2110-3-6-30

[ST: From the Warden of] ALL SOULS COLLEGE, OXFORD

July 3. 1919

My dear Buchan,

I have let far too much time pass without writing to thank you for sending me the little privately printed book of sketches of a galaxy of brilliant friends. None of them were known personally to me, except Bron Lucas [ST: Lord Lucas] & Raymond Asquith: & even those but slightly, albeit one was a neighbour in the New Forest, & the other of the same College. Of Lucas, beyond the little I knew of him by meeting him now & again, I had heard little account, but Raymond Asquith was so much 'vivus per ora

virum' that one had just a vivid idea of the manner of man he was. Your picture of him exactly bears out the notion I had formed of him from hearing many mens' talk of him.

It so happened that his nine years in All Souls fell during the time when I was out of the College, and of my visits here, only one coincided with his being here: then I had some half hour's talk with him.

Even of those friends of yours, who were first unknown to me, I feel you have drawn a real living presentiment: and I had great pleasure in reading your book.

I shall put it in the College Coffee Room, where I know it will be welcome; for many of our members will have known those of whom it tells.

I am sorry I was not at "The Club" on Tuesday. I had an American stranger within my gates.

Yrs sincerely

Francis Pember