I think we do know a good deal about 17th c. English speech, from rhyming dictionaries of the time, and largely from the letters of the not very well educated ladies, etc., who spelt phonetically. I studied that a lot while I was writing that book about them.2 C. 16 is far more difficult to pin down.
1st Feb. I was at Romford yesterday, and didn’t proceed with this letter. Returned, I found your air paper posted 28th, full of interesting information about Latin hymns, which sent me to the good little collection you sent me. But first let me go on answering your earlier letter. Howards End I find is a Penguin, and I have ordered it, and directly it comes (it is at the moment reprinting) I shall send it you. Oh thank you so much for Tudor England, which came before your letter, and which I am reading with great interest; it is good, isn’t it. Well, I drove E.M. Forster to Abinger; it was the birthday of his late mother, and we took flowers to her grave. He was rather nice; he distributed sprays of mimosa also to the graves of his aunt, close by, and other deceased acquaintances, according to their deserts, taking some away when he recalled tiresome things they had once done, and being very careful to raise no jealousies; it seems that, even in the grave, feuds rage in country villages. It was a chilly day and grey, but not raining or snowing. But the day after, frost and ice set in, and Saturday, when Gerard Irvine and I were going into Herts, was impossible, with ice-coated roads and snow, so we didn’t go. We shall choose a better day, later on. Yes, I drive these valuable persons with immense care.
You know how I should like it if you called me Rose not only to God, even though we are not driving or exchanging cigarettes. I feel you have known me long enough for that, don’t you? I really should like it, very much indeed, though didn’t like to suggest it. Of course you could never be anything but “Father” to me; it is what you are, and have been now for well over a year (and were, after all, for a time many years back). I think I like you to call me exactly, at any time, what comes natural to you. All these young men (and older ones of course) call me Rose, almost at once; it is the modern habit; the young ones aren’t at all deterred by the fact that I could easily be the mother of some of them. I prefer it; it seems easy and sensible and friendly….
2nd Feb. How interrupted this letter is! It has become Candlemas, a feast I have always loved. At Varazze we always had a picnic on it, and lovely little coloured candles; I think I described them in Personal Pleasures. No picnics in this weather in this country, and no coloured candles like that, and the priest doesn’t come round to bless them. At Grosvenor Chapel we only have the early Mass (by the way, did I say—I seem to remember that I did—that we don’t have Evensong? This is quite wrong … I don’t go to it, as it is only said, and one could do that as well at home, if one had the time. I do agree with you in liking the psalms well sung; if I had time I would go to All Saints, or St. Paul’s, or the Abbey, every day. But I don’t). But this morning I made time, for old sake’s sake, and drove to All Saints at n for the distribution and blessing of candles, which we always liked at Varazze. Then the priests and choir proceeded, incense-swinging, round the church, while we all stood with our lit tapers. Mass followed, but I didn’t stay for that, as I had to meet Gilbert Murray at the Athenaeum for lunch. At Varazze the procession was through the streets and piazzas, the weather being more seemly. But what a nice feast it is. It seems it was kept before Xmas day was; till the 5th c. the three main Xian festivals were Easter, Epiphany and Candlemas. And it was then simply a festival in honour of Our Lord; the Purification of the B.V.M. came in later. That much travelled lady, Etheria,1 saw it celebrated at Jerusalem, in the late 4th c. The Candelaia, we called it in Italy. I suppose one likes it for the beauty of the symbolism, the idea of the Light of the world, lighting the small candles of every man that cometh into it, the light that has always lit man, and is now focused in Christ. All Saints, with its forest of tall altar candles in the dimness, and the forest of little tapers held by the congregation, looked very beautiful. Not for a moment would I not prefer my Chapel, which does seem to me to have even more of the essential, but one likes these rites and trappings too; they seem to express the tastes of the whole world at worship—like plainsong chanted.
Yes, I think on the whole I prefer the E[nglish] H[ymnal] version of Deus Creator1—anyhow some stanzas. But neither is v.g., and both a long way from the Latin. Why aren’t verse translations more exact? I suppose, as you say, it is difficult to keep the metre, and the meaning; and add rhymes in addition (though why add rhymes, after all?). These translations] do lack force, nearly always. Whereas St. Ambrose’s doesn’t. I have found the hymn in the 100 Best;2 and have been looking again at others. It is a really good collection, and one I like to have. Isn’t it a pity that neither A. &M.3 nor E.H. have the whole of Adeste fideles.4 They leave out those lovely stanzas about the shepherds and the Magi, and the next two. “Stella duce Magi, Christum adorantes,” etc.5—how beautiful! As to Jerusalem the golden, Dr. Neale was certainly in a less happy moment when he made the E.H. translation than the A. &M. one; I wonder which he made first.6 Social joys indeed! What a prospect! Yet of course these might be very stimulating, in such company as the blessed are promised. Only one would feel a fish out of water, invited to the great party among martyrs, saints, even angels, like common people invited to a party at a Bishop’s palace. Nescio, nescio, indeed. I don’t think “conjubilant with song” so hot, either. I haven’t the Latin; it’s not in the 100 Best, I think. Rather nice, that Medieval Latin primer sounds. I hope it includes some drinking songs.
Tell me sometime what you think of A Room with a View.1 It is an early one, of course; actually written before The Longest Journey,2 though published two years later. It is very amusing, and sometimes moving, and the family life of the Honey churches delightful. The clergyman, Mr. Beebe, who starts a nice man, turns out very oddly, and isn’t adequately explained ever. And old Mr. Emerson is a bit of a bore. But the detail, the conversation, the witty touches, the charming writing of it all, never fail to delight me. It’s not on the scale of Howards End, which I mean you to have shortly.
Thank you for further references to the Breviary Absolutions, etc. I have found them, and like them. What a treasury the Breviary vols, are; I keep finding new things in them.
3rd Feb. Well now this letter, so long in writing, really is ended, and I shall take it and post it en route for High Mass at the Chapel. It’s very cold here still. I do wonder what J. C. Powys thought of your letter about him when he saw it! I expect he would be interested and pleased. I’ve just been reviewing a Life of Flaubert. What an extraordinary character he had! Not likeable—but colossal in a sense. That intense, undeviating devotion to his art. But his hatred for humanity was pathological.
My love always.
Your ever affectionate
R.M.
February
20, Hinde House, Hinde St., W.I.
IIth February, 1952 †
Dear Father,
Thank you much for your letter posted 5th Feb. On getting it, I wrote to my Conybeare cousins at Cambridge (Dorothea Conybeare knows everything about our relations) to enquire about that Canon Rose of Harpenden, of whose home you gave such a charming account. I thought he might be a cousin, but I haven’t heard back from her yet. The only Canon Rose I know of was my grandmother’s brother,1 who was rector of Weybridge all my mother’s childhood and girlhood; she and her mother lived at Weybridge, to be near him, and he was a kind of adored father to her, who had lost her own before she could remember. She always said that she owed all that she knew of good and of religion to his teaching; not that her mother wasn’t good and religious too, but he does seem to have been a kind of saint. He died sometime in the 1880s. The Harpenden Canon may or may not have been a relation. I hope he was, as this would make us some kind of relations too! I will let you know.
How refreshing was your letter, coming into this present desert of royal funerals, royal accession proclamations, lauding of the late monarch and the new one, mournful valed
ictory music and words on the radio, official assumption that all other interests are in abeyance.2 Most people are by now very tired of it; out of no disrespect to the good king dead or the new queen enthroned, for there is great feeling for both, but the feeling is inflated and blown up out of all proportion by our publicists. On the day he died, the BBC shut down altogether, but for periodical repetition of the sad news. A friend of mine, dropping into a pub for a drink, heard a woman there saying bitterly, “It’s bloody murder, that’s what it is, having no wireless. That’s what drives a woman into the pubs.” The funniest thing announced by the BBC (I read it in the papers) was that, during the period of national mourning, variety comedians on the air were to abstain from making jokes in bad taste. The comedians must be waiting eagerly for this close time for vulgarity to end. I fancy some of them can make no jokes in good taste! No doubt their public are waiting impatiently too. This solemn announcement was somehow very funny. Well, into this unnatural atmosphere arrived your good letter, full of interesting things. I looked up those Medieval Latin German texts,1 and find they are, or some of them, in the Library, but not shelved all together, one has to look them up separately. I found one—about Clerical Discipline, but didn’t have time to look at it much. It is a mistake not to catalogue and shelf them together, I think. Tell me some of the names of the authors some time, and I will look them up at leisure. Oh I see you mention Jakob von Vitry; I’ll look for him. I should enjoy those stories and sermons.2 Now I’ve just noticed again one of your marginal notes, and see that Disciplina Clericalis is mentioned by you, so I shall get that one out and read it.3 The L[ondon] L[ibrary] hasn’t, it seems, got the Beeson Primer,4 or any other. Or I think not; but it was near closing time, I will look again. I have sent you Howards End (Penguin). I shall be enormously interested to know what you think of it, and of the other Forsters. He is profoundly a moralist, and believes in People and personal relationships, and affection, and goodness. Not in God.
What good news about the Teas! I am delighted by this. Now you will have more time for reading, and looking up things I should read. What I am reading just now (when any time) is the letters between André Gide and Claudel—fascinating interchange between two distinguished and so utterly different minds. Claudel, of course, wanted to turn Gide into a Catholic. Then, later, he discovered that Gide was a homosexual, and was horrified. If you like reading French, do get hold of this book1; it would interest you and amuse you. One day I shall send you Simone Weil (in English2) which I have. I have lent it to my convert cousin.
Oh dear, why do these converts have to be so sure they have the monopoly of truth? But my cousin (who is a dear) kindly says that, though Anglican sacraments of course aren’t valid, in the full meaning of the word, God can work through them, and does, so she feels I have got something good … By now she must know my ignorance is invincible, so that I am all right as regards my final end, and shall get more light after death. But I have a feeling that my ignorance will still be invincible! She is intellectual, generous, and really spiritual, and lives on a high level, mentally and morally. All [that is needed] … (as Dr. Cockin, the Bp. of Bristol, said to-day on the air) is a grain of wholesome scepticism about having the whole truth; a thing, as he says, which is needed by both Christians and secularists. And certainly by R.C.s. Well, they will know one day.
Thank you for saying “propitius respicere”3 for me, dear Father. Please sometimes say too “O Sapientia.” And “O Oriens” Light and wisdom. With those one can’t go far wrong. Either in the car or out of it. Actually, my car is a life-saver in this wintry weather. If I walked (or bicycled) out to Mass each morning, in this cold, wet, sleet, winter wind, and whatever, I should likely enough get bronchitis, or at least a bad cold and cough. Whereas I trundle along cosy in my darling green car, and am only cold when in that blessed chapel. Then, in summer it runs me to my morning swim; and in the afternoon to my researches in a library, or what not, and in the evening to such “social joys” as await me. Social joys are rather diminished now in our time of national woe; all kinds of things cancelled, which leaves one the more time for work. Yes, I found those brief prayers, and have memorised some. Oh did I tell you how much I am finding in Wm. Law? I think I did. He is so very good. Have you got those Mystical Writings of his? If so, I should so much like to know if you like them as much as I do. Oh dear, I see this is the end. That is the worst of these convenient air papers; they run out all of a sudden, before ever one has done. This day last year, I think I lay on a sick-bed. I have been lucky this winter. I do so hope you are too, and will be.
My love and thoughts,
R.M.
20, Hinde House, Hinde St, W.I
13th February, 1952 †
Dear Father,
Further to my air paper of nth: I have now heard back from Dorothea Conybeare, and know all about that Harpenden family. But you are wrong about their name, which wasn’t Rose but Vaughan. Rose was the maiden name of Mrs. Vaughan, and that is what you must have been told, and you must have been related to her family, the Roses. She was my great-aunt Mary, my grandmother’s sister, and she married the Rev. Edward Vaughan, who was Rector of Harpenden 1859-96; he was also a Canon of St. Albans. I don’t remember ever seeing either of them, but my mother used to stay there as a child. And I have met some of their daughters (who all married except one, and before you went there, for their children are mostly older than I and my brothers and sisters). The unmarried daughter was called Ellen. Of course some of the married ones may have been staying there when you went there. But isn’t that interesting, and rather nice, that you used to go to the rectory of my great-uncle and aunt, so long ago. And, since you are related to the Roses, we must be relations, which is nicer still. The father of my great-aunt and grandmother was the Rev. E. J. Rose,1 vicar of Rothley after (or before?) my great-grandfather Aulay Macaulay. The father of E. J. [Joseph] Rose was the Rev. William Rose, vicar of Carshalton, who would be my great-great-grandfather. Does this help at all in the quest after your Rose ancestors? I have two nice pastel portraits, one of my great-grandfather Rose, the other of his mother, the wife of the vicar of Carshalton. I assume it was to the Roses you were related, not to the Vaughans. His father was, I believe, a Dean of Llandaff,2 and Master of the Temple, and his disciples were known as Vaughan’s doves. But I have made you a Rose relation not a Vaughan. I believe great-uncle Edward3 was rather evangelical, and used to embarrass my mother as a little girl staying there by praying, at family prayers, for “this little lamb of Thy flock now with us,” which she considered in poor taste.
Letters to a Friend Page 26