Pitfalls of Memory. Peter Milward

ideal. Only I was mistaken as to the amount of pepper I should (or should not) have added to the mixture, and so I was the only one to partake of my portion, while pretending how delicious it was, if somewhat spicy. But the others, after a brief taste, refused to follow my example.

      That wasn’t our only hut. But just outside the woods we had a number of bee-hives, with a number of philosophers to look after them. They, too, needed a hut, and there was a Swiss member of our community who had the requisite talent for building. To this hut I switched my allegiance as cook, but first my hands were needed for helping with the building. It was my task to paint the ceiling with white paint, and there I was, standing on a perch of boxes, when my perch gave way under me, and I fell to the ground with the white paint spilt over my head. I must have looked like a Christmas pudding, and the witnesses couldn’t help laughing at me! Nor could I help laughing at myself. But I had to get the paint out of my hair, and for this purpose I had to retreat to the house and make my way to one of our baths and wash my hair in turpentine. So for some days I went about smelling of turpentine.

      All this time I find I have forgotten to mention our superiors. In the noviceship it was the Master of Novices. In the juniorate it was the Prefect of Juniors. In the philosophate it was the Dean of Philosophers. After all, this was England, and we like to have a different name for superiors of different stages of formation – just as even in Oxford we have different names for the heads of different colleges, such as the Master of Balliol, the President of Trinity, the Warden of New, the Dean of Christ Church, the Provost of Worcester, and the Principal of St Hilda’s. But above them all there was the Rector of St Beuno’s College, the Rector of Manresa House, and the Rector of Heythrop College. And on our arrival at the latter place we found, to our dismay, that our new Rector was none other than our old Master. What was more, he was just as unpopular with the community there, as he had been with the novices then. Wherever he went, it seemed he projected a feeling of tension into the prevailing atmosphere. Fortunately for us, however, he only lasted another year, before being promoted to Superior of the Mission in Southern Rhodesia, and he was replaced by a more genial man, formerly Rector of Stonyhurst. Rather than remaining aloof in his room on the second floor of the mansion (or what in England we call “the first floor”), and issuing his commands and prohibitions from there, our new Rector was fond of strolling round the corridors and asking whomever he might meet their opinions on how the house was being run, on the food and the cooking, on daily life and the various practical problems that arose in daily life. It thus took him less than a week to bring about a feeling of relief and relaxation.

      Once a year our Father Provincial would come round for his Visitation, and then he would receive each of us one by one for our annual Manifestation of conscience. At that time he was a famous Jesuit philosopher, formerly Master of Campion Hall, Oxford, and brother to our former Prefect of Juniors, Fr Martin D’Arcy. From my boyhood (as I have said) I had been interested in the so-called Foreign Missions, but the missions entrusted to the English Province were then in Southern Rhodesia and British Guiana (now Zimbabwe and Guyana), and in them I was less interested. But when I heard of an appeal from the then General, Fr Janssens, for volunteers to Japan, I mentioned this desire of mine to Fr D’Arcy. But he seemed to be less interested. He was more interested in my taking a degree in Classics at Campion Hall. So, after giving the matter a little thought, he said I should pray about it. And so I did, and so I waited for the next Provincial, who turned out to be no other than our good Rector of Heythrop. Then he wrote me a covering letter for my application to the General. And then I was accepted for Japan, after I had already begun my study of the Classics at Oxford. (Or rather, I didn’t then begin that study, as I had been studying them all along from my time of Donhead onwards and upwards, with my degree at Oxford as the climax.)