Monk's Folly, 10th August

Darling Elizabeth:

Ifelt particularly virtuous this morning, and drove over to Romford to see old Admiral and Mrs. Grafton. Such a dear Darby and Joan pair, so different from the foot-in-the-grave old couples one meets now-a-days. The Admiral was pruning roses in the dearest little garden when I drove up; he hobbled up with a wheeze and muddy fingers and opened the carriage door before Alfred had time to dismount from the box. He welcomed me to Romford with an old-school bow, and gave me an elbow to shake because his hands were full of lumps of Somersetshire clay. He asked me to sit down in the dining-room (they always shut up the drawing-room in the summer, and it is as damp as a church), while he called his wife. Mrs. Grafton, who is a dear, kissed me on both cheeks, and asked after my neuralgia and you. Although it was awfully hot, she was wearing the Queen's Indian shawl; they keep the rooms so dark that I nearly sat down on the Angora cat, which was sleeping in the most comfortable chair in the room. While the Admiral was washing his hands and choking with asthma in the next room, Mrs. Grafton told me about the rheumatism in her left shoulder, and that she had thought at first that I was the chiropodist they were expecting from Taunton.

They insisted on my seeing the kitchen garden, and were very proud that their Brussels sprouts took the first prize at the Bath Vegetable Show in the Spring. I saw the pigs being fed, and the Admiral told me that one of his sows had been given him by the Dowager Marchioness of Ealing, who had brought it to him in her arms wrapped in cotton-wool when it was a week old. The Admiral amuses himself with carpentering, and has had one of the conservatories fitted up as a tool-house, but since he mistook one of his thumbs for a shaving and nearly planed it off, he hasn't been able to finish the table for the butler's pantry. Mrs. Grafton made him show me his artificial ice-machine, and he frappÉed a Veuve Clicquot for me, but the vacuum or something didn't work and the neck of the bottle broke. Then we went back to the dining-room, where the Angora cat was sharpening its claws in the lace curtains. The Admiral said, "Damn that beast, Maria!" but Mrs. Grafton gave him such a look, and said, "Oh, Arthur! how can you when he has been so ill lately. Puss, puss, purr-r, purr-r."

A servant brought in some port wine and biscuits, and the Admiral asked me if I cared to see his views of places on the Pacific station. We came to a photograph of a woman in a mantilla, whom the Admiral said was the belle of Lima, and he sighed and chuckled. "Those were days to remember; we were the fastest ship in the Navy, and when we went out of commission there wasn't a pair of black eyes from Valparaiso to Vancouver that didn't shed tears." Then Mrs. Grafton told me of the voyage she made out to the station, when she was the only woman on the steamer, and how two men quarrelled over her in Colon harbour, and another threatened to throw himself in among the man-eaters at Barbados, because she hadn't spoken to him for a whole day. The Admiral looked very savage, and wheezed terribly and called her Mrs. Grafton. They were too delightfully Jo Anderson, my jo, John. I could have spent the whole morning with them, for it is so refreshing to find people natural and sincerely attached to each other. They never spoke a word of scandal during the whole visit; and when I left, Mrs. Grafton gave me a beautiful bouquet of MarÉchal Niels and said if she were a man she knew she would break her heart over me, and the dear old Admiral insisted on helping me into the carriage and gave me such a charming Early Victorian salute.

I know they only said nice things of me when I was out of sight, and I wish there were more people like them in the county.

Blanche Blaine came to tea in the afternoon; two of her fingers are iodined and she had a leather strap round her wrist; she says she sprained her hand at tennis yesterday and can't grip her racquet. Daisy biked over to Exeter this morning with Mr. Frame to represent Taunton in the mixed doubles and ladies' singles. The Duchess of Windermere is to give the prizes. Lady Beatrice is furious because the Committee decided at the last moment to scratch her name in the ladies' doubles. I think it is quite time she gave up tennis, for she can't hit a ball and disputes every point and looks such a fright. She was so mad when she heard she had been scratched, that she refused to go over to Exeter, or to let any of her house-party go. The Parkers took a party in a special Pullman; Blanche thinks they own it, for they always have it wherever they go. The Duchess of Windermere has invited them to sit under the marquee with her.

I was sorry I could not go to their dinner-party last night. Blanche says it was awfully well done. The chef from Prince's and an army of waiters came down from London. The plate was superb, china was only used with soup and fruit—Dresden and SÈvres; the handles of the knives and forks were gold, studded with rubies, those of the spoons were silver and ebony. The favours must have cost a small fortune. Lady Beatrice, who went in with Mr. Parker, got a diamond aigrette; Blanche got two volumes of Tennyson's poems in calf; there must have been some mistake in the order, for there were not enough favours to go round, and Mr. Rumple, who sat next to Blanche, found a ten-pound note under the roll in his napkin.

As usual, Mrs. Parker wore a high-necked dress and no jewels; Miss Parker was À la Paquin and went in to dinner with the Duke of Clandevil. There was no attempt at precedence, and Lord Froom was in a towering rage that Mrs. Parker went in with Mr. Frame. But I think it was very bad taste of him, as his favour was a gold watch, with the Froom crest and motto in diamonds, and as the Parkers are foreigners and kings in their own country every excuse should be made for them.

Clandevil is stopping at Astley Court, and rumour has it his engagement to Miss Parker will soon be made public. I pity her, for she seems a decent sort, and we all know what the duke is. He is five years younger than she, and only the ha'penny papers published his cross-examination in the Ventry divorce. But I suppose even an American king's daughter would not refuse an English duke, and Mrs. Parker was heard to tell Mr. Frame with a sigh that it would cost such a lot to stop the leaks in a seven-acre roof.

Mr. Parker, Junior, is very retiring and can hardly be got to speak or do anything. Blanche thinks him stupid, but Mrs. Chevington says he has what she calls "a head for business," for he never goes to the Stock Exchange without causing a panic. Considering the food and the presents, the dinner was a huge success, but Mr. Parker would persist in telling Lady Beatrice how he had made his money, and that fifty years ago, "when you and I were young, Lady Beatrice, I was a barefoot newsboy in Broadway."

You amuse me with your account of the Westaways. I don't pity Lady Westaway very much for having such a daughter-in-law; if she had used tact with Billy he would probably have listened to reason. I am so glad, darling, that you are a girl and not a boy; boys are such a source of anxiety in families of our station. They are always getting into trouble, and they pick up such vulgar tastes. Why is it, I wonder, that one never hears of girls marrying beneath them, but it takes all the ingenuity we possess to keep the boys out of mÉsalliance. Billy Westaway is a fool, and there are so many like him.

Between us, I would rather have a son as bad as Clandevil than one as silly as Billy Westaway; but if it came to marrying one of them I should prefer it to be the other way about.—Your dearest Mamma.