DISRAELI AS A LOVER

Dominion, Volume 23, Issue 221, 14 June 1930, Page 24

DISRAELI AS A LOVER

Great Man Craved Feminine Sympathy

AN INCURABLE SENTIMENTALIST

Widow Whose Devotion Aided His Career

How far Disraeli’s successful friendship with women was due to his personal attractiveness, or to their vanity being touched by the attention of the greatest figure of the day, is a matter for speculation. With his flamboyant and extravagant taste in dress, his jewellery and his long, oily, black curls, together with the prejudice roused by his alien birth, he could hardly be called a figure to engage the affections of fastidious Englishwomen.

Perhaps the secret of his fascination lay in his wit and verbal brilliance, and yet these friendships were by no means intellectual, but purely affairs of a heart clamouring for feminine sympathy and admiration. Disraeli was guilty of an exuberance of sentiment (says a writer in the Melbourne “Age”). His novels drip with it, and in the intimate and loverlike correspondence into which he impulsively plunged with more than one charming woman it would easily have appeared ridiculous had it not also been, a little pathetic. Although his statesmanship was recognised, and although the door of every house in London was open to him, politically and socially Disraeli was a lonely man. He confessed frankly that he did not understand men, and felt at ease only in the company of women. His attitude towards them was that of an incurable romantic. In his old age he acknowledged “I owe everything to women'; and if in the sunset of life .1 have still a young heart, it is due to that influence.” There were two women, certainly, who each in her own widely divergent ways gave him their loyal s support. They were his Sovereign, Queen Victoria, and Mary Anne Disraeli, his wife. Although contemporary society could see no reason for it, he surrounded both these women with an aurpra of romance that was no mere diplomatic self-disillusionment, but a very real and genuine conviction. Social Instinct. In 1832, when Disraeli was 28, he was so shifty and insincere in his political principles that he was looked upon with interest more as a political adventurer and an arresting personality whose novels had won h|m a certain notoriety than as a man who was likely to win distinction as an able and brilliant statesman. He had a decided social instinct that found him admission to fashionable society in London. Lady Dufferin wrote an account of his appearance at this time at a dinner party given by her sister, Mrs. Norton. “My sister’s fantastic guest,’’ she said, “wore a black velvet coat lined with satin, purple trousers and a gold band running down the outside seam, a scarlet waistcoat, long lace ruffles falling down to the tips of his fingers, white gloves with several brilliant rings outside them, and long black ringlets rippling down upon his shoulders.” His letters to his sister Sarah give a vivacious account of parties he attended, and he seems to have beei) as conscious of the details of other people’s appearance as Lady Dufferin was of his. One letter in particular is of interest because in it he mentions his first meeting with Mrs. Wyndham Lewis, the lady who seven years later was to become his wife. . I was introduced ‘by particular desire’ ” he wrote, “to • Mrs. Wyndham Lewis, a prettv little woman, a flirt and a rattle: indeed, gifted with a volubility I should think unequalled, and of which I can convey no idea. She told me that she liked ‘silent, melancholy men.’ I answered that I had no doubt of it,” Another letter dated a year later shows that his thoughts were turned upon matrimony. "There was a review in Hyde Park,” it reads, "and the Wyndham Lewis’s gave a dejeuner, to which I went. By-the-bye, would you like Lady Z for a sister-in-law? — very clever, £25,000 and domestic. As for ‘love,’ all my friends who have married for love and beauty either'beat .their wives or live apart from' them. This is literally the case. I may commit some follies in my life, but I never intend to marry for ‘love,’ which I am sure is a guarantee of infelicity.” This was an obvious piece of youthful cynicism, no doubt intended to hide the fact that his feelings had been genuinely stirred. Disraeli, seems to have made a favourable impression upon this Channing and romantic young lady, whom he regarded in the light of a matrimonial plum, but, whatever the reason., or whosoever, the fault,. Lady Z married somebody else, and fifty years later Disraeli was pleased to recommend her son for a . peerage. .■ Wealthy Widow. Wyndham Lewis died suddenly inlB3B, leaving his widow a life interest in all his property, a house at Grosvenor Gate and £4OOO a year. Although she was. thirteen years his senior, Disraeli had no hesitation in asking her to become- his wife. She had obviously made it quite plain to him that she wns willing .to help him with her fortune. It has been saidthat she was an inadequate intellectual companion for Disraeli, but. at all events, she was shrewd enough to have divined

his genius while he was still Wyndham Lewis’s Parliamentary protege, and to be convinced of his coming greatness. She also knew that he was hopelessly in debt. When later the list of his liabilities was presented to her she said: "I always knew that Dizzy’s mess was a large one.”

Although he admitted that no romantic feeling prompted his proposal, he was before long wooing her with all the ardor of his eager and impulsive nature. Mrs. Lewis, however, was sufficiently conventional to insist that there was to. be no open engagement until the year of her widowhood had expired, and. being entirely feminine, perhaps, too, she was not unaware that a little diffidence would lead her impetuous lover to a more ardent endeavour to retain her affections. This was evidently the case, for. after what seemed to him an unnecessarily long separation, he wrote;: — “Dec. 30. —I am mad with love. My passion is .frenzy. .The prospect of our • immediate meeting overwhelms and enttranees me. , I pass my nigh-ts and days in scenes of strange and fascinating rapture. ...'. , L6se pot a moment unnecessarily in coming. I cannot wait. I can scarcely believe in the joy of our immediate meeting. Will the time ever pass until-that raptnrous moment?” “Jan. 22.—-,’Tis twilight after a lovely day,-but I ■ have no dark thoughts. All my emotions are soft and glowing ns the ■sky, Sweetest and dearest of women, our united loves shall flow like two rivers; as gentle and clear._. . . Bless you, and bless you and bless you 1” “Jan. 23. —I love you, if possible, each day ntore truly and more tenderly. All my hopes of happiness in life are centred in ypiir sweet affections, and I wish only to be the solace and glory of your life.” Only Quarrel. But surely no wooing is complete without a lover’s quarrel, whose ultimate reconciliation has all the beauty of the rainbow when the storm is passed. A letter from Disraeli found after Lady Beaconsfield’s death amongst her papers gives the clue to their first and only serious disagreement. . It is a long letter, and full of bitterness, as such letters frequently are, but it has always been very ■rightly agreed that it is the privilege of lovers to be histrionic without being insincere, and certainly the sincerity of ■ Disraeli’s protestations of love were proved by a lifetime of devotion. Anyway, the letter called forth , from her the necessary ery of anguish. “For God’s sake eome to me. I am ill and almost distracted. ' . . I anv devoted to you.” Lady Beaconsfield had none of the social graces that society demands from the wife of. a public man, and many stories are told of her gaucheries, her eccentricities of dress and her artless expressions of admiration for her husband in public. But with all her idle prattling she never qnce betrayed the confidence with which Disraeli trusted her. To him she was the “perfect wife,” though he never ceased to be amused at her indiscreet sallies. “We have been married for thirty years, and she has never given me a dull moment,” he told Lord Gower during her last illness. One of the rare occasions on which Disraeli was known to smile was when Sir William Harcourt’s ready wit took its cue from one of Lady Beaconsfield’s naive remarks. Sir William was dining with the Disraeli’s, and during the evening his hostess saw him looking at a picture, of a very scantily-clad lady. “Jt oughtn’t to be allowed in here.” she remarked. “but it is nothing to the Venus that Dizzy has up in his bedroom.” “That I can well believe,” replied Sir William with a gallant bow. Secret Suffering. Frivolous though she was. she was -also capable of heroic self-command. Once whilst driving to Westminster with her husband her lingers were caught in the door of the carriage, but, lest the knowledge of it should upset Disraeli on the eve of a great party debate, she bore the pain during the long drive in silence, lheir chivalrous devotion to each other, and their mutuel desire to spare each other pain, is exemplified in the most touching manner during the last months of Lady Beaconsfield’s life. After a hemorrhage from an incurable cancer she knew that her doom was certain, and that the happy years of her wedded life were coming to a close, but she determined to keep her secret, whilst he, knowing it all the time, did not allow her to guess it so that she should be spared the pain of his grief. Her thoughts for him reached even beyond the grave. Knowing that in all probability she, being, his senior by so many years, would be the first to die. she had written a letter of farewell to him some years prior - , to her death. nr rx 1 June 6 - 18S6 ' My Owu Dear Husband,—lf I should depart this life before you, leave orders that we may be buried in the same grave at whatever distance you may die from England. And now, God bless you, my kindest, dearest. Ybu have been a perfect husband to me. Be put by my side in the same grave. And now farewell, my dear Dizzy. Do not live alone, dearest. Someone I earnestly hope you may find; as attached to you as your own devoted Mary Anne.

The loss of one who had so intimately shared his hopes, his aspirations, his disappointments and his triumphs so lovingly and so loyally as had Lady Beaconsfield, was indeed a staggering blow to Disraeli. Feminine sympathy was an essential factor in his daily life, and the attraction which he formed for Lady Bradford and Lady Chesterfield almost immediately after his wife’s death in no wav reflects unfaithfulness to her memory, it was but a natural psychological reaction of a temperament supersensitive to feminine sympathy.