22 October.—­It is very strange to find oneself in a country where war is not going on.  The absence of guns and Zeppelins, the well-lighted streets, and the peace of it all, are quite striking.  But the country is pro-German almost to a man!  And it has been a narrow squeak to prevent war.  Even now I suppose one wrong move may lead to an outbreak of hostilities, and the recent German victories may yet bring in other countries on her side.  Bulgaria has been a glaring instance of siding with the one she considers the winning side (Gott strafe her!), and Greece is still wondering what to do!  Thank God, I belong to a race that is full of primitive instincts!  Poor old England still barges in whenever there is a fight going on, and gets her head knocked, and goes on fighting just the same, and never knows that she is heroic, but blunders on—­simple-hearted, stupid, sublime!

24 October.—­I went to the English church this morning with Mr. Lancelot Smith, but there was no service as the chaplain had chicken-pox!  So I came home and packed, and then lunched with Mr. Eric Hambro, Mr. Lancelot Smith, and Mr. ——­, all rather interesting men at this crisis, when four nations at least are undecided what to do in the matter of the war.

About 6 o’clock we and our boxes got away from Stockholm.  Our expenses for the few days we spent there were L60, although we had very few meals in the hotel.  We had a long journey to Haparanda, where we stopped for a day.  The cold was terrible and we spent the day (my birthday) on a sort of luggage barge on the river.  On my last birthday we were bolting from Furnes in front of the Germans, and the birthday before that I was on the top of the Rocky Mountains.

Talking of the Rockies reminds me (did I need reminding) of Elsie Northcote, my dear friend, who married and went to live there.  The other night some friends of mine gave me a little “send-off” before I left London—­dinner and the Palace Theatre, where I felt like a ghost returned to earth.  All the old lot were there as of yore—­Viola Tree, Lady Diana Manners, Harry Lindsay, the Raymond Asquiths, etc., etc.  I saw them all from quite far away.  Lord Stanmore was in the box with us, and he it was who told me of Elsie Northcote’s sudden death.  It wasn’t the right place to hear about it.  Too many are gone or are going.  My own losses are almost stupefying; and something dead within myself looks with sightless eyes on death; with groping hands I touch it sometimes, and then I know that I am dead also.

[Page Heading:  LOVE AND PAIN]

There is only one thing that one can never renounce, and that is love.  Love is part of one, and can’t be given up.  Love can’t be separated from one, even by death.  It comes once and remains always.  It is never fulfilled; the fulfilment of love is its crucifixion; but it lives on for ever in a passion-week of pain until pain itself grows dull; and then one wishes one had been born quite a common little soul, when one would probably have been very happy.