Chapter XVIII

DEALING IN FUTURES

There are some who think that in Manchester the Caucasian is very much played out, but I am not of their number. I look back on the past history of the city and compare it with the present, and am still of opinion with Richard Cobden that Manchester is the place for all men of bargain and business. The gambling trade in bills no doubt belongs to London, but the real trade of making, collecting, and selling belongs to Manchester. For Manchester is the place where people do things.

It is good to talk about doing things, but better still to do them. As a great teacher used to say to his art students: “Don’t talk about what you are going to do—​do it.” That is the Manchester habit. And in the past through the manifestation of this quality the word Manchester became a synonym 312 for energy and freedom, and the right to do and to think without shackles.

And as I say, there are some who think that the days of freedom and energy are gone, and that Manchester is “left as a cottage in a vineyard, as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers,” but I refuse to be of their party. For as I have read of the past, so I look round and see here to-day the old eternal fight going on, the contest between those who think anything is good enough for Manchester and those who think nothing is too good for Manchester. For these contending spirits are the Genii fighting over the soul and the body of the Master of the Event.

And anon you find the good spirit in the ascendant, and a citizen raises an Owens College or a Whitworth Gallery or a Rylands Library that the name of Manchester may be magnified, and again the Evil Genie has gained the day and hardened the hearts of the rulers of the city, and they can only sit and talk and talk about necessary libraries and art galleries, having altogether lost the Manchester habit of doing them. And to those who are in despair about the hopelessness of the fight, let me recall that delightful American parable dear to my childhood, the Story of the two Frogs. There were, as I remember, two frogs who visited a dairy. One was an optimist and the other a pessimist. And the latter fell into a milk-can and swam about, gazing despondently at the shiny sides up which he could not crawl, and at last feebly ceased to struggle and sank to the bottom and was drowned. Now the optimist frog also fell 313 into a milk-can, and he too looked up at the shiny sides of the can, but he kept a good heart, and all through the night swam and kicked and struggled, until in the early dawn he found himself at the bottom of the can sitting on a pat of butter.

That kind of spirit is not only to be found in frogdom. Richard Cobden had it, and calls it Bonapartian, “a feeling that spurs me on with the conviction that all the obstacles to fortune with which I am impeded will (nay shall) yield if assailed with energy.” That is the true Manchester spirit, and it is not dead to-day.

And to my thinking, if you want to realise fully the wonderments that trade and commerce could produce if they would, turn into the real Manchester Cathedral—​not the parish church which belongs to the past—​but the Cathedral of to-day in Deansgate, the Rylands Library. Around you, seated in their stalls, are the great prophets and preachers of the world, clothed in glorious but perfectly legal vestments, not thrusting their messages uncivilly toward you, but waiting in dumb dignity until you feel worthy to approach and learn. And for my own part to reach one of those side niches, those pleasant pastures of study, harbours of letters in quiet creeks away from the main stream of the library, is to arrive at the haven where I would be. I do not grudge another his ritual and his music, and the sing-song of his priest. I only know that I feel better without them. For in this building I find an odour of sanctity not always to be found in churches. 314 Here I have listened to sermons—​voices from beyond—​more eloquent in their wisdom than many preached in latter-day pulpits. Sitting in peace and at rest in this beautiful building, the dim ripple of the outer traffic just reaching my ear, I have often wondered whether all Manchester might not be builded and furnished in the same spirit of honour and worthiness. And being faintly imbued with the Manchester spirit myself, there are times when I believe that this will really be so. For my eyes refuse to see, even in nightmares, a picture of Manchester in ruins, with tourists tracking over the desert on hired camels to visit the remains of the Town Hall with its battered frescoes, and the shell of the Rylands Library, sole relics of a vanished city.

My dreams and imagery are far otherwise, and I hold with the poet that eidolons are the entities of entities. And if I have ever appeared to the good librarians in Deansgate to have had my eyes closed in ecclesiastical slumber, it was not really so. I was seeing visions, dreaming dreams, or more truly perhaps, I had impelled my spirit into the future and had left my body, umbrella-wise, hypothecated in the safe keeping of the library officials. For in this method I have many times visited Manchester several hundred years hence, and my difficulty has always been to find the Rylands Library, or even the Town Hall, so many noble buildings of even finer proportions stood among the lawns and gardens and fountains of the city. And I had rather see visions of a New Manchester than a New Jerusalem.

315 I know no prettier dream, if it be one, than to sail from Eastham up the pure waters of a wider canal and see the country folk resting after their day’s work in the dainty cabarets along the shores, and as the last lock gates close behind you and you swing into the great lagoon to the south of the city, the setting sun crimsons the clean stone and marble warehouses of a noble city. For this I can prophesy—​it is information, not a tip—​that if there is to be a Manchester at all some hundreds of years hence it will be a city without smoke, its people will be healthy and handsome, its Pharisees will be fewer, and all will breathe pure air and walk clean streets, and when a citizen’s day’s work is done he will be found angling for a trout in the church pool with a better chance of success than he would have to-day.

But these futures depend on the good Genie of Manchester winning the battles of to-day. For when energy, freedom, and the power to do things depart from Manchester she will become “as an oak whose leaf fadeth, and as a garden that hath no water.”

316

317

INDEX

Abbott, Rev. Edwin, 18

Abbott, Elizabeth, 18

Abbott, George (Archbishop of Canterbury), 18

Addison, J., Q.C., Judge, 41, 113, 139, 152, 153, 174

Agnew, Sir William, 58-64

Aitken, Louis, 90, 134, 135, 212, 214, 221, 224

Anderson, James, Q.C. (Official Referee), 58, 64

Anderson, Mary, 280

Anderton, Mr. (Solicitor), 144, 145

Archer, William, 244

Arnold, W. T., 73-80

Ashton, Thomas, 196

Asquith, Rt. Hon. H. H., 39

Astbury, J. M., 151, 208-210

Balfour, Rt. Hon. Arthur James, 201-207, 265

Ballantine, Serjeant, 23-29

Barrett, Wilson, 281

Barrie, J. M., 75

Beccaria, Bonesana, Marchese di, 107

Bell, Joseph, 192-198

Benson, Frank, 281

Berry, James, 109

Blair, Falkner, 62, 80-83, 87-89, 90, 96, 113-120, 248, 249

Blair, Mrs., 81

Bovill, Sir W., Q.C., 23

Bowen, Lord Justice, 49, 131

Bradbury, J. K., 96

Bradlaugh, Charles, 102

Britland, Mary Ann, 111-118

Brontë, Charlotte, 79

Brougham, Lord, 18, 232

Brown, Ford Madox, 278

Bruce, J. A. B. B., 44, 45

Bryce, Rt. Hon. James, 221

Burnaby, Rev. E., 249, 250

Burnie, R. W., 43

Bury, Dr. Judson, 296

Butt, Hon. Mr. Justice, 50-54

Byrne, T. F., 88, 113-117, 140, 141, 221

Cagney, C. F., 42

Caiger, Rev. W. S., 264

Calvert, Charles, 278, 279

Calvert, Louis, 282-289

Carr, J. Comyns, 244

Cave, Hon. Mr. Justice, 113-118, 134-136, 203, 249

Cecil, Lord Robert, 203

Chamberlain, Rt. Hon. Joseph, 40, 43, 55-57, 233, 235

Clarke, Sir Edward. K.C., 114

Clay, Robert, 69

Cobden, Richard, 311, 313

Coleridge, Rt. Hon. Lord Chief Justice, 47, 89-92, 139, 219

Collier, Joseph, 298, 299

Collins, Henn, Q.C., 34

Costeker, Charles, 142

Cottingham, James, 122

Courtneidge, Robert, 283

Coventry, Judge, 142, 143

Coward, Lewis, 58, 203

Cox, Bertram, 40

Danckwerts, W. O. A. J., 39-41, 203

Darling, C. J., 54

Davey, Sir Horace, 132, 133

Davies, Rev. Llewelyn, 17

Davis, Mrs., 81, 82

Day, Mr. Justice, 195-198

Derby, Lord, 197

Dixon, Mary, 112, 113

Dixon, Thomas, 112-116

Douro, Lord, 22

Drummond, Lister, 51, 52

Ducat, Colonel, 62, 63

Dukes, 119-122

Duncombe, Thomas Slingsby, 22

Edwards, Dr. Hall, 295

Esher, Lord, 130, 131

Farren, William, 280

Finlay, Sir Robert, Q.C., 119, 132, 203

Flanagan, Richard, 282

Forbes-Robertson, J., 280

Freemantle, George, 202, 206

Frere, Bartle, 40, 41

Garnett, Richard, 19

Gaskell, Miss, 78-80

Geoghan, G., 42

George, Rt. Hon. D. Lloyd, 43

Gladstone, Rt. Hon. W. E., 56

Gordon, George, 119, 120

Gordon, Meyer, 119-122

Gordon, Mr., 119-122

Grantham, Hon. Mr. Justice, 127-131

Green, John Francis, 204, 205

Gully, W. C. (Lord Selby), 99, 100, 130, 155, 160-162, 195

Gwenn, Edmund, 288

Haldane, Rt. Hon. R. B., 44, 45

Hannen, Lord, 131

Harwood, Sir John, 265

Hawkins, Hon. Mr. Justice, 23, 49, 63, 133

Heron, Sir Joseph, 59

Herschell, Sir Farrer, Q.C., 36

Heywood, Judge, 133, 220

Heywood, Oliver, 194

Hicks-Beach, Rt. Hon. Sir Michael, 168

Higgin, William Housman, Q.C., 95-101

Hill, Dr. Birkbeck, 106

Hockin, Mr. (Solicitor), 303, 304

Hodgson, C. D., 169-173

Holker, Sir John, Q.C., 24

Holyoake, George Jacob, 19

Hopkinson, Charles, 192, 193

Hopwood, Charles, Q.C., 158, 248-255

Horniman, Miss, 283

Hughes, Charles, 221, 282

Hughes, Judge, 140, 141

Hulton, Mr., 246, 247

Hutton, Crompton, Judge, 143-146

Irving, Sir Henry, 77, 200, 279, 281

James, Sir Henry, Q.C., 36

Jelf, Sir Arthur Richard, Q.C., 53

Johnson, Dr., 105-108, 266

Jones, Dr. Franklin Emrys, 295

Jordan, Ernest, 158

Kelly, Mr., 215, 216

Kendal, Mr., 281

Kendal, Mrs., 281

King, Alderman, 59

Kingsley, Charles, 267

Larmuth, Dr., 296

Leatherbarrow, James, 136, 137

Lee, Yate, Judge, 132

Leech, Dr., 196, 296, 297

Leese, Sir Joseph, 274, 275

Legros, Alphonse, 36

Leresche, J. H. P., 99-101

Lister, Mr. Registrar, 222

Loehnis, H. W., 39

Lovett, William, 21

Lowe, R., 244

Lush, Robert, Q.C., 23

Lyttelton, Hon. A., 203

McCall, R., Q.C., 214, 215, 216

McKeand, Charley, 67, 88, 96, 153-162, 298

McLachlan, Lachlan, 58-64

Maclure, Rt. Rev. Dean of Manchester, 33

Maclure, Sir John William, 274-277

Maltby, Mr., 205

Martin, Baron, 28

Marwood, Mr., 108

Mathew, Hon. Mr. Justice, 49-54

Matthews, Henry, Q.C., 53

Montgomery, P. (Surgeon), 29

Morley, Samuel, M.P., 165

Morris, Phil, R.A., 81

Mouillot, Frederick, 291

Müller, William, 164

Munro, Professor, 203, 207

Murphy, J. P., Q.C., 201-206

Nash, T. A., 240, 241

Newman, Cardinal John Henry, 54, 190, 191

Nowell, Dr., 179

Nunn, Rev. Canon, 261

Orton, Arthur, 49

Panizzi, Anthony, 19

Pankhurst, Dr., 58-63

Parnell, Charles Stewart, 247, 248

Parry Dorothy, 292

Parry, Rev. Canon Edward, 12

Parry, Edward (Tanner), 12

Parry, John Humffreys (Welsh Antiquary), 10

Parry, John Humffreys, Serjeant, 10-31, 35, 144, 269

Parry, John Humffreys (Actor), 30

Parry, Thomas (Attorney), 12

Partington (Artist), 200

Pete, Sir Samuel, 22

Pinero, Sir A. W., 77

Pope, Sam, Q.C., 86

Price, Judge, 177

Rosebery, Lord, 56

Ross, Sergeant, 121

Ruskin, John, 182

Russell, Sir Charles, Q.C., 24, 160, 161, 163

Russell, Judge, 137, 138

Salter, Clavell, K.C., M.P., 42

Sarcey, Francisque, 77

Scott, C. P., 72, 245, 246

Scott, Mrs. C. P., 72, 78

Shee, H. G., 88, 96, 195, 219

Shee, Serjeant, 23

Shields, Frederic, 60

Shuttleworth, Mr., 137

Simon, Henry, 196

Smith, A. L., Hon. Mr. Justice, 136, 137, 212

Smith, Richard, 37-39, 58-64

Southam, F. A., F.R.C.S., 296

Spencer, Reuben, 196

Spencer, Mr., 247, 248

Stanhope, Hon. Edward, 54

Stewart, Archie, 45-47

Sullivan, Barry, 280

Sutton, E., 96, 195

Taylor, William, 294

Terry, Edward, 281

Terry, Ellen, 281

Thomas, John (Solicitor), 11

Thomason, Henry, 294

Thompson, Stephen Chesters, 201-205

Threlfall, Thomas, 54, 55

Toole, J. L., 281

Tree, Sir Herbert, 283

Trevelyan, Rt. Hon. Sir G. O., 44

Tuke, Dr. D. H., 26

Vaughan, Father Bernard, 268

Webster, Sir Richard, Q.C., 55

Welldon, Rt. Rev. J. E. (Dean of Manchester), 7

West, Henry Wyndham, Q.C., 89-95

Weston, Sir Joseph, M.P., 163-169

Whalley, Mr. (Solicitor), 260

Will, Shiress, Q.C., 58

Williams, Lord Justice Vaughan, 131-133, 203

Willis, Judge, K.C., 24, 175

Wilson, Richard, R. A., 12

Woodard, M. N., 113

Woodburne, Lancaster, 135, 136

Wotton, Sir Henry, 105, 123

Wright, G. A., F.R.C.S., 296

Wright, R. S., Hon. Mr. Justice, 39, 47, 132

Wright, Wildy, 29, 30

Wynne, Mr. (Solicitor), 11

Yates, W. M., 96

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