My Life

My Life - Oswald Mosleycut and determined features, who came from another Staffordshire family. Herprinciples were rigid, and she never risked their impairment. Someone gave her abook by R. H. Benson, which she put aside with the rebuke that he was a RomanCatholic: 'I am not going to have them converting me'. Nevertheless, within hernarrow limits she was a fine woman, always occupied with deeds of Christiankindness from which wide and diverse circles benefited.Rolleston visits provided even greater contrasts with our way of life at home. It wasan abrupt transition in childhood from a wayside house with a few rooms, a patch ofgarden, and one maidservant fresh caught from the village green, to the massiveedifice of Victorian comfort - which replaced the burnt Tudor house - set amid itspark, lakes and gardens. About thirty gardeners outside and eleven menservants insidemaintained this establishment, with a small army of housemaids and of cooks,supplemented by two still-room maids exclusively engaged in the making of cakes,which must considerably have contributed to the vast girth of senior members of thefamily. My great-grandfather, well named Sir Tonman Mosley, was always reputed tohave jumped off the scales when they passed twenty stone; jumped, for he was stillactive, and lived to be seventy-seven in defiance of modern dietary theory. His way ofliving - he had a large area cut out of the table to accommodate his stomach while hereached for the surrounding supplies - deprived him of only nine years of life incomparison with the spare frame of his learned father, the Whig M.P. for NorthStaffordshire, who died at eighty-six.My grandfather was a man of more moderate dimensions, and the meals were notquite so gargantuan. He died at sixty-seven after a rather heavy dinner, topped up withhis favourite combination of port wine and walnuts; but his strong constitution hadbeen undermined by diabetes in a period before the discovery of insulin. His twobrothers lived in the usual family fashion in full possession of their faculties until wellinto the eighties. The elder of the two was created Lord Anslow by the Liberal Party,of which he was a pillar. I had to take evasive action in avoiding his efforts to makethe peerage hereditary to me - which I do not think could in any case have succeeded -but we remained on good terms and I had a strong regard and affection for himdespite every political divergence.His younger brother, named Ernald after the founder, and nicknamed Uncle Tat, was atiny little man of girth almost equal to his height, who lived in a medieval doll's housenear Horsham. He was like a Beatrix Potter character, and I was devoted to him inearly life, listening for hours to his history or legend of the family. He left hisminiscule dwelling to my youngest brother John. This was appropriate because thehouse was in the middle of the stockbrokers' paradise, but inappropriate because Johnis six foot three, and its long garden fence facing the Brighton road could so easily bedecorated with the words 'Up Mosley' by my passing supporters; my genial relationswith my brother survived even this test.In each generation it was the eldest son - with the exception of my great-greatgrandfather- who tended to live in a rather immoderate fashion, and I became anotherexception to the rule. I have sometimes wondered why I live in such a different way,and the answer I suppose is that I have a powerful desire to keep myself fit in order toserve certain purposes in life; also in our time we have learned more of the art ofliving, what to eat and what not to eat to keep the physical form we desire. It is10 of 424