The Henson Journals

[107]

Saturday, March 14th, 1931.

A beautiful bright day, almost springlike. I left the Deanery after breakfast, and went to the Athenæum, where I deposited my bags, & visited the hairdresser and the book–seller. Then I returned to the Club, & wrote to Cecil Fortescue. After this I went to the Temple, and lunched with the Master of the Temple, before going to the Temple Church for the marriage of Miss Helen Roche to Mr Waldy of Darlington. The Church appeared to be nearly full of guests. Making my apologies for avoiding the reception I went back to the Athenæum, killed an hour by running through a book on Peter the Great, (who is represented as a homicidal maniac of enormous energy and sheer savagery.) and then proceeded to King's Cross, where I took the Pullman Express, which left at 4.45 p.m. and arrived (theoretically) at 9.37 p.m., and actually about a quarter of an hour later. Leng met me with the car, & carried me to the Castle. There had been another snow storm in the morning, & snow lay on the landscape. Was it wise, reasonable, or anyway defensible that I should waste two days, when I am much pressed by work, expend £5 when I am menaced by poverty, & provoke the resentments of the orthodox by officiating at a wedding in Lent?

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