CHAPTER XXI. PROFESSOR BLACKIE HIS VERSATILITY, VITALITY, AND DISREGARD OF CONVENTION - DINNERS AT BLACKIE'S AND CALDERWOOD'S THE HELLENIC CLUB PRESENTATION ON HIS EIGHTIETH BIRTHDAY-HIS INGENUOUSNESS-MASSON CHRISTISON MACLAGAN NORMAN MACLEOD HIS BREADTH, FORCE, HUMANITY, AND HUMOUR-THE LATE DURING the three years, 1867 to 1870, when I was joint classical examiner for degrees in Edinburgh University, and from 1888 to 1895 as a member of the Hellenic Society, of which Professor Blackie was president, I saw a great deal of him both officially and socially. Like all who came into contact with him, I was struck by his marvellous versatility and vitality, his large-hearted tolerance, his wide sympathy, his alertness in everything literary, and his præfervidum ingenium in the advocacy of all that he believed true and right. Combined, however, with these high qualities one could not fail to observe a complete disregard of convention, a PROFESSOR BLACKIE. 243 youthful and almost boyish-may I say?—rowdyism, which detracted somewhat from dignity of bearing, and an eccentricity which sometimes bordered closely on buffoonery, perhaps originally assumed, but ultimately natural. Those who knew him best and liked him most will readily admit there was a considerable amount of vanity in his composition, but it was inoffensive and by no means aggressive. Nor was this feature in his character difficult to be accounted for. Welcomed wherever he went, a most popular platform speaker, enjoying the friendship of men eminent in almost every field of literature, receiving constant proofs that he was regarded as no ordinary man, it is not matter for wonder that he should come to think of himself as others thought of him. How few men in such circumstances could have escaped being vain? in how many would not the vanity have been offensive? In him it was not. For a man with strong opinions on most subjects, he was singularly free from malice and pettiness in his intercourse with those who differed from him. This transparent good-nature and sweetness of temper enabled him to make, without offence, personal remarks on which men of different type could not have ventured, or which, if made, would have been sharply resented. At a dinner-party in his own house Sir Lyon (afterwards Lord) Playfair, Professor Calderwood, and myself were seated on his right hand. As the decanters went round Professor Calderwood, who was a consistent but not at all an aggressive abstainer, passed them on without helping himself. Sir Lyon seeing this asked him if he would not take a glass of wine. "No," said Blackie, taking the reply out of his mouth, "he does not take wine himself, but," addressing Calderwood, "you must not refuse it to your friends." This remark was prospective, because next night we were to dine with Calderwood, who was promoter of degrees that year. Next night Blackie reached Calderwood's house immediately before me. After disposing of his hat and plaid he turned round, and, seeing me, remembered the conversation of the previous night, and, clasping me in his arms, sang out in tones that rang through the house, "Nunc est bibendum, nunc est potandum!" and on entering the drawingroom rapturously embraced Sir Alexander Grant and repeated the exclamation. As to the strain of vanity observable in him, I remember meeting him one day on a short railway journey almost immediately after Mr VERSATILE AND INGENUOUS. 245 Gladstone's famous speech in connection with Mr Bradlaugh's admission to Parliament. I remarked that it was a great feat for a man of Gladstone's age to make such a long and able speech. "Oh," he replied, "age has nothing to do with it. The part of a man that's strongest lasts longest if the muscles are strongest, they last longest; if the brain is strongest, it lasts. longest. I could not climb Ben Nevis as nimbly as I could thirty years ago, but my head is as clear as ever it was, and I could speak for an hour and a half or more without any feeling of fatigue." To this I replied half seriously, half in joke, "Ah, yes! but there are not many Gladstones and Blackies in the world." It was not unnatural to expect him to deprecate being compared with such a giant as Gladstone. He did not, but complacently accepted, as legitimate and serious, a comparison from one point of view quite legitimate, but not more than half serious. A good example of the ever-varying moods of the "old man eloquent," and of his almost boyish vitality combined, was given at a meeting of the Hellenic Club, when he was presented with a silver cup by the members as a memorial of his eightieth birthday. Care was taken that he should have no knowledge of the proposed pres entation, which was made with great taste and feeling by Mr Charles Robertson, one of the oldest members. The surprise and pleasure were almost overwhelming to the old man. For a few moments, under strong feeling, his wonted fluency failed him, but glancing round the meeting, which was an unusually full one, and catching the sympathetic looks of friends who had sat under his presidency for many years, he pulled himself together, and expressed his thanks in a speech which, permeated throughout with deep feeling and the true ring of sincerity, for felicitous phrase, genial warmth of sentiment for old friends, sound counsel to the younger members, and a catholic kindliness for all, was absolutely perfect. That speech will be remembered by all who heard it. And yet that cultured old man, not very many minutes after he sat down, on being asked to sing a song, chose one of his own composition about Jenny Geddes and the cutty stool, and would have been miserable if he had not had at hand, in the absence of a cutty stool, a cane chair to fling for dramatic effect at the head of the offending dean. It occurred to me that in one sense, and not an entirely unfavourable one, it was true that there were not many Gladstones and Blackies in the world. |