I have some hesitation in speaking of Mr. Chamberlain in his private and “at home” character, though in these days I hardly know that I need be very timid or scrupulous.  The public has a ready, I might almost say a greedy, ear for personal details concerning the lives and habits of public men, and there are plenty of writers willing to gratify its desires in this respect, and that, too, with the knowledge and consent of the eminent personages themselves.  Many people like to hear all about the characteristics of prominent men, and have a keen appetite for all particulars concerning their personal habits and peculiarities.  They love to hear what a celebrated man eats, drinks, and avoids, what time he rises and at what hour he usually goes to bed; and even a little thimbleful of scandal touching his shortcomings, delinquencies, and, possibly, his small vices, is as nectar to the gossip-loving taste.  To tell some people what they have no right to know is often to delight them.

Without at all professing to be in any sense an intimate friend of Mr. Chamberlain’s, I may, perhaps, say that I have many times had the pleasure of sitting at his table, and a more genial and interesting host it would be difficult to describe.  He is bland and gentle to a degree that might surprise those who only know him as a vigorous, fighting politician.

I remember that once when Sir William Harcourt was a guest of Mr. Chamberlain’s at Highbury, he said that he went to stay with his honourable friend with feelings almost amounting to trepidation, but he soon found that Mr. Chamberlain was by no means the ogre he had been represented.  Mr. Chamberlain eat his meals with an ordinary knife and fork; and he rose up in the morning and went to bed regularly like any other sane and well-conducted person.  Indeed, he found him quite a tame and inoffensive creature compared with the rampant, rampageous autocratic being he had so often heard him described.

I do not pretend to quote Sir William Harcourt’s words literally.  I am repeating entirely from memory, but I give the gist of some of his amusing, characteristic remarks when speaking in the Birmingham Town Hall at the time he was Mr. Chamberlain’s friend and guest.  Certainly, I have always found Mr. Chamberlain a delightfully pleasant host.  He is not given to monopolizing the talk.  He does not dogmatize or lay down the law; in fact, when acting as host he is so mild, docile, and pleasant that a fossilized Tory, or even a fiery Nationalist, might play with him.

Sometimes I have been among a favoured few who have been asked to stay after most of his guests have left, and have a cigar with Mr. Chamberlain in his library.  On such occasions there has been some rare good talk.  I remember on one occasion the conversation did become warmly political, and there was quite a smart little tussle between our host and Mr. Jesse Collings.  At that time Mr. Collings had a trifle more sympathy