The Henson Journals

[107]

Thursday, December 31st, 1914.

150th day

I struggled all the morning with the attempt to write a sermon on prayer, as a fitting prelude to the Intercession service. But I had no success. The subject is beyond me. Ella & I lunched with the Ritsons. Their son, an officer in the Inniskillens now on the staff of General French, was home for short leave. I had some interesting conversation with him. He says that the German soldiers behave well enough, & get not rarely into kindly relations with our men. Thus he knew of a football match being arranged in one place between the hostile troops! But the officers were an unpleasing set. He said that the Indians had been cut about a good deal, that they were perforce recognizing the superiority of the white soldiers, that they could not stand the trenches. He thought the war would be over by June.

Then we called to inquire for John Wilson. I went to his bed–room, and found the old man very weak & broken. Then I looked in at the Town–hall, & said grace at the tea which some good ladies had arranged for the children of soldiers. Before & after midnight the bells of the cathedral rang out merrily to mark the passing of one tragical year, & the beginning of another. Linetta insisted on my reading (!) a dolourous poem of Leonardi addressed to the moon, & conceived in the mood of suicidal melancholia!! Truly the happenings of this year might excuse the suicide, & compel the melancholia. During the last 12 months I have preached in the following Cathedrals:– 1. Durham. 2. Oxford. 3. Belfast. 4. Winchester. 5. Norwich. 6. Canterbury. 7. Manchester. 8. Carlisle. 9. S. Paul's. 10. Glasgow. 11. Edinburgh. Also I preached in Westminster Abbey, Stratford on Avon, & Aston. On only two Sundays in the year have I not officiated, & of the remaining fifty there are scarcely any on which I have not preached once or twice. I have preached in sixteen parish churches within the diocese.

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