He paid visits to certain friends of my mother's to consult about his
position. He did this solely out of deference to her wishes, but not, I
think, with any hope that his purpose would be changed. They were, I
believe, John Reeve, Rector of Lambeth, a very old and dear friend of
our family, Bishop Wilkinson, and Lord Halifax. The latter stated his
position clearly, that the Pope was Vicar of Christ _jure ecclesiastico_
but not _jure divino_, and that it was better to remain an Anglican and
promote unity so. Hugh had also a painful correspondence with John
Wordsworth, late Bishop of Salisbury, a very old friend of my father's.
The Bishop wrote affectionately at first, but eventually became somewhat
indignant, and told Hugh plainly that a few months' work in a slum
parish would clear his mind of doubt; the correspondence ended by his
saying emphatically that he regarded conversion almost as a loss of
sanity. No doubt it was difficult for one of immense patristic and
theological learning, who was well versed in the historical aspect of
the affair as well as profoundly conscious of the reality of his own
episcopal commission, to enter the lists with a son of his old friend.
But neither sympathy nor harshness could have affected Hugh at this
time, any more than advice to return could alter the position of a man
who had taken a leap and was actually flying through the air.

Hugh then went off on a long bicycle tour by himself, dressed as a
layman. He visited the Carthusian Monastery of St Hugh, near West
Grinstead, which I afterwards visited in his company. He spent a night
or two at Chichester, where he received the Communion in the cathedral;
but he was in an unhappy frame of mind, probably made more acute by
solitude.