much love and longing to see you
Mum
You will just water the plants, won’t you?
Old Terry Bank
Kirkby Lonsdale
Westmorland
1 August [1967]
Dearest Tina,
I felt distressed at seeing you disappear, we all did, particularly as Daddy said the 2 young men sitting next to you looked very rough and we wished they were a nice English lady; but I daresay you could deal with them. Now I am waiting eagerly to hear what it is like at Courcelles-Chaussy and whether the Comtesse met you, oh dear I do think you showed considerable courage going off like that.
Meanwhile we transferred to Euston, (so sordid as it’s still all kept up by scaffolding) and had to change at Preston (antique Victorian station with Corinthian pillars in wrought iron) and catch a local to Carnforth, Maria was very patient though we had 2 nuns in the carriage who watched every morsel we ate.
I’m now sitting in the (nice) church in Kirkby Lonsdale while Willie* practises the organ (100 years old and painted with flowers and crowns on top of the pipes) she is playing the piece Bach wrote on his death-bed which is rather nice I think. The organist who is teaching her is a stout little man, terribly strict, who won’t permit her even to play for school services unless everything is perfect, so she has to come for an hour every day.
The pony is called Nutty, and is in a field opposite the house, and a TV set has now been acquired as otherwise the girls were never in, but they’re asked after supper if they would like to watch, after they’ve helped with the washing-up, I can see that Maria’s amazed at this. Hoping to go to Wordsworth’s cottage this afternoon, it’s only a little way away at the other side of the lake. There are 2 nice Jack Russell terriers and an old cat, which looks nice, like a black and yellow fur rug.
Maria and Susan are out doing the shopping, but Maria is rather cross because I haven’t enough money for postcards. I hope she soon won’t be. We’re thinking of you so much, darling Love Mum
Old Terry Bank
Kirkby Lonsdale
2 August [1967]
Dearest Tina,
In the excitement of going away I don’t believe I ever gave Daddy our address, I’m so vexed as he won’t be able to write, or to forward your letter, when it comes, but then I expect we’ll be back in London by that time, especially as poor Willie has had bad news about her mother and may have to go to Norfolk to see her in hospital, but in spite of this we are having a lovely holiday so far, wonderful mild sunshine, there’s a kind of arch out of the yard at Willie’s house and you see all the hills and clouds framed through it. Of course Ria’s still in blue jeans, already very muddy, and they are going out this morning with the pony, Nutmeg, who clearly has everybody’s measure exactly, and a lovely new green bike Susan has which I daresay Ria will prefer, up the hill tracks. We did miss you very much at Wordsworth’s cottage yesterday, it was lovely and sunshiny there too, it’s built into the hillside so that you go into the front door at one level and out of the back-door halfway up the hill. Ria read out of the guide – but very firmly, and we also had Dorothy Wordsworth’s diaries, how they managed the cooking &c. I can’t think, but we saw W’s gun, sandwich box, waterproof hat, skates and the flat-irons and goffering irons and stew-pots they had, and wash-jugs and basins – but all the walking – 12 miles to see Coleridge, 2 miles to get eggs – and they often seem to have felt ill – I didn’t realise until yesterday that Dorothy was insane for the last 20 years of her life and Mary Wordsworth went on looking after her, even after Wordsworth died, she must have been a saintly woman. The cottage rent was £8 a year, their income was £80, and tea cost 15 shillings a pound, and there were locks on the tea-caddies. They had to make their own candles out of mutton-fat in candle-moulds, and yet they did all that reading and writing – Shakespeare and sermons aloud in the evening, and Coleridge came over and read aloud his new ballad – the Ancient M! – and she doesn’t say what he thought of it!
We had a nice picnic by Grasmere and Susan and Maria swam in the lake and could see clear down to the bottom. Mrs Spyra seems far away.
Willie and Mike fell in love with the Gorges of the Tarn and want to go and live there for a year in a quaint cottage or auberge, sending the little girls to a French school. I do wonder what you are thinking of Froggyland this time
much love
Mum
Old Terry Bank
Kirkby Lonsdale
6 August [1967]
Dearest Tina,
To begin with, some little bits from the newspapers (obtained with
great difficulty as they aren’t delivered here)
1. Lord Robens has been more or less completely blamed for the Aberfan disaster, but sulks and more or less refuses to resign.
2. Dymock and Oldenshaw on the Fellows have made up their disagreement.
3. Harvey Smith’s O’Malley has been nobbled at the Royal Lancashire Show – he has twice been let out of his box at night, although Harvey had secured it with string, and ate a lot of grass in the show grounds and couldn’t jump properly next day. But Harvey S. won everything with Harvester. However it’s felt that ‘competitors’ dislike Harvey Smith so much that an unsuitable element is being brought into the gentlemanly sport. Of course we get all the Lancashire papers up here which report all this at length.
Maria is snoozing after more violent exercise – long walk taking turns with the pony and a swim in the icy cold lake above the house – the old Scotch Road where as I think I told you the Young Pretender retreated during the ‘45.
Also she had to help cook the supper and wash up! As poor Willie’s mother is dying and she had to hurry down to gloomy Ipswich General Hospital to see her, leaving everything at sixes and sevens. But Susan, the 13 year old, is managing very well, especially as Mike who has returned for the weekend is queerly strict and has inspections to see that the rooms are tidy and makes everyone change for dinner. I feared he mightn’t pass Ria’s orange bloomer suit which looks a bit voyant in Westmorland. Many strange relations (vets from Canada &c) have arrived and help themselves freely to everything, even the sanatogen tonic wine and the spinach from the garden, but they’re all quite childish and love playing ball in the yard after dinner so the girls are in fits of laughter.
Back to London tomorrow which I am afraid will be dull for Ria, but she can start revising her clothes to go to Italy: Willie rang up from Ipswich and asked us to stay longer, but I’m getting so asthmatic up here that I actually coughed up blood in the night (complain, complain) and anyway with all this trouble about her mother I daresay she’d like to be clear of visitors for a while, but it certainly is a nice place for Maria, and I’m getting very attached to Nutmeg.
Hoping to find a letter from you when we get back –
very much love Mum
185 Poynders Gardens
London, sw4
9 August [1967]
Dearest Tina,
Many thanks for nice long informative letters, which we are reading eagerly. So glad the water is back, and I quite see there is nothing to do either in Metz, or on your day off, so it looks as though this time will have to be written off, except for the study of literature française. It was all very well for the Austrian girl as apparently she had some relations or friends in Metz. So glad too that the bites are somewhat better, but surely if you run out of medical supplies, such as elastoplast, the Comtesse would give you some? But perhaps the aristocracy don’t have such things. Haemophilia?
Feel the anti-German thing is definitely bad, but agree that all must be attributed to living in Alsace-Lorraine (don’t forget La Dernière Classe!) But perhaps better not to say so.
The whole valley of the Lune (where we were with Auntie Willie) has now flooded owing to heavy rains and cottages are being carried away, just a day or so after we left. I think Maria really did enjoy it, and felt pleased when she cantered briskly about on the pony and explained to Mike (who has a mania that town children can’
t do anything, and do ‘damage’ all the time) that ‘Tina had taught her’. Fortunately asthma reduced my impulse to get everything cleaned up and enter him for the local Agricultural Show, which includes a shepherd’s crook-jumping competition.
Alas, poor Daddy couldn’t manage the paint-spray and didn’t dare scrape off what he’d done, so the bath is not a great success, but hope it will pass – perhaps fit a dimming lampshade?
Alison is going to France for 3 days as Mr Packer doesn’t like to be out of the country longer (why?) and so Ria may have to come up to Bedford with me to see Miss C., but still it won’t kill her. Our tickets have now come from Lunns with an absurd brochure, advising you not to forget the name of your hotel, and to stick to English dishes. By the way, I should so much like to know what the food is like at Aubigny.
I’m going to goggle at the Royal Ascot show so that I can tell you whether Harvey Smith appears.
Meanwhile I have received a letter from Valpy (as I expect you have too) suggesting that you go to the Angie* family for the Easter holiday, as a kind of exchange, as it’s so difficult to find a paying job, now this of course is for you to decide and you must write direct to Valpy about it, but I was rather taken aback as the fare, £30, is so high and the journey rather formidable by oneself and, also, I’d rather thought of our offering hospitality to Angie, which I do want to do, rather than its all being an exchange – a kind of business arrangement? Also, quite honestly, is the Angie family an easy one to live with? I’d thought more of San Sebastian, or somewhere with a much cheaper fare, but I know that without a job I shan’t really be able to manage it: still we were going to try the Franc ha Leal. You’ll write to Valpy, won’t you, and tell me what you decide? Of course it is very sweet of him to make this suggestion and I would do anything rather than hurt his feelings, for many reasons.
Next week we must start our great pack – Daddy’s new summer coat is already looking rather crumply, but apparently it was a great success in the office, so he keeps wearing it. I do hope your clothes are all right, except the unfortunate sandals.
Workmen are trying to strengthen the wire around the playground, but I expect the kiddies will be ready with blow-torches. Nothing will keep them out.
Will write again soon – very much love from us all – X Mum
185 Poynders Gardens, sw4
15 August [1967]
Dearest Tina,
I can see you are well up on the news owing to the Comte’s TV and so will merely give a little sports and T.V. news – Michael Miles* has been arrested twice at London Airport, once for being drunk and disorderly and once for trying to get by with excess luggage, and at the Dublin Horse Show O’Malley was not ‘nobbled’ and Harvey S. won almost everything. We have just seen Cassius Clay on TV getting ready to go to jail. But I think he’s still appealing really. – Hope you didn’t feel any earth tremors – they seem to be much farther south. This reminds me of Spain, and you won’t forget to write to Valpy about his scheme of your staying with the Angies?
I sent the mosquito stuff, which I hope arrived, but was relieved to learn that you might be able to get some from Metz. Also very glad that Dr Gibbie’s pills were of some use. So sorry Mme. was cross the one morning you overslept. Surely she must appreciate all the useful work you’re doing, much more than the Hapsburg, I’m sure.
Maria is being very good although it is dull for her since all her cronies have left London and the Packers are now off on their mysterious trip to France, to see Mr Packer’s old battle-grounds. She is helping me paint and decorate, but soon all this must be put aside and we must make lists and start ironing everything. I can’t decide what to do about the plants – I’ll try putting a plastic bag round the creeper, as I did last year.
I helped an old lady across the road this morning who told me she was 92 – she’s lived in Clapham since 1880, when there were horses in all the stables. But she tells me ‘there are still many kind hearts in Honeybourne Road’.
We went up to Grove Cottage for lunch on Sat: – Auntie Mary had a nice new navy-blue tablecloth. A mysterious Indian had come to tea unexpectedly and told them that Uncle Rawle has resigned from the Daily Telegraph (which I suppose will mean leaving the house they have now) and is making some other mysterious deal – perhaps with the Times of India? So I sent Miss Chamot there only just in time. I suppose I shall have to wait till I see William* to get details of this.
I don’t think I’ve ever felt quite so exhausted as when we went to Oxford Street on Monday to get the olive-green bath-towels (vexatious expenditure).
Maria, clumping along in her Dr Scholl sandals, was most gallant and encouraging. But the first ones I bought turned out to be spring green when I got them to the light and so we had to take them back to the man and pretend to be dissatisfied customers. Then we couldn’t afford the things in John Lewis’s and the assistant humiliatingly recommended us to go to Wallis’s. Meanwhile Maria had sunk onto a chair and a kind lady, apparently taking her for a waif, asked her if she felt well enough to go home. Nothing ever tasted better than the cup of tea that we made when we got back. I’m so jaded that I can’t study any Russian, and am reduced to reading ‘Diary of a No-body’ for the 20th time. – Are you sure that Sabine is worse than ‘Junie’ in Britannicus?*
As you see I have nothing interesting to tell, but am enjoying your lovely long letters immensely, and Grandpa says they mustn’t be lost on any account. Try to send Mme. de B.** a note if you can.
So glad they liked the Christina Rossetti. That was a very sad life, I think – to give up love, as she certainly did, for Christian principles, and having that dreadful Dante Gabriel as a brother – much love always, Mum
185 Poynders Gardens, sw4
[August 1967]
Dearest Tina,
You can easily imagine what it’s like here when I tell you we are just packing and cleaning up before going to Elba tomorrow. I have been mending my sandals with plastic wood (unfortunately Woolie’s only had ‘antique walnut’) and rather good new plastic soles, also from Woolie’s: but Ria says they’re horrible. I’ve also cleaned the oven and put clean sheets on the beds and checked over a very long itinerary – Daddy, very reluctantly, as he had lunch very late and no rest, is fixing up a curtain-rail for himself, and Maria has filled up his suitcase already with li-los, suncream &c. and he hasn’t even started putting his clothes in.
Sporting news is depressing as this American runner, Jim Ryun, wins all the miles and half miles by practically a lap, and the others have given up trying, and the crowd actually attacked the Yorkshire team with umbrellas because they played so slowly – the bowler actually stopped to dry the ball between each over. – Michael Miles has apologised for being drunk at the airport and giving the name of Hughie Green; and murdered Joe Orton was cremated in a maroon coffin at Golder’s Green and Harold Pinter read a poem, part of which ran
If you’re sad that he’s dead
you’d make him sad
that you’d missed the point
of his best bad joke
When the wretched man was hit on the head with a hammer!
Lord Boothby’s tasteless engagement to a lady croupier from Soho is condemned by all.
I expect Maria has written to you about our strange trip to Bedford to see Miss Charboneau – Mme. de Baissac (delighted with your letter, by the way, so I’m so glad you wrote it) has become rather Victorian Society and v. enthusiastic about the graceful railway arch at St Pancras – Bedford a dreary red-brick and green tree place full of Italian brickworkers – terribly embarrassing as Miss C. had prepared a vast lunch, liqueurs &c. which we couldn’t possibly eat.
Yesterday we went up to Grove Cottage, grandpa looking rather frail but very spry; he has a new (mild) mania that Rawle may want to take Indian nationality, I do hope not.
I don’t know whether I told you that I met Myrtle, my old pottery teacher – at the Hampstead Open Air Exhibition. She now has a studio and bookshop in Rosslyn Hill.
much love darling
Mum
[postcard]
22 August [1967]
Thankyou for lovely letters, but you were right as usual, we may be moving, as beach here is stony, though we are in a nice friendly hotel with plenty of pasta, and grapes growing round washing-line. We came here on a hydrofoil from Pisa – very rapid. Maria devoted to task of getting brown. Much love from all X Mum.
On board cronky ferry-steamer
23 August [1967]
Dearest Tina,
So I Have Thought of You Page 9
