1925
After the entry for 1–3 August 1924 Lewis gave up his diary until 6 February 1925. He was very busy during this period correcting Local Examination Papers and preparing to take over Mr Carritt’s teaching. On 14 October 1924 he began his course of twice-weekly lectures for the University entitled ‘The Good: Its Position Among the Values’ as well as tutorials for University College.
Jack and Warnie were with their father in Belfast from 23 December 1924 to 10 January 1925, after which Warnie stopped at ‘Hillsboro’ for a week.
Hilary Term began on 11 January 1925 and on 23 January Lewis began a twice-weekly course of lectures entitled ‘Moral Good: Its Position Among Values’. When the diary is resumed on 6 February we find Lewis giving tutorials at University College and correcting School Certificate Essays in his spare time.
Friday 6 February: Into town as usual after breakfast. Buckley brought me an essay on deduction—better than last time. I find it hard to make myself understood with him—we are always at cross purposes. Next came Hogg with whom I read the first and second analogies. Swanwick came in to join us, but as he works with Watson’s selections we found it impossible to harmonise and sent him away.
At 12 I went to the Payne for my lecture. Today my audience had dwindled to two—Hawker and the old parson. As they professed a wish to continue the course, I had them to my room. I said we could now be informal and I hoped they would interrupt whenever they wanted. The old parson availed himself of this so liberally that I could hardly get a word in. He seems to be a mono maniac—he has some grudge against the Archbishop of York—who came in twice—I forget how. He also has some psychological hobby horse about ‘the hedonic tone of psychosis’ wh. came in more than once. The funniest thing was when he said that an object qua cognition could not attract: he held out a very ugly hand with hair on the back and stubbed nails and said ‘Now suppose I have an object here—a quite unattractive object.’ Hawker promised to back me up.
Home by 1.30 and an excellent lunch. After usual jobs I went for a walk up Shotover. Am just beginning to be conscious of the face of nature again after a long strange imprisonment in myself. Steel coloured sky, and a cold rain came on. Pat and I hid among trees on the top of Pullen’s Gap. On the way home one half of the sky was grey cloud but there was a huge blue gap over Wytham and glittering piles of white beyond it.
Home for tea. Afterwards I set papers on the Merchant of Venice and started looking up a suitable ‘English Story’ for L[ocal] C[ertificate]. At 6.30 in to Hall.
A man called Ingles was there as Keir’s guest who was apparently up with me, but I had forgotten him—now at Cuddesdon—rather a prig I think. Sat between Allen and Lawson. Quite good talk.
Home by 9 o’clock. Read Matière et Mémoire in the evening.
Saturday 7 February: Beattie came this morning with a rather muddled but vigorous essay on the plurality of goods. We had an excellent discussion. Then came Donald on Kant’s causation. Interesting and paradoxical as usual, but not very solid. Finally came Swanwick without an essay, and I tried to hammer some interpretation of deduction into him. It is impossible to tell how much he understands . . .
Walked out after lunch and bought Travels with a Donkey (which I need for L.C.) at Mowbray’s: then bussed home and walked up Shotover with Pat. Went to the grove at the far end by the path wh. has just been re-opened since the foot and mouth disease scare. Home with a headache after a beautiful walk. Maureen had Celia Waterhouse to tea—a dull girl. Read Travels with a Donkey in the evening: a glorious book if you could omit the Modestine parts. Lateish to bed.
Monday 9 February: In after breakfast. Little Buchanan came with an essay on Utilitarianism, the first he’s done for me: really very good and already far beyond Swanwick. Next came Nash who thought two sides of a foolscap a sufficient essay on the Refutation of Idealism and appeared in discussion to have read hardly any of it. I made myself as unpleasant as I could about it, but I am not much good at this sort of thing.
I then went out and got an envelope to post my long delayed letter for Carritt and ordered Gadney’s to send over in the afternoon Sidgwick’s Historical Ballad for L.C. . . .
After tea into College and worked over my Berkeley and Hume notes for tomorrow. Dined in. Haig, of my year (now in Nigeria) was there as Ley’s guest. A dull evening except for a few quips of Poynton’s. Bussed home—a windy moonlight night—and was collared for unseens by Dotty. Poor D still marmalading.
Tuesday 10 February: Rather late up. Into town and worked on my Sidgwick paper for L.C. At 12 came Campbell—rather sleepy I thought, and not so good as usual. Keir and Lawson came for lunch: the usual brisk but not really interesting conversation. We are rather like the three curates in Shirley.
Came home and took Pat for a walk in Cuckoo Lane. In at 5.30. Bradley and Gordon-Clark came: the former does nearly all the talking—he is a nephew of Appearance and Reality. They had brought me several questions on Berkeley and Hume, all of which I was able to answer, by good fortune.
Dined in hall and left at once to hurry to the theatre for the O.U.D.S. [production of] Peer Gynt. D, Maureen and Dotty were already there. I was v. disappointed in the play. The general idea of a history of the soul is all right, but Peer’s soul hasn’t enough in it to last for four hours: most of him is mere Nordic windbagism. No good making a story of Peer: you only want to kick his bottom and get on. The Troll parts from the visual point of view were the best stage devilment I’ve ever seen . . .
Wednesday 11 February: Up at 7.30 and so to breakfast. Stevenson had been to the O.U.D.S. too and thought it excellent. Cox didn’t turn up. Henderson and, after him Ross the American.
Keir and Lawson for lunch. I quoted a line from the Prelude and Lawson thought it came from Rowbottom.
Home and for a walk with Pat by the cemetery. Worked on Leibnitz in the evening in my new edition. He had wonderful insight in some ways: he has the sense for biology wh. none of his contemporaries get anywhere near.
Early to bed, all rather tired. D still at the infernal marmalade.
Thursday 12 February: In as usual in the morning and a walk in the afternoon. Back to town by 5.30 and took Firth—a fairly good hour. I dined in hall: several undergraduates from other colleges there as guests.
Immediately afterwards I went to Ware’s rooms in Worcester St. for a meeting of the Phil. Soc.—I should have had some difficulty in finding them if I had not met Ewing. Ziman read his paper on causality. I, having heard it all from him in the morning, was rather bored. The discussion afterwards soon drifted off on to Touche’s and Dawson’s favourite position and I had an enjoyable argument. Home late—a wet night.
Saturday 14 February: Beattie came this morning. I like this man really very well. Then came Donald who read a most pretentious essay, full of silly epigrams, nominally on the plurality of goods, but as usual all Gentile and water. I applied the Socratic method, I think with some good results. What a lot of good a term with Kirk would do him! Finally came poor Swanwick.
Lawson came to lunch: talked about Iceland which we both want to visit. Bought a copy of Peer Gynt (Everyman) and took Joachim’s Spinoza out of the Union.
Bussed home. Took Pat down by the cemetery and got some rain: also a wonderful livid light over Otmoor. After tea I worked on Spinoza—I find the psychology (if one can call it that) very puzzling. Phippy was here. Thank heavens D has finished the marmalade. She had a touch of neuritis last night. Long conversation with Dotty and Maureen at supper time about the difference between men’s and women’s friendships.
Sunday 15 February: . . . Got home about noon and sat in my old room where the fire had been lit to dry the damp out of the wall. I read thro’ ‘Dymer’ I–VI. I, II, IV, and V are better than I thought—if only I could have kept it up!
After lunch I washed up and did the usual jobs, then worked on Leibnitz till tea time. D came and sat with me and we were very snug. After tea I took a spell off and read Mary Rose—a beautiful and suggestive play.
Then supper and while doing jars etc. afterwards I read most of the Master Builder and understood it much better than when I had seen it with Harwood at the Playhouse. Earlyish to bed—a most enjoyable day.
Monday 16 February: I went in in some trepidation lest a staff meeting might have been sprung upon us since Saturday, but fortunately a notice of warning for Friday next came round and set my mind at rest.
Buchanan brought an essay on Thrasymachus. While he was with me Dawson came in and asked me to the Martlets dinner. I asked to be allowed to come en Martlet (i.e. not as a parasite) but he would not have it. I booked him for walk and tea next Saturday. Nash came at 11 and read a much better essay than last week.
The morning was really glorious—Dionysiac. I enjoyed my walk with Pat before breakfast greatly—round by the Croft. Now it was even better, looking from my window down on the crocuses in the garden and over to Merton tower.
Went to the Union and returned Hoffding, taking out Pollock’s Spinoza: then home by bus. Read a good bit in Pollock before lunch. Afterwards I took Pat down by the cemetery. Home and worked again on Spinoza . . .
Tuesday 17 February: . . . Went to College, having bought a second hand copy of B. Russell’s Problems [of Philosophy] for 1/-, I worked for some time on Spinoza and finished Ethics Part II: then read Problems wh. I had not read before since 1917. What an excellent clear book for anyone to begin on . . .
Home and read a little Bridges, then, after tea, into town and took Bradley and Gordon-Clark on Spinoza and Leibnitz.
Dined in. Farquharson in the chair. Heard a splendid yarn about Campbell of Hertford getting drunk on dentist’s ether—must remember to tell Tchanie [Jane McNeill]. Farquharson discussed the madness of Mary Lamb—quite interesting conversation. I mentioned my qualms about Swanwick to him just before leaving.
Home in good time. D in excellent spirits.
Wednesday 18 February: Called by D at 7.30 and (after tea and bread and butter) walked to the top of the hill and then bussed in to breakfast in Common Room. Poached eggs cold—why can’t they get things hot?
Up to my room where Cox soon arrived. I began to twit him about skipping his last tutorial when I discovered to my horror that he had been absent because his father was dying. Of course I had known nothing about it, tho’ they have sent me round slips with the names of every other fellow who has been absent. I apologised of course, and did the best I could, but it was very unpleasant for everyone.
Next came Henderson with an excellent essay: then Ross who was quite unexpectedly good. After him Nightingale and Hawker for lecture. I unhappily mentioned Heathcliff and of course discovered that Nightingale was an ardent Bronte-ite which gives him another conversational opening.
When these had gone I went down to Keir’s rooms and lunched with him and Lawson. They also complained of never having their own pupils on the Aeger list. Keir suggested that they put a representative selection of names in to show you: ‘This is the kind of man who is sick at present.’
I took Moore’s Philosophical Studies out of the library and bussed home. Phippy was here. Started for a walk with Pat before tea but was driven back by rain. Went down Cuckoo Lane with him later on—a beautiful sunset. Read Moore on ‘External Relations’ in the evening. Supper at home and all very jolly.
Thursday 19 February: A very cold day. Low came at 10 and read quite a good essay on Spinoza. Next was Johnson on Kant’s Ethics: a good discussion and not a bad essay—there’s no doubt he’s improving. A welcome telephone message came to say that Ziman had a bad cold and could not come for his tutorial.
Bussed home. After lunch I started for a walk with Pat and was just crossing the allotments to Shotover when I was driven back by rain. Went to my room and looked through ‘Dymer’ VIII: was pleased with it and thank the Lord it’s not very old. I managed to get a little stroll down Cuckoo’s Lane: home for tea and in to College to take Firth on Kant’s Causality. An interesting essay. Dined in hall. Poynton and Farquharson both in and very amusing.
Friday 20 February: Up early. Poor D had had a very bad go of neuritis in the night—much worse than before . . .
Buckley came with an essay on Spinoza. I got on with him better than last time. Next was Hogg—a little better but far from good. After him was lecture. Hawker arrived a little earlier than Nightingale and I had a few words with him. He said mine was the most intelligible scheme of ethics he had yet heard. Nightingale was specially interruptive today and remarked ‘I hope I am not taking up your time—but I find I learn more by talking than by listening.’ I was tempted to reply ‘So do I.’
Lunched with Keir and Lawson in Keir’s room. Keir tracked down Kant’s Scottish ancestry—apparently Kant is a good Scotch name. Quite a good rag conversation.
Then bussed home. Feeling very fit. I had a divine walk up Shotover by the main road and down by the path through Quarry. It was frosty with a veiled blue sky and big cloud pinnacles and the most wonderfully fresh and sweet air. Then worked on Moore’s ‘External Relations’ after tea and in to dinner. We had wine in the summer common room afterwards, which I always like better. Farquharson in the chair. He and Allen very amusing.
Saturday 21 February: A fine bright morning. Beattie came and then Donald who read an essay full of squibs, quite clever, but off the point. Then poor Swanwick—worse than ever. I have spoken to Farquharson about him but no one takes any notice.
Then home to lunch. Dawson, Touche and Ewing came at 2.30 and we all walked to Stowe Woods, Dawson preaching Gentile at me hard. Of course neither of us moved the other but it was quite good talk. They came back for tea and stayed till 6.45. I liked them all, even that queer little troll of a Ewing. Dawson has a touch of conceit in him and is a little bit edgy but he has it in hand. Touche I take for anima candida.
Tuesday 24 February: In to College by 10 o’c. and worked till 12 on Hobhouse—a man after my own heart. Then came Campbell with an essay on Plurality of Goods. Rather an interesting discussion.
A terrible day of cold and driving rain. Bussed home and had lunch: then took Pat for a short walk in Cuckoo Lane, getting wet again. D seemed rather tired and depressed today . . .
I then jotted down a few ideas that had occurred to me on the theory of knowledge. In to College by 5.30 and took Bradley and Gordon-Clark on Kant. The latter talked a fair amount, for the first time: I like him much better than Bradley . . .
Wednesday 25 February: In for breakfast by 8.15. Quite a good morning. One very funny episode occurred when the door was opened for a moment and a snatch of Carlyle’s voice croaking away outside drifted suddenly in and threw us all into laughter. Leys gave an excellent sketch of Carlyle in the next world.
Took Cox at 9, Henderson at 10, and Ross at 11—all good in their degrees . . . Then had Hawker and Nightingale: the latter very talkative but rather more relevant than usual . . .
At 7 I bussed in for the Martlets dinner. Managed to dress while Hayden (the Cambridge Martlet whom they have billeted in my bedroom) was in his bath. He turned up presently and we went together to Cox’s rooms. The Master, Allen, and Keir were there. At dinner in the J.C.R. I sat next to Hayden—a most aggressive pup who told me I was ‘terribly Oxford’ and ‘academic’ because I said I disapproved of English as a final honour school.
He read us a paper afterwards on Atlantis in the Senior Common Room, bringing some anthropological and geological evidence which was quite interesting, and then giving us a sketch of Atlantean civilisation: when, by a chain of initiates first planted in the ‘Atlantean colony’ of Egypt and afterwards removing to Tibet, we derive all our ethics and religion to this day. Christ, Moses and a few others were all such initiates or their disciples. The odd thing was that when challenged by Dawson (who is now President) he denied any knowledge of anthropology. Carlyle was very good and roasted Hayden, within the bounds of civility, but exquisitely . . .
Thursday 26 February: Low was absent. Johnson read an essay on the moral faculty which was really quite good in style as well as in thought—a change from his first efforts. I like this man, despite his odd manners and appearance. Ziman, who should have followed him, was aeger . . . Firth at 5.30—a good and agreeable hour.
Dined in hall and went afterwards to the Phil. Soc. in Firth’s rooms where Paton of Queens read a paper on ‘Duty or Duties’. A charming creature: a picture philosopher’s face and a soothing voice on whose modulations he has taken pains and not in vain. He is strong on the analogy between ethics and aesthetics and distinguished sharply the legal morality of the vulgar from the creative morality of the saint. He thinks the highest moral good may well be something literally impossible for most men—that the ought does not imply the can. I thanked my God when a drunk man burst into the room by accident with a genial cry, but he left us all too soon, and we went on. Quite a heated discussion afterwards. Dawson and I for once were on one side. We cldn’t make Paton admit any essential difference between art and virtue . . .
Friday 27 February: Buckley, Hogg (much improved) and lecture. At the end of the latter old Nightingale broke forth into a panegyric on my lectures. What between comic despair that my only admirer was such an old ass, and a sort of shame that I shd. return an old honest man’s good will by thinking him an ass, I was in a confused state . . .
Sunday 1 March: Up late. A grey, raw day, bringing horizons near. Up Shotover with Pat after breakfast. Too many people about, but I enjoyed my walk. The fire was in the yellow room. Sat there when I got home and began re-reading Tasso’s Jerusalem with considerable enjoyment: but I was disappointed in my Italian. Lunch and jobs and a nice quiet afternoon reading in the yellow room with D: the girls being all at the Taylors, D and I had a pleasant little stroll round Barton after tea.
Once again Lewis abandoned his dairy, this time from 2 March until 16 August 1925. While it is a pity that this happened when there was so much of interest going on, the events which he was too busy to record are pretty amply covered in letters to his father. Writing to him in April 1925 he said ‘This is my last term “in the bond” at Univ. and there is still no word of the Fellowship. I begin to be afraid that it is not coming at all. A Fellowship in English is announced at Magdalen and of course I am applying for it, but without any serious hopes as I believe much senior people including my own old English tutor are in for it. If he gets it I may get some of the “good will of the business”: I mean some of the pupils at Univ., Exeter and elsewhere whom he will have to abandon. These continued hopes deferred are trying, and I’m afraid trying for you too. About money, if you will put in £40—if you think this is reasonable—I shall be on the pig’s back.’
The next few weeks were to be some of the most nerve racking of Lewis’s life. Writing to his father about them on 25 May he described what happened about the Fellowship in English at Magdalen: ‘First of all, as I told you, I thought that I had my own tutor Wilson as a rival, which would have made the thing hopeless. But that I found to be a false rumour. Then I wrote to Wilson and Gordon . . . for testimonials, relying on them as my strongest support. Within twenty-four hours I had the same answer from both. They were very sorry. If only they had known I was going in for it . . . they thought I had definitely abandoned English for philosophy. As it was, they had already given their support to my friend Coghill of Exeter . . . That was enough to make anyone despair: but mark how the stars sometimes fight for us. Two days later came news that Coghill had been offered a fellowship by his own College and had withdrawn from the field. Wilson’s testimonial—a very good one—came by the next post. Gordon said he wouldn’t write anything as he was going to be consulted personally by the Magdalen people, but he would back me . . .
‘Then came an invitation to dine at Magdalen on Sunday a fortnight ago [3 May]. This showed only that I was one of the possibles . . . Then came a spell of thundery weather of the sort that makes a man nervous and irritable even if he has nothing on his mind: and the news that Bryson and I were the two real candidates . . . One afternoon, in that week, I saw the said Bryson emerging from Magdalen and (“so full of shapes is fancy”) felt an unanswerable inner conviction that he had won and made up my mind on it . . . On Monday [18 May] I had a very abrupt note from [Sir Herbert Warren—President of Magdalen College] asking me to see him on Tuesday morning . . . I got to Magdalen, and . . . when he did see me it turned out to be all formalities. They were electing tomorrow and thought me the “strongest and most acceptable candidate”. Now, if I were elected would I agree to do this, and would I be prepared to do that . . . The only thing of the slightest importance was “would I be prepared in addition to the English pupils, to help with the philosophy”. (This, I imagine, stood me in good stead: probably no other candidate had done English as well as philosophy.) I need hardly say that I would have agreed to coach a troupe of performing bagbirds in the quadrangle . . . And then next day—about 2.30—they telephoned for me and I went down. Warren saw me, told me I had been elected and shook hands . . . It is a fine job as our standards go: starting at £500 a year with “provisions made for rooms, a pension, and dining allowance.”’
Sunday 16 August: The day was spent in preparations for our departure tomorrow for Cloud Farm at Oare on Exmoor. How the putting up of three people’s clothes for three weeks can take so much labour is a mystery. D spent most of the day making a canvas cover for the new trunk so that the packing proper could not begin till about five and did not end till 2 A.M. . . .
In the afternoon I went to order a taxi for tomorrow at Griffins, and finding him engaged, walked down to Nicholls on Cowley Road. A sweltering afternoon. Sometime between eleven and one we drifted into a discussion on packing in which Maureen and I foolishly ventured on some criticisms. I hope it was not my fault, but D was so angry and nettled that we had to drop the subject. To bed with a fairly bad headache but slept sound.
Monday 17 August: Up in good time. Pretty bad time till we got off at 10.45. D called on Herbert to have some small point set right in her new teeth which are, on the whole, a real piece of artistry: not too regular—a life-like if idealistic version of her old ones and comfortable as well. I am glad that business has been so well got over.
In the train to Reading D had lunch with a remarkably unpleasant old woman who told brazen lies about a seat. It was another gorgeous day. I think I never stopped sweating from the time I got up till after supper. We managed the rest of the journey to Minehead quite comfortably, tho’ we were crowded till Taunton. We had lunch and tea from our own stores in the train. It was interesting to go through the Old Cleeve country. I was at the window from Watchet to Minehead picking out every detail of that wonderful three weeks in 1920. From Minehead we came to the County Gate (above Glenthorne by char-a-banc: the first time any of us had travelled in one. We didn’t like it—either for comfort or safety—specially on the nightmare hill from Porlock).
Once on top of the moor, despite the heat and discomfort of our crowded seats, we all revived: tho’ poor D was feeling a little sick. It was heather all round us and a grand smell . . . the sea far down below on our right: and every now and then a glimpse to the left of flattish grey and brown ridges, one behind the other to the horizon—a gloriously large horizon.
At the County Gate we were met by a civil but densely stupid raw boned youth with a two wheeled vehicle on which D and Maureen and the luggage went off. There was a woman by the Gate whom I shall always remember: a cross between the Duchess in Alice in Wonderland and the first Mrs Rochester.
Then Pat and I turned in ecstasy to our walk. Pat bolted after the others but I recovered him. I went through a wicket on to the moor and proceeded down hill. In front of me I saw a deep winding valley stretching as far as I could see to left and right and deeply wooded: at right angles to it on the far side, another and narrower combe (which I rightly took for Badgworthy) piercing well into the moor. After a few more steps I could see a broad flat brown river in the bottom before me. On my way down I had a glimpse of a fat fast snake in the bracken. I reached the river and forded it: shoes and socks in my left hand, a stick and Pat’s lead in the right.
Here, at the bottom, I was as if between walls: purple walls of heather behind me and green ones ahead: both unexpectedly steep when seen from that angle. I shall remember while I live the feel of that cold yet not biting water and the deliciously cool stones. It made amends for all the troubles of packing and journey.
I then followed a red lane into Malmsmead which proved to be no more than three or four cottages with black pigs at doors and a house of entertainment where stone ginger was the best they could give me. I had some difficulty in finding the path to Cloud Farm: but was finally led to it by a man on a pony whom I met at Oare: a respectful horsy person—a huntsman perhaps, who read me a lecture on the merits of Exmoor ponies. I followed up a path through a wood on to a flat field by the riverside: it was still cultivated land about me but I saw the real moor ahead—the almost black combe opening out beyond Cloud Farm in its windings.
Here I met D and Maureen. The whole thing realised my best dreams. The farm house stands under a wood of fir with one field between it and the river. The rooms were comfortable and the supper good.
After the meal Pat and I went out and having crossed Badgworthy began to follow the valley up. It was an almost colourless evening with one star very much blunted by mist hanging in the V shaped cleft of the hills before me. The river is very broken with rocks and there is plenty of white foam. I went as far as a little wood and here the path went a bit higher, and thence down to a flat platform of turf between the wood and the water. I was quite out of sight of cultivated land here: I looked back and I looked forward and either way saw nothing but high hills.
It was not until I struck a match for my pipe that I realised how dark it had grown. When I got back into the wood it was almost pitch black except for the odd light cast upwards from the stream through the tree trunks. There were many strange appearances of white stones that could have passed for ghosts.
Home and to bed by eleven in that glorious thing—a good feather bed. Through my window I saw a side of moorland and a few stars. The sky seemed to have cleared.
Tuesday 18 August: We breakfasted about nine, after a good night’s rest, on eggs and home cured bacon: both excellent. D was still rather tired from the journey and said she would take ‘a lazy day’. Maureen and I started for a walk at ten.
We went up the valley in the tracks of my evening stroll. The wood grew even better beyond my last night’s farthest south. The trees were very old and mossy, the turf of a jewel like greenness and studded with white boulders. The path rose considerably as we went through the wood. We stopped for our first halt at a stream where Maureen cooled her feet. After we left the wood the path was high above the river and very heathery. The view back down the receding reaches of the valley, deepening as it receded and backed by the great ridge at the County Gate, was one of the finest I have ever seen: and with every step forward increased the sense of penetrating into ‘the bowels of the land’.
Presently we turned up the Doone Valley. Here we were rather disappointed to find a party on ponies in front of us. Just at the shepherd’s hut a cow ran at us, but I waved my stick and it considered that honour was satisfied. We put on speed after this until we had passed the ponies and then struck right over open moor. It was very hot. Presently we began to descend and saw a big lump of hill opposite us which I take to be Great Black Hill. To our right we had a lovely new glimpse of Badgworthy Combe and the woods beyond it. About here we got into very dense heather and saw it suddenly quiver in front of us . . . We . . . struck left till we reached a green gully about four feet deep and running quite straight down the hillside. After a few yards descent it developed, as I had expected, into a stream, where we picked our way from stone to stone laboriously. We found plenty of frog spawn and some red mosses.
It was a relief to find another stream running east at the bottom and to stretch our legs on flat gravel. This was Lank Combe . . . We then went on again and a little to our left till we saw the woods of Cloud Farm below us. We intentionally overshot our mark and went on, beyond a little combe, to the green part of the hill. Here we had a long rest.
Maureen, apropos of something, asked me if the evolutionary theory meant that we had come from monkeys. I explained what it really meant. She asked where Adam and Eve came in. I explained that the Biblical and scientific accounts were alternatives. She asked me which I believed. I said the scientific. She said ‘I suppose if one believes in it then, one doesn’t believe in God.’ I said one could believe in God without believing in all the things said about him in the Old Testament. Here the matter ended. I don’t see how I could have answered differently at any point.
. . . We waded the river for our feet’s sake and so arrived home at 1.15. D had been unpacking and was very sleepy. Indeed we all felt a drowsiness in the air which increased after a very ample and excellent lunch of boiled chicken. Maureen and I made some play with doing German while D very nearly sank into real sleep.
. . . After tea we found more comfortable seats at the top of a kind of miniature cliff near the farm. I went on with Cowper’s Task which I began to read for the second time just before we left home. I was at Book II, ‘The Timepiece’, one of the poorest parts. At his worst he is bad enough, but somehow he never irritates me . . .
After supper all three of us went up to the wood as I had done last night. The difference between society and solitude, together with a little more delight, altered everything. Last night it had been all desolation and awe: tonight it was peaceful and drowsy. To bed by eleven.
Wednesday 19 August: We had some thunder and lightning in the night and continual rain. When I woke in the morning the view from my window was a solid wall of fog. Then gradually the dark surface of the moor would show through and reach a certain point of clearness: after which it would fade again. The fog went on thinning and thickening like this for an hour. When I had shaved I went down to the river. From a few yards away the outline was invisible: only the swirls of foam showed up rather whiter than the smoky mist. I took a dip in the deep pool under the fall. It was quite deep enough to swim in and very cold, so that I did no more than reach the further bank and come back.
D was more rested this morning and I think she is going to like the place—a point about which I have had some fears. After breakfast Maureen and I set out with Pat. We went down the valley on this side by the path over three fields and through a wood which is the normal entrance of this farm. The grass was soaking and the fog very thick. On reaching the road we turned right and went to Oare where we had a look at the church: a pleasant crowded little building but neither very old nor beautiful . . .
Just before lunch I yielded to a long treasured desire and wrote for Geo. MacDonald’s Lilith: he and Wordsworth being the only people it seems possible to read here. We had chicken for lunch again: very good and better than yesterday by the addition of green peas. We sat in till tea time. I did some German with Maureen and continued The Task.
After tea all three of us went out for a delightful walk. We turned up the valley, keeping to our own side of the river. It is much rougher here and, happily, not open to the public. The view both up and down was beyond anything I have yet seen. It reminded D of Norway . . .
Thursday 20 August: A grey morning. I bathed as before. After breakfast Maureen said she would stay at home and I sallied forth by myself. I crossed the river and turned to my right as if for Malmsmead: then to my left by a lane which brought me up quickly to a high and richly heathered part of the moor. I followed this for some little way and turned to my right by a track which would lead me past the tumuli. Even frequent references to the map did not keep me in the true way. I bore too much to my right and crossed two westward flowing streams instead of one. At the first I had a pleasant halt and a smoke in a little green valley full of boulders overhung with miniature cliffs of heather.
I reached my objective—the upper end of Lank Combe—earlier than I expected, but I was not sorry. On the level tops of these hills with no valleys in view I find it a little oppressive. Indeed on my walks and in my mental pictures these last two days I can trace a little hyperaesthesia. Perhaps it is just as well I have never seen real mountains. The descent of Lank Combe was very laborious, but beautiful.
As I reached the bottom it began to rain. The rest of my walk was unpleasant, not so much because of the rain as of a small boy—ceteris paribus the least pleasant type of human being—who tacked himself on to me and followed me with relentless conversation however fast or slow I walked. One touch of nature deserves a record. He asked me (in the wood) if I’d been up here in the dark. I said ‘Yes’ and began to like him better. I asked him if he had been in the river. He replied ‘No’ and, poor creature, looked mortified as if he had relinquished all claims to manhood. Then suddenly a bright idea struck him. ‘Me and my brother was nearly killed the other day.’ His brother’s head had been cut by a collapse of stone ‘and he made ten shillings showing it to the visitors’.
Got home and changed. After lunch I began St John Ervine’s Alice and a Family which I found in a cupboard: in many ways a good book, but it plays too much on the mere language of Cockneys. Now this is only a repetition of the child’s idea that all foreign languages are mumbled English. Every dialect ought to be got over and taken for granted. Then we can get at what is really going on.
After tea we had an excellent walk up the far side of the valley nearly to the ‘Doone Valley’. By the way when I see the crowds of lost townspeople who trail up that far side of the river of a fine morning, blind to heather, sky and rock, and deaf to birds and water, to look at one of the least attractive combes because it has been labelled ‘Doone’ and then ask fretfully, ‘But what is there to see?’—I cd. wish Blackmore had never written . . .
Friday 21 August: Another grey day. Bathed. Set out to find the way to the sea at Glenthorne. I walked down our own side of the valley, crossed the Lyn at Parsonage Farm, and up to County Gate. Couldn’t find any way down so turned west and went to Brendon. Home by road with a delicious halt in the wood by Malmsmead.
Out after tea with D and Maureen. A card to say that Lilith is out of print and an insane letter from Aunt Lily. I am sorry about Lilith. I asked for it about two years ago and it was in print then, but in those day 6/-for an unnecessary book was not to be thought of.
Saturday 22 August: A blue sky at last, which held up all day, though full of floating white clouds. After a bathe and an excellent breakfast of fresh whiting I set out for Brendon to see about Mrs Hume-Rotheray’s mirror. Just as I had crossed the bridge Maureen ran after me, asking me on Mrs Lock’s behalf to buy a lb. of candles. Moral—don’t tell where you’re going!
The walk over the moor was delightful. I overshot my mark a bit and came down by a long and beautiful glen with an easy path which brought me into the Lyn valley about a mile to the west of Brendon. I turned left to an inn further down where a bridge enabled me to cross into the woods on the other side: and through them I came back to Brendon . . .
After lunch (roast mutton and such good peas) we all sat out in the sun under the fir wood. I read Esmond. I have never got so far in it before. It is good. After tea we all walked up to the beginning of Lank Combe. D, who had been complaining of lumbago and had not meant to go far, was enticed into turning up and after a short glen we emerged unexpectedly into a lovely open place full of sunlight with the whole combe before us. We spent a long time childishly throwing sticks into the stream and watching their various fortunes and peripeties in the rapids. Maureen gave Ada a music lesson in the evening.
Sunday 23 August: D’s pain was much worse this morning. She thought it was a chill on the kidneys. She was very miserable with it all day and I am horribly anxious. I was out in the morning up the glen that D discovered, over Oare Common, down the valley of Chalk River to Oareford (or rather beyond it) and home by road. A changing sky that brightened at first but turned to rain about 12.
Sat in all the afternoon and so did D. Wrote a few lines on Jesseran. Ada gave Maureen a riding lesson. After supper D went to get a warm at the kitchen fire and I went out for a pitiful attempt at a stroll which Pat almost refused to accompany. A grim, ominous looking place this is when one has something hanging over one.
D went to bed at 10.30 with two hot water bottles. Maureen privately suggested to me that we should divide the night and each watch a part. I chose the first as D had great ease from the jars and seemed sleepy. I hoped she would have a good night and that after a few hours I might go to bed without waking Maureen. When I went up at 12 D was awake and had only been dozing. The good effect of the jars seemed to have worn off. Went up again at 1 and found that she had not slept at all since. The pain is pretty bad: but it seems to get much worse from any movement after she has been in one position for some time, which gives me hope that it is a chill. I sat with her for about half an hour, interrupting it to go and investigate kettles in the kitchen against refilling the jars. We talked quite cheerfully.
I have suppressed even mental Dymerisms so far. I have been reading Esmond which I shall always hate for this, and am writing this at two minutes to two. It gets cold down here. 2.50 down from D again: she is much the same. I have found some peat in the scullery and mended the kitchen fire but I am afraid it will be long before there is any really hot water. I got nice and warm in there. 4 o’clock: I have filled the two jars and the water was really hot. I had almost despaired of my peat fire: it is heartbreaking stuff to boil a kettle by. When I brought the second jar up D seemed to be asleep—I hardly dare to write it down for the superstition. Touch wood: I gave the jar noiselessly to Maureen and crept down. I have found some milk in the kitchen, about half a tumblerfull, on which I shall now feast. Poor Maureen has had hardly any sleep. Tired of Esmond and am reading Hilaire Belloc’s Mr Emanuel Burden. I don’t know enough to appreciate it fully, but I fancy it is good.
Monday 24 August: Got to bed about 4.30 and up at 9 this morning. D still pretty bad. As soon as I had had breakfast I set off for the nearest doctor who lives at Rockford: this is the pub with the bridge beyond Brendon and it is some ten miles there and back. I found the walk tedious, though it runs through a glorious valley all the way, and was footsore. I had forgotten to bring money and could get no drink. The doctor lives in a cottage full of trophies: a sad, weatherbeaten old man: not quite a gentleman and not very pleasant to speak to. He promised to come in the afternoon. When he came he gave all his directions to Mrs Lock. He left a medicine and ordered a mustard plaster. D quite liked him.
I spent most of the day in the kitchen stoking the fires for the repeated jars which we needed. My powers of perspiration were a source of amusement to the family who apparently feel like Chaucer about it. I must admit that the necessity of being always in and out with them became rather irksome before it was done. D was a good deal better in the evening. I gave her two jars last thing at 10.30 and went to bed. I replaced them at five, being then woken for the purpose.
Tuesday 25 August: D was very much better this morning. I started out in mist and rain to walk over moor to Brendon for the tobacco I had been unable to get yesterday. When I got on top of the moor it began to clear. There was brilliant sunshine with big white sailing clouds. I had a glimpse of the sea. My spirits rose and in a few minutes I was singing my small stock of Wagner and getting what seemed at the moment to be a splendid idea of Jesseram. I came home the same way after an enjoyable walk and a pint of beer in Brendon.
We both sat in D’s room in the afternoon. I went on with The Task: I am now at ‘The Winter morning walk’. D was much better and very cheerful. After tea Maureen and I had an interview with the two black pigs who were asleep in the field. They hardly looked like animals: more like big leather bottles with curiously shaped stoppers. They lie on their sides and grunt to each other alternately as fast as the ticking of a grandfather clock. Each grunt shakes the whole body. I tickled one with my foot and it made to roll over on its back like a cat. They are perfectly clean. I have never seen pigs at close quarters before. Later on I walked up as far as the Doone Valley.
Wednesday 26 August: D had had a poor night. Walked over to Rockford in the rain after breakfast and reported to the doctor as he had told me to do. He seemed satisfied and gave me another bottle. D was up in the afternoon and more comfortable. Read on with The Task and did some work on Jesseram.
Thursday 27 August: D pretty well today but still upstairs. It was a wet morning and there was a hunt on, which two reasons determined me to stay in. I read a good deal more of Esmond. After a very late lunch it cleared and the rest of the day had a cool white sky with a few patches of blue and more of pigeon colour.
I went out at 3.30. I walked by road to Oareford in a delightful wooded valley where the river is deeper than ours and very rocky. Tho’ a small stream, it sometimes has a rock gorge about fifteen feet deep. I left the road just after it had crossed the stream and began on a path that climbed left, i.e. northward, to the main road. This brought me up the side of a magnificent combe which was chiefly felled wood with that odd grey look about it (how the ground aghast was of the light). The landscape in every direction was beyond hope. Behind was the moor with deep alluring valleys winding up into it: westward the green and stony valley of the Lyn with its path and clumps of fir trees. In front of me this big grey ravine closing up towards the thicker woods that made the horizon.
I reached the main road at a gate lodge where I took some ginger beer. I then crossed into an estate north of the road and skirted along in it for about half a mile. It was partly wood and partly heather. I saw the sea, the Foreland point and the hills beyond Porlock. I then crossed the main road again and found a bridle path in a scrubby wood running south west by a mossy ditch with a hedge of young beeches above it. This brought me out to open heather above Deddy Combe.
I never saw anything better. The whole of the Oare and Malmsmead valley suddenly appeared as a green island in the middle of blue black moor with the first sun of that day shining upon it. Everything was tumbled and crooked, running this way and that, so that one hardly knew where the horizontal was. The distances looked far larger than they really were.
Home by 6 and did French with Maureen. Finished Esmond later in the day.
Friday 28 August: D had a poor night and was very stiff and sore in the morning. It wore off during the day. I stayed in after breakfast and finished The Task. There are some fine passages in the last book which I had quite forgotten—I may have skipped them before—on the good, old, and inexhaustible theme of the good time coming. It is interesting to read them shortly after Prometheus Unbound: wh. I read in London with Barfield lately. After a very late lunch I went out.
There had been rain in the morning but now it was a clear warm afternoon with a very soft air. All the hills were alive with sunshine and the moving shadows of clouds. I went by Parsonage Farm and up to County Gate: thence westward along the main road in hopes of finding a way down to the sea. I was in sight of it all the time: very blue today, with the Welsh mountains showing on the far side. The country between me and it was very attractive with heather and deep gorges but it was all enclosed and I could not leave the main road until the path leading to a farm which my map names ‘Desolate’ . . .
I found a more definite track. This soon brought me on to the road running to the Lighthouse at the Foreland. It was so late that I did not go down. I sat for a long time looking down on Caddow Combe, a very fine grim ravine between two steep hills of grass and shale. A little schooner worming its way round the point gave a more comfortable feeling to the place.
I came back to Brendon by the road that passes Combe Farm where I have not been yet. The Brendon valley and moors beyond, seen from this new angle, astonished me. Indeed the whole walk was quite bewildering with the amount and variations of its beauty. I have never spent a better three or four hours. In Brendon pub I met old Lock who stood me a glass of beer: drinking it and returning it kept me there some time. He was engaged in a game of quoits with some other farmers and all very merry. Home for a late tea.
In the evening we were all in the kitchen where a couple of new visitors—a young man and his wife—were sitting. The young man said of something that it couldn’t be because it wasn’t useful. ‘Ha,’ said I, half joking, ‘that might lead to an interesting discussion.’ Greatly to my surprise it did. He is a designer of furniture, well primed with Morris and Ruskin and a worthy person. I don’t know which of us was more surprised to find that the other knew of such writers. We had a long and lively discussion which soon cleared the room. After we’d been at it for an hour and a half and were just settling down to the conflict between the artist and the nature of industrial society (or some dear old stager of the same sort) old Lock suddenly turned up.
His family, by the by, had been looking for him all day and when I left him at Brendon he had come out after me to say ‘You can say you’m an’t seen me’—a direction I scrupulously obeyed. Finding his own kitchen empty save for two young men in earnest conversation, one each side of the great open peat fire, Lock surprised me (for he is a most retiring man) by drawing up a small chair for himself between us and saying ‘Ah . . . you’re talking politics. I like a bit of politics now.’
We were a little nonplussed at this totally unexpected demand on our conversational powers, but we managed to rally and bring the talk into the channels that were expected of us. Lock summed up the state of the nation by saying ‘Things were a bit too much one way in the old days and now they’re a bit too much t’other.’ Ada came and said ‘What ever have you been to all day, Dad?’ to which Lock replied with great deliberation ‘One thing and another, you know, one thing and another.’ The whole scene reminded me strongly of Tristram Shandy.
Saturday 29 August: Poor D had a bad night again with rheumatism; I hope it is not going to become chronic.
It was a grey morning with a light damp wind but Lock said it would probably clear up and I decided to realise today my old project of walking to Simonsbath. Starting at 10.30 I walked due south up the Badgworthy by the ordinary path. The woods and hills all look different when one passes them in a good stride with a day’s new country before one. Everything was soaking with dew. Once past the Doone Valley I was in unknown waters. The gorge of the Badgworthy became narrower and the hills on either side lower. Heather soon gave place to rough grass and bracken. There was still a tolerable path. The gorge wound about so much that I was almost at once out of sight of all I knew. There was not even a sheep to be seen and an absolute silence until little by little in the narrowing valley the wind began to make itself heard—a curious muffled blustering round the corners.
In the solitude, the sound of Pat scampering after me sometimes sounded like a whole bunch of sheep or ponies and made me turn round. After I had passed Hoccombe Water (coming in from my right) I was bothered with a dry stone wall a few feet from the water’s edge. The ground seemed better on the river side but every now and then there would be hardly any space between the wall and the water. The path had quite disappeared. When the next tributary came in from the right I left the Badgworthy: after a halt at the meeting of the streams in a flat stony valley. I felt already as if I had been all day in this wilderness. A heron rose quite close to me.
I continued my journey up this new stream till the ground became so marshy that I was driven up to walk on the hills to my right. I was now on Trout Hill. I presently rejoined the stream and followed it pretty close as my only guide to the point at which I should cross the next ridge. The water soon became red and curdled and stank abominably: dead sheep I think. I now got into a bad bog, right on top of the ridge. It was the usual business: three steps forward and then my stick would sink up to the handle in front of me: then what looked like an obvious path to the right or left which I followed joyfully, only to be stopped in the same way after a few paces. This went on for about half an hour. The bog was covered with beautiful white flowers and red mosses and inhabited with the most enormous slugs I have ever seen. I was dripping with heat. The view behind sticks in my memory more than anything this day: the absolutely bare grey land sloping away from me as far as I could see without any variation except the little creases which were really deep valleys.
At last I managed to get on to firmer, tho’ still soaking, ground, and began to go downward. I saw two deer about three hundred yards off on my right. A long greyish green valley across my path came into sight, and a road eastward which I rightly took to be the way from Warren Farm to the main road. I was so tired of bogs and turning my ankle on hummocks that I gave up my plan of coming out at Cloven Rocks and made for the road. It was a relief to hear one’s feet on the metal. The remainder of the walk into Simonsbath was rather tedious: tho’ the country—white roads here, not red, and very like northern Ireland—was very pleasant.
At Simonsbath I lunched in Exmoor Forest Hotel: a miserable house where they keep ‘only wines’ or stone ginger. There were three residents at lunch: one a very well bred looking old man with a dry, peevish voice, whom I took to be mentally deranged. He had a grown-up daughter with him (or a nurse) and the talk ran something like this.
HE: ‘Look at this ham. It’s all cut in chunks.’
SHE: ‘Oh do be quiet.’
HE: ‘Anyone would think they were cutting it for coal heavers (pause) or stonebreakers. It’s . . . it’s . . . wasteful you know, so wasteful.’
SHE: ‘Well you needn’t worry about that, need you?’
HE (savagely): ‘Look at that. It’s abominable.’
SHE: ‘Oh do be quiet. Get on with your lunch. I want to get out.’
HE: ‘What’s it like out?’
SHE: ‘It’s lovely.’
HE: ‘Oh yes, I know it’s lovely. What I want to know is, is it cold or hot?’
SHE: ‘It was cold when I first went out, but—’
HE (interrupting): ‘There you are. Cold. I knew it was cold.’
SHE: ‘I was going to say, if you’d let me, that it was very hot before I got back.’
HE (after a pause): ‘Look at that. It’s really disgraceful to cut ham like that. It was a nice ham too. Well smoked, well cured and a good fibre. And they go and spoil it all by cutting it in chunks. Chunks. Just look at that!’ (stabbing a piece and holding it up in mid air).
SHE: ‘Oh do get on.’
HE: (something inaudible)
SHE: ‘Well they’ve as much right here as we have. Why can’t you get on and eat your lunch?’
HE: ‘I’m not going to be hustled over my lunch. Hustled. I won’t let you hustle me in this way.’ (a pause) ‘Why don’t you ask Mrs Ellworthy to let you make some of that nice porridge of yours?’
SHE: ‘How could I in a hotel?’ (They had a long argument over this.)
Then HE (almost pathetically): ‘Why don’t you eat some of this salad? It’s beautifully flavoured’ (here his voice broke and he added almost in a whisper) ‘—with cucumber. If it wasn’t for the ham . . .’
And so they went on. I had a cup of coffee and a rest in the garden and left about 2.30. I came home by the main road across the moors. For the first hour or so the broad white road with its high hedges and glimpses of big fields on interminable but gentle slopes, and a white cottage here and there, supported the illusion of being in Ireland. The roaring of the wind in the crisp beech hedge on my left had a homely feeling.
After crossing the ‘stripling Exe’ I came on to open moor and everything changed. The sun came out and shone for the rest of the day. The road, unfenced, wound across the heather to the horizon. To left and right the ground dropped into long and many coloured valleys and then rolled away to the sky, ridge after ridge, blue, purple, grey and green. Instinctively I walked faster: and so, after a long halt at Brendon Two Gates and another on Tippacott Ridge, I came home in a dream and only discovered at tea how footsore I was.
I admit I was annoyed when later on I had to turn out with Maureen and her pony. A day’s walking should never be undertaken unless the evening lounge—the crown of the day—is safe. In other words family life is incompatible with real walking. I began Joseph Conrad’s Chance—one of the very best novels I have read. D seemed much better in the evening.
Sunday 30 August: Poor D had a worse night again and had to wake me for fresh jars—after hours of miserable wakefulness for her—at five o’clock. After breakfast I walked by road to Rockford and saw the doctor. He gave me a new bottle. There seems very little to be done for a rheumatic attack. Very footsore. D much better during the day. Went on with Chance.
Monday 31 August: Thank goodness D had a very much better night, probably owing to yesterday’s fine sunshine.
It was arranged that I should go to Lynton to do some necessary shopping and Maureen decided to accompany me. We set out at 10.30 or so and went by the road over the moor. The first ascent from the Malmsmead lane, between high hedges, was very muggy and hot and I was afraid we were in for a close thundery day, unpropitious for walking.
As soon as we were on top of the moor we got into fresh breezes and heat and cold kept on alternating with the ups and downs of the country for the rest of the way . . . Through a gate we had a glimpse of fields piled upon hills up to some peak in the distance, and sprinkled with cottages. We then went on and down a hill so steep that it was equally comfortless whether you stood, sat or walked, and into Lynton.
We lunched at the Cottage Hotel. The view from the balcony was beyond everything I have seen—not for sublimity or ‘sober certainty of waking bliss’ but for mere luxuriousness and sensual beauty. Straight ahead and across the gorge, the hillside rose hundreds of feet above us into a big cap of well shaped rock. Behind that the Lyn valley opened out in long perspective of winding water and many coloured woods, heather and grass. To the left was the bay, not deeply blue but of a strangely pure clear colour and beyond it a line of surf between the water and the cliffs which fell away East and North, sometimes reddish, sometimes almost purple, and topped with a great perfectly white cloud that covered the whole foreland and sent a few smoky shreds down the hillsides . . .
Tuesday 1 September: D had a good night until six o’clock: which I suppose is better than none at all. It poured with rain all day and I was not out except for five minutes before supper. We had our peat fire (I got the peat) and were quite comfortable.
I finished Chance. It is a good book: even great. Whether the denouement has any justification I don’t know. He seems to kill Anthony for no reason except the whimsical one of avoiding a happy ending, and then to marry Flora to Powell in a moment of sentimental repentance. Perhaps I have misunderstood it.
Wednesday 2 September: I sat in the morning and read The Bride of Lammermoor which I bought in Lynton. The early parts are a little mechanical, I thought, but it becomes great as it goes on. It has done what it intended and the hags are excellent of their kind: so is the scene of Ravenswood’s return.
In the afternoon I walked by the shortest route to the light house at Foreland. I had a headache when I set out but it left me after a while. It was a bitterly cold day with a strong wind, the sea steel coloured, the sky white and dark grey and the further hills black. I usually enjoy such weather and the bleakness of the point when I reached it ought to have pleased me, but somehow I found the whole walk tedious.
I had tea at Combe Farm on my way back—a fine stone house built round three sides of a square and well back from the roads. The spacious beamed kitchen with a bright hearth and much bread and butter largely cured me of my dull humour.
D had had a good night and was much better today.
Thursday 3 September: Another wet day. I had only a short walk after tea when I explored Southern Wood for the first time; the evening sunlight, bright but very cold, was breaking out by now after a day of cloud. I left the ordinary path as soon as I had reached the top of the hill above Malmsmead.
In a moment I was out of sight of everything in a wood of nothing but oak, very low and tangled like a grove of sea weed. There was not a blade of grass to be seen, but the undisturbed moss grew deep on the ground and over the highest branches. The sunlight came slantwise through the trees and the wind roared. Then there were clearings where the path seemed to run straight up into the sky, and others from which I caught glimpses of the surrounding hills, new and hard to recognise from this position. In spite of all my glorious walks round here, it was in this little saunter only (so far) that I got the real joy . . .
Friday 4 September: Read some of the Kingis Quair in the morning—a very second rate poem: not to be compared with poor old Lydgate’s Story of Thebes which everyone mocks. I read it shortly before we left home and thought it a very pleasant romance. All we read about these authors in modern critics usually boils down to this: that the critics are too sophisticated to enjoy romance unless it is helped out by some extraneous interest. They feel no curiosity as to what will happen to the knight when he gets into the garden: this is not a virtue in them but ‘their necessity in being old’.
In the afternoon I went to Rockford to pay the Doctor. I went by road to Brendon and then struck up on the road past Combe Farm. It was a changeable day with occasional sunshine. When I reached the open heather near Countisbury I had a halt to look my last (I suppose) on the most beautiful landscape I know. The Brendon valley was on my left and in front the lower Lyn gorge with its complicated woods winding on to Lynmouth.
I then went westward across the moor, with the telegraph posts on my right and began to descend from such a point that the long straight reach on whose upper end Rockford stands, was straight in front of me. After a steep scramble down bracken and heather I got into thick and silent woods. Every kind of tree grows here, all at an acute angle on the steep hillside. There is plenty of moss and ivy and biggish rocks and boulders, some covered with green, some sticking through like bones of the hill. I sat there and again came very near the real joy, but did not quite arrive.
After this I went down to the water’s edge. The stream was smooth here and the valley bottom quite flat (on this side) with big forest trees dotted at wide intervals . . . There was one quite awesome place where I looked down through dead fir trees into a black hole lighted with foam at the bottom: and suddenly a swallow flew out just above the water.
I saw the Doctor and had tea at Rockford. I came home by Southern Woods. Here I struck up to my right and after a beautiful walk through the wood came out on the moor. A dazzling yellow sunshine was coming from the west. I crossed the upper road to Brendon and went straight across the moor for home—with an enormous shadow in front of me. The oddest thing happened here. A swallow came and for ten minutes or so flew to and fro in front of me, so low that it was almost in Pat’s mouth, so fast that you could hardly follow its flickering black and white.
In the strange bright evening the view just before I came down into Badgworthy valley was indescribable: the hills were full of colour and shadows away towards Porlock and the little bit of sea which showed above County Gate was burning. It all died out before I reached Cloud and became one uniform grey . . . Read Hans Anderson in the evening.
Saturday 5 September: As we had not heard from the garage at Porlock to whom we wrote for a taxi on Monday, it was arranged that I should go there today . . .
I walked up the valley past Oare, then through the wilder and narrower valley past Oareford, then up the wooded hill to Oare Post. It had been misty all day and was now raining pretty hard. I continued on the main road with a blurred view of Porlock valley and the strangely yellow, bald looking hills beyond Porlock. Just beyond Whit Stones I went down over the moor into Shillett Wood: as lovely as all the glens in this country and lonelier than most. My face had been lashed with the rain so long that it was a relief to be in shelter. The rest of the walk, constantly crossing and re-crossing the river down Hawk Combe was delightful.
After arranging for a taxi to come to Cloud at 8.45 I had an excellent lunch at the Castle Hotel (where, alas, I lost my stick). I began the homeward journey. At a point mid way between West Porlock and Porlock Weir I found a path going up into the wood. This was the wildest one I have been in: the road was really a sort of trench about three feet deep, full of red stones, and tunnelled through the trees. I saw a weasel quite close. It is not a good place to sit in, being given over to that race of super-ants whom I met before at Old Cleeve.
As I went on I had one or two nice glimpses at the highly coloured valley behind me: but it soon began to rain and blow. It did both, more and more violently, for the rest of the afternoon. I have seldom been in such a storm. As long as I was in the deep dark wood path (so dark in places that the opening of the next tree-tunnel, as you caught sight of it, sometimes looked like, not an opening, but a big solid black object) it was tolerable. Going up Small Combe however, it became impossible to see ahead of me: my feet were soaked through and to look at the map was out of the question. I got up to the Lodge and came home down Deddy Combe—rather enjoying it all in a way I luckily have.
I was lazy for the rest of the day after a change and tea by a good fire. Slept in another bed room tonight to let three stranded women have my room.
The diary breaks off here, and is not resumed until 27 April 1926.