The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke, Volume 2Gwynn, Stephen Lucius
History
The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke, Volume 2
Gwynn, Stephen Lucius
Dilke, Charles Wentworth, Sir, 1843-1911; Great Britain -- Politics and government -- 19th century
Above these rooms, Sir Charles's little study, occupied all day by his
secretary or himself, was lined with books of reference and piles of
despatch-boxes, while every spare foot on the wall held relics of the
past. There was the Herkomer portrait of his second wife, there also a
copy of a favourite picture, Bellini's Doge Leonardo Loredano; the
portrait of Keats, the only one Severn did from the life--now on loan at
the National Portrait Gallery--old political cartoons of Chelsea days,
portraits and prints of John Wilkes, and a head of Mazzini. Felix
Moscheles (the nephew of Mendelssohn and baby of the Cradle Song)
painted Mazzini. Concerning its subject the Memoir notes: 'In the course
of 1872 I lost a good friend in Mazzini, whose enthusiasms, Italian and
religious, I at that time scarcely shared, but whose conversation and
close friendship I deeply valued.... The modernness of the Universal
Cigarette Smoking Craze may be judged by the fact that Mazzini was the
first man I ever knew who was constantly smoking cigarettes.'
The rest was a medley impossible to catalogue: portraits of Charles
Lamb, who had been the grandfather's friend; a scarce proclamation by
the Pretender; medals and other 'Caryll' relics; rapiers, pistols which
had travelled with Sir Charles through America; a section of the Trinity
Hall boat which was head of the river in 1862 and 1864; seven cups,
trophies of rowing, walking, fencing, and shooting matches, with shots
dug up on his Toulon estate which were mementoes of the British
blockades of the town. Apart from works of reference, a special case was
given to autographed books from Hood, Rogers the poet, Gambetta,
Laveleye, Louis Blanc, Castelar, Cardinal Manning, Queen Victoria, and
many more. In this collection figured all Sir Charles's college prizes,
carefully preserved; the family Bible of Lord Leicester, uncle to Sir
Philip Sidney, with Dilke family entries; and a little volume in which
his second wife had written for him some of the most beautiful passages
from 'Queens' Gardens' in _Sesame and Lilies_; it was bound in white
vellum and 'blessed by Ruskin.' Here, too, were many Keats letters and
books afterwards left by will to Hampstead.
A hoard of treasures filled a little book-room above--his mother's
sketches, drawings of his first wife driving her ponies in Sloane
Street, photographs and trinkets of hers, old family caricatures, and
also some original sketches by Leech. In the room next to it, occupied
by his grandmother till her death in 1882, was a John Collier of the
first Lady Dilke.
When the grandmother's sitting-room was used later by Sir Charles's
second wife, its main features were a small reference library of French
art and a collection of books on Labour. Before the fireplace, on the
writing-table as it was in 1885, were bowls of French porcelain filled
once a week with fresh flowers from the Toulon garden--paper white
narcissus and purple anemones or big violets of Provençal growth.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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