Sunday August 22 1937

SISSINGHURST CASTLE.
KENT.

My dear James,

Our letters crossed. Or rather my postcard crossed with your
letter.

I have been terribly busy trying to write my book at the rate
of two chapters a week which means ten hours work a day. Apart
from that I have bathed every morning, gardened for an hour, and
eschued all wines, spirits, starches, sugars and fats. The result
is that I feel XXXX an look exactly the same as I did a month
ago. But I suppose it does good r ally, if only the moral good
of proving that one can discipline oneself.

I am not sure about Shiant. I know you think I admire Nigel
more than he deserves, but I do believe he is a very remarkable
and original person and that one cannot judge his actions by what
one would oneself enjoy . I daresay that for him this experience
is really valuable. You see I think his one fault ( to my mind)
is lack of imagination. I believe that this is due to a reaction
on hi part ( since his mind is terribly aloof from other minds)
against the "literary" atmosphere of his home. Shiant represents
for him all the Shelley he has refused to admire. It is a strong
and to mind a bitter tonic to take, but as he needs something

of the romantic spirit in him, I do not see that it does harm
for him to take it in one enormous gulp.

I cannot identify or follow the story about Gerry. I have a
rule in life never to be affected by things people repeat. Even
if they are true, they become wounding by the very fact that they
are repeated behind one's back. If you said to me "Harold, you
are becoming disgustingly fat" I should not mind. But if Gerry
said, "James says you are becoming disgustingly fat" I should mind
very much indeed. All repeated remarks are wounding and one should
ignore them.

I blame myself a little about the Gerry episode since I did
not fully remember how crude G. really is. But I am pleased about
Jim as he has a heart of gold. Above all I am delighted that your
religion should become something central and stable in your life.
You have sails rather larger than is quite safe for your build of
yacht and the keel must be weighted. Besides, I believe that the
Church will always be a better adbiser to you than old buffers lik
Gerry and myself.

When do you get back ? Let me know. I am down here till Octo-
ber but shall be about after that.

Bless you, James

8th January, 1938.

My dear James,

You have no conception what pleasure is given
me by your present of the bed hangings. I shall treasure
it carefully as a relic (1) of your kindness; (2) of
Byron's honeymoon, and (3) of how disturbing to the
senses are red curtains. You, with your precise and
accurate mind, may be able to tell me at what date and
under whose inspiration the people of these islands
decided that it was unhealthy to draw the curtains of
a bed at night-time. I remember my grandmother, who
died at the age of 100 in 1919, saying that nobody drew
the curtains of their beds while she could remember.

The incident at Halnaby took place five years
before my grandmother's birth and, therefore, ten years
after the Halnaby episode the custom must have gone out.
I know that both my grandmother's generation and my
mother's generation never dreamt of sleeping with their
windows open, as there was supposed to be a great danger
from what they called "night air", but they did not have
curtains to their beds or, if they did, they never drew
them.

SISSINGHURST CASTLE.
KENT.

23rd September 1938.

My dear James,

Many thanks for sending me Nigel's letter which is
indeed interesting. He takes a very sane view both of his
present occupation and the situation generally.

The difficulty about the Germans is that they always
ask for more. They started by asking for the Carlsbad
points and when we showed signs of yielding they then said
that what they wanted was annexation. When we yielded on
that they said that the Polish and Hungarian districts
should also be annexed and if we yield on that they will
say that Benesh must be removed and a pro-German government
put in his place.

I shall be up on Monday and if you like to come in
after six o'clock I shall probably be at K.B.W.

Ever yours,

19th December 1938.

My dear James,

I never send my Christmas presents on the right day since I feel so sorry for the postmen. I therefore send you the enclosed in advance. How I wish I could send you instead an appointment as Curator of the National Portrait Gallery. I am always on the look out for jobs for you and do much more about it than you imagine. I beg you not to get depressed about yourself. If you were an ordinary person you would fit into some insurance office and all your family would say "what a comfort James is". But as you aren't an ordinary person it is difficult to find the round hole into which to fit so curiously carved a peg. All this may make you feel rather dissatisfied and unhappy but don't allow these things to depress you unduly. It is infinitely better to be a person like yourself with your clever head and warm heart than to be dully competent. I feel sure that if you go on doggedly with your London Guide Book you may bring off a scoop. I have no doubt at all

Friday May 12 1939

CENTRAL 7964

4. KING'S BENCH WALK.
TEMPLE.
LONDON, E.C. 4.

My dear James,

This is just a little note to meet you on board and to remind
you that there are people on this island which you can observe
through your port-hole who will miss you very much indeed and to
whom you are an ever living memory. I well know that you will
feel very glum when you see the light of the Start dip below the
horizon and when you feel yourself yurrounded by strange people
who do not understand why you should feel bored, home-sick or
unhappy.

But James please dwell upon the bright things of life. You have
good health, a clever mind, a devoted family and a whole future
of romance and interest. During six months you will mix with uncon-
genial people in an island reeking of pitch, bitumen, angustura
and guano. But that does not mean that life has become intolerable.
You will derive an intellecutal pleasure from becoming an observer
of yourself. You will watch with pleasure this handsome young man
with the sky blue lining to his evening coat being sweet and char-
ming to the wife of the Colonial Secretary and the niece of the
district attorney. You will watch with ξη sophisticated enjoyment
how far better mannered a clever person can be than a stupid person.

And meanwhile the real James will remain there, reading his books
writing his little notes, preparing for the great work on Venezu-
ela and adjacent islands.

And after all, even in moments of gloomy despair there is
the thought of Messrs Batsford and that delightful moment when
you receive the first bound copy of your first book.

No, James, I cannot feel really sorry for you. But I do know
how irritating and depressing such occasions are and how, when the
sun begins to set over the purple sea and the bell rings along
the gloomy decks and you have to go down to dress in anticipation
of yet one other dinner--I do know how the tears will rise in
you eyes. Then think of all the people who love you over here
and who will welcome you home again with joy and jubilation.

Not in my best typing mood today somehow.

I have told the Spectator to send itself to you regu-
larly. That is the most useful present I could think of.

Yours ever, my dear James,

Friday September 28 1940

MINISTRY OF INFORMATION,
MALET ST., W.C.1.

My dear James,

I send this to your home since I doubt
whether a letter to Chatham would catch
you in time. I shall be down at Sissing-
hurst next week end ( I leave for there
this evening) but if you are passing
through at the end of next week do let me
know. I am sleeping here at the Ministry
but still use K.B.W. for baths and dress-
ing.

I don't mind your view about the war
so long as you do not air them to people
who might get you into trouble. I know it
does you good to be able to abuse a person
of my generation especially when he is in
an official job. And it does me good in
a way to hear you voicing thoughts that
I half think myself. But why you should at

abus me who have always warned people against this nightmare I am not quite clear. My line has been perfectly consistent. (1) Versailles was a mistake which could only have been redeemed by using the League as a real organization of authority and conciliation. (2) Nazism is an evil doctrine and if we once allow it to become powerful it may destroy us. (3) We must build an air force greater than that of any possible enemy.

Had we done all these things and had we smashed Italy in time over Abyssinia and had we supported the Republicans in Spain we should not now be in this mess. So why curse me for things which I have fought to remedy all my life ? Merely because it does you good to curse someone and you know that you have always the chance to bang me over the head whenever you want to.

What a funny word you invented. "quixotry". Very odd. But does it never dawn upon you that this world is made not by us ( who are a gentle people) but by the fascists and the Nazis who are not.? It is mere es- capism to blame your own people for a state of thought and action which is due entirely to a theory of violence and rapine which has either to be accepted ( as Denmark and

MINISTRY OF INFORMATION,

MALET ST., W.C.1.

Sweden have accepted it, or fought against
as we are fighting.

I wish I could really understand your
frame of mind. It seems to me to be based
upon a purely instinctive sense of anger
and panic. You feel frightend and furious
at this interruption of your life. You
have no sense of history only an acute FE
liking for historical anecdotes. And you
are like a hurt animal biting at the hands
of your friends. I can well understand
the ordinary middle class person feeling
that life would be much the same for him
if Hitler were to win and that all this
suffering is not worth it. But I do not
understand a person of intellectual and
patrician instincts such as you have to
so fine a degree, being prepared to allow
the dignity of this country be submerged
under the appalling vulgarity of the fasc-
ist idea. Anyhow it is no use arguing
about it. It must be some slight comfort
to you to feel that people of my age are
exposed to danger also and to great dis-
comfort.

Poor Ben's flat has been smashed and I
have only qith great difficulty been able
to rescue his pictures. He is now at Det-
tling which you know is not exactly a pleas-
ure resort.

There is a terrain

Sunday October 27 1940

Sissinghurst Castle,
Kent.

My dear James,

What a gloomy letter you sent me ! I wonder now whether it was
wise to urge you to join the Bird Sanctuary since I ought to have
foreseen that the Keeper might be lured away and that the poor
birds would be put in steel cages and their lovely plumage ruffled
and damaged. I feel that people like you suffer more from war than
any other type of male or female. It possesses no gdamour, no stim-
ulus, no interest and no opportunity for you. It denies and destroy
all the bright things in your life and makes you acutely unhappy in
every fibre. I think you are hard none the less on Victor. He is no
in the least a Jew - old huguenot family and all that. He is a Chris-
tian Scientist which gives him that soapy feel. But he is a kind
good man and did spare many people twelve months of horrible war
conditions. I daresay you will prefer the Octu although its name
imspires fear. You may meet Ben there. And what regiment will you
join ? Does the ides of a kilt produce the ground-swirl of the
perished leaves of hope ?

Now are you very kind about the Scots. Anyhow I will let that
pass, being so thoroughly anglicised, denationalised and internat-
ionalised myself.

The French news is bad. Very bad indeed.

I do not think that you are right when you say that civilized
life will never return. I agree that the Carlton Club, and Chats-
worth and the Ritz in Paris and Antibes may not return. Nor will
Lord Kemsley take his yachting friends to Posilippo. But you do
not care for these things. What will revive is bohemian life and
art and writing and small dinners in Soho restaurants. I remember
in the last war thinking "Life will never be the same again" As
a matter of fact after 1919 it was ten times more amusing. That ma
be the fault of everything. We loathed the war so that when it was
over our old men and our young men wallowed in the luxury of peace
But I think one of the mistakes the young make ( and I have made i
it clear in Peacemaking) is that they overrate the part played by
stupidity in life. They think that they will be far more clever
and enlightened. As we did in 1919. But human events are always
more complicated than we suppose and are not remediable beyond a
certain point.

Bless you my dear James. Vita sends her love. I hope and pray
your grey lonely days will not last for ever.

Ever yours affectionately,

December 2 L94/

December 2 1940

Monday

MINISTRY OF INFORMATION,

MALET ST., W.C.1.

My dear James,

You imagine that I as a Member of the Government am an influential man. That worries me, since if I fail to do something for you you immediately conclude that I am either unwilling or incompetent. But in fact my influence on the P.M. might be described in mathematical terms as follows:

--- &&é"; §§:11111111111111111111111111111111?____________________

NOT

None the less I am a fool. Beta minus 1:
I well know— third rater you have already told me—but still

but still

(What a bore it is if one has a literary mind not to be able either to write

legibly r to typewrite with those neatness
es and subterfuges which one would oile)
Now look at that word "oile" which I have
written. From the context you can see (
being an acute young bird) that what I
wanted to say was "like". A usual world.
I mean word. But when I say "oile"-pthat
is pub Ronald Firbank. )

As younread this youwill say "Poor
old Harold, he has been dining out." But
the awfz1 thing is that my dinner has not
yet begun. Only I have had a husy day and
send this un a hurry which lands in a mess
Anyhow--what am I out to say ? It is

MINISTRY OF INFORMATION,

MALET ST., W.C.1.

this :-

(1) Being unwilling without unbiassed banking to back my young friend, I consisted (a) The American Division. Who said that such a book would indeed be worth while (b) Sir Kenneth Clark K.C.B. who recorded in writing his opinion that you of all me was the one to write it.

Fortified by this and these opinions, I have written a letter to my opposite number (opposite number) in the W.O. (War Office) saying that we ant you to have six weeks leave.

(2) I have asked our liaison officer here whether in so doing I have committed