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Letter of acceptance for the 1905 Apostles' dinner.

The Shiffolds. - Still having fine weather, 'after just enough rain to keep us from being quite dried up'. Julian is well, 'enjoying his holidays, and also looking forward to his journey North'; Robert thinks him 'both stronger and less nervous than last year'. Bessie is currently reading him Gulliver's Travels, which 'he enjoys a great deal'. In the evening they read Emma, as Johannes Röntgen and his fiancée Miss [Julia] Fentener van Vlissingen know enough English to understand most of it'; they have just reached 'Mr Elton's declaration, which is a supreme piece of comedy'.

On Sunday Austin Smyth, 'the House of Commons librarian', is visiting; he is a 'first rate Aeschylean scholar', and Robert is going to discuss 'various difficulties in the choruses of the Choephoroe with him'. Has now finished his translation, apart from 'these choric passages, where the text is despairingly corrupt'. Hopes to come to Wallington a few days later than Bessie and Julian, on the Tuesday.

15 Cottesmore Gardens, Kensington, W.8. - Thanks for [Bob's translation of Aeschylus's] "Oresteia"; thinks the 'words on p. 12 [referring to Bob's use of Smyth's unpublished notes] are quite right'. Looks forward to reading it, the result of 'so much thought and labour'. Best wishes to Bob and his wife for the new year.

27 Gledhow Gardens, London SW. - Will go to the premiere of [Trevelyan's] "Meleager" and [Sturge Moore's] "Medea" with [Austin?] Smyth and Maisie Marshall, a classical scholar, costume and set designer who 'clothes the Beecham Opera'. If Trevelyan, Bessie and Julian are free beforehand, he invites them to dine. Hopes Ronny Watkins won't send them home to commit suicide 'as he did the poor old woman' by reciting miserable poetry. He and Smyth saw the "Bacchae" [the Cambridge Greek Play] and enjoyed it very much; he congratulates Trevelyan for his nephew's part in it.

Welcombe, Stratford on Avon. - Robert's report of the Hunt was very interesting: Basil Williams and [Robin?] Mayor 'must have been notable members of the Old Guard". Told [Austin?] Smyth in his reply that he had been Chairman of the [Apostles'] dinner 'exactly half a century ago', when the Vice-Chairman was 'a lively undergraduate... Welldon by name'. Is looking forward 'with an old man's uneasiness' to the journey North [to Wallington]. Remembers a year when the 'Etonian Trinity men' could not go to the 4th of June [holiday] as it was on the 5th, when the 'Trinity May began'.

Red House, Hursley, Winchester. - Has just finished reading Lucretius though not with the Latin text, as he plans to one day. Bob's translation, 'in loyalty to the Latin... in purity of English, and in freedom from translator's slang' seems a 'firstrate performance'. It has also brought him to 'a much heartier acceptance' of something he has previously found it hard to accept, with 'the twiddles you play on the traditional blank verse of the sequence Shakespeare - Milton - Wordsworth'. Of course has some reservations, but these are 'mostly anticipated' in the preface.

Hallington Hall, Newcastle-on-Tyne. - Thanks Bob [for sending his translation of Lucretius' "De Rerum Natura"]. Geoffrey and Hilton Young are staying here and reading the book 'with delight'; George will start on it tomorrow. It is a 'great work' to have published 'at last', and he congratulates Bob 'heartily'.