eeting again Commander
Cameron, Mr. Henry Irving, M. Du Chaillu, Mr. A. C. Swinburne, and Mr.
Theodore Watts[-Dunton]. What Burton was to Mr. Swinburne is summed up
in the phrase--"the light that on earth was he." [556]

153. H. W. Ashbee.

His principal place of resort, however, during this visit was the house
of Mr. H. W. Ashbee, 54, Bedford Square, where he met not only Mr.
Ashbee, but also Dr. Steingass, Mr. Arbuthnot, Sir Charles Wingfield
and Mr. John Payne, all of whom were interested, in different ways, in
matters Oriental. Ashbee, who wrote under the name of Pisanus Fraxi (Bee
of an ash), was a curiously matter-of-fact, stoutish, stolid, affable
man, with a Maupassantian taste for low life, its humours and laxities.
He was familiar with it everywhere, from the sordid purlieus of
Whitechapel to the bazaars of Tunis and Algiers, and related Haroun
Al-Raschid-like adventures with imperturbably, impassive face, and
in the language that a business man uses when recounting the common
transactions of a day. This unconcernedness never failed to provoke
laughter, even from those who administered rebukes to him. Of art
and literature he had absolutely no idea, but he was an enthusiastic
bibliophile, and his library, which included a unique collection or
rare and curious books, had been built up at enormous expense.
Somebody having described him as "not a bad old chap," Mr. Payne added
characteristically, "And he had a favourite cat, which says something
for him."

154. A Bacon Causerie.

The serenity of these gatherings, whether at Mr. Ashbee's or at Mr.
Arbuthnot's, was never ruffled unless somebody happened to introduce
politics or the Shakespere-Bacon Question. Arbuthnot the Liberal was
content to strike out with his back against the wall, so to speak, when
attacked by the Conservative Burton, Ashbee and Payne; but Arbuthnot the
Baconian frequently took the offensive. He would go out of his way in
order to drag in this subject. He could not leave it out of his Life of
Balzac even. These controversies generally resolved themselves into
a duel between Mr. Arbuthnot and Mr. Payne--Burton, who loved a fight
between any persons and for any reasons, looking on approvingly. Mr.
Ashbee and Dr. Steingass were inclined to side with Mr. Payne. On one of
these occasions Mr. Payne said impatiently that he could not understand
"any sensible man taking the slightest interest in the sickening
controversy," and th