Scope and Content
"Here I am back at my typewriter again - after much coming and going - and trying to clear up this vast heap of correspondence still waiting to be answered before I set out in search of the SUN again. I leave here on December 14th. for Amsterdam, and sail from there on the 15th. On Christmas Day I should be at sea basking in the sun and well on the way to Cape Town. I am more than ready to be off, especially in view of the weather! I think it has rained every day since I returned from Italy. Usually we have a beautiful spell of fine weather in Oct/Nov. here - sort of Indian summer - but this year there has been no sign of it. The fall of chalk to which your cutting refers was in Botany Bay, which is about half a mile from here along the coast in the Margate direction. But the cliffs all round this coast are eroding, and falls of chalk are quite frequent. We at the castle expect to be faced with a bill for £30,000 before long - repairs to the cliff below the terrace. Two of the flats at the extreme corner are in a dangerous state - they are only a few feet from the edge, and the chalk has fallen away so that the terrace is hollow underneath at that point! However, we have engineers and consultants on the job, and the next thing will be the estimates. Actually, there is a 2 1/2 million plan for Broadstairs sea defences. The under cliff walk you say you took last Easter towards Ramsgate is the beginning of the plan. A wall like that is due to be begun at Kingsgate before long, and will eventually stretch all the way along the coast. Of course, this perpetual rain we have had recently accentuates the trouble. The chalk gets soft, and falls away. It is worse if there is a frost as well, as then it comes away in huge lumps.
I have not the vaguest idea when I shall be back in England. There are all sorts of alternatives. When I reach Mombasa, I shall be met by two friends (brothers) who live on the slopes of Mt.Kilimanjaro, in the Tsoa National Park in Kenya, who I visited last year. They want me to stay with them a month, and pick up the next ship on the Holland-Africa Line. They go round Africa every month. I have not decided yet to accept their invitation. If I do not, I expect we shall come up into the Mediterannean sometime at the end of March, calling at Beirut, Naples and Genoa. The last two years, on arrival at Genoa, I have gone on to Menton to stay with my French cousins, and I shall probably do this again. If I do, it is more than likely I shall stay on in France, go up to Paris, and then to Normandy to my other French cousins (they are all actually second- and third- cousins). I love Normandy and my relations there, and I am no hurry to cross the Channel once I get there. There seems to be no point in it if I am going into Italy for the summer as I hope to do again. This time it may be to Lake Garda in the north, and all the countryside round there which I have not explored. Again, I have friends at Gargano on the Lake who want me to go there. So it will be better for you to wait until you have news from me that I am actually back before sending a letter. As I think I told you in my recent letter, I write the minimum of letters when I am abroad, and my correspondents have to be content with p.c.s. I refuse to clutter my luggage up with a typewriter - I always travel light, with a bag in each hand to render me independent of porters (who get fewer and fewer on the Continent, and are non-existent in places like Jugo-Slavia). I may add that my postcard list is quite formidable, and the cost in stamps (especially if I send by air) really something!
Yes, you did send me the press cutting of the enclosed. I remember Mrs.Miles and Mrs.Sexton (I appointed them as teachers!) but none of the others: perhaps, vaguely, Mrs.Chapman. Mr.Davies has put on weight! He looks exactly like J.B.Priestley.
I saw the announcement of the death of Miss Romola Russell. She must be the last of the Victorian ladies who held sway over Ampthill in my day. It was so odd that so many of them went in twos. The two Miss Russells, the two Miss Wingfields, the two Miss Eagles, the two Miss Bartons, the two Miss Smiths (Woburn St), the two Miss Fitts, there was no end to them. And now they are all gone! They were typical of an age when "ladies" did not go out to work, but devoted themselves to "the poor". Lady Bountifuls. Now the young ladies of the aristocracy are more likely to be found in Chelsea High Street in mini-skirts.
I have had no reply from America in acknowledgment of the Richard Nicols book. So anything may have happened to Mr.Allison Kent Thomas. After all it was 22 years ago! How the time flies! It is 12 years ago this week since I came to the Castle. Changes are always taking place here ... people coming and going. There are several people here now whom I do not know. It is quite possible that my friend Sydney Crouch will be clearing out of here next year. He has been troubled with his heart for some years, and it has worsened recently. He has angina, and the doctors say he ought not to live alone, never climb stairs, lead a very quiet life generally. So he may decide to go and live with his brother and sister-in-law somewhere in the Midlands. If he does go, I shall have nowhere to stay in the Castle until my tenants (who are due back in the New Year) move out. However, they may be going before long, as they have a chance of a house in Sandwich.
Our porter is back, and seems much better. Mrs.MacLeod, I am glad to say, is always on hand to do things for me: also her son John, who is a wonderful handyman.
Now I must finish, and get on with the next.
Outside a stormy wind is blowing, and the rain lashing against the windows ... it will be good to get into the southern hemisphere and feel some heat.
Yours sincerely,"