Clay Lane

The Copy Book

A Library of History and Literature in English

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877

Wrath Reawakened

During the Orlov Revolt of 1769, Greek islanders get their hands on a copy of Homer’s epic tale of Troy.

During the Greek Revolution of 1821-1829, against the Ottoman Empire, Irishman Edward Blaquière found his fund-raising in London hampered by doubts over whether today’s Greeks were worthy of their ancient forebears. Blaquiere showed them that the spirit of Achilles, wrathful hero of the Trojan War, lived on.

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Picture: © Rol1000, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 3.0.. Source.

878

The Quiet Revolutionary

As Viceroy of India, Lord Ripon was rather more popular with the people of India than he was with some of his own civil servants.

When Lord Ripon took over as Viceroy of India in 1880, he at once set about including more Indians in Government, and allowing the local press to hold lawmakers to account. Many opposed him and it took a long time for his policy to bear fruit, but Ram Chandra Palit believed that it was Ripon, and not his critics, who was truly British.

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Picture: © Sujay25, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0.. Source.

879

The Righting of Wrongs

John Bright MP urged a critic of the British Raj to offer India more than fine words.

In 1883, Major Thomas Evans Bell, a former employee of the East India Company and a severe critic of the British Raj, was preparing for a lecturing tour in the United States. John Bright MP (who was not uncritical himself) wrote to remind him that what India needed most from Britain and America was not colonial guilt or blame, but free trade.

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Picture: © Bernard Gagnon, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 3.0.. Source.

880

Big Hitter

Meriel Talbot’s distinguished career in government came as no surprise to those who had seen her at the wicket.

As a young woman, composer Ethel Smyth played cricket for a ladies’ team in Kent, the White Heather Club. The club’s leading light was the future Dame Meriel Talbot, who would soon play a key government role in the Commonwealth and the Great War. Though still in her early twenties, Meriel’s demeanour on and off the pitch showed she was destined for greatness.

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Picture: From James Lillywhite’s Cricketer’s Annual for 1890, via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.. Source.

881

Daw Chorus

Composer Ethel Smyth starts telling the Archbishop of Canterbury a joke, and then wishes she hadn’t...

In the late 1880s, rising composer Ethel Smyth became friendly with Nelly Benson, daughter of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and often shared in the family’s meals. Archbishop Benson’s massive dignity never failed to disconcert Ethel, and on one occasion she started nervously babbling an anecdote about a misprint in a newspaper.

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Picture: © Maigheach gheal, Geograph. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0.. Source.

882

The Princes in the Tower

Sir Thomas More gives his explanation for the mysterious disappearance of King Richard III’s nephews.

On April 9th 1483, Edward IV’s son acceded to the throne as Edward V. But the boy’s uncle pronounced him and his brother Richard illegitimate, named himself Richard III, and shut the two princes up in the Tower of London. Thirty years later, Sir Thomas More gave his version of what happened next.

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Picture: By John Everett Millais, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.. Source.