Page:Tex; a chapter in the life of Alexander Teixeira de Mattos (IA texchapterinlife00mcke).pdf/141



whole book is a gem, if I may say so myself." So I've had one appreciative reader at any rate!

On 27. 8. 20 he adds:

Tell Norman [Major Holden, then liberal candidate for the Isle of Wight] that, should there be an election in "the island" before I leave Ventnor, he'll find me both able and ready to impersonate the oldest inhabitant and gallop to the polling-station, in my bath-chair, and vote for him

And, finally, in praise of toleration:

31 August 1920 (being the birthday of Her Majesty the Queen of the Netherlands).

''It won't do to insist on this racial aspect of things. I was never of those who called L. G. a damned little Welsh solicitor. He would have been just the same had be been Scotch or English or Irish. After all, our friend R. is little and Welsh and was a solicitor and will as likely as not be damned if he doesn't join his wife's church. And there is the converse case, when you hear men describing an outrage committed by Englishmen as "unenglish." How can the things be unenglish which the English do?''