THE LETTERS OF RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS

32 Aubrey Walk,
London W.8

Christmas Day 1946, 6 P.M.

My dear old Ralph

Sitting by by myself in front of the fire, my Christmas Party, Marriott, Pierre, Andrew¹, Pa & Ma Lefevre having gone, my thoughts turned vividly to you & to Adeline & I write to send you my most affectionate wishes for Christmas.
My mind wandered to all the gay & grave things with which we two have been so mysteriously joined together from quarrelling – that was my fault – over the seating of the Bach Choir to walking with D² & Fanny³ over the Berkshire & Wiltshire Downs. The memory of it all is now golden and the clouds have disappeared & you stand in the centre of it all, a great figure whom I love & who has given me – for no at all obvious reason – his affection & companionship.
My blessing be on you both.
My “radio-gram” has been recently restored to life – though it is dying of old age & won’t last much longer – & I have got some “late” Beethoven quartets (op 131 & 132); I feared that I shd: not like them but they seem to me to be about the most beautiful things I have ever heard; the more I listen to them the more does their beauty reveal itself to my uncultured mind.
Yours always

Bobby

P.S. Miss Cullen⁴ most generously wrote the other day asking me to be Steward at the Fest: again; but I could not do that, but I hope to come down one day to take a minute & silent part in the fully restored Festival

1.  ?Ambrose
2.  Dorothy, Longman’s wife who had died in June 1940 (see VWL1423).
3.  The Hon. (later Dame) Frances Farrer, daughter of the co-founder of the LHMC, and Hon. Secretary 1923-39.
4.  Margery Cullen, Secretary of the LHMC 1939-64.