Page:Tex; a chapter in the life of Alexander Teixeira de Mattos (IA texchapterinlife00mcke).pdf/21

 seclusion; of his first public services and his last private friendships.

By 1914 Teixeira stood in the forefront of English translators; and, through his labours, translation had won a place in the forefront of English literature. Almost simultaneously with the outbreak of war, he was attacked by the heart-afifection that ultimately killed him; and the record of this period is the record of an invalid. Ill-health notwithstanding, he offered his energy and ability to the country of his adoption; and, in an emergency war-department largely staffed by men of letters, the most retiring of them all became enmeshed in the machinery of government. From his marriage until the war, Teixeira had lived an almost monastic life, only relaxing his rule of solitary work in favour of the bridge-table. Once set in the midst of appreciative friends, this sham recluse found himself entertaining and being entertained, joining new clubs, indulging his old inscrutable sociability and almost overcoming his former shyness.

For three-and-a-half out of these last seven years, one of Teixeira's colleagues worked