26 August: Boreham on John Buchan

Evolution of a Governor-General
This is the birthday of Lord Tweedsmuir who, despite the passage of the years, is still better known to his admirers as John Buchan. No Scotsman of our time cut a more knightly figure, did a more splendid work, or left a more fragrant memory than did he. He never, in the ordinary sense, attended school. His mother, who, at the age of 17 years, was tremblingly attempting to sustain the dignity of a minister's wife, used to say laughingly that her boys educated themselves. What with natural brilliance, intense application, and the capture of scholarships, John simply danced over the hurdles that stood between an upcountry manse and Oxford University. Not least among his teachers was the scenery surroundng his home. He loved the brown heath and shaggy woods, the brawling torrents, and the purple moors that lay everywhere around him.

It was, indeed, his passionate love of Nature that, at the age of four, nearly ended his career and that left him with the frightful scar across his forehead that he wore to his dying day. Intent upon a picnic, the entire family was driving along a country road when John suddenly caught sight of a cluster of bluebells. Impulsively springing to his feet, he fell out and the wheel caught his head. He was so crushed that little hope was held for his recovery, and nearly a year passed before he found himself once more upon his feet. Having overcome this initial handicap, his intellectual development was amazing. On his convalescence every effort was made to shield him from intellectual strain. The doctors insisted that he was to have no lessons till he was seven. But, without the slightest difficulty, he taught himself to read by means of the posters and hoardings of the street. He regarded every man he met as a victim whose brains it was his duty to pick. He asked everybody the most penetrating questions about everything.

An Actor Who Played Many Brilliant Parts
Once he applied himself to the serious discipline of education, he advanced with sensational rapidity, leaving his competitors bewildered. His mental processes followed a line of their own. Prof. Gilbert Murray, who was himself only 26 at the time, tells how, at the end of a lecture to his Middle Greek class at Glasgow University, a boy of 17 asked a question. His action was, as the professor remarks, quite commonplace; it was the question itself that startled everybody. For John Buchan wanted to know why Bacon quoted the Greek philosopher Democritus in Latin. Where could he have found a Latin translation of Democritus? "No doubt," says Murray, "the passage was a quotation from Cicero; but such a pupil in the Middle Class was obviously a treasure and we formed a friendship that lasted through life." His parents and teachers tell countless such stories.

Just as, in the ordinary sense, he never went to school, so, in the ordinary sense, he never chose a vocation. Nobody can say in so many words what John Buchan was. A barrister, he became a Member of Parliament; went to South Africa with Lord Milner, the High Commissioner; became one of the principals of Nelson's publishing house; and wrote, in addition to the "History of the First World War," a batch of classical biographies, sentimental romances and exciting mystery stories. He was appointed Director of Information; he twice represented His Majesty as Lord High Commissioner at the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland; and finished up by becoming Governor-General of Canada.

A Combination Of Modesty And Chivalry
John Buchan was a small, slight, frail-looking man, easily distinguished by the terrific dent in his forehead. He took a lot of knowing. Most people thought him stand-offish and statuesque. His wife, whose charming personality and beautiful devotion constituted themselves the greatest enrichment of his maturer years, confesses that when she first met him she thought him conceited and difficult to talk to. But his aloofness quickly melted. He developed a genius for making people feel that he was genuinely interested in them, and wanted to know all about them. In buses and railway carriages he would find out not only the names of his chance companions, but their nicknames and pet names, and why those names had been given. Yet, although he liked other people to talk about themselves, he hated talking about himself. His least successful book is his autobiography. It is metallic, geologic, academic, without smiles or tears; it leaves us cold. His real autobiography is his portrayal of Sir Edward Leithen in the novels. He was at his best when doing all kinds of little things for little people; but he could not bear to have a fuss made of it. He would meet a struggling young mother who was worried about the future of her boy, would undertake to see the boy through school and university, and would regard the incident as all in the day's work.

Lord Baldwin declared that no man could define with precision the secret of John Buchan's fascinations. "As well try to grasp the rainbow," he said, "though all can see the crock of gold." And Violet Markham, who enjoyed his life-long friendship, says that she never once heard him speak a harsh or unfair word. Nothing ever pleased him more than the King's request that he should represent the Crown at the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in Edinburgh. A son of the manse, he loved the Church's service and traditions. "He was," as Kenneth de Courcy put it," a supremely honest Christian gentleman whose faith was simple, unshakable, and inspired." Shortly after his death, his sister, Anna, herself an authoress of renown, was making a purchase in an Edinburgh shop and had occasion to give the shop girl her name. The girl stared reverently, almost incredulously. "Are you his sister?" she asked. Anna's tears gave the answer. "He must be an awfu' miss!" observed the girl. Her words sum up the general impression that his fine character and variegated career had everywhere created.

F W Boreham

Image: John Buchan