Collected Letters Volume One: Family Letters 1905–1931

son Jacks

‘“Carpe Diem” after Horace’‘In the metre of “Locksley Hall”’ (Tennyson)

When, in haughty exultation, thou durst laugh inFortune’s face,Or when thou hast sunk down weary, trampled inThe ceaseless race,Dellius, think on this I pray thee–but theTwinkling of an eye,May endure thy pain or pleasure; for thou knowestThou shalt die,Whether on some breeze-kissed upland, with aFlask of mellow wine,Thou hast all the world forgotten, stretched be-Neath the friendly pine,Or, in foolish toil consuming all the springtimeOf thy life,Thou hast worked for useless silver and enduredThe bitter strife:Still unchanged thy doom remaineth. Thou artSet towards thy goal,Out into the empty breezes soon shall flickerForth thy soul,Here then by the plashing streamlet fill theTinkling glass I prayBring the short lived rosy garlands, and beHappy–FOR TODAY.

TO HIS FATHER (LP IV: 90-1):

[Malvern]

Postmark: 26 October 1913

My dear P.,

I hope it did not seem that my act of sending you the poem was meant for a ‘draw’, which it was not. All the same, thanks very much for the P.O. which has restored ‘the firm’ to its pristine health and prosperity. Anderson, one of the people in our study, has just received a huge crate of pictures from home which will enable us to sell some of our older pictures and raise capital. I had not been able to see about the extra copies of the Cherbourg magazine, as I have not yet been up to see Tubbs. I think however that I am going up today, when I shall be able to transact all my business.

On Thursday we had our field day and it was really a great affair. We started for the place, which is quite near Malvern about an hours march, at ten o’clock. W’s friend Captain Tassell was in great form, mounted on a steed of which he was obviously terrified. Of course no one knew in the least what was meant to be happening, but we all dashed about, lying down and firing at intervals: on the whole it was very enjoyable.

You ask me what type of person one meets at Malvern: I will tell you. The average Malvernian may be, in fact usually is, a very good fellow in reality, but he always does his best to make himself out as bad as possible. Never believe his own account of his thoughts, deeds, or ideals. It is always far worse than the truth. Beyond this very childish and thoroughly British foible, there are very few faults in him. When you break through the shell of foolish affectation, you find him an honest kind hearted manly enough sort of fellow. At least that is how six weeks acquaintance of him strikes me. To use for once the phrase you have condemned, ‘I may be wrong’. But I think not.

Yesterday there was a lecture in the Gym by that man Kearton who came to the Hippodrome last holidays. I must confess that I thought him very poor indeed. So we did not miss much by leaving that ‘popular house of entertainment’ alone.

The mother of Stone,

(#ulink_42b900b1-8071-58dd-aad5-8e7333c64395) one of our House Pres., has died this week and he has consequently gone home. It is a very nasty business.

your loving

son Jack.

TO HIS BROTHER (LP IV: 96):

[Malvern 2?

November 1913]

My dear W.,

Although always quite ready to fall in with your wishes whenever they are within the bounds of possibility, I always like to point out some of the more glaring absurdities in the same. It has not occurred to you that this simultaneous attack on the paternal purse will savour somewhat too much of preparation. But to proceed. The following is what I intend to write home, coming at the end of a long and cheerful letter, when he will be bucked.

‘I have heard from W. again in the course of this week, and he seems to be comfortable with Kirk, although still working at high pressure. He mentions in this last letter, as he has done frequently before, that he entertains an idea of coming down here at the end of the term and travelling home with me as we did in the old times. This of course would be exceedingly pleasant for me, especially as most of the other new boys here have got friends coming down at the end of term; and it is undoubtedly pleasanter as well as more economical to travel in pairs than singly. The Old Boy, who by the way is one of the real good points about Malvern, has asked once or twice after W., and expressed a hope that W. will come down some time soon. Of course I am aware all this has nothing to do with me, but still he seems to have set his heart on it, and as I gather from the tone of his letter he has not mentioned it to you…’

As I said, it looks rather artificial, and can’t be made much better. How are you getting on, old man? I hope this thing will work, as I am looking forward to another journey in the good old style. As you will notice in my epistle, I have made it the Oldish and not the James who wants you to come down.

(#ulink_47b9081a-259a-56d0-9e53-11a43aa1f128) I think that his name will carry more weight.

So far I am having a very good time here. You ask me what I think about Jacks.

(#ulink_82f77587-44e5-5fc9-a8d1-652af91d4d20) I’ll tell you. He’s always most awfully nice to me, spends half hall talking to me about you and Smugy and things, and never fags me or drops me; but all the same I can’t blind myself to the fact that he is an absolute ______ to most other people. But of course that doesn’t worry me.

We had field day on Thursday at Malvern. I have managed to get into my house section, ‘mirable dictu’,

(#ulink_5fb57638-7375-5d31-aecb-9abd48237e7f) although I mob all the recruit drill. I can’t go on now.

your affect.

brother Jack

TO HIS BROTHER (LP IV: 101-2):

[Malvern 9?

November 1913]

My dear W.,

You don’t seem to be having a bad time at Gt. Bookham with your visits to ‘The Laughing Husband’ and the Hippodrome etc. I wouldn’t boom these diversions over loudly in the paternal ear, as, innocent though they may be in themselves, yet they would not convey an impression of ‘good hard work’. You may bet your boots I’ve heard enough about ‘warm singlets and drawers etc.’ to last me for a life time. P. tells me that ‘when I come home he’s going to take me in hand and see that that chest of mine gets as sound as a bell’. I wonder what that means?

I don’t really know that a house tie would be worn with a black suit, but we’ll see. Anyhow you must provide the tie as I am too ‘stoney’ for anything. I am amused to see that you have fallen into the excellent Marathon trap of spending 20/-where 5/-would do. As well, I wonder if ‘Miss Thompson’ would have heard about it. No one in T. Eden’s shop ever seems to have heard of anything, do they?

It’ll be a great weight off your chest when this filthy exam is over, so I am glad that it is comparatively soon.

(#ulink_eb8c4003-04c5-53e3-a4d1-59b01f241be0) I should think you ought to pass fairly easily if you’ve been oiling with Kirk. I am longing to find out from you in the hols what Kirk is really like. A kod of the first water I should imagine by all reports.

At the end of this term we really must get Jarnfeldt’s Preludium.

(#ulink_e258bca8-1724-5db5-8b6b-d3dc4223e814) I heard it again at the Classical Orchestral Concert, and was more than ever charmed with it. Perhaps too you are right about this Marathon scheme. We can talk that over anon.

P. of course refuses to accept your scheme of taking the trip to Malvern as a birthday and Xmas gift. At least he writes to me, ‘W of course with his usual ingenuity says that this trip is going to be his Christmas and birthday present. But that is not quite the way I do things’. By the way, are we travelling home a day early or do you want to stay for the House Supper? I don’t mind staying a bit if you like, only it is so close to Xmas with that fearful problem of P’s present.

yours Jack.

TO HIS FATHER (LP IV: 104-5):

[The Sanatorium,

Malvern]

Postmark: 24 November 1913

My dear Papy,

I am sorry to hear that you are ‘thinking long’, but, as you know, there is a good reason for the absence of letters as this is the first day I have been able to write. As you say, I have a lot of things to talk about and the first is Smugy’s half term report.

I must confess that I was very disappointed in it. But I should have expected it all. For, the fact of the matter is about this Greek Grammar, that I know very little indeed: and the consequence of this is that what the rest of the form are running over in a sort of casual way for the third or fourth time, I am often learning for the first time in my life. This of course makes it rather difficult to keep up with the running. Then again, there are a lot of points of Greek grammar which I learnt up in furious haste at Cherbourg in the last few moments before the exam–and of course forgot again. These have to be faced with a half knowledge which is worse than ignorance, because it only muddles one’s brain. But all these things should come right in time; as I flatter myself I am not cursed with ‘an inability to grasp the elements’ of any reasonable subject. As for the place in form, I was prepared for it to be poor, as the general standard of the form is rather beyond me–seeing that with the exception of the other scholars it consists of people who have filtered through to Smugy’s care just at the end of their Malvern career. However, I get on well with Smugy and really that is half the battle.

You need not have been so worried about my temporary indisposition. It is only one of those trifling, although irritating chills to which I am subject in the winter months. Anyway, the worst of it is over now, as I am up in my room at the San. today. The San. is about the most curious place I have ever been in. I arrived here a week ago on Friday and was placed in a bed in a large and many windowed apartment, in one corner of which a fire was cheerfully engaged in belching forth dense clouds of smoke, which rendered it well nigh impossible to see or breathe. Conquering a natural terror of at once becoming unconscious in such an atmosphere, I resigned my self to sleep that night–but not for long. I soon discovered to my cost that the room in which I had been deposited was directly over the kitchen. I was apprised of this fact by the musical efforts of the domestic staff, whose vigorous and unwholesome concert was prolonged far into the night. But the funniest thing about this place is the noises that one hears in the morning. I really cannot imagine what the staff do. Judging from the loud peals of laughter and the metallic clangs which strike my ears before breakfast daily, they engage in hand to hand combat with the fire irons.

After a short period of the smoky room I was removed to a smaller but much more comfortable chamber where I still remain. Here my only trouble is the determined ‘quacking’ of a body of geese imprisoned somewhere in the neighbourhood.