Practised bed making & more bandaging. I tried also to reduce housekeeping expenses. Butter for instance is to be curtailed. No bread & butter for early morning tea.
Must think out more schemes. Eggs to be used very carefully. Cakes to be plain dough cakes.
In afternoon Mary & I went in Tavistock to see the Red Cross sec’t*1 & give in our names. We have to pledge ourselves for a year and to be ready to come at any moment. Attend 3 drills a week.
That evening at dinner came a telegram from the woman at the head of the red cross detachment to Father. Which began “Boggis wires” went on to ask all trustees to meet that evening at 7. The hour then being 8.15. Father very annoyed. He knew what they wanted, namely that Kelly College*3 should be turned into a Hospital.
There was a fine scene at the table & much mirth.
[Inclusion*2:
The ballad of Boggis.
Arms and the Man I sing, but who is he?
Merely “this wasted master V.A.D.*4”
Raising a whirlwind in our cups of tea?
No! Boggis wires
Most reverent Kelly, Morshead, Matthews, Plum.
Shall they be summoned by the beat of drum
And like a herd of inky schoolboys come
When Boggis wires?
No! Let her wait, say all the grave trustees
Yet see them buzzing like a hive of bees
somehow this stirring message fails to please,
Though Boggis wires.
You must surrender your prized school of Kelly
For territorial’s wounded in the melee
And we will nurse them, bandage, willy nelly
So Boggis wires
Next day, behold in Tavistock they meet
Some drive some motor, some there on feet
And each to each independently repeat
These Boggis wires.
Great Victor Plum, for whom all urchins fly
stoops to appeal for help, they hear his cry,
and with one voice, united make reply
[not the Excelsior as some people might suppose, but]
“The answer is in the negative”
(Here Boggis expires)
Stella Domville]
*1 (sic) Secretary
*2 This poem was written separately and included in the Journal at this point. It was most probably written later!
*3 Kelly College was founded by Admiral Benedictus Marwood Kelly in the Victorian age. Father was still, as a descendant relative, serving as a trustee and possibly governor. Kelly College continues to offer an excellent education.
*4 V.A.D. = Voluntary Aid Detachment (Nursing corps)