Churton Collins, though, of course, I've no right to speak for
literature," and without more ado he signed the petition, adding,
"Regius Professor of Greek at Trinity College, Dublin."

"When you next see Oscar," he continued, "please tell him that my wife
and I asked after him. We both hold him in grateful memory as a most
brilliant talker and writer, and a charming fellow to boot. Confusion
take all their English Puritanism."

Merely living in Ireland tends to make an Englishman more humane; but
one name was not enough, and Tyrrell's was the only one I could get. In
despair, and knowing that George Wyndham had had a great liking for
Oscar, and admiration for his high talent, I asked him to lunch at the
Savoy; laid the matter before him, and begged him to give me his name.
He refused, and in face of my astonishment he excused himself by saying
that, as soon as the rumour had reached him of Oscar's intimacy with
Bosie Douglas, he had asked Oscar whether there was any truth in the
scandalous report.

"You see," he went on, "Bosie is by way of being a relation of mine, and
so I had the right to ask. Oscar gave me his word of honour that there
was nothing but friendship between them. He lied to me, and that I can
never forgive."

A politician unable to forgive a lie--surely one can hear the mocking
laughter of the gods! I could say nothing to such paltry affected
nonsense. Politician-like Wyndham showed me how the wind of popular
feeling blew, and I recognised that my efforts were in vain.

There is no fellow-feeling among English men of letters; in fact they