Theodore Watts-Dunton: Poet, Novelist, Critic. Douglas James

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СКАЧАТЬ quail like him of old who bowed the knee —

      Faithless – to billows of Genesereth?

      Did I turn coward when my very breath

      Froze on my lips that Alpine night when he

      Stood glimmering there, the Skeleton, with me,

      While avalanches rolled from peaks beneath?

      Each billow bears me nearer to the verge

      Of realms where she is not – where love must wait. —

      If Gelert, there, could hear, no need to urge

      That friend, so faithful, true, affectionate,

      To come and help me, or to share my fate.

      Ah! surely I see him springing through the surge.

[The dog, plunging into the tide and strikingtowards him with immense strength, reacheshim and swims round him.]

      Oh, Gelert, strong of wind and strong of paw

      Here gazing like your namesake, ‘Snowdon’s Hound,’

      When great Llewelyn’s child could not be found,

      And all the warriors stood in speechless awe —

      Mute as your namesake when his master saw

      The cradle tossed – the rushes red around —

      With never a word, but only a whimpering sound

      To tell what meant the blood on lip and jaw.

      In such a strait, to aid this gaze so fond,

      Should I, brave friend, have needed other speech

      Than this dear whimper? Is there not a bond

      Stronger than words that binds us each to each? —

      But Death has caught us both. ’Tis far beyond

      The strength of man or dog to win the beach.

      Through tangle-weed – through coils of slippery kelp

      Decking your shaggy forehead, those brave eyes

      Shine true – shine deep of love’s divine surmise

      As hers who gave you – then a Titan whelp!

      I think you know my danger and would help!

      See how I point to yonder smack that lies

      At anchor – Go! His countenance replies.

      Hope’s music rings in Gelert’s eager yelp!

[The dog swims swiftly away down the tide.

      Now, life and love and death swim out with him!

      If he should reach the smack, the men will guess

      The dog has left his master in distress.

      You taught him in these very waves to swim —

      ‘The prince of pups,’ you said, ‘for wind and limb’ —

      And now those lessons, darling, come to bless.

Envoy

      (The day after the rescue: Gelert and I walking along the sand.)

      ’Twas in no glittering tourney’s mimic strife, —

      ’Twas in that bloody fight in Raxton Grove,

      While hungry ravens croaked from boughs above,

      And frightened blackbirds shrilled the warning fife —

      ’Twas there, in days when Friendship still was rife,

      Mine ancestor who threw the challenge-glove

      Conquered and found his foe a soul to love,

      Found friendship – Life’s great second crown of life.

      So I this morning love our North Sea more

      Because he fought me well, because these waves

      Now weaving sunbows for us by the shore

      Strove with me, tossed me in those emerald caves

      That yawned above my head like conscious graves —

      I love him as I never loved before.

      In these days when so much is written about the intelligence of the lower animals, when ‘Hans,’ the ‘thinking horse,’ is ‘interviewed’ by eminent scientists, the exploit of the Second Gelert is not without interest. I may, perhaps, mention a strange experience of my own. The late Betts Bey, a well-known figure in St. Peter’s Port, Guernsey, had a fine black retriever, named Caro. During a long summer holiday which we spent in Guernsey, Caro became greatly attached to a friend, and Betts Bey presented him to her. He was a magnificent fellow, valiant as a lion, and a splendid diver and swimmer. He often plunged off the parapet of the bridge which spans the Serpentine. Indeed, he would have dived from any height. His intelligence was surprising. If we wished to make him understand that he was not to accompany us, we had only to say, ‘Caro, we are going to church!’ As soon as he heard the word ‘church’ his barks would cease, his tail would drop, and he would look mournfully resigned. One evening, as I was writing in my room, Caro began to scratch outside the door, uttering those strange ‘woof-woofs’ which were his canine language. I let him in, but he would not rest. He stood gazing at me with an intense expression, and, turning towards the door, waited impatiently. For some time I took no notice of his dumb appeal, but his excitement increased, and suddenly a vague sense of ill seemed to pass from him into my mind. Drawn half-consciously I rose, and at once with a strange half-human whine Caro dashed upstairs. I followed him. He ran into a bedroom, and there in the dark I found my friend lying unconscious. It is well-nigh certain that Caro thus saved my friend’s life.

      Chapter VIII

      LONDON

      Between Mr. Watts-Dunton and the brother who came next to him, before mentioned, there was a very great affection, although the difference between them, mentally and physically, was quite noticeable. They were articled to their father on the same day and admitted solicitors on the same day, a very unusual thing with solicitors and their sons. Mr. Watts-Dunton afterwards passed a short term in one of the great conveyancing offices in London in order to become proficient in conveyancing. His brother did the same in another office in Bedford Row; but he afterwards practised for himself. Mr. A. E. Watts soon had a considerable practice as family solicitor and conveyancer. Mr. Hake identifies him with Cyril Aylwin, but before I quote Mr. Hake’s interesting account of him, I will give the vivid description of Cyril in ‘Aylwin’: —

      “Juvenile curls clustered thick and short beneath his wideawake. He had at first struck me as being not much more than a lad, till, as he gave me that rapid, searching glance in passing, I perceived the little crow’s feet round his eyes, and he then struck me immediately as being probably on the verge of thirty-five. His figure was slim and thin, his waist almost girlish in its fall. I should have considered him small, had not the unusually deep, loud, manly, and sonorous voice with which he had accosted Sinfi conveyed an impression of size and weight such as even big men do not often produce. This deep voice, coupled with that gaunt kind of cheek which we associate with the most demure people, produced an effect of sedateness.. but in the one glance I had got from those watchful, sagacious, twinkling eyes, there was an expression quite peculiar to them, quite inscrutable, quite indescribable.”

      Cyril Aylwin was at first thought to be a portrait of Whistler, which is not quite so outrageously absurd as the wild conjecture that William Morris was the original of Wilderspin. Mr. Hake says: —

      “I am especially able to speak of this character, who has been inquired about more than any other in the book. I knew him, I think, even before I knew Rossetti and Morris, or any of that group. He was a brother of Mr. Watts-Dunton’s – Mr. Alfred Eugene Watts. He lived СКАЧАТЬ