INTRODUCTORY


It is now many years since I began these memoirs. I wrote fully a third of
them, and then put them aside, having found increasing difficulties as I
went on with my task. These arose out of the constant need to use the first
person in a narrative of adventure and incidents which chiefly concern the
writer, even though it involve also the fortunes of many in all ranks of
life. Having no gift in the way of composition, I knew not how to supply or
set forth what was outside of my own knowledge, nor how to pretend to that
marvellous insight, as to motives and thoughts, which they affect who write
books of fiction. This has always seemed to me absurd, and so artificial
that, with my fashion of mind, I have never been able to enjoy such works
nor agreeably to accept their claim to such privilege of insight. In a
memoir meant for my descendants, it was fitting and desirable that I should
at times speak of my own appearance, and, if possible, of how I seemed as
child or man to others. This, I found, I did not incline to do, even when I
myself knew what had been thought of me by friend or foe. And so, as I
said, I set the task aside, with no desire to take it up again.

Some years later my friend, John Warder, died, leaving to my son, his
namesake, an ample estate, and to me all his books, papers, plate, and
wines. Locked in a desk, I found a diary, begun when a lad, and kept, with
more or less care, during several years of the great war. It contained also
recollections of our youthful days, and was very full here and there of
thoughts, comments, and descriptions concerning events of the time, and of