My Life

My Life - Oswald Mosleyentry to the House of Lords on the death of his father. Lady Astor was the candidateand Cimmie was very fond of her; Cliveden, their house by the Thames, at that timeplayed a considerable part in all our lives.The by-election was as lively as all other events connected with Nancy Astor. I spentsome time at Plymouth as a speaker, while Cimmie canvassed, and I vividlyremember riding the storm caused by my attacks on the Labour leaders' war record atthe large eve-of-poll meeting. It was here I met for the first time the Liberal M.P. forthe neighbouring division, Isaac Foot, father of several distinguished sons, and formeda personal friendship which lasted through my parliamentary life. A great authority onCromwell, he was a Radical who appreciated the character of action.Cimmie and I continued to see much of each other for the rest of 1919, and in theearly spring of 1920 we became engaged. She was the daughter of an enigmatic figureto the younger generation, Lord Curzon of Kedleston, who was then ForeignSecretary and had previously been a distinguished Viceroy of India. The stories of hisdignity and pomp, of his archaic and affected manners were legion, and alwaysinclude his old-world habit of giving words like grass a short 'a', as in bat. Forinstance, on his entry to the Secretary of State's room at the Foreign Office, when,pointing at the inkpot, he commanded: 'Remove that object of glass and brass, andbring me alabaster'. I had never met him, but soon discovered that his real characterwas very different from his public image, as it would be called in these days. Cimmie,his second daughter, was on the best of terms with her father, though resistant to theexaggerated magnificence in which she had been brought up. His hobby wasacquiring old castles for national preservation and doing them up in the grand style ofhis most discriminating taste. He was a snob—the theme of many of the stories—andshe was not. He quietly observed to me one day: 'If you are the Leader of the Houseof Lords, it is your metier to be a snob'.No doubt he apprehended that Cimmie's independent character might lead her to somemarriage less desirable than the alliance with the eldest son of a prominent peer whichhe might have selected for her. She was a little uncertain of her reception when sheentered his room in Carlton House Terrace to announce her engagement, and herentertaining account of his demeanour on this possibly trying occasion was long acause of merriment to her friends. When she said, 'I'm engaged,' he rose and embracedher warmly; always affectionate and always correct. Then she thought she detectedjust the whisper of a sigh as his eye roved along the imposing array of finely boundbooks on his library shelf until it reached the humble reference books: for a moment itpaused on Debrett, but moved on without hope to Who's Who. Then he spoke, in hiscurious, archaic accent with clipped, short 'a': 'Pass me that red book, and tell me hisname'. Laughing, she passed over Who's Who and brought him instead Debrett: I wasone of the lesser denizens, but still just inside the magic circle.I liked him at once, from the first meeting. Lord Curzon was certainly a distinguishedand imposing figure; his appearance was almost a parody of what a Leader of theHouse of Lords should be, but his dignity carried it without absurdity. God's butler,the young used to say, and it was a joke to which he referred with quiet appreciation;he was aware of most of the tales and quips at his expense. He collected them ratheras Henry Ford gathered jokes about Ford cars, and would often analyse their degree ofverity. Such stories as his alleged observation when he saw men just out of the95 of 424