n ?1^ UooZ CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY GIFT OF Passing by. .T 1924 013 582 329 The original of tliis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013582329 PASSING BY BY MAURICE BARING LONDON : MARTIN SECKER Goo3 fi 11 T a 7>. q S {'C^'i- LONDON : MARTIN MECKBB (LTD.) 1921 From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Friday, December i&th, 1908. Gray's Inn. I went to the station this morning to see the Housmans off. They are leaving for Egypt and intend to stay there a month or perhaps two months. They are stopping* a few days at Paris on the way. Saturday, December i()th. My Christmas hoHdays begin. I am spending Christmas with Uncle Arthur and Aunt Ruth. I have to be back at the office on the first of January. Thursday, January \st, 1909. Gray's Inn. Received a post-card from Mrs Hous- man, from Cairo. Monday, February 2nd. Received a letter from Mrs Housman. They are returning to London. Sunday, February ?>th. The Housmans return to-morrow. They have been away one month and twenty- one days. 7 Passing B . Monday, February f)th. Went to meet the Housmans at the station. They are going straight into their new house at Campden Hill and are giving a house-warming dinner next Monday, to which I have been invited. Tuesday, February loth. Lord Ayton has been made Parliament- ary Under-Secretary. I do not know him but I remain in the office. He is taking me on. Monday, February i6th. Gray's Inn. The Housmans had their house-warming in their new house at Campden Hill. I was the first to arrive. On one of the walls in the drawing-room there is the large portrait of Mrs Housman by Walter Bell, which I had never seen since it was exhibited in the New Gallery ten years ago. It was always being lent for exhibitions when I went to the old house in Inverness Terrace. While I was looking at this picture Housman Passing By joined me and apologised for being late. He said the portrait of Mrs Housman was Bell's cJief-d'ceuvre. He liked it now. Then he said: "We are having some music to-night. Solway is dining with us and will play afterwards. He plays for nothing here, an old friend ; you know him ? Miss Singer is coming too. You know her? She writes. I don't read her." At that moment Mrs Housman came in and almost immediately Mr and Mrs Carrington-Smith were announced. Mr Carrington-Smith is Housman's partner, an expert in deep-breathing besides being rich. Mrs Carrington-Smith had lately arrived from Munich. The other guests were — Miss Housman (Housman's sister), Lady Jarvis, Miss Singer, whom I was to take in to dinner, a city friend of Mr Housman's, Mr James Randall, a little man with a silk waistcoat, and, the last to arrive, Solway. I sat on Mrs Housman's left, next to Miss Singer. Carrington- 9 Passing By Smith sat on Mrs Housman's right ; Housman sat at the head of the table, between Mrs Carrington-Smith and Lady Jarvis. Miss Singer talked to me earnestly at first. She is writing on the Italian Renaissance. I told her I was ignorant of the subject, upon which her earnestness subsided, and she smiled. Then we talked of music, where I felt more at home. She had been to all Solway's concerts. She is not a Wagnerite. Just as we were beginning to get on smoothly there was a shuffle in the conversation and Mrs Housman turned to me. I told her we had a new chief at the office — Lord Ayton. "We met him in Egypt," she said. "He had been big-game shooting. I had no idea he was an official." I told her he was only a Parliamentary Under-Secretary. At that moment there was a lull in the general conversation and Housman overheard us. "Ayton," he broke in. "A pleasant 10 Passing By fellow, not too much money, some fine things, furniture, at his place, but he won't go far, no grit." , I asked Mrs Housman what he was like. She saict they had made great friends at Cairo but she did not think they would ever meet again. "You know," she said, "these great friends one makes travelling, people, you know, who are just passing by " Miss Singer said he had an old house in Sussex. She had been over it. It was let ; there were some fine old things there. " But he won't sell," said Housman. " He's not a man of business." Mrs Carrington-Smith said she pre- ferred impressionist pictures, especially the Danish school. Housman laughed at her and said there was no money in them. Miss Housman said she had heard from a dealer that Lord Ayton had a remark- able set of Charles II. chairs and that she wished he would sell them. Solway took II Passing By no part in the conversation but discussed music with Miss Singer. I caught the phrase, "trombones as good as Baireuth." Mrs Housman asked me whether I had seen Ayton yet. I told her he had not been to the office. " I think you will like him," she said. Then, as an afterthought, " He's not a musician." She asked me whether there were any changes in the staff. I told her none except for the arrival of a new Private Secretary (unpaid) whom Lord Ayton is bringing with him, called Cunninghame. She had never heard of him. We stayed a long time in the dining-room. Housman was proud of his Madeira and annoyed with us for not drinking enough. Mr Randall said he was sorry but he never mixed his wines, and he had some more champagne. Randall, Carrington-Smith and Housman talked of the international situation. Solway explained to me why portions of the Ninth Symphony were 12 Passing B 1/ always played too fast. He was most illuminating. Then we went upstairs. More guests had arrived. A few people I knew, a great many I had not seen before. Solway played some Bach preludes and the Waldstein Sonata. The unmusical went downstairs. There were about a dozen people left in the drawing-room. Afterwards there were some refresh- ments downstairs. I got away about half-past twelve. Tuesday, jFedruary 17M. Gray's Inn. Our first day under the new regime. The new chief came to the office to-day. He looks young, and was friendly and unofficial. The new Private Secretary came too, Mr Guy Cunninghame, an affable young man. He wears a beauti- fully tied bow tie. I wonder how it is done and whether it takes a long time or not. He is well dressed, but when it comes to describing him he is dressed like anyone else, and yet he gives the im- pression of being well dressed. I don't 13 Passing By know why. I suppose it is an art like any other. I could not tie a tie like that to save my life. Equidem non invideo magis miror. He seems to have been everywhere, to have read everything and to know every- one. He is not condescending, he is just naturally agreeable. I had to go over to the Foreign Office in the morning to see someone in the Eastern Department. When I came back Cunninghame told me that a Mrs Hous- man had been to see Ayton, about some billet for her brother-in-law. She talked to him first. Cunninghame said he thought she did not like coming on such an errand. She then saw A., who said he would do what he could. He told C. afterwards he was sure he couldn't do anything for the fellow. C. had never met her nor heard of her, but curiously enough he said he recognised her from her picture which he had seen, Walter Bell's picture. I asked him if he had seen it at the New 14 Passing By Gallery. He said no, at a dealer's in America two years ago. I asked him if he was sure it was the same picture. He said he was quite sure. The picture was for sale. "One couldn't mistake the picture," he said. " It's the best thing Walter Bell ever did. His pictures are valuable now he is dead, but there was a slump in them before he died, or rather, there never was a boom in them. That one picture attracted a great deal of attention when it was first exhibited, and then one heard little of him till he died. Now, of course, his pictures fetch high prices." 15 Letter from Guy Cunninghame to his cousin^ Mrs Caryl London, February iqth, igog. Dearest Elsie, Since my last letter I have been installed. I am George Ayton's Secretary. I sit in the office with another man, who was there before and has been taken on, called Mellon He is as silent as a deaf-mute and I have no doubt is the soul of discretion. There isn't much work to do and Ayton has got a real Secretary of his own who writes shorthand and type- writes without mistakes and lives in his house. He writes all his private letters and does all his business for him. He is not supposed to do official work, but George brings him to the office all the same, and he has a typewriter in the clerk's room and is always ready to do any odd job. I find him most useful. He is still more silent than Mellor. I i6 Passing By haven't much to tell you. I have got into my new flat in Halkin Street. It will be presentable in time. The pictures are up, but not the curtains. Let us hope they won't be a failure; They were pro- mised last week but have not yet arrived. If you have time and are passing that way I wish you would get me from the Bon Marche half-a-dozen coloured tablecloths. George has got a flat in Stratton Street. I dined with him alone last night. We went to a Music Hall after dinner and heard Harry Lauder. His sister, Mrs Campion, is in Paris. Perhaps you will see her. Yesterday a lady came to the office to interview him and saw me first, a Mrs Housman. Have you ever heard of her? I recognised her at once as the subject of a picture by Walter Bell. Do you remember a large picture of a lady in white playing the piano ? Such a clever picture. I saw it in New York at Altheim's shop, but I believe it was exhibited years ago at the New Gallery. Well, she is far B 17 Passing By more beautiful than the picture. She is not really tall, but she looks tall, with a wonderful walk, but I can't describe her, she makes other people look unreal — like wax-works. She was dressed anyhow and rather shabbily in black, wearing no gloves but the most beautiful ring I have ever seen, a kind of double monogram, probably old French. She came on business. I wonder who she is. She is not a foreigner and not, I think, an American, but she is, looks and talks, especially talks, not like an English- woman. I shall try to come to Paris for Easter. Don't forget the tablecloths. Yours, GtlY. From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Monday, March \st. I dined last night with the Housmans. They were alone except for Solway, and after dinner we had some music. Solway played the Schumann Variations and then he asked Mrs Housman to sing. I hadn't heard her for a long time as she hardly ever will sing now. She sang Willst du dein Herz mir schenken. Solway says the song isn't by Bach really but by his nephew. Then she sang a song from Purcell's Dido, some Schubert ; among others, Wer nie sein Brot, and the Junge Nonne. Solway said he had never heard the last better sung. Hous- man then asked her to sing a song from The Merry Widow, which she did. Housman plays himself by ear. She did not allude to having been at the office, nor did I. 19 Passing By Tuesday, March 2nd. Dined with Cunninghame at his flat last night. A comfortable and luxurious abode. I asked him if Ayton was likely to marry. He laughed. He said he had been in love for years, with a Mrs Shamier. I had never heard of her. Cunninghame said she was clever and accomplished, and had been very pretty and painted by all the painters. He says A. will never marry. I asked him if Mrs Shamier was in London. He said of course. She has a husband who is in Parliament, and several children ; a country house on the south coast ; but they are not particularly well off. "You must come and meet her at dinner," he said. " I am devoted to her." I asked him if she was fond of A. " Not so much now, but she won't let him go." I went away early as C. was going to a party. 20 Passing By Wednesday, March ^rd. Went to the British Museum before going to the office, to look up an old English tune for Mrs Housman from Ford's Music of Sundry Kinds called The Doleful Lover. I found it. Thursday, March ^th. Went to Solway's Chamber Music Concert last night. Brahms Quintet and a trio by Solway himself. Some Brahms Lieder. The Housmans were there. I thought Solway's trio fine. Friday, March ^th. A. went to the country this afternoon to stay with the Shamiers ; so C. said, but, as a matter of fact, he told me he was going to his own house. Cunninghame is going away himself to-morrow. He always goes away on Saturdays, he says. I remain in London. Saturday, March 6th. Went to the London Library and got some books for Sunday : Thais, by Anatole 21 Passing By France, recommended to me by C. ; a book called A Human Document, recom- mended me by Mrs Housman. I do not think I shall read any of them. The only literature I read without difficulty is The Times and Jane Eyre, and The Times doesn't come out on Sunday. Sunday Night, March "jth. Called on the Housmans in the after- noon. She was out. Luncheon at the Club. Dinner at the Club. I began A Human Document, but could not read more than five pages of it. I couldn't read any of the book by Anatole France. Went to a concert in the afternoon. It was not enjoyable. Read Jane Eyre. 22 Letter from Guy Cunn'mghame to Mrs Caryl London, Monday, March 8M. Dearest Elsie, I meant to write you a long letter yesterday from the country. I went to stay with the Shamiers. I thought, of course, George would be there. He didn't come near the office on Friday. He wasn't there and evidently wasn't even expected. Louise in tearing spirits and a new man there called Lavroff, a Russian philosopher ; youngish and talking English better than any of us, except that he always said " I have been seeing So-and-so to-day," "I have been to the concert yesterday." Needless to say, I didn't have a moment to write to you, in fact the only place where I get time to write you a line is at the office. Everything is appallingly dull. Mellor, the Secretary, had dinner 23 Passing By with me one night. He spoke a Httle but not much. I think he is shy but not stupid. George likes being in London, but Louise didn't mention him.. It's curious if after all this fuss and trouble to get this job and to be in London it all comes to an end. The tablecloths have arrived. Thank you a thousand times. They are exactly what I wanted. The curtains have arrived too but they are a failure ; too bright. I can't afford to get new ones yet. This week I have got some dinners. George said something about giving a dinner this week. Yours in great haste, G. 24 From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Monday, March itk. A. asked me whether if I was free on Thursday I would dine with him. I said I would be pleased to. He said he would try and get a few people. Tuesday, March ()th. A. has got a Secretary called Tuke. He writes all his private letters and he comes down to the office in the mornings. This morning he came and asked me Mrs Housman's address. It is curious that he should have applied to me and not to C, as I was not here when she called, nor does A. know that I know her. How can he have known that I know her ? Wednesday, March \oth. Dined with Cunninghame last night at his fiat. The guests were Mr and Mrs Shamier, Miss Macdonald, C.'s cousin, M. Lavroff, a Russian, and a Miss Hope. I sat between the Russian and Miss Macdonald. Miss Macdonald is an elderly lady, kind 25 Passing By and agreeable. Mr Shamier, M.P., was once, I believe, an athlete, a cricket Blue. Miss Hope looked as if she were in fancy dress ; Lavroff, the Russian, is unkempt, with thick eyebrows and dark eyes. Tolstoy was mentioned at dinner. Mrs Shamier said he was her favourite novelist, upon which Lavroff became greatly excited and said the day would come when, the world would perceive and be ashamed of itself for perceiving that Tolstoy was not worthy to lick Dostoyevsky's boots. Being asked my opinion I was obliged to confess that I had read the works of neither novelist. Miss Macdonald asked me who was my favourite novelist. I said Charlotte Bronte. She said she shared my preference and couldn't read Russian books, they depressed her. After dinner we had some music. Miss Hope sang and accompanied herself. She sang songs by Faure and Hahn ; among others La Prison. She altered the text of the last line, and instead of singing " Qu'as tu 26 Passing By fait de ta jeunesse ? " she rendered it — " Qu'as tu fait dans ta jeunesse ? " : scarcely an improvement. When she had finished Lavroff was asked to play. He consented immediately and played some folk songs. Athough he is in no sense a pianist, they were beautifully played. Thursday, March wth. Had dinner last night with Admiral Bowes in Hyde Park Gardens. The only people there besides myself were Colonel Hamley and Grayson, who is, they say, a rising M. P. The Admiral said his nephew, Bowes in the F.O. (whom I know a little), had become a Roman Catholic. "What on earth made him do that?" said Colonel Hamley. " Got hold of by the priests," said the Admiral ; and they all echoed the phrase : " Got hold of by the priests" and passed on to other topics. I have often wondered what the process of being "got hold of by the priests" consists of, and where and how it happens. 27 Passing By Friday, March 12 th. Dined last night with A. at his flat. I was surprised to meet Mr and Mrs Housman. The hostess was A.'s sister, Mrs Campion. She is a deal older than he is, a widow and good company. There was also a Mrs Braham, and a younger man called Clive. He is in a bank and is, I believe, a useful man in a sailing boat. I sat between Mrs Campion and Mrs Housman. After dinner A. said to Mrs Housman that, knowing she liked music, he had provided her with a musical treat. Mrs Braham would sing to us. She sang, accompanying herself, The Garden of Sleep, The Silver Ring, MMsande in the Wood, and, by special request. The Little Grey Home in the West. There was no other music. Saturday, March i^th. Had tea with the Housmans. They asked me to dinner next Tuesday to meet A. Mrs Housman says that Mrs Campion 28 Pass ing B y is one of the rnqst charming and amusing people she has ever met. C. is staying in London. This Saturday A. is going to his house in the country. He has a small house on the coast near Littlehampton, where he keeps his yacht, but, of course, he cannot yacht yet. He has a large house in Sussex which is let. Sunday Night, March \\th. Went down to Woking to spend the day with Solway in his cottage. He is composing a Sonata for piano and violin. He played me the first movement. He said he thought there was a certain amount of good music being composed at the present day which nobody was taking notice of, but which would probably come into its own some day. He said Mrs Housman was the singer who gave him the most pleasure. He said : " Her singing is business-like. She is divinely musical." 29 Letter from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl Sunday, March i^tk. Dearest Elsie, I have been spending a perfect Saturday to Monday in London. I have had a busy week and was glad to see no one and do nothing all to-day, that is to say, comparatively no one and nothing, as I went to the play on Saturday night, and to-day I went to a large luncheon party at Alice's, who is back at Bruton Street. The news is that the Shamier episode is over, quite, quite over. There is no doubt about it. She is madly in love with Lavroff. I don't wonder. He is so intelligent and plays wonderfully. As for George, I don't think he cares. You will at once ask if there is no one else. Nobody that I know of I don't know who he sees and what he does. He hates going out, and talks every day of giving a dinner at his flat, 30 Passing By but as far as I know he hasn't entertained a cat yet. I dined out every night last week, and gave one dinner at my flat. I think it was a success. Freda Macdonald, Louise, Lavroff and Eileen Hope, who sang quite beauti- fully. I asked Godfrey Mellor, but I really don't know if I can ask him again to that sort of party as he didn't utter a word. Freda liked him. But it does ruin a dinner to have a gulf of silence in the middle of it, especially as when he does talk he can be quite agreeable. George has gone down to the country. His sister is here now, but she goes north next week. I believe London bores him to death and he is longing for the summer and for his yacht, I am sorry you can tell me nothing of Mrs Housman. I haven't seen or heard anything more of her. Thank you very much for the langues de chat. They added to the success of my dinner. Yours, etc., Guy. 31 From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Monday, March idth. I asked C. where he got his cigarettes. He said he got them from a little man who lived behind the Haymarket. Every- body seems to get their cigarettes and their shirts from a "little man." The little man apparently never lives in a street but always behind a street. My new piano, a Cottage Broadwood, arrived to-day. It is bought on the three years' system. Tuesday, March T^th. Dined with my Aunt Ruth and Uncle Arthur last night, in Eccleston Square. A large dinner-party : a Permanent Under- Secretary for Foreign Affairs, the French Charge d'Affaires and his wife, the Editor of The Whig and his wife. Lord and Lady Saint-Edith, Professor Miles, Sir Herbert Wilmott and Lady Wilmott^ Mr Julius K. Lee of the American 32 Pass ing By Embassy, and Mrs Lovell-Smythies, the novelist. As we were all waiting for dinner in the dark library downstairs a Miss Magdalen Cross came in late, carrying a book in her hand. " This book," she said to us all, " is well worth reading." It was a German novel by Sudermann. An old lady who was standing next to her, and who I afterwards discovered was the widow of the Bishop of Exminster, said: "You prepared that entry in your cab, dear Magdalen." Miss Cross blushed. I took her in to dinner. She talked of sculpture, the Chinese nation, German novels, and Russian music. She has been three times round the world. She has no liking for most German music and cannot abide Brahms. She likes Wagner, Chopin, Russian Church music and Spanish songs. On the other side I had the wife of the French Charg^ d'Affaires. She said : " J 'adore I'odeur des paquets anglais." Her favourite English author, she said, c 33 Passing By was Mrs Humphry Wood. I did not like to ask her if she meant Mrs Humphry Ward or Mrs Henry Wood. She said the works of this novelist made her weep. When we were left in the dining-room after dinner, L'ord Saint-Edith, Professor Miles and Hallam (of The Whig) had a long argument about some lines in Dante, and this led them to the Baconian theory. Lord Saint- Edith said he couldn't under- stand people thinking Bacon had written Shakespeare's plays. If they said Shake- speare had written the works of Bacon as a pastime he could understand it. He believed Homer was written by Homer. The Professor was paradoxical and said he thought the Odyssey was a forgery. "Tacitus," he said, "was known to be one. After dinner upstairs there was tea but no music. Uncle Arthur is growing very deaf and forgetful and asked me how I was getting on at Balliol. Aunt Ruth told me she had asked my 34 Passing By new chief to dinner, but that he had refused. "Of course," she said, "this is not the kind of house he would find amus- ing. But considering how well I knew his father I think it would be only civil for him to come to one of my Thursday evenings." Wednesday, March 11 th. I dined at the Housmans' last night. It was a dinner for A. He was the guest of the evening. To meet him there were Lady Maria Lyneham, who must be over seventy ; a French lady of imposing presence called, if I caught the name correctly, the Princesse de Carignan and who, Housman whispered to me, was a Bourbon, and if she had her rights would be Queen of France to-day ; a secretary from the Italian Embassy; Mr and Mrs Baines. Mr Baines is an official at the British Museum and is half French. His wife, he told me, had once been taken for Sarah Bernhardt. There were several other people : Sir Herbert Simcox, the 35 Passing By K.C., and Lady Simcox, an art critic, a lady journalist and Miss Housman. A. sat between Mrs Housman and Lady Simcox. Housman had the Princesse de Carignan on his right and Lady Maria on his left. I sat between Lady Maria and Miss Housman. Lady Maria told me she dined out whenever she could, and asked me to luncheon on Sunday. "Don't come," she said, "if you mind meeting lions ; I like pleasant people. Only I warn you I have an old-fashioned prejudice for good manners and I always ask their wives." Mr Baines talked beautiful French to the Princesse. Lady Maria told me she was neither French nor a princess, but the illegitimate daughter of a Levantine. "But very respectable all the same, I'm afraid," she added. After dinner a few people came. Among others, Housman's partner and Esther Lake, the contralto. She sang (she brought her own accompanist) some 36 Passing By Handel and Che faro and, by request of Mr Housman, Gounod's There is a Green Hill. I drove home with A. He told me he had enjoyfed himself immensely and he thought Esther Lake was the finest singer in the world. He said Miss Housman was a very clever woman and Housman appeared to be quite a good sort. He said he liked this kind of dinner- party. Thursday, March i&(A. The first day there has been a feeling of spring in the air. I went to St James's Park on the way to the office. Dined at the Club. Friday, March igtk. A. asked me to spend Sunday with him in the country. I told him I was sorry I was engaged to go out to luncheon on Sunday. He said I must come the week after. 57 Passing By Saturday, March loth. C. said it was a great pity A. did not go out more. He used to go out a great deal, he said. " I suppose," he added, "it's because he doesn't wast to meet Mrs Shamier." I said I thought C. had told me he was fond of her. "Yes," said C, "he was very fond of her, but that is all over now." Sunday Evening, March 2 \st. I went to St Paul's Cathedral in the morning. Then to luncheon with Lady Maria in her house in Seymour Place. A curious luncheon. There were two actors and their wives. Father Seton, and Mr Le Roy, who writes detective stories, and his wife, and Sir James Croker. I sat next to Mrs Le Roy, who is, she told me, a Greek. She told me her husband had written one hundred and ten books, but that she had read none of them. She said it worried him if she read them. She said it was a great sacrifice as she 38 Passing By doted on detective stories and was told his were very good. The actors, who were both actor managers, told us about their forthcoming productions. Mr Vane said there was going to be a real panther in his next production (a Shakespearean revival). Mr Jones Acre is producing a play which is translated from the Swedish, and which deals with the question of a man who has inoculated himself and his whole family with a fatal disease, in the interests of science. Father Seton took a great interest in the stage, and said he considered the Church and the stage should be close allies. The clergy took far too little interest in these things. It was a pity, he said, to let the Romans have the monopoly of that kind of thing. This surprised Mrs Le Roy, who said she thought he was a Roman Catholic. He laughed and said Rome would have to capitulate on many points before any idea of corporate reunion could be entertained. 39 Pass in g B \ Sir James Croker told stories of early days in the Foreign Office and Lord Palmerston. We sat on talking until half-past three. I then went home and read Jane Eyre. 40 Letter from Guy Gunninghame to Mrs Caryl Halkin Street, March i$th. Dearest Elsie, I start on Thursday and shall arrive Thursday evening. I have got rooms at the Ritz. Let us have dinner together Thursday night, and not go to a play. I shall stay in Paris a week and then go for four days to Mentone, Then I shall come back to Paris for three days, and then home. I suppose we shall have to dine at the Embassy one night. George is going to the country for Easter with his sister. I want a really nice screen (a small one). You must help me to find one, not too dear. I also want something for the dining-room, which at present is too bare. I won't write any more now. Yours, G. 41 From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Sunday, March 2^tk. Hotel St Romain, Rue St Roch, Paris Went to a concert at the Cirque d'EU this afternoon, not a very interesting programme. A great deal of Wagner, and L ' Apres-midi cCttn Faune. Dined by myself at a Duval. Start for Florence to-morrow morning. Tuesday, March ^oih. Villa Fersen, Florence Arrived this morningf before luncheon after an exhausting journey second-class. In the carriage there was a soldier belong- ing to the Garde RJpublicaine. He said he was on duty at the Opera and had he known I was passing through Paris he could have given me a billet de faveiir. The Housmans' villa is at the top of a hill on the Bellosguardo side. It is rather a large house, covered with wistaria, with high windows with iron bars. It has a large empty salon with a piano. A 42 Passing By fine room for sound. The garden is beautiful. fVednesday, March 31s f. I walked down into Florence very early in the morning. I reached the town before anything was open and met a party of men in shorts and flannels running back to a hotel. They were Eton masters taking exercise. I didn't go to any picture galleries, but I walked about the streets and went into the Duomo, an ugly build- ing inside. I got back for luncheon. Housman said that they must leave cards in the afternoon and take a drive in the Cascine. They went out in a carriage and pair. I went for a walk to the Boboli Gardens. At dinner Housman said they had met several friends, and he is giving a dinner-party on Sunday. Thursday, April ist. The Housmans took me to luncheon with a banker called Baron Strong. What the explanation of this title is I do not know. They live in the modern part of the town. 43 Pa s sing By He was a genial host, portly, with long white whiskers. His wife, the Baroness, an Italian, a distinguished lady. There were present a Marchese whose real name I was told was Goldschmidt, and his wife, a retired and talkative English diplomatist, a Russian lady, an Italian, who talked English, French and Russian with ease, called Scalchi, Professor Johnston- Wright, who is spending his holiday here, and a Frenchman. When the latter heard Scalchi talk every language successively he said to him: " Vous etes une petite tour de Babel." In the afternoon we left cards at several houses and villas and then went for a drive in the Cascine. Some people called at tea-time, but I escaped. After dinner Mrs Housman sang some Schumann, FrUhlingsnacht, and the Dichterliebe. These songs, she said, suit Florence. Friday, April '2nd. I had a talk with the Italian gardener as far as my Italian permitted me to. I 44 Pass ing By pointed out a plant, a mauve-coloured plant, I don't know its name, that seemed to grow in great profusion. He said : " Fiorisce come il pensiere dell' uomo." More calls in the afternoon, and another drive in the Cascine. Housman has bought a large modern statue representing The Triumph of Truth, a female figure carrying a torch, with a serpent at her feet. She is triumphing, I suppose, over the snake. Saturday, April ^rd. We went to see the Easter Saturday ceremony at the Duomo, and then to luncheon at the Villa Michael Angelo. It belongs to a rich American called Fisk. There were present besides Mr and Mrs Fisk an English authoress, a picture connoisseur, Scalchi, an American archae- ologist, an Italian man of letters, and a Miss Sinclair, also an archaeologist. Housman said afterwards this was the cream of intellectual Florence. 45 Pass ing By I sat between two archaeologists. I found their conversation difficult to follow. After luncheon we called on the British Consul's wife, whose day it was. Then after a drive in the Cascine we went home. Easter Sunday, April \th. Mrs Housman went to Mass early. Went for a walk with Housman. On the Ponte Vecchio we met Ayton and his sister, Mrs Campion. Mrs Campion, he said, had insisted on him taking her to Florence. Housman asked them to dinner to-night ; they accepted. A great many people came to tea. The dinner-party to-night was quite a large one. Baron and Baroness Strong, Lord Ayton, Mrs Campion, Mr and Mrs Fisk, Scalchi and the Marchese and his wife, whom we met lately. I sat between Mrs Campion and Baron Strong. After dinner Mrs Fisk played Chopin with astonishing facility, but without any ex- pression. 46 Passing By A. intends to stay here another fortnight. Housman said he received a telegram which will necessitate his meeting his partner at Genoa. His partner is on the way to the Riviera. He may have to go to Paris too, but he hopes not, and intends to be back in a few days if possible. Monday, April ^th. Housman left to-day for Genoa. I went with Mrs Housman to San Marco and the Accademia in the morning. In the afternoon to the Certosa with Mrs Housman, A. and Mrs Campion. Tuesday, April 6th. Mrs Campion and A. came to luncheon. Mrs Campion, who is an expert gardener, told me the names of all the flowers in the garden. They have not remained in my mind. Wednesday, April 1th. We all spent a morning sight-seeing and had luncheon at a restaurant. In the afternoon we drove to Fiesole. 47 Passing By Thursday, April ^th. Housman is not coming back. He is obliged to go to Paris and he will go straight to London from there. We drove to Fiesole in the morning. Had luncheon with some Italian friends of Mrs Campion, Count and Countess Alberti. Nobody there except the host and hostess and their three children. A fine villa and no garden. Countess Alberti said it was no use having a garden if one lived here in summer, as everything dried up. She is a charming woman, natural and unpretentious, and talks English like an Englishwoman. She asked A. if he had met many people, and A. said he was a tourist and had no time for visits. Countess Alberti said he was quite right and that she knew nothing in the world more — seccante was the word she used, than Florentine society. She asked us all to come agfain next week. I am leaving on Sunday, and A. 48 Passing By and Mrs Campion are going to Paris on Monday. Mrs Housman remains here another week. Friday, April gth. Mrs Housman hadaheadacheanddidnot come down. I went to the town and did some shopping and went over the Bargello. Mrs Housman came down to dinner and sang afterwards, Schubert, Schumann and Brahms. I had never heard her sing Versenk o versenk dein Leid mein Kind, in die See before. Saturday, April loth. We went to a great many churches in the morning and saw a number of frescoes. Mrs Housman received a great many invitations, but refused them all. A. and Mrs Campion and the Albertis came to dinner. Countess Alberti per- suaded Mrs Housman to sing. She sang some English songs : Passing By, Lord Randall, etc., Gounod's Chanson de Mai, and some Lully. Countess Alberti D 49 Pass ing B y said it was a comfort to hear singing of which you could hear every word. A. Hked Passing By best, and he made her sing it twice. He asked me who the words were by. The tune is Edward Purcell's. The words, although generally attributed to Herrick by musical pub- lishers, are by an anonymous poet, and occur in Thomas Ford's Music of Sundry Kinds, 1607. They are as follows : — There is a ladye sweet and kind, Was never face so pleas'd my mind, I did but see her passing by, And yet I love her till I die. Her gestures, motions, and her smile, Her wit, her voice my heart beguile, Beguile my heart, I know not why ; And yet I love her till I die. There is also a third stanza. 50 Letters from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl Villa Beau Site, Mentone, Thursday, April iih. Dearest Elsie, It is divine here and this villa is a dream. We went to Monte Carlo yesterday and I won 300 francs and then lost it again. I saw hundreds of people, monde and demi-monde. Among the latter Celia Russell, having luncheon with rather a gross-looking shiny financier. I asked who he was and found out that he was Housman of Housman & Smith. Apparently C. R. has been living with him for some time, ever since, in fact, L. went to India. But the interesting thing to me is that Housman is the husband of that beautiful Mrs Housman I told you about. M. knows them and knows all about them. Mrs Housman was a Canadian, very poor, with no one 51 Passing By to look after her but an old aunt. He married her about ten years ago. Since then he has become very rich. Carrington- Smith is now his partner. Housman supplies the brains. They live some- where in the suburbs and she never goes anywhere. I am not coming back till next Monday. I shall be able to stop two or three days in Paris, very likely longer. Yours, G. Halkin Street, Sunday, May gth. Dearest Elsie, I have had a busy week since I have been back. Monday I dined with George at his flat. A man's dinner to meet some French politicians who are over here for a few days. I told you I was determined to make Mrs Housman's acquaintance, and I have. I had luncheon on Tuesday with Jimmy Randall, a city 52 Passing By friend of mine. You don't know him. ■ He knows the Housmans intimately. I told him I wanted to know them and he asked me to meet them last night. We dined at the Carlton, Randall, the Housmans and myself I think she is even more beautiful than I thought before. I couldn't take my eyes off her. She was in black, with one row of very good pearls. I never saw such eyes. Housman is too awful ; sleek, fat and common beyond words, but sharp as a needle. He has an extraordinary laugh, a high, nasal chuckle, and says, " Ha ! ha ! ha ! " after every sentence. They have asked me to dinner next Tuesday. I will write to you about it in detail. Mrs H. is charming. There is nothing American or Colonial about her, but she is curiously un-English. I can't understand how she can have married him. I caught sight of her again this morning at the Oratory, where I always go if I am in London on Sundays, for the music. Randall told me she is very 53 Passing By musical, but I didn't get any speech with her. The flat looks quite transformed with all the Paris things. They are the greatest success. Yours, G. Wednesday, May 12 th. Dearest Elsie, The dinner-party came off last night. They live in Campden Hill. I was early and the parlour-maid said Mrs Housman would be down directly, and I heard Housman shouting upstairs : "Clare, Clare, guests," but he did not appear himself I was shown into a large white and heavily gilded drawing-room, with a candelabra, a Steinway grand, and light blue satin and ebony furniture, a good many palms, but no flowers. The drawing-room opened out on to an Oriental back drawing-room with low divans, small stools inlaid with mother-of-pearl, and a 54 Passing By silver lamp (from a mosque) hanging from the ceiling, heavy curtains too, behind which I suspect stained - glass windows. Over the chimney-piece an Alma Tadema (a group on a marble seat against a violet sea). At the other end of the room Walter Bell's picture. It was the picture I saw before, but more about that later. On another wall over a sofa a most extraordinary allegorical picture : a precipice bridged by a large serpent, and walking on the serpent two small figures, a woman in white draperies and a knight dressed like Mephistopheles, all these painted in the crudest colours. The Housmans then appeared, and Housman did the honours of the pictures, faintly damned the Alma Tadema, and said the Snake Picture was by Mucius of Munich in what he called Moderne style. He had picked it up for nothing ; some day it would be worth pots of money. Ha ! ha ! Then the guests arrived. Sir Herbert Simcox, K.C., Lady Simcox, dressed in 55 Passing By amber velvet and cairngorms ; Housman's sister Miss Sarah, black, and very large, in yellow satin, with enormous emerald ear-rings ; Carrington-Smith, Housman's partner ; Mrs Carrington-Smith, naked except for a kind of orange and red Reform Kleid, with a green complexion, heavily blacked eyebrows, and a Lalique necklace. Then, making a late entrance, as if on the stage, a Princesse de Carignan, a fine figure, in rich and tight black satin and a large black ruff, heavily powdered. Housman whispered to me that she was a leeitimate Bourbon. I think he meant a Legitimist. We went down to dinner into a dark Gothic panelled dining-room, with a shiny portrait of Mr Housman set in the panelling over the chimney-piece. I sat between Mrs Housman and Mrs Carrington-Smith. I talked to Mrs Hous- man most of the time. Mrs Carrington- Smith asked me if I liked Henry James's books, I said I liked the early ones. She said she preferred the later ones, but 56 Passing By she could never feel quite the same about Henry James again since he had put her into a book. She was, she said, Kate in The Wings of the Dove. After dinner Housman moved up and sat next to me. He talked about art and hric-h-brac. I asked him if I could possibly have seen Bell's portrait of Mrs Housman in America. He said, "Certainly." He had bought it cheap and sold it dear, anticipating a slump in Bell, which was not slow in coming. He had then bought it back directly Bell died, anticipating a boom, which had also occurred. " It is now worth double what I gave for it. Ha ! ha ! ha ! " Randall said he liked a picture to tell a plain story and he could make nothing of the Snake Picture upstairs. Housman laughed loudly and said it was the oldest story in the world : the man, the woman, and the serpent. Ha! ha! We went upstairs, where there was a crowd. I was seized upon by the Princesse de Carignan, and she whispered to me confidential 57 Pass ing By secrets about Europe. She preened her- self and displayed the deportment of a queen in exile. Then we had some music. Esther Lake bawled some Rubinstein, and Ronald Solway played an interminable sonata by Haydn with variations and all the repeats. Some of the guests went downstairs, but I was wedged in between the Princesse and a Mrs Baines, a fluffy, sinuous woman, dressed in a loose Byzantine robe. Her husband, who is an expert in French furni- ture, told me she was once mistaken for Sarah, and she has evidently been living up to the reputation for years. He was careful to add that it was in the days when Sarah was thin — Mrs Baines being a wisp. After the music, which I thought would never stop, we went downstairs again for a stand-up supper and sweet champagne. I was introduced by Housman to Ronald Solway. Housman told him I was a musical connoisseur, so he bored me with technicalities for twenty minutes. I 58 Pass ing By couldn't get away. He had no mercy on me. Housman has got a box at the Opera. He told me I must use it when- ever I like. How can she have married that man ? Yours, G. l¥ednesday. May 19M. Dearest Elsie, Thank you for your most amusing letter. I have been busy and not had a moment to write. We have had a good deal of work to do. Last Friday I had supper at Romano's after the play. Housman was there with Celia Russell. I spent Saturday to Monday with the Shamiers. Lavroff was there. Last night I went to the Opera to the Housmans' box. It was Boheme. During the entr'acte who should come into our box but George. He stayed there the whole time, talking to Mrs H., and came back during the next entr'acte. 59 Passing By The next day at the office when I was in his room I said something about the Housmans and began telling him about my dinner. He froze at once and said Mrs Housman was an extremely nice woman. I said something about Housman, and George said: "Oh, not at all a bad fellow." So I saw I was on dangerous ground. Housman has asked me to spend next Sunday at his country house, a small villa on the Thames near Staines. I am going. They are dining with me on Thursday. I asked George, too, and he accepted joyfully. Yours, G. Monday, May z\th. Dearest Elsie, I am just back from the country. But first I must tell you about my dinner. I had asked the Housmans, George, Eileen Hope, and Madame de 60 Passing By Saint Luce who is staying in London for three weeks. Just before dinner I got a telegram saying that Mrs Housman was laid up and couldn't possibly come. Hous- man arrived by himself. George was evidently frightfully annoyed and hardly spoke. Madame de Saint Luce was amazed and rather amused by Housman, and after dinner Eileen sang beautifully, so it went off fairly well except for George. Saturday I went down to Staines. Housman had got an elegant villa on the river. Very ugly, with red tiles, photogravures, and green wooden chairs and a conservatory, full of calceolaria. But I must say his food is delicious. George was there, Lady Jarvis, and Miss Sarah. After dinner on Saturday there was a slight fracas. George asked Mrs Housman to sing. She didn't much want to, but finally said she would. Miss Sarah, who is a brilliant pianist, said she would 6i P as si ng B\ accompany her (she evidently hates being accompanied). She sang a song of Schubert's, Gute Nacht. Miss Sarah played it rather fast. Mrs Housman said it ought to be slower. Miss Sarah said it was meant to be fast, and that was her conception of the song in any case. Mrs Housman said she couldn't sing it like that, and didn't, and then she said she couldn't sing at all. Afterwards she did sing some English ballads and accom- panied herself. She sings most beautifully, her voice is perfectly produced and you hear every word. There is nothing throaty or operatic about it but her voice goes straight through one. George was en- tranced. Sunday afternoon George and Mrs H. went out on the river and stayed out all the afternoon. I spent the after- noon with Lady Jarvis, who is most clever and amusing. She told me all about the Housmans. Mrs H. is not Canadian but 62 Pass ing By Irish. She was brought up in a convent in French Canada. Directly she came out of it her marriage with H., who was then in a Canadian firm, was arranged by her aunt (her aunt was an imbecile and quite penniless). They lived several years in Canada, California and other parts of America, and came to England about three years ago. Housman was unfaith- ful from the first. Lady Jarvis knew about Celia Russell. I asked her if Mrs Housman knew. She said she — Lady Jarvis — didn't know, but it wouldn't make any difference if Mrs H. did or not. She said : " There is nothing about Albert Housman that Clare doesn't know." Then she said that unless I was blind I must of course have seen George was madly in love with her. I said I agreed. She said she thought Mrs Housman was madly in love with him. I said I wasn't sure. Lady Jarvis said she was quite sure. They came back very late from the 63 Passing By river and Mrs Housman didn't come down to dinner. She said she had a headache. We had rather a gloomy dinner although Miss Sarah and Lady Jarvis never stopped talking for a moment, but George was silent. You know he sees nobody now except the Housmans. Yours, G. 64 From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Monday, May j,rd. Gray's Inn. A. returned to London a day sooner than he was expected. His Secretary, Tuke, had not returned. He had left his address with me. He spent his holiday in the Guest House, Fort Augustus Abbey, a Benedictine monastery. He returned this morning. A. asked me on Saturday where he was. When I told him, A. showed great surprise. He said : " He has been with me six years and I never knew he was an R.C. It's extraordinary when a thing once turns up, you then meet with it every day. I seem always to be coming across Catholics now." Tuesday, May i^th. Alfred Riley telegraphed to me to know whether I could put him up to- night. I have answered in the affirma- tive, but he will be, I fear, most uncomfortable. E 65 P as s i ng B y Wednesday, May ^th. Riley arrived last night. He has been in Paris for the last three months working at the Bihliotheque Nationale. He told me he had something of importance to tell me : that he was seriously thinking of becoming a Roman Catholic. I was greatly surprised. He was the last person I would expect to do such a thing. I told him I had no prejudice against Roman Catholics, but it was very difficult for me to believe that a man of his intellectual attainments could honestly believe the things he would be expected to believe. Also, if he needed a Church I did not understand why he could not be satisfied with the Church of England, which was a historic Church. He said : " Do you remember when we were at Oxford that we used to say it would be a great sell if we found out when we were dead that Christianity was true after all .-' Well, I believe it is true. I believe, not in spite of my reason, nor against my reason, 66 Pa s sing By nor apart from my reason, but with my reason. Well, if one believes with one's reason in the Christian revelation, that is to say, if one believes that God has uttered Himself fully and uniquely through Christ, such a belief has certain logical conse- quences." I said nothing, for indeed I did not know what to say. Riley laughed and said : " Don't be alarmed ; don't think I am going to hand you a tract. For Heaven's sake let me be able to speak out at least to one person about this." I begged him to go on, and he said he thought Catholicism was the only logical consequence of a belief in the Christian revelation. Anglicanism and all forms of Protestantism seemed to him like the lopped off branches of a living tree. I asked him what there was to prevent him worshipping in Roman Catholic churches if he felt inclined that way with- out sacrificing his intellectual freedom to their tenets. He said : " You talk as if it was ritual 67 Passing By I cared for and wanted. One can be glutted with ritual in the Anghcan Church if one wants that." As for giving up one's freedom, he said I must agree that law, order and discipline were the indispensable con- ditions of freedom. He had never heard Catholics complain of any loss of freedom, indeed Catholic philosophy, manners, customs, and even speech, seemed to him much freer than Protestant or Agnostic philosophy, and what it stood for. He asked me which I thought was freest, a Sunday in Paris or Rome or a Sunday in Glasgow or London. I suggested his waiting a year. He said perhaps he would. Thursday, May dth. Riley talked of music, Wagner, Parsifal. He quoted some Frenchman who said that Parsifal was " moins beau que nimporte quelle Messe Basse dans nimporte quelle Eglise." I said that I had never been to 68 Pass ing By a Low Mass in my life, but that I disliked the music at most High Masses I had attended. I said I disliked Wagner, especi- ally Parsifal. He said he agreed about Wagner, but I did not understand what the Frenchman had meant. I confessed I did not. He said : " It is like com- paring a description of something to the reality." I told him that I envied people who were born Catholics, but I did not think it was a thing you could become. He said it was not like becoming a Mussulman. He was simply going back to the older tradition of his country, to what Melanchthon and Dr Johnson called and what in the Highlands they still call the Old Religion. I told him that I had once heard a man say, talking of becom- ing a Roman Catholic, "if I could tell the first lie, all the rest would be easy and follow naturally down to scapulars and Holy Water." Friday, May •]th. Riley left this morning. He has gone 69 Passing By back to Paris. He is not going to take any immediate step. Sunday, May ()ih I went to see Mrs Housman yesterday afternoon. I told her what Riley had told me. I asked her if she thought people could become Roman Catholics if they were not born so. She said she wished that she had not been born a Catholic so as she might have become one. She envied those who could make the choice. I asked her if she did not consider there was something unreal about converts. She said she thought English converts were in a very difficult situation which required the utmost tact. Many perhaps lacked this tact. She said that in Canada and America, where she had lived most of her life, the anti-Catholic prejudice as it existed in England did not exist, at any rate it was not of the same kind. "The nursery anti-Catholic tradition doesn't exist there." She asked me what I had advised 70 Passing By Riley to do. I told her I had dissuaded him from taking such a step and had begged hirn to wait. She said: "If he is to become a Catholic there will be a moment when he will not be able to help it. Faith is a gift. People do not become Catholics under the influence of people or books, although people and books may sometimes help or sometimes hinder, but because they are pulled over by an invisible rope — -what we call Grace." I told her I would find it difficult to believe that a man like Riley would believe what he would have to believe. She asked me whether I found it difficult to believe that she accepted the dogmas of the Church. I said I was convinced she believed what she professed, but that I thought that born Catholics believed things in a different way than we did. I did not believe that this could be learnt by converts. She said I probably thought that Catholics believed all sorts of things 71 Passing By which they did not beHeve. Such at least was her experience of English Protestants, who seemed to imbibe curious traditions in the nursery, on the subject. I asked her if Mr Housman believed in Catholic dogma. She said : " Albert has been baptized and brought up as a Catholic, but he is an Agnostic. He is very charitable towards Catholic institutions." She asked me more about Riley and whether he had any Catholic friends. I said : " Not to my knowledge." " Poor man, I am afraid he will be very lonely," she said. She said that she herself knew hardly any Catholics in England, that is to saj' she had no real Catholic friends, and that she felt as if she were living in perpetual exile. "You see," she said, "your friend ought to realise that he will have to face the prejudice and the dislike not only of narrow-minded people but of very nice intelligent and broad-minded people, who 72 Passing By agree with you about almost everything else. The Church has always been hated from the beginning, and it always will be hated. In the past it was people like Marcus Aurelius who carried out the worst persecutions and hated the Church most bitterly with the very best inten- tions, and it is in a different way just the same now." I said that to me it was an impossible mental gymnastic to think that Catholicism was the same thing as early Christianity. She said : " Because the tree has grown so big you think it is not the same plant, but it is. When I go to Mass I feel as if I were looking through the wrong end of a telescope right back into the catacombs and farther." I told her Riley would take no decisive step. He had promised to wait. She said there was no harm in that. There were many other things I wished to ask her, but A. arrived, and after talking on various topics for a few moments I left. 73 Pass ing By Monday, May \oth. A. told me he had been invited to dinner by Aunt Ruth next Thursday and that he was going. He asked me whether I was invited. I said I was invited. Tuesday, May nth. Cunninghame said he was dining at the Housmans' to-night. Wednesday, May 12th. I asked C. whether he had enjoyed his dinner. He said it was very pleasant, but that the music was too classical for his taste. A. was not there. Thursday, May \j,th. I dined last night with A. in his flat. Nobody but ourselves. A. played the pianola after dinner. He said I must come and stay with him in the country soon. He would try and get the Hous- mans to come too, Friday, May \\th. A. dined with Uncle Arthur and Aunt Ruth. So did I. It was a dinner for the 74 Passing By American Ambassador. I sat next to a Miss Audrey Bax, a lady of decided views and picturesque appearance. She talked about Joan of Arc, and asked me whether I had read Anatole France's book about her. I said I had not, but I had read an English translation of Joan of Arc's trial which I thought one of the most impressive records I had ever read. She said : " Ah, you like the stained-glass-window point of view about those sort of people." I was rather nettled and said I preferred facts to fiction. I thought Joan of Arc as she appeared in her trial was a very sensible as well as being a very remarkable person. She had not read this. She said Anatole France told one all one wanted to know from a rational point of view. It was a comfort to read common-sense about this sort of hallucinated people. A man who was sitting opposite her joined eagerly in the conversation, and said that the two people in the whole of history who had made the finest defence when tried were 75 Pas sing B y Mary Queen of Scots and Joan of Arc. Miss Bax said she supposed he looked upon Mary Queen of Scots as a martyred saint. The other man, whose name I found out afterwards was Ashfield, an American who is now at the American Embassy, said that he regarded Mary Queen of Scots as a woman who was tried for her life and who had defended herself without lawyers without making a single mistake under the most difficult circumstances. He said he had been a lawyer, and spoke from a lawyer's point of view. Miss Bax went back to Joan of Arc and Anatole France and said his book was as important a work as Renan's Vie de Jtfsus. Mr Ashfield said he thought that work no improvement on the Gospel. I said 1 had not read it. Miss Bax aorain said that if we preferred sentimental tradi- tions we were at liberty to do so. She preferred rational writers untainted by superstition. Ashfield said he regarded Renan as a sentimental writer. Miss 76 Passing By Bax said : " No doubt you prefer Dean Farrar." Ashfield said he did not think Renan's book was a more successful attempt to rewrite the Gospels than Dean Farrar's although it was better written. She said that proved her point, and as she seemed satisfied, we talked of other things. But throughout her conversation she struck me for a professed free-thinker to be singularly dogmatic and sometimes almost fanatical, Saturday, May it,th. Spent the afternoon and evening with Sol- way at Woking but came back after dinner. Sunday, May i6ih. Went to see Mrs Housman in the after- noon, but she was not at home. This is the first time she has not been at home on Sunday afternoons for a very long time. Monday, May 1.1th. A. said he was going to the opera to-night. Housman, whom he had seen yesterday, had told him it would be a very fine performance. 77 Pass ing By Tuesday, May iSth. Went to the opera in the gallery. Some fine singing. Cunninghame had been in the Housmans' box. IVednesday, May \<^th. Was going to dine with the Housmans to-night, but Mrs Housman is unwell. Thursday, May 20th. Lady Jarvis has asked me to stay with her Sunday week. Friday, May 21st This morning a man called Barnes came to the office. He is an acquaintance of Cunninghame's ; he is in the F.O. He talked of various things, and then he asked Cunninghame whether he knew Mrs Housman. He said she was playing fast and loose with A.'s affections. She was doing it, of course, to convert him. Catholics didn't mind how immoral thfiy were in such a cause. He said that she was well known for it. She had refused to marry Housman till he had been con- verted. He had been so much in love 78 Passing By with her that he could not refuse. I said that I happened to know that Housman had been baptized a Catholic when he was born. Cunninghame bore me out and said it was all nonsense about A. He was sure Catholicism had nothing to do with it. He knew Mrs Housman quite well and she had never mentioned it to him. Barnes said we could say what we liked, but all London was talking of A.'s unfortunate passion and Mrs H.'s behaviour. " One sees them everywhere together," he said. C. said : " Where ? " Barnes said : " Oh, at all the restaurants and at the opera." Cunninghame said he had expected Mrs Housman to dinner, but she had been unable to come. Saturday, May zind. Called on Mrs Housman to inquire. They have gone to the country until Monday. 79 Passing By Monday, May 2\th. I had luncheon with A. to-day at his flat. He said he had been staying with the Housmans at their house on the Thames. He said he had put his foot in it. On Saturday night at dinner they were talking about Ireland, and he said he had no wish to go to a country full of priests. Mrs Housman told him, laugh- ing, she was a Catholic. He asked me if I had known this. I told him I had always known it. He asked me whether she was very devout. I said I knew she always went to Mass on Sundays, that she had never mentioned the subject to me except once when I asked her a question with reference to a friend of mine. He asked me whether Housman was a Catholic too. I told him what I knew. Tuesday, May 2^th. Went to the opera, in the Housmans' box. Housman and Cunninghame were there. Mrs Housman did not come. A. looked in during the oiir'acie. 80 Passing By Wednesday, May 26th. A. gave a dinner at his Club. All politicians exceptmyself and Cunninghame. Thursday, May 2,'jth. Tuke asked me to take a ticket for a concert at Hammersmith at which his sister is performing on the piano. I have done so. Friday, May z%th. Luncheon with A. at his Club. He is staying with Lady Jarvis on Saturday. The Housmans, he said, will be there. Cunninghame is going also. A. told me Mrs Housman has not been well lately. I said I thought she did too much. He asked me in what sort of way. I said she attended to a great many charities and that as Housman entertained a great deal I thought it tired her. Mrs Housman had told him I was very musical. He asked me if I played any instrument. I said none except the penny whistle. He asked me if I did not think Mrs Housman F 81 Passing By a very fine singer. I said I did. He also said that he supposed she knew a lot of priests. I said I had never met one in her house. Sunday, May jfith. Rosedale, Surrey. I arrived rather late last night. Besides the guests I knew I was to meet, was a Frenchman, M. Raphael Luc, and a Mrs Vaughan. After dinner we had some music. M. Luc sang several French songs, by Lully, and others that I had heard Mrs Housman sing. His singing was greatly appreciated and applauded, and it is, I confess, as far as it goes, perfection itself, as regards quality, taste and art, but I could not help thinking the whole time that it would be impossible for him to interpret Schubert. This morning I sat in the garden and read the newspapers. Mrs Housman drove to Church which was some distance off. Mr Winchester Hill, the novelist, arrived for luncheon and brought with him Miss 82 Passing By Ella Dasent, the actress. At the end of the meal she gave us some vivid impersona- tions of contemporary actors and actresses. We sat talking for some time in the verandah. Then Lady Jarvis took Housman to show him the garden, and Cunninghame walked away with Mrs Vaughan and M. Luc. Miss Housman, Mr Hill, Miss Dasent, and myself remained on long chairs under- neath a large tree. Miss Dasent and Mr Hill discussed at great length a play that he is adapting for her from one of his novels. The story seemed to me absurd — it was something about an Italian noble- man strangling his wife's lover with a silk handkerchief. Towards five we had tea and after tea Mrs Vaughan took me for a stroll round the garden. I found her a well-read woman who has lived a great deal in Paris and is familiar with the Bohemian world in more than one continent. 83 Pass ing By At dinner I sat between Mrs Housman and Cunninghame. Mrs Housman said that Luc's singing made one despair, and she felt she could never sing again after hearing him. I told her I doubted if he could interpret German music. She was annoyed with me and said I was missing the point, and that the songs he sang were exquisite. We sat in the verandah after dinner, while Luc sang to us from the drawing- room. He sang P^aure's settings to Verlaine's words. 84 Letter from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl Monday, May 21st. Dearest Elsie, I have just come back from Rosedale, where I have been staying with Lady Jarvis. It is an old Tudor house that was bodily transported from the west of England. I believe it is quite genuine, but it looks unreal and the rooms are like show rooms at a second-hand dealer's. The garden is quite beautiful. We had a most amusing party. Jane Vaughan (looking very pretty), ^ Raphael Luc, George, the Housmans. Raphael sang both nights quite divinely after dinner. On Saturday night we all sat in the big downstairs room, but after he had sung two songs Mrs Housman went out on the verandah. She is so musical that one could see it was more than she could bear. I am certain she felt she was going to cry. Sunday morning I had a long 85 Pas sin,g By talk with Lady Jarvis. She told me Mrs Housman is a very strict and devout Catholic. We both agreed that there is no doubt that George is very much in love with her. She thinks she is in love with him. I am still not sure Lady Jarvis is right about her. I sat next to her (Mrs H.) at dinner on Saturday night, and George was on her other side. She was perfectly natural, but 1 thought miles away. During the whole time we were there she didn't pay much attention to him and she didn't avoid him. She went to church by herself on Sunday morning and stayed in all the afternoon. I think she likes him, but nothing more than that. Godfrey Mellor, the silent Secretary, is devoted to her too. The other morning at the office a man came to see us and said all sorts of most absurdly silly things about Mrs H. I could see he was furious. He has known the Housmans quite a long time. More people came down to luncheon on 86 Passing By Sunday, but nobody interesting. George says he will be able to yacht now. I think Mrs H. is delightful. I like her more and more. I have been to the opera twice, to a good many dinners, and some balls. There may be a chance of Paris for a few days later. Yours, G. 87 From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Monday, May 51 si. I travelled back from Rosedale with A. He asked me if I was fond of yachting. I said I was a moderate sailor. He asked me to gt) next Saturday to his house near Littlehampton. His sister is going to be there, and perhaps the Housmans. Dined at the Club. Tuesday, /i///e is/. There is going to be a large concert at the Albert Hall for the Albemarle Relief Fund. Tuke brought the programme and placed it on my table this morning. Esther Lake is singing, and the Hous- mans and A. are among the patrons. Dined with A. at his Club. He told me he thought Mrs Housman was far from well. He said what she wants is sea air. Wednesday, June 2nd. Cunninghame told me he had dined at the Housmans' last night. He said Pass ing By there was no one there but himself and Carrington-Smith. He said Mrs Hous- man talks of going away soon. London tires her. Dined at the Club. Thursday, June yd. I have just come back from a dinner- party at Aunt Ruth's. A great many diplomats and politicians. I sat between Thornton- Davis, who is at the F.O. now, and Mrs Vernon, who is French and a Legitimist and talks of the Place de la Concorde as the Place Louis XV. Aunt Ruth said she heard A. was doing very well and spoke well in the House. It's a pity, she said, that he is such a Tory. Friday, June ^th. Went this afternoon to the concert at —the Albert Hall for the Relief Fund in the Housmans' box. Miss Housman and Mrs Carrington-Smith were there, but neither Mrs nor Mr Housman. Miss Housman says that Mrs Housman has 89 Passing By not been well lately. She said she goes out far too much. I enjoyed nothing in the programme. Dined at the Club. Saturday, June ^th. A. told me he expected me at Little- hampton, but that I would find it dull, as he had no party. Sunday, June 6th. Littlehampton. A. has a nice and comfortable little house. His yacht, a small cutter with room for two to sleep on board, is here. He took Mrs Campion and myself out this morning. There was what is called a nice breeze. I cannot say I enjoyed it very much. He told me that he had asked the Housmans, but they could not come, Mrs Housman is going to Corn- wall soon for the rest of the summer. She has not been well, and the doctors told her she must leave London. A. said he would miss them very much. He liked them both exceedingly, and he thought Miss Sarah was such a good 90 Passing By sort. A. said the truth was that Mrs H. worked herself to death over charities and things hke that. He was sure the priests were greatly to blame for this. 91 Letters from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl London, Monday, June ith. Dearest Elsie, There's not the slightest chance of my coming over to Paris now. I am not going to Ascot at all this year. The Housmans thought of taking a house for Ascot week, but she has not been well, and they are staying out of London till they go down to Cornwall. They have taken a house somewhere near the Lizard, and when she goes she will stay the whole summer. Both George and poor little Mellor are in low spirits. I had a very nice letter from Mrs H. asking me to go down there in August and to stay as long as I liked. Housman has lent me his box for the whole of Ascot week. There is such a rush that I haven't time to write properly to you. Yours, G. 92 Passing By London, Friday, June lith. Dearest Elsie, I have spent the most perfect Ascot week in London. I have enjoyed every moment of it. I went to the opera every night in the Housmans' box, which besides being fun was most convenient as I was able to ask people who had done things for me. I dined on Saturday with Jimmy Randall, who had been at Ascot all the week. He says that Housman has fallen violently in love with a Mrs Rachel Park. You may possibly have heard of her. She used to sing at concerts under the name of Rose Sinclair. She was quite beautiful, with enormous eyes and flaming hair, but quite brainless and quite unmusical. She married a barrister who is now Park, K.C. He works like a slave, but she spends money more quickly than he can make it. This explains the Cornwall arrangement. Jimmy R. says that H. has violent scenes 93 Pass ing By with Celia R. and that the end of that idyll is only a question of hours. He says Mrs P. will lead him a dance. She is mercenary, stupid, common and a real harpy. Poor "Bert," as Jimmy Randall calls Housman. He is so good-natured. And poor Mrs H.! Mellor hardly spea&s at all now, and George doesn't say much. He goes nowhere, but talks of yachting on the west coast during the summer. Yours, G. P.S. — Just got your telegram. I am delighted you are coming to London. I particularly wanted you to meet Mrs Housman — and " Bert." You must come. And now I shall just be able to manage this if you will dine with me on Monday night. She leaves for Cornwall on Tues- day morning. I've asked George too. He stays in London till Parliament is over, and then he is going away and I shall be free. How much leave will Jack get? Three weeks at least, I hope. The 94 Passing By Shamiers want you to stay with them Sunday week, and Lady Jarvis wants you to go down there. If you don't want to stay there, we might go down for luncheon one day. I shall be in London till the end of July. Then I am going to Worsel for a fortnight. The Housmans have asked me to go to Cornwall, and I shall try and fit that in between Worsel and the Shamiers. They have been lent a lodge in Scotland and have asked me to go there in September. I have promised to stay a few days at Edith's as well. There is a parcel for me at the Embassy. It is too big for the bag. Could you bring it with you ? 95 From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Tuesday, June loth. Dined with Cunninghame last night to meet his cousin, Mrs Caryl. She is the wife of a diplomat who is Second Secretary at Paris. A pleasant dinner. The Housmans were there, and A. and his sister. Friday, June 2e^th. Received a letter from Mrs Housman to-day. She says the change of air is doing her good. She hopes I will come to Cornwall some time during my holiday. Monday, July ^th. Dined with Housman last night. Miss Housman was there, and the Carrington- Smiths, and a Mrs Park who used to be a professional singer. She sang after dinner. Miss Housman accompanied her. She sang Tosti's Ninon, some Lassen, some Bem- berg, a song by Lord Henry Somerset, and E. Purcell's Passing By. Miss Housman 96 Passing By said it was a comfort to accompany some- one who had a sense of time. She has a powerful voice and has been well trained, but Passing- By did not suit her style of singing, and I regretted that she had attempted that song. She was not always in tune. Housman enjoyed it, and accompanied her himself afterwards in some coon songs which he played by ear. Housman asked me to stay with them for the whole of August. He said he was very anxious that I should go, as he would not be able to be much in Cornwall and he was afraid Mrs Housman would be lonely. He asked Cunninghame also. I accepted. A. spends all his spare time now on his yacht. I am going to stay with him next Saturday. Monday, July 12th. A. is going to the Cowes Regatta. He asked me to go with him, but I am leaving on the I St of August for Cornwall. G 97 Passing By Sunday, August tst. Grey Farm, Carbis Bay, Cornwall. I arrived here last night. A pleasant spot near the sea and not far from a golf links. Mrs Housman and Housman are here alone. Housman is greatly perturbed because Mrs Carrington-Smith is bringing a divorce suit against her husband for infidelity. The other person concerned is Miss Hope, whom I met at dinner one night at Cunninghame's flat. Housman says that Miss Hope is neurotic and unhinged. Mrs Housman has never met Miss Hope. Housman said he hoped I would be able to stay on here, as he would not be able to spend much time in Cornwall. Carrington-Smith was so greatly upset by this wretched business that he could not attend to the affairs of the firm. He was afraid Mrs Housman would be lonely. Lady Jarvis had promised to come later, and Cunninghame also, but he did not know when. Miss Housman had been 98 Passing By obliged to go to Vichy to take the waters. Housman played golf in the afternoon with a member of the Club. I am not a golf player, unfortunately. I told him that Cunninghame was an admirable player. Monday, August ■znd. Housman has been telegraphed for and left this morning. In the afternoon we went for a long drive and had tea in a farm-house. The climate is warm and agreeable. Tuesday, August ^rd. Bathed in the sea this morning and went for a long walk in the afternoon with Mrs H. After dinner she tried some new songs by Tchaikovsky. We did not care for them much and fell back on Schubert. Schubert is her favourite composer. She sang the Gruppe aus Tartarus. Wednesday, August \th. We went for an expedition to the Lizard. Mrs Housman told me that when she was a girl she had much wanted 99 Pass ing By to become a professional singer, and that she was studying for the Concert Stage when she met Housman. Thursday, August ^th. We sat on the beach all the afternoon. It was extremely hot and enjoyable. Mrs Housman read Consuelo, by George Sand, aloud. She reads French with great purity of accent. Father Stanway, the local priest, came to dinner, a cheerful man with a venerable appearance. When we were left alone, after dinner, talking of men in public offices, he said he knew Bowes, in the Foreign Office, who had spent his Easter holidays here. I asked him whether he thought converts of that description made satisfactory Catholics. He said he thought Bowes would be an admirable Catholic. I said I thought it must be very difficult for a man of his upbringing, as Bowes had been brought up in a rigid Church of England family, and his father often wrote to The Times, condemning ritualistic loo Passing By practices and innovations. Father Stan- way said it was not so complicated as I thought. There were only three things indispensable to a man if he wished to become a Catholic : To believe in God, to follow his conscience, to love his neigh- bour as himself If he did that all the rest was easy. He said he admired Bowes greatly for taking the step. Friday, August (tth. We went to the Land's End, where there were a great many tourists. Mrs Housman continues to read out loud Consuelo in the afternoons and evenings. It is an interesting book, but I prefer Jane Eyre. Satnrdav, August ith. I received a letter from Riley this morning. He has been in London nearly a month, and was there a fortnight before I left, but he did not come to see me for the following reason. He has taken the step and has been received into the Roman lOI Passing By Catholic Church, and he says his first intention was not to tell anyone of his conversion. He did not come to see me because he knew he would not be able to help discussing it. He is no longer making a secret of it now. He found this too difficult. Two or three days after he had been received he happened to be dining out and it was a Friday. His hostess said to him, in the course of conversation : " You are not a Catholic, are you .-' " He resolved then and there to keep it secret no longer. He tells me in liis letter, "Your phil- osophy of the first lie is quite right. Only I regard what you call the first lie as the Jlrst Truth. Once this is so, all the rest follows." He says that after he left me in Gray's Inn in May he resolved to put the matter from him for a time and not to think about it. He went back to Paris and pursued his research. One morning he woke up and felt he could not delay another moment. He took the train for Io2 Passing By London the next day, where he intended to go soon in any case for his holiday, and the day after his arrival he called at the Brompton Oratory and asked to see a priest, as he knew no priests. He sat in a small waiting-room downstairs, and presently an elderly priest. Father X., arrived and asked him what he could do for him. He told him he wished for instruction prior to becoming a Catholic. He called the next day. Father X. told him after they had talked for some time that he did not think he would need much instruction. But he continued to see him for the next three weeks. He was then received. He says that what seemed be- fore a step of great difficulty now appeared quite extraordinarily simple, and he cannot conceive why he did not take it a long time ago. Sunday, August ?>tk. Mrs Housman went to Mass. I sat in the o-arden ; when she returned from Mass I told her about Riley. She asked me X03 Passing B \ how old he was. I said I thought he was about thirty-five. I told her he was a brilliant scholar, and had taken high honours at Oxford. He had a post at the Liverpool University. She said she had felt certain he would come into the Church. Lady Jarvis is coming here next week. Monday, August ^th. We spent the whole day on the beach, reading aloud. Housman has written to say that Mrs Carrington-Smith will insist on bringing their affairs into court. Carrington-Smith is much worried. Mrs Housman says that Mrs Carrington-Smith is an absurd woman. Tuesday, August loth. We spent the morning at St Ives, shopping. I bought The Pickwick Papers and an old silver teapot. We sat on the beach in the afternoon, reading Consuelo. After dinner Mrs Housman sang a beauti- ful French-Canadian song. 104 Passing By Wednesday, August 11 th. Just as we were sitting down to luncheon A. walked into the room ; he had sailed here from Cowes in his yacht, which is anchored in the bay. He could not stay to luncheon as he was lunching at the Golf Club with a friend. Mrs Housman asked him to dinner. He accepted. He said he had spent a most enjoyable week at Cowes in his yacht, but had not won any races. His sister had been with him, only as she is a bad sailor she had not enjoyed the sailing as much as he would have liked. Cunninghame has been at Cowes for three days on board a Mr Venderling's steam yacht (an American). A. says that he intends to spend some time here cruising about the coast. Thur.Jay, August xith. Lady Jarvis arrived this morning. She says she thinks that if Mrs Carrington- Smith goes into court she will get a divorce. She has substantial evidence. Carrington- Smith is most uneasy. 105 Pass ing By A. came to luncheon and proposed that we should all go for a sail in the afternoon together. Lady Jarvis and I declined, as we are both moderate sailors. Mrs Housman went with him. They came back at six and she said she had enjoyed it immensely. Fiidav, August XT,th. Mrs Housman received a telegram from Housman this morning, telling her she must ask A. to stay here in the house. She had written to tell him — Housman — A. was here. A. came to luncheon and Mrs Housman invited him to stay. He said he would be pleased to do so for a few days, but that he is due in his yacht early next week at Plymouth. Mrs Housman has re- ceived a letter from Cunninghame, asking whether it would be convenient for him to come next week. She has telegraphed to him that she would be glad to receive him. Saturday, August ij^th. The weather was so beautiful and the sea was so smooth that we were all per- io6 Passing By suaded to go on board the yacht, where we had luncheon. We went for a short sail in the afternoon. Although I did not feel ill I cannot say 1 enjoyed it, I prefer the dry land. Lady Jarvis said she enjoyed it greatly, although she is a bad sailor as a rule. Mrs Housman is an excellent sailor. Sunday, August T-^th. I am finishing Consuelo by myself as we are not able to read aloud any more. We all went for a drive in two carriages in the afternoon through disused mines, and had tea in a farm-house. A. says he is enjoying his holiday immensely. Cunninghame arrives here to-morrow. We had some music in the evening. A.'s favourite composer is Sullivan, but his favourite song is Offenbach's Chanson de Fortunio, which Mrs Housman sang to-night. 107 Letters from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl Grey Farm, Carbis Bay, Cornwall, Tuesday, August i^th. Dearest Elsie, I arrived here from Worsel last night, and found Mrs Housman, Lady Jarvis, George, who sailed here in his yacht from Cowes, and Godfrey Mellon It is the most delicious place. A blue sea with pink and purple streaks in it, and a soft west wind, and wonderful sand beaches, thick with people. It is the height of the season. The Housmans have oot a comfortable little house near a g-olf links. Housman has had to go to to o London to see his partner, Carrington- Smith, who has been threatened with divorce by his wife, who accuses him of infidelity with — who do you think ? — Eileen Hope. " Bert " is by way of com- ing down here on Saturday. George is radiantly happy. I don't think she's io8 Pass ing By thinking about him. He wanted us all to go out in his yacht this afternoon, but as it was blowing half a gale Mrs Housman was the only one who faced the elements. She is a passionately good sailor and the rougher it is the more she enjoys it. I played golf with a General York who lives here. Godfrey Mellor doesn't play, which is tiresome. We are having the greatest fun. Lady Jarvis is in the most splendid form. She told us some killing stories about Mrs Carrington- Smith. She says that the whole of last year she would only eat raw roots and uncooked fruit because she says in a former existence she was a priestess of I sis, and that was the rule. Lady Jarvis pointed out to her that she is not a priestess of I sis now, but she said that if she ate meat it would spoil her chance of serving Isis again in her next existence. She said, too, that it would displease the elementals. Mrs Housman seems per- fectly happy and cheerful. Mellor is 109 Passing By depressed, but I am terribly sorry for him. I feel he was having such a divine time here before we all came. Grey Farm, Monday, August 2^rd. Dearest Elsie, "Bert" came down on Saturday night, but went away this morn- ing. He is completely upset about Carrington-Smith, who says his wife is bent on divorcing" him. Now that he is gone one can laugh, but while he was there we simply didn't dare. Eileen was apparently a most imprudent correspond- ent. Housman says she will win her case without any doubt if she brings it into court. I played golf with him all Sunday. We had great fun after dinner last night. Mrs Housman sang songs out of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas, and some Offenbach, too, the Chanson de Fortunio, too beautifully. George is desperately in love — but I still don't think she is. Yours, G. no Passing By Grey Farm, Carbis Bay, Tuesday, August 24M. Dearest Elsie, I am going to stay an- other week as Edith can't have me yet. George was leaving to-day, as he has got to be at Plymouth for a regatta some- where, but he has put off going till to- morrow because of the weather. I am enjoying myself immensely. I have got to like Godfrey Mellor very much. I went for a long walk with him one afternoon. When one gets him quite alone like that he talks quite a lot and is delightful. Mrs Carrington-Smith is going to insist on divorce. I am going to the Shamiers' on the ist of October. I told you they have been lent a lodge in Scotland on the coast. Yours etc., G. Ill From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Monday, August i6th. Grey Farm, Carbis Bay. Cunninghame arrived late in the evening. We talked at dinner a great deal about the likelihood of the Carrington-Smith divorce. We discussed divorce in general Mrs Housman was of course against divorce, but she said that the rules of the Church were terribly hard on the indi- vidual in many cases. She said : " We are allowed to separate." Tuesday, August i^tk. We all went for an expedition to the Land's End. Wednesday, August i8//z. We all bathed in the morning. Mrs Carrington-Smith has refused to relent in spite of Housman's attempts at media- tion — apparently she found some letters addressed by Miss Hope to her husband and Miss Hope was an imprudent corre- spondent. Lady Jarvis and I wondered 112 Passing By why people kept letters, especially when they were compromising. Mrs Housmaa said she quite understood this. She never could bring herself to burn old letters, although she never looked at them. Thursday, August igfA. We had luncheon on board the yacht, but after luncheon we left A. on board and went for a walk on the cliffs. Friday, August 2otk. I went for a walk with Cunninghame in the afternoon. He talked a great deal about A. He said he ought to marry. He said he thought Mrs Housman was one of the nicest people he had ever met in his life. Saturday, August 21st. Housman arrived in the evening. It poured with rain all day, so we sat indoors. Lady Jarvis played patience. Mrs Housman played some old songs she found in the house. There is nothing, I H IT3 Passing By think, more melancholy than old or, rather, old-fashioned music. Sunday, August ■22nd. Housman announced his intention of going to Mass with Mrs Housman this morning. He said he always did so at the seaside, he thought it right to support poor Missions. Housman said at luncheon that Father Stanway had preached an excellent sermon. He had said in his sermon that man was a ridiculous animal, and that every time we slip on a piece of orange-peel or sit down on a hat by mistake, we should give thanks for the Grace of God that is teaching us humility. In the afternoon Cunninghame and Housman played golf. Housman lost. He says Cunninghame is a very fine player. Monday, August ij^rd. Housman left for London this morningr. A. leaves to-morrow for Plymouth, but the weather is still very unsettled and it 114 Passing By has been blowing hard, and I wonder whether he will be able to start. Last night after dinner Mrs Housman suggested reading aloud. A. asked her to I read some stories by an American called O. Henry, whose works have not been published in England, and whom I had never heard of. A. has travelled in America. Mrs Housman did so. She said she thought we would find them difficult to understand as we did not know America. We did, that is to say, Cunninghame and myself. But A. was greatly amused, and Lady Jarvis said she thought they were clever. Tuesday, August 2^th. It is still blowing hard and A. has put off going to Plymouth altogether, as he would not get there in time for the regatta. Cunninghame and A. played golf to-day with a retired Indian General, who lives in a house about three miles from here. His name is York. They brought him back to tea, a brisk, direct man. He Passing By said something about his wife and Mrs Housman asked if she might call on her. General York said they would be delighted. More O. Henry was read out in the evening. I prefer Mrs Housman's read- ings in French literature. A. enjoyed it immensely. Wednesday, August 2^th. Mrs Housman called on Mrs York this afternoon. Mrs York greeted her with the words : " This is very unusual." Mrs Housman did not understand what was unusual. Mrs York said she did not recollect having called. She was the oldest inhabitant and had discovered the place. Mrs Housman apologised. She has asked the General and Mrs York to luncheon on Sunday. Thursday, jliigust 2.6t/i. Cunninghame played golf with the General. 1 went for a walk with Lady Jarvis in the afternoon. She talked of lib Passing By a great many things ; of music and musical education abroad. She considers Mrs Housman a fine artist. She talked of A., of his work and mine and my prospects for the future. I told her I en- joyed routine work and had no ambition to do anything else. She talked of marriage. She said A. ought certainly to marry soon as he would be very lonely otherwise. His sister, Mrs Campion, could not look after him, as she had her own children to look after. Her eldest daughter would soon be out. She asked me whether I had ever thought of marrying. She is a most intelligent and agreeable woman. Friday, August 11 th. A. was obliged to go to Penzance to- day for the day. We all went for a walk in the afternoon. It is finer and quite warm, but the sea is still very rough. Mrs Housman received a letter from Mrs York this morning saying that she was unable to come to luncheon on Sunday, but that she had no doubt the General 117 Pausing By would accept the invitation with pleasure. Mrs Housman wrote back to say she would be delighted to see the General on Sunday. The O. Henry book is finished. Mrs Housman is now reading us some stories by another American author, Richard Harding Davis. I wish she would return to European literature. But A. enjoys these American books. Saturday, August 2.?>ih. The wind has gone down and A. went out sailing. Cunninghame played golf. Mrs Housman spent the day at a convent which is some miles off, and she did not come down to dinner. Lady Jarvis took me into the town in the morning, and in the afternoon we went for a drive. We had no reading in the evening. Sunday, August 2<)th. General York did not come to luncheon after all, he wrote a note excusing him- II.8 Passing By self. Mrs Housman went to Mass in the morning. A. and Cunninghame played golf. Mrs Housman read out loud a story by Kipling after dinner. I wonder what an E.P. tent means. IIQ Letter from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl Grey Farm, Careis Bay, August 2,0th. Dearest Elsie, The weather has been too awful, but now, thank heaven, it is fine again. George was obHged to put off going to Plymouth by sea as it was too rough. The Shamiers have put me off. They can't have the Lodge that was going to be lent to them, so they won't go to Scotland at all this year. This changes all my plans. Mrs Housman asked me to stay on another week here, and I am going to as there is now no hurry to get to Edith's. I shall then go back to Worsel for three days if they can have me, and then stay with Edith for the rest of my holiday. She has got the whole family there at this moment, so I shall enjoy going there later better. I shall be back in London the first week in October. 120 Passing By There is a charming old man here who plays golf with me, General York. His wife, who was huffy because Mrs Housman " called," paid a call in state this afternoon. She came in a barouche with an Indian servant on the box. She is organising a bazaar and asked Lady Jarvis to help at her stall. She said the bazaar was in the cause of the Church ; she did not ask Mrs Housman. She stayed seven minutes by the clock and refused tea, which she said she never took as it was trying for the nerves. She was dressed in black jet, and brought with her a small Pomeranian dog. She said she and her husband had lived here eight years and that it used to be a charming place when they discovered it. Write to me here and then to Edith's, but not to Worsel as that is uncertain. Yours, G. 121 From the Diary of Godfrey Meilor Monday, August 2,'^th. I am glad to say Cunninghame has put off going for a week. Mrs York called this afternoon. I was introduced to her, but she addressed no remark to me. Tuesday, August 2,'ist. A. has gone away for a night as he is staying with someone in the neighbour- hood. Mrs Housman took Cunninghame to the Lizard, which he had not yet seen. Lady Jarvis and I spent a lazy day in the garden and on the cliffs. It is extremely hot. Wednesday , September ist. Cunninghame and A. played golf with General York and suggested his coming back to tea, but he declined with much embarrassment. Mrs Housman returned Mrs York's visit, but she was not at home. Mrs Housman sang after dinner. A. does not care for German music, which 122 Passing By limits the programme ; he is fond, however, of old English songs. Thursday, Septemher 2nd. A beautiful day for sailing, so they said. A. took Mrs Housman for a sail. Friday, September 7,rd. I find A.'s spirits a little boisterous at times. He took us out fishing this after- noon. After dinner he insisted on Mrs Housman playing some American coon songs. Saturday, September /^th. Housman arrived unexpectedly with Car- rington-Smith this afternoon. Carrington- Smith seems depressed about his coming divorce. Mrs Housman was out sailing with A. and they did not come back until just before dinner. Carrington-Smith is a great expert on boxing and gave us a sparring exhibition after dinner. That is to say, he explained at great length the nature of a straight left, and upset some of the furniture in so doing. After dinner 123 Passing By Housman, Carrington- Smith, Cunning- hame and Lady Jarvis played Bridge. Sunday, September $th. Housman played golf and met General York, knowing nothing of what had occurred, and asked him and Mrs York to luncheon. The General was much embarrassed and said his wife was an invalid. Housman then asked him to come by himself The General stammered and said they were having luncheon out. But Housman would take no refusal and asked them to dinner. The General said they didn't dine out on Sundays! His wife And then he got dreadfully confused, and Cunninghame came to the rescue and said Housman had forgotten we were dining on board the yacht, which we were of course not doing. Cunninghame leaves, I regret to say, to-morrow. 124 Letter from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl Grey Farm, Carbis Bay, Sunday, September $th. Dearest Elsie, I leave to-morrow for Worsel. I am only stopping here a week. Then I go on to Edith's where I shall stay to the end of the month. Most of the family have gone. I spent a whole day with Mrs Housman on Tuesday and w^ went to the Lizard. This is the first time I have had a real talk alone with her since I have been here. We were talking about my plans and I said that I had been going to stay with the Shamiers. She said : " Oh yes," and paused a moment and then said : " She's a charming woman, isn't she ? " I could see she knew. Later on she talked of George and said how nice Mrs Campion was and what a good thing it would be if George married. I said: "Yes, what a good thing. It was 125 Passing By the greatest mistake his not marrying. " Upon which she said : " Do you think he will ? " And then in a flash I knew that Lady Jarvis had been quite right and I had been utterly wrong. What an idiot I have been ! It must have been quite obvious to a baby the whole time ! I can't tell you how I mind it. I think it is the greatest pity and really too awful ! What are we to do ? That's just it — one can do nothing : there is nothing to be done, absolutely nothing. Of course Godfrey Mellor must have seen it clearly the whole time. I am sure he is miserable. It is all the greatest pity and how I can have been so blind, I don't know, not that it would have made any difference if I hadn't been. Housman, of course, sees nothing and has begged George to stay on. As a matter of fact he (George) is going away quite soon as he has to sail his yacht back and he is stopping somewhere on the way. He. will be back in London in October. It is all very depressing and I am quite 126 Pass ing B y glad to be going. Lady Jarvis has said nothing to me but I can see that she sees that I see. Godfrey Mellor is staying on. Housman leaves to-morrow. Write to me at Edith's. Yrs. G. 127 From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Monday, September 6th. Housman and Cunninghame both left this morning. A. goes away on Wed- nesday. A stormy day — ■ too rough for sailing. Carrington-Smith, who is remaining on, played golf with A. Tuesday, September ifk. Mrs Housman and A. went out for a sail. I went for a walk with Lady Jarvis. Carrington-Smith played golf: after dinner he sang Fll sing thee songs of Arahy, Mrs Housman accompanied him : he has a tenor voice. Wednesday, September ith. A. left in his yacht this morning. Lady Jarvis took Carrington-Smith for a walk. I went out with Mrs Housman. She suggested finishing Consuelo : I told her I had already finished it. Miss Housman arrives on Saturday. 128 Passing By Thursday, September gth. Mrs Housman received a telegram from Mrs Baines, who is in the neighbourhood with her husband, proposing themselves. Mrs Housman has asked them to stay. They will arrive to-morrow. Carrington- Smith sang Tosti's Good-bye after dinner. I went for a walk with Mrs Housman in the afternoon. She said she likes Cunninghame particularly. She said that A. ought to marry. Friday, September loth. A rainy day, we remained indoors. Carrington-Smith went for a walk by himself. Mr and Mrs Baines arrived in the afternoon. After dinner they played bridge : Lady Jarvis, Carrington-Smith and Mr and Mrs Baines. Mrs Baines said she greatly admired the works of Mrs Ella Wheeler Wilcox. "She is," she said, "a true poet, or perhaps I should say a true poetess." She said theatrical performances affected her so much that she could seldom "sit out a piece." She I 129 Passing By had been obliged to take to her bed after seeing The Only Way. Carrington-Smith said he preferred a prize fight to any play. Mr Baines did not care for the English stage, but he always went to a French play when there was one to see in London : he had greatly admired Sarah Bernhardt in old days. His wife, he pensively reminded us, had once been taken for her. Mrs Baines protested and said that it was in the days when Sarah Bernhardt was quite thin. " Such a beautiful voice," she said. " Quite the human violin in those days. Now, of course, she rants and appears in such dreadful plays — so violent." Saturday, September nth. Mr and Mrs Baines left this morning. Miss Housman arrived in the afternoon. Carrington-Smith played golf and I went out with Mrs Housman. After dinner Miss Housman suggested Bridge, but there were only three players, as Mrs Housman does not play. Miss Housman 130 Passing By said I must play. I said I did not know the rules. She said she would teach me. I played — I was her partner. She became excited over what is called the "double ruff," a point I have not yet grasped. Carrington-Smith, who is an excellent player, explained me the rules with great patience. Sunday, September izth. Mrs Housman went to Mass. In the afternoon she went for a walk with Miss Housman. We played Bridge again after dinner. Miss Housman was annoyed with me as I neglected to finesse. Monday, September \7^tK. The last week of my holiday. It becomes finer and warmer every day. Miss Housman said she must see the Land's End. Mrs Housman took her there. I went for a walk with Lady Jarvis in the evening. More Bridge after dinner : I revoked, but my partner, Carrington- Smith, was most amiable about it. 131 Pass ing By Tuesday, September i^th. Miss Housman took Mrs Housman into the town as she said she needed help with her shopping : she did not make many- purchases. As far as I understood, only two yards of silk. I went out with Carrington-Smith in theafternoon. Bridge in the evening — I do not yet understand the "double ruff." Wednesday, September i$tk. We all went to the Lizard in two carriages. Miss Housman said she must see the Lizard. She, Mrs Housman and myself went in one carriage ; Lady Jarvis and Carrington-Smith in the other. Bridge in the evening ; Miss Housman lost, which annoyed her. Thursday, September i6th. A wet day. Miss Housman practised all the morning (Fantasia in C sharp minor, Chopin) ; her touch is very metallic. We played Bridge in the afternoon after tea, as well as after dinner. 132 Passing By Friday, September iith. My last day. It cleared up. We all went out on to the beach. Miss Housman read aloud a novel, which she had already begun and which we will certainly not have time to finish, called Queed, by an American author. After dinner we played Bridge. Saturday, September i^ih. Arrived at Gray's Inn. Travelled up with Carrington-Smith. Sunday, October yd. Gray's Inn. Stayed at home in the morning and read the Sunday newspapers. In the afternoon I went for a walk in Kensington Gardens. Monday, October A,th. A. and Cunninghame returned to the office. A. told us that his sister, Mrs Campion, had invited both of us to stay with her next Saturday at her house in Oxfordshire. We have both accepted, 133 Passing By Tuesday, October ^th. Cunninghame asked me to dinner. We dined at his flat and sat up talking until nearly one o'clock in the morning. I had a letter from Lady Jarvis telling me she has returned to London and inviting me to visit her in Mansfield Street when- ever I felt inclined. Wednesday, October 6tk. Dined with A. at his Club. He told me that Mrs Housman arrives to-morrow ; he met Housman in the street this morning. Thursday, October "jib. I called on Lady Jarvis late this even- ing and found her at home. She said Cornwall had had a beneficial effect on Mrs Housman's health. 1 stayed talking till nearly seven. Friday, October ith. Received a note from Mrs Housman asking me to dine there next Tuesday. Went to a concert with Lady Jarvis at the Queen's Hall : the programme was 134 Passing B if uninteresting, but I enjoyed my evening nevertheless. Saturday, October ^th. Wraxted Priory, Oxfordshire. I travelled down with A. and Cunning- hame and found a party consisting, besides ourselves, of Mrs Campion and her three children, Fraulein Brandes, the governess. Miss Macdonald, Cunninghame's cousin, and a Miss Wray. I sat next to Mrs Campion at dinner : she said she hoped they would go to Florence again next Easter. After dinner we played Conse- quences and the letter game. Sunday, October xoth. Everyone went to church this morning except Cunninghame and myself. At luncheon I sat next to Fraulein Brandes. She said Shakespeare was badly performed in England and that she preferred the German translation of the plays to the original ; she considered it superior. "Aberdas," she added, "will kein Englander gestehen." She was shocked to hear I had 135 Passing By never read Shakespeare's plays. I told her I had no taste for verse. She said this vi^as unglaublich. I told her I was fond of German music. In the afternoon Mrs Campion took me for a walk. Cunninghame went out with his cousin. At dinner I sat next to Miss Wray. I found her most agreeable. She has travelled a great deal and seems to have a real appreciation of classical music. 136 Letter from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl London, Monday, October nth. Dearest Elsie, We had a delightful Sun- day at Mrs Campion's. A lovely old house not very far from Oxford : grey stone walls, a hall with the walls left bare and a few bits of good tapestry and another panelled room. Freda was there, and Lavinia Wray, who has just come back from South America. She is looking so well, her lovely skin whiter than ever and those huge eyes — George liked her enormously. He had never met her before. How wonderful it would be if that could come off. It would be exactly right. Of course I am sure Mrs Campion wants it and is not likely to do anything stupid. I shall get Edith to help later if possible. She is still in the country now. Mrs Housman has come back to London 137 Passing By and I hear from Randall that Housman is mad -about Mrs Park. I shall go and see her next week. George is in goo4 spirits. When I got back I couldn't bear the sight of my flat with those glaring curtains and I have committed the great extravagance of changing them. The new ones are coming next week. I hope they will be a success as I , .shan't be able to change them again. Yrs. G. 138 From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Monday, October nth. Dined at the Club. Tuesday, October 12th. Had luncheon with Cunninghame to meet his sister, Mrs Howard. She is older than he is and less communicative. Her husband is on the Stock Exchange. She was only in London for the day but she said she hoped I would come and see her when she settled in London later. She has a house in Chester Street. Wednesday, October i^th. Dined with the Housmans last night. A. was there, Miss Housman and Mrs Park. I sat next to Mrs Housman. Mrs Park contradicted A. when he mentioned music and said something about the gross ignorance of English amateurs. After dinner she asked Miss Housman to accompany her. She sang some operatic airs and Gounod's Ave 139 Passing By Maria. I drove home with A., who told me he could not bear Mrs Park. Thursday, October i^ih. I am just back from dining with Lady Jarvis. A. was there, Miss Wray and several other people. Lady Jarvis asked me if I had seen the Housmans. I told her about my dinner there. She said that Mrs Park was an intolerable woman : she knew her when she was a singer and she said she had never met anyone who gave herself such airs. Walked home with Cunninghame, who was dining there too. He is dining with the Housmans on Sunday. The Carrington-Smith divorce case is in the newspapers. Friday, October i^fh. Dined at the Club. Mrs Carrington-Smith has got her divorce. Saturday, October i6th. Spent the day at Woking with Solway. He has finished his Sonata. 140 Pass ing By Sunday, October iith, I went to see Mrs Housman this after- noon and found her at home. After I had been there about five minutes a great many visitors arrived and I left. 141 Letter from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl Halkin Street, Sunday, October iith. Dearest Elsie, I am having a quiet Sunday in London. George is staying with the Prime Minister. I dined last night with the Housmans. Mrs Park was there, Randall and Miss Housman. Mrs Park is incredible : a magnificent figure, hair dyed a rich bronze with flaming high lights, dressed in a flowing robe of peach-coloured satin with a neck- lace of fire-opals and a large diamond lyre on her shoulder ; the semi-royal manner of an ex- Prima Donna, at the same time making it quite clear that she no longer mixed with the artistic world — she had soared to the top of it and out of it. She said : " Years ago when 1 was at Balmoral the dear Queen told me she reminded me of Grisi." I said: "1 suppose you 142 Passing By mean you reminded her of Grisi," and she drew herself up stiffly and said she meant what she said. She told me that Madame Cosima had implored her to sing at Bayreuth but of course she couldn't think of doing- such a thingr. Poor Theodore (her late husband) hated Wagner. After dinner she sang, Miss Housman accom- panied her, a song out of Cavalleria. They had a fierce argument about the time. Mrs Park said she was playing too fast, which she was, although I don't believe Mrs Park knew this. Miss Sarah stuck to her guns and played, if anything, faster. Mrs Park then refused to sing. Housman asked his wife to accompany her, which Mrs Housman most good- naturedly said she would be delighted to do. This was more than Miss Housman could bear — she said Mrs Housman was playing too slow and Mrs Park agreed. Miss Housman tore Mrs Housman from the piano and sat there herself, and the song was sung to the end. All seemed to 143 Passing By be peaceable but Miss Housman unfortun- ately couldn't refrain from saying that Mascagni's music was rubbish, upon which Mrs Park burst into a furious passion. Who was Miss Housman to judge? she screamed. Miss Housman said she had studied music for five years under the best musicians in the world at Leipzig. Mrs Park said she had sung to Patti, who had said she was the only English artist worthy of the name of "artist." Miss Housman, in a sardonic voice, said that Patti was so kind. Mrs Park said that the arrogance of amateurs knew no bounds. She had sung before the most critical public in two continents. Miss Housman said she did not consider the Americans a critical public. Mrs Park then said she would never sing again in the Housmans' house as long as she lived, not if every- one went down on their knees to her. Housman became greatly agitated and fussed about the room, saying : " Never mind, never mind ; we are all very tired 144 Passing By to-night, it's the east wind." Mrs Park said she always sang her best in an east wind. I caught Mrs Housman's eye and we were seized with a fit of uncontrollable laughter. We laughed till we shook. Randall caught it too. This made things much worse. Mrs Park said she was being insulted and swept out of the room, Housman running after her. He came back alone gibbering with agitation, and Miss Housman then attacked him and said of course if Albert (rolling the "r " with a rapid guttural) would invite such awful people, what could one expect ? Then " Bert" got really angry and we all sat in dead silence while he and Miss Sarah abused each other like pickpockets. Then the door opened and Mrs Park came back saying she had left her fan behind. She took no notice of us but disappeared with Housman into the Oriental lounge, and there we heard spirited skirmishes of talk going on in an undertone. Miss Housman sat down K 145 Pass ing By defiantly at the piano and played, or rather banged, the Rapsodie Hongroise. When this was over they both came back and Housman suggested, with a nervous chuckle, that we should all have some lemonade. We jumped at the idea and the evening ended peaceably enough, but Mrs Park ignored Miss Housman, was icy towards Mrs Housman, and made all her remarks to me and Randall. I then left the house. Housman followed me nervously to the door and said that Mrs Park had the artistic temperament and that I mustn't mind, and that it was too bad of Sarah to provoke her. Yrs. G. P.S. — I suppose you read about the Carrington-Smith case in the newspapers. Mrs Housman and I laughed a good deal about it when " Bert " wasn't listening, but I am very sorry for Eileen. Aren't you.-* 14b From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Monday, October iZth. A. has been staying with the Prime Minister. He does not appear to have enjoyed himself very much. He asked me if I had seen the Housmans lately. Tuesday, October igtk. A. and I dined with Cunninghame. Miss Wray was there, Mrs Howard and Lady Jarvis. A. said afterwards that Miss Wray was a charming girl — it was a pity that she did not marry. Wednesday, October 20 tk. I called on Mrs Housman late, but she was not at home. Housman came out of the house as I was standing at the door. He asked me to dinner on Sunday. I accepted. Thursday, October ■zist. Dined at the Club. 147 Passing By Friday, October i2nd. Dined with Mrs Howard. A. was there, Cunninghame, Miss Wray, Miss Macdonald, and others. Mr Howard is half- Irish and very boisterous. I sat next to Miss Wray ; she said Mrs Campion was the nicest woman she knew. Uncle Arthur and Aunt Ruth have come back to London and are starting" their Thursday evenings. They have asked A. and myself to dinner on Thursday week. Saturday, October 2T,rd. A. has gone to the country to stay with a General ; a military party. Sunday, October ii,th. I had luncheon with Lady Jarvis. She told me she did not think Mrs Housman would stay long in London, as the London winter was bad for her ; she said she thought she would most likely go to Florence. I dined with the Housmans. A strange party. Mrs Park was the only person 148 Passing By there I had met before. There was a South African magnate and his wife, a retired Indian official, and a Mr Perry, an AustraHan, and his wife, who were apparently intimate friends of Mrs Park's, at least she called him Tom. I sat next to Mrs Perry, who told me that Paris had been a disappointment to her. She told me, also, that the women in England were, according to Australian standards, dowdy. On the other side of me was Lady Bowles, the wife of the Indian official. She told me she was Mrs Park's greatest friend ; she said she. lived at Cannes and only spent a few weeks in London every .year ; they were staying at the Hyde Park Hotel. She found London dreadfully slow : she was accustomed, she said, always to smoke between the courses at dinner, and not to do so was a great deprivation. She also said she was a great gambler and was used to gambling all night. " Of course I find this exhaust- ing," she said ; "and I always tell Harold 149 Passing By I shall take to cocaine some day." Housman seemed rather embarrassed. Miss Housman was not there. After dinner Lady Bowles suggested a game of Poker. They all played except Mrs Housman and they were still playing when I left. Monday, October 2^th. I had luncheon with Cunninghame at his Club. He said A. had come back from the country in a very bad temper and had said that nothing would induce him to pay a visit anywhere again. Tuesday, October zdth. Went to a concert at the Queen's Hall. Saw the Housmans in the distance, and to my astonishment I met A. in the interval. He said he had been dragged there by his sister. 1 met them again as we were going out. A. asked me to dinner on Friday. Wednesday, October I'^th. Had luncheon with A. He seems in high spirits. He told me that his sister 150 Passing By had come up from London for the winter — she had taken a house in Pont Street. He said the Housmans and Cunninghame were dining on Friday and it would be a Cornwall party. Thursday, October lith. Dined with Aunt Ruth — a large political dinner ; the F.O. largely represented, as usual. A. was there and sat next to the wife of the French military attache, and on the other side of Aunt Ruth. I am afraid he found the dinner tedious, but after dinner he talked to Miss Wray : I sat next to her at dinner. She asked me if I had known A. long. She said he was so like his sister. Uncle Arthur has not yet grasped I am working in a public office. He asked me how I was getting on in the city. Friday, October iijth. Dined with A. at his flat. Mr and Mrs Housman, Lady Jarvis, Miss Wray, Cunninghame and Miss Macdonald, Mrs 151 Pass ing B y Campion was coming but had been obliged to go down to the country. Mrs Housman said she was very likely going abroad for the winter. Saturday, October ^oth. A. was engaged to go somewhere in the country but he has put off going. He left a telegram at the office to his hostess but forgot to fill in the address. Tuke brought it to me. It was to Mrs Legget, Miss Wray's aunt. She is not in Who's Who, but I rang up Lady Jarvis on the telephone and she knew. Sunday, October ^ist. I went to call on Mrs Housman but she 'vas not at home. 152 Letter from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl London, ' Monday, November ist. Dearest Elsie, I spent Sunday in London and had luncheon with Lady Jarvis. She told me the Housman manage was all upside down owing to Mrs Park, who refused to let Housman see any of his old friends, insulted them all, and quarrelled every day with Miss Housman, and in- sisted on her friends being asked nightly to dinner — and what friends ! Fast colonials. Lady Jarvis says, and the dregs of the Riviera ! Poor Mrs Housman is utterly worn out. Mrs Park behaves exactly as if it were her house, orders the servants about, complains of the food, and is always there ! The result is Mrs Housman has gone to Florence ; she was to leave this morning and she is going to stay there the whole winter. I did not 153 Passing By know how George would take this bit of news, but he knew already and seems, oddly enough, in good spirits ! Edith thinks he is fond of Lavinia Wray and that he will end by marrying her, but Lady Jarvis does not agree, although she said that his sister thinks the same thing. They can't understand his being in such spirits otherwise. Last Friday we all had dinner at George's flat. After dinner, so Lady Jarvis told me, before we came out of the dining-room they were playing the game of saying who you could marry and who you couldn't, and after mentioning a lot of people, Godfrey Mellor among others, Freda Macdonald said : " Georee." Lady Jarvis and Freda said : " Oh yes ; we could marry him." Mrs Housman and Lavinia Wray said : " No — quite im- possible." Except Lady Jarvis, they are all extra- ordinarily optimistic about George and think that there is nothing in the Housman thing and that it will pass off and he will 154 Passing B // marry Lavinia. I am sure they are wrong, and I am more depressed about it than words can say. Lavinia is fond of him, too, and that is all that has been gained. There are now three miserable people, instead of two ! No letter from you this week, but I hope to get one to-morrow. Yrs. G. 155 From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Monday, November \st. Gray's Inn. Received a letter from Mrs Housman saying that she was leaving for Florence this morning, She was sorry not to have seen me yesterday. She is going to stay in Florence until the end of May. Tuesday, November 2nd. Had dinner with A. alone at his flat. He was in low spirits and said that he hates official life. Tuesday, December 21st. My Christmas holidays begin to-morrow. I am going to Aunt Ruth's. Cunninghame is staying with Lady Jarvis. A. said he would most probably spend Christmas with his sister, but he was not sure. Thursday, December 2yd. Received a telegram from Aunt Ruth saying the party was put off as Uncle Arthur has got bronchitis. A telegram 156 Passing By arrived for A. at the office this morning. I telephoned to Tuke at his flat to know where to forward it. Tuke said A.'s address for the next week would be Hotel Grande Bretagne, Florence. Christmas Day. Dined at the Club. Tuesday, December zSik. Tuke telephoned to say not to forward any more letters to A. He was on his way home. Saturday, January ^th, 1910. Received a letter from A. from his sister's house. He is coming up next week. ■ Riley has written to me from Paris to know whether I could put him up next month. He is going to spend a month in London. I have told him I would be glad of his company. 157 Letters from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl ROSEDALE, Saturday, January ist, 1910. Dearest Elsie, I have been staying with Lady Jarvis for Christmas. There is a very small party, only Jane Vaughan and Winchester Hill besides myself. Just before I came down here Housman asked me to dine with him at the Carlton. I went and he was alone. After talking nervously on ordinary topics, he told me he did not know what to do. It gradually came out that Mrs Park is making his life quite unbearable. She won't let him see any of his friends ; she quarrels with Sarah, and has the most violent scenes ; she makes scenes every day, and not long ago, he said, broke a fine piece of Venetian glass. He is miserable ; he says he can't call his soul his own. I told Lady Jarvis all about this and she said the only thing 158 Passing By to be done would be for Housman to get Mrs Housman to come back. She has been away two months, and if she comes back at the end of the month the worst of the winter will be over. She is very much worried about Mrs Housman and says this is most unfortunate, as it would be better really in every way if she were to stay out there. You see Edith and Mrs Campion and Freda all think that it is only a passing fancy of George's and that he will get over it and marry Lavinia Wray! Lady Jarvis says this is wrong; she knows they are wrong. She thinks George and Mrs Housman are desperately in love with each other and she doesn't know how it will end. She is so worried that she nearly went out to Florence last week. She had heard from Mrs Housman quite lately. She said in her last letter that George had suggested coming out to Florence for Christmas with Mrs Campion. She had told him that she would most likely not be in Florence as the Albertis 159 Passing By had asked her to spend Christmas with them at Ravenna ; she was not sure, however, whether she would go or not. Whether George went or not, I don't know. He told me he was going to spend Christmas with Mrs Campion at the Priory. I am going back to London at the end of next week. Yrs. G. London, Wednesday, January IXth. Dearest Elsie, I came back to London on Monday. I asked Housman to dinner with me and told him that he had much better get Mrs Housman back. He said he quite agreed that it was the only thing to do. Things were now worse than ever. Mrs Park was impossible. Poor little " Bert " ! The worst of it is, that directly this is over there is quite certain to be someone else and perhaps someone worse. 1 60 Passing By However, let us hope for the best. George came to the office yesterday. He said he had been staying with his sister ; he said nothing about Florence. ^ He ia in low spirits. I shall certainly go abroad at Easter and spend a few days in Paris in any case. Lady Jarvis is back in London, and the Shamiers. I dined there last night. Lavroff was there and Louise is just as fond of him as ever. Poor Godfrey Mellor is terribly melan- choly. He has got a friend staying with him now and I don't see much of him. Yrs. G. i6i From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Tuesday, February i^th, 19 lo. Alfred Riley ari'ived last night. He is now professor at Shelborough University and is editing Propertius. He has come to consult some books at the British Museum. Wednesday, February i6th. Sat up very late last night talking with Riley. He was amused by a conversation he had overheard at a Club. Two men were talking about someone who had become a Roman Catholic. Someone he didn't know. One of them said to the other that it was a very pleasant solution if you could do it. The other one said : " Certainly ; no bother, no responsibility . . . everything settled for you." I said that I did think the Confessional must be the negation of responsibility. Riley said that by becoming a Catholic you became responsible for all your actions. He said 162 Passing By that before he was a Catholic he felt no responsibility at all to anything or anyone, but that the moment you were a Catholic everything you did and said counted. Every time you went to Confession you acknowledged and confirmed your assump- tion of responsibility. I mentioned a common friend of ours, O'Neil, who had been a Catholic all his life and who, though he was married, had never ceased to live with a Miss Silvia Thorpe, whom I had known as an artist. He didn't hide it, neither did she. Riley said that this proved his point. O'Neil never dreamt of going to Confession ; he knew it would be useless, because he had no intention of giving up Miss Thorpe, and that being so, he knew he couldn't get Absolution. It was a sacrifice to him, a very great sacrifice, as he Was a believing Catholic. "That shows," he went on, "that you don't understand how the thing works. You and all Protestants think that one can stroll into the Confessional, wipe the 163 Passing By slate olean and go on with what you are doing, however bad it is, with the implied sanction of the Church. But the fact remains that practising Catholics who are living in a way which the Church condemned do not go to Confession. Going to Confession entails facing re- sponsibility instead of evading it." He said that if what I thought was true, people like O'Neil would go to Confes- sion. I must face the fact that he did not go to Confession and was extremely unhappy on that account. He would like to go to the Sacraments but he had made this great sacrifice with his eyes open. I said that I had always thought the Church was lax about such matters. He said individuals might be lax. The Church was not responsible for the conduct of individuals, but the rule of the Church was absolutely uncompromising. I said O'Neil might be an extreme case, but supposing a devout Catholic married woman had a great man friend, supposing 164 Passing By he was very much in love with her, but she was a virtuous woman, faithful to her husband, she could go on seeing the other man as much as she liked ? Would the Church forbid it? Riley said the Church would forbid sin. Any priest would tell her that if she thought it might lead to sin, she must cut it out of her life. I said that was quite clear, but he was not telling me what I wanted to know. He said : " What is it that you want to know ? " I said I must give it up. I couldn't put it into words. I said Roman Catholics were always so matter-of-fact. They handed one opinions and ideas like choco- lates wrapped up in silver paper. He said : " You think that, because you would sooner walk naked in the streets than think things out, or call things by their names. You like leaving them vague. ' Le vague,' Renan said, ' est pire que le faux.' " I said, going back to the question of responsibility, that I had often heard i65 Passing By Catholics themselves complain of the want of responsibility of Catholics. Riley said that might very well be ; they might lack a sense of responsibility, just as they might lack a sense of charity or honesty. " You think," he said, "that the Church is perpetually arranging comfortable com- promises. Nothing is further from the truth. Nothing is harder on the individual than certain of the commandments of the Church with regfard to marriage : for instance, divorce, and the bearing of children. Some of the Church's views were just as hard on the individual as it was hard on a man, who is going to catch a train to see his dying child, to be delayed by a policeman holding up the traffic, but in order to make traffic possible, you had to have a policeman, and the individual couldn't complain however much he might suffer. " I know a much harder case than O'Neil's," he said : " a colleague of mine who is married and has been completely i66 Pass ing By neglected by his wife. On the other hand, he has been looked after devotedly for years by another woman, who nursed him when he was ill and saved his life. He wants to become a Catholic, but he knows quite well that the Church will not receive him unless he were to give up this woman, whom he adores, and go back to his wife, who is indifferent to him. What you don't understand," he said, "is that the Church is not an air cushion but a rock." He said I accused the Church of being lax, but many people that he knew found fault with what they called the hardness of the Church. But as a matter of fact they had generally to admit that as far as the human race was concerned the Church in such matters of morals was always right. He cited instances of what the Church was right in condemning. I said that one did not need to be Roman Catholic to know that immorality was bad for the State, and that vice was noxious to the 167 Pass ing By individual. The ordinary laymen reach the same conclusions merely by common- sense. Riley said there were only two points of view in the world : the Catholic point of view or the non-Catholic point of view. All so-called religions which I could mention, including my layman's common- sense view, were either lopped-off branches of Catholicism or shadows of it, or a blind aspiration towards it, or a misguided parallel of it, as of a train that had gone off the rails, or a travesty of it, sometimes serious, and sometimes grotesque : a dis- tortion. The other point of view was the materialist point of view, which he could perfectly well understand anyone holding. It depends, he said, whether you think human life is casual or divine. I said I could quite well conceive a phil- osophy which would be neither materialist nor Catholic. He quoted Dr Johnson about everyone having a right to his opinion, and martyrdom being the test. Catholicism, 1 68 Passing By he said, had survived the test ; would my philosophy ? As far as I was concerned I admitted that 1 held no opinion for which I was ready to go to the stake, except, possibly, that Jane Eyre was an interesting book. Monday, February 21st. I heard from Mrs Housman this morn- ing. She returns to-morrow. Saturday, February %f)th. Called on Mrs Housman, and found her in. Housman was there also. They asked me to dinner next Monday. Sunday, February 2'jth. Rosedale. I am staying with Lady Jarvis. There is no one else. Lady Jarvis said she was glad Mrs Housman had returned to London. 169 Letter from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl London, Tuesday, March isi. Dearest Elsie, I dined with the Housmans last night. Only myself, Miss Sarah, Lady Jarvis, and Godfrey Mellor. Every- thing as it used to be. Carrington-Smith came in after dinner. He has not been inside the house for months. I don't know what Mrs Housman did nor how it was done, but it was done, and done most successfully and quickly! She only came back a week ago. "Bert" looks quite different and is perfectly radiant. George, I gather, hasn't seen her. They asked him to dinner last night, but he had an official dinner and couldn't come. He asked me whether I had seen her. He said he had been there several times, but she had always been out. He is still most depressed and goes nowhere 170 Passing By unless he is absolutely obliged to. The Housmans have asked me to spend Easter at their villa. Lady Jarvis is going, and Godfrey ; and Housman told me he was going to ask George. I am going and I shall stop two or three days in Paris on the way. Lavinia Wray has gone to the south of France with her aunt. The Shamiers are going to Paris next week. They will tell you all the news, not that there is much. Yrs. G. 171 From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Monday, February lith. A. told me he had not been to the country after all on Saturday. Tuesday, March xst. Dined with the Housmans, a very agree- able dinner. Mrs Housman played and sang after dinner : Brahms' Lieder, and some Grieg'. -&• Wednesday, March 2nd. A. asked me to luncheon. He told me he had been so sorry not to be able to go to the Housmans' last night. He said he had not seen them yet. He was so busy. He asked me how Mrs Housman was and whether Florence had done her good. & Thursday, March ^rd. I told Riley I had been reading Renan's Souvenirs d'enfance et de jeunesse, and that Renan said in this book that there was 172 Passing By nothing in Catholic dogmas which raised in him a contrary opinion ; nothing either in the political action or in the spirit of the Church, either in the past or in the present, that led him to doubt ; but directly he studied the " Higher Criticism " and German text-books his faith in the Church crumbled. I asked Riley what he thought of this. He said people treated German text-books superstitiously then and they still did so now. If German text-books dealt with Shakespeare people could see at once that they were talking nonsense, and that mountains of erudition were being built on a false base, a base which we knew to be false, because we were English ; but when they dealt with things more remote, like the Gospels, people swallowed what they said, and accepted any of their theories as infallible dogma. In twenty years' time, he said, nobody will care two straws for the " Higher Criticism." Riley is going away to-morrow 173 P as s i ng By Friday, March ifth. Mrs Housman has written to ask me to come and see her on Sunday afternoon if I am in London. Dined with Cunninghame at a restaur- ant and went to the Palace Music Hall afterwards. Saturday, March c^th. A. is much annoyed at having to stay with the Foreign Secretary. Dined at the Club. Sunday, March 6 th. Spent the afternoon at Mrs Housman's. There was nobody there until Housman came in late just when I was going. Housman said we must all meet at Florence. He said he was going to ask A. "But we never see him now," he added. He asked me what A. was doing. I told him he was staying with the Foreign Secretary. He said, of course he was right to attend to his official and especially to his social duties. He said he would ask him to dinner next week. He asked 174 Passing By me to dine on Wednesday. Mrs Hous- man asked me to go to a concert with her on Tuesday. Monday, March ~ith. Dined at the Club. Tuesday, March ?>th. Went to a concert in Chelsea with Mrs Housman, Housman and Miss Housman. Solway played, and an excel- lent violinist, Miss Bowden ; Beethoven Sonata (G Major) and Schubert Quartet (D Minor). We all enjoyed the music and the playing. During the interval we went to see Solway. Housman asked him to dinner to-morrow. Wednesday, March ^th. Dined with the Housmans. Lady Jarvis, Mrs Campion, Solway, Cunning- hame, Mrs Baines, and A. and Miss Housman were there. I sat between Lady Jarvis and Mrs Campion. After dinner Mrs Housman asked Solway to try a song with her, a new English song 175 Passing By by a boy who has just left the College of Music. She sang this and after that she sang all the Winterreise. Housman asked A. and Mrs Campion to stay with them in Florence. Mrs Campion cannot get away this Easter. A. accepted the invitation. Thursday, March loth. Went after dinner to Aunt Ruth's. Uncle Arthur is quite restored to health. He asked me whether I had been ap- pointed to Paris, still thinking that I was in the F.O. There were a great many people there. Aunt Ruth spoke severely about A. and said she heard he only went out in the Bohemian world. I said he had stayed with the Foreign Secretary last week. Friday, March nth. Dined with Mrs Campion. A. was there and the Albertis, who are over in England. A. said he was much looking forward to Florence. Easter is early this year. 176 Passing By Saiurday, March I2fh. A. has gone to Littlehampton. He has asked the Housmans and Cunninghame. I am going to Woking. Sunday, March i^t/i. Spent the day with Solway, who played Bach. Returned by the late train after dinner. 177 Letter from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl London, Monday, March 1/^th. Dearest Elsie, I have just come back from Littlehampton, where I spent Sunday with George and his sister. The Hous- mans were asked and Housman went, but Mrs Housman was not well. I start on Thursday morning and shall be in Paris Thursday night and stay there till Monday. Let us do something amusing. I should like to go to the play one night. But you- have probably seen all the best things hundreds of times. I am going on to Florence on Monday. I don't think George has seen much of Mrs Housman. I dined there last Wednesday. Mrs Housman sang the whole evening so that he did not get any talk with her. Godfrey has been much more cheerful lately and even suggested going to a music-hall 178 Passing By one night. Mrs Campion is coming to Florence too. I'm sorry I've been so bad about writing lately. I seem to have had no time and yet to have done nothing, and there have been a series of rather tiresome episodes at the ofifice. Au revoir till Thursday, Yours, G. 179 From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Monday, March i\th. A. came back from the country in a gloomy state of mind. He said it was a great mistake to go to the country in March and that his party had been a failure. He said bachelors should not give parties. He asked me to dine with him, which 1 did. He says he is leaving on Wednesday but will stop two nights in Paris. Mrs Campion is travelling with him. Tuesday, March i^th. Mrs Housman rang up on the telephone and told me that a young vocalist was dining with them to-morrow night. She wanted a few people to hear her. Would I come ? Solway was coming. Dined with Cunninghame at his Club. He says he has never seen A. so depressed. Wednesday, March x6th. Dined with the Housmans. Miss Housman, Solway and Lady Jarvis were i8o Passing By there. The vocalist, a Miss Byfield, did not arrive till after dinner. Mrs Housman said Miss Byfield was shy and had refused to dine at the last moment. After dinner she sang some songs from the classical composers. She was extremely nervous. Mrs Housman and Solway say she has promise. Housman said to me confiden- tially that he was sure there was no money in her. The Housmans leave to-morrow. A. left to-day. Thursday, March i^th. Cunninghame left to-day. I had dinner with Lady Jarvis. She asked me to travel with her on Saturday. We are both stopping Sunday night in Paris. Friday, March i&fh. Lunched and dined at the Club. Packed up my things. Am taking some music with me. Saturday, March igth. Paris. Arrived at the Hotel Saint Romain. Had a pleasant journey with Lady Jarvis. i8i Passing By Sunday, March 20th. Lady Jarvis took me to see a French friend of hers, Madame Sainton. It was her day. There was a large crowd of men and women in the drawing-room and the dining-room, where there was tea, Madeira and excellent sandwiches. The French take just as much trouble about preparing a good tea as they do to write or to dress well. I was introduced to a famous composer, who talked to me technically about boxing. I was obliged to confess that I knew nothing of the art. It was a pity, I thought, Carrington-Smith was not there. I was also introduced to a French author, who asked me what was the place of Meredith in modern literature, what les jeunes thought about him. I was obliged to confess I had never read one line of Meredith. The French author thought I despised him. He asked me : " Qu'est qu'on lit en Angleterre main- tenant avant de se coucher ? " I said that I had no idea what les jeunes read but 182 Passing By that I personally, for a bedside book, preferred Jane Eyre. The French author said "Tiens!" He then asked me what I thought of Bernard Shaw. I had again to confess that I had never seen his plays acted. I told him that when I had time to spare I went to concerts. He said: "Ah! la musique," and I felt he was generalising a whole movement in young England towards music. In the evening we went to the Op^ra Comique and heard Carmen, which I greatly enjoyed. Monday, March ■zist. Florence. Villa Fersen. We arrived at Florence this morning. Cunninghame and A. and Mrs Campion were in the same train. The Housmans had been there some days already. Tuesday, March 22nd. Cunninghame, Mrs Housman, A. and Mrs Campion went out together. Lady Jarvis stayed at home. I went later in 183 Passing By the morning to the Pitti. In the afternoon they went to Fiesole. Housman went to call on some friends. Lady Jarvis and I went for a walk. Wednesday, March 2T,rd. We were invited to luncheon by a Mr Eugene Lowe, a friend of Lady Jarvis. He has a flat in the town on the Pitti side of the river. The Housmans and Cunninghame and myself went. A. and his sister had luncheon with the Albertis. Mr Lowe's flat had the peculiarity that everything in it had been ingeniously ' diverted from its original purpose. The only other guest besides ourselves was an ex-diplomatist whom I met last year. Thursday, March ^\th. Lady Jarvis has gone to Venice, where she is staying with friends until next Monday. While we were sight-seeing this morning we met a lady called Mrs Fairburn, who claimed to. be an old friend of Mrs Housman. Mrs Housman told 1 84 Passing By me she had met her in America soon after she married, but that she had never known her well. She asked us all to luncheon on Saturday. Mrs Housman accepted for herself and Housman. Cunninghame and I also accepted. A. and his sister were engaged. In the afternoon Mrs Housman said she was going to hear a Dominican preach. Cunninghame and I asked if we might accompatny her. A. said it was no use his going as he did not understand Italian. He was most eloquent. Friday (Good Friday), March 2c^th. Mrs Housman spent the whole morning in church. I went with Cunninghame for a long walk. Saturday^ March 26th. We had luncheon with Mrs Fairburn, who has a villa on the Fiesole side. She is a widow and always, she says, lives abroad ; so much so, she told us, that she had difficulty in speaking English correctly. 185 Passing By She gave us no evidence that she spoke any other language with great correctness. She told me she was overjoyed at meeting Mrs Housman, who was her oldest friend. Housman asked her to dinner to-morrow night. Sunday (Easter Sunday), March ■z'^th. I went for a walk by myself. When I got back I found various people at the villa and escaped to my room. Mrs Fairburn came to dinner. When Housman said he had been suffering from a headache she exclaimed : '' Poveretto !" and said she was feeling rather "Moche" herself Looking at Mrs Housman, she said to me : " She is ravissanie, che bellezza ! E vero? " 1 86 Letter from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl Villa Fersen, Florence, Easter Monday, March 2?,th. Dearest Elsie, We arrived safely and we are a very happy party. Lac^y Jarvis has gone to Venice to stay with the Lumleys, but comes back to-morrow. George is, of course, immensely happy at being here, but it isn't really satisfactory. We haven't seen many people, though we have been out to luncheon twice : once with that terrible bore, Eugene Lowe, who lives in a flat which is the most monstrous and absurd thing I have ever seen. The walls are hung with Turkish carpets ; the chairs and tables with Church vestments ; the books turn out to be cigarette lamps and cigar cases ; the writing-table is a gutted spinet ; and in the middle of the room there is a large Venetian well, which he uses for cigarette ashes. 187 Passing By On Saturday we had luncheon with a Mrs Fairburn, who professed to be an old friend of Mrs Housman's. This turned out to be a gross exaggeration. She is an affected woman who dresses in what are meant to be ultra- French clothes, and she speaks broken English on purpose. She pretends to be silly, but is far from being anything of the kind. I can see now that she has got her eye on Housman. He was quite charmed by her. She has arranged an outing next week. I can see that she is going to stick like a leech, and she will be, unless I am very much mis- taken, much worse than Mrs Park or any of them. Godfrey Mellor is, I think, liking it, but he insists on going out by himself, and every day he goes to some gallery with a Baedeker, all alone. We always ask him to come with us, but it is no use. He says he has got things to do in the town and off he goes. We go about mostly all together except i88 Passing By for Godfrey, who always manages to elude us. I am staying till Monday, then two days at Mentone, and then home (via Paris, but only for a night). Yrs. G. 189 From the Diary of Godfrey Mel lor Monday {Easter Monday), March lith. We all had luncheon with the Albertis. Lady Jarvis returned in the afternoon from Venice. Tuesday^ March 2^th. Went to the Uffizzi. Housman said he was going to spend the day in visits. Wednesday, March ^oth. Mrs Fairburn came to luncheon. Housman said when she had gone that she was a very remarkable woman, so cultivated, so well read and widely travelled. He said she ought to have held some great position. She should have been an Empress. I went to the Pitti in the morning and to the Boboli Gardens in the afternoon. Thursday, March ^\st. The Albertis came to luncheon. Baroness Strong and Mrs Fisk called in 190 Passing By the afternoon. They both asked us all to entertainments, but Housman explained that we had guests ourselves every day. He asked them to dinner on Sunday, but they declined. Friday, April ist. Housman has bought some miniatures by a young artist recommended by Mrs Fairburn. I do not think they are well done, but I am no judge. A. and Mrs Campion left. Saturday, April 2nd. Mrs Housman suggested having luncheon in the town and going to Fie- sole afterwards, but Housman explained, with some embarrassment, that he had promised to go with Mrs Fairburn to see a studio and to have luncheon with her afterwards. I leave for London to-night. I am going straight through. / 191 Letter from Guy Cunninghame to Mrs Caryl Villa Beau Site, Mentone, Wednesday, April dth. Dearest Elsie, Just a line to say I shall arrive the day after to-morrow, and I can only stay one night. Godfrey Mellor left Florence on Saturday, and George and his sister are on their way back. George was very sad at going — I think he feels it's the end — Mrs Housman and Lady Jarvis are staying on till next Monday, and I think Housman also. What I fore- saw has happened more quickly than I expected. Housman is now the devoted slave of Mrs Fairburn, and she has announced her intention of coming to London in the summer, so this will make fresh complications. I am having great fun here. The Shamiers are here, I am travelling back with them. I am sorry not to be able to 192 Push I u g B , stop more than a night in Paris, but it really is impossible. I can't dine at the Embassy on Friday, I am dining with the Shamiers that night. But I will come and see you in the morn- ing, and we might do some shops and have luncheon together. Yrs. G. 193 From the Diary of Godfrey Mellor Monday, April \th. London. Back at the office. Tuke came this morning and said A. would not come to the office till to-morrow. Cunninghame does not return until Friday. Tuesday, April s^th. A. came to the office. He says that Housman has returned to London, but that Mrs Housman and Lady Jarvis will not be back before next Tuesday. Thursday, April lih. Dined with Aunt Ruth. I sat next to a Mrs de la Poer. She told me she knew the Housmans. I said I had been staying with them in F"lorence. She said : "I suppose Lord Ayton was there." I said that A. and his sister always spent Easter in Italy. She said : " And he spends the summer in Cornwall when Mrs Housman is there. It is extraordinary how far 194 P