What interests me most on looking back now at those ten years is
the loyalty, devotion and fidelity which we showed to one another
and the pleasure which we derived from friendships that could not
have survived a week had they been accompanied by gossip, mocking,
or any personal pettiness. Most of us had a depth of feeling and
moral and religious ambition which are entirely lacking in the
clever young men and women of to-day. Our after-dinner games were
healthier and more inspiring than theirs. "Breaking the news," for
instance, was an entertainment that had a certain vogue among the
younger generation before the war. It consisted of two people
acting together and conveying to their audience various ways in
which they would receive the news of the sudden death of a friend
or a relation and was considered extraordinarily funny; it would
never have amused any of the Souls. The modern habit of pursuing,
detecting and exposing what was ridiculous in simple people and
the unkind and irreverent manner in which slips were made material
for epigram were unbearable to me. This school of thought--which
the young group called "anticant"--encouraged hard sayings and
light doings, which would have profoundly shocked the most
frivolous among us. Brilliance of a certain kind may bring people
together for amusement, but it will not keep them together for
long; and the young, hard pre-war group that I am thinking of was
short-lived.
The present Lord Curzon [Footnote: Earl Curzon of Kedleston.
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