1939 April
Family letter from LJT
Chinsurah
Bengal
April 5th 1939
My Dears,
This has been in some ways rather a domestic, but at the same time a very enjoyable week. It is true that we were down in Calcutta on Friday, but only for a short day, and we got back in time for dinner. Herbert had to attend two meetings, one in the morning and one in the afternoon, and he also wanted to see a good many people in the Secretariat. I spent most of the morning working at the Geological Survey Office, drafting letters, which Probodh Babu sent over to me to sign at the United Service Club in the late afternoon, and only had a little time left for shopping before I was due to go and say good-bye to the Percy Browns, who were off to Kashmir that evening. They gave me the kindest invitation to go and stay with them on their house-boat for as long as I liked, but I think its up to me to stay here this hot-weather. If I could get Herbert to go up with me it would be a different thing.
Reggie Cooke and I lunched to-gether at the Saturday Club, and I showed him a lot of letters about matters to do with the Himalayan Club, and sat on quite a while after lunch. Herbert really needed the car in the afternoon, so I did some of my shopping over the phone from the U.S.Club, and also spent quite a lot of time phoning various people about Himalayan Club matters, so that I really did not have much time to put in “Having a rest” before Herbert and the car turned up at 4.15. Herbert had an Indian gent coming to tea with him, and I went to tea with a charming little friend of mine, Phyllis Gosset, who has been ill with dysentery, poor soul, and is just off to spend the hot weather with her brother, who is the political Officer in Baluchistan, and who has a lovely summer residency somewhere up in the hills from Quetta. Stupidly I have forgotten the name of the place. I always enjoy being with Phyllis Gosset. She is a most able artist, a keen botanist, and a great reader, and I am sorry that she will be able to be in Calcutta so little this year. Her husband was at school with Herbert.
Young Ronald Townend met us at the U.S.Club at 5.30, to take over Herbert’s old .577 Rifle, which we are giving him. We are glad to be rid of it, for I am quite sure that Herbert will never want to use it again, and Ronald is glad to have it.
It was pleasant driving home in the open car, but we both had the illusion that it was late at night, and Herbert thought that if the servants meeting us, behaved as if it were 11.p.m. we might have gone meekly to bed without any dinner!
The Tufnell Barretts were leaving on Saturday, and came in to say good-bye to us in the morning. They are delighted to be going to Calcutta and Darjeeling. The roses they gave us, by the way, have stood the move despite the hot weather, wonderfully.
We were entertaining a party for the week-end. Louise and Everard Ranken arrived in time for lunch, complete with a dachshund and a Sealyham (specially invited by me) and Sir Leonard Costello, one of the High Court Judges arrived for tea. Our object was sight-seeing in the vicinity. We set off about 4:45 and visited the old Hindu Temples at Bansberria, about seven miles north of this place, and near the site of what used in the 11th and 12th centuries to be the most important Hindu town in this part of the world. Later it was conquered by the Mohammadens, and was still a place of great importance in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. In fact it was probably why the reason why the various European nations made settlements up this river. From there we went a few miles further north, to another old place called Tribeni, a sacred spot where three holy rivers used to meet. At least one of these, the Sarasawati, has shrunk to the dimensions of a tiny stream, but it still flows in a wide river bed. This is bridged, but the bridge is impassable for wheeled traffic, so we had to leave the cars, and walk across. We were pleased by a notice on the bridge saying “This bridge is being re-built in memory of the Jubilee.” There is no sign of work having started yet! How typically Bengali! I expect they had a meeting and felt all glowing and good about this splendid idea, but having got as far as putting up the notice, they just forgot all about it, and when the notice has rotted away, the memorial to the Jubilee will have gone too. However that is indulging in Western ideas and points of view, and as we crossed the bridge and entered the narrow streets on Tribeni, we passed very much into the East. The narrow streets which are so offensive in Chinsurah and Hoogly where motor buses, and cars and bullock carts, manoeuvre for space, and where the pedestrians and bicyclists are pushed into the gutters., are pleasant enough in Tribeni where there is no wheeled traffic, and one can walk comfortably in the road, and observe the shops and the people at ones ease. As Indian towns go, the place seemed to me clean, and the people rather cheerful. We were objects of great interest. As we walked towards the temples and the great ghat, or stairway down to the river, the shops became more and typically the sort that cater for the pilgrim or the tourist. They were stacked with little attractive rubbishy trifles, to be taken home as mementoes. There were little figures of the gods, and numbers of small plaster fishes, which I suppose hove some religious significance. Small mirrors, cakes of soap, colored pictures of different deities, and all sorts of little oddments made of brass, especially tiny lamps for burning butter. Other shops,numbers of them, were piled to the ceiling with earthen-ware pots in red or black, in all shapes and sizes. In this land where you can’t eat out of a dish used by anyone else, there is a great sale for these pots and saucers, which are so cheap that even the poor can afford to use them for a meal, and then throw them away. Fans made from the leaves of the palm trees were another popular line. Passing the group of six small temples, neatly drawn up on either side of the one large one, we found the sides of the street near the top of the ghat lined on either hand by sort of shrines, differing in construction in no way from the shops, except that instead of goods for sale, they were occupied by various members of the Hindu Pantheon. There must have been quite eight or ten of these places, and in each the most conspicuous figures were Jagannath, with his companions, Balaramaand Subhadra, brother and sister of Krishna. I have never discovered why these two are always on either side of Jagannath, for Krishna was a different incarnation of Vishnu. Crowds of other gods were packed in around them, so that each pilgrim may worship as best pleases him. At the top of the wide stairway leading down to the water, the foot of a handsome pipul tree had been made into a shrine, where a rather dramatic image of Kali standing some three feet high, presided. The view from the ghat was most attractive. In the evening light, the boats coming up the river on the tide, their square sails filled with the southerly breeze, looked charming, and we tore ourselves away unwillingly, only because we knew if we did not, there would be no light left by which to examine the Mohammaden remains on the southern side of the Sarasawati. Tribeni bears the same history as most places in India. The ancient Hindu, conquered by the Mohammaden. Mohammaden mosques and colleges built from the stones and the carved bricks taken from the Hindu temples. The Mohammaden buildings eventually allowed to rot away, till rediscovered and cleaned up by the British, while the Hindu worship still goes on undisturbed by political events, as it did for hundreds of years before the Mohammadens appeared. At Tribeni there are two courts or enclosures, with a number of tombs, and the remains of a mosque, the pillars of which are clearly of Hindu origin. It was getting too dark to see properly, and Herbert was wanting to get home, so I registered a decision to come back again another day when there was plenty of daylight, and time to poke about and look at the things in detail.
We were in for a truly archeological weekend. The Rankens had been up to see the ruined city of Gaur near Maldah, in North-Western Bengal, which was not just the capital of a small kingdom, but of a considerable Hindu Empire, later replaced by a Mohammaden one,and I had asked them to bring the photos they took there, so that we might look at them on the epidiascope. They were interesting, but a little disappointing, for so many were either personal ones in which one or other of them figured against some mildly interesting background, or else they were pictures of typical country scenes. However there were enough of the ruins to give us some idea of their size and extent.
The next morning Louise and Everard and I set out to see and photograph the local sights in Chinsurah. They had a new Roloflex camera with which one is supposed to be able to do all sorts of special things, and dozens of photos were taken, half of which I cannot help thinking will be failures. It was nice out in the early morning, but getting hot by the time we came back to breakfast at 9:45. Herbert and the Judge had remained comfortably at home, and were still sitting and talking over their cups of tea when we returned.
People sat about and read papers and looked at books, and talked and had drinks during the morning. This house is agreable for that sort of thing, for it remains so cool and there is lots of room. Lunch, followed by a siesta, and cups of tea in our rooms at 3.30, prepared us to sally forth, facing the heat of the afternoon, and drive 17 miles to Pandua, once a capital city of a Hindu kingdom. The Grand Trunk road is looking about its best just now, for the trees have mostly just got their new green foliage. The part of the road we traveled over is all curves, which makes it pretty, though tiresome when one is in a hurry. At Pandua we had sent notice of our arrival, and the strange tower, somewhat like a small Kutb Minar, had been unlocked for us. It was an interesting view form the top. Near about the tower, were three old mosques, and a sort of court. We suppose the site of the old city is the highish land on which these stand, and which is not covered with bamboo groves, and clumps of trees. The modern town, such as it is, has moved away to the north west, and we could see the chimneys of its rice mills sticking up beyond the feathery bamboos. We poked about happily among the ruins, Sir Leonard saying every now and again “I am enjoying this”, and insisting on going to look at some other bit of tumbled masonry. It was he who insisted on searching for the sacred tank in which the venerable crocodile lives. We got vague directions to go on about a mile and turn to the left by a rice mill. The driver was not pleased by this, for he hates asking the way. However we found the place, and though we had to dismount from the car a few hundred yards before we reached the tank, the visit was a great success, and the driver, who followed us on foot, was completely mollified by the sight of the swimming beasts, for it turns out that there are four. One of the grey-beards of the village suggested that he should fetch a chicken to throw to the croc’ who was swimming slowly in the middle of the tank, but I said “No” that my heart was full of pity for the chicken. This was taken as one of the most amusing of jests, and kept the old boy and some of his friends laughing for quite a time.
It was getting dark by the time we left the tank, and was quite dusk when we reached the little rest house, where we planned to have a wash and cold drinks. We were jolly glad of both, too. It was nice sitting out in the garden in the moonlight, but we could not linger long, for we had to be home for dinner. The drive was delightful, with the hood of the car down, and the moon appearing and disappearing behind the storm clouds that were blowing across the sky.
Sir Leonard went off to Calcutta after dinner. The Rankens stayed till early the next morning, and since then we have led a quiet and more or less undisturbed life.
Herbert is still working away at the Forest Committee Report, and making a very good job of it, though he takes so much trouble that it takes a long time - Best love -
LJT
From LJT to Annette
Chinsurah
Bengal
April 6th 1939
My darling Annette,
You supplied us with a bit of information for which we were seeking, and that was an opinion of George Formby. Dining out the other night a certain woman, who is herself a bore, praised George Formby to skies. Since Dad and I had an idea of going to the picture a few days later, should there be anything agreable and amusing to see, we found the only thing that sounded attractive was a film with George Formby in it. Finally we thought the attraction did not sound enough to weigh against Dad’s exhaustion. The thought that anything this woman praised so, was probably bad, influenced us too, I think, but perhaps her taste was not so bad after all.
We are rather glad that Richard has not bought the expensive boat, for we could not help wondering where he was going to get so much money from. From his account “Pandora” must be a useful sort of craft.
* * * * *
A pause here, while I have been having a lengthy telephone conversation with Reggie Cooke. Dad has gone over to hear some “appeals” at the office, so I am able to get at the phone without disturbing him. Reggie Cooke has drawn up a very detailed and closely thought out plan for an Autumn attempt on Mount Everest, which he wants the Himalayan Club to sponser. The Eastern Section Committee were favourable, and I sent it up to the Central Committee, who sent it home to the Everest Committee in England. Meantime we are circulating a copy of the scheme to experienced climbers to get their opinions on it. Dont, by the way, let the press get wind of this, because it is most undesirable that anything should be published about it at this early stage. I was reporting to Reggie about some of the replies that have come in, and also consulting him about various other things, for he is Chairman of the Eastern Section this year. A good illustration of the sort of thing for which the Himalayan Club is so useful, has just happened. Some few weeks ago I heard from two men in Quetta, saying that they were planning to go and try to climb the great mountain, Tirich Mir, in Chitral in June and July, and as their original party had been reduced to two, they wondered if I could put them in touch with any other climbers, who would like to join them. Last week I heard from a man I know, who is now stationed at Drosh in Lower Chitral, saying that he and some friends were planning exactly the same thing and at the same time, and wanted to know of any one who would like to join forces with them. I sent letters off to both parties immediately.
It was an interesting week-end we had with the Rankens here. For an account of our doings see the family letter. Louise is such a keen and intelligent little person, and her husband is reasonably so too. It was a pleasure taking them about, and enharnced my pleasure in the places we visited. The old Judge was as keen as mustard too! Louise has just sent me two lovely pairs of stockings, which seems a super way of aknowleging an enjoyable week-end. Dad enjoyed their company in a way, but there is always an under-current of feeling that he grudges the time taken up by guests. I wish he did’nt. Its good for him to meet and mix with people now and again, and not necessarily because they have something to do with his work.
My daily practice of mind concentration goes on, but I don’t yet see much progress. Still I shall continue. I am sure one will get it with persistance.
I am sorry to hear that Peg has not been well. It seems to me that the journey up to town, plus her work and play, must be very exhausting. Its a pity she cant afford to live in London, or get a decent job in Chelmsford or Braintree.
The morning is flitting away and I must write to young Romey.
Best love and thanks for your letter
Mother
From HPV to Annette
Chinsura
Bengal
April 6th 1939
My dear Annette
The main street of Chinsura is narrow: it is impossible for two vehicles to pass where there is a lamp post or telegraph post and there are no pavements. Today the driver had to jam on his brakes to avoid a man who stepped out of a house into the road, and a cyclist coming the other way had to stop dead and put one foot on the ground to avoid hitting him: at this the cyclist leaning forward pulled the man heartily by the nose, with some brief words. No retaliation. Curious: Shakespearian – almost.
I went to Midnapore last Thursday. By the Bombay Mail. I had forgotten it was boat train night: there was a pack or scrum on the platform: but most were seers-off and I had no difficulty in getting a seat: whatever happened, after all, there would have been no difficulty about this for there are only four sleeping bunks per carriage and each of the two lower bunks will seat three. At Kharagpur where I left the train, three armed guards with fixed bayonets fell in behind and three in front of me: and five miscellaneous police with revolvers marched on either side. This was to guard me from possible attacks by anarchists! But it looked more as if I was being taken off to jail or execution – and I hope that my friends in the train didn’t suppose this to be so. The same thing happened when I was returning (I got up at five so as to have time to drive the seven or eight miles from Midnapore and to cross a broad river in a ferry) but in the intervals there was less excitement. Merely the guard with a revolver – except that there were armed guards by couples every 100 yards on the roads along which I went. It is so always for the District Magistrate and he must get heartily sick of it. I was there only two days: 32 gentlemen saw me on the first morning and 36 on the second. I worked the rest of the day. On Friday evening we went (my host and I) over to Khanagpur and saw boxing: with much blood. On Saturday evening there was a dinner party and the guests didn’t leave till 12.30! The night when I got up at 4, I was exhausted by the time I reached here, though I had breakfast when I got to Howrah before coming on in the car – A lot of work this week and nothing to show for it. Richard’s cable gave us both much pleasure: I suppose that he was pleased himself: was he? He is quite capable of having principles forbidding it.
Much love
Dad
Family letter from HPV (carbon, ‘Annette’ hand written in ink)
Chinsurah
April 11th 1939.
My dear Annette
You may take the preface of this letter plain? It is the Forest Report (drafting of -----) this time; but there would be something else if it were not that. Also your mother is in Calcutta for the day. Whenever this happens they feed me with beef-steak and onions and very often I write a letter to the family. I cannot spell when I type, I cannot spell when I am tired, and I spell worse now that I am growing old. The handicaps to letter-writing are becoming too numerous. And how I detest forests and the Forest-Committee members and the Ministers and Laus sometimes called Louse Martin who suggested that I might do this work in addition to what I had to do.
Among the alleviations is the manifestation by the animal world that I am becoming a lovable one. Like as I say St Anthony of Padua who was treated affectionately by a pig (but your mother and Mrs Rankin knowing only one St Anthony and an inferior one at that imagined that I claimed to be tempted by maidens at night: which at no time has been true) or like as I now remember St Simeon Stylites who was visited by maggots, I am visited by birds. In this I do not even give a twist to the thing. As I sat working in my office room there came a pecking on the window pane; and behold! There were two birds, Seven Sisters, squeezed close together and all eagerness, pecking with insistance while behind stood another bird which to my eye was a mynah: you will not believe that these two pecked at every pane on ground level before they walked off round the house; when they came to a pane that was not there they pushed their heads in, astonished and went off to the next. Since then they have visited us several times, in several different rooms; same technique each time and the same excited interest. Your mother pooh-poohed the myna and on each occasion when she has seen them the third bird was a Seven Sister also; but this afternoon the myna was there all right, roaring annoyance that the two birds were making such fools of themselves and fluffing out his feathers as he rapidly bowed --- while a third Seven Sister sat in a flower pot and disassociated itself from the whole thing. Add to this that two doves came and sat together and looked at me through the window-pane this afternoon, just like the Seven sisters except that they did not peck. Consider this in the light of the Big Owl and the Small Owl and the Parrot. I do not count the Squirrels because they have been fed. Your mother has put up the ridiculous explanation that the Three Seven Sisters have been separated in some way from the rest of the Seven and mistake their own reflections for them: this as you all so aptly have observed will not explain the doves. The snag about the more plausible explanation is that my temper has been more and more vile. Why, it has reached such a pitch that I take no pleasure in the thought of forests and very little in the memory of ministers whom I have known. Item I forgot to say that your mother suggests St Francis.
It will please Annette to hear that at the School in Calcutta where her mother guided the girl guides a very little new girl proudly told the teacher “Please, I have two daddies --- and one of them is a Chinaman.” I said that it was too tragic to laugh at and at once guffawed.
What more? What more, indeed --- I shall not conceal anything. Sen Gupta has finished his estimates of the Hooghly Howrah Irrigation scheme at last; no harm, for it was more than time; but he has also in the innocence of his silly heart omitted from the scheme a large area in the South West where the people have embarked on a drainage scheme certain not to work and likely to increase malaria, omitted also an area on the East where years and years ago Government put through a drainage scheme which has never worked properly and has increased malaria, and had gone out of his way to suggest that the Railways ought to pay part of the cost. The Railways are Government of India, it would take years and years to persuade the Government of India to contribute even if there were any sense in it, the suggestion is the sort of tomfoolary that appeals to Bengalis and so is likely to be supported, and thus the prospects of anything being done have receded far, and worse my patience has diminished. I asked him why if he wanted his scheme put into effect he went out of his way to muck it up and he poor prune said that he had only wanted to help. Is it worth going on? Answer adjudged 100% correct, NO. I shall go on as soon as I have got this Forest Report off my chest, if indeed it occupies so honourable a place which I doubt.
We have had many visitors of late. Let your mother tell of them. They gave me a pain in the neck: unless indeed it was due to touching the ground behind my head with my toes for too long at a time.
Why go on indeed? I have read today in Wells Huxley and Wells that not only the body but the brain shrinks with age: and although thus less exposed to swelled head I feel that it is not so good.
I do not like the idea of Richard’s going to sea on or in a Ribless Boat. Was not the story of selling before it was really finished a Saleman’s yarn? Unless he meant ‘finished the rib-breaking process’. However Idris Matthews says airily that ribs are nothing. But even complete with ribs a boat would daunt me. Too much sea underneath, with fish in it.
Much love
Dad
Family letter from LJT
Chinsurah
Bengal
April 12th 1939
My Dears,
We had such a lovely cool week-end for Easter. All Thursday of last week, storm clouds were rolling about and thunder rumbling in the distance, and it became quite cool, so we kept all the windows open. I went down to spend the evening with the Doctor and his wife at the Angus Jute Mill. The wife, Betty, I have known for some years as she is the daughter of the man who was D.I.G. of police in Darjeeling for some years. Her mother was the Mrs Walker, with whom Herbert made his famous appearances in amature theatricals at Barisal. The Copelands are a nice couple. The plan was that Idris Matthews and some other people from Cossipore, were coming up to spend the evening, and the idea was to bathe in the nice little swimming bath about 6.30, and then see some of the Copelands’ colour films. Actually the evening seemed to be so chilly that we did not feel extra keen about bathing, and just sat and talked and looked at the excellent films, had dinner and came away soon afterwards. Idris came back here with me, to pay us a long promised visit. About five o’clock the next morning I was woken by a great clap of thinder, and the wind roaring through the house. I lay and listened to it with much pleasure. A few minutes later the rain came hissing down, so I skipped out of bed to shut my dressing-room windows, and the spare dressing room. Instead of going back to bed, I went on to the little south verandah and watched the rain pouring down, and gradually the lawn almost going under water. Its always a renewed delight when a heavy rain storm comes in the hot weather and all the parched earth gets soaked. It was still raining at breakfast time, which gave us one small disappointment, for the squirrels did not turn up to be shown to idris. However by the time we had finished our meal, the rain had stopped, and when Herbert went out and called the little creature came.
It was cloudy and heavenly cool all day. Idris and I after looking round the garden, went up to call on the manager of Dunlops’ rubber works, and after wandering round their garden, the two men went off into the Factory (which was not working since it was Good Friday) saying they would be back in ten minutes. After three-quarters of an hour, Mrs Bennett and I thought we had better to and look for them, and we finally found them in one of the enormous shops, apparantly quite oblivious of time. That afternoon Ronald Townend and the friend with whom he was staying at one of the Jute Mills across the river, came across in the latter’s motor boat, and we had tea in the garden. Its hard to describe the pleasure of cool days to people who have not been in a hot climate, but it was delicious sitting out on the lawn with the fresh breeze blowing off the river. The boys did great justice to our tea, and afterwards I conducted them and Idris round the usual sights of Chinsurah. I confess I have seen rather much of them lately but as a rule when people come here for the first time, they do like to see the relics of the early Europeans in India. The excitement of that evening was whether the boat would get stranded by the falling tide. All was well when we got back to the house, and as the tide did not seem to have turned, we decided that the boys could spare time to have a drink. We stationed the sweeper, (who happened to be handy at the moment) beside the boat, with instructions to push the boat out a bit, directly the water began to go down. It was tied by a wire to a small anchor on the bank. Some three quarters of an hour later, when dusk had fallen, we went down to the river bank, to find the boat almost high and dry. The only reply the Sweeper had to our questions was “Pani chalagyia” (Water gone away). I sent him to summon all the people he could find, and a crowd of domestics and hangers-on, including the dhobi’s twelve year old son, arrived, and it did not take long to shift the boat, almost lifting it, into the water. There was a great deal of chatter and excitement, and everyone asking everyone else questions about the boat. We then wondered whether the engine would start, but it behaved beautifully, and the little craft soon disappeared into the shadows of the river.
Idris seemed immensly interested in the old places here, and the previous day as we had driven past the old Bandal Circuit House, which is now being left to rot away as far as I can see, he expressed a wish to go and see it. Another cool and breezy morning made the outing most pleasant, and besides looking at the house we wandered about in the spacious grounds, looking at the trees and shrubs and birds. It is a sort of unintentional bird sanctury, and certainly what we heard gave the lie to the often repeated statement that there is no pleasant bird-song in India. On our way home we visited the Imambara, in which Idris also took a great interest. I am becoming a good guide to these places!
Idris had an engagement in Cossipore that evening, and left us after lunch. We enjoyed having him here. We also had an engagement that night. We were dining with the Administrateur of Chandanagore, and it was a charming party. The other guests were the French Consul General and his German wife, - the French Consul and his American wife, and the French Trade Commissioner and his French wife! Since M. Menard’s (the Administrateur) English is very shaky, we talked French most of the time. It was comfortable for us, for we both understand French pretty well, and any word we did not know when trying to speak, could be quickly supplied by one of the French people most of whom talked English well. M. Menard is a witty little fellow when he gets going, and ably backed by M. Didot, the Consul, he kept the party in a fairly constant ripple of amusement. Our fears that we should be taken to dance at the Hotel de Paris, a rather sordid resort, were happily unfulfilled, and we sat and talked on happily after dinner. I had a few minutes of serious conversation with Mme Dubois (the Consul General’s wife). She is just back from Germany where she has been to visit her son by her first and German husband. The boy is now in the Army and is, as she says they all must be a Nazi. We were talking in English at that moment, and she said “Unhappily my German people are like sheeps (her English is only fair.) They most of them follow without too much question”. Its a dreadful situation for her, poor woman! Talking of dreadful situations, did I mention that about three weeks ago I had a letter from Mary Ow-Wachendorf saying that her husband had not been in good health, and that they had taken long leave and were going to Java. At the German Consul-General’s cocktail party just after the crisis in the early twenties of March, the Chancellor of the German Consulate asked me if I had heard anything from the Ows, and when I told him what I had heard he said he was afraid that there were other reasons than poor health to account for the Baron’s sudden voyage to Java. Now I get a newspaper cutting from England, saying that Baron Ow Wachendorf had been summoned to Berlin to report, and had replied by sending his resignation, saying that when he joined the Diplomatic Service, he did not know he would have to serve under a regime like the present. The paper further stated that he was intending to settle in Java. Mary Ow’s mother, Baroness Griskra, is American, and some of her money is in America, so I suppose they will live on that, and what the Baron got for the pictures and curios he sold in Cairo, for I imagine all his estates in Germany will be confiscated. Sorry as I feel for them, I also feel glad to know of someone who is brave enough to sacrifice worldly comfort and position for his beliefs. As Edward Groth said to me over the phone yesterday when we were talking about this “Wael, One always knew that they were real people”. It sounded effective in his slow deep American drawl. Another of my German friends, Herbert Richter, in a letter written early in March, told me that he had been appointed to Tetuan in Spanish Morocco, and was thankful to get away from the Foreign Office in Berlin.
To write about world politics as such is beyond me. One wonders whether the world was ever quite so disturbed before, but I suppose it has often been, the nearest example being the close of the Napoleonic Wars. I still believe that there are a greater number of people in all countries with a greater “Will to Peace” than there have ever been before, but it takes so many ‘just men’ to save even one town.
To return to my own small doings, I had to go down to Calcutta yesterday, chiefly to meet the wife of one of the Himalayan Club members, who is going to try to climb the great mountain, Tirich Mir in Chitral. This girl has driven herself all the way from Loralai, near Quetta in an Austin 7 with a young bull terrier as her sole companion. She thought that, as time was short, it would be better to come down herself and collect equipment and Sherpa porters. We had a great time going through the tents and stuff yesterday morning, for our Equipment Officer is away, and I phoned Reggie Cooke to meet us for lunch at the Saturday Club. Mrs Smeeton is the prettiest blue-eyed creature, but evidently a stout climber herself, and one of those people who climb up rock faces like flies. We met again for a bathe at the Saturday Club in the evening, and Reggie kindly gave her dinner and saw her off the Darjeeling, for I have promised to go to dinner with Harry and Winsome whom I had not seen for ages.
The Compound seems to be recovering from its troubles. The dhobi is cured of his chicken pox, and appeared with a note from the Health Officer this morning to say that he might come to work again. Mogul and his daughter have recovered from the attack of ‘Flu’, though Mogul looks and seems run down still. His wife, I am sorry to say, is still running a temperature, and I fear the lady-doctor who came from the hospital to see her, suspects a possibility of T.B. She is to go and have her chest X-Rayed on Friday morning, and a sample of sputum has been taken for testing. I do most profoundly hope it is not this dread disease.
The newly transplanted roses benefitted greatly by the wet week-end, and it was a good chance to get a lot of the hot-weather things planted out –
Herbert is still working on the Forest Report. He is only able to give a limited time to it, of course, but I am a little worried, because I think he is getting over-tired, and has got the thing on his mind. To-morrow being the Bengali New Year, or something of the sort, the office will be shut, and Herbert has consented to go down to Calcutta to see Jessie Matthews in “Climbing High”, and later to dine with Harry and Winsome.
Best love to you all
LJT
From LJT to Annette
Chinsurah
Bengal
April 13th
My darling Annette,
Dad’s dairy, which is full of information about what happens on certain dates at Oxford and Cambridge, announces that Trinity Term begins on April 12th. However as I have no idea whether you will have gone up again, I am sending this to Highways.
Fancy your never having seen Mr Deeds! Its odd how fate works against one seeing certain plays and films sometimes. I don’t think Mr Deeds will have dated. I feel as if I should like to see it again. I think Mr Deeds is rather like Uncle Tim used to be when he was young, only possibly with higher ideals.
Oh dear! Oh Dear! I have been interrupted no less than three times since I started this page. The electrician called me to check the fact that he had done his work properly: The dhirzie summoned me to try on a dress and see that the hem was straight: And the chaprassi brought the post which I had to sort and look through. I have’nt an awful lot of time for letters anyway this morning, for we are having lunch early and going off to Calcutta to see a “Flick”.
Your letter gives a very home like “Highwayish” feeling. There are always such a lot of activities going on. It seems to me the country is far from dull as far as the Highways household is concerned.
Rosemary’s report is far better than her examination marks had led me to expect. She still seems to be weak in maths. I wonder whether it would be a good thing for her to have some special coaching. The whole thing turns on getting someone who is a good coach, and makes the stuff interesting. I wish she could have a few hours work a week with Idris. He is mathematically on the plane when the subject becomes a living science and the key to many of the worlds problems.
My attempts at “meditation” don’t seem to be improving. I still find my brain hareing off after some plan for the garden when I am endeavouring to meditate on the infinite!
There are some interesting ideas in Vivakananda’s “Karma Yoga”. They need a good deal of chewing over before I feel I shall be able to discuss them, but many of them are extremely enlightening, and some are shiningly full of common sense.
Do you do any philosophy except in so far as it comes into the French books you are studying? Richard is working at the subject this year I believe. What I shall want soon is someone with whom to discuss some of the ideas I am reading about now. Its a pity Dr Biswas is so far away. So many Englishmen are shy of, or frightened of, discussing anything which they think of as being “Religious”, whereas most educated Indians are prepared to discuss such things without the slightest self-consciousness.
Best love
Mother
P.S. Thanks for sending the book to Rosemary
LJT to Rosemary
Chinsurah, Bengal
April 13th, 1939
My darling Rosemary,
It was very nice to hear about your Confirmation. Aunt wrote to me the very next day which was nice of her.
Your school report came this week, and it is better than your exam marks led me to expect. You still seem to find maths a stumbling block. Would you like to have a little more special coaching? You may certainly do so, either in that or any other subject, if you feel you need it, and can fit it in. I am sure your progress will be largely a question of being able to focus your interest on it. It’s strange that Newton, who was, I suppose, the most wonderful mathematician that the world has ever seen, was not interested in mathematics, but he was intensely interested in science, and he did his epoch-making mathematical work in order to forge the mathematical instruments with which he could work at his science. Whether you ever have to make any practical use of the maths you do at school I am sure of this, that you will be able to understand and enjoy the accounts of the scientific discoveries that are going on infinitely better, if you have a reasonably good grasp of ordinary maths, and have learnt the trick of thinking mathematically, a thing which I never come near, only touch now and again under the influence of Indris Matthews.
Untidy work in biology is simply a question of control. One is untidy because one is uncontrolled, and in the long run that is the matter of keeping the mind in order. Don’t you know people who never seem able to control their clothes or their hair? I think it is always due to lack of control of the mind. Take Auntie Mona, for instance. She has never been able to control her belongings, because her mind is so untidy. I am trying hard every morning after I get up, to practice mind concentration. I have not succeeded very well so far, but I intend to go on trying, for I believe it is one of the most useful and valuable habits one can form. I wish I had realized the value of it years ago. I commend it to your notice. You see it is just as valuable for play as for work. I should have been twice as good a tennis player as I was, if I had been able to concentrate on what I was doing, instead of letting all sorts of other thoughts go chasing through my mind.
This letter seems to be reading rather like a lecture! I don’t mean it to be, but I do want to hand on to you some of the ideas that have slowly come to me, in case they may help you.
I hope you have had a good time in Ireland. I am looking forward to hearing about it.
Best love, darling
Mother
Family letter from LJT
Chinsurah
E.I.Rly
Bengal
April 18th 1939
My Dears,
Its strange how one gets used to living on a volcano. The thought that we may be at war to-morrow, has become almost part of our daily outlook. Opinion here seems very mixed about the utility of the President’s appeal. One hopes that, at any rate, it will consolidate American opinion in favour of some sort of intervention. I heard the first news of it over the wireless at 10.45 Calcutta Time last Saturday night. I almost begin to wish we had a wireless these days. Its nice to get the news quickly when such great events are in progress.
Herbert having worked himself almost to a standstill last Thursday, we went off to Calcutta for a little relaxation. After an early lunch, we set off in the car, and went to the 3,o’clock performance of Jessie Matthews in “Climbing High”, and though it is essentially a silly film, we laughed a lot at it. Afterwards we had tea at the Saturday Club, and intended to bathe, but we met so many friends, and Herbert took so long to get his hair cut, that we did not go into the swimming bath, but went along to Harry and Winsome for drinks and dinner. We were slightly disappointed to find that they had guests coming in. They were an American Couple, and I did not care much about her. She seemed to me one of those people who after spending a few days in a country, know much better than anyone else about everything. She asked me why I pronounced “Chinsurah” wrong, saying that the heavy accent should be on the “u”. Actually by commonuse a slight accent is generally put on the “Chin”, though actually in Bengali all the syllables receive equal accent. Bengali and the other languages derived from Sanscit have that feature in common with French, i.e. that each syllable is accented equally. One name from Tibetan that is invariably pronounced wrong by English people is the “Potola”, which is the Dalai Lama’s palace. The three syllables have exactly equal value. I am sorry that when I was talking to Mrs Crews I did not know that the name Chinsurah is derived from the name of a small fish, the “Choonchoorah” It was so long since I had met an American of this type, that I felt quite surprised. All my American friends in Calcutta are so different.
The Mrs Smeeton I told you about last week, arrived here on Friday evening on her way back to Lorelie. She had been up to Darjeeling, and had had the luck to be on the spot when word came from Eric Shipton that he only wants five porters this year, instead of the ten that he and his friends had reserved, so Mrs Smeeton was able to get five first class men. Her Baby Austen has a van back to it, and she had packed the tents and equipment in it, making the top as flat as possible so that “Puddle” the bull terrier, could repose on top of it. Its nice to meet a girl as completely fearless as that. She explained that if there is any doubt of her getting to a dak-bungalow for the night, she can easily sleep in her car. She was a most attractive person, and we were sorry that we only had her with us for such a short time, for she wanted to be off by seven o’clock in the morning, and was, to the tick. She was to do 250 miles that day. Its pretty stiff in the Indian hot weather!
Herbert is still not quite through with his report, but I think it really is nearing the end. It is a wonderfully complete account of the forests of Western Bengal, their history, how they grow, what use is or should be made of them. How they should be cultivated, - how they are misused in a vast number of ways in different places – the evil effects of allowing them to disappear. Then there are recommendations of what should be done, with pages given to dealing with difficulties, and reasons why certain things, which one would think could be done quite easily, are impossible. Finally he has to recommend what legislation should be passed to make it possible to compel people to look after their forests in the public interest, and if they are not prepared to do so, then to make it compulsory to hand them over to the Forest Department to manage, receiving a share of the profits. All this has to be done so cunningly, that the members of the committee will sign it whatever their politics, so it needs extremely careful drafting, though I confess to wondering whether the pains Herbert is spending, are not a little out of proportion, - - not to the importance of the subject, which is a vital one over most of the world, but because of the sort of government with which he has to deal.
We used his urgent work as an excuse for him to refuse to go down to Serampore and dine with the Principal of the College and his wife. I went alone. Luckily I had allowed myself very ample time. It takes us half an hour to Serampore main street as a rule, and as the college is away on the river bank, I left here at 7.15 for dinner at 8 o’clock. It was the night of the Bengali New Year and the whole way the road was full of people out strolling. There were all the fathers and mothers and children and grandparents, and the cows and their calves (one very young calf ran for two or three hundred yards in front of us) Dogs and the pups, and goats and their kids. The animals seemed affected by the idea of having a happy evening, and we had to creep along amongst the crowd at about twenty miles an hour, so that it was just on 8 o’clock when I reached Serampore, and a little after when I got to the Rawson’s house. The only other guests were Kitty and Walter Jenkins, and another I.C.S. man who had all been up at the college playing tennis.
Mr Rawson is an extremely interesting man, deeply read in Indian literature, but its difficult to get him to talk to advantage, because his wife, who is a pleasant enough, but rather brainless creature, always cuts into the conversation, and carries it into some futile channel. Her great interest at the moment is whether Hitler has several doubles, and whether, in fact, Hitler is really dead, and one of the doubles is being used as a figure head. I am sure “The People” and “The Daily Sketch” must be the sort of papers that delight her. When it was suggested that we should play “rummy” after dinner, I firmly said that unless anyone else was specially keen, I would much rather talk. I am quite sure I was voicing the opinion of the other guests.
On Sunday I had a quite unexpected surprise. Miss Westwater, the Scotch Missionery, who often comes in here, and who is a sadly dull creature, wrote a note to ask if she might bring a friend from Calcutta to see me in the evening. I had been looking forward to a quiet evening and some time to read, but had to say “Yes” of course, and resigned myself to the idea of entertaining two rather boreing females. I had chairs put out on the chabutra, for there was a lovely breeze, blowing. The unknown guest turned out to be such a nice woman, and we had a most interesting and enlightening discussion of the subject of that play by W.H.Auden, “The Ascent of F6”, which I saw acted by an amature company a little while ago, and which puzzled me considerably.
Yesterday our new Collector and his wife came in about 7 o’clock, and I am glad to find her a pleasant and quite intelligent woman. Actually I think I shall probably have more in common with her than I did with Mrs Tufnell Barrett.
We have a Himalayan Club Committee meeting on Thursday, and a lecture on Friday, so I am going to stay the two nights with Idris at the Towers. I wonder whether Herbert will have finished the report by the time I get back.
I am greatly relieved to get the medical report about Mogul’s wife, which is to the effect that there is no sign of T.B., only a tendency to chronic bronchitis.
Best love to you all
LJT
From LJT to Annette
Chinsurah
April 19th 1939
My darling Annette,
My mind is slightly distracted this morning, because I have a lot of material to get ready for the Himalayan Committee meeting to-morrow evening, and also for the Insurance Agent with whom I have an appointment about the question of insuring the porters. There does’nt seem to be a flow of ideas, so to speak. There is another factor at work I think, and that is that the “news” seems singularly disturbing this morning. This fear that Italy is going to try to get Gibralter is not a nice idea. If anything comes of it, I suppose there is no hope but that we shall be plunged immediately into war. President’s Roosevelt’s offer has evidently made the dictators feel a bit uncomfortable. I wish Hitler would fall down in a fit like St Paul did, and get a “Change of heart”. That would be much better than getting him murdered!
We have been half expecting Auntie Winsome out here this week, for the Shaw Wallace senior partner, and his wife, who have been up in Delhi, where he is a member of The Council of State, and who after spending a few days here last week before stated off for their leave in Europe, telegraphed from Bombay saying that they had changed their minds, were not going home, but would probably spend their leave in Ootycamund. They left HD and Winsome in some doubt as to whether they would come back to Calcutta before going to Ooty. Winsome was almost driven demented when they were in the house before, and she rang up to say that if they do come back there, may she take refuge with us!
My mind control is improving slightly I think!! I wonder what Dad would think if he knew that I was going in for what I feel sure he would think, heathenish practices!
The household seem to take up a lot of my time these days. The mali cut a huge gash in his hand a few days ago, which I have been dressing twice a day, and the under-khit had a small boil on his shoulder which I taught him to ferment with boric. then the Electrolux refrigirator when wrong. The Calcutta agents cheerfully told me to turn the great thing upside down, because there was probably a gas-clock causing the trouble. I took fright at the idea, and so they sent out a man, who did the necessary. The servants say that now they have once done it, they can do it again, should necessity arise. All these things eat up time, but I suppose they are what I really should look upon as my job, instead of tending to regard them as interruptions.
The weather is hot again, but the experts prophesy a storm within the next two days.
Oh! I forgot to mention that we have been invited to spend five days at Government House in Darjeeling from the 11th to the 16th May. It will be nice in a way, but its an expensive journey for such a short time, and Dad complains that it breaks into his work.
Best love, my dear
from
Mother
From LJT to Annette
Chinsurah
Bengal
April 26th 1939
My darling Annette
I had been wondering if, should you make up your mind to try for the Home Civil, you would be able to have your first shot next year – If you do want to go in for it, don’t be put off by the fact that you cannot take the exam straight away after leaving Oxford – Unless anything unforseen occurs, we ought to be able to send you to a “crammers” – I am sorry that Modern Languages are said to be the worst preparation for it. I should try to get some more information on that point – Mind you, I don’t want to influence you to try for the Civil Service if you have ideas of some other line you would rather attempt.
Funny! Your mention of going up to London with Auntie May brought such a vivid picture to my mind of the day I drove up with her during the Sept crisis – The Parks were then being torn up to make Air Raid shelters. I suppose that is all a “fait accompli” now – I wonder whether we will be able to hear a translation of Hitlers speech in Calcutta on Friday evening. It will be taking place actually while we are in the Cinema, seeing “Pygmalion” – I should think they will give us the important news there – what a tense moment for the world!
Anina Brandt, whom I had out here for the week-end and who was in Germany for a short time last year, says she thinks Hitler will not dare to take any actual step that would mean war, for she does not think he has the country at all solid behind him – I wonder whether she is right.
Did you ever read “An Experiment with Time” and “Serial Time” by Dunne? I did not, but Idris was thrilled by them and did his best to explain them to me, with only middling success. I have just been reading Dunne’s later book “The New Immortality” which is supposed to be for the completely non-mathematical “man in the street”. I found the beginning dull – jumped on to the middle – Found it very interesting – Went back to the beginning and read through to the end – finding it very interesting up to the last two or three chapters – where I got lost – The points he makes and the beliefs he reaches, seem to be very much those reached by the Vedic philosophers some four thousand years ago – only he has got there by a different road – and I frankly cannot grasp what he means by psudo-time and what by real time – I think I must have another shot at those final chapters. I was reading them at tea time yesterday and Dad kept on reading me goo bits out of the Life of Edison – One ought really to sid down to them with a pencil and paper and draw out the diagrams for oneself. I think the book is worth reading for some intriguing ideas it enshrines – Its an amusing notion that whatever has happened or existed is there – always and that we shall eventually come to a state when we can take our attention off the straight line we have been busily following (like the chicken and the line of chalk) and then we shall be able to use every thing that we have ever known or experienced to make just what patterns we like. I cant say I find it a convincing belief, but its rather a nice one – Idris says that the “Experiment with Time” and “Serial Time” are the only two books that have begun to give him any sort of a belief in “Immortality” –
April 27th
The news that conscription has come in England is in the paper this morning – I suppose there will have to be a good deal of adjustment in the life of the ‘Varsities. I wonder how it will be arranged – and I wonder what is going to happen with the Absolute Pasifists –
I must get on to the family letter now.
Best love
from
Mother
Family letter from LJT
Chinsurah
Bengal
India
April 28th 1939.
My Dears,
The Headlines of the papers this morning tell us that conscription has come in England. Judging by what one has seen in the press lately, there has been a very general demand for it. Adjustments to it will be a bit complicated I suppose. For the moment it looks as if it will not cause immediate dislocation to Richard’s and Gavin’s varsity careers, as by the Autumn, when I suppose Gavin will be due, one imagines that the necessary adjustments will have been made.
After writing to you last week, I had three very busy days in Calcutta. There was a lot of Himalayan Club work besides the actual Committee meeting and the lecture. Before lunch on Thursday I met an Insurance Agent and went into the figures I have been collecting about porters climbing accidents. It was interesting to see his attitude change, as he looked at the figures, and realized what a lot of climbing has been done in the last eighteen years, and how few accidents there have been.
I lunched with Charles Crawford at the Great Eastern Hotel (such bliss in weather like this to spend a few hours in a cool air-conditioned room), and after lunch we found our party of mountaineers who had arrived the day before, and I stayed talking with them for some time. The leader of the party, Herr Grob, is Swiss. His two companions are Germans. None of them could speak a great deal of English, but we got along alright, and then I discovered that Herr Grob could talk French, so communication was comparatively easy. I had a lot of things to settle up with them about the lecture and their porters and their subscriptions to the Himalayan Club and so on. There was not much of the afternoon left for work when I left them, for I was meeting Louise Rankin for a farewell tea at 4 o’clock. She and her husband go on leave this week. I shall miss them.
The Committee meeting was an interesting one, and a large part of it given up to Reggie Cooke’s plan for an Autumn attempt on Mount Everest, by a party recruited in India.
Idris and I dined on the terrace of the Bristol Hotel over-looking Chowringhee and the Maidan, and even there, in the open air, with a fan, it was hot, so that again it was pleasurable to get into the cool air of the Cinema, where we saw “Pygmalion” and enjoyed it enormously.
One of the excitements at Cossipore is a crow which Idris found with a broken leg. He put it into a cage, and got the Factory doctor to come and set it, and the bird is already beginning to get quite tame, and has quite strong ideas on what it prefers for breakfast. The squirrels have become almost a nuisence. They are so tame now that they rush up on to the table all the time, and if not supplied with nuts or bread, see what they can grab off ones plate.
After a busy morning in Calcutta, I again lunched at the Great Eastern, this time with Dr Heron, and again we joined Herr Grob and his party after lunch, and looked at some of their photos. The had Reggie Cooke, and Capt and Mrs Hunt with them, whom they met when all of them were climbing in Sikkim in the Autumn of 1937. We arranged to fetch them for a bathe and tea at the Saturday Club later in the afternoon, and again the afternoon was very short! It was lovely in the bath, and they did enjoy it. It was a help having John Hunt with us, for he speaks German fluently. Dr Heron speaks a little too. A little later in the evening Dr Heron took the party off to see the Rowing Club on the Dakuria Lakes, and I went back to the U.S. Club to make all arrangements for the lecture and dinner, and to meet Mr Groth and discuss the outfitting of the nine porters who were due the following morning from Darjeeling, on their way up to join the American Expedition to K.”, and who had to be fitted out with warm clothes and boots for the trek. I had sent my driver earlier in the day to make some enquiries about prices and qualities in the Bazaars and I wanted to go through these with Mr Groth who was looking after the men on behalf of the American party.
We had a merry evening. Herr Grob managed his talk extremely well. He had written out what he wanted to say in English, and the rather slow speech and somewhat quaint choice of words, with which he described the supurb pictures of the climb of that queen of beautiful mountains, Siniolchu, was very effective. Herr Paider showed some hair-raising pictures of climbing in the Alps and the Caucasus, and Herr Schmaderer, of the last German attempt on Nanga Parbat last year. There were a good many Germans in the audience, for we have a good many keen German members of the club. I find I cant feel any personal animosity to-wards them. It seems so hard to believe that we may be in the position of being at war with them at any moment.
It was great fun meeting the porters at the American Consulate on Saturday morning. There were several old friends of mine amongst them. I took a couple of them in my car, and the rest went in an extraordinary sort of bus which belongs to the Consulate. We went first to Whiteaway Laidlaw’s to get boots. I had seen some there which I thought would do well, but the porters did not like them, because they had soft toes, and not those stiff hard toe-caps. One of the men said he remembered the place in Lal Bazaar, where he had been taken to get boots the previous year, so we all went off there, found a small shop, and got what they liked, for Rs5 per pair, instead of Rs9, which was all to the good, provided the boots last out the journey (They are not the ones they will climb in) Of course we became the centre of attention in no time, so the Driver of the American car, a very capable stout fellow, in a smart uniform, took up his stand on the raised platform of the shop (These Indian shops are all open to the street, and have their floors raised some two or three feet above the street level) He addressed the crowd. He said, in Hindustani, “You bander-log! Have you never seen a memsahib before? Have you not got the whole street to walk in, that you must crowd round and keep away all the air? Go!” and they went, quite meekly!
Boots obtained, after much bargaining and trying on, we moved on to get warm jerseys at the Agency for some of the Lucknow woolen mills, and then I left them in Charge of the driver and of Mr Groth’s bearer, to go and get the rest of their things. Poor little men! They were dripping! (And so was I!) It always seems to be hone of the Hottest days of the year when any of them have to go through Calcutta.
After some rather hurried shopping on my own account, it was Heaven to get into Winsome’s cool dim house, and have a long cold drink, and it was very nice to see them both, for it being Saturday, Harry came back for lunch.
After lunch I called for Anina Brandt, whom I was bringing out here for the week-end, and we drove out here in the heat of the afternoon, and got home for tea. We nearly always get a cool breeze blowing here by about 6 o’clock, and we sat out in the garden and enjoyed it, and then had the pleasure of watching a storm come up, which after swirls of dust, gave us some heavy rain, and made it nice and cool.
Anina was happy to spend a quiet day on Sunday, for she works hard in Calcutta. He had a visit from the young Dutch vice-consul, who is living at Chandanagore, and a friend, also Dutch I think, who was staying with him, Mr Eekhout has got several books on the History of Chinsurah and has discovered that this house was called “The Well Placed” by its Dutch builder, Unfortunately the Dutch word is a difficult one with several spitting noises in it.
Anina had to get back on Monday morning, and I have been busy with Himalayan Club work, and the garden almost ever since. Herbert has finished the Forest Report, I am glad to say. I suppose the proof reading of it when it is typed will be quite a job. Perhaps I can help him with that.
I forgot to tell you last week that we have been invited to stay at Government House, Darjeeling from the 11th till the 16th May. Herbert feels a little worried at having more time taken off his work, but it will be good for him to have a little holiday in the Hills. We shall leave Calcutta on the night of the 10th. Its two and a half years since I was in Darjeeling, and I look forward to seeing it again.
There are great excitements going on in the Congress World these next few days in Calcutta. Ghandi has come down to Calcutta to discuss things with Subash Bose, the President, and if they cannot come to some sort of plan about the working Committee, who nearly all resigned when Subash Bose was elected President, they will have to be an All India Committee, and there seems a possibility that Subash will be asked to resign, and then there are likely to be all sorts of splits and rows. Its odd that with the ever present menace in Europe, its hard to take much interest in Indian politics. One skips through the news of them as a sort of duty.
We have done a big bit of work in the garden this week. We have realigned the long border which runs along the top of the river bank. The lawn above it is held up by a low brick wall, so we had to have a cartload of bricks, etc and a “raj-mistri” (mason) in to do the wall building. Its done now and is a great improvement.
This is the season of the flowering trees and shrubs, in fact the Indian Spring. The Gold Mohurs are flaming everywhere, and Calcutta looks at its best. There is a big bush of double gardiniers in the garden and the mali has put a bowl of them on my writing table this morning. They scent the whole room!
Herbert got bitten by big red ants the other evening, when he was pruning some bush. When he showed the bites to the Bearer, he was over-come by mirth, and immediately told how very funny it had been the other day when one of the Chapprassis when to sleep, and was bitten all over by ants, including his head. This seemed to the bearer the height of humour.
Idris Matthews is at last getting his sailing yacht, reconditioned, but our Driver thinks poorly of it, saying with a sniff that it is not a “Machine-wallah”. I tried to explain that some sahibs prefer useing sails, but I think my argument left him quite unconvinced. His view is evidently, if you can afford an engine, why in the name of wonder, bother about sails?
Best love to you all
LJT
HPV to Annette
Chinsura
April 28th 1939
My dear Annette.
I debated whether to cut out of today’s paper and send to you a paragraph describing the killing of a wild boar by an unarmed villager: the technique was good – Tarzanish, and so the cutting would be more suitable for Richard: he succeeded in getting upon its back after a struggle and he remained there until the animal died of exhaustion.
That is rather how I feel myself at the moment. Last night was one of those on which I failed to get off to sleep until a late hour. Kept awake by anger, maybe: composing snatches of replies to a letter from the Irrigation Secretary, a new man who has come to many decisions without reading up the facts. It is a hopeless business when the mind persists in going over the same thoughts again and again: but there is no cure for it. At least none for me: the whole thing is a symptom of tiredness. I had done a lot of work during the day, forgetting to reserve any energy for letter writing; and the writing of three letters after dinner just made the difference. Bad letters they were too.
No rain is the chief news. Not that it matters to us particularly: but the cultivators will be badly affected if this continues. They cannot get their seed in: fields too hard to plough and where they have managed to plough the seeds have not germinated. There has been a very strong breeze up the river these last few days. Everything in the house rattles and when the windows are opened (during the day in the hot weather they are kept shut) the curtain crack like whips. Mosquitoes are much fewer of late: but we have to use mosquito nets. A large mosquito room which allows one to stretch out freely in bed instead of keeping carefully in the middle so as not to touch the net. The drawback is that the wind tends to blow the net off the ground.
Much love Dad