R,CHARD MONCKTON MILNES was born in the year - OUDL Home

viiiPrefacedecidedly down on their luck. It seemed worth whilebefore they became subject to the more absolute inquisitionof history to take a casual, friendly glance at them.It is no better than a glance, in no sense a digest. Thereis no passing of judgment. But by good luck and deserving—moreprecisely perhaps, by the generous senseof duty of some of its Fellows, stealing time and energyfrom their own literary affairs—the Society has hadat command what is rather a full battery of glances,fired from varying points of vantage. One main differenceof position will be noted. Some of us write out of recollection: to some the Eighteen-seventies are but historyalready. If there is a hint of attack and defence, ifa slight deflection of the firing would make our area abattleground—well, the book will not be the less instructiveor entertaining for that.There is better reason for leading off with a paper onLord Houghton than the fact—though in academiccourtesy this would be reason enough—that in it theSociety's president writes of his father. For, as LordCrewe tells us, 'the tale of his friendly acquaintanceamong men of letters up to 1870 would be little morethan an exhaustive catalogue of the workers in that field'.It is surprising indeed that he was never president himself.He so typified the relation between Letters and Affairswhich is England's nearest practical approach to therecognition of literature as a public service. Now, whetherthis is a satisfactory one is a large question, far too largefor present discussion. That it is better than none willhardly be disputed; though Lord Houghton himself—if ever a little chafed by that 'alarming reputation forbenevolence to aspiring writers'—might excusably haveprotested that a human link is, after all, only Jiuman.He was a patron of letters, and sympathetic and discerningas perhaps only one who was also a man of letters