And, as I live, I think I’ll write no more. I have no more to say; and the papers have just come. I leave here after lunch (eon) to-morrow, spend an hour or two in Chichester cathedral and arrive home in time for my bread and milk....
On his return to Chelsea and a typewriter, he says, 1.9.21:
You will be pleased to receive a letter from me in legible type, instead of in that hand which is becoming almost as crabbed as yours. And I continue to address you at Bamborough Castle, though that stronghold figures as something very near Zambuk Castle in your letter of 30 August.
N. filled me with fears of internecine feuds within your fortress, of bloody strife for the one shady nook of the orchard and so on. You say nothing of these things; and I assume that there has been no slaughter in your time. There was a horrid game when I became a British kid in the early seventies: I am king of the castle! Get out, you dirty rascal! I trembled at the thought of you and N. playing this game against ruthless border clansmen. All’s well that ends well....
I lost twenty goodish guineas at three-handed bridge after Brother Roy arrived. He wanted to can everything on the estate: the apples, the pears, the fleas on the dogs’ backs, the flyaway ducks. He wanted to introduce New Zealand mutton-birds into this country....
I had a tooth out yesterday, he writes, 3.9.21,—until then I had thirteen of my own left, an unlucky number—and was not at my best.... The tooth was extracted at a high cost, in the presence of a dentist, an anaesthetist and my body-physician but without unpleasant consequences. And this afternoon I go to the Sutros for a brief week-end.
I have no news, except that I have bought some most attractive socks, or half-hose....
... I have no news, he complains, 12.9.21. I write to you simply out of friendship and duty. I spent five hours at the Zoo y’day.... We lunched there; so did most of the beasts, heavily. You should have seen S. staggering under the weight of about nine pounds of the most expensive oranges, bananas, apples and onions, not to mention sugar, monkey-nuts, and two raw eggs. Say what you will, it is laffable to feed a small monkey with slices of apple till he has both pouches full, all four hands and his mouth. When you hand him the eighth slice, you wait in breathless expectation....
I had a tooth extracted last week, reducing the number of my real teeth to twelve. To-day the number of my pseudo-teeth is to be increased to eighteen (quite correct: they swindle you out of a couple) and I propose to lunch at the Reform Club with many gaps in my mouth.