1909] Meredith and Rossctti 249 



" I forgot to say that Meynell, who dined with me last night in Lon- 

 don, narrated to me the true version, as he heard it from Meredith, of 

 Meredith's quarrel with Rossetti. They were at breakfast one morn- 

 ing, and had a dispute about a trifle, and Rossetti, resenting something 

 that Meredith had said, told him that if he said it again he would throw 

 a cup of tea in his face. Meredith thereupon repeated it, and Rossetti 

 threw the tea, and Meredith left the house at once and sent for his 

 effects during the course of the day. I have been reading ' Evan Har- 

 rington ' coming here in the train, but as far as I have got, it does not 

 alter my opinion of these novels. I fail to take any interest in the char- 

 acters. They are cleverly sketched, but act very much at hap-hazard. 

 They are not comic enough to make one laugh, and not tragic enough 

 to make one weep. They bore one before one is half through with 

 their doings. There is a good deal of subtle observation and happy 

 phrasing, but it is strange that anyone should call them great novels. 

 Yet I find people comparing Meredith with Shakespeare and all the 

 heavenly host ! 



" Z r d June. — I have spent the day very pleasantly, the morning with 

 Miss Ethel Webb, who, in spite of a rugged exterior, is a nice woman, 

 more conversible, I think, than her sister, though both are good talkers. 

 Having that department under her special charge, she showed me every- 

 thing outside. Certainly Newstead is a splendid domain, through the 

 abundance of its water and the lie of the land about it. The trees 

 are mostly sycamores, to me a new feature, the soil being unsuited to 

 oaks. The celebrated oak sown by Byron only a hundred years ago, 

 is already dying. I have recommended its being pollarded as the best 

 chance of prolonging its life, but the soil is gravel and sand. Yews 

 grow better than any other tree on it, and the tank, which is over- 

 shadowed by them, is one of the most beautiful features of a garden I 

 ever saw. Miss Webb pointed me out the place in the garden wall 

 where there had been a postern gate opening formerly towards the 

 forest. This has been built up, she tells me, for centuries, yet her dogs 

 sometimes scratch at it, recognizing it as a doorway still. We sat in her 

 rock garden in the sun, for the wind was cold, and she told me she 

 had acquired the power of making birds understand her, and that the 

 blackbirds and thrushes give her warning of the approach of strangers 

 when she is there alone, as she often is. not wishing to be disturbed. 

 The outside walls of the Abbey have been much spoiled by restoration, 

 done in Wildman's time, who spent £100,000 on it, so that it is difficult 

 to make out quite what is old and what is new, and the windows have 

 been plate-glassed, and otherwise bedevilled, but it is still a splendid 

 possession, much larger and more important than I had at all imagined, 

 and one can well understand how the sudden inheritance of it by 

 Byron and his mother turned their heads, and helped to give him that 



