REMINISCENCES OF TROLLOPE.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 3355, 4 January 1884, Page 2

REMINISCENCES OF TROLLOPE.

Mr Edmond Yates contributes the following personal reminiscences of Trollope to the “ World.*' He says “It is very long since I have read a book to me personally so interesting as ‘ Trollope’s Autobiography.’ The intimation, given here and there, that the words then flowing so frankly and honestly from bis facile pen would not be read till he had passed away seems to me inexpressly touching; nor can I readily call to mind, in my limited reading, anything much more affecting than the manner in which he chronicles his manly regard for John Millais. Surely never was book so thoroughly the outcome of the author. Beading it, I seem to see his bison-like head held low down, bison-fashion, when about to attack, and to hear the roaring of the whirlwind of rage which possessed him when differing from any given proposition. The inflrmity of his temper rendered him an easy prey to his adversaries in argument, and was invariably taken advantage of by the man whom he hated with all his great capacity for hatred, Sir Rowland Hill. No two men more opposite in every respect could be found. They had one quality in common determination ; but to carry it out they worked in very different ways. Trollope was passionate, insolent, defiant, losing his head at the outset, banging his fist on the table, and so choking and spluttering that it was difficult to comprehend him. Hill was perfectly calm, quiet, ' and self-possessed, sitting back in his chair with his hands—the finger points touching—in bis lap before him, making the most cutting comments, the most diabolically unpleasant observations in a low voice, with a hard provincial accent, Trollope, with sound and fury, whirled about his quarter staff, but Hill’s polished rapier pierced him through and through, Hill, too, was Trollope’s official superior, and, when they were in contact never failed in making his adversary recognise the fact. I have seen Rowland Hill’s pale face illumined by quite a glow of satisfaction, as he metaphorically took Trollope by his bull neck and rubbed his nose in the dirt. The ‘craving for love ’ which Trollopejadmits, and which he says was first gratified when be made the acquaintance of the old whisters at the Garrick Club, was unsuspected by his brother officers. Wholly unsuspected, because in his official relations he went out of bis way to make himself offensive, and was in general heartily disliked. To be disliked (as Trollope records was his fate) by men so totally opposite as the two Secretaries whom he served—Colonel Maberly and Sir Rowland Hill—shows that he must have had a huge capacity for making himself objectionable ; and he had. In later life, literarysucoess and worldly prosperity did much to humanise him ; but he was unpopular to the end of his official career. Odd to think that his old foe, Colonel Maberly, though many years his senior, is still alive. In Trollope’s novels there is scarcely a gleam of real humor; but I doubt if one could find anything more genuinely funny than the stories of his splashing the ink in the Secretary’s face, or.of the German baron who presented him with balf-a-orown, as told in his ‘Autobiography.’’ 4