MS West Devon Area Record Office Acc No 308
My dear Mary
I hope your Dynamite explosions will soon cease Are they through Sheepstor or through the wood above Hanover Green[?] Major Woollcombe and I have been mourning over them. He does not think the Auckland people are RCs. You remember one Lord Auckland was Bishop of the I of Man.1 A RC named Capes, who takes one of the houses on the Winchester Road and the village people say his rough terriers name is Pope, which I cannot believe. Major and Mrs Woollcombe have been here for a week, sleeping at the Vicarage but she up here all day. Gertrude was so ill when she came that I should have sent for her, if she had not been coming but she rallied on Wednesday and is nearly in her usual state, so Mary is gone – just now, to be able to come when she is more needed. Henry Bowles, with Reginald is gone today to Guildford the Grandfather there is so delighted to have Reggie2 Alethea and the Baby move up to the Post Office, and the nurse takes Cicely and Margaret to Dorking while repairs and cleaning are going on. The Church Army van is at Allbrook, and is to come up here in a day or two. It shows a magic lantern, and I do not quite know what more it is to do. The captain of it read the Lessons at Church on Sunday, very loud and not in an educated voice. I wish gentianella would grow here as yours do! But I never saw the garden prettier, and the nightingales are singing with all their might Banksias are coming out and I brought in a Gloire de Dijon this morning I hope yours have met Jane, but uncertainties always attend the Colbornes, as we well know. I thought she was to come home this year for good.3
your most affectionate
C M Yonge