BR TO CONSTANCE MALLESON,1 JAN. 1921
BRACERS 19722. ALS. McMaster
Edited by S. Turcon. Reviewed by K. Blackwell

Peking1
New Year’s Day 1921.

My Darling Love

Thank you 1000 times for the lovely soap and shaving sticks which came the other day — it was dear of you to send them — You must try to imagine that you have the Chinese coat I wrote about — in spirit it is a Xmas present, but I don’t think it can be safely be sent, so it will probably have to wait till I get home. I haven’t had a letter from you for some time. The soap is infinitely delicious.

The wind is howling outside and it is bitterly cold after a fall of snow, but by dint of stoves we keep warm indoors — it is too cold to go out. Last night for New Year’s Eve they put Chinese lanterns along all the main streets — it was lovely, with the snow falling.

A Japanese Socialist2 to whom I sent an article3 writes that when it was published “the blood of the young Japanese was boiled with enthusiasm to read it. All the conversations everywhere among gentleman classes, students and laborers centered upon your article, so great was the attraction of your thoughts to them. The admiration for you of the millions of our young men here is something extraordinary”.4 This is not mere compliments, because he pays much higher rates for my articles (he is a Socialist editor) than anybody in Europe or America.

Goodbye my Beloved. I hope I shall get a letter from you soon — I wonder where you are.5 I wish I could be in 2 places at once — Lynton6 is so much in my thoughts these days — Bless you my Heart’s Comrade.7

B

• 1

  [document] Document 200723.

• 2

  Japanese Socialist Sanehiko Yamamoto, president of the Kaizō Co. (Kaizōsha) which published the monthly magazine The Kaizō (or La Rekonstruo). It had been founded in 1919 and contained articles on a variety of topics: politics, economics, philosophy, literature, science and social affairs. Several letters from Yamamoto are in RA1 410. One of his letters (BRACERS 19717) ended up in Colette’s possession.

• 3

  sent an article The English manuscript of “On Patriotism” has never been found. It was published as “Aikokushin no Koka” in The Kaizō in January (B&R C21.01). It is described in “Lost Papers”, Papers 15: 463, where the first paragraph is printed from the first page, which appears as an illustration.

• 4

  “the blood … extraordinary” This quotation is taken from Yamamoto’s letter of 25 December 1920 to BR (BRACERS 84293). BR quoted it correctly but did not place ellipses before the last sentence to indicate that he was omitting several sentences which appear in the original.

• 5

  where you are She was travelling around England with a theatre company.

• 6

  Lynton Lynton, Devon. BR and Colette spent Christmas at the Cottage Hotel there in 1918 and 1919 with Clifford Allen.

• 7

  Heart’s Comrade For information on the use of the term, see BRACERS 19145, n.12.