68 Gladstone Re-elected [1892 



Ireland will never have a chance again. On all other grounds I am 

 glad, and so is Morris, but politics are a weary thing. I read him part 

 of ' The Stealing of the Mare/ which he approves, and advises me to 

 publish, though he says nobody will read it ; and he read us some of his 

 own Scandinavian translations in return. 



" 13th July. — Mark Napier has got into Parliament, I am glad to 

 see. Gladstone's majority will now be 50 or more. Lord Salisbury, 

 George tells me, will meet Parliament, and will not retire till a vote of 

 want of confidence has been passed. Gladstone's personal majority in 

 Midlothian only 650. 



" igth July. — Gladstone has now a majority of 46 in the new House 

 of Commons. I have not voted at all in this election, or taken any 

 part. 



" 23rd and 24th July. — Meeting of the Crabbet Club, those present 

 were : 



George Wyndham. Charles Laprimaudaye. 



George Curzon. Harry Cust. 



Nigel Kingscote. Hubert Howard. 



Charles Gatty. George Leveson Gower. 



Theobald Mathew. Dick Grosvenor. 



Godfrey Webb. Mark Napier. 

 Loulou Harcourt. 



George Wyndham performed a wonderful feat, writing a long poem 

 in a most complicated metre, and full of excellent things in hardly 

 more than an hour, between sets of lawn tennis. Cust wrote another 

 under like conditions, so full of wit that we nearly gave him the prize. 

 George Leveson was also good. The tennis handicap was won by 

 Hubert Howard, the laureateship by Mathew. Hubert won the cup 

 through Grosvenor's magnanimity, who having the last set in hand 

 suddenly found himself lame and retired. Cust is interesting, and of 

 great abilities. George Leveson a delightful butt, and cause of wit in 

 others with untouchable good humour. These occasions are the salt 

 of life. 



"26th July. — To Hamilton Aide's at Ascot to meet Lady Brooke, 

 the Ranee of Borneo. She is, or rather has been, a fine, fair woman, 

 and is now perhaps thirty-seven, living in England away from her 

 husband, Aide tells me, because he prefers other wives. I have had a 

 good deal of conversation with her about native races and European 

 civilization. I have sent in my proofs of ' Esther,' finally corrected, 

 with five of the sonnet-stanzas cut out. George Wyndham thinks the 

 poem will not greatly suffer, though he regrets it. 



" 1st Aug. — Dined at the Gerald Balfours, Betty charming, and a 

 very gay evening, the other guests being Lady Frances Balfour, clever, 



