THE years after the War are full of letters to a family
growing more scattered. From my father she was
rarely away. Her dependence on him was not on
account of his constant service, for she was never very
much aware of the difference between comfort and discom-
fort, and had as few needs as anyone in the world -- a char-
acteristic for which Katherine Tynan supplies a beautiful
reason when in writing of her she says: "She had grown
up in Italy, and like many more for whom the sun has been
all-sufficing, she had few yearnings after material comfort,
none at all after luxury." But she depended utterly on my
father for reassurance and equability and companionship.
"My ever darling, keep up your invaluable heart," she
wrote to him in family anxiety, pleading for her own
strength from him.

She went about very little, but the impression made on
those whom she did meet at this time was not an ordinary
one. Sylvia Lynd wrote later, when she had been reading
her poems after her death: "Reading these poems, the
conviction presses in upon me that when I met the faded,
remote, slowly-speaking woman, with her sweetness,
keenness, and unexpected humour, I met a being whom
my sceptical mind must reluctantly name a saint."

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