August 10, 1911

It's been a good camp in every way. I was battalion scout most of the time and had the extraordinary luck to outwit a whole section of Cameronians (regulars) in one field-day while I was investigating behind the enemy's lines. What an ideal country for fighting this is, with all the pine-trees and the long stretch of Laffan's Plain and CÆsar's Camp. I wish that Radchester could be burnt down and rebuilt somewhere on these Surrey hills. Every evening I used to tramp over to the Aldershot baths from Farnborough, tired as I was, and then back to join the riotous "sing-songs." I find that one gets through a good deal of money at the canteens. I always want to eat like a pig and drink like a fish at the finish of each day's manoeuvres. I have never been so bronzed as I am this year: my face is almost black with the sun and the dust. We had some excellent fights during the ten days, not always as on the programme. We had a first-class row with the Melton corps. They "swank" as if they owned the whole camp, so we let all their tents down one night. There was a battle royal and an inquiry the next day, when about eight Generals all gave tongue and talked about the honour of the Army. You can't suddenly pretend that a schoolboy ceases to be a schoolboy because you dress him up in khaki. He will have his "rags," whatever Guardsmen say.

There was, too, the usual smoking row. As a matter of fact, the great majority of fellows don't smoke in camp: they can afford to wait till the holidays begin. It is an education in itself to meet all the people from the other schools, to see how those with the great names take it for granted that they are cock-of-the-walk and "hold up" the canteens, while members of less well-known schools have to wait.

As a matter of fact, the officers' mess is the place to learn things. I dined there one night as a guest. I had no idea that Oxford and Cambridge were, or could be responsible for, such bounders as I met on that one evening. Good-hearted fellows for the most part, but it was ludicrous to see them in the same mess with these pukka officers of the Grenadiers and Coldstreams. They are keen on their job, too, but without the ghost of an idea how to behave, or how to speak the King's English. They are indescribably funny to watch as they sidle up to the Colonels and Generals and try to adopt a sort of Army attitude to life. There are heaps of men here whom I used to know at Oxford; most of them, however, are in the regulars and not O.T.C. men at all.

One of the "stunts" is for the boys to get the General or some big "nut" to go to tea in their tents. They provide a palatial meal and the wretched old man has to gorge himself nearly sick in order to please these fifteen-year-olds, who would be tremendously upset if he didn't eat all that was offered to him. But the man we all stand in dread of is the Brigade Sergeant-Major, who has a voice of thunder, and puts the fear of God into every one who comes near him, officer and man alike. He seems to be a walking encyclopÆdia; there is nothing he doesn't know and he requires absolute perfection every time. I must say ten days of this life make our puny efforts at school to be smart look pretty cheap. Here we really get the hang of things: at school somehow we nearly always fail. It's partly competition and the ever-present fact that we have a reputation to keep up.

August 15, 1911

I have just had four days in town as an aftermath. The comparison between London and camp is extraordinary. I'd no idea my love for London was so deep-rooted. There hangs over London an ever-present air of success, of money-making and money-spending. The shops tempt you, the hotels tempt you, the theatres tempt you, everything tempts you. I fed well and met all sorts of interesting people, among them Chichester. He lives at Hampton Court and I had one great afternoon on the river with his sisters, himself and his mother. They appear to be very wealthy and at dinner, to which I stayed, there was such a variety of wines that I got nervous as to which wine to put in which glass. I believe I got them all wrong, except the liqueurs, but I don't think they noticed. How Chichester can bear the bleak savagery of Radchester after the rich comforts of his own home, I can't conceive.

Some day I am to go back and stay with him. He appears to spend his holidays boating, motoring, riding, playing billiards, going to theatres, reading and writing. I never met people who put one so quickly at one's ease. Although they are rich they don't seem to worry about Society: they do none of the right things, for which Heaven be praised. They just enjoy life to the full and take each blessing as it comes. They have less of the snob in them than any people I have ever met. They appear to be unduly grateful to me for what I have done for Tony. My hat! The boot's on the other foot: what has Tony not done for me?

August 23, 1911

After a glorious week with my uncle in Dawlish, during which time I bathed and walked a good deal, I am back in town again. I love Devon: the coast scenery fills me with ecstatic delight and I thank God every minute that I am alive and strong to enjoy the good things of life.

I got into conversation with heaps of strangers of both sexes, and heard views of life that I am sure never enter the heads of my colleagues: when I am asked, as I frequently am, what I do in life, they always think I am lying when I say I am a schoolmaster, and laugh good-humouredly as if I had said something supremely funny when I mention that Oxford was once my University: apparently all young men claim to be "college boys": it's part of the game. Their whole conversation is one vast lie. But it does no one any harm and gives them a sense of romance: they get right away from the humdrum existence of the shop-counter and the office, and for a fortnight imagine themselves to be dukes and duchesses. But they miss half the joy that Devon provides by not scouring the country. Their programme is to rise late, dress with lavish care in the most glaring and tasteless colours, and slowly promenade up and down the Front. It is all very pretty and harmless and would delight the heart of O. Henry. They miss entirely the thousands of joyous little creeks with which the coast is studded: they never try to discover the secret charm of the moor. They prefer listening to the comic songs of the coons to the birds on the hillside, and the band on the Promenade to the rush of wind in the ears as one stands on the cliffs.

I wish I could write a novel. But I lack every faculty necessary for it. I can't observe properly: I can't describe the effect that scenery has on me. I am too nervous to probe into the inner history of sad-eyed women and dour-faced men. That they have their passionate loves and hates, of course I know, but these every man keeps in the secret places of the heart. Your Devonian is not the sort of man to wear his heart upon his sleeve for daws to peck at. I came back to London two nights ago, with my uncle, and he took me to several plays. When I am in town I'm never satisfied unless I can put in two theatres a day. I am just as excited at the rise of a curtain or the tuning up of the orchestra to-day as I used to be when I was a small kid. To be able to see in the flesh all these great actors, of whom we only hear dimly in our fastness of Radchester, is a delight not less than, if very different from, the sight of the red loam of Devon, or a great stag breaking from cover with the hounds close upon his heels.

September 26, 1911

I spent a week with the Chichesters at Hampton and had a joyful time in company with Tony. After leaving them I went home because my mother suddenly developed rheumatic fever and was seriously ill. I read aloud to her for about three hours every day from Ford Madox Hueffer's "Ladies Whose Bright Eyes" and W. L. Courtney's "In Search of Egeria."

I have heard from the Head Master that Anstruther is to have Marshall's house. Anstruther! Ye Gods! He is two terms junior to me. I hear that the Begum of Bhopal wants me to coach her son in Constantinople. That would be fun. Think of the experience! I wanted to clinch with the offer at once, but my mother made me promise not to. Heaven knows what it would have led to. I should have seen the world, met all the best people, and perhaps found a good job at the end of it.