1894] George Meredith at Box Hill 143 



" 28th May. — Breakfast with George Wyndham. He is at last 

 bringing out his book of French Lyrics. With any luck it should be a 

 great success. 



" iot!i June (Sunday). — To Wotton to see Evelyn, who is in poor 

 health. He wants me to act in concert with him on the question of a 

 new Conservative candidate for East Grinstead. On Thursday I met 

 Frederic Harrison, just back from France. There is great excitement 

 about the Anglo-Belgian Agreement in regard to the Congo and Upper 

 Nile, the last of Rosebery's thieves' treaties, but Harrison says the 

 wirepullers assure him that the French menace will come to nothing. 

 I am not so sure, as it is being taken up in Germany also. 



" nth June. — Still at Wotton. After luncheon drove to Box Hill to 

 see George Meredith. Found him with his daughter, a pretty little bar 

 maiden just engaged to Russell Sturgis, and another young lady. He 

 is terribly deaf and afflicted with creeping paralysis, so that he staggers 

 from time to time while walking, and once to-day nearly fell. It does 

 not, however, affect his mind, and he has a novel on hand at the present 

 moment which keeps him writing six hours a day. He is a queer, 

 voluble creature, with a play-acting voice, and his conversation like 

 one dictating to a secretary, a constant search for epigrams. I took 

 the bull by the horns at once about his novels, said I never read prose 

 and looked upon him only as a poet. This pleased him, and he gave 

 me two volumes, recommending to me especially the piece called 

 ' Attila.' He told me Tennyson was the first person to discover the 

 merits of ' Love in a Valley.' I asked him to explain sundry obscurities 

 in ' Modern Love,' and he said he would do so if I would come up with 

 him to a little literary den he has at the top of his garden, but the 

 young ladies unfortunately followed us, and he was unwilling to talk 

 about this poem before them, so I missed my chance. During our talk 

 a luncheon was brought to him on a tray, as he said he was too busy to 

 sit down to a regular meal, and could not write after one o'clock, so I 

 left him to his work and drove on. I had driven my four horses in at 

 the front entrance, a difficult feat, and got them out again and went on 

 over the hill to Ockham, where I picked up Judith, and back in the 

 evening again to Wotton over Ranmore Common and down the steep 

 descent of Coombe Bottom. I fancy in all history no team of four 

 horses was ever driven before down that road, not even by Tommy On- 

 slow of happy memory, certainly not by a woman, for Judith had the 

 reins. 



" Compare the local rhyme, for Onslow lived close by : 



What can Tommy Onslow do ? 

 He can drive a coach and two, 

 Can Tommy Onslow do no more? 



