Two Men Who Thought in Millions

Greymouth Evening Star, 25 February 1928, Page 9

Two Men Who Thought in Millions

BETWEEN those masterful magnates, Lord Northcliffe and Lord Leverhulme. and the millions that they amassed, we may dis-

dlllduOCU) »» uii'ij tuo ccrn an economic association (writes P. W. Wilson in an American newspaper). Each was a man of the people who had won a peerage by serving the public through the Press. Lord Northcliffe organised newspapers; Lord Leverhulme advertised in them; and in both cases the result was a fortune.

These biographies may be read, therefore, in parallel. On Lord Northcliffe, Mr. Macnair Wilson pronounces an intimate panegyric which, as we shall see, is all the more instructive because of its limitations. To his father, the second Lord Leverhulme devotes an interesting review of commercial and domestic activity which is the more valuable because interpretation thereof is left

to the reader. Let

us' endeavour, then, to see these books a their perspective.

According to Mr. Macnair Wilson — and we agree with him —the-Britain of the nineties had arrived for the first time in her history at democracy. Northcliffe, says he, ’ tersely, “believed in Man as opposed to classes of men; in red blood as opposed to blue blood; inequality as opposed to the political liberty of the Whigs.” It was the French Revolution that had at last crossed the Channel.

Both to Harmsworth and Lever, therefore, it was the Many who alone mattered. Harmsworth held that the Many should read. Lever added that the Many should wash. Both were right. To both the public responded. Lever’s soaps and Harmsworth’s newspapers were equally a success. In both cases the success was thoroughly deserved. Lord Leverhulme was a man of immense ability and public spirit. Not only did he employ his workers, but he housed them, and under conditions fairly to be described as ideal. In reorganising the Congo, it was to Lord Leverhulme that King

Albert of Belgium tunned for co-c peration. \ 1 Perhaps the most clk xrming anecdote in these books shows Loverliulme as the guest of the Rockefellers:— The meal was of the ''.simplest. The. house was very beautiful, with a great deal of Oriental porcelain i«f ;great rarity, which is exactly as it should, be, because his friends will get a great} deal of pleasure out of these works of art. When I arrived there the Hon introduced me by saying that he thought his father) and I had very much in', common, to j which I replied, "Except cine thing, .and that was that the father ’ iad been able to make money in business,and I never could. The old gentleman ;at once replied, as quick as a flash, ithat he was | sorry to hear that, as he was on the point of asking me if I co’Eild lend him) some. . |

The idea behind the “Daily Mail*’ was as sound as the idea- behind the use of soap. The only question is whether the idea was fully- carried, out. According to Mr. Macnair Wilson, the new journalism “brought the empire, the world to the cottage idoor.” North-, cliffe —

gave to the humblest the raw material of opinion. He made it possible for the agricultural labourer and the dweller in mean streets to argue from actual facts and with knowledge. His news was honest; it was full; it embraced the. whole earth. Moreover, the cleverest descriptive writers in the country made it. easy to read and easy to understand.

and the cleverest page-makers and type•setters in the country caused it to “leap

to the eye.” On the other hand, as we are also reminded,-the “Daily Mail” of those days was described as having been “written by office boys for office boys” —a judgment which, as Mr. Macnair Wilson is doubtless aware, was attributed to the late Lord Salisbury. .< In the case of both our peers, therefore, an interesting question arises. The voice of the people, says the proverb, is the voice of God. But ir the proverb to be trusted? Is it the best that makes the strongest appejal tv the .most? Is it possible a for the few to be niore discerning than the many? Lord Leverhulme had the imagination to realise that utility in life is not.enough. There should also b* the beautiful. Hence, he was an enthusiastic patron of the arts. His houses, were full of pictures, statues, tapestries, furniture and objects of interest to the connoisseur, and it was in such ' a gallei.- of- masterpieces that, when he

died, he lay in state. Yet the very art which yielded to his purse was a kingdom that he failed to ' explore. , In the territory that he conquered he lost his way and, as a compass, his taste was uncertain. Of his lapses, we may mention the piquant experience of Agustus John. To be frank, no one, not even Lloyd > George, expects to be painted by Augustus John, except at a personal risk.-. He is an impressionist to whom a canvas is a battlefield of colour and when Leverhulme received his face back again he was not at all pleased with what Augustus John had done to it.

3 One fine day, therefore, the astoni ished genius was greeted by a familiar s! package. \ Opening it he found his picture, with the face <jut out—-this and not a syllable of explanation. The r. artistic temperament, solicitous over » its masterpieces, was not unruffled, and the nation was much interested. In these pages the’ mystery is elucidated, and yet further point is added to Lord Leverhulnie’s curious naivete. He did not intend in any I way, so we are told, to offend the painter. But the picture was not one that he wished to hang and it had proved to be too big for his safe. He preferred not to roll the canvas and he thus cut out as much of it as would lie flat with his other papers. The housekeeper, seeing that the packing case was marked “returnable," naturrally returned it—and with the part of the picture included which had escaped the knife. So much for quality and quantity as applied bv commerce to art. , t To Lord Northcliffe, the adornment ot utility was not painting but politics, and it was in politics that his naivete was revealed. Mr. Macnair Wilson tells us that he made himself “the main source” of information in Britain, and there is ground for this bold claim. When, however, we read further that “news and views were kept separate” and that “on no single occasion in his life did he (Northcliffe) abuse that postion," we rub our eyes. We wonder whether that will be the verdict of history. Mr. Macnair Wilson hiipself reminds us that Northcliffe was assailed by “torrents of abuse.” Precise!}*, and why? Because it was alleged that, while announcing news, he was applying views. And he had a reason. It is not on every day that news provides a sensation. < On dull days it was views that stimulated the sales. "I have often heard the grotesque accusation levelled against Lord Northcliffe,” writes Mr. Macnair Wilson, “that he 'made the Great War.’” Whether the charge was grotesque or not, we are unable to say. History must look into it. But if any man has written what would prove the allegation, it is Mr. Macnair Wilson, and his eyidence is all .the more significant because the witness is so uncon-. scious apparently of the effect of his own language. Take this curious passage:— had realised what the “Little Englanders never realised, namely, that England had only just become a democracy. The growls of the lion were not the growls of old age; they were the expression of youth, ready to fight with its own shadow, and confident always of victory. Youth will be served. A “scrap”, of some sort, somewhere, was almost inevitable. This, then, was the philosophy. A Britain, rejoicing in youth, must be provided with a war; and so she was. In South Africa, youth was served and, in Britain, as Mr. Macnair Wilson gleefully assures us, the circulation of tho “Daily Mail” rose from 700,000 to 1,100,000, “a figure undreamed of in journalism at that time.

With the South African War quenched in unpopularity, Northcliffe was convinced that it was the turn of youth in Germany to be served. Mr. Macnair Wilson says that three other men only, King Edward, Balfour and Roberts, believed that this greater war must come. Of the quartette it was Northcliffe who had the means to turn his forebodings into fact. In Paris and in Manchester, as well as in London, the ‘Daily Mail” was published and “this tremendous engine of publicity was employed by Northcliffe, day in and day out, to expose the designs of Germany and to knit together, in a defensive understanding, the three great democracies of the world, the United States, France and Britain.” The sentence, interpreted by the files of the “Daily Mail,” shattered Mr. Macnair Wilson’s theory that Northcliffe’s news and views were kept in separate compartments. The views were the gunpowder, the news was the bullet.

The war, when it came, was. of course, a very different “scrap” from any anticipation envisaged by the ‘ arch-prophet. What precisely were bis services during that great ordeal 'it is not easy to say. By far the ablest brain devoted to the British Army in modern times had been Lord Haldane’s. It is claimed for North cliff e that he drove Haldane out of Whitehall and nominated Kitchener. If that be so, this narrative shows that, within a month or two, file had discovered his mistake, and in due course, he was attacking Kitchener more violently than he had ever attacked Haldane. Tow r ard Lloyd George his attitude was scarcely less erratic. In many matters Lord Northcliffe did his bit. Not only was he a great newspaper man but he was one of the greatest men ever captured by newspapers. Within his proper sphere, his was a brilliant and epochmaking success. But beyond that sphere he was out of his depth, and, in his heart, he knew it. Criticising Cabinets, he was all courage. Invited to enter them, he was all caution.