He was also an art _connoisseur_, and had a very fine
collection of water-colours. The first time I saw the Doctor was years
before on a steamer on the Rance, between Normandy and Brittany. I made
a sketch of his extraordinary features, so that when he entered the
Garrick Club I recognised the original of my caricature. We frequently
walked down to the Houses of Parliament together after dinner, and more
than once he invited me behind the scenes and under the stage of
Parliament, through the "fog filter" and ventilating shafts, when he was
wont to indulge in a grim, saturnine humour appropriate to his
subterranean subject. As he opened the iron doors for us to pass from
one passage to another, close to and above which the benches are
situated,--for the whole House is honeycombed for ventilating
purposes,--he pretended that long experience enabled him to discriminate
between the odours from different parts of the House, and declared that
he could tap and draw off a specimen of the atmosphere on the Government
benches, the Opposition side, or the Radical seats, at will.

"There, my boy! eh? Pretty thick, aint it? That's the Scotch lot. Now
hold your nose. I open this door and we get the Irish draught. Ugh! Come
on, come on quickly--mixture of Irish, working-men M.P.'s, and Rads.
Kill a horse!"

The table of the House, which Mr. Disraeli erroneously described as "a
solid piece of furniture," is in reality--like so many arguments which
are flung across it--perfectly hollow; and one evening when I arrived
with Dr. Percy and found that in consequence of the winding-up speech of
Mr. Gladstone in a great debate the Press Gallery was full and all the
seats under the gallery were occupied, Dr. Percy kindly allowed me to
sit _inside the table_. I was sorely tempted to try the effect of
inserting my pencil through the grating which forms the side of the
table, and tickle the shins of the right hon. gentleman. Anyway, I
looked straight into the faces of the Ministers and those on the front
bench, and not only heard every word, but the asides and whispers as
well.

[Illustration: DR. PERCY. "THE HOUSE UP."

_From "Punch."_]

I only once caricatured Dr. Percy in _Punch_ (December, 1886), after
there had been a sort of earthquake in the Inner Lobby of the House, and
the tesselated pavement was thrown up. I made a drawing, "The House up
at last." Dr. Percy "is personally directing the improvements." It is
interesting to know that