[This absurd confusion, stimulated by the word 'poet,' was evidently the result of a long strain at reading barely legible trance-writing for more than an hour, and was recognised immediately afterwards with dismayed amusement by the sitter. It is only of interest as showing how completely unknown to anyone present was the reference intended by the communicator.—O. J. L.]
R. H.—No. Myers knows. So does ——. You got mixed (to Miss R.), but Myers is straight about Poet and Faunus.
I venture to say that to non-classical people the above message conveys nothing. It did not convey anything to me, beyond the assurance, based on past experience, that it certainly meant something definite, that its meaning was probably embedded in a classical quotation, and that a scholar like Mrs. Verrall would be able to interpret it, even if only the bare skeleton of the message were given without any details as to source.
Letter from Mrs. Verrall
In order to interpret this message, therefore, I wrote to Mrs. Verrall as instructed, asking her: "Does The Poet and Faunus mean anything to you? Did one 'protect' the other?" She replied at once (8 September 1915) referring me to Horace, Carm. II. xvii. 27-30, and saying:—
"The reference is to Horace's account of his narrow escape from death, from a falling tree, which he ascribes to the intervention of Faunus. Cf. Hor. Odes, II. xiii.; II. xvii. 27; III. iv. 27; III. viii. 8, for references to the subject. The allusion to Faunus is in Ode II. xvii. 27-30:—
'Me truncus illapsus cerebro
Sustulerat, nisi Faunus ictum
Dextra levasset, Mercurialium
Custos virorum.'
"'Faunus, the guardian of poets' ('poets' being the usual interpretation of 'Mercury's men').
"The passage is a very well-known one to all readers of Horace, and is perhaps specially familiar from its containing, in the sentence quoted, an unusual grammatical construction. It is likely to occur in a detailed work on Latin Grammar.
"The passage has no special associations for me other than as I have described, though it has some interest as forming part of a chronological sequence among the Odes, not generally admitted by commentators, but accepted by me.
"The words quoted are, of course, strictly applicable to the Horatian passage, which they instantly recalled to me.
(Signed) M. de G. Verrall"
I perceived therefore, from this manifestly correct interpretation of the 'Myers' message to me, that the meaning was that some blow was going to fall, or was likely to fall, though I didn't know of what kind, and that Myers would intervene, apparently to protect me from it. So far as I can recollect my comparatively trivial thoughts on the subject, I believe that I had some vague idea that the catastrophe intended was perhaps of a financial rather than of a personal kind.
The above message reached me near the beginning of September in Scotland. Raymond was killed near Ypres on 14 September 1915, and we got the news by telegram from the War Office on 17 September. A fallen or falling tree is a frequently used symbol for death; perhaps through misinterpretation of Eccl. xi, 3. To several other classical scholars I have since put the question I addressed to Mrs. Verrall, and they all referred me to Horace, Carm. II. xvii. as the unmistakable reference.