THE MOST BEAUTIFUL WOMAN HE EVER SAW
IT WAS GLORIOUS! JACK AND Warren Lewis were cycling in the beautiful County Down countryside, with “the world as their oyster” for two whole months. The roads and lanes they followed were narrow; their width had been untouched for centuries. The hedges were high, and the land was planted with crops and fruit trees. The fields were lavishly dotted with herds of sheep and dairy cattle that in time would create the basis of one of the strongest agricultural industries in Europe.
All across North and East Down, the countryside through which they cycled was filled with little huddles of heavily whitewashed farm buildings. The boys panted heavily up one side, and breathed easily down the other side of the little drumlins.
The name drumlin is Irish. It is the name given to a mound of land characteristic of areas formerly covered by glaciers. Drumlins are shaped like the bowl of a teaspoon turned upside down, with the highest part near one end. Hundreds of drumlins enhanced the landscape of County Down, creating the pleasant rolling farmland that was so greatly loved by Jack and Warren.
What had happened in the lives of these two boys? For a start, the Reverend Robert Capron had stopped beating the boys at Wynyard. It was not because he had changed, of course. He no longer had any boys to beat, for the school had had to close in 1910 for lack of pupils. Jack had written to his father, asking to leave the school, and Albert sent his sister-in-law to investigate. She faced Capron, and as a result of the showdown things did improve at Wynyard School for a time. Fortunately, Capron had never beaten Jack. In September 1909 Warren had gone on to Malvern School, leaving Jack to endure Wynyard for two more terms. For the next fifty years, he was to resent and feel anger towards Oldie. Who could blame him? In fact, Jack was not able to forgive Oldie until the last year of his life. That he survived Wynyard School to become the man he was is a triumph of hope over circumstances.
Hope had been satisfied with the end-of-term holidays; but now it was more deeply satisfied with the end of Wynyard. For Jack and Warren, the holidays had been the main goal of their existence so far. Not only did they cycle across the beautiful County Down countryside, but also they wrote, drew, played, talked, and read books in that home of books. It must have been bliss to be home. The boys were inseparable, and any interruption—be it another child, or the social convention of having to go to adult evening parties that included dancing—was viewed as sheer persecution.
Quite naturally, from all this reading, Jack’s speech was peppered with formidable words. To his great discomfort, he found that adults would lead him on in conversation just to laugh at him. To circumvent the problem, at every party he went to he affected a style of conversation that offered nothing that would stimulate or challenge. Under a guise of imitating adult conversation, laced with joking and false enthusiasm, he deliberately hid what he thought and felt. He became a consummate actor, and it was with great relief that he joined Warren for the cab ride home—the best part of the night, as far as he was concerned.
In terms of communication, the gap between teenagers and adults seems to have been every bit as wide in Edwardian days as it is now in the twenty-first century. Jack later maintained that one family bridged that gap in a way that made a deep and lasting impression upon him. That was the Ewart family. Sir William Ewart was a Belfast merchant and linen manufacturer. In 1864 he was one of the deputies from Belfast involved in the arrangements for a treaty of commerce with France. He was the Member of Parliament for Belfast East, Justice of the Peace for the Counties of Antrim, Down, and the Borough of Belfast, and Lord Mayor of Belfast from 1859 to 1860. A baronetcy was conferred on him in 1887. He and his wife, Isabella, had seven sons, who were all in their father’s business. The eldest, Sir William Quartus Ewart, lived at the family seat, Glenmachan House. In Jack’s childhood days the house was in a wooded glen. Sir William was married to Flora Lewis’s cousin, Lady Mary Ewart. Flora and Lady Mary were the very best of friends. There was an open invitation for Jack and Warren to lunch at Glenmachan House, and later Jack was to write a very warm and moving tribute to the family’s kindness.
It was under Lady Mary’s kindly eye and by her lilting, memorable, Southern Irish accent that the Lewis boys were taught to be polite, courteous, and well mannered. They needed such teaching, but it was no dictatorial regime that reigned at Glenmachan House; people further removed from the behaviour of the Wackford Squeers of Watford could not have been found. The boys enjoyed wise-headed and warm-hearted benevolence there; yet a high standard of manners was set and kept at Glenmachan House.
In the twenty-first century the pendulum of manners has swung widely in the opposite direction. When the two top swearwords in Britain are “God” and “Christ,” we are in a serious spiritual situation. People say they don’t mean anything by such language, of course. Yet the Bible states that we should not take the name of the Lord in vain. This means that we must not use the name of the Lord in our conversation without ascribing profitable meaning to it.
There has been strong reaction against some Edwardian etiquette as being too stiff and formal. No doubt such a reaction is healthy, but Jack Lewis came to appreciate that not all Edwardian etiquette was irrelevant. He had a formidable etiquette to follow. Imagine applying what was expected of an Edwardian gentleman to twenty-first-century living.
The Edwardian gentleman was always to be dressed neatly, and his clothing must never be loud or ostentatious. His nails must be scrupulously clean and his hair neatly combed and free from dirt or oil. He must carry himself erectly, but not stiffly. His spine must be straight, his shoulders back. He must always aspire to calm confidence rather than to loftiness. He must never put his hands in his pockets. His hands should hang comfortably at his sides or be clasped behind him. A gentleman must never smoke in the presence of a lady, or in the street, or in church. Smoking was for the smoking room or the presence of other smokers. A gentleman was always expected to ask permission before lighting a cigarette. And a gentleman was never, ever, to spit.
When in the company of a lady, an Edwardian gentleman was expected to see to her every need and want. He must pull out a chair for her, rise when she rose, hold open doors for her, assist her out of a carriage, and if she should drop her handkerchief or other such item he must pick it up. A gentleman was expected to precede a lady into a room in order to provide a chair for her, and he was expected not to sit until she was seated. As the era proceeded, a gentleman was expected to assist a lady into a motorcar. A gentleman was expected never to make anyone feel awkward. Upon entering a room, a gentleman was expected to greet everyone pleasantly and to introduce himself to those he did not know.
As for table manners, a very clear etiquette was to be observed. While waiting to be served, a gentleman was never to play with his knife and fork. He was not to hold them vertically at the sides of his plate. When his meal was finished he was never to cross his knife and fork, and he was always to use them noiselessly. Under no circumstances was he to put his knife into his mouth; his knife must be used only for cutting meat and hard substances. He must never appear greedy, and he must always take small bites. He must never speak with his mouth full. If his hands were unoccupied at the table, he must keep them under the table, neatly folded in his lap. If he had to rise from the table he must ask his host or hostess if he might be excused. If he were to find a hair or a fly or any unpleasant object in his food, he was to remove it subtly and without remark. He must never use his knife, fork, spoon, or finger to serve himself. If no serving utensil was provided, he was to take his cue from his host or hostess. As a dinner guest, he must always keep other people’s pleasure in mind. He must never take medications at the table. A golden rule was that he must never take more than he could finish. He must not allow his silverware to touch the table after he had picked it up. He must not smack his lips. He must never slurp his soup, and he was always expected to spoon his soup away from him, starting from the outside of the bowl. Were these requirements too much? No doubt they were. But good manners are easily carried through life. Later Jack maintained that whatever he knew of the ability to act appropriately and with courtesy in social situations, he had learned at Glenmachan House.
Jack thought the world of the grey-bearded Sir William. He was a kindly, humble, and gracious Edwardian gentleman. To Jack, the gentle, coaxing hand and voice of Sir William’s wife, Lady Mary Ewart, meant a great deal. Could it be that the frequent passivity of an older generation towards the young has led to the banality of much in current Western culture?
Sir William’s three daughters—Hope, Kels, and Gundreda—used to take the Lewis boys out in their donkey trap pulled by an obstinate donkey called Grisella. (Ah! When Gundreda urged Grisella to move on, it must have been something else! Don’t you think somebody should write a poem about it?) The Ewart family took the boys with them on many walks, car trips, picnics, and visits to the theatre. Glenmachan House was a home-from-home, and in many ways a calmer home than Little Lea.
Jack maintained that Gundreda Ewart was the most beautiful woman he ever saw. This belief had nothing to do with having a boyish crush for her. He asserted that even a child could see her beauty. To him, her every movement, her colour, her voice, her laughter were absolutely perfect.
Gundreda not only possessed beauty; she also possessed a fascinating name, to say the least. We know that Jack’s mother was a Warren; her ancestry can be traced to an Anglo-Norman whose family had been planted in Ireland in the reign of Henry II. The now dissolved C. S. Lewis Centenary Group, who produced the C. S. Lewis News, have told us that this Anglo-Norman was William de Warrenne, one of the greatest of William the Conqueror’s barons. To De Warrenne was given in marriage Gundreda, the Conqueror’s reputedly illegitimate daughter. Through Gundreda, wife of William de Warrenne, C. S. Lewis was descended from William the Conqueror and Charlemagne! The Centenary Group also pointed out that, through this aristocratic connection to the Warrennes, C. S. Lewis “was descended from the Plantagenet Kings of England, Kings of France, Scots, and Princes of Wales.”2 The genealogy of Jack’s beautiful cousin Gundreda certainly goes back a very long way.
In July 1910 Jack left Wynyard and the rule of Oldie, and for half a term he attended a school only one mile from his home in Belfast, called Campbell College. For Jack, it was actually the very first time he could say the little Belfast ditty:
Jack Lewis is my name;
Ireland is my nation.
Belfast is my dwelling place;
And school’s my occupation.
Campbell College was founded through the benevolence of a wealthy linen merchant called Henry James Campbell; it has since become a famous school in Northern Ireland. Set in the beautiful and tranquil hundred-acre Campbell Estate, today the school provides a balanced and rounded education for 680 boys, and takes around 60 boarders. It is Northern Ireland’s equivalent to an English public school; its preparatory school, Cabin Hill, stands in the same grounds. Why on earth did Albert Lewis not send his boys to Campbell College in the first place? It is a question that will always be asked.
Jack was a boarder at Campbell but was allowed to go home on Sundays. The present school leadership states that they believe “boarding helps develop confidence, community spirit, independence, social skills, cultural awareness, and respect for others.” The school emphasises that one of its major strengths is its “House System.” Each House consists of 50 boys, with the House Master and House Tutors responsible for overseeing the welfare of the boys in their charge in all aspects of their school life. Inter-House competitions in sporting and cultural events are a vital part of the school’s life. Today’s sporting activities include archery, athletics, badminton, basketball, cricket, cross country, golf, hill-walking, hockey, mountaineering, orienteering, rugby, shooting, soccer, squash, swimming, tennis, and volleyball. There is an orchestra and a jazz band, and the school has a strong choral tradition. The school choir, comprising both staff and boys, leads the morning assembly and performs at special occasions.
In Jack’s day, things were very different in many ways. The House system was present, but it was not as strong, and games were not compulsory. Prefects held no prominence.
Today, the Common Rooms at Campbell have satellite TV and DVD players. Access to the Internet is available for e-mail and research purposes. All pupils after year ten have accommodation on an individual-room basis; but in Jack’s time only senior boys had a separate study. Two of his overriding memories were the lack of privacy and the noisy Common Rooms.
When reading the description of Lewis’s memories of Campbell College, one is reminded of the classic Alexander Sokurov film The Russian Ark. It portrays a large crowd of people flowing like a tide down a staircase after a ball, then flowing down a corridor—thinning here, fanning out there, chatting, calling to each other, gossiping, and passing on news. Suddenly, there is an open doorway through which water can be seen stretching away to the horizon. The water is said to represent eternity. Jack described out-of-school hours at Campbell College as either moving away from, or going with, a tide of boys. The description sounds much like the movement of the people in The Russian Ark. Jack also described his experience at school as living in a railway station. His metaphor will resonate with many as a childhood memory of school crowds. Eternity still flows beyond the school door; but for the pupil, life is dominated by the here and now. For Jack, the here-and-now meant watching school fights with the ever-prurient crowds. There were “seconds,” even, at these boxing matches, attendants who assisted each combatant. Jack reckoned that there was also betting going on. He surmised that fists and wit could win any pupil his place in the life of the school! For Jack, though, any bullying at Campbell amounted to once being shoved down a hatch into a coal cellar. He found himself in the company of another small boy, as part of a game being played by roving gangs of fellow pupils.
Jack must have found Campbell College a Shangri-La in comparison to Wynyard. In the place of Oldie, he found Octie. Octie was the nickname the boys had for Lewis Alden, the Senior English Master at Campbell from 1898 until 1930. As far as Jack was concerned, the most important event to happen to him at Campbell College was to hear Octie read Matthew Arnold’s Sohrab and Rustum. With his deep, resonant voice, Octie obviously sparked something in Jack’s imagination as he read Arnold’s masterpiece of heroic, even epic poetry. By the shores of Belfast Lough, in Octie’s Form Room, from the very first lines Jack was entranced:
And the first grey of morning fill’d the east,
And the fog rose out of the Oxus stream.
But all the Tartar camp along the stream
Was hush’d, and still the men were plunged in sleep;
Sohrab alone, he slept not; all night long
He had lain wakeful, tossing on his bed;
But when the grey dawn stole into his tent,
He rose, and clad himself, and girt his sword,
And took his horseman’s cloak, and left his tent,
And went abroad into the cold wet fog,
Through the dim camp to Peran-Wisa’s tent.3
The reversal and rhetoric in Arnold’s epic story of Sohrab the Tartar and Rustum the Persian—the son and father’s edging closer to their fatal combat, in which the father unknowingly kills his son—fired Jack’s imagination. As the final lines fell on his ear, telling of the majestic Oxus River floating on, Jack felt that he was gazing at things in a very far country:
Out of the mist and hum of that low land
Into the frosty starlight . . .
The long’d-for dash of waves is heard, and wide
His luminous home of waters opens, bright
And tranquil, from whose floor the new-bathed stars
Emerge, and shine upon the Aral Sea.
Jack entered into European poetry as never before. It seemed to depict something he longed for, but which was, for now, unattainable. He was only a twelve-year-old boy. He could not have known that he, like Matthew Arnold before him, would begin to have serious doubts about the veracity of the Christian faith. Matthew, son of Thomas Arnold, the famous headmaster of Rugby School and himself a pioneer of state education, found that his doubts brought him great anxiety, as he tried very hard to reconcile “traditional religion” with the conclusions of the new “higher criticism.” In his poem Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse, he wrote of “wandering between two worlds, one dead, the other powerless to be born.”4
In June 1851, Arnold married Frances Lucy Whiteman, daughter of Sir William Whiteman, a judge of the Queen’s Bench. At Dover on his honeymoon, Arnold heard the waves raking across the shingle outside his hotel bedroom. And in his poem “Dover Beach” he wrote:
The sea of faith
Was once too at the full and round Earth’s shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furl’d:
But now I only hear
Its melancholy long withdrawing roar,
Retreating to the breath
Of the night wind down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world. . . . 5
Matthew Arnold’s journey led to agnosticism; Jack Lewis’s led to atheism. Arnold was part of the great ebb of faith throughout Europe, beginning (as mentioned in the preface) particularly with the Deism of the eighteenth-century Scottish aristocrat David Hume. The loss of faith came down through the writings and beliefs of people like Thomas Carlyle, Marx and Engels, the gifted novelist George Eliot, Charles Darwin, Tennyson, Thomas Hardy, John Ruskin, and George Bernard Shaw. This loss of faith among writers, artists, and intellectuals in Western civilisation has had a seismic effect upon our culture.
The twelve-year-old boy was not to know that one day he would be seriously considered for the position of Professor of Poetry at Oxford University, a position which Arnold held for two successive terms of five years. Nor was the boy to know that one day Sir Anthony Hopkins would unveil one of his poems, engraved on a plaque in Oxford itself. Enchanted by the poetry of Arnold at Campbell College, Jack Lewis was not to know that the living God would use him to help turn back the tide of faith once again.