Family Treasures

Dominion, Volume 26, Issue 218, 10 June 1933, Page 17

Family Treasures

SOMEBODY once described the House of Lords as the natural protector of every man who had a silver tea-pot or a dozeti silver teaspoons to bequeath to his descendants. ’That was in the brave il.tjs before the War when we slill had a stock of such complacent

phrases for daily use and went on repeating them with a gusto that never quite lost Its novelty. We talked of “a stake in the country.” of the English sovereign as "worth its weight in gold,” of the City of London as the “strong-box of Europe.” Perhaps we never knew quite what we meant; but the very repetition bad in it. something that ministered subtly tc our sense of comfort and security.

"An ill-favoured thing. Sir, but. mine own,” said Touchstone of hi* homely bride. It: is the unspoken reflection of thousands of us every da;, of our existence. There is no instinct more tenacious limn that of possession of intimate personal association with some external object.; the need for

something of our very own. something that bears our individual impress that reflects upon us. and upon us alone, some familiar image that Ims itorigin in ourselves. What the particular object may be. matters but little, it may be great or small, magnificent or commonplace, imposing or ridiculous The one essential is that it should be ours. It must be a natural-born citizen of the esoteric Kingdom of which every individual among us is the undisputed sovereign. Beyond that, nothing is of any account. What matter whether the shrine contain a rude wooden etligy or a marble figure carved by a master hand? It is all one to the priest of the temple.

Every man is a priest of his own private shrine, and to each shrine belongs its own inalienable idol. For one it may lie a stately picture gallery full of ancestral portraits—ranging in due succession from the bearded

Tudor merchant, the founder of Hie house, through all the long line of his descendants: the Cavalier who stood siege against Fairfax; Hie florid veteran in full-bottomed wig who saw service under Marlborough ; the Georgian seigneur to whose features Reynolds has lent a touch of his own serene and gracious spirit: the Victorian magnate, stiff, frock-coated, and benevolent; the slim figure in khaki—keen-eyed and erect of carriage—with whom so many fond hopes lie buried beneath the Flanders mud. But picture galleries are flie luxury of the few. Most of ns are satisfied with something much less pretentious. Willi a few wood-cuts or engravings, perhaps a little the worse for wear. Look at this one. for example—the presentment; of great-great-ii ncie George, a stout old Warwickshire parson, famous in bis day for feats across country and over the bottle. \\ by lie sat for his portrait in a tasselled nightcap, iw one has ever explained ; imt one cannot look at tiic picture and wish him otherwise. Or observe that plaster relief ovei file chimneypiece, in its square oak frame; no great work of .art to be sure. Imt enough Io guard Hie memory of a face once alight, with every noble impulse, with every generous emotion. The list may be multiplied at will Here, is a sandalwood box of Indian design, full of carved ivory letters; here a pair of bowls cut from flic timbers of an old bridge that was los< in Hie floods half a century ago: here a grandfather clock, still ticking gallantly as it has ticked these seventy years; here a set of brass tobaccostoppers shaped in the likeness of Pickwick characters; here— imt quo fes sum rapitis? The number of such family treasures is legion. Who does not know them? Who has not eyed and handled them with the wistful curiosity of childhood, neglected them perhaps in the arrogance of youth, returned to them wit It fondness redoubled iu declining years?—John Pullen in "The Spectator.”