The Letters of Rudyard Kipling: Volume 3: 1900–10

498 Pages·1996·48.181 MB·English

by  Thomas Pinney (eds.)

THE LETTERS OF RUDYARD KIPLING
Kipling on the steps of his private rail-car, 'Dalton', in Canada, October 1907. Kipling and his wife
travelled from Quebec to Vancouver and back to Montreal in this car, put at their disposal by the
Canadian Pacific Railway (Collier's Magazine, 14 March 1908).
The Letters of Rudyard
Kipling
Volume 3
1900-10
Edited by
THOMAS PINNEY
p Igrave
I 11
* The Letters of Rudyard Kipling © by the National Trust for Places of
Historie Interest or Natural Beauty 1996
Selection and editorial matter © Thomas Pinney 1996
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1s t edition 1996 978-0-333-63733-3
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First published 1996
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ISBN 978-1-349-13741-1 ISBN 978-1-349-13739-8 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-13739-8
Volume 1: 1872-89 (ISBN 978-0-333-36086-6)
Volume 2: 1890-99 (ISBN 978-0-333-36087-3)
First published in 1990
Volume 4: 1911-19 (ISBN 978-0-333-43989-0)
First published in 1999
Volume 5: 1920-30 (ISBN 978-1-4039-2131-4)
Volume 6: 1931-36 (ISBN 978-1-4039-2132-1)
First published in 2004
Set of six volumes: ISBN 978-1-4039-2133-8
This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully
managed and sustained forest sources.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3
13 12 11 10 09 08 07 06 05 04
Contents
List of Illustrations vi
Preface and Acknowledgements ix
Chronology of Rudyard Kipling's Life, 1900-10 xi
The Letters, 1900-10
I South Africa and Sussex, 1900-2 1
11 Disappointments and Honours, 1903-7 117
III In Liberal England and on the Continent, 1908-10 295
Register of Names and Correspondents 476
v
List of Illustrations
Frontispiece: Kipling on the steps of his private rail-car, "Dalton", in
Canada, October 1907. Kipling and his wife travelled from Quebec to
Vancouver and back to Montreal in this car, put at their disposal by the
Canadian Pacific Railway (Collier's Magazine, 14 March 1908).
Plates
1. Cecil Rhodes on the verandah of Groote Schuur (Cape Archives, Cape
Town).
2. The Woolsack, the house on the Rhodes estate where Kipling spent
every winter from 1900-1 to 1908 (University of Cape Town
Libraries).
3. The staff of the Bloemfontein Friend, March-April 1901: H. A.
Gwynne, Perceval Landon, Kipling, Julian Ralph (Transvaal Archives,
Pretoria).
4. Colonel Henry Wemyss Feilden, Kipling's neighbour and closest
friend in Burwash (Sir Henry Feilden).
5. The east front of Bateman's, Kipling's horne from 1902 (Bateman's,
National Trust).
6. Aboard the Kenilworth Castle returning to England from the Cape,
April 1907: John and Eisie Kipling seated on the deck, Carrie and
Kipling standing (University of Cape Town Libraries).
7. Kipling in his doctor's gown, Oxford, June 1907 (Bodleian Library).
8. Sir John Bland-SuUon and Kipling arriving at the Middlesex Hospital
before Kipling's speech to the students of the Medical School,
1 October 1908 (Sir John Bland-Sutton, The Story 0/ a Surgeon, 1930).
9. Opening ceremonies, Rhodes Memorial, Table Mountain, Cape Town,
1912, Earl Grey presiding (Cape Archives, Cape Town).
In-text illustrations
1. Sullivan, the lion cub, on the stoep of The Woolsack
(Houghton Library, Harvard University). 43
vi
List 0/ Illustrations vii
2. Kipling "drinking the coffee of separation" in Henry James's
Lamb House: sketch by Philip Bume-Jones (1903) (Houghton
Library, Harvard University). 141
3. Rebus letter to B. H. Walton, [10 August 1904] (Library of
Congress). 161
4. "The Divotee Club": drawing by Kipling (Dalhousie
University). 171
5. "Anonymous Letter" to Cormell Price, 30 January 1906
(Library of Congress). 202
6. Medallion portrait of Elsie Kipling by Henry Pegram,
September 1907 (Bateman's, the National Trust). 255
7. "The Song of Songs which is Solomon's", drawing and text
~~~ ~
8. Sketch in letter to Lord Milner, 27 January 1908 (Bodleian
Library). 302
9. Watercolour design for stained-glass window: "Patience and
Chastity Alluring Saint Jameson to Golf", April 1908
(Dalhousie University). 319
Preface and
Acknowledgements
To the list of abbreviations and short tities in the first volume of this
edition the following items are added:
Dunham Papers Papers of Josephine Balestier Dunham in the
care of Wolcott B. Dunharn, Jr, New York
City.
Motor Tours Accounts by RK of his motor tours in
England and abroad, March 1911-August
1926: typescript, Kipling Papers, University
of Sussex.
Rees extracts A typescript containing summaries of and
extracts from Caroline Kipling's diaries,
1892-1936, made by Mr Douglas Rees for
Lord Birkenhead when the latter was
engaged on the biography of Kipling autho
rised by Kipling's daughter, Mrs Bambridge.
The Rees extracts to a large extent duplicate
the extracts later made by Charles
Carrington from the same diaries that I refer
to in the notes as "CK diary". But the two
sets of extracts are by no means identical,
and each is a valuable supplement to the
other. A copy of the Rees extracts in the
pos session of Mrs Rees was made available
to me through the good offices of Sir
Anthony Kenny and the generosity of Mrs
Rees. Another copy has now been placed in
the Kipling Papers at the University of
Sussex.
Bateman's Visitors Book Blank book containing arecord of visitors to
Bateman's, 1902-36. All of the entries are in
RK's hand, except for the three by CK in
1936.
ix
x Preface and Acknowledgements
I should like to acknowledge here the assistance I have been given
towards the annotation of this volume by Mrs Sally R. Hofmann, of
London, whose knowledge of the archival resources of London has been
invaluable to me. I also wish to record the loss to this edition of one of its
best friends in the death of Miss Matilda Tyler, of New Haven,
Connecticut. The most energetic and indefatigable of Kipling enthusiasts,
Tilly never failed to respond to an editor's many questions and requests
with keen interest and ready willingness to help. The great Kipling col
lection that she formed is now her memorial as the Tyler Collection in
the Beinecke Library of Yale University.
In the first volume of this edition I described, as an editor is bound to
do, something of the losses that must be deducted from the sum of
Kipling's extant letters - almost all his letters to his parents, for example.
Many reviewers fixed on this fact and, understandably, regretted how
much, on account of such los ses, we shall never know about Kipling. I
should like to emphasise here how much, none the less, we still have. As
Johnson said on a very different occasion, "in this work, when it shall be
found that much is omitted, let it not be forgotten that much likewise is
performed" - not, I hasten to add, by the editor, but by the writer of the
letters.