood to a height of about five feet. Above the panelling were placed twelve owls in carved and silvered wood, each one about two feet high, supporting gas-standards. Rose-coloured silk was stretched from the panelling up to the heavy frieze, consisting of "swags" of fruit and foliage modelled in high relief, and brilliantly coloured in their natural hues. The domed ceiling was painted sky-blue, covered with golden stars, gold and silver suns and moons, and the signs of the Zodiac. I may add that the effect of this curious apartment was not such as to warrant any one trying to reproduce it. The house also contained a white marble swimming bath; an unnecessary adjunct, I should have thought, to a dwelling built for winter occupation in Montreal.

The Ice-Castle erected by the Munic.i.p.ality was really a joy to the eye.

It was rather larger than, say, the Westminster Guildhall, and had a tower eighty feet high. It was an admirable reproduction of a Gothic castle, designed and built by a competent architect, with barbican, battlements, and machiocolaions all complete, the whole of gleaming, transparent ice-blocks, a genuine thing of beauty. One of the princ.i.p.al events of the Carnival was the storming of the Ice-Castle by the snow-shoe clubs of Montreal. Hundreds of snow-sh.o.e.rs, in their rainbow-hued blanket suits, advanced in line on the castle and fired thousands of Roman candles at their objective, which returned the fire with rockets innumerable, and an elaborate display of fireworks, burning continually Bengal lights of various colours within its translucent walls, and spouting gold and silver rain on its a.s.sailants.

It really was a gorgeous feast of colour for the eye, a most entrancing spectacle, with all this polychrome glow seen against the dead-white field of snow which covered Dominion Square, in the crystal clearness of a Canadian winter night, with the thermometer down anywhere.

Another annual feature of the Carnival was the great fancy-dress skating fete in the covered rink. The Victoria Rink at Montreal is a huge building, and was profusely decorated for the occasion with the usual flags, wreaths of artificial foliage, and coloured lamps. An American sculptor had modelled six colossal groups of statuary out of wet snow, and these were ranged down either side of the rink. As they froze, they took on the appearance and texture of white marble, and were very effective. Round a cl.u.s.ter of arc-lights in the roof there was a sort of revolving cage of different coloured panes of gla.s.s; these threw variegated beams of light over the brilliant kaleidoscopic crowd below. Previous Governors-General had, in opening the fete shuffled shamefacedly down the centre of the rink in overshoes and fur coats to the dais, but Lord and Lady Lansdowne, being both expert skaters, determined to do the thing in proper Carnival style, and arrived in fancy dress, he in black as a Duke of Brunswick, she as Mary Queen of Scots, attended by her two boys, then twelve and fourteen years old, as pages, resplendent in crimson tights and crimson velvet.

The band struck up "G.o.d Save the Queen," and down the cleared s.p.a.ce in the centre skimmed, hand-in-hand, the Duke of Brunswick and Mary Queen of Scots, with the two pages carrying her train, all four executing a "Dutch roll" in the most workman-like manner. It was really a very effective entrance, and was immensely appreciated by the crowd of skaters present. I represented a Shakespearean character, and had occasion to note what very inadequate protection is afforded by blue silk tights, with nothing under them, against the cold of a Canadian February. One of the Aides-de-Camp had arrayed himself in white silk as Romeo; being only just out from England, he was anything but firm on his skates. Some malicious young Montrealers of tender age, noticing this, deliberately b.u.mped into him again and again, sending his conspicuous white figure spinning each time. Poor Romeo's experiences were no more fortunate on the rink than in the tragedy a.s.sociated with his name; by the end of the evening, after his many tumbles, his draggled white silk dress suggested irresistibly the plumage of a soiled dove.

A hill (locally known as "The Mountain") rises immediately behind Montreal, the original Mont Real, or Mount Royal, from which the city derives its name. This naturally lends itself to the formation of toboggan slides, and one of them, the "Montreal Club Slide," was really terrifically steep. The start was precipitous enough, in all conscience, but soon came a steep drop of sixty feet, at which point all the working parts of one's anatomy seemed to leave one, to replace themselves at the finish only. The pace was so tremendous that it was difficult to breathe, but it was immensely exciting. The Montreal slide was just one-third of a mile long, and the time occupied in the descent on good ice was about twenty seconds, working out at sixty miles an hour. Every precaution was taken against accidents; there was a telephone from the far end, and no toboggan was allowed to start until "track clear" had been signalled. Everything in this world is relative.

We had thought our Ottawa slides very fast, though the greatest speed we ever attained was about thirty miles an hour, whilst at home we had been delighted if we could coax fifteen miles an hour out of our rough machines. The Lansdowne boys were very expert on toboggans, and could go down the Ottawa slides standing erect, a thing no adult could possibly manage. They had fitted their machines with gong-bells and red and green lanterns, and the "Ottawa River Express" would come whizzing down at night with bells clanging and lights gleaming.

I can claim to be the absolute pioneer of ski on the American continent, for in January, 1887, I brought my Russian ski to Ottawa, the very first pair that had ever been seen in the New World. I coasted down hills on them amidst universal jeers; every one declared that they were quite unsuited to Canadian conditions. The old-fas.h.i.+oned raquettes had their advantages, for one could walk over the softest snow in them.

Here, again, I fancy that it was the sense of man triumphant over Nature that made snow-shoeing so attractive. The Canadian snow-shoe brings certain unaccustomed muscles into play, and these muscles show their resentment by aching furiously. The French habitants term this pain mal de raquettes. In my time snow-shoe tramps at night, across-country into the woods, were one of the standard winter amus.e.m.e.nts of Ottawa, and the girls showed great dexterity in vaulting fences with their snow-shoes on.

A Canadian winter is bathed in suns.h.i.+ne. In the dry, crisp atmosphere distant objects are as clear-cut and hard as though they were carved out of wood; the air is like wine, and with every breath human beings seem to enter on a new lease of life.

It is not so in the lower world. There is not a bird to be seen, for no bird could secure a living with three feet of snow on the ground.

Nature is very dead, and I understood the glee with which the children used to announce the return of the crows, for these wise birds are the unfailing harbingers of Spring. With us Spring is undecided, fickle, and coy. She is not sure of herself, and after making timid, tentative advances, retreats again, uncertain as to her ability to cope with grim Winter. In Canada, Spring comes with an all-conquering rush. In one short fortnight she clothes the trees in green, and carpets the ground with blue and white hepaticas. She is also, unfortunately, accompanied by myriads of self-appointed official maids-of-honour in the shape of mosquitoes, anxious to make up for their long winter fast. As the fierce suns of April melt the surface snow, the water percolates through to the ground, where it freezes again, forming a sheet of what Canadians term "glare-ice." I have seen at Rideau Hall this ice split in all directions over the flower-beds by the first tender shoots of the crocuses. How these fragile little spears of green have the power to penetrate an inch of ice is one of the mysteries of Nature.

Would s.p.a.ce admit of it, and were paper not such an unreasonably expensive commodity just now, I would like to speak of the glories of a Canadian wood in May, with the ground flecked with red and white trilliums; of the fields in British Columbia, gorgeous in spring-time with blue lilies and drifts of rose-coloured cyclamens; of the autumn woods in their sumptuous dress of scarlet, crimson, orange, and yellow, the sugar-maples blazing like torches against the dark firs; of the marvels of the three ranges of the Rockies, Selkirks, and Cascades, and of the other wonders of the great Dominion.

As boys, I and my youngest brother knew "Hiawatha's Fis.h.i.+ng" almost by heart, so I had an intense desire to see "Gitche Gumee, the Big-Sea Water," which we more prosaically call Lake Superior, the home of the sturgeon "Nahma," of "Ugudwash" the sun-fish, of the pike the "Maskenozha," and the actual scene of Hiawatha's fis.h.i.+ng. To others, without this sentimental interest, the Great Lakes might appear vast but uninteresting expanses of water, chiefly remarkable for the hideous form of vessel which has been evolved to navigate their clear depths.

One thing I can say with confidence. No one who makes a winter journey to that land of suns.h.i.+ne and snow, with its energetic, pleasant, and hospitable inhabitants, will ever regret it, and the wayfarer will return home with the consciousness of having been in contact with an intensely virile race, only now beginning to realise its own strength.

CHAPTER X

Calcutta--Hooghly pilots--Government House--A Durbar--The sulky Rajah--The customary formalities--An ingenious interpreter--The sailing clippers in the Hooghly-Calcutta Cathedral--A succulent banquet--The mistaken Ministre--The "Gordons"--Barrackpore--A Swiss Family Robinson aerial house--The child and the elephants--The merry mids.h.i.+pmen--Some of their escapades--A huge haul of fishes--Queen Victoria and Hindustani--The Hills--The Manipur outbreak--A riding tour--A wise old Anglo-Indian--Incidents--The fidelity of native servants--A novel printing-press--Lucknow--The loss of an illusion.

Lord Lansdowne had in 1888 been transferred from Canada to India, and in May of that year he left Ottawa for Calcutta, taking on the way a three months' well-earned holiday in England. Two of his staff accompanied him from the vigorous young West to the immemorially old East.

He succeeded as Viceroy Lord Dufferin, who had also held the appointment of Governor-General of Canada up to 1878, after which he had served as British Amba.s.sador both at Petrograd and at Constantinople, before proceeding to India in 1884.

Lord Minto, too, in later years filled both positions, serving in Canada from 1898 to 1904, and in India from 1905 to 1910.

Whether in 1690 Job Charnock made a wise selection in fixing his trading-station where Calcutta now stands, may be open to doubt. He certainly had the broad Hooghly at his doors, affording plenty of water not only for trading-vessels, but also for men-of-war in cases of emergency. Still, from the swampy nature of the soil, and its proximity to the great marshes of the Sunderbunds, Calcutta could never be a really healthy place. An arrival by water up the Hooghly unquestionably gives the most favourable impression of the Indian ex-capital, though the river banks are flat and uninteresting. The Hooghly is one of the most difficult rivers in the world to navigate, for the shoals and sand-banks change almost daily with the strong tides, and the white Hooghly pilots are men at the very top of their profession, and earn some L2000 a year apiece. They are tremendous swells, and are perfectly conscious of the fact, coming on board with their native servants and their white "cub" or pupil. There is one shoal in particular, known as the "James and Mary," on which a s.h.i.+p, touching ever so lightly, is as good as lost. Calcutta, since I first knew it, has become a great manufacturing centre. Lines of factories stand for over twenty miles thick on the left bank of the river; the great pall of black smoke hanging over the city is visible for miles, and the atmosphere is beginning to rival that of Manchester. Long use has accustomed us to the smoke-blackened elms and limes of London, but there is something peculiarly pathetic in the sight of a grimy, sooty palm tree.

The outward aspect of the stately Government House at Calcutta is familiar to most people. It is a huge and imposing edifice, but when I first knew it, its interior was very plain, and rather bare. Lady Minto changed all this during her husband's Vice-royalty, and, with her wonderful taste, transformed it into a sort of Italian palace at a very small cost. She bought in Europe a few fine specimens of old Italian gilt furniture, and had them copied in Calcutta by native workmen. In the East, the Oriental point of view must be studied, and Easterns attach immense importance to external splendour. The throne-room at Calcutta, under Lady Minto's skilful treatment, became gorgeous enough for the most exacting Asiatic, with its black marble floor, its rose-coloured silk walls where great silver sconces alternated with full-length portraits of British sovereigns, its white "chunam" columns and its gilt Italian furniture. "Chunam" has been used in India from time immemorial for decorative purposes. It is as white as snow and harder than any stone, and is, I believe, made from calcined sh.e.l.ls.

Let us suppose a Durbar held in this renovated throne-room for the official reception of a native Indian Prince. The particular occasion I have in mind was long after Lord Lansdowne's time, when a certain Rajah, notoriously ill-disposed towards the British Raj, had been given the strongest of hints that unless he mended his ways, he might find another ruler placed on the throne of his State. He was also recommended to come to Calcutta and to pay his respects to the Viceroy there, when, of course, he would be received with the number of guns to which he was ent.i.tled. The Indian Princes attach the utmost importance to the number of guns they are given as a salute, a number which varies from twenty-one in the case of the Nizam of Hyderabad, who alone ranks as a Sovereign, to nine for the smaller princes. Should the British Government wish to mark its strong displeasure with any native ruler, it sometimes does so by reducing the number of guns of his salute, and correspondingly, to have the number increased is a high honour. Sulkily and unwillingly the Rajah of whom I am thinking journeyed to Calcutta, and sulkily and unwillingly did he attend the Durbar. On occasions such as these, visiting native Princes are the guests of the Government of India at Hastings House (Warren Hastings' old country house in the suburbs of Calcutta, specially renovated and fitted up for the purpose), and the Viceroy's state carriages are sent to convey them to Government House. Everything in the way of ceremonial in India is done strictly by rule. The precise number of steps the Viceroy will advance to greet visiting Rajahs is all laid down in a little book. The Nizam of Hyderabad is met by the Viceroy with all his staff at the state entrance of Government House, and he is accompanied through all the rooms, both on his arrival and on his departure; but, as I said before, the Nizam ranks as a Sovereign. In the case of lesser lights the Viceroy advances anything from three to twenty steps. These points may appear very trivial to Europeans, but to Orientals they a.s.sume great importance, and, after all, India is a part of Asia. At right angles to the Calcutta throne-room is the fine Marble Hall, with marble floor and columns and an entirely gilt ceiling; empty except for six colossal busts of Roman Emperors, which, together with a number of splendid cut-gla.s.s chandeliers of the best French Louis XV. period, and a full-length portrait of Louis XV. himself, fell into our hands through the fortunes of war at a time when our relations with our present film ally, France, were possibly less cordial than at present. For a Durbar a long line of red carpet was laid from the throne-room, through the Marble Hall and the White Hall beyond it, right down the great flight of exterior steps, at the foot of which a white Guard of Honour of one hundred men from a British regiment was drawn up, Aligned through the outer hall, the Marble Hall and the throne-room were one hundred men of the Viceroy's Bodyguard, splendid fellows chosen for their height and appearance, and all from Northern India. They wore the white leather breeches and jack-boots of our own Life Guards, with scarlet tunics and huge turbans of blue and gold, standing with their lances as motionless as so many bronze statues. For a Durbar, many precious things were unearthed from the "Tosha-Khana," or Treasury: the Viceroy's silver-gilt throne; an arm-chair of solid silver for the visiting Rajah; great silver-gilt maces bearing & crown and "V.R.I."; and, above all, the beautiful Durbar carpets of woven gold wire. The making of these carpets is, I believe, an hereditary trade in a Benares family; they are woven of real gold wire, heavily embroidered in gold afterwards, and are immensely expensive. The visiting Rajah announces beforehand the number of the suite he is bringing with him, and the Viceroy has a precisely similar number, so two corresponding rows of cane arm-chairs are placed opposite each other, at right angles to the throne. Behind the chairs twelve resplendent red-and-gold-coated servants with blue-and-silver turbans, hold the gilt maces aloft, whilst behind the throne eight more gorgeously apparelled natives hold two long-handled fans of peac.o.c.k's feathers, two silver-mounted yak's tails, and two ma.s.sive sheaves of peac.o.c.k's feathers, all these being the Eastern emblems of sovereignty.

We will suppose this particular Rajah to be a "nine-gun" and a "three-step" man. Bang go the cannon from Fort William nine times, and the Viceroy, in full uniform with decorations, duly advances three steps on the gold carpet to greet his visitor. The Viceroy seats himself on his silver-gilt throne at the top of the three steps, the visiting Rajah in his silver chair being one step lower. The two suites seat themselves facing each other in dead silence; the Europeans a.s.suming an absolutely Oriental impa.s.sivity of countenance. The ill-conditioned Rajah, though he spoke English perfectly, had insisted on bringing his own interpreter with him. A long pause in conformity with Oriental etiquette follows, then the Viceroy puts the first invariable question: "I trust that your Highness is in the enjoyment of good health?" which is duly repeated in Urdu by the official white interpreter. The sulky Rajah grunts something that sounds like "Bhirrr Whirrr," which the native interpreter renders, in clipped staccato English, as "His Highness declares that by your Excellency's favour his health is excellent. Lately, owing to attack of fever, it was with His Highness what Immortal Bard has termed a case of 'to be or not to be!'

Now, danger happily averted, His Highness has seldom reposed under the canopy of a sounder brain than at present." Another long pause, and the second invariable question: "I trust that your Highness' Army is in its usual efficient state?" The surly Rajah, "Khirr Virr." The native interpreter, "Without doubt His Highness' Army has never yet been so efficient. Should troubles arise, or a pretty kettle of fish unfortunately occur, His Highness places his entire Army at your Excellency's disposal; as Swan of Avon says, 'Come the three corners of the world in arms, and we shall shock them.'" A third question, "I trust that the crops in your Highness' dominion are satisfactory?" The Rajah, "Ghirrr Firrr." The interpreter, "Stimulated without doubt by your Excellency's auspicious visit to neighbouring State, the soil in His Highness' dominions has determined to beat record and to go regular mucker. Crops tenfold ordinary capacity are springing from the ground everywhere." One has seen a conjurer produce half a roomful of paper flowers from a hat, or even from an even less promising receptacle, but no conjurer was in it with that interpreter, who from two sulky monosyllabic grunts evolved a perfect garland of choice Oriental flowers of speech. It reminded me of the process known in newspaper offices as "expanding" a telegram. When the customary number of formal questions have been put, the Viceroy makes a sign to his Military Secretary, who brings him a gold tray on which stand a little gold flask and a small box; the traditional "Attar and pan." The Viceroy sprinkles a few drops of attar of roses on the Rajah's clothing from the gold flask, and hands him a piece of betel-nut wrapped in gold paper, known as "pan." This is the courteous Eastern fas.h.i.+on of saying "Now I bid you good-bye." The Military Secretary performs a like office to the members of the Rajah's suite, who, however, have to content themselves with attar sprinkled from a silver bottle and "pans" wrapped in silver paper. Then all the traditional requirements of Oriental politeness have been fulfilled, and the Rajah takes his leave with the same ceremonies as attended his arrival. At the beginning of a Durbar "tribute" is presented--that is to say that a folded napkin supposed to contain one thousand gold mohurs is handed to the Viceroy, who "touches it and remits it." I have often wondered what that folded napkin really contained.

When I first knew Calcutta, most of the grain, jute, hemp and indigo exported was carried to its various destinations in sailing-s.h.i.+ps, and there were rows and rows of splendid full-rigged s.h.i.+ps and barques lying moored in the Hooghly along the whole length of the Maidan. The line must have extended for two miles, and I never tired of looking at these beautiful vessels with their graceful lines and huge spars, all clean and spick and span with green and white paint, the ubiquitous Calcutta crows perched in serried ranks on their yards. To my mind a full-rigged s.h.i.+p is the most beautiful object man has ever devised, and when the dusk was falling, with every spar and rope outlined in black against the vivid crimson of the short-lived Indian sunset, the long line of s.h.i.+pping made a glorious picture. Nineteen years later every sailing-s.h.i.+p had disappeared from the Hooghly, and in their place were rows of unsightly, rusty-sided iron tanks, with squat polemasts and ugly funnels vomiting black smoke. A tramp-steamer has its uses, no doubt, but it is hardly a thing of beauty. Ichabod! Ichabod!