The Henson Journals

[71]

Monday, April 24th, 1922.

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The Dean and Huxley's grand–daughter Awdry, his girl guest, accompanied me to the station. I left Gloucester at 10.10 a.m., and went through to Leeds, where I arrived at 3.12 p.m. There I changed stations, and finally reached Ripon about 4.30 p.m. The Bishops of Carlisle and Wakefield were in the train. We all proceeded to the Palace, where we were kindly welcomed by the Bishop. After tea we fell to work on the doctrinal statement, and, after two hours work, reached agreement on a draft, which was a hybrid of all the suggested drafts.

William wrote to say that the Birmingham people will not release the car before next week. He suggests that he had best sleep in Birmingham on Wednesday night, and motor through to Auckland on Thursday, May 14th, picking me up at York, where I shall have gone for the meeting of Convocation.

The Palace, Ripon, is a commodious but commonplace building, placed in a park of considerable size. It is said to be inconvenient for diocesan purposes, and the "reformers" desire to get rid of it. As the see only dates from the XIXth century, there are no historical associations worth considering. Strong is evidently getting hold of the diocese, and revealing as a bishop the same admirable qualities as marked his behaviour as a dean, & earned for him such remarkable popularity in Oxford.

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