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Chap. XX.] A Sabbath-Breaking Dog. 279
the 2 ladies and waited every morning for the visitor on Sundays and asked to be taken out by her. She always complied with the dog's request. Eventually the dog got into the habit of paying no attention whatever to the Sunday movements of its mistress.—(Ex relatione oculati testis, 1909.)
Debating Societies.
My appreciation of Institutions like the " East-Bourne House of Commons " is due to my recollections of two Debating Societies to which I once belonged in London. The first of these was a Society which existed during my early days at King's College, where we had set debates, chiefly on political subjects, every week. Two of those who were associated with me in those days ultimately reached very high positions in the great Council of the Nation, namely Sir E. Clarke, K.C., and Baron De Worms afterwards Lord Pirbright. Clarke was, as he still is, a tower of strength to the Conservative Party, but Baron De Worms was in College days the leader of the Liberal Party in the King's College Society. In the later years of his life however, he saw the error of his ways, and finally took office under Lord Salisbury after becoming M.P. for the East Toxteth Division of Liverpool, and before he was created a Peer. I lost sight of him and never saw him for 22 years, but one day whilst reading a newspaper at the Carlton Club, I heard a voice behind me which I recognised at once as the Baron's voice, but I could not recognise the man. I stared at him in vain. I went on listening but not in vain. At last when he had finished his conversation with his friend, I went boldly up to him and said, " You must be my old friend Baron De Worms, if only because of your voice." From that day I kept up my acquaintance with him till his death. He entered public life as M.P. for Greenwich at the General Election of 1880, replacing Mr. Gladstone who dared not stand again because of his unpopularity in connection with the discharges of workmen at Woolwich. The Baron who |
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