1900] Death of Oscar Wilde 375 



not prevented him. Mohammed Abdu praised him for his power of 

 making himself agreeable when he chose, as he had done in England, but 

 said he had been most indiscreet afterwards, having told everything that 

 had happened there to the editor of the ' Mokattam,' who had straight- 

 way published it. 



" George, according to a telegram, has got the Chief Secretaryship 

 of Ireland. I am glad of it for him as a step in his ambition, but it is 

 a thankless task, if he thinks to reconcile Ireland to English rule." 



During the rest of the month my diary is mostly rilled with an account 

 of explorations made in the eastern desert, interesting in themselves, 

 but not of sufficient importance to be here transcribed. We were back 

 at Sheykh Obeyd the first week of the month. 



" 10th Dec. — Oscar Wilde is reported dead. He was without ex- 

 ception the most brilliant talker I have ever come across, the most 

 ready, the most witty, the most audacious. Nobody could pretend to 

 outshine him, or even to shine at all in his company. Something of his 

 wit is reflected in his plays, but very little. The fine society of London 

 and especially the ' Souls ' ran after him because they knew he could 

 always amuse them, and the pretty women allowed him great familiari- 

 ties, though there was no question of love-making. Physically, he was 

 repellant, though with a certain sort of fat good looks. There was a 

 kind of freckled coarseness in his colouring I have seen at times in 

 other Irishmen. I was never intimate with him, though on superficially 

 cordial terms when we met. He had been two or three times at our 

 Crabbet parties and was a member of our Club, but only attended one 

 regular meeting. The last time I saw him was at that brilliant luncheon 

 party at Asquith's in Upper Grosvenor Street which I have already 

 described. His poetry, though nothing very wonderful, was good, es- 

 pecially his ' Ballad of Reading Gaol,' as was also a protest he wrote 

 on leaving prison against prison treatment, and if he had then begun a 

 decent life people would have forgiven him, but he returned to Paris 

 and to his dog's vomit and this is the end. I see it said in the papers 

 that he was received into the Catholic Church on his deathbed, a strange 

 ending, and yet not strange! 



" 22nd Dec. — The old century is very nearly out, and leaves the 

 world in a pretty pass, and the British Empire is playing the devil in 

 it as never an empire before on so large a scale. We may live to see 

 its fall. All the nations of Europe are making the same hell upon earth 

 in China, massacring and pillaging and raping in the captured cities as 

 outrageously as in the Middle Ages. The Emperor of Germany gives 

 the word for slaughter and the Pope looks on and approves. In South 

 Africa our troops are burning farms under Kitchener's command, and 

 the Queen and the two Houses of Parliament, and the bench of bishops 

 thank God publicly and vote money for the work. The Americans are 



