1936 August
From LJT to Annette
14/1 Rowland Rd
Calcutta
Aug 5th 1936
My darling Annette
My world is full of Germans at the moment and I have been very much wishing that I had not forgotten nearly all the German I once knew. Herr Paul Bauer, the famous German climber arrived here yesterday and since I have been making various arrangements for him, the German Consulate and the German Colony here are making much of me too. I spent nearly two hours with Herr Bauer yesterday, discussing his plans – The German Consul General gave a lunch party at which I was the only woman with about fifteen men – In the evening at 6.30 I went to a party and lecture at the German Club. Bauer showed his lantern slides of Kangchenjunga and gave a lecture in German – I could follow a bit partly from recognising words and partly from my knowledge of the mountain. After this I went to a dinner party for Bauer at the house of a very merry little German couple who are members of the Himalayan Club – There were six Germans and one Englishman – He talks German, so the whole party had to talk English for my sake. Its a pity to let a language go, as I have done German, for I put in a lot of work at it.
Congratulations on getting a Literature prize in the Grand Concours. It would have been fun if you had got a Silver medal – Dad wonders whether a professor of phonetics could teach you those few French sounds which you cant manage – I don’t know how you find such a thing as a Professor of phonetics but I suppose they exist. Possibly two or three lessons during the Winter holidays might help you for that specially and for the general study of languages too. I’ll see if I can find out anything – Will you see if you can get any information your end? I don’t think it would be any use going to anyone who was not really good.
What is the position with regard to the Head of the School? Is the present “Head” leaving? As nothing has been said about it, I wonder whether perhaps she is not.
Is’nt it awful of of me? I am quite longing to be finished with my Guides – It may be partly a clash of interests. I have so much work I want to do in connection with the Himalayan Club and writing up articles for the Journal, that I think I rather grudge the time given to the Guides, especially all the boreing mechanical things like keeping the register, test cards and charts up to date – Checking uniform and dealing with all the “mechanics” of the thing – Well, I shant have many more rallies now, as I think the girls break up early in Sept.
I have to go out now to arrange the table plan for the Himalayan Club dinner to Paul Bauer, which takes place to-night – and then I am going to take Herr Bauer shopping in the New Market. He wants to buy plates, mugs, spoons etc. I am taking the faithful Mogul along to advise.
My love to you, darling and suitable greetings to Frau von Pflugk.
Mum
From HPV to Annette
Calcutta
August 5th. 1936
My dear Annette
Among the axioms or postulates is this: writing letters is a labour. If only I didn’t do the same thing every day! But what use is it to if. It would be wise to keep a book of doings in which to write notes of things which might fill letters. But somehow I don’t run to it. True when I hear see or do something I often think “that would go in a letter” but, that done, I forget it. It is a conviction that you might be amused by a vulgarity. But they come rarely. A German told as true the other day a tale that must be false: the scene was not far behind the lines in France: the occasion a Senegalese soldier accused of walking “naked as a thought” (said the German) down the village street and refusing to do otherwise: French equivalent of a court martial: the defence “But I had permission from my officers”: query “What!”: reply “Yes I had been given a week’s leave and told that I might wear mufti.” How cumbrous a machinery for how small a point!
That is the sort of lumbering tale that Americans like. Trailing slowly to a catastrophic conclusion. Talking of which, we saw the Show Boat on Saturday night. Why go at all? It was an error: the cousin, Jean Townend (a dull young woman: suburban accent: desire to impress) came to dinner: partly my sense of duty, therefore, and partly a wish to hear (is it?) Paul Robeson. He, indeed, was good: what there was of him. Also the old nigger woman: and some of the minor characters. But the film – the plots joined nowhere, and it was almost all flat. One point of interest: half the characters were much like people whom I know well. So I could follow their doings with a little more interest. But the general result was discouragement. And therefore I have not had the heart to see another film which was suggested to me as likely to entertain: with Jessie Matthews in it. Which reminds me that I had a letter (unsigned) form Isabelle Vaughan Stevens: a little older than Rosemary. It was she who took me to buy cider in a jug on a Sunday morning from a pub: a terrible ordeal. Your mother is fond of the tale. Isabelle with protruding tongue and eyes fixed on the cider gambolled round me, in hope: but I advanced in terror lest I should spill the stuff, heartily disliking the smell. Isabelle, Isobel?, ate with round eyes and eager interest not in the food but in our talk: her mother snapped “Do you want a hot bottom?” and Isabelle at once put all her pudding into her mouth, pouched half in the cheeks and by sheer strength of tongue attempted to get the rest compressed down her throat. Hence I regarded her with benevolence: and sent her a message to that effect. The contents of her letter are nothing: but it ought to be thrilling thus to get an anonymous letter: ending “Give my love to Mrs Townend, Annette and Rosemary.” But you’ll have forgotten her. Jalpaiguri and Darjeeling were the places where you met.
Without news I have managed to cover a lot of paper. But you must have some news. It is this. All day I have had a headache. Also I found two sores on my face: maybe attempts at pimples: and applied a violet dye which is a powerful disinfectant. And next morning it wouldn’t come off; though it has always come off, when applied to my feet, - if rubbed hard enough with spirit. I went round that day looking like – what? I don’t know what. Nor did others.
Much love Dad
Family letter from LJT
14/1 Rowland Road
Calcutta
August 6th 1936
My Dears,
The cold which was making me feel so stupid last week, luckily took its departure quite rapidly, and I was able to attack life with my usual zest by Friday, when Eric Shipton again appeared to spend the day here, on his way back to Kalimpong, where he is staying till he goes off to Nanda Devi. I think I told you that I had been trying to put Eric Shipton in touch with the man who is going to survey Nanda Devi. The result has been more satisfactory than we had ever imagined. Mr Shipton saw the Surveyor General in Simla, and he has been taken on as an extra surveyor for that trip, which means, presumably that he not only gets his expenses paid, but gets some pay as well. He does know something about Surveying work. He is immensely pleased, and so is Major Osmaston. We went out to do some shopping in the morning, and we lunched with the Cookes. After lunch we called for a funny little Seventh Day Adventist padre, who used to be stationed here, and who takes the most wonderful mountain photos. He also has an almost uncanny knack of spotting mountains from different angles, and has what really amounts to a passion for mountain topography. We took him back to the house with us, and got out the photos of the group of Sikkim mountains where Mr Shipton was climbing this years. The padre knows them very well, and was able to elucidate a lot of points about them. We had to pack Mr Shipton off to see Col Wheeler, and Padre Hamilton and I got down to the photos of the North East corner of Sikkim into which I penetrated this year, and of which the map is entirely wrong. He had brought me about a dozen of his beautiful photos as a gift, and some of them happened to be of that part of the world, and with those and mine, and what we had both seen we were able to elucidate quite a lot of the topography of that region. The following morning we spent a long time with Mr Auden who has also been up there, and with the help of his photos as well, we are on the way to-wards being able to re-draw the map of that corner of Sikkim. Padre Halmilton is now stationed in Rangoon, and very sad to be so far from his beloved mountains. He has gone up to Mussorie for a conference, and is going to spend the day with me on his way back, and we hope to do the map sketching. On Friday afternoon I dropped the Padre at the house where he was staying, picked Mr Shipton up at the Survey Office, and we joined a few other people for tea and bathing at the Saturday Club, came home to an early dinner, and sent our guest off to Sealdah station.
Becoming more and more enthusiastic about his garden, Idris and I went to the Agri-Horticultural Garden on Saturday afternoon, while Herbert had a rest, and we chose plants. Later we met Herbert at Tollygunge where he bathed, while we made comments, and then we had tea on the lawn. Jean Townend, who has finished with the Minto Nurses, and goes off to Australia on Friday, came to dinner, and so did Idris, and we, including Herbert, went to see “The Show-Boat”. Except for Paul Robson singing, we thought it most disappointing. They concentrate far too much on a common-place threadbare story, not well told, or convincingly acted, and give one far too little of the boat.
On Saturday evening I had a telegram from Paul Bauer, fixing Wed 5th for the Himalayan Club dinner, so I had to get hold of our clerk on Sunday morning, and go along to the Geological Survey Office, to give him the dinner notices to do on the copying machine, and get them sent off at once. I also had to see the Steward at the United Service Club, which is almost next door, and in the intervals of my work, I popped into Mr Auden’s room to join in his and the Padre’s review of Maps and photos. Herbert slept late on Sunday Morning and only woke at 9 o’clock, just as I had decided to have my breakfast. He breakfasted in pyjamas, and had a really lazy morning. We went out to Tolly in the afternoon, and there we fell in with the Chief Justice, who asked us to have tea with him, and we sat talking on the lawn till fairly late. He seems a lonely sort of man, and to tell the truth is rather dull. We went along to Harry and Winsome’s at 7.30, so as to be in time to say good-night to the children. It was a family party. Jean Townend is staying with them till she leaves to-morrow. I think her branch of the family dont indulge in at all the same brand of conversation, and she feels a bit lost when she encounters it. Herbert’s and Harry’s habit of keeping a conversation dealing with three or four subjects at the same time, defeats her entirely.
On Monday morning I had to get busy with arrangements for the dinner such as getting the menu printed, and the photos ready to go on it. Idris came in in the afternoon, and we fetched our plants from the Gardens fitting ourselves and the plants into his little car with some difficulty. We got a lot of work done in the garden, which is beginning to look awfully nice.
Since Tuesday my time has almost all been taken up by the German party and their affairs. Paul Bauer left the boat by which they were travelling, at Madras, and came up by train, arriving here early on Tuesday morning. He is staying with the Marrs, friends of mine and members of the Himalayan Club. I went round to see him at 9.30, with all sorts of information and papers I had for him, and we were hard at it till 11.15, working out his best method of getting his luggage to Gangtok as quickly as possible, and a thousand and one other details. I had to go off then to see the Doctor, and have my nose “irrigated”. Dr Norris is a very amusing Scotchman, and we have quite a lot of time for talk while he is waiting for the local anaesthetic to take effect.
The German Consul General gave a lunch party for Bauer, at which I was the only lady with about fifteen men. It was made up of members of the German Club, and the committee of the Himalayan Club. It was a pleasant party, with rather amusing food. Bauer, who sat next to me, is a quiet looking little lawyer, with glasses and grey hair. One would never pick him out as a spot mountaineer, but one soon realized it when seeing his pictures, which he showed before dinner at the German Club that evening. Sandwiched in between these German functions, I had to switch my mind on to my Guides, who seemed to be particularly tiresome that afternoon. Bauer’s lecture at the German Club, was naturally in German, but helped by his photographs, I was able to follow the general drift of what he was saying. I was able to get home for half an hour to see Herbert, before going out to a German dinner-party, given by one of the German members of the Himalayan Club for Bauer. They were all Germans except Mr Auden and Myself, and as he speaks German, they all had to talk English on my account, which made me a little ashamed. It was a nice party, and I enjoyed it.
Yesterday was the day of our Himalayan Club dinner, and after attending to the table plan and a few other things, I took Herr Bauer out shopping. Mogul came with us to see that we went to the cheapest places, and were not cheated. I did not get back till lunch time, which meal, for a change, I had in my own house, and I also, to my great comfort, had a quiet afternoon, and did not have to go out till 7 o’clock, when I had to be at the United Service Club to see to the final focusing etc of the lantern. The dinner went off very well indeed, and Bauer spoke very well in English, and some of his photos fairly took the audience’s breath away. The lecture finished about 11 o’clock, but the party did not break up till mid-night. I had spread the big German map of Kangchenjunga on top of the grand piano, and a group of people got Bauer talking about it, and were only dislodged with the greatest difficulty. Bauer goes off to Darjeeling this evening. The rest of his party arrive about 5 o’clock this afternoon stay one night here, and leave to-morrow, travelling direct to Gangtok, where he will met them. I have yet another mountain friend arriving from Rangoon this afternoon and going off by the Imperial Mail at 10 o’clock this evening, on his way home to be married. He is John Hunt, who was selected for Everest this year and then rejected on the Air Ministery’s endurance test. He is a young man I am very very fond of. He is one of those charming people who put his whole soul into what he is doing. He was stationed here with his regiment, the K.R.Rs, and later did special police work in Bengal. Now he is back with his regiment in Rangoon. Unfortunately his boat is not getting in till about 6 o’clock, instead of getting in in the morning as the Burmah boats often do.
Its a regular pouring wet day to-day. Its the sort of thing you imagine the “rains” to be, when you have never seen them, and which they so seldom are. The floods in the UP. Are dreadful. Bengal at present is not affected, but has made up the water famine it suffered from last year.
I have just been reading such a fascinating book, which I recommend to all of you. It’s called “The Living Garden” and is by Salisbury, the Professor of Botany at University College, London. It tells you all the whys and the wherefores about plants. Such things as how they get their good, why some like shade, and some like sun, and some heavy and some light soils, and all manner of fascinating things. Its written for the amature, and Salisbury keeps almost entirely away from scientific language, and makes one feel on such intimate and friendly terms with the plants.
Harry and Winsome and ourselves were all greatly excited at the news of Joey’s splendid achievement in getting First Class Honours. We really felt we ought to do something special to celebrate it, but we did not quite know what!
Best love to you all.
LJT
Family letter from HPV
Calcutta
August 11th.
1936.
My dears,
Yesterday Joan went off as happy as anyone ever was to have her operation; looking forward to it as an encore of the happy time when she went to hospital with cholera and had the best ever of rest cures. Dr. Norrie operated early this morning at 7 or 7.30 (to avoid the heat of the day) and soon afterwards they rang me up to say that all was well. I rang up at lunch time when she had still not come round from the anaesthetic and went in after office, at about six. The nurse said that she was again asleep and that I should merely sit there quietly, but after a little she started talking. They gave her some dope to put her to sleep first: then when she was asleep they gave a spinal injection and the first she knew of anything was when she woke after five o’clock, thinking that it was ten and surprised beyond measure to hear that the day was nearly done. No pain, but a certain amount of discomfort with both nostrils plugged because breathing through the mouth makes the throat dry. She tried drinking some tea but it came back upon her gracefully. As a visitor of the sick I was no great success. It had been a hard day in office and as it happened I had had a poor night, failing to get off to sleep for hours and waking stale-like: so my conversation-powers were small. I was quite happy sitting there but Joan began to worry about it, because she dozed off every few minutes and then woke up with a start thinking that I must be bored: so I came away. The reward of having a wife who is both popular and in hospital is that people ring one up in office to ask about her. The Japanese climbers had decided to send a deputation to thank her for all that she had done for them, and failing in this they selected Mr Auden who belongs to the Club but is so far as I know nothing special in it (?a Committee member?), and sent the deputation to him. The Vice-Consul came as interpreter: if he has as a rule any job to do he must be cursing them by this time. I was a grief to Joan on Sunday because she has been waiting for an opportunity to discuss the Autumn trip with me and hoped that I should plunge eagerly into the study of maps and the guide book but I was dead beat and unable to apply my mind or feel an interest in anything, thus falling short of the standards usual among the virtuous. For some time I have been working with fury in the hope of getting done with the Debtors Act work and being able to start on my more congenial work of getting the Development Act rules out. But my Honourable Member goes from strength to strength: he was so delighted with some worthless figures (alas!) that I had compiled to show how much profit the working of the Act would show [if only there were truth in certain assumptions which I made] that he wound himself up to write a long note suggesting the expenditure of some twenty lakhs of rupees on the thing; he pictures himself and his party sailing into power after the reforms come in if only this can come off: jobs for the sons of a lot of his supporters as I was careful to point out to him and eyewash for all the electors who were not money lenders. He is probably right on the main point that it is useless to pass an Act if you dont put it into operation wherever it is needed, but there is still the question whether we were not muts to pass the Act at all, and I suspect that we were.
Wednesday.
I had to stop yesterday because it was my fate to go out to dinner: only with the Carey Morgans of whom I am fond and who are not tiring to talk with: but when one is dead beat to start with to be able like the Lama in Kim to refrain from action is always good. I went round to the nursing home on my way to office this morning and found Joan much more like her self than yesterday. She had got back colour and lost the drugged look. She remembered that I had come in to see her but forgot all details and so told me again all her experiences. As yesterday except that it was somewhere round three thirty that she came round and not after five as she had said. Mr Norrie had been in to see her this morning and expressed satisfaction. He said that when he started operating, he realised that it was even more necessary than he had before supposed: there was a bit of cartilage loose and the nasal passages were very constricted. Now Joan is racking her brains to remember when she had a whack or whang on the nose to cause this. The nurses came in several times last night with offers of aspirin in case the pain was bad: they expected the after-dullness from the operation to wear off somewhere round midnight and for pain to come on. But Joan said there was no pain of any kind, and there has been none today; only the sort of uneasiness that one has with a really bad cold, when unable to breathe through the nose. They say that she will be out at the latest in five days and this has rather disappointed her, since Norrie originally spoke, in the vague way peculiar to doctors before such things, of two or three days in bed. Apparently she will have to be careful for some time after the cotton wool plugs are removed to avoid sudden changes of temperature which cause the membrane of the nose to contract and expand, which after this operation is for some reason undesirable. They will take them out tomorrow probably.
As to the general doings, memory fails me. On Saturday it drenched and we abandoned a plan of having Harry and Winsome out to tea at Tollygunge. Instead we went to the Saturday Club where I bathed and incidentally cricked my back trying to be clever, and afterwards went round to their place. Their nanny had been seized with a complaint; having till then been perfectly fit she found on getting up after a nap that she became giddy and it was only when lying flat that she could escape this. Perhaps I should have said Nannie; I can neither think nor spell when manipulating this thing. Dealing with carbon papers under the electric fan has difficulties of its own. To revert to the Harry household, John chose that moment to be exceptionally rowdy and tiresome and Charlotte fell into grief. I took them out for a drive round the docks, -- singularly dull but a distraction to them because I followed such roads as they chose. This in fact restored calm. We waited till a pause in the rain allowed a bonfire to be lighted in the garden – six small bits of stick and a basket full of dried leaves: but under Harry’s showmanship it had the glamour of a whole Brock’s benefit. Joan started riding again on Saturday or maybe Friday: the horse has healed. On Sunday rain prevented her from going out. I think it probable that that was the day when I over-slept. In the afternoon having for a change refrained from bathing I went with her to the movies; we were guests of some folk and dined with them afterwards. The King Steps Out, I think; amusing but poor stuff. I dont mind the Emperor of Austria talking American or even looking a bit nigger; but it peeved me that Grace Moore should burst into screams of song whenever she happened to be near an open window. However our hostess yelled with laughter and I howled; so I should not complain. I have spent two hurried days analysing trade figures and statistics about the just crop and as always find that all the figures turn out to be self-contradictory as soon as they are carefully examined; it beats me to see how easily satisfied the Scotch business man is in such matters. Enough. Joan feels vaguely cheated. She had pictured herself sitting up all day and writing masses of letters; instead she has no wish to do anything but lie flat
Much love,
From HPV to Annette
Calcutta
August 12th (?1936)
My dear Annette
Your mother as explained in the circular letter enclosed cannot write this week. She asked me to send her love and say that she is sorry.
As for me I have exhausted the springs of eloquence in that typewritten screed. I have no further news: except that I lunched with Nazimuddin today. Almost an hour after the time fixed by him: he was detained at a Cabinet meeting. We talked of high matters. I believe that I won: for he ended by deciding not to adopt a policy to which I objected. It would have given me extra work (though I have no time for more – so that would make no difference) and been a failure anyhow.
Strange to say I have been more genial of late, though things have by no means gone my way.
I hope that Dresden proves a success. If you see Dr Richter convey to him my regards – I am sorry that he has left, and that the Ow Wachendorfs have left. You could not get nicer people anywhere. Though, it is true, I saw but little of them: seeing little of anyone, in fact.
Life is blank for me outside the work for I have nothing to read. Having finished all the detective stories that the two clubs possess and savouring nothing more solid. However I did take out and did read a book called the Living Garden (physiology of plants in gardens in simple English) by a Professor Jalsburg. Very good. Very very good. Indeed a lot better than you could possibly expect. Like Jeans on the stars but with less hanky panky about it.
Decidedly I am not a good visitor of the sick. It might be different if I did not come tired from office – or were not going off there in a hurry.
Much love
Dad
From LJT to Annette
14/1 Rowland Rd
Calcutta.
Aug 17th 1936
My darling
I am sorry that I did not write to you last week and also that Dad’s letters did not go home, as I fear they may have missed you in Germany. Having no knowledge of operations and anaesthetics, I happily pictured myself sitting up in bed and writing all Wednesday and Thursday – Actually I think I was still a bit drowsy on Wednesday – At any rate they wanted me to keep lying down most of the time – On Thursday morning I had the plugging taken out of my nose and then I had to lie flat for an hour in case it started bleeding and I felt very lazy and disinclined to write – so I just did’nt!
Well! Your school Report was very good – and I am glad to see that you are Head Girl. I hope you wont have a very difficult team to manage. Are the prefects a good lot do you think? It makes an enormous difference, does’nt it – Vera Brittain was a prefect when I was Head and did not pull with the rest of us. Moreover we knew and everyone knew that she was not really honest and that she had a sneaking sort of character. Its really very amusing the way she ascribes her unpopularity at school to the fact that her people were not well off – whereas all are who were there with her knew it was because she was a mean little tick!
Walter Jenkins came to see me when I was in the Nursing Home and we had a long talk on the subject of phonetics. He thinks that you would find a course of phonetics invaluable from every point of view and not only as a help to conquer the special sounds that still bother you in French. He says the man on phonetics is Professor Daniel Jones of London University. If he is not available, he thinks anyone belonging to London University School of Phonetics would be safe to be an able teacher of the subject. The question is would it be in any way possible for you to have any lessons. I don’t know whether it would be feasible for you to go up from school. I should think probably not. I wonder whether there are any vacation courses. Will you try to find out? I think if you wrote to The Principal – School of Economics – London University, you could probably get some information.
Dad is very tired again, which makes me very worried, and also makes me wonder whether he would not do better to retire. He feels he would be letting down his “scheme” if he did – but it seems to me that his life is very little worth while living if he can barely struggle through his work and has no energy left to get any sort of relaxation or enjoyment out of life – or even to attend to the simplest thing connected with his own affairs. The annoying thing is that I am sure that threequarters of this exhaustion is psychological and perhaps could be cured if only we could find the key. I always hope that going to the Hills will do him good. It does a bit – but not very much.
He has at last spoken about his leave next year and I have just written to Grindlay’s to see if they can get us passages on the Kaiser-i-Hind on April 3rd from Bombay – That would get us home in the middle of April and we should have about half the Easter holidays with you –
Did I ask you before if you had any idea what would be the best thing for you to do between leaving school at the end of the Easter Term and, presumably, going up to the ‘Varsity in the Autumn: I would like to persuade Dad to motor across Europe – Holland – Germany – Austria etc – but I doubt whether he would do it – quite apart from the fact that I have very little idea what it would cost – Just supposing anything came of that (but don’t build on it) do you think it would be waste of your time to come with us? In a sense there’s no better education than visiting other countries if you go with your eyes open. I have quite a lot of friends sprinkled about Germany, Austria and Switzerland now, mostly made through the Himalayan Club.
I think of you much in Germany and am very curious to know what you found life like there. I suppose there was vast excitement about the Olympic Games.
Best love to you, my darling
from
Mum
P.S. When I read yours and Rosemary’s reports I think that Dad and I are very lucky to have children who not only have reasonably good brains, but reliable characters too –
Family letter from HPV (typed)
Calcutta
August 19.th 1936.
My dear Younglings,
I have attained to that state of weariness when the thought of writing the same news differently in three letters destroys the judgment; and therefore I essay to type though well I know and you know better still that I cannot type and that it is a phantasy to suppose that in the long run or in the short for that matter I shall save labour by this process. It has been for me not one of the too good weeks; I have however abstained from actually screeching; and, I ask you, is not that a worse thing than any split infinitive? “The Editor of the Westminster Gazette was so excited that he split not only all his infinitives but a good half of his subjunctives.” Is this fair comment? What is your opinion of the pedant who produced it? . . . . . . To resume. Fury has gnawed my gizzard and I have brooded over matters at night till sleep forsook me. The Finance Department has done me down: not unexpectedly for they are like that: but I was annoyed, for privily I had arranged matters with the Finance Secretary beforehand and he went back on me. At the last I did what may be a foolish thing, writing an essay on the general folly and showing that by refusing to sanction expenditure on staff as asked for by me they had succeeded in wasting several thousand pounds. It is written calmly and without too much open hatred but is designed to expose them to the contempt of the Governor to whose notice it will come unless I get my way otherwise. Not that he will be too pleased to be involved in a sordid row of this kind or will think the better of me consequence. But of all experts in nose-biting and face-spiting (judging the time or by numbers as you please) none so expert as your father – and a murrain on the perversity of the typewriter! Today however disregarding other matters which clamoured for my immediate attention, but they all do without exception, I turned to the preparation of Rules under my Act; and adopted the totally wrong procedure of starting off to write them without roughing out in my own mind what I ought to put down. But the theory of this is the same as when one speaks extempore without even jotting down heads: if one knows the subject well enough the various points will shape themselves and fall into some sort of logical order before you’ve done: like telling beads (not that ever I have done such a thing, though I owned a Moorish rosary thing when about four years old and I never realised till this moment that someone much have pinched it), for it doesn’t much matter where you start, it will go the round if you keep on long enough. To revert to the topic of matters of immediate urgency, I had today two files which were not marked Immediate or even Urgent; and so I did them first. Interrupting the rule-writing even. To my pleasure this went quite well and it is possible that I may yet extricate myself from this Cordine Fork, by performing miracles of improvisation. Talking which I should like to know precisely what the Duc de Guise did of a meritorious nature to drive the English out of Calais: the reference to it is somewhere in the Three Musketeers and Richard (if he read his little bit intelligently) ought to be able to tell you all and me). One of the more pleasing things about Roman history is the hearty way in which they tell of their being knocked flat: whereas our people merely gloss it over by saying “owing to the weakness, imbecility, or indifference of the King – “ this or that bit of dirt was eaten by us: that is the chief advantage of having a monarchy; you need never blame disasters on the race. It was to discover what actually had happened to us in the past that I bought a French history while I was in Poictiers: it doesn’t mention the battle there. The only point on which there is agreement between our history and their’s is that the Spaniards got it in the neck whatever happened; poor toads, they are proving that now. Of all the political virtues laziness is the greatest. I wonder why the Dutch, Germans, Swiss, Danes? Norwegians? And Swedes and English (with a ? also after revelations) alone of races have honest Civil Servants.
Your mother is almost herself again though careful not to wag or shake her head. Much contrary to my advice she went to the other end of Calcutta today to look at the Cossipore garden and I none the worse for it. The doctor said that he had added two thousand feet to her capacity. I secretly wonder how I shall stand trekking this year for it is not a healthy life that I have been leading.
There is no particular reason why I should go on with this. My apologies to Rosemary who must have found it all almost past bearing: the other two may count it as educative matter and give themselves two marks each for labouring through it: if always they have.
Much love
Dad
Family letter from LJT
14/1 Rowland Road
Calcutta
August 20th 1936
My Dears,
I am sorry about not writing to you last week. I had pictured myself sitting up in bed with the typewriter on the bed-table, and polishing off a letter in great style. The nurses thought otherwise, and indeed, though at no time did I feel ill, I did feel lazy, and much more inclined to lie and read and doze, than concentrate my mind on anything special. The book that suited my mood to perfection was Kingdon Ward’s “Riddle of the Tsangpo Gorges”. There is a great deal about the mountain flowers in it, and when I was tired of reading I was able just to shut my eyes and think about them. Herbert wrote to you last week, and no doubt told you that Dr Norrie did the operation on Tuesday morning early. The nurse gave me some sort of dope, and I knew nothing from about 5.30 in the morning till 5.30 in the evening. Its curious to lose an entire day out of ones life like that! My nose was plugged up, and the plugs were kept in all Wednesday, and taken out on Thursday morning. I had to keep quiet for a bit in case any bleeding started, but was allowed to sit up in a chair for a bit in the evening, and came home on Friday morning. I had rather expected that I should be able to step straight back into my normal life, but Miss Riorden told me I should have to go very slow for a few days, and keep fairly quiet for a week. And it has proved so. The first few days I found that if I moved about much, or lent forward, I got an ache in my nose, so I spent most of my time reclining on a couch in the drawing room, and writing on my knee, which I was able to do quite comfortably. Each day I have felt more normal, and yesterday decided that I was quite recovered, and went out to Cossipore to see how the garden was getting on. I spent the whole of Saturday morning map-making with Padre Hamilton (whom I am sure I have mentioned before). He was on his way back to Rangoon from a meeting of the Seventh Day Adventists, which he had been attending in Musoorie. We really got down to an attempt to sketch how the mountains and glaciers in the north-east corner of Sikkim are situated, for the map of that district is quite wrong. We had got on the track of this when the padre went up to Musoorie a couple of weeks ago. He and John Auden and I spent some hours examining the photos which all of us had taken at different times, with the most minute care, and we got so many peaks taped from different angles, that we felt, with the aid of the compass bearings taken by John Auden and myself, we could venture on a sketch map. After a couple of hours of work, the padre and I produced something which seemed to be reasonably sound. John Auden came round on Sunday morning with a very rough sketch of a couple of the main valleys and biggest glaciers drawn in from his compass bearing, on the same ½ inch scale that we had been using, and it was quite thrilling to find that when we superimposed the padre’s and my camp which was on tracing paper, the two agreed almost exactly. Mr Auden and I then set to and redrew another bit of Sikkim that lies round about the Sebu La which I crossed this spring, and though I do not think the map we have made is quite so good at the North-East corner, it is a great deal more like reality than the existing map. I dont know why I tell you all this for it cant be very interesting to you, but it completely absorbed my thoughts for the whole of those two mornings, and for most of our evening as well, for I persuaded Herbert to go off and have a tea at Tollygunge, and I settled down to draw in properly, we had only sketched in the morning.
(bits of letter missing here) People have been awfully kind about coming . . . . Nursing Home, and since I came back here, . . . .been anything but dull. Phyllis Carey . . . . . of the school-masters who has come . . . .Public School at Dehra Dun. . . . . . about going to Gyantse . . . . wanted to come to thank . . . . .We did not half finish a . . . .
Tuesday evening, and spent two hours here while Phyllis was at a meeting. He had time to tell me quite a lot about the school then. Even with an entirely British staff, I fear they are doomed to considerable disappointment.
My mind is beginning to occupy itself with detailed plans for our move to Cossipore, and with the arrangements for our Autumn trek. There is quite a lot to be thought out. Herbert is going to Darjeeling on the 12th Sept. I shall stay down a few days, and move all the furniture out to Cossipore, and probably follow Herbert to Darjeeling about the 17th. We go off for our trek on the 17th October, and come straight down to Calcutta arriving on Nov 2nd. Our address in Darjeeling will be “The Club” and our Address at Cossipore “The Towers”
Herbert has at last turned on the Finance Dept who have been holding him up in every conceivable way about the engaging of staff. He has been brooding over it for some time, and has consequently been tired and depressed. He simply could not find time to write the necessary note on the subject, but has managed to do so at last. I think it has done him good to get it off his chest. I want him to retire if they wont do what he requires. I think he may threaten to, but I rather fancy it will be only a lever to get things done and that we shall not be coming home next year for good.
We are still having a tremendous amount of rain, and the floods in Bihar and parts of Bengal are very bad. I suppose it is not much comfort to people who have been washed out of their homes and probably lost all their humble possessions, to know that they will probably bet a bumper crop next year.
I am very pleased with the garden at Cossipore. Even the new rockeries are beginning to look quite dressed. I got a lovely basket of plants for them from our old jewish landlord yesterday. Idris and I lent over the top verandah of the house yesterday and almost purred with satisfaction to think that what was such a short time ago just an ugly bare untidy patch is now so pretty.
Best love
LJT
From HPV to Annette
Calcutta
August 25th 1936
My dear Annette.
And how did you like Dresden? - What folly! For your letters, despatched before this reaches you, will have told us. When I was there I stayed at the station Hotel (but there may be more than one station): it was winter: everywhere there was snow and my nose ran. We went out to Meissen and then for a walk – and incidentally at the other end got into a train going the wrong way and found ourselves trundling off to some destination unknown instead of back to Dresden. We waited for hours in a little wayside station before could get back. There was a pub built into the station and we got dinner. It would have been very different at a little place of the same size in England. – It is typical of me that practically the only picture that I remember of all those which I saw in Dresden, besides a certain Madonna, was the original of a German print which I had brought while I was at Oxford: obtaining it with great trouble through a London Picture dealer and finding afterwards that I could have bought it for 7/6 in a Covent Garden shop. There was a gallery of sculpture down by the river, an opera house, a church where there was a concert (to which probably may be traced my lack of enthusiasm for music) sordid streets – curious that I can remember no shops and no wide streets except just by the station. I drew a map of the town afterwards which turned out to be nearly right: strange that I remember none of it which I have quite a clear mental picture of the lay out of Prague where we spent only a morning. – One day we went on excursion into Saxon Switzerland: but the river was frozen over too thickly for a ferry boat to run and too thinly for one to walk across and so we could not even start on the trip when we reached the end of our train journey. I tell you all this because I have nothing to tell about. It has been a week of violent work: not unpleasant because since last Tuesday I have been hammering away at my own hobby, the rules under Development Act. I have been having difficulties with the various snags which were allowed to go in although I protested that they’d be a nuisance: but none the less have done about a months work in a week (having not had time to do otherwise than sit down and write things straight out which is quick but laborious) and ought to feel pleased with progress. But I’m not because I’m fed up with everything about it, Government’s apathy, the lying in the newspapers, the hostility of the people and so on. Though I admit that the said people would be mutts if they did not object heartily to my efforts to make them pay up.
Your mother has recovered. She says that she is quite well again, which I find hard to believe because I have a cold in the nose myself.
Much love
Dad
From LJT to Annette
14/1 Rowland Rd
Calcutta
August 27th 1936
My darling Annette
There’s not much to evoke comment in your letter written just before leaving for Germany because I had interruptions this morning and because its now after lunch and very hot, I feel sleepy and uninspired. I have been trying to make up a Law Game for my Guides – I thought I would read out a Nursery Rhym or part of one and the girls (numbered would run up in turn and write on a slate the number of the Law which had been kept or broken in the rhyme – I don’t think I can get enough nursery rhymes, so shall probably add in proverbs. I think it may amuse them more than a story, which is what I have done once or twice before with them. Only two more rallies for me now – but sad to say I have not yet found anyone to take my place. However – I shall leave that to the authorities – They are sure to get someone when people come back for the cold weather.
Best love, darling
from
Mum
Family letter from LJT
14/1 Rowland Road
Calcutta
August 27th 1936
My Dears,
Mail-day last week was the last day on which I had promised to “Keep quiet”, and on Friday I plunged into my normal routine of life once more, after rather enjoying a quiet week. Eric Shipton came through here again on Friday on his way through to go to Nanda Devi once more. We spent half the morning making up his store lists. The Survey Department have taken him on as an extra surveyor to accompany Major Osmaston on his expedition to Survey Nanda Devi. Major O had written to him to bring a certain amount of stores, and he was feeling a little sad about it, for he and his friend Mr Tilman believe in living almost entirely on the country. However as he is getting paid for this trip, instead of paying out money, it makes a difference. The lists make, he went off to do his shopping, and arrived back here for lunch with the car full of parcels! The Cookes came to lunch, and Mr Cooke brought a most ingenious three-tier “cooker” which he made to fit over a primus stove, and which was a great success on his climb of Kabru last year. Mr Shipton is a great advocate of “pressure-cookers”, in which you can cook anything, even haricot beans, at any altitude. The rival demonstrators had their respective “cookers” in the drawing-room, before lunch, and set forward their merits most ably. Seeing Mogul and the young khitmatgar Latif, peeping in at the door, we had them in and explained how these mysterious things worked, and suggested that we should cook the lunch in them. The smallest jokes go down well with Mogul, and hiding his grin behind his two hands, he said that the lunch was all ready, so there was nothing to do, but for us to go and eat it. Eric Shipton had to spend the afternoon with the Assistant Surveyor-General, who was largely instrumental in getting this job fixed up. They came along and met John Auden and myself later at the Saturday Club, for tea, and then the others bathed, but that is still taboo for me. I had to bustle every body along to get Eric Shipton and his goods away from the house in time to catch his train at 8 o’clock at Howrah. He had the faithful Antarkay with him, who did such splendid work on Nanda Devi two years ago, and who is now considered probably the best climber and all-round man amongst the Sherpa and Bhutia porters. He had spent a happy day seeing the sights of Calcutta with one of our chaprassis.
I had to turn my attention quickly to other matters, for I was dining with Arthur Moore who is the Editor of “The Statesman”, and who was entertaining the Governor, and had asked me to act as hostess for him, as his wife is in England. It was a nice and quite informal party of twelve. I sat next to H.E. who pinned me down to talking nearly all the time about my trip in Sikkim this spring, and making suggestions about where he could go if he can get away for a few days this autumn. H.E. is a nice creature, and I like him but he is always a little ponderous. He is a person who likes every I carefully dotted, and every T crossed, and nothing slipshod about facts. Herbert is one of the few people who really makes him laugh heartily!
Herbert, though still a bit tired, was feeling better over the week-end I think. We took Arthur Dash, the Commissioner of Calcutta, with whom Harry and Winsome are going to live next cold weather, out to bathe and tea at Tollygunge on Saturday afternoon, and the two men practised a lot of ridiculous diving antics, which made us laugh enormously, and even caused the most dignified old bearer who is in charge of the swimming bath, to grin. We went and called on Harry and Winsome later, and I went up to see Charlotte, who was most engaging. She has just been equipped with a minute pair of rubber top-boots, for Darjeeling, and these are the pride of her life. She trotted off into the bed-room to fetch the boots and put them on to show me though they must have been abominably hot. I said to her “Charlotte, when you come back from Darjeeling, will you come and have tea with me in my new home? It is beside the river and you can see all the boats going by”, “Yes” said Charlotte, “And if my sandals get muddy, I can wear my big boots, cant I?” I thought it best to be firm at once, and explain that Hoogly mud was not the sort of stuff one went paddling in.
I was very gay, and went out to dinner again on Saturday night. I dined with John Auden, and a couple of other men. John Auden had intended to take us to the cinema, but could not get any seats at the New Empire, which is our best cinema, and there seemed nothing worth seeing at the other houses, so we petitioned to stay at home and talk. One of the other guests is a man who has quite recently come out from England as a Professor at the Presidency College, and he is an interesting man and a good talker. We drew him on to give us some idea of his impressions of his pupils and of life out here. It was none of it very favourable. Mr House has evidently lived in a highly intellectual and literary atmosphere at home, and as evidently misses it out here. I am afraid there are a large section of people out here who regard an interest in books, plays, pictures and music, as indicative of posing, and general mamby-pambyness, but there are quite a large number of people in Calcutta who are not like that. The trouble is it takes a little time to find them. I enjoyed my evening. It was a bit different from the ordinary party in Calcutta.
Mr Cooke and I did nearly two hours Himalayan Club work on Sunday morning. We were discussing future plans for the Club, and have called a Committee meeting to consider our suggestions. The Club has been developing so fast that we have to make new arrangements to meet new situations.
The Carey-Morgans and Idris Mathews came out to tea at Tollygunge on Sunday. Idris, and Arthur Dash (who had been out with us the previous afternoon) are just as full of the reviving and reorganisation of the Flying Club at Dum Dum, as Mr Cooke and I are of the Himalayan Club, only we are in the satisfactory position of responding to growing keenness and growing demands, and dealing with the nicest possible sort of members, whereas the flying Club has fallen on rather evil days, and seems to have got into the wrong hands. Much against his inclination Idris has consented to stand as Secretary, and Arthur as Vice President, and they have a plot to get me to join the Club so that I can go on to the House Committee, which at present is quite moribund. They have an idea that one strong-minded female (! ! !) could manage things without much interference from the rest of the committee, and have decided that I might be that strong-minded female. I don’t a bit know whether I shall do this yet. I don’t want to at all, except that Idris has given me so much pleasure with his ‘plane, and no doubt still will, that I should like to do anything I can to help him. On general grounds too, I think it is a pity to let the Flying Club go to bits.
We had a family dinner on Saturday night. Harry and Winsome were our only guests, and while the brothers talked of I know not what, Winsome and I revelled in retailing all our plans of what we are going to do in our new homes. They go home in the Spring, and Winsome will probably stay at home for eighteen months, to see John happily settled at school. Last week I think I told someone that I had asked for passages on the “Kaiser-i-Hind” on April 3rd. I should have said “The Viceroy of India”. It seems doubtful if we shall get passages on her. If we cant we hope to get them on the Maloja the previous week, but all the boats are frightfully full. We ought to have applied ages ago.
Mondays seem to have become almost regular gardening days, and I was out at Cossipore this Monday. The rockery is really finished, and a lot of other jobs that must be finished before the Rains are over, are well under way. Now we are tackling an old untidy bit of shrubbery, and the mali is hating doing it, because it is the place where he keeps all sorts of treasures, which he really should carry away to his shed. I took Mogul out with me so that he could consult with the servants about what of our things such as kitchen utensils, glass and china we should leave out. It is the sort of job which Mogul adores, and feels very important and confidential about. He told me almost in a whisper the next day, that the sahib has very few things in his kitchen, and we shall need all our stuff. He says it is the custom where there are no Memsahibs, and the servants just borrow from a neighbouring house when there is a party.
I had a visit from another little Japanese mountaineer yesterday. He does not belong to the party who have recently gone off to climb Nanda Kot, but comes from a different part of Japan, He has come to India now, to try to get permission for his party to try to climb Mount Godwin Austin next year. I rather doubt if they will get it, but have told him where to make his application and so on. He presented me with a little fan and a silk handkerchief, and said it was a very very small present, but he had brought it from his home in Kioto, which perhaps I knew is a very beautiful place.
I am still messing about with map work on the new Sikkim sheet, and I think I will go and see the Director of Map Publications to-morrow. Plans for our Autumn trip have matured a little more, and I shall have most of the detail worked out within the next few days. I do hope we have fine weather like we did last year.
We dined with Hugh and Phyllis Carey-Morgan last night, and I went on to the cinema with them, to see “Secret Agent” which was said to have been a great success at home, but which we all thought one of the worst films we had ever seen. There was some satisfaction in that they had not paid for the seats, since Hugh acts as Managing Director when Mr Shrosbree is away, and can generally have the Directors box when he wants.
I have just had a visit from Milly Chaudhuri, whom I was glad to see, only rather wishing she had not chosen mail-day morning to come and see me. We were discussing psychology this morning, and laughing over several similarities of attitude which she and Herbert share. One is that if they are annoyed with anyone that person becomes anathema to them, and they feel that nothing is too bad for them! Herbert is very like that, though he does not like to own it.
Its funny to think that I shall only write you about two more letters from this house.
Best love to you all
LJT