Gladstone and other elderly ladies and
political wives took me on as to the duties of the spouse of a
possible Prime Minister; they were so eloquent and severe that at
the end of it my nerves were racing round like a squirrel in a
cage.
When Mr. Gladstone came into the drawing-room I felt depressed
and, clinging to his arm, I switched him into a corner and said I
feared the ladies took me for a jockey or a ballet-girl, as I had
been adjured to give up, among other things, dancing, riding and
acting. He patted my hand, said he knew no one better fitted to be
the wife of a great politician than myself and ended by saying
that, while I was entitled to discard exaggeration in rebuke, it
was a great mistake not to take criticism wisely and in a spirit
which might turn it to good account.
I have often thought of this when I see how brittle and
egotistical people are at the smallest disapprobation. I never get
over my surprise, old as I am, at the surly moral manners, the
lack of humbleness and the colossal personal vanity that are the
bed-rock of people's incapacity to take criticism well. There is
no greater test of size than this; but, judged by this test, most
of us are dwarfs.
Disapproving of long engagements and wishing to escape the
cataract of advice by which my friends thought to secure both my
husband's and my own matrimonial bliss, I hurried on my marriage.
My friends and advisers made me unhappy at this time, but
fortunately for me Henry Asquith is a compelling person and, in
spite of the anxiety of the friends and relations, we were married
at St.
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