The Henson Journals

[119]

Tuesday, July 24th, 1917.

1086th day

The weather continues very hot. I adventured being shaved by the local barber. The accounts from Russia are distressing. In a week the Germans have regained all Brussiloff's conquests, & are now established in an excellent position. Meanwhile the Russian Army is drifting quickly into anarchy. I wrote to Jimmy Adderley who is in France at a Church Army Hut, & to a chaplain who had written to me about the question of the clergy being subject to military service. We lunched at the Vicarage. There were no other guests. Mr Serres has been here from no less than 19 years, &, as a result of all that long ministry, appears to wield no influence among the people. His large garden (4½ acres) mainly occupies his mind and time. For the rest, he is "stale", and ill–contented with his work, and possibly with himself. Yet the parish church has an attractive aspect. The services are numerous, & reverently rendered: on paper everything looks well enough. Yet there is no life or reality anywhere. One asks whether if the Church were withdrawn, the spiritual effect would be perceptible.

Later Marion took me to her Hospital, where I had some talk with the Matron, and afterwards sate with the men in the garden, & talked with them. It is rare indeed that one comes across a bad face in these wounded soldiers. Mostly they have candid & winning countenances, somewhat refined & exalted by physical weakness. I judge that the "war–weariness" which is so evident at home is also present in the armies. This sudden & spreading collapse of Russia will certainly tell potently on our own people. They see actually taking place the very event to which for many years past the Apostles of Socialism have bidden them look forward, viz. the refusal of the conscripts to fight. That is an example more likely to be appreciated in free countries than in countries which are enslaved. France, England, & Italy are more endangered by the Russian precedent than Germany, Austria, & Turkey. All points to a dénoûment of anarchy!

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