The Henson Journals

[21]

Wednesday, December 18th, 1918.

I got up, & came down to an early lunch. After lunch there was a meeting of the standing Ctee of the Dioc: Confce. It was decided on the motion of Mr Wheeler to treat the existing Conference as valid for the purpose of the present election: and to issue the requisite notices for the purpose. This the secretaries, Col: Middleton & Canon Bannister, undertook to do forthwith. A meeting of the Book–Box Ctee was attended by Bannister, and two laymen, of whom the only one whose name I could identify was Wiltshire, the clerk to the County Education Ctee. This gentleman announced that the late Bishop had transferred the Fund to Trustees, & thus taken it altogether out of the hands of his successor in the see. This announcement made everybody look very silly! It makes no real difference, & relieves me of responsibility for the Fund. But it is an odd, furtive, inexplicable way of doing business.

I wrote to Gamble, James Adderley, and a Mr Molesworth, who sent me an interesting account of his dealings with the sectaries in a large Norfolk parish. Also I wrote to Pearce. The proof of my letter to the diocese arrived from the printers. It is cold, stilted, and limited in range, but it will have to serve. There are disadvantages attaching to a chronic inability to "fall into line".

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