The Henson Journals

[156]

Saturday, June 10th, 1922.

More sheafs of questions from the income tax people! The one thing that I want, and cannot get, is their demand, that I may satisfy it!

Laws reports that both the pigs have been found dead in their sties. This is both humiliating and costly.

Ella, Fearne, Clayton and I motored into Durham, & there I preached from the throne to a considerable congregation of women, past & present students of St Hilda's Training College. My text was S. Mk. X. 44. "Whosoever wd be first among you shall be servant of all", and I took up my parable against the base mechanical spirit which now holds the minds of the elementary school teachers. The Precentor celebrated, and there were nearly 300 communicants. It was a moving & significant spectacle that I looked down upon from my Throne. After lunching with Clayton in the Castle, I attended a meeting of the Diocesan Conference: My Presidential address dealt solely with the question of the right age for Confirmation. I don't think the Conference liked what I said, but they listened very closely, and the effect must needs be educative. Then Gouldsmith introduced the Resolutions on the new method of financing the Diocesan Fund. He spoke badly, & all the speakers were hostile. I made a virtue of necessity, & advised him to withdraw his Resolutions. This was done, & the Conference dispersed having "sat on" the Bishop triumphantly!!

[157]

I was certainly surprised at the general hostility of the Conference, and think there must have been some active canvassing against the proposals. I think Gouldsmith is not very popular: and that any suggestion to alter the existing method is resented as almost a personal affront by those who have acquired a measure of personal importance by working it. Still the complete absence of support for resolutions which were readily adopted by the Board of Finance astonished me.

I went to the Chapter House, and formally witnessed the taking of the Oath of Allegiance, & the making of the legal declaration of Assent: and I urged the candidates to realize the gravity of what they did.

Then I dined pleasantly at the Castle in Hall: and after dinner went to the Deanery, and delivered a final "charge" to the Ordination Candidates. When this was over, I motored back to Auckland with William.

A tiresome confusion has arisen about the date of my preaching in Westminster Abbey, but the responsibility does not lie with me. I was able to send Charles his own letter in which he accepted my substitution of the 18th for the 20th of June: evidently he omitted to report the change of dates, and in the interval has himself forgotten that he made it!!

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