Lovely day. Very hot in the afternoon, the temperature rose to 18 in the shade.

Drove in morning to Brentor to take one of the servants home for a holiday. Bouchier gave me a lesson in driving the car.

Went on to Lydford station & brought back Mr Plum for lunch. The Radcliffes also came & were photographed by Mary. She is doing a lot of portraits & selling them. Proffits to go to the war fund. I went in afternoon to Lifton. Met Mrs Bradshaw at the Arundell Arms. She & I belong to a soldier & sailors help society & we wanted to discuss plans but our work will not begin until after the war, when we are able to help men find employment who have had to leave the Army.

Dorothea has been made a representative of the Soldiers & Sailors Families Association SSAFA, which provides help for the women & children of those who are fighting. All these different societies are very confusing. A great deal of fuss goes on. I had a postcard this morning from Cicely Young asking me to collect mufflers for the men of HMS Paragon Link. She says the cold in the N Sea will very soon be severe. Evidently her young man is on that ship. Here is a way the children can help, so I went up to the school, & asked them if they would knit them, whilst I provided the wool.

Lovely evening. On my way from shutting up the fowls had bright red sunset sky away over Lanson & a glorious full moon rising over Ramsdown, an effect one does not see very often. Reginald went over to Milton after dinner to attend a recruiting meeting.

The news in the paper to day is more serious. The Germans are now only 40 miles from Paris. Our army keeps on falling back. Full list of officers’ casualties this morning, none that we know. The King’s Own Yorkshire L I have suffered severely “King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry”.

The stories of the Russian army passing through England must be true. We keep hearing the same story so many times, that they came by Bristol & through the Severn Tunnel. Several thousand of them.