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In Ireland Englishmen are judged by their actions alone. No assurances of good will have the slightest effect on public opinion there; no English promises make it easier for moderate opinion to get a hearing. Every solution of the Irish question presupposes a friendly feeling between England and Ireland, and we are stimulating hatred.
Thus only by changing our executive policy can we create the atmosphere necessary to the successful working of any solution whatever of the Irish question.
We are, Sir, yours faithfully,
ERNEST BARKER
PHILIP GIBBS
CHARLES GORE
HUBERT GOUGH
J. L. HAMMOND
L. T. HOBHOUSE
DESMOND MACCARTHY
JOHN MASEFIELD
C. E. MONTAGUE
GILBERT MURRAY
C. P. SCOTT
H. G. WELLS
BASIL WILLIAMS
1 (#ulink_0ca61942-ca05-5105-8b7b-835499d3b495) The parliament formed by Irish republicans on declaring independence from Britain in 1919
2 (#ulink_243ab4fe-15fd-53cb-89ab-ac5a82fcef8a) Butter was an important export and co-operative agricultural ventures, of which dairies were the most numerous, were central to rural Irish life
The Government’s measures only fuelled greater violence, which continued to escalate until a truce was signed in 1921. Ireland was partitioned and the next year the Irish Free State came into being.
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Wigs and Gowns
1 April 1922
Sir, I am glad to say that I do not know the name of any member of the Committee of Judges and Benchers of the Inns of Court whose recommendations concerning the forensic costume of women barristers you publish this morning 31 March. I can therefore criticize their “wishes” without fear or favour.
I have no fault to find with what they recommend about gowns, bands, or dresses. As to wigs, I think they are hopelessly wrong. A wig is, historically and essentially, not a covering, but a substitute for natural hair. I believe the history of the forensic wig to be in substance as follows. About the period of the Restoration, some of the leaders of fashion in France, for reasons of cleanliness and health, took to shaving their heads. They accordingly wore wigs, which soon became very large and elaborate. The fashion found such favour that for something like a century all gentlemen, when fully dressed, wore wigs. During this time they either shaved their heads, or cropped their hair very close, and probably also wore night-caps when in bed.
Then the wig gradually disappeared, and the modern method of cutting the hair short, but just long enough to make an efficient covering for the head, was gradually adopted. Judges and barristers followed this practice like other people, but found that, as long as the hair was short, the wig formed a distinctive, dignified, and convenient headdress for use in court. If women barristers are going to cut their hair short as we cut ours, our wigs will suit them well enough, but I do not believe they will do anything of the kind.
The Committee wish that their wigs “should completely cover and conceal the hair.” Why they entertain this wish I cannot imagine. Our wigs by no means completely cover and conceal our hair. Suppose a woman barrister wears her hair “bobbed.” Her wig, if it completely conceals her hair, will certainly not be an “ordinary barrister’s wig.” Suppose she has plenty of hair, and wears it coiled in one of the usual ways. She will then want one pattern of wig when fashion places the coils on top of her head, another when they are resting on the back of her neck, and a third when they approach the situation of the old fashioned chignon, high up on the back of the head. Each of the three will impart to the wearer a hydrocephalous, ungainly, and ludicrous appearance.
It must be apparent to every one, except the Committee, that women barristers ought to wear a distinctive, and probably dark-coloured, headdress, in approximately the form of a biretta, a turban, or a toque. I use each of these terms with very great diffidence.
I am, Sir, your obedient servant,
HERBERT STEPHEN
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Unjust Divorce Laws
11 October 1922
Sir, During the last weeks of the Summer Term, at the request of the Lord Chancellor, I undertook the trial of undefended suits for divorce and heard about four hundred cases. They were taken in due order from the list, and included every class, but with a large preponderance of the poor, owing to their numbers, and also to the difficulty of their getting decent homes.
The experience was startling, and explains why it is that practically every Judge on whom a similar duty has devolved has urged an alteration of the law. I believe that the reason why this demand is not universal is that the facts are not known, and false modesty prevents their disclosure. Women’s societies pass resolutions declaring that if any change be made, equality must be established between men and women, forgetting, or not knowing, that the present law produces the most insulting inequality, and that it is in the interests of women that reform is sought.
Plain facts need plain speech, and I beg, without apology, to ask attention to the following statement, based on the cases I tried, prefaced only by saying that I scrutinized the evidence with especial care, and that I am satisfied as to the truth of what I state.
A woman marries a man, and is at once infected by him with syphilis. She is an innocent woman, and knows nothing as to what is wrong until the disease has her fast in its grip. The doctor is satisfied that infection occurred immediately on marriage; consequently the law politely bows her out of Court and makes her pay the cost of her struggle for liberty. In the particular case to which I refer, the husband had deserted the woman, and it was possible to prove, though with difficulty, that he had also transferred his “affections” to someone else; but for this his wife was bound for life.
Another woman had been made the victim of the unspeakable savagery of brutal and perverted lust. She also must have remained bound by the bonds of matrimony, enforced by violence, but that her husband went to satisfy his fury elsewhere, and was found out.
A third was deserted, after a week, by a soldier who went to the American continent, where he might have lived unmolested for ever in a life of peaceful adultery, but as he violated two children he also was discovered, and she was able to be free.
I could multiply the recital of individual cases, but lack of space forbids, and the general conditions need attention.
Bigamy was extremely common, but entirely confined to poor persons, for bigamy is not a vice of wealth; the rich can find other less illegal outlets for their emotions. The existing statute, however, provides that bigamy is not sufficient ground for divorce — it must be “bigamy with adultery” — and, though it might be assumed, anywhere outside a law Court, that a man who has risked penal servitude to obtain possession of a woman was not prompted by platonic love, yet the law requires independent proof of the adultery. Further, by a decision now sixty-five years old, this adultery must be with the bigamous wife — adultery with any number of other people is quite inadequate.
On the wisdom and justice of this ancient judgment I will not comment, but it throws great difficulty in the way of a woman who can prove that her husband has been convicted of bigamy, but finds it difficult to trace and obtain evidence of adultery; quoad hanc1 (#ulink_6be792fa-82f2-53d8-91ea-2a8e185c6efa), in one case before me, she almost failed.
Among the poorer people desertion was the commonest event: rich folk walk more delicately, and, being in a hurry, obtain a decree for restitution, to be obeyed in a fortnight, instead of waiting two years. It was, of course, only in the rare instances where the deserting husband could be traced and his undoubted adultery legally proved that any relief would be obtained. In one such case the husband, who had first insulted and then deserted his wife, left the country in a ship with the woman with his affection for whom he had often taunted his wife, but, of course, that did not constitute legal proof of adultery, but merely companionship.
In no case that I tried did there appear to me the faintest chance of reconciliation; the marriage tie had been broken beyond repair and its sanctity utterly defiled; nor, again, though I watched with extreme vigilance, was there any single case where collusion could be suggested. With regard to cruelty, there was no case which a competent lawyer, skilled in the knowledge of witnesses, could not have tried.
I was, of course, faced with the question as to what is cruelty, which, we are informed, is so difficult that you want the King’s Proctor as an expert in cruelty to keep the law steady. I made my own rules. If a man who was sober kicked his wife in the stomach when she was pregnant, that seemed to me enough; if she were not pregnant, and he was drunk, he might have to do it again or else her complaint might be due to what the most persistent opponent of my Bill called “nervous irritation.” So, also, with kicking her downstairs, or making her sleep on the doormat in winter — all of which cases I had to consider. But, however brutal and repeated the cruelty, no divorce must be granted for it, or we shall Americanize our institutions and soil the sanctity of English homes.
I had no case before me involving the question of lunacy or criminality, for these, as the law stands, are irrelevant considerations in connexion with divorce; but the evidence on that is near at hand. Within the last few months two women have been left eternally widowed, with their husbands fast immured in criminal lunatic asylums, and in this unnatural state they will remain while the shadow of the years lengthens and life’s day grows dim. Surely the desire to help such people is not, as some appear to think, prompted by a Satan, but is a humble effort to carry out the principle of the supplication which asks that, while our own wants are satisfied, we should not be unmindful of the wants of others.
Parliament will shortly resume its work. Our divorce laws have been condemned by the most competent authority as immoral and unjust. The House of Lords has patiently heard every argument that can be advanced against further change from the lips of the most skilful advocates, and has repeatedly, and by emphatic majorities, demanded reform. Common sense — but for respect to my adversaries I should have added common decency — rejecting the existing law. Is it asking too much to entreat the Government to afford a chance to Parliament to cleanse our laws from this disgrace?
Yours faithfully,
BUCKMASTER
1 (#ulink_d8ea14f4-db00-5ad8-ad80-cbed1909acbc) In legal Latin, the sexual impotence of the husband
Viscount Buckmaster had been Lord Chancellor from 1915–16. Men were able to obtain a divorce on proof of a wife’s adultery, but women had to prove both a husband’s adultery and another reason, such as domestic violence. Despite Buckmaster’s efforts, the law was eventually reformed, largely at the instigation of AP Herbert, only in 1937.
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The Spectacle of Respectable
8 February 1923
Sir, Is it not time that the official categories of respectability were revised?
In order to secure the renewal of a passport, it is necessary to obtain a signed declaration of identity and fitness from a mayor, magistrate, justice of the peace, minister of religion, barrister-at-law, physician, surgeon, solicitor, or bank manager, with whom the applicant is personally acquainted; and similar lists are found on many other official forms. On what principle they were compiled I know not, but they cause considerable inconvenience, and defeat their own end.
I never knew a mayor. But I have known many Civil servants of reasonable integrity, and in my neighbourhood are two or three not more unscrupulous than the rest of their profession; I am friendly with two editors; I know a peer; several stockbrokers, baronets, novelists, and Members of Parliament would readily swear that I am a fit and proper person to go to France. But these gentlemen are not worthy, and I am forced to search any casual acquaintance for magistrates and dental surgeons, who, in fact, know nothing about me.
For persons even poorer than myself the difficulty is more serious. As a rule, the only “respectable” people they know are the physician and the clergyman, and why should these alone be bothered with the things? Why not the policeman, the postman, the landlord, the tax collector? Things have come to a pretty pass in this democratic age if the word of an attorney is more than the word of a publisher: and if we cannot trust a policeman, whom can we trust?
The result, in most cases, is that the applicant obtains a solemn declaration from that one of his acquaintance who knows least about him. This is the kind of trivial official rubbish which is allowed to endure forever because no one thinks it worth while to protest. I therefore protest that these antiquated and offensive lists should be revised, as above, or, if that be too daring, abolished altogether. Why not simply “a householder”?
I am, Sir, yours faithfully,
A. P. HERBERT
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Gathering Nuts in May
9 May 1923
Sir, I remember that, when I read the Classics, I had always a liking for the reading of the manuscript and a distaste for emendations. It is probably the same instinct which leads me to think that “nuts in May” are really nuts. (But I remember that, when I joined in the chant some forty years ago, we used to say “nutsimay,” and I liked the mysterious sound, and wondered what “nutsimay” was.) If nuts do not grow upon trees in May, I conceive it to be possible that they grow in the ground. Certainly one of my pleasantest memories is that of hunting for nuts in the ground (a long time ago) somewhere about the month of May. They were to be found on a little bank, overshadowed by trees, that overhung a disused quarry. You knew their presence by the tender green shoots which grew from them; and when you saw those shoots, you took your knife, made a small excavation, and had a succulent reward. I have consulted the New English Dictionary (my general refuge in all mental perplexities), and I have found there, s.v. groundnut, the admirable entry which awakens a pleased reminiscence and rumination. “Bunium flexuosum: Culpepper, English Physitian, 64; they are called earth-nuts, earth-chestnuts, groundnuts.”
What I cannot really remember is whether we actually gathered Bunia flexuosa in May. But while I cannot prove it (except by the obvious device of consulting some scientific work of reference), I flatter myself that it is extremely probable. In any case, there was some real fun in gathering this sort of nut. It was elusive; it was succulent; it was neither so obvious, nor so unsatisfactory, as your hazel nut.
But it pains me to think of these things. They belong to the Arcadia of a vanished youth. Où sont les neiges d’antan? Where are the nuts of yester-year?
Yours obediently,
ERNEST BARKER
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Nestletripes and Piggy-Widdens
7 June 1923
Sir, “Tantony” is a new name to me for the small one of a litter of pigs or dogs. Some years ago I made the following collection of names all in use in various parts of the country:
Nisgil (Midlands), Nisledrige and Nestletripe (Devon), Darling, Daniel, Dolly and Harry (Hants), Underling, Rickling, Reckling, Little David (Kent), Dillin, Dilling (Stratford-on-Avon), Cad, Gramper, Nestletribe, Nestledrag, Nestlebird, Dab-Chick, Wastrill, Weed, Dandlin, Anthony, Runt, Parson’s Pig (the least valuable to be devoted to tithe purposes), Nest Squab, Putman, Ratling, Dorneedy (Scottish), The Titman (Vermont), Nestledraft, Pigot, Rutland, Luchan, Piggy-Widden.
Yours faithfully,
EDWIN BROUGH
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A Diamond in the Rough
28 October 1924
Sir, As one who has sampled most British sports, may I say a word upon baseball? It seems to me that in those Press comments which I have been able to see too much stress is laid upon what may appear to us to be a weakness or a comic aspect in the game and not nearly enough upon its real claim on our attention. I fully agree that the continual ragging is from a British view-point a defect, but baseball is a game which is continually in process of development and improvement, as anyone who reads Arthur Mathewson’s interesting book on the subject is aware.
The foul tricks which were once common are now hardly known, and what was once applauded, or at any rate tolerated, would now be execrated. Therefore, this rough badinage may pass away and it is not an essential of the game. What is essential is that here is a splendid game which calls for a fine eye, activity, bodily fitness, and judgment in the highest degree. This game needs no expensive levelling of a field, its outfit is within the reach of any village club, it takes only two or three hours in the playing, it is independent of wet wickets, and the player is on his toes all the time, and not sitting on a pavilion bench while another man makes his century. If it were taken up by our different Association teams as a summer pastime I believe it would sweep this country as it has done America. At the same time it would no more interfere with cricket than lawn tennis has done. It would find its own place. What we need now is a central association which would advise and help the little clubs in the first year of their existence.
Yours faithfully,
ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE
Conan Doyle was a keen sportsman who had played first-class cricket. He also helped to introduce skiing to Switzerland from Scandinavia, and so popularise the sport in Britain.
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Long Lives in The Times
1 January 1925
Sir, On the front page of The Times last year there were reported the deaths of 402 persons of 90 years of age and over. Of these 123 were men (including 18 clerks in holy orders) and 279 women; of the latter 178 were married. The number of those who reached their century is eight; of these two were men and six women, two of whom were 105 and had been married. Four others (two men, one a clerk) were 99. Besides the above named, 95 attained their 90th year, 28 men (six clerks) and 67 women, of whom 30 were married. The number of nonagenarians who have died in the last ten years is 3,153, a yearly average of 315, ranging from 263 in 1918 to last year’s big total of 402. The number of centenarians for the same period is 55, the most in one year being 11 in 1923.
In other parts of The Times deaths have been reported of 40 others who had been born before or during 1824. Of these four were 103; six, 104; one, 105; four, 106; and one, 107. Under “News in Brief” on 16 August, John Campbell, of County Antrim, aged 112, is reported dead; and on 18 August, under “Telegrams in Brief,” the same is told of Alexa Vivier, of Manitoba, who had reached the, nowadays, patriarchal age of 113.
I am, etc.,
C. B. GABB
Ten years later, Mr Gabb wrote to The Times to mark its 150th birthday. He noted that Zaro Agha, a Turk who had recently died, supposedly aged 157, could (and undoubtedly would) have read 46,950 issues of the newspaper — had he not been illiterate.
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All Greek to me
22 January 1925
Sir, Reading with great interest the pleasant controversy between the Headmaster of Christ’s Hospital and Mr. Austen Chamberlain, I have noticed that my own beloved and reverend headmaster, Mr. J. S. Phillpotts, is as alert and vigilant as ever.
The issue that has been raised is an old one, and as false as it always has been. Controversialists start on the wrong tack when they assume that learning and teaching grammar must be dull and unstimulating. Nothing is more untrue. There is everything in grammar, the accidence as well as the syntax of language, to make it as stimulating to thought and the imagination and as full of humour as any instrument of education. Witness the inexhaustible romance of the verbs in -μι, the miraculous history of the Greek preposition, or the indefinable wonders of the subjunctive mood!
HUBERT M. OXON:
Hubert Burge, Bishop of Oxford
Replied on 23 January 1925
Sir, The Bishop of Oxford’s letter gives a delightful picture of cultured boyhood. We see him indulging in a hearty laugh with his headmaster on the vagaries of εἰμί, or walking, a slender stripling, in a summer sunset, tracing with wistful eyes the romance of the subjunctive mood into the glowing West!
