Transgressions, Installment XCV

July 11, 1938, Monday

Back to London and our flat and the world. The Countess’s “sticks from the attic” are rather grand for these small rooms. Perhaps I’ll catalogue them. She and Violet are deep into discussions about drapes and such. We are invited—as a special favour to the Countess—to spend our first English week-end as a married couple at Harrowby, Halifax’s place in Yorkshire.

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Watson sent for me this morning, which made me a bit nervous—I thought he might sack me—but no, it was that he had decided not to re-place Gifford and wished me to undertake his duties. “No additional remuneration possible, unfortunately.”? As nothing else is on offer at the moment, I agreed, with thanks as warm as I could muster under the circumstances.

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And back also to politics. Jack welcomed me with some headings for his next letter. He said that Duncan Sandys has sent a memorandum to Fonseca-Miller proving that the state of the country’s anti-aircraft defences are unsatisfactory. “Harrison is furious,” Jack said, “Because it’s true. He’s threatening to have Duncan Sandys imprisoned under the Official Secrets Act. This is a good thing, as it breaks up any chance of an alliance between Harrison and Winston.”? We will have to find a way to refer to this without saying so in order not to face the Official Secrets Act ourselves. On another matter, Jack says that Halifax has arranged affairs so that the Czechs are to be forced to request an investigator from Britain, who is to be Runciman (the father, not Haxton’s fringed friend), who will be expected to make recommendations that the Czechs wouldn’t have otherwise accepted. If, by chance, the Czechs accept them, it will be said that he is their investigator, and Britain is not bound by his recommendations. Very neatly done by the PM, said Jack.

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Then, to make it a full first day back in London, drinks with Watt at his club. He committed an epigram:? “Some people are a waste of time, even when your cock is in his mouth.”? We had just been talking about Gifford. I am not quite sure that Watt was speaking from experience.

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Other points:? He is making progress, he says, with unintelligible matters and imaginary machines and he believes that “it is obvious”? that Britain is trying to strengthen Germany, hoping for a German/Soviet war. “Stalin knows all about it.”

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All in all, quite a plunge back into ordinary life after the dream of Hyères.

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July 12, 1938, Tuesday

There is an exhibition of recent work by Yves Tanguy at Guggenheim Jeune (through July 16). One of her Surrealists.

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Rather flattered that anyone at King’s should want to talk with me, I had arranged to meet Adcock this afternoon, while Violet and her mother plundered the shops in Mayfair. The once-familiar train to Cambridge, then, and the usual stroll through the Market Square to the College. I was surprised to find a Naval officer with Adcock, naval officers being thin on the ground in the Fens. After some talk about my studies—“German is your language I take it?”— and my work at Hertford House, Adcock asked (rather abruptly I thought):? “In the event of war, would you stay in this country and if so would you be willing to do confidential work for the Foreign Office?”? I said that I probably would stay in Britain in the event of war and that I would of course be honoured to do what I could, if they thought it wise to employ foreigners. The Naval officer nodded and that was the end of it. I suppose I might be useful explaining the ways of Woodstock to the Foreign Office. The whole thing had obviously been set up by Watt. I imagine that is a good thing. I just wonder what kind of a good thing it is.

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Churchill has an article in the Daily Telegraph deploring the treatment of Austrian Jews by the Nazis.

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July 13, 1938, Wednesday

Feeling a bit guilty about my absence and about not getting right down to work on Monday, I spent the morning surveying the uncatalogued furniture at Hertford House for a good beginning point to exercise my new eminence. I’ve decided on a cartonnier by my old friend Dubois. A cartonnier is a piece of furniture meant to store paper. This particular item contains three compartments, one up, two down, in a box set on another box to bring it up to desktop height. Then, of course, there is the decoration.

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July 14, 1938, Thursday

Livia’s. Livia made a little speech, welcoming “those newly wedded” to join those “anciently wedded,” I squeezed Violet’s hand, and then the stream of the conversation in Livia’s salon, continuing now for its second or third year, smoothly resumed around us. Jack reported on his lunch with the Nazi leader of Danzig, a Herr Forster, whom Jack called a “frank young gangster, rather nice.”? Forster is said to be close to Hitler, whom he says wants peace. “As do we all,” commented Lord Cecil. “It is about the getting there that we differ.”

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Nicolson says that his son Ben has become a temporary attaché at the National Gallery. Which is how it is done, isn’t it?

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July 15, 1938, Friday

Harrowby, near Leeds, is a kind of magnification of a village house, that is, each part modest enough to look at—not Palladian—but the whole is huge, with, of course, a clock tower. It is the seat of the local Hunt and in general could not be more different from Waddesdon in look or tone. The house functions as smoothly as one imagines Viceroy’s House in Delhi—everything one might expect provided—with just a hint of York-shire thriftiness. Lady Halifax—the daughter of a Governor General and the wife of a Viceroy—is, as it were, officially gracious and kind, but obviously much more pleased to see the Countess than “the young man” ac-companying her. I took refuge under the labels of “American” and “bookish” and soon made my way into the reception rooms where, with some effort, I found the Titian portrait. A wonderful thing to find this young Italian gentleman so very near Hadrian’s Wall.

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The conversation at dinner was of plans for the Hunt next month and other country matters. However, after dinner, it soon became apparent that Halifax wanted to discuss the current crisis with the local grandees without the presence of a more or less unknown young man. I said some-thing about “my bride” and was excused.

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July 16, 1938, Saturday

A vast country breakfast, then a walk up Harrow Hill, which is the highest point in the district. Wonderful views despite the wet and the lowering clouds. Violet seems content to alternate walks with me and tea with the Countess and the other ladies. After our morning walk and be-fore the next vast meal I surveyed the pictures and furniture. I wonder how the Titian ended up here?? Gifford would know—or would have said that he knew.

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Everyone much relieved that war has not yet begun and all seemingly determined to keep the peace. As one (non-governmental) gentleman put it:? “Why should we fight for the French?? If we fight anyone, it should be the Reds.”? All seemed to be agreed on this point.

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July 17, 1938, Sunday

Wet, black and cold today. This is the worst July on record. We spent the morning next to the fire in the library and then it was time to go back to London. I do not expect to sleep anywhere as grand again.

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July 18, 1938, Monday

The stand of the cartonnier is decorated with gilt reliefs, battle flags, in front, framed by grooved pillars, topped with lion heads in roundels. Above this, a kind of puppet theatre: a box, open at the front except for curtains, which can be drawn back to reveal the shelves within. All this topped with an extraordinary assemblage of sculpture:? Cupid and Psyche embracing on top of a sort of tobacco jar, against which lean two bare-breasted ladies, one with helmet and spear, the other with a sheaf of wheat:? Love accompanied by War and Agriculture?

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Lunch with Jack, who said he went this morning to “your friend” Halifax’s home in Eaton Square to meet with Hitler’s adjutant (who had been Hitler’s commanding officer in the World War), Captain Fritz Wiedemann. Wiedemann said that during the war he had thought of Hitler simply as “a brave, reliable soldier”. Jack says that Halifax told Wiedemann that he would welcome a visit to London by Herr Hitler as head of state, in which case, Halifax had said, he was sure that the Ger-man leader would receive a friendly welcome from the King and the English people. We tried various formulations of this that might go into the next letter, but none seemed satisfactory.

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Cecil has told Jack that his sources in Berlin talk about a German in-vasion of Czecho-Slovakia on or about September 25.

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The Italians have published an Anti-Semitic decree along German lines.

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July 19, 1938, Tuesday

The Loyalist have launched their Ebro offensive.

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Lunch with Watt, who said that last night he and Philip went drinking at the Gargoyle Club, owned by David Tennant (brother of the exquisite Stephen, who is to be seen there). “Full of types like that professional beauty & Brian Howard & Gerald Hamilton, who eventually formed up in a pack and left in search of fresh prey in Soho.” Watt said that the Club is decorated with dark blue floors and silver stars in the ceiling. “Shall we do the same here?” he said, looking around the RAC dining room. Hamilton is known as the model for Isherwood’s Mr Norris.

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Watt says that William Coldstream, who was at the Gargoyle (“as who was not?”), is having an affair with Sonia Brownell, while Louis MacNeice is having an affair with Mrs. Coldstream, “for whom Eric Blair pines.”? He thinks it will not be long before, say, Brownell and Blair are lovers and the Coldstreams have gone their separate ways. “Such behavior would be deplored in my sort.”

He asked about “the love nest.”? I told him it was convenient to Hertford House, which led to a brief topographical cross-examination and then laughter. “Well,” he said, “That’s convenient to the Welbeck Street assembly.”? It seems that Rabensberg has a flat there that he lends to friends—and friends of friends. “Including, at the moment, our red-head.”

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July 20, 1938, Wednesday

Haxton is in the midst of a four-part series on the BBC called How I Look At Modern Painting. Last night he said that he enjoys the abstract kind of modern painting, while thinking it “A very odd thing to like . . . It seems to me a queer taste of a rather remote and not very valuable kind like, say, having a passion for higher mathematics.” When I mentioned this to Watt over our now habitual afternoon drinks he remarked that queers have all kinds of tastes, but higher mathematics is not like any of the others.

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Later, thinking of Haxton’s talk on modern painting, I scooped up an armful of avant-garde art magazines (XXe Siècle, Verve, and Minotaure) at Zwemmer’s. They look pretty on the floor next to my armchair in our new flat.

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We went the other night to a party at the studio of a painter across from South Kensington Station. It was a huge, gloomy place that had belonged to Millais. James S-B was there, Guy Burgess (of course), rent-boys, dealers, journalists. Very few women other than Violet. James says that Penrose has given his wife to Picasso for the summer. “I would say that I would rather roger Roland himself, if asked,” James S-B screeched, not needing to be asked.

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July 21, 1938, Thursday

Livia’s:? Lord Cecil says that Duff Cooper has tried and failed to have the Cabinet decision to ration the service departments—this in spite of a budget surplus—reversed. Franklin, as usual, defended the PM:? “Cooper and Churchill and the others want to bankrupt the nation out of blind hatred of the Germans.”?

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“It isn’t blind hatred,” interjected Cecil. Franklin waved him off.

?“The PM has laid out a carefully planned course of action that, if successful, will leave us in possession of the Empire, prosperous, and free of the U.S.A..”

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“And subservient to Berlin.”?

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“The PM is quite sure of his influence in that quarter.”?

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?“I hope to God he’s right.”

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July 22, 1938, Friday

Picking up another thread from our pre-marital life, we have come to Waddesdon for the first time this summer. Violet is planning to devote herself this week-end to riding.

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My Waddesdon check-lists have become somewhat more official, as the avalanche of wooden crates from Paris has now finally come to an end and everything has been unpacked and placed among the already overwhelming collection of furniture, pictures, china and objets d’art in the house. The Rothschild taste is sufficiently distinctive—and uniform—that Lord James’s parents’ collection fits perfectly into the existing decor. I have now created many, many notes of the form:?

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Veneered on oak with tulipwood, sycamore, holly and ebony. Inlaid with plaques of bleu-céleste Sèvres porcelain painted in reserves with floral motifs. The mounts are of bronze chased and gilded.

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Which is what the Rothschilds buy when they are in want of a small table.

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July 23, 1938, Saturday

Violet and Philip rode all day; I made notes about Rothschild pos-sessions; Watt read German mathematical tomes and Cassel remained in his room, reading—according to Nadine—books about Jews in the Low Countries in Rembrandt’s time.

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At dinner Cassel (who has begun to grow a beard) talked about how the images of the past are a doorway into the cultural milieu from which they came, its dominant mental states and attitudes. “We might, for instance, think of those quattrocento landscapes always securely placed in a window frame. We are inside, protected, part of a civilised order, looking out at nature, which is threatening even when cultivated. Compare with the Dutch two hundred years later. All those wet fields & and half-drowned cows. The increase in confidence of the domination of humanity over nature is indicated by the absence of any framing device. We could, then, finally simply look at nature without continually reminding ourselves of the constructed world of culture.”

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“Look at cows?” said Violet.

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“Wet cows?” said Philip.

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Cassel smiled, which is becoming rare.

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July 25, 1938, Monday

Runciman pere is definitely to go to Prague as a mediator. He told Jack that he expects to do some golfing in the German sections of the country. That is a good bit to slip into Jack’s letter. Jack says that there have been definite peace overtures from Berlin; Lord Cecil says that there have been definite indications of war in September. Both agree that the Czech’s are being unhelpful.

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July 26, 1938, Tuesday

The cartonnier is en suite with the Tilsit Table, which makes the history part of the description superfluous (“see also”). The materials are similar to those of the table:? oak lacquered with green vernis Martin, partly gilt. The figures and mounts are of chased and gilt bronze. The paper-rack is lined with dark green velvet and the small drawers on each side are lined with green silk.

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July 28, 1938, Thursday

Livia’s: The v. tall Lord Cecil and the extraordinarily short Alexander Cadogan whispering about German preparations for war with Czecho-Slovakia—Cadogan sceptical about the reliability of the information.

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Livia has become, as it were, vividly present to everyone on these occasions, while becoming simultaneously somehow increasingly not really there. Not that I can say anything to her about it.

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July 29, 1938, Friday

Watt:? “Do you recall that dour, if brilliant, Scotsman who came top of the poll for the F.O. a few years back?” “Cairncross?” “Right. Bought him a drink the other day. They’ve had enough of him and are packing him off to Treasury where he belongs. Of course he wanted me to do him a favour, take some papers to a colleague of his in Paris when I go through there. Can’t see why he doesn’t use the bloody post.”?

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And then:? “I suppose you’ve heard about Fiona’s triumph?” “No.” “Top marks on the Civil Service examination. Rather rare for a woman. Seems she had been secretly swotting away in Paris and such.”

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July 30, 1938, Saturday

Cassel came down for dinner this evening and lingered to hear Philip play a few Cello suites. During dinner he talked about Rembrandt’s collections, which we know from the 1656 inventory. He had a series of eighteen busts of Roman emperors, which, according to Cassel, were probably antiques, not casts.

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“We think of Rembrandt as painting portraits, still lives, and history paintings and value most the portraits. The antique busts hover about among those categories, do they not?? Did Rembrandt collect marble Roman emperors as a connection to antiquity?? As study objects for the technique of realism?? As types?? Some of his paintings seem to animate those busts to the point that they compete with the living models posed in contemplation of them. Strictly speaking a painting of a statue is a kind of still life, yet it is also a portrait of the subject of the sculpture, especially when we are looking at a painting of a Roman bust. It is therefore, then, also in a sense, a history painting.”

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Watt:? “The Roman emperors helped bankrupt him.”

?“Yes. He does not seem to have been a talented businessman.”

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“Unlike Rubens.”

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“Which is odd, if one thinks in stereotypes: the philo-semite Protestant unable to conserve his fortune, while the Roman Catholic courtier ac-cumulated a lordly estate.”

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July 31, 1938, Sunday

V. in the gallery, before breakfast. Nadine appeared just as we were adjusting our clothing. She pretended not to notice anything unusual.

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Watt is writing on probability theory:? “Something I just worked up for some chaps interested in that sort of thing.”? This involves much flipping of coins, which, given Edmund’s dexterity—or lack of it—is amusing to watch.