It was early in 1944 that business claims made it necessary for me to undertake a journey to the United States. I could not have chosen a better moment for my visit, for the Anglo-American entente was just then at its zenith. After the Five Years’ War, it is well-known, there was a period at which relations were somewhat strained, chiefly owing to our indebtedness. It is a common experience in ordinary life that, however friendly be your feelings towards A., you tend to avoid A. in the club or crowd to the other end of the Tube-lift at her approach when she has become your creditor. Such was the constraint in our relations with the United States, and for a time it seemed (I am speaking of my own memories of my geographical training at Oxford) as if the two countries were bound to remain on distant terms and finally drift into hostility. It was only in 1935 that the ill-starred political genius, James Tremayne, brought forward his scheme for a rapprochement, which was still laughed at as chimerical at the time of his early death in 1936. It is true that his proposals had erred on the side of generosity, offering as they did four dukedoms, eight marquisates, thirtytwo peerages, and a hundred and eight baronetcies to American citizens on condition of a full discharge of our War Debt. There was also a good deal of doctrinaire objection on the part of the labour Government which was then in power: “the sons of George Washington,” as Mr. Ropes oratorically put it, “are not to be bribed with sugar-plums.” The sons of George Washington could not very well make any advances while the market was still so doubtful, and it was only on the accession to power of the Tories (under Lord Hopedale) in 1941 that negotiations were begun in earnest. The buyers were coy at first, and for a time it seemed as if no business was being done, but in 1942 patriotism on both sides of the Atlantic triumphed over all obstacles and our Transocean creditors consented to call it a deal at three dukedoms, six marquisates, thirty-six peerages, seventy-two baronetcies, and a hundred and twenty knighthoods, on condition that the honours in question were put up to an open ballot, the British Government waiving on its side all right of selection.

My American hosts used to describe to me the excitement of those early days of 1943, when the ballot was held. An attempt was made at first to keep a fixed price for the tickets, £1000 for a dukedom entry and so on; but this attempt soon proved impracticable. When the first allotment had been completed the tickets immediately began to be put up to auction, and prices soared dangerously, £10,000 being freely quoted for a dukedom entry before the end of April. But a slight trade depression produced a slump, and prices were sagging heavily by the end of June, when the ballot was held. The Duke of Illinois, for example, got in on the ground floor and picked up his ticket in discharge of a bad debt at £4000. Among all the buyers, none brought a cooler head or a more iron nerve to the business than a young citizen of Connecticut, Wilson J. Harkness. He had speculated early; a millionaire himself, he had formed a ring in which all the other partners were men of straw whose premiums were paid by himself, and by the time the first allotment was made he found himself almost safe for a marquisate, while he held a block of baronetcies that almost amounted to a controlling interest. At the moment when the market was strongest he sold out his marquisate options, and as prices fell began steadily buying peerages. His forethought was justified, for though at the time of the ballot he held eighty-six peerage tickets, only one of these proved to be a winning number. (His three baronetcies, by a gracious act of international courtesy, he allowed to lapse to the Crown.) There was some feeling at first among the successful competitors against the adoption of territorial titles, and there is still a Duke McGinnis in Boston to-day, but Wilson Harkness knew by instinct what was expected of him, and early appeared in the Honours List as Wilson Lord Porstock.

It was in the first flush of good feeling, when Great Britain felt the relief of being discharged from so fearful an indebtedness, and the United States public felt bound to us closer than ever by the ennoblement of so many of its most prominent citizens, that I made my business trip. I went by air, of course, on the Atmospheric, one of the old Handley Page line. I missed, by doing so, the sight of the Statue of Liberty, which had then only just been fitted with the apparatus which makes its right eye wink on the approach of the traveller: but as we came to earth at the customsdrome we were greeted by the gigantic “Eagle” scar on the hill-side, which has since been filled in with lapis-lazuli, but was then more striking for the simplicity of the natural chalk. We were still in the old prohibition days, and I remember that before landing we came to water beside a sea-going liner, into which we transferred all our petrol tins, receiving in return a heavy cargo of similar tins, concerning the contents of which no questions were asked of us when we landed.

The hospitality of the Americans has always been, and still is, justly famous, but I suppose the arrangements for its exercise have never been so elaborate or so complete as they were at the time of my visit. You took with you no introductions, had no questions asked about your antecedents, so long as you were a first class passenger. You went straight from the customsdrome to a hospitality bureau, where you stated the probable length of your stay and gave a list of the cities you intended to visit, in return for which an official handed you a complete list of the hosts who were to entertain you at each centre, together with a little sheaf of “emergency introductions” for each—the need for these last came home to me at San Francisco, where I found that my destined host had gone bankrupt and shot himself the day before my arrival. It was without any fuss or elaborateness of introductions etc. that I spent seven months on this hospitable continent, visiting New York, Boston, Washington, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New Orleans, Wichita, and Rooseveltville in the course of my stay. I should explain that when I arrived at New York I received a wireless informing me that the business projects which my visit had in view were not, after all, feasible; but my partners agreed with me that since I had had all the fatigue of the journey I might as well travel about and improve my mind a bit before returning to harness.

I have not been to America since, so that I cannot speak as an eye-witness when I contrast the America of forty years ago with the America of to-day. My readers will not, therefore, expect any very full descriptions under this head. I need only remind them that this was before the shifting of the earthquake zone, which made it necessary for our cousins overseas to build all their houses in one storey: that the war between the Wet and the Dry had not yet been fought, and General Murchison was only known as an obscure political agitator; that the repatriation of the negro population, which only set in properly with the granting of Nigerian Home Rule, was at this time hardly thought of; that the immigration of Chinese and Japanese exiles, which was due to the over-population of the Eastern countries before the benefits of our civilization began to tell upon the birth-rate, was still regarded as a menace; that Catholicism, finally, though it had the numerical superiority, was still far from being the dominant religion of the Continent—its progress in Canada was more rapid than its progress further South. It was a very different America, then, that I visited; and I think the best way to avoid continual comparisons between then and now, of which my readers must be sufficiently weary, will be to quote extracts from the letters I wrote home to my mother at the time. She kept all these, and for myself I think the value of old letters in recapturing a lost atmosphere amply atones for the occasional irritation one feels at their out-of-dateness. Let them stand, then, as I find them in my mother’s desk, in the clear, bold typewriting of my girlish days. I should say, however, by way of preface, that at the time of my visit the country was much exercised by the violent, but, as it proved, unsuccessful campaign which was being organized against the importation and use of chewing-gum. Society was everywhere divided into the Sticky Party and the Clean Party, and you have to understand what is meant when I speak of a state “going sticky” or “going clean.”

I am quartered here on Lord Poughkeepsie and his wife, such a charming couple. The weather is, we hear, intensely cold, but one doesn’t come into personal contact with it in these parts: a closed motor stands ready on the lift when you want to go “out,” and you take care to fasten all the windows before it is lowered into the porch. The same sort of thing happens, of course, at the other end. We had a most interesting dinner-party here last night with a very old American family, the van Murphy’s—he is said to have refused a knighthood, which is regarded as a frightfully desperate thing to do, out here. He says the Cleans are gaining in the East, though New York is sticky to a man; but it is the Western vote which will count. In Los Angeles it is not safe to go out of doors unless you pretend to be chewing, and some of the more peaceable citizens keep marbles in their cheeks permanently, to avoid being held up and questioned. Several of the States have already gone clean, including Maine, where the result, they tell me, has been an appalling outbreak of sweet-eating. Even here it is quite difficult to get butterscotch or barley-sugar, because there is such a lot of hoarding going on. I asked whether either party was likely to include the No-gum plank in its platform, and he said the Revolutionaries (they correspond to our Conservatives, you know) have practically pledged themselves to it. I haven’t caught the habit myself yet; it is horrible when they are chewing the stuff, but still worse when they “release” it.

Mr. van Murphy startled me by asking me whether I was fond of Theocritus! For a moment I imagined it was a kind of cigarette, but just remembered in time that it was the name of a classical author, and said I had never been encouraged to read him, because in England it wasn’t thought proper for young girls. This was a desperate shot, but turned out to be a fortunate one; he quite understood. It seems that they read the classics out here with great avidity, and Greek forms part of their ordinary education! Mr. van Murphy continued to talk about Theocritus, seeing that the field was clear for him, and said he did not think he was as good as Longfellow, not so uplifting. I said I always felt uplifted by Longfellow. He said Lucretius was great stuff, but kind of old-fashioned: the man hadn’t got our advantages, scince being little studied in those times. He thought if Lucretius could come to life now a man like Jefferson could hand him the soap. I had no idea what he meant, so agreed feverishly. He said he had learnt scince pretty average when he was at the seminary, and thought it was a great thing for a boy; gave him a kind of scatter for things. I was feeling badly out of my depth (you know, Lady Poughkeepsie afterwards told me that the real high-class Americans don’t talk slang; “a man like Alge van Murphy, now, you couldn’t tell him from a Britisher by his talk”). I felt it was my turn to “come in” somehow, so (remembering my Stories from the Aeneid) I asked if Virgil was read much in American schools; I thought boys enjoyed it so much more if the books they read had a plot and a human interest. He said it was pretty generally considered in American circles that Virgilius P. Maro was the greatest man God ever. I turned in despair to the man on the other side. He turned out to be a Professor of philosophy, but was fortunately disinclined to talk shop. Indeed, for about twenty minutes on end he told me all about the points of all the Derby winners for the last ten years or so: they are a strange people....

New York, March 24. To-morrow I am to cross the Continent. I am going by helico after all, because I want to crowd in as much sight-seeing as I can. I am sorry, though, to miss the train journey; apparently it is like nothing on earth. The trains only go at twenty miles an hour, on a fabulously broad gauge, and living in them is like living in a hotel. The engines consume their own smoke, and if the weather is fine you spend your time on the top of the carriage, which is all laid out as a flower garden! Each coach is named after the flower that is principally cultivated on the top of it. Life on the train is so quiet that the journey is regularly recommended by doctors to patients who have had a nervous break down. There is always a hospital coach, and it is a favourite joke against the company to declare that when the train reaches its terminus the guard—I mean the “conductor”—has to hand in a list of Births, Deaths, and Marriages. Another humorist assured me that it is only a matter of time before they start granting divorces on these trains; “twenty-five days between stations is a long stretch, you know, Miss Winterhead.” It is really true that they have swimming-baths in summer, and that you can send your clothes to the wash!

I am very sorry to hear about the strike at the College of Heralds. It’s true, of course, that they’ve had to work overtime, and that the salaries are calculated on a hopelessly outworn scale, but I can’t feel they’re likely to get their way. And what will Frank Hopgood do if they don’t take him back after the strike? He had such a promising career in front of him, and I can’t imagine him settling down to a new job....

Washington, April 7. People talk about nothing except the Gum Question here. Mrs. Rivers, my hostess here, who is passionately Clean (you understand what I mean, don’t you? It’s the oddest thing to hear people talking about it, because one’s always hearing things like “We’ll have no Clean Senator in these parts,” or “Mrs. So-and-so isn’t as Clean as she used to be”)—what was I saying? Yes, Mrs. Rivers tells me that the reason why they are so keen on it is that the gum-makers have notoriously been introducing opium into the gum for years past. She says a girl who has the chewing habit is “sucking her Particular Judgement every time,” which I thought a nice phrase. By the way, I have been making a little list of Americanisms to send you: I give them here with the equivalents opposite:

And so on and so on. I’m only gradually getting into the way of understanding what it all means; probably when I come home I shall just have begun to talk it!

Please tell Mrs. Rowlands that I have been under the Niagara Falls on a hydroplane. I haven’t been anywhere near them really, but I thought she’d like to hear that kind of thing....

Los Angeles, June 2, 1944. I told my host here that I wanted to go out and see the country a bit, and what was my surprise to be told that it is forbidden by the police! It appears that the whole of this country-side is entirely given up to the film industry, and there used to be so many accidents through people getting caught in prairie-fires, being trodden to death by wild buffaloes, falling into man-traps, getting cut off by artificial floods, and (worse than all) standing in the way when the pictures were actually being taken, that they had to issue a sort of special permit for film actors, and non-combatants (so to speak) have to keep within the area of the town itself. I was, however, allowed to fly over the country a bit, and saw, within the space of two hours, a volcano in explosion, two bull-fights, an auto-da-fÉ, and what looked like a lynching, but was really, I believe, a comic scene representing a man trying to get away from autograph hunters....

Boston, July 29, 1944. I went out to dinner with some very exclusive and old-fashioned people here, who, I was told afterwards, are Christian Scientists. They believe there is no such thing as pain, and no such thing as sin, which must be very comforting for them. They were started, I am told, by a Mrs. Eddy, whom they are expecting to reappear on earth very shortly.

I am beginning to be homesick already. I have not met many people here, except one young man, whom I thought rather interesting; but I had that odd feeling one gets sometimes that he didn’t like me. I’ll tell you about him later, perhaps. I feel rather lonely, and wanting to be back with you at dear Greylands.

Please tell Mrs. Rowlands that the Feminist movement is making great strides in Salt Lake City. A woman may regard herself as ipso facto divorced if her husband forgets to shut the door, and they are working steadily towards polyandry....

I must here interrupt these selections from my correspondence; for it was at Boston, as my reader will perhaps have guessed, that I had the happiness of meeting Porstock; and my letters from that time onwards have a way of always coming back to one subject, and treating that subject in the sentimental vein young ladies are apt to fall into on such occasions—I will not “give myself away” by risking any more quotations. It was with my kind hosts at Boston, Lord and Lady Massachussets, that Porstock was first introduced to me; he used to tell me afterwards that he had the feeling his tie wasn’t straight all the evening, and that he was never so uncomfortable in his life! He was of the American type of handsomeness which has given so many bridegrooms to the daughters of English families; tall, straight, square-jawed, a man of purpose. After our second meeting we seemed to have a natural attraction for one another, and he used to call every morning and take me out in his helico till late at night, missing, I am afraid, a luncheon engagement now and again. People began to suspect that an attachment was growing up between us even before we realized it ourselves; and witty Lady Massachussets used to chaff me when I seemed absent-minded in conversation by telling me I was always up in the air!

“Was it touch of hand, turn of head?” I only know that one evening when we were flying back from Montreal (the only time I crossed into Dominion territory during my stay) he had just had occasion to help me with the steering-gear, which was a little stiff, when suddenly we looked into one another’s eyes and knew our fate. “It’s a pity,” he said suddenly, “there’s no landing-stage at that damned registry.” “Wilson, you fool,” I said, “has it taken you a fortnight to discover that?” “Guess I’m not going to be that kind of fool any longer,” he said—and he wasn’t. But there! What right has an old woman, after all her good resolutions, to repeat all these tender passages? Enough to say, as Porstock himself said in announcing the affair to our host, that we came down hitched. I asked his leave to speak to his mother the same evening, and found her kindness itself. “Take him, my dear,” she said, “and God bless you; you have discovered our treasure.”

It was arranged, of course, that I should take him back to England, and that our marriage should be celebrated there. Since my mother did not approve of short engagements, we decided to put off the ceremony till October. The Press—what a curious habit the Press has of suddenly waking up and finding that it knew all about you!—gave us an almost royal welcome. I must overcome my blushes, and give you an extract from the Daily Mail, if only to let you enjoy the quaint, archaic language of it:

“The U.S. citizen is a brainy lad, and it isn’t only for titles he comes over this side: I hardly suppose! Wilse Harkness, anyhow, Lord Porstock as he is since those birthday honours set things buzzing, knew a good thing when he saw one; and pretty Miss Winterhead, daughter of the lamented Lord Blisworth, was too good a thing to miss when he met her flying over Boston. When he found he hadn’t foul-hooked an angel (his first impression) he lost no time in exhorting her to nominate the anniversary. So the red carpets will have to be got out against her return to her charming country seat at Greylands, near West Mill in Herts, and the congregation will have another set of banns to sit out on Sunday. Lord Porstock’s fame as a good sportsman and a charming host has preceded him here, and those who envy him his fortune will not be slow to hold out to him the hand of good-fellowship. The best of luck to him and his winsome lady!”

They are yellow now with age, those lines that once looked fresh and clean in my scrap-book, and their old-world diction falls oddly on the ear, that once sounded so modern and so vivid. Yet they are still fresh to the heart of a sentimental old woman, whose wrinkled features could once justify those sprightly gallantries, and who felt then, with a certainty she has never had reason to regret, that the summer-time of her life was coming and that all was well with her world.