PERSONAL. 13 



President should be changed annually, but the members 

 insisted on repeatedly re-electing the individual who had 

 undertaken the office in the first instance. My qualifica- 

 tions for the position were a habit of regular attendance 

 and an unlimited capacity for listening. As a matter of 

 fact, I missed only one meeting, my absence then being 

 due to my dispatch on official business to Paris soon after 

 the Armistice. On every other occasion I was in the 

 Chair from the beginning to the end of the meeting. Except 

 that I once or twice started the discussion my position was 

 that of a keenly interested observer, as the active duties of 

 the Chairmanship were negligible, and the task of keeping 

 order was a sinecure. 



There are many who will recall those meetings in Gains- 

 borough's old studio with feelings of almost affectionate regret. 

 It was a pleasant party which gathered on either side of 

 the big Georgian fireplace on a winter's night. The murk 

 and glamour of London were only a few yards distant, the 

 motors and taxis passed in ceaseless procession outside the 

 doors, the Automobile Club, with its cosmopolitan crowd, 

 was next door, and near neighbours included the grave and 

 reverend Athenaeum, the serious Carlton, and the still 

 more serious Reform, while across the way the select Marl- 

 borough Club, like the adjacent Marlborough House, reminded 

 us of proximity to Royalty. In the core of the Metropolis, 

 where historically and actually all that is eminent whether 

 by rank or birth, by learning or influence, in the nation's 

 life, was concentrated, a group of country folk foregathered 

 to talk about their mutual concerns. Mr. George Edwards 

 would tell the story relevant to many discussions of his 

 early introduction to agricultural affairs as a boy of six 

 scaring birds ; Lord Selborne would recount bis experience 

 as the Chairman of a Parish Council consisting of seven 

 labourers, one tradesman and one landowner, and their unani- 

 mous hostility to improvements in the village which would in- 

 crease the rates; Mr. George Nicholls, from his own biography, 

 would describe how a horseman on a farm, keen at his work 

 and determined to " make good," could establish a position 

 for himself and become Mayor of an important borough and 



