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Liberalism is bound to treat this type of government as an anachronistic survival; but we are no longer in the nineteenth century, and we need not pay much respect to the "fly-blown phylacteries" of philosophic Radicalism. An Italian professor, visiting Oxford in August this year for the meeting of the British Association, said of his own country under Mussolini: "We have lost our liberty, but never before have we been so well governed." When the choice is offered between the loss of liberty and anarchy, a nation will always choose the former; for where there is anarchy there is no liberty, and there is a host of other evils. Fascism, like Napoleonism, stands for Real-politik and a "swallowing of all formulas." Political theories, formulas, and phrases, as a Frenchman has said lately, do not generate great movements: they approve, justify, and " crown " them. I begin by taking what I want, " said Frederick the Great; "I can always find pedants to prove my rights." The twentieth century may, before its close, find a new set of formulas to justify the phase of political evolution through which it is passing. If so, we may be sure that they will be very unlike the shibboleths of nineteenth century Liberalism, but it would be a very bold prophet who would venture to guess what they will be. It is best, perhaps, that every man should think for himself, as Mr. Trevelyan's admirable history leaves us free to do. He makes us feel that whatever the future may bring, this little island, "set in the silver sea," has played a noble part in the grand drama of humanity.

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SIR RIDER HAGGARD'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY

The Days of My Life. By Sir H. RIDER HAGGARD. Edited by C. J. LONGMAN. Longmans, Green. 1926.

SIR Rider Haggard's "Days of My Life" is the autobiography

of a man who did not keep a diary. The best autobiography that ever was written, we shall probably agree, is that of Samuel Pepys; and there is convincing internal evidence in plenty that it was not intended for publication. The diary form has its obvious merit in the liveliness of the record of daily recollections. Pictures summoned to the memory long after their event will scarcely have the same vivacity. But the diary form suffers its disadvantages also: it cannot have the same sense of proportion; cannot see all in a true perspective as the later review may do.

This is a consideration of peculiar importance for the record of a life like Rider Haggard's, which was divided with more than common sharpness into two very different periods: the earlier, when he was seeking his name by the writing of his wonderful romances; and the later, when he was working in his native East Anglia, and elsewhere, for the betterment of agriculture.

Now, making two turnips grow where but one grew before in the soil of Norfolk is a very meritorious occupation, but it is less interesting to most readers than the story of the conception of "She," "King Solomon's Mines," "Montezuma's Daughter," Eric Bright-Eyes," " Cleopatra," and many other novels. One knew that Haggard had turned with relief, strange to say-for he grew weary of romance writing-from the foreign wonders to the native turnips. It was while all his attention was given to agriculture that he wrote his autobiography, which was completed in 1912, and one had a natural fear that his pre-occupation of the moment would play a very large part in the story and might even be made subordinate to the other-the earlier, the imaginative.

It is not so. The author, knowing his public well, has divined what would be of interest to it. More than that, we may say that he has appreciated which portion of his lifework is really of the greater and more abiding importance. It is scarcely to be doubted that his glorious fictions have been of greater value to

his readers than his agricultural industry. Perhaps he himself scarcely has realised their value. But he has entertained sad souls in many an hour when they sorely needed entertainment and taken them to a strange world where present troubles are forgotten; and also it is not to be doubted that his South African romances have filled very many a young fellow with longing to go into the wide spaces of those lands and see their marvels for himself, and have thus aided far more than we can ever know in bringing British settlers and influence into new country. They have helped to accomplish the dreams and aims of Rhodes.

Very largely, then, these volumes are the story of the earlier Haggard-at first of his doings while his mind was, unconsciously for the most part, storing itself with material for later use in his novels; and, as he tells us of these doings, so at the same time he reveals to us the manner of man he was that did them. And this, too, is a subject in which there was a sharp division.

In Rider Haggard, even more than in most men, there would seem to have been two personalities. There was of course the man of brilliant imagination, the artist, as we all figure him. He was much of a dreamer in his school days, so that he made no figure in examinations. It seems that his mind was very little receptive of information that did not grip him with its own interest. So far he was artistic. But then, for the rest of the man's mental and moral make-up, we seem to meet a being as remote as one needs to be from the weaknesses and dangers of what is called "the artistic temperament." He was a man in whom the nerve of duty was very strong: and we may more than guess, as we read his autobiography, that he owed this invaluable heritage to his mother, for whom his devotion was without bounds.

There is a legend in the family of a remote Danish ancestor, Ogard by name; but it is rather misty in Rider Haggard's account of it; and what concerns us more is that at the time of his birth the family had for many years been in East Anglia, and that for four successive generations its head had been squire of Bradenham Hall in Norfolk, where Rider was born. He describes his father to us as a forcible, emphatic, loud-voiced man, much beloved, though hasty in speech and in anger; chairman of Quarter Sessions for more than forty years; and a very active man in county business. There were several brothers, and all, including

Rider, seem to have inherited from the father his voice of more than common power. But from the father's side that appears as if it had been the whole of this son's heritage. It was from the mother, as we must think, and as he certainly would have delighted to think, that he took his qualities.

Twenty-two years have passed (he writes) since she left us, but I can honestly say that every year has brought to me a deeper appreciation of her beautiful character. . . . Her abilities were great; taking her all in all she was perhaps the ablest woman I have known, though she had no iron background to her character; for that she was too gentle. Her bent no doubt was literary, and had circumstances permitted, I am sure she would have made a name in that branch of art to which in the intervals of her crowded life she gravitated by nature. Also she was a good musician and drew well. . . . Further, she did her very best to teach her numerous children the truths of religion and to lead them into the ways of righteousness and peace.

Though the cares of a family prevented the mother from following the inspirations of her genius, it is easy to see from these words whence one at least of her children derived his disposition and his gifts. The last sentence about religion is worth notice; for throughout his life, Rider Haggard was a deeply religious man, and seems never to have been troubled with the "doubts" which brought very great pain to many of his generation, who had been trained in the strictest sect of the "Fundamentalists" and were unable to make that training tally with the new gospel of the Darwinians.

Rider Haggard's life as a boy did not differ much from type. He did a little shooting with a single-barrelled muzzle-loader, a little hunting on such steeds as the heavy calls made on his father's purse by the growing family allowed him to provide for the sons. There were five older brothers than Rider; education bills came up to £1200 a year; and while his elders had gone to Winchester, followed by Oxford and Cambridge, Haileybury and Westminster, he had to content himself with the Ipswich Grammar School, "a rough place" where there was "much bullying." Thence he went to Scoones, the crammer, to be coached for the Foreign Office examination, and while there had his first experience of a spiritualistic séance, which made an abiding impression on his receptive young mind.

While he was at Scoones', Sir Henry Bulwer, a friend of his father's, was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of Natal. Mr.

Haggard asked Sir Henry if he would take Rider with him as one of his staff. Sir Henry consented. The first step was taken towards "She" and "King Solomon's Mines."

Rider Haggard went out to South Africa in the days of Bishop Colenso, Sir Theophilus Shepstone, Sir Bartle Frere, and the series of political and military errors which culminated at Majuba Hill. He was, as he writes frankly of himself, "a tall young fellow, quite six feet, and slight; blue-eyed, brown-haired, freshcomplexioned and not at all bad-looking. The Zulus gave me the name of Indanda,' which meant, I believe, one who is tall and pleasant-natured." The name gives us the Zulus' agreeable estimate of the writer. On the next page or so we have his reciprocal interest in them: "From the beginning I was attracted by the Zulus, and soon began to study their character and their history." A little later: "I accompanied Sir Henry on a tour he made up-country and there saw a great war-dance which was organized in his honour. I mention this because the first thing I ever wrote for publication was a description of this dance. I think that it appeared in the Gentleman's Magazine."

He had been but a little while in the country when Sir Theophilus Shepstone was sent on a special mission to the Transvaal, and begged Sir Henry Bulwer to give him young Haggard as a member of his staff. This was arranged, although reluctantly on the part of Sir Henry, and in the course of this mission Haggard was lucky enough to have as a colleague on the staff one of whom he writes as " my friend Fynney," who was the chief interpreter and had infinite knowledge of the Zulus. “From him," Haggard goes on, "I gathered much information as to Zulu customs and history which in subsequent days I made use of in 'Nada the Lily' and other books. There the reader may find a true account of the doings of these awful witch-doctors." Then he adds this noteworthy passage, noteworthy both because it shows a sympathy with these occult mysteries very dear to the soul of savage man, which the man of civilization generally scorns, and also because there is little doubt that it was this sympathy and this large share of belief even, which enabled Haggard so wonderfully to enter into the spirits of the Zulus and to make the working of these spirits vivid, if not actually intelligible, to his readers. "Often I have wondered," are his words, "whether they (i.e. the witch doctors) are merely frauds, or whether they

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