PEOPLE AND THINGS
By HAROLD NICOLSON
e, 11HE English winter," wrote Lord Byron, " ends in July in order to begin again in August." The truth of this apophthegm was abundantly proved during the course of last Sunday. The gale from the south-west had about it that peculiar and snow-laden bite which one asso- ciates with a February north-easter. The rain alternated between a Scotch mist and an Icelandic downpour. The yachts of the rich shuddered at their moorings in South- ampton Water. It was the boats of the poor that ventured out into the turmoil of the Solent.
Having endured five hours of howling wind and rain, I put in to the comparative calm of Lymington. I shed my oilskins for a mackintosh. I went (accompanied by Dr. Malcolm Burr's truly admirable book on insects), to the local pub; and there, to my joy, I met a fellow politician. He was in some distress. Being interested in the defence of his country he had arranged to visit a signalling section of the territorial army which (unwisely perhaps) had selected Lymington for a Saturday to Monday camp; he had been unable, however, such had been the force of wind and tide, to get beyond Calshot spit and had returned to the 1I amble River; from there he had taken a car to Lymington in order to rescue that signal section. We found it. It was as drenched as the sheets of last week's newspaper floating sodden down the Thames. Night was already approaching. He agreed to take seven of them back to the Hamble River. I agreed that two of them should sleep upon my yawl. They would at least be dry. In the comparative warmth of the cabin we discussed the Danzig situation.
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