Memoirs of Sir Wemyss Reid 1842-1885 | Page 4

but a man may be forgiven a measure of sensitiveness when his honour is impeached.
He always used to speak with gratitude of the action of Lord Russell of Killowen at that period. He heard the gossip of the clubs, and was not content, like the majority of men, either to believe it or to dismiss the matter with a shrug of the shoulders. He sought my brother out at his own house, heard the whole story from his own lips--through an informal but stringent process of cross-examination--drew his own conclusions, and did more than anyone else to turn the tide of misrepresentation. Lord Russell never rested until Wemyss Reid was elected an honorary member of the Eighty Club, a distinction shared by only two or three persons, and one which did not a little to bring about, in the Liberal party at least, a quick reversal of public opinion. The chivalrous action of Lord Russell was all the more creditable as the two men at the time were only slightly acquainted. Other honours came to my brother within the next two years. The University of St. Andrews in 1893 conferred upon him the degree of LL.D., and in the following year he was knighted "for services to Letters and Politics."
It is a pleasure to hark back to the literary interests which grew around the later years of my brother in London. He went thither in 1887 to take control of the business of Messrs. Cassell & Company--a position of wide influence and hard work which he retained to the last day of his life. He used to tell me that he detested the City and the irksomeness of keeping office hours, but he stuck manfully to his post, and his presence at the desk there lent a lustre even to the traditions of a great publishing house. I betray no confidences when I say that at first he found his new duties somewhat uncongenial. He had won his spurs as a journalist, he was fond of the cut and thrust of party politics, he missed the rush of public life, and he felt that perhaps he had been ill-advised in quitting the editorial saddle. But this feeling of depression quickly wore off when he set himself, with characteristic energy, to master the details of his new work, though to the last he often cast longing glances backwards to the years in which he inspired the policy of a great daily newspaper. Before he left Leeds--and here I may say that he did not leave without substantial proof of the esteem in which he was held--he accepted two literary commissions, either of which would have satisfied most men and absorbed all their energies for a term of years.
One was the preparation of an authoritative biography of Mr. Forster, the other a similar work--less political and more literary--on the first Lord Houghton. He was, of course, in a position to speak from close personal knowledge of both men, and in each case all their private letters and papers were placed at his discretion. He found relief from the prosaic details of a business career in these congenial tasks, if such a term is applicable to what in reality were labours of love. Both were big books, and the marvel is how, with all that he had in hand at the time, he contrived to write them. But the passion for work was the zest of his life, and it was never turned to more admirable account than in these labours. "The Life of the Right Hon. W. E. Forster" was published in 1888, and "The Life, Letters, and Friendships of Lord Houghton" in 1890, and both met with a reception which it is hardly within my province to describe. It is enough to say that they widened his reputation, added materially to his influence, and, best of all, brought him many new and powerful friends.
Almost before he had finished writing the second of these books, at the instance of Mr. Bryce (with whom his relations were always most close and cordial) and other well-known men in the Liberal party, he, in conjunction with Sir John Brunner, founded the _Speaker_, a weekly journal which was started on similar lines to the _Spectator_, but devoted to the advocacy of the Home Rule cause, and broadly of the policy of Mr. Gladstone. The first number was published on January 4th, 1890, and from that time until October, 1899, he alone was responsible for its editorial control. He gathered around him a brilliant staff of contributors; he used laughingly to say that he was over-weighted by them, and, if I may venture a criticism, he gave them too free a hand. Contemporary politics were discussed amongst others by Mr. Morley, Mr. Bryce, Mr. J. A. Spender,