The Henson Journals

[46]

5th Sunday after Easter, May 13th, 1917.

1014th day

Before breakfast I wrote a letter to the "Record" under the heading' "Exchange of Pulpits & the Rights of the Laity". The post brought me a letter from Ernest, and also one from Hutton. At Mattins Watkins preached a sermon which was almost inaudible to me in my stall. After the Benediction I read the King's Proclamation. I attended Evensong, and afterwards the Gees called with Simpson of S. Paul's. I spent an hour in shewing him over the house & the cathedral. I wrote to Mr Hamilton–Hoare in answer to his very civil letter about the Warden. He is evidently an ancient man, but not unwilling to have a hand in a Memoir of an old friend. There is, perhaps, some danger of my being submerged by reminiscences, which are too general & discursive for my purpose. However, that is preferable to a total lack of material, which at present seems the more prob1able fate. I am reading Jowett's 'Life of Letters'. His letters are admirable compositions; they abound in dicta of permanent value; & treat freely of subjects which will always engage the attention of serious men. But the Warden's correspondence, so far as I have yet gone, had not this character. It limits itself to the immediate point, generally some business matter, & hardly ever goes into anything of general interest. The Journals are equally destitute (save for a few passages) of biographical value. He was devoted to his friends, but does not seem to have "opened out" to them on paper. Perhaps, one reason for this was their proximity. Willert, Raper, & Strachan–Davidson were his closest friends, and they all lived in close & frequent personal intercourse. They were within conversational range. In All Souls he was on terms of friendship with Doyle, Compton, Mowbray, & some of the younger men, but he met them at short intervals, stayed in their houses, shot & travelled with them, rarely wrote them letters of intimacy & value. This, I think, must be the reason for the disappointing quality of his letters, at least of those which I have seen.

The day became sultry towards the close: there was thunder & rain about 10 p.m.

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