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Updated: June 21, 2025
I could fill a volume with reminiscences of his talk, as I used to hear it during my frequent visits to Fryston, and of the warmth of his sympathy with one who had no claim upon him. I have made many friends in the course of my life, and looking back upon the list I am constrained to say that I have made more friends through the mediumship of Lord Houghton than through that of any other man.
Having found his way to Constantinople, he applied himself to the study of Oriental languages, and at the time he visited Fryston he was planning the most picturesque event of his life namely, his journey to Khiva, Bokhara and Samarcand, which in emulation of Burton he accomplished in the disguise of a dervish.
One of the earliest lessons a man learnt on being admitted to Houghton's cosmopolitan society was the great need of care in the selection of topics in addressing a stranger. Most persons one met at Fryston had either done something or were somebodies, and occasionally their fame was not of the kind that commends itself to everybody.
I had been in confidential correspondence with Lord Derby long before I first met him at Fryston, and in 1879 I wrote an article in Macmillan's Magazine dealing with his career at the Foreign Office, and with his reason for resigning his post in Lord Beaconsfield's Administration. This article was written on information which he supplied, and he himself corrected the proof-sheets.
Accordingly, when I was walking with him in the Fryston woods on the following morning, I plucked up my courage, and asked him if he had been at the Charterhouse with Thackeray. "Certainly I was," replied the eminent publicist; "we entered on the same day, and were great friends all the time we were at school."
He is one of the most distinguished of the figures I associate with Fryston and its gifted owner. The very last time that I dined with Lord Houghton I had an amusing experience. It was in the late autumn of 1884. Houghton had just met with a rather severe and painful accident.
I wanted to know which of his schoolfellows it was who broke his nose and disfigured him for life, and I had made up my mind that if ever I met a man who had been at school with him I would question him on this point. During one of my earlier visits to Fryston I found that George Venables, the well-known Parliamentary counsel and Saturday Reviewer, was staying there.
My usual time for visiting Fryston was on Saturday, when I was free from the charge of my paper for four-and-twenty hours. My kind friend always insisted on Sunday morning that instead of going to church I should spend the morning in strolling in the park, either alone or in his delightful company. This, he would say, was necessary in the interests of my health.
Forming Good Resolutions Provincial Journalism in the 'Seventies Recollections of the Franco-German War The Loss of the Captain and its Consequences to me Settling Down at Leeds Acquaintance with Monckton Milnes Visits to Fryston Lord Houghton's Chivalry His Talk His Skill in Judging Men Stories about George Venables Lord Houghton's Regard for Religious Observances.
It was in 1880, when the great statesman, having won the most brilliant triumph of his life, and finally defeated his great rival, Lord Beaconsfield, was struck down by serious illness a few weeks after he had regained power. "I am so sorry to see that Gladstone is getting better," Houghton said to me as we sat in the library at Fryston.
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