The Henson Journals

[22]

Thursday, June 12th, 1919.

The weather seems to have broken at last. Today, there is a falling glass, a high wind, & occasional essays at rain. Olive & her mother left us in the forenoon. I employed myself on the letter for the diocesan Messenger. To lunch came Mr Ward–Jackson & his wife. He is evidently being harried by the clergy for having drawn back on the Enabling Bill. He had never seen the Bill, and was rather startled when he did see it. I comforted him by pointing out that, after all, not one tenth of the clergy in his constituency had written to him!

In the afternoon Ella & I visited the Horse & Cattle Show. There were some amazingly fine animals exhibited, but the spectacle mainly bored me, for there was a violent wind which raised the dust, & the dust of a cattle show is the nastiest in the world. We dined with Frank James and met there his brother–in–law, Sir Walter Lawrence, an interesting & intelligent man, who had recently returned from Palestine. He says that the Zionist adventure is foredoomed to failure. The country cannot sustain a large population, and it is already occupied by non–Jewish people, who will not welcome the new arrivals from Europe. The outlook is certainly unpromising.

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