AT MANCHESTER 65 



and sometimes they gathered quietly about him as 

 he amused them with his pencil. 

 In another Manchester family, whose name will The 



Gaskells. 



be familiar to my readers — ^that of the Gaskells, 

 Fleeming was a frequent visitor. To Mrs. Gaskell, 

 he would often bring his new ideas, a process that 

 many of his later friends will understand and, in 

 their own cases, remember. With the girls, he 

 had ' constant fierce wrangles,' forcing them to 

 reason out their thoughts and to explain their pre- 

 possessions ; and I hear from Miss Gaskell that they 

 used to wonder how he could throw all the ardour 

 of his character into the smallest matters, and to 

 admire his unselfish devotion to his parents. Of 

 one of these wrangles, I have found a record most 

 characteristic of the man. Fleeming had been 

 laying down his doctrine that the end justifies the 

 means, and that it is quite right ' to boast of your 

 six men-servants to a burglar or to steal a knife 

 to prevent a murder ' ; and the Miss Gaskells, 

 with girhsh loyalty to what is current, had rejected 

 the heresy with indignation. From such passages- 

 at-arms, many retire mortified and ruffled; but 

 Fleeming had no sooner left the house than he fell 

 into delighted admiration of the spirit of his adver- 

 saries. From that it was but a step to ask himself 

 ' what truth was sticking in their heads ' ; for even 

 the falsest form of words (in Fleeming's life-long 

 opinion) reposed upon some truth, just as he could 



£ 



