Complete Works of Kenneth Grahame
Page 95
‘Mouse and Saunders have become very good friends and now call each other “old chap” and he goes to tea there when he likes. You seem to have been having a splendid time, both of you, and you won’t care to tear yourselves away, even for Venice. The card you sent me of Innsbruck was beautiful, and rather tugged at me. But foreign places all do. We are fixed here for August anyway, and a bit of September. After that — I don’t know; there are possibilities.
‘You don’t say if the boys have had all the climbing they wanted. Sooner them nor me. Something with a restaurant on its airy summit is quite good enough for me.
‘Yours most sincerely,
‘KENNETH GRAHAME
‘E. is most tremendously obliged for the dental silk, wh duly arrived.’
‘Boham’s,
‘Blewbury, Didcot,
‘Berkshire, England,
‘24th August 1910
‘DEAR PURVES, — I have intended that you should find this waiting for you at Philadelphia on your return, as a sort of a greeting from a continent which by that time will seem very strange and far away, in time and space; but Mrs. Purves’s cheery letter, which we read with much delight, has put it in my power to catch your boat, with luck, at the pleasant city of Marseilles — where I once ate a perfectly whacking and stupendous quantity of bouillabaisse. So this will not be a greeting, but a valediction. Well, you seem to be quitting in the right spirit; not damning your luck, as most of us do at the end of a holiday, but blessing it; and by so doing you shall take your holiday back with you as a keepsake, not leave it hopelessly behind. Perhaps “Blessed are those who bless their luck” is an eleventh Beatitude, got dropped out somehow — with one or two others.
‘Thank you very much for negotiating that N. York draft for me — I sent you a meagre card of acknowledgement at the time. And many thanks for the colour print of the “Pan You have a fine possession awaiting you — the god in the best aspect of remote and withdrawn seclusion, piping to “Water, first of singers I am keenly looking forward to the prints you have kindly promised to send me (the missing ones, by the way, have never turned up).
‘I have your letter of 21st — for which much thanks. And it is good indeed of you to be sending Mouse a cape for the storms that daily drench us here. He will be truly proud when it reaches him — and he will have a dry skin as well, which a proud spirit cannot give. He continues to be very happy and contented here. He has had three expeditions to Oxford also, all in beautiful weather; and in a fortnight or so we hope to go in again, for the big annual Fair of St. Giles’, which will be a delirium of caravans and roundabouts and hideous noises. The day after to-morrow there is another Sheep Fair at East Ilsley, and we hope to be in the thick of it. So you see, if we don’t get to the Passion Plays and Venices and things, we have our own little diversions.
‘Your hospitable and tempting invitation to come over and stay with you is not being docketed and pigeon-holed, but is being kept fully in our minds as affecting any future plans. Meantime I can only say that if at some later date the thing should prove possible, we shall bring it off, with much light-heartedness; and we do not need your assurances that we shall be comfortable, free and happy. That is the one thing of which we are completely confident.
‘And now good luck to you all, and a fair voyage, and an even keel. And may a prospering wind fill the sails the Venezia hasn’t got, and bring you speedily in sight of the dear old Custom-house which will tell you that you are really “Home”.
‘Yours most sincerely,
‘KENNETH GRAHAME’
‘Boham’s,
‘Blewbury, Didcot,
‘Berkshire, England,
‘30th Sept. 1910
‘DEAR PURVES, — Yesterday arrived the packet containing the two beautiful pictures (Jason and Bellerophon), doubly welcome, i e for themselves, and as telling us you were safely home again, with the rest of the Argonauts — at least I hope so. I don’t know why it was, but the Venezia never appeared in the Shipping News, either as starting or arriving or doing anything else — she didn’t even find an uncharted rock, apparently. Unexciting sort of vessel. We sent you a couple of parting screeds to Marseilles, and hope the Venezia condescended to admit them on board.
‘The two prints are exceedingly beautiful things. Imbued with the true classical spirit, they recall long-forgotten but haunting Virgilian phrases, and will send me back I think to that delightful author — if I can find my boyhood’s copy among the debris that still strews the shores of Boham’s. Thank you very much for them and for your promptness in sending them.
‘Mouse’s rain-cloak arrived in due course and he was installed its proud possessor. He highly approves of its cut and style, and so does his governess, who finds it light and convenient to carry. It is probably due to the cloak that, since it arrived, we have hardly had any rain at all; and just now we seem to be having a little bit of our lost summer. This morning Mouse and I went to see Farmer Saunders and buy some apples — and first we went up a ladder into the apple-loft, and sampled every sort of apple and filled our pockets — and then we sat in the parlour and discussed circuses, and all three of us agreed that they were the only thing worth living for.
‘While you have sailed across half the world nothing has happened here except that the Michaelmas daisies have come out. O, and St. Giles’s Fair at Oxford, which M. and I visited and had a dizzy day riding around on pink bears, swinging to the clouds in Dreadnoughts. Next Thursday is our own fair, which doubtless all the world will attend.
‘Yours very truly,
‘KENNETH GRAHAME’
‘Boham’s,
‘Blewbury, Didcot,
‘Berkshire,
‘England, 18th Oct. 1910
‘DEAR PURVES, — I hasten to acknowledge receipt of your letter of the 11th.
‘I received and read the Maxfield Parrish letters with great delight and the consciousness of a vivid personality behind each written word; and I much appreciated your kind offer of them for my own keeping. I am, however, sending them back; for I feel very strongly that a letter has a peculiar and direct and special appeal for the recipient, which no one else can entirely share; and you will like to glance over these again, on some happy idle day that is surely to come.
‘We have been living through a strenuous time of Fairs, — the tale of Blewbury Fair must await a more leisurely letter — the glory and colour of it all, the friendly show-people and their vans, and the maddening whirl of the roundabouts. I dare not embark on the subject at this late hour of the night.
‘Yours most truly,
‘KENNETH GRAHAME’
‘Boham’s,
‘Blewbury, Didcot,
‘Berkshire, England,
‘12th Jan. 1911
‘DEAR PURVES, — I have been a shamefully long time in acknowledging your beautiful Christmas present — but I have been laid up in bed with a sharp attack of bronchitis, which has interfered sadly with my Christmas duties, and pleasures too for that matter, and other people’s also; but that is over for the present, though I have to sit indoors over a fire and not run about over the downs, as I would fain be doing.
‘The book is a charming book, and a fresh instance of Pierre Marot’s care and thoughtfulness in choosing for me just the thing I like best. You are very fortunate to possess those fine and stately pictures, and I like to think that you’ve got them. And I’ve got the book — and thank you very much.
‘We have not had much fun this winter — too much wet for gadding about. But Mouse goes to children’s parties and is very happy. He goes to school after Easter and is much pleased and excited at the prospect. It is a nice place in Dorsetshire, near the coast, with beautiful bathing and surroundings. We took a short trip to that part of the country in November and liked it much.
‘I have got possession of my “barn” — you may remember the outside of it — I have put a good stove in, and most of my books, and it makes a very decent study indeed, and gives us more room, wh
ich we wanted, though you’d be surprised at the way we have “settled in” since you were here and the place was still all straw and packing-cases. The new study also takes art very freely and your family bas-relief — the plaster cast — is there, with much else of varying merit.
‘The Saunderses were much pleased and flattered to get your Christmas card. The boy and they continue to be great friends, and he takes tea with them most Sundays. Blewbury hibernates during the winter and you don’t meet people unless you go and knock them up, when you find them by excellent fires and they give you ginger-wine in exchange for news. No fairs, no sheep markets, no riding round on gaily-coloured wooden horses with their names painted on their necks. But at Easter we shall wake up again, when the gay caravans take to the road once more. Sometimes we have the hounds though, and Mouse and I had a wonderful bit of luck one morning in November, when the hounds ran into their fox at our very feet and we saw every detail of the kill and the “breaking up” and then Mouse shyly asked the huntsman to “blood” him — do you know the nasty process? And this the good-natured man did and presented him with the brush as well, and he was proud indeed.
‘With love to you all.
‘Yours most sincerely,
‘KENNETH GRAHAME’
‘Boham’s,
‘Blewbury, Didcot,
‘Berkshire, England,
‘7th February 1911
‘DEAR PURVES, — Very many thanks for your letter of the 25th Jan.
‘We are all four for Cornwall three days hence, if nothing intervenes. First to the Lizard, for two or three weeks, then, I hope, to Fowey. I want Mouse to make the acquaintance of my Cornish haunts, and friends, before he goes to school — then he may like to go back there. So my next letter may be from familiar scenes and contain tidings of gulls and lobsters. Meantime good-bye and thanks again.
‘Yours most sincerely,
‘KENNETH GRAHAME’
‘Boham’s,
‘Blewbury, Didcot,
‘Berkshire,
‘England, 15 th May 1911
‘DEAR PURVES, — Many thanks for your interesting letter of the 21st March. This reached me when we were established at St. Catherine’s House, Fowey, and of course ought to have been answered from that classic spot. But I found the arrangements of the house (which was also very full most of the time) very uncomfortable for correspondence, and I may say here, that we were greatly disappointed in St. C.’s, and the way it is now run. I went there because I thought it would be more simple and homelike for the boy and his governess than the hotel, which I should have preferred; but there was a skimping and a pinching everywhere, which was not agreeable. Skimping in food, in lights, in chamber linen, in hot water even. Complaints were general, and for my part I shall not go there again. It is indeed becoming a little difficult to find accommodation at Fowey. The doctors have begun to send convalescents there, the G.W.Ry advertises it assiduously, and although it was still a fortnight to Easter when we left, the place was as full as in summer.
‘Well, enough of that side of it, the town itself, the harbour, the river, greeted us with all their old charm. Bigger steamers than ever come up to the “tips”, the clay is loaded by electricity, and the work goes on night and day. Fowey is prospering, and new houses have been built, out Point Neptune way; but the quays and the old town and the harbour-front are the same as ever — the same mud, the same fish heads and guts (apparently). Also the same Q, looking not a day older and even more beautifully dressed than formerly. Mouse was particularly struck with Q’s clothes. I think he then realized, for the first time, that Man, when he chooses to give his mind to it, is incomparably the finer animal of the two, and does the greater justice to clothes. (Soldiers and peacocks know this already, of course.) He observed solemnly to me, after contemplation of a certain suit of checks — Irish homespun — that “Q. was his idea of a hero of a novel”. The “Haven” was “done up” too, last autumn, in a new suit of excellent style and taste, and sparkled with cleanliness and colour. Mouse and Foy became good friends at once, and had many teas and walks together, and expeditions to the farm—” Priam’s Cellars.”
— which flourishes exceedingly. One sunny day we all went over there with a large luncheon basket, and lunched in the open, off “hoggy puddin” and other good things, in a riot of daffodils and primroses, with three big foreign ships — Danes and Norwegians — moored right below us, and all the merry harbour traffic passing busily up and down. They have struck water there — a spring from the rock — and made a tank for water-lilies, and the clearance has made great progress. The terraces of the old garden, that were there hundreds of years ago, show clearly in places.
‘Also, we had several expeditions to Rosebank and had two of Atky’s “special” luncheons — i e mostly fancy hors d’oeuvres and every sort of sausage — and Mouse had several teas, with gramophone, and liberty to potter about among all the books, and objects. He had not begun sailing, but was busy “fitting out” in the boat-house. He has been doing a lot of carpentering this winter, and that seems to have done him good.
‘One specially warm and sunny day I took M. and his governess up to tea at Lerryn, “on a tide”, sailing up and rowing back. There is to me a tremendous sense of age about Lerryn — if I were painting some thirteenth or fourteenth century incident, I would be content to take Lerryn water-side, with the old bridge, for background; just as it is — indeed it has probably altered little since those days.
‘Bevil was back from Oxford part of the time, but we didn’t see much of him. He was on the water all the time — sailing, sailing, sailing.
‘Mouse has asked to be taken back to Fowey some day soon, which is a good sign — but I fancy, on the whole, he liked the Lizard best. To be sure he went there first, and we had better weather there, but the wildness, freshness, and strangeness of the Lizard, its grandeur and sparkling air, probably impressed him more than the slightly sophisticated Fowey; and he liked the simple, friendly people, who were all so nice to him and let him run in and out of their places, and had him to tea, and called me “Mr. Kenneth”, as I was known to them four-and-twenty years back. But the cliffs are not really safe for children, so I shall not hurry to take him back till he’s a good deal older.
‘By the way, I thought “Lady Good-for-nothing” excellent, and quite in Q’s best and finest manner.
‘Since we got back from Cornwall we have been very busy fitting M. out for school and getting him off. The joy and pride of a complete new outfit of clothes — including even “Eton” jacket and trousers for Sundays — no doubt mitigated the pangs. At any rate he made the great plunge last Monday, going off very manfully and composedly and, from what we hear, he is falling into the ways of the new life very well. It is very quiet here now without him.
‘I hope your influenza is all over by now and that P. M. has emerged from the trial all new and shiny, and that the boys continue on their wild careers without check or hindrance. Blewbury is slow in waking up after the winter, but the farmers are all busy and happy, for it has been grand farming weather for weeks and both fruit and crops look most promising. The place itself is a mass of blossom and colour.
‘The enclosed lobster is for Jerry, in memory of the past lobsters that died nobly in a good cause. Alas, I never see a lobster now in this inland village. If I were to meet one walking on the downs, I would fall on his neck with tears of joy, and I would lead him gently home, and we would not part again, never, never.
‘With warmest regards and the best of good wishes from both of us to all of you.
‘Ever yours sincerely,
‘KENNETH GRAHAME’
‘Boham’s,
‘Blewbury, Didcot,
‘Berkshire,
‘England, 16th Aug. 1911
‘DEAR PURVES, — Thank you very much indeed for the beautiful Maxfield Parrish colour print you sent me — the pie picture. It is a noble piece of colour, and I am glad indeed to possess it. Of course it ought to have been
acknowledged long ago — and your two letters — and there is also Mrs. Purves’s letter to E. and the two Print Collector’s Quarterlies, the five magazines, and the gift of photos.
‘We never expected you to write at all during your terrible heat-wave. How thankful you must have felt that the boys were away. Here we have been having a bit of a wave too, in our own small English way. People have been crying out, of course — but, to me, it has been the most glorious summer that I remember. I never saw such colour in the crops — burnt to a fierce tawny red. What is getting serious is the drought — practically no rain in these parts for two months, and no sign of it. The farmers are hard put to it to find food for their beasts, and sheep are fetching wretched prices in the market.
‘We are staying on here quietly, for the present, for Mouse’s summer holidays. He seems quite happy and contented here which is as it should be. When he is older, perhaps, he may find it a bit dull. He brought home good reports, and says he liked it from the first day.
‘We had several pleasant trips to Oxford before the hot weather set in. Since then it has not been possible to make any expeditions — at least it was possible, but it would not have been very wise. I take a siesta, foreign fashion, from 2 to 4, and later, get up on the downs, where there is generally a breeze. I hope soon to get some boating on the Thames; but since I last wrote to you, our life has been most uneventful. Not even any fairs as yet. Owing to the coronation, when we poor country folk spent all our hoarded pennies in decorations, &c., the dates of all the village fetes and fairs have been fixed for us late in the summer as possible, to give us a chance of saving a few more pennies for shows and roundabouts. But when we get our harvest money, we shall be rich again, and the fun will begin. Then we will ride on noble steeds of wood, with their names painted in gold on their necks (they are all named after famous racehorses of old time), and shy for cocoa-nuts, and swing till we are sick — at least I shall be sick.