



Produced by Tapio Riikonen and David Widger







PASSAGES FROM THE ENGLISH NOTE-BOOKS

By Nathaniel Hawthorne


VOL. II.






PASSAGES FROM HAWTHORNE'S ENGLISH NOTE-BOOKS.



LONDON.--MILTON-CLUB DINNER.


April 4th, 1856.--On Tuesday I went to No. 14 Ludgate Hill, to dine with
Bennoch at the Milton Club; a club recently founded for dissenters,
nonconformists, and people whose ideas, religious or political, are not
precisely in train with the establishment in church and state.  I was
shown into a large reading-room, well provided with periodicals and
newspapers, and found two or three persons there; but Bennoch had not yet
arrived.  In a few moments, a tall gentleman with white hair came in,--a
fine and intelligent-looking man, whom I guessed to be one of those who
were to meet me.  He walked about, glancing at the periodicals; and soon
entered Mr. Tupper, and, without seeing me, exchanged warm greetings with
the white-haired gentleman.  "I suppose," began Mr. Tupper, "you have
come to meet--"  Now, conscious that my name was going to be spoken, and
not knowing but the excellent Mr. Tupper might say something which he
would not, quite like me to overhear, I advanced at once, with
outstretched hand, and saluted him.  He expressed great joy at the
recognition, and immediately introduced me to Mr. Hall.

The dining-room was pretty large and lofty, and there were sixteen guests
at table, most of them authors, or people connected with the press; so
that the party represented a great deal of the working intellect of
London at this present day and moment,--the men whose plays, whose songs,
whose articles, are just now in vogue.  Mr. Tom Taylor was one of the
very few whose writings I had known anything about.  He is a tall,
slender, dark young man, not English-looking, and wearing 
spectacles, so that I should readily have taken him for an American
literary man.  I did not have much opportunity of talking with him, nor
with anybody else, except Dr. ------, who seemed a shrewd, sensible man,
with a certain slight acerbity of thought.  Mr. Herbert Ingram, recently
elected member of Parliament, was likewise present, and sat on Bennoch's
left.

It was a very good dinner, with an abundance of wine, which Bennoch sent
round faster than was for the next day's comfort of his guests.  It is
singular that I should thus far have quite forgotten W------ H--------,
whose books I know better than those of any other person there.  He is a
white-headed, stout, firm-looking, and rather wrinkled-faced old
gentleman, whose temper, I should imagine, was not the very sweetest in
the world.  There is all abruptness, a kind of sub-acidity, if not
bitterness, in his address; he seemed not to be, in short, so genial as I
should have anticipated from his books.

As soon as the cloth was removed, Bennoch, without rising from his chair,
made a speech in honor of his eminent and distinguished guest, which
illustrious person happened to be sitting in the selfsame chair that I
myself occupied.  I have no recollection of what he said, nor of what I
said in reply, but I remember that both of us were cheered and applauded
much more than the occasion deserved.  Then followed about fifty other
speeches; for every single individual at table was called up (as Tupper
said, "toasted and roasted"), and, for my part, I was done entirely brown
(to continue T-----'s figure).  Everybody said something kind, not a word
or idea of which can I find in my memory.  Certainly, if I never get any
more praise in my life, I have had enough of it for once.  I made another
little bit of a speech, too, in response to something that was said in
reference to the present difficulties between England and America, and
ended, as a proof that I deemed war impossible, with drinking success to
the British army, and calling on Lieutenant Shaw, of the Aldershott Camp,
to reply.  I am afraid I must have said something very wrong, for the
applause was vociferous, and I could hear the gentlemen whispering about
the table, "Good!" "Good!" "Yes, he is a fine fellow,"--and other such
ill-earned praises; and I took shame to myself, and held my tongue
(publicly) the rest of the evening.  But in such cases something must be
allowed to the excitement of the moment, and to the effect of