HOMPIS OF lath PAST.*

WHAT reviewer, or for that matter what reader, has not experi- enced the blessed relief of suddenly deciding that some " impor- tant " book is insufferably tedious and unlikely to repay him adequately for the pains of reading it Y We shut it up with a bang and toss it aside as who would say, " Tried and found • 110515$ of the Pat. By W. H. Helm. London: John Lane. [f.2 11.]

wanting." It is pleasant to say " That's that " and ha ye done

with it. The present reviewer had just comfortably said that that was that in the case of Mr. Helm's Homes of the Past when

his eye lighted on the legend, " A proposal for preserving certain typical houses, to be furnished as an example of its own time." As any book containing so enlightened a " proposal " could not be utterly negligible, he forced himself to face again the irritating style and the feeble pen-and-ink plates, and confesses that his fortitude did not go altogether unrewarded.

Mr. Helm's idea is that certain selected country houses,

typical of the various periods from the Mediaeval to the Early Victorian, appropriately fitted and furnished, should be main-

tained by some association of the rich and the righteous for the benefit of the general public. The houses arc to be of the middling sort, and preferably within easy reach of London and its foreign and Dominion visitors. Curators are to be installed who will servo " A plain, cold meal such as might have boon eaten there when the walls were newly built "—presumably an extra to the suggested half-crown entrance fee.

" At the usual tea-hour some light repast might be taken under a shady tree or in a leafy arbour. But, since auachron- isms must so far as possible be avoided, the actual beverage, tea, would not be procurable except at the Restoration and Eighteenth-Century houses."

Mr. Helm is thorough indeed in his determination to avoid anachronisms, even if ho is forced to the use of such terms as " tea-hour " and " repast." The wonder is that he brought himself fo write " arbour" instead of " bower.''.' Possibly ho did and thought better of it. The gardens, too, and all their flowers are to be of a period with the house ; but that is sound sense enough, even though the 1851 house has bedded out geraniums and lobelias. The desirability of thus preserving

specimen houses for the instruction and entertainment of the

public is not to be questioned, even though we might not agree as to the feasibility of Mr. Helm's proposals for management and finance.

It might prove easier, for instance, to subsidize the impoverished owners of certain selected " typical " houses on condition that the public (sifted and guaranteed reputable by the half-crown ticket test) should be admitted to the major part of house and gardens on certain specified days of the week. Taxation and rates might be remitted to the owners of the scheduled " show-places " in proportion as they chose to admit the public to share in their enjoyment. The extra cleaning would be paid for by tho gate-money, and the office of guido would provide paid employment for the local antiquary. If, however, the authorities insisted on the strict " periodiem " advocated by Mr. Helm, there might be difficulties.

It would be no light matter for the old squire of the four- teenth century manor-house to give up his deep, loather arm- chair in favour of an oak bench, to purge his cellar of port and his storeroom of tea, coffee, and tobacco, his garden of peas and potatoes and almost all its flowers. He might very well prefer to struggle on in the Philistine comfort of the housekeeper's room

and shut up the rest of the house rather than face the rate-aided rigours of correct mediaevalism. The gentleman selected for the early Victorian ride might also turn sensitive under the derisive eye of an ." enlightened " brake-load and tear up his

geraniums, and with them his tax-exemption papers.

Clearly there are sometimes reasons other than high taxation for old homes finding new owners.

" The filth Marquess of Northampton, in an appreciative book published in 1904, told us how nearly an ignoble pride brought about the total destruction of this old home of his family. The reason of the dismantling of the house in 1708 was a con- tested election ! The borough of Northampton at that time was divided in its allegiance between three nobles, Lords Spencer, Halifax, and Northampton, among whom a family rivalry seems to have existed. While the election lasted, for all who wore thirsty, beer ran in Althorp Park, at all cross-roads, and pro- bably also at Castle Ashby and Horton. Other liquors were supplied, as it is stated that the electors, having drained Lord Halifax's cellars of port, wore given claret. This %11113 not strong enough, so they migrated in a body to Castle Ashby and Its port. The election over, next came tho scrutiny, not as after- wards by half a dozen members of the House of Commons, but by the whole House, and each of the peers entertained members to obtain their support. Forty covers were laid daily at Spencer House, and as many at the houses of the other two noblemen. It was at length decided in favour of Lord Spencer, who had then to nominate the member, the votes having appa- rently been given for the peers, and not for candidates. Ha had so much difficulty in finding one that, eventually, so runs the story, he nominated a man who was in the East Indies. All this seems ludicrous, but it was a serious matter to the families concerned. The expenses were enormous. Lord Spencer was said to have spent nearly £130,000, and the debt was only paid off after many years. Lord Halifax was ruined. Lord North- ampton, besides cutting down all his old timber to the amount of £50,000, sold most of his furniture from Castle Ashby, and the whole of that from Compton Wynyatos, and spent the rest of his life in Switzerland. Before going abroad he gave orders that his Warwickshire house should be pulled down as he could not afford to keep it up. This, however, Mr. Birrell (the agent) deferred doing on various excuses, patching up bad roofs, ac., as well as he could afford. The family owes him an eternal debt, for he not only saved the house, but planted many of the present trees."

Food and drink are very properly given a conspicuous place in Mr. Helm's book—one might well write a nation's history in terms of them. The wretchedness of British coffee was becoming notorious, even in 1781, when Moritz, the Prussian Lutheran pastor, wrote in his journal : " I would always advise those who wish to drink coffee in England to mention beforehand how many cups are to be made with half an ounce, or else the people will probably bring them a prodigious quantity of brown water which, notwithstanding all my admonition, I have not been able wholly to avoid." The just pastor, however, did not allow the thin coffee and the " scanty dinners " of which he complains to jaundice his view of us and our institutions generally.

" I must own that the heat or warmth given by sea-coal, burnt in the chimney, appears to me softer and milder than that given by our stoves. The sight of the fires has also a cheerful and pleasing effect. Only you must take care not to look at it steadily, for this is probably the reason that there are so many young old men in England who walk and ride in the public streets with their spectacles on thus anticipating, in the bloom of youth, those conveniences and comforts which were intended for old ago."

It is surprising to hear of a German thus seeing John Bull as bespectacled—as surprising, indeed, as the explanation. He was much impressed as he walked through the streets of London by the " far greater number and handsomer people than one meets in Berlin. It gives me real pleasure when I walk from Charing Cross up the Strand, past Saint Paul's to the Royal Exchange, to meet in the thickest crowd persons from the highest to the lowest ranks, almost all well-looking people, and cleanly and neatly dressed. I rarely see even a fellow with a wheel- barrow who has not a shirt on, and that, too, such a one as shows it has been washed ; not even a beggar without both a shirt and shoes and stockings. The English are certainly dis- tinguished for cleanliness."

One is disturbed to hear that black bed-linen was frequently used in the seventh century. The reason, it is to be feared, was a prudential one, the cost of soap being at that time extremely high. Mr. Helm has, indeed, a good deal to tell us of domestic life in the past that is entertaining, though it ought to be more so. The fault is the author's. He has a " down " on machinery and all it stands for that is obtruded rather tediously, and a too uncritical admiration of what ono fears ho thinks of as " Ye geode olde times."