CHAPTER VI 



FRANCIS THOMPSON 



I have had a pleasant week at Clouds, and am to stay on to the 

 25th, a house full of children, relations, and friends, busy, too, index- 

 ing my " Secret History," and writing a programme of new Egyptian 

 policy for the " Manchester Guardian." 



" igth April. — Things are going well in Egypt, Cromer's breakdown 

 in health has resolved itself according to the ' Daily Telegraph ' into 

 ' an attack of indigestion, which has prevented his taking his usual 

 nourishment.' It has not prevented his attending a public luncheon 

 party, or accepting an engagement to deliver a farewell speech at the 

 Opera House at Cairo. What rot it all is, and now Fox-Bourne (of 

 the Aborigines Protection Society) writes that the Egyptian Committee 

 has decided not to oppose a parliamentary grant to him of money, or 

 honours. I have suggested his being raised to the dignity of Duke of 

 Denshawai. 



' Talking about the Anglo-French Entente with Percy Wyndham 

 he tells me that the agreement was signed here at Clouds, in the East 

 Room, the three signatories being Arthur Balfour, Lansdowne, and his 

 son George. This adds to the interest of what George told me about 

 it last year, viz, that it was agreed upon by a very small inner Cabinet of 

 the Cabinet, and that they understood it as a bar to anything in the 

 way of annexation or permanent retention of Egypt as a British pos- 

 session. It was signed during the Easter recess of 1904, which Arthur 

 always spends at Clouds. 



" Percy is much troubled at Asquith's new Budget, which increases 

 the death duties on fortunes of over £150,000; I don't think myself it 

 much matters. All it means is that the very great houses will have 

 to reduce their scale of domestic expenditure, and live in a smaller 

 way. He feels himself over-housed at Clouds, and I, too, personally 

 find myself much happier at Newbuildings where I can live in a quite 

 small way, than I was at Crabbet. 



" 22nd April. — Pamela Tennant is here with sundry children. 

 Among them is a boy of nine (Bimbo), who has writen some good 

 verses. His mother recited some of these to me, especially a Blakian 

 rhyme addressed to her, which I thought excellent. In the afternoon 

 George arrived. I think I have persuaded him that mine is a wiser 



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