I

At the time of the Queen’s Jubilee in 1887, Irving had something to do in the celebration in a histrionic way. He was able to make welcome at the Lyceum and to entertain individually many of those who came from over seas to do honour to the occasion. The only act of general service which came within his power was to lend the bells which were played in Hyde Park on the occasion of the Children’s Jubilee. These were the “hemispherical” bells which had been founded for the production of Faust, and were the largest of the kind that had ever been made. On that day it seemed as though the carillon sounded all over London.