that very evening, in which I was to play a part with a well-known and highly-popular member—the funny man of the Club, and an eccentric-looking one to boot. He had conceived the idea to make me up as a double of himself. We were the same height, but otherwise we in no way resembled each other. He was stout, I was thin; he prematurely bald, I enjoyed a superabundance of auburn locks; but he had very marked characteristics, and wore very remarkable clothes. He was also very clever at "making-up." The idea was to test his talent in this direction, and deceive the whole of our friends. It was arranged that he was to leave the piano after singing half his song, and I—up to that moment concealed—was to come forward and continue it. This I explained to my visitor, who expressed his belief that the deception was impossible. He promised to keep the secret, and that evening was early in the room and seated close to the piano. My "double"—fortunately for me, an amateur—sang the first verses of one of his well-known songs, but in the middle of it complained of the heat of the room (one of those large rooms on the first floor in Adelphi Terrace, famous for the Angelica Kaufmann paintings on the ceiling), and opening the French window close to the piano he went out on to the balcony. There I was, having walked along the balcony from the next room. So successful was my "make-up" that in passing through the supper-room to get on to the balcony some of the members spoke to me under the impression I was the other member! The hall-porter had handed me a letter intended for my "double." Of course I imitated his walk, his mannerisms at the piano, and his voice, but I made a poor attempt to sing. This was the joke. "What was the matter?" "Never sang like that before," "Evidently thinks it is funny to be completely out of tune," "Hullo, what is this?" as my "double" walked through the crowded room just as I finished, and shook hands with me!
I would really have sung the song better, but my eye happened to catch the puzzled stare of my friend the literary visitor in the front row. He looked angry and annoyed, and before my "double" came up to me, my friend, scowling at me, said, "Sir, I think it is infernal bad taste on your part to imitate my friend Harry Furniss!"
A SUCCESSFUL "MAKE-UP."
Who is it that says we English have no sense of humour? My "double" in the preceding tale was my brother-in-law, who as a boy was the companion of Mr. George Grossmith, and in fact once appeared as an amateur at German Reed's, the old Gallery of Illustration, in a piece, with "Gee Gee" as his double, entitled "Too much Alike."
He was also an inveterate and clever raconteur, and of course occasionally made a slip, as for instance, on a railway journey to Brighton once, when he found himself alone with a stranger. The stranger in conversation happened to ask my relative casually if he were fond of travelling. "Travelling? I should rather think so" he replied airily, and imagining he was impressing someone who was "something in the City," he continued, "Yes, sir, I'm a pretty experienced traveller. Been mostly round the world and all that kind of thing, you know, and had my share of adventures, I can tell you!" After a bit he gained more confidence, and launched into details, giving the stranger the benefit of his experience. "Why, sir, you read in books that hunters of big game, such as tigers, watch their eyes. Not a bit of it. What you have got to do is to watch the tail, and that's the thing. It mesmerises the animal, so to speak, and you have him at your mercy," and so forth, and so forth. On arriving at the hotel he found his travelling companion had just signed his name in the visitors' book. It was Richard Burton! My brother-in-law hastened to apologise to Sir Richard for his absurd tales. He had no idea, of course, to whom he was retailing his stiff yarns. Burton laughed. "My dear sir, not a word, please. I was more entertained than I can tell you. You really might have travelled—you lie so well!"
TWO TRAVELLERS.
One of the most eccentric men I ever met, and certainly one of the most successful journalists—a rara avis, for he made a fortune in Fleet Street, and retired to live in a castle in the country—was a man whose name, although a very singular one, remains absolutely unknown even to members of the Fourth Estate. He was a clever, hard-working journalist; every line he wrote—and he was always writing—was printed and well-paid for, but he never signed an article, whilst others, journalists, specialists, poets, essayists—logrollers of high degree—see their name often enough, are "celebrities," "men of the time," fêted and written about, but eventually retire on the Civil List. Eccentricity is the breath of their nostrils, their very existence depends upon it, publicity is essential. My friend's eccentricity was for his own pleasure. He lived in a frugal—some might think in a miserly way—in two rooms in one of the Inns of Court. Perhaps I shall be more correct if I say he existed in one. A loaf of bread and half a pint of milk was his daily fare. The room he slept in he worked in. The other was empty, save for bundles of dusty old newspapers containing articles from his ever active brain. "I keep this room," said he, "for times when I am over-wrought. Then I shut myself up in it, and roar! When by this process I have blown away my mental cobwebs, my brain regains its pristine energy, and I go back to my study calm and collected, having done no one any harm, and myself a lot of good." I have dined at his Club with him in the most luxurious fashion, quite regardless of expense. He was a capital host, but, like the magazines he wrote for, he only appeared replete once a month. His Press work he looked upon as mere bread and milk. His work was excellent, journalism which editors term "safe," neither too brilliant nor too dull, certainly having no trace whatever of eccentricity.
I may here offer an opinion, and make a suggestion to young journalists, and that is—safe, steady, dull mediocrity is what pays in the long run; to attempt to be brilliant when not a genius is fatal. To have the genius, brilliancy, pluck, and success means tremendous prosperity and favour for a time, but the editors and the public tire of your cleverness. You are too much in evidence. It is safer from a mere business standpoint to be the steady, stupid tortoise than the brilliant hare. The man or woman who writes a carefully thought-out essay is flattered, and quoted, and talked about: for that article the writer may possibly receive as many sovereigns as the writer of a newspaper article receives shillings; but the shillings come every day, and the sovereigns once a month. It is wiser in the long run to be satisfied with a loaf and milk once a day than with a dinner at a Club every four weeks.
THE DUKE OF BROADACRES.
If in the old days the Bohemian scribbler was not in Society, he could at least imagine himself there. There was nothing to prevent his speaking of a member of the aristocracy as "one of us" with far less embarrassment and with as much truth as he could nowadays when he is invited—but still as the oil that never will mix with water. Except in imagination—an imagination such as I recollect a well-known figure in literary Bohemia had when I knew it well, a writer of stories for the popular papers: Society stories, in which a Duke ran away with a governess, or a Duchess eloped with an artist, each weekly instalment winding up with a sensational event, so as to carry forward the interest of the reader. This writer—quite excellent in his way—a thorough Bohemian, knowing nothing about the Society he wrote about, had the power of making himself, and sometimes fresh acquaintances, believe that he played in real life a part in the story he was writing. He did not refer to the experiences as related by him as incidents in his story, but as actual events of the day.
"Brandy and soda? Thanks. My dear fellow, I feel a perfect wreck, shaken to pieces. I had an experience to-day I shall never forget. I have just arrived from Devonshire; ran down by a night train to look at a hunter Lord Briarrose wanted to sell me. Bob—that is Briarrose—and I travelled together. He is going to be married, you know; heiress; great beauty—neighbour—rolling in wealth. I stopped at the Castle last night, and before Bob was up I was on the thoroughbred and well over the country, returning about eleven along the top of the cliffs. To my horror, I saw a carriage and pair charging down a road which at one time continued a long distance skirting the cliffs. Cliffs had fallen; road cut off; unprotected;
