A DISRAELI-BROWNING INCIDENT.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1403, 19 January 1899, Page 16

A DISRAELI-BROWNING INCIDENT.

' Canon McColl, in the " Observer," gives what he claims to be the true account of a Disraeli-Browning incident in connection with the Academy Exhibition of 1876. At one of Mr Gladstone's breakfast parties in Harley street, in 1878, the Canon was a guest. He says:—" Someone happening to refer to the then music-hall song ' We don't want to fight/ etc., Browning exclaimed, 'l'm dead sick of that doggerel. Besides, I have composed a much better version of my own/ Asked what it was, he recited three versos, of which only the first has stuck to my memory. Here it is: ' I don't want to fight; But, by Jingo, if I do, The man whose head I'd like to punch Is Beaconsfield the Jew.' Browning declared emphatically that he regarded Lord Beaconsfield as ' the greatest liar living,' and then proceeded to tell a i story by way of illustration: ' Two years ago/ said Browning, ' I was at the Academy dinner. Mr Disraeli made tho speech of the evening, and his theme was the extraordinary display of the imaginative faculty in the pictures of the year. After dinner he came up to me and said, " How do you do, Mr Browning?" I waß taken aback, for we had never been introduced, and I had never spoken to him. So I replied: 'f Very well, thank you, Mr Disraeli; but I think you mistake mo for somebody else." " Oh, no," said he, " it is impossible to mistake Mr Browning. What do you think of the pictures of this year's exhibition ?" I was so taken aback by his addressing me at all that, like a fool, instead of giving my opinion, I asked, " What do you think of them, Mr Disreali?" forgetting that it was only half an hour before that I heard him give his opinion in his speech. Stroking his chin, he replied, " Well, Mr Browning, if I had to make any special criticism, it would be to say how wofully lacking the pictures of this year are in the imaginative faculty." I stood dumb and rooted to the spot. It was only half an hour before that I heard this man say that what particularly struck him in the pictures was the extraordinary display of the imaginative faculty. I repeat ' —with tremendous energy—' he is the freatest liar living.'" Mr Gladstone is hen reported by Canon McColl to have

said laughingly that Browning had taken Disraeli too seriously. At the same time lie remarked that Disraeli was addicted to making false statements. " I sometimes debate with myself whether he ever had in his mind a clear line of demarcation between truth and falsehood; but if he had, I am sure that for years past his mind has been in a state of baptismal innocence with regard to the difference. Men tell lies to serve a purpose; but I have known Lord Beaconsfield make false statements which could be of no manner of use to him, but rather the contrary." The recollection of Canon McColl (an ardent Gladstoneite, with no liking for Disraeli) may pass. If Disraeli, just after praising the Academy exhibition, in carefully framed words, said just the opposite half an hour iater to Browning, lie was either indulging in hght paradox or serious jest. The " incident " makes us think less of Browning, who need not have got angry, without thinking worse of Disraeli. The Academy speech of 1876, by the way, startled the critics and leaderwriters not a little, but if we remember aright, what Disraeli praised tho imaginative qualities of the British etlfol, and not any particular exhibition.