Athenæum Club, where his unfailing spirits and cultivated talk were long appreciated.[1]
Another very dear friend was the late Sir Robert Meade, the permanent Under-Secretary of the Colonial Office, who was also a neighbour in Berkshire, at Englemere, Mowbray Morris's former home near Ascot Heath.
A member also of the Cosmopolitan Club in Charles Street, Berkeley Square, the favourite resort of such wits as Lord Houghton, and the better-known figures in the political and social world of London, Dasent became as prominent socially as he was already amongst men of letters.
A constant visitor to Baron Meyer de Rothschild at Mentmore in the early seventies, he warmly interested himself with the Baroness in support of the movement for the Oral Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb, a scheme generously forwarded by the Rothschild family by every means in their power. In 1872 the Prince of Wales presided at a public dinner in furtherance of the scheme, at which Dasent explained the advantages of the system over any other method of educating deaf mutes and lightening the burden of their lives. For many years he attended the meetings of the Committee of the Association, and strove to influence public opinion on its behalf.
While continuing to write reviews for the Times, so
- ↑ Elected to the Athænaeum under the rule which provides for the admission of men "of distinguished eminence in literature, science, or the arts," without the ordeal of the ballot, his name remained on the list of members for forty years.
