I am sending with this Shallow Soil wh. I finished last night. It is a disagreeable book but worth your reading – for, if the thing had to be done, it is well done. Why these sort of writers shd. be called Realists passes my comprehension. There is much more ‘realism’ in Shakespeare or even in Dickens than in these more or less morbid studies of Scandinavian & Russian putrescence. However I shall be interested to know what you think. I have made a discovery this morning wh. may amuse you about our evanescent friend V— S—. He turns out to be a baronet created such by me! (unwittingly I need not say). I find also that he is of mature years and cannot look for a long span of enjoyment either in the Cloisters, or in his White Cottage (with which you were no doubt once familiar) in the County of Sussex. He is gradually being stripped of his cloak of mystery. I got no dinner last night till after 10 when Bongie & I had a scratch meal in my room. I sat through the speeches till then (except Amery’s – at whom I draw the line). Yesterday was a particularly dreary day – except for our divine time together, for wh. I bless you. I shall see you to-night? All love.

I am beginning to receive letters of thanks from the recipients of honours. Henschel is strongly backed by Charles Stuart Wortley who knows a good deal about music. I am sorry about Parky. We are going to make Beauchamp a KG: he has done pretty well out of changing his party