New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1891-06-07
LAURENCE OLIPHANT.
THE STRANGBST MAN OF HIS TINE.

MEMOIR OF THE LIFE OF LAURE NE oLIpHA Ant
AND OF ALICE oLJPHANT, HIS WIFE: BY mar MAI
PIP. 5l4-3ss. Harper Brothers.
Few stranger. more restleSsly adventurous OF
more oontrarily mixed lives than that of Laurence
Oliphant have been lived and none more
full Of interest or more deserving OF
study. He might easily have found
moro sympathetic biograpler than Mrs Mar
garet Oliphant. but perhaps not one as wen
informed concerning the details of his singular
and manifold experiences. Not thao MIS-. oii-
phant has in these volumes undertaken to follow
him in all his adventures To have done this would
have been to extend the narrative inordinatey
nor was it necessary since he has himself recorded
the most interesting of his secular and not few
of his psychical experiences. Born OF an ola
Scotch family the ELEPHANTS of Conde. his father,
Sir Anthony Oliphant. received the appointment
of Chief Justice of Ceylon while Laurence was d
child and he brought up in that Oriental pos
session of England II was bis fathers intention
that he should be educated In the mother country.
but when the time came for sending him 10 one
of the Universities. Sir Anthony was about 10
take a vacation. and had determined to employ
IL in European travel. Learning this Lowry
as the family called him. undertook to persuede
his father that q course of foreign travel would
dence and as his parents spoiled the boy' ne had
his own way. This was serious misfortune to
him He thereby missed the instruction and the
intellectual discipline which would have guarded
him against mental decisions; and he acquired
that taste for adventure and travel winch 1or
years was to be the ruling passion Of his life.
From a very early age he had been used to
society His fathers exalted office in Ceylon
made his house the rendezvous of all people OF
distinction who visited the colony. and its re-
lations with India are such that constant stream
of travel passes through 1t, embracing all the bu
reaucracy Of Hindostan together with the main
current of travel for pleasure to and from India
Young Laurence had quickly developed special
social qualities. He had learned TO play the host
to brilliant companies in his fathers absence
He had acquired the knowledge, the savoir faire,"
the tact and address, necessary to successful
man Of the world. His manners were so charming
that he made friends everywhere His m1nd
though i'll cultivated. or rather lrregularly Gull
tivated was kind, penetrating and of o fine quail
ity. The career of q barrister was marked out Tor
him. and he studied, admitted to the Colonial
bar and practised frequently in Oingalese courts,
before going home to eat his dinners at Llncons
Inn, and to take his examination for the Scotch
bar where it was felt necessary for him to qualify
also. Among the letters printed here there are
some curious ones, showing the development in
him of RELIGIOUS emotion His mother, Lady OIL
phant. was a very devout Christian woman, and
her chief anxiety was for the welfare of her boys
soul lie himself, however was an original
thinker, and did not long rest content to take
creeds upon trust. He compared, too, the pro-
LESSONS of the men and women he knew with
the practice, and the results of this observation
disturbed and shook him. But he was very young
.,1A
btion, thrust religious problems into the back
ground for a time All that can be gathered from
his correspondence at this stage is that he
thought when he did think, independently
than do most young men of his age.
But the world was all before him, where TO
choose and he was too eager for action to miss
any opportunity A chance offered for journey
to and through Russia, and he took it, the result
being an acquisition of fresh knowledge about
the Russian shores of the Black Sea, which en-
abled him to write peculiarly seasonable book on
his return for the Crimean War then in sight.
When war was actually declared, Laurence of
course yearned to join the Army, but just then
Lord Elgin offered him place as private
secretary with his mission to Washington, on
the Oregon boundary question, and this was too
important opening to the diplomatic career
In his letters home he gives some strange accounts
of the dissipation which then prevailed at Wash
ington, and which was craftily avaied of by
Lord Elgin to float the treaty through on cham
payne" AS all this has already been published
in Episodes in Life of Adventure" it is un-
necessary to say more of the matter here. Young
Oliphant made himself very popular at Washing
ton, however, and also at Quebec, whittier ne fol
lowed his chief for the winter. Here he acted as
secretary TO Lord Elgin, now Governor General,
and later he was appointed Indian Superintendent,
and was thus enabled again to crafty his Grant
propensities travelling by canoe or through the
primeval forest, making treaties with the red men.
Returning TO England in 1883, he was in time
to 60 out TO the Crimea. At this time he had an
idea of his about getting the alliance of
Schamyl and raising anti-Russian movement in
the Caucasus and this plan he urged upon the
Home Government and the Horseguards with all
the enthusiasm and confidence of his impusive
nature. At one time he almost believed in sue
cess for he was TO be sent to Circassia on a kind
of preliminary survey. The scheme came to
nothing, but it brought Laurence into notice, and
gave him opportunity of showing what he
could do by building and mounting battery in
front of Russian position. Turkish general
had mistaken the young man for an English en-
gineer officer. That was how he came to be so
oddly employed. But he did the work and very
creditaby, and without losing man in the pro-
cess. The end Of the Crimean War took away
his occupation for the moment, but the passion
for adventure had firm hold of him by this time,
so he crossed over to the United States, went
South, and was on his way to join Walkers fill
clustering expedition when the opportune inter-
vention of English man-of-war was the means
of detachlng him from that ill-starred undertak-
ing Next we find him with Lord Elgin's mission to
China, and in the intervals of fun and diplomacy
lotta 10
religious problems and exhibiting, as his biog-
rapher truly if not very alphabetically Observes
little aptitude for philosophy or criticism. After
the Chinese expedition was over Oiphant went to
Japan, where he was appointed Chief Secretary
of the Embassy under Sir Rutherford Alcock.
Laurence happened TO be =" charge dafIaires" in
af his chief yhen thn rde rnlls at