m to live
quietly on at Hare Street whatever happened. The result was that even
when he came back from his journeys the time at Hare Street was never a
rest. He worked from morning to night at some piece of writing, and
there were very few commissions for articles or books which he refused.
He said latterly, in reply to an entreaty from his dear friend Canon
Sharrock, who helped him to die, that he would take a holiday: "No, I
never take holidays now--they make me feel so self-conscious."

He was very careful to keep up with his home and his family ties. He
used to pay regular visits to Tremans, my mother's house, and was
generally there at Christmas or thereabouts. Latterly he had a Christmas
festival of his own at Hare Street, with special services in the
chapel, with games and medals for the children, and with presents for
all alike--children, tenants, servants, neighbours, and friends. My
sister, who lately spent a Christmas with him, says that it was more
like an ideal Christmas than anything she had ever seen, and that he
himself, full of eagerness and kindness and laughter, was the centre and
mainspring of it all. He used to invite himself over to Cambridge not
infrequently for a night or two; and I used to run over for a day to
Hare Street to see his improvements and to look round. I remember once
going there for an afternoon and suggesting a stroll. We walked to a
hamlet a little way off, but to my surprise he did not know the name of
it, and said he had never been there. I discovered that he hardly ever
left his own little domain, but took all his exercise in gardening or
working with his hands. He had a regular workroom at one time in the
house, where he carved, painted, or stitched tapestries--but it was all
intent work. When he came to Cambridge for a day, he would collect
books from all parts of the house, read them furiously, "tearing the
heart out of them" like Dr. Johnson. Everything was done thus, at top
speed. His correspondence was enormous; he seldom failed to acknowledge
a letter, and if his advice were asked he would write at great length,
quite ungrudgingly; but his constant writing told on his script. Ten
years ago it was a very distinctive, artistic, finely formed hand, very
much like my father's, but latterly it grew cramped and even illegible,
though it always had a peculiar character, and, as is often the case
with very marked hand-writings, it tended to be unconsciously imitated
by his frie