[No surviving envelope]
Letter 33.
Since I last wrote I have two letters, one from a place at Nantucket with an extraordinary name, and the first from Concord, of the 21st September. I have also received your birthday cable, which of course gave me great satisfaction; and which arrived just long enough after my birthday (spent in Swansea) for me to take it myself on the telephone. In your letter from ‘the Gordon Folger’ your ink ran out, and, for the first time, some of what you wrote in pencil completely defeated me. Your pencil writing is never the clearer for its journey, but what you wrote on the back of a sheet on which you had written in ink with a thick pen on the other side, has proved quite undecipherable. I was however able to read the first sheet, and assured myself that you had not been caught at Nantucket by the hurricane, ofEliot, Henry Ware, Jr. (TSE's brother);i5 which Henry had told me, as I feared. I was also able to read your reproaches about Mrs. Elsmith, which I agree I fully deserve: and the sun shall not get down to-day until I have written to her. Your second letter was still more welcome. OwingHale, Emilyphotographs of;w7in a group;e7 to the habit of amateur photographers of posing their objects either with the sun full in their faces, or in complete shadow, the photographs are not wholly satisfactory: but it is evident that your figure has not suffered in the last five years – if anything, rather too thin; and in the group, I assure you that you look the most juvenile of the three. Perhaps the new hair-cut contributes: I can’t see it well enough to make sure that I like it, but I think I do. The setting is very charming and peaceful looking; and altogether, qua snapshots, these give me much contentment.
IEnglandLondon;h1in wartime;d4 imagine that if my news about Russell Square had been sent earlier, it would have been blacked out before it reached you. In any case, public announcements of buildings damaged are not issued immediately. Lincoln’s Inn, I understand, is not structurally damaged, only the usual blasting of windows and doors: it was Staple Inn (you may remember the front in Holborn – but that part remains – that was badly injured.1 No complete list of damaged public buildings has been issued, or is likely to be for some time, I should expect. IKnowles, Sylvia Hathaway;a7 am sorry to hear of Sylvia Knowles’s elm trees. Your description of your room in Concord sounds charming – but is it only ‘a room’ in the singular? I should like you to have two rooms, anyway: I think it makes all the difference in feeling at home, to be able to go from one room to another and both your own, and not to have to sleep, work, etc. all in one room. And your round of work sounds very heavy indeed: is that due to wartime contraction of the staff, or would you be expected to do so much at any time?
IUniversity College of North Walesphotograph of TSE's visit;a7 enclose a snapshot of myself, which, though made by a professional, is not as complimentary as yours (but what looks like a bald spot is only sunlight).2 YouAssociation of Bookmen of Swansea and West Waleslecture recounted;a6 will notice that not only the Mayor of Swansea, but his wife also, wears chains of office: a custom, so far as I know, which must be peculiar to Swansea, or perhaps of this particular mayor, who is a brewery manager and a stout Conservative. AldermanLabour Party, the;a4 Percy Morris, also in the picture, is a pillar of the Labour Party: otherwise, they might be brothers. Several of the group are local booksellers – I really went, qua publisher, to oblige the booksellers who support the Association of Bookmen of Swansea and West Wales. It was all really very pleasant, and apart from having to stand in a queue at Paddington for an hour to get onto the platform for the South Wales Express, I had a comfortable journey both ways; and I was treated with homely and genuine hospitality. The'What is Minor Poetry?';a2 speech I made will appear in ‘The Welsh Review’. There is a huge gap in the middle of Swansea: the middle of the town was bombed and burnt out in the early blitz, before they started coming to London at all: but their Guildhall, of which they are very proud, and which I must say is a very grand affair, built in 1937, is intact. I was especially interested in examining the Criminal Court part of it, and was able, on the same occasion, to stand in the dock, the witness box, the jury box, and sit in the judge’s chair. I also visited the cells. This, by the way, is my first experience of a Criminal Court (or any other).
ThisBooks Across the SeaAGM;a4 weekend I have to prepare my presidential address for ‘Books Across the Sea’ annual general meeting, and go up on Monday for a night in order to deliver it: then I have to go up again on Wednesday, andVirgil Society, TheTSE's Presidental Address for;a3 again on Saturday just for the day in order to deliver myWhat is a Classic?;a7 presidential address to the Virgil Society on Saturday afternoon. After that no particular engagements – exceptHarrow SchoolPoetry Society addressed;a1 to go to Harrow to meet the boys’ Poetry Society, andChurchill Club, The;a2 at the end of November speak again to the Churchill Club for American Soldiers (which suspended its entertainments during the worst of the flybomb period). FaberFaber, Geoffreyin nursing home;k2 is in a nursing home in London having his antrum operated upon; MrsMrs Millington (the blind masseuse)traces TSE's cramp to Harvard;a2 Millington, the blind masseuse, is now convinced that my writers’ cramp (which has been somewhat aggravated by the work I have done on the lawn at Shamley) isHarvard Universitywhere TSE's writers' cramp began;b7English 26 (Modern English Literature)
Your photographs, somehow, have made me feel happier.
MegNason, Margaret ('Meg') Geraldinesends TSE birthday cake;a3 sent me a birthday cake as usual (a very good one) and a letter which I will not enclose in this lest I make it too heavy. They have had 70 to 80 people a day to tea during the summer, she says; and she and Doreen were just leaving for a fortnight’s holiday.
1.Staple Inn, an impressive part-Tudor building located on the south side of High Holborn in central London, was damaged by a German flying bomb on 24 Aug.
2.Cutting enclosed of published picture, presumably from a Swansea newspaper.
3.HenryEliot, Henry Ware, Jr. (TSE's brother) Ware Eliot (1879–1947), TSE’s older brother: see Biographical Register.
11.GeoffreyFaber, Geoffrey Faber (1889–1961), publisher and poet: see Biographical Register.
2.SylviaKnowles, Sylvia Hathaway Hathaway Knowles (1891–1979), of New Bedford, Mass. – a descendant of a long-established merchant and business family based there – was a friend and room-mate of EH from their schooldays at Miss Porter’s School in Farmington, Vermont.
1.MargaretNason, Margaret ('Meg') Geraldine (Meg) Geraldine Nason (1900–86), proprietor of the Bindery tea rooms, Broadway, Worcestershire, whom TSE and EH befriended on visits to Chipping Campden.