om her except postcards. I was, however, mistaken, for she wrote me
a kind of "Oxford day by day," which I, struggling with a strange
language in a strange land, was very glad to have. I don't know
whether The Bradder taught her to refer to the Vice-Chancellor as the
"Vice-Chuggins," but in her description of the Encaenia that most
important gentleman was certainly not mentioned with the respect which
I consider that people, who don't belong to Oxford, ought to feel for
him. In fact Nina succeeded in catching the Oxford language so badly
that she told me that my father had been having "indijuggers," and I am
sure that he would have had a worse attack if he had known what Nina
called it. I am sorry to say that she treated the Encaenia in a very
light and airy way, though some most mightily distinguished men were
receiving honorary degrees at the function.

"I like the Sheldonian because it is so round," she wrote to me, "but I
was not impressed by the Encaenia. The area of the theatre was reserved
for the dons, who wore what I believe you call academic dress, but they
did not look as if they had room enough to be comfortable. I sat in a
gallery with a lot of people, and there was a man, who somebody told me
was a Pro-proctor--at any rate he wore robes and looked, I thought,
rather nice--to keep order. You do mix up things queerly at Oxford;
some of the jokes which were made were really not very funny, and
mother was afraid that some one might be offended. She was quite
nervous. I liked the Public Orator, who seemed to me to be introducing
the people who were to receive honorary degrees to the Vice-Chuggins,
and I was sorry for the University prizemen, who wore evening dress and
had to read out their prize poems and things. I couldn't hear a word
the Public Orator said, but perhaps that was because I had a man near
me who made jokes all the time and a bevy of relatives kept up a chorus
of giggles. Mr. Bradfield had to go to luncheon afterwards at All
Souls. I met Mr. Ward in the Turl yesterday; he was only up for two or
three hours, and I thought he said he was going to coach. I am sure he
said something about coaching, and as I remembered how fond he was of
horses I thought he was going for a driving tour. But it turned out
that he was going to read with somebody; very silly of me. Do you
remember when he jumped into the 'Cher'? It seems ages ago. Mr.
Bradfield punts splendidly, we all like him very much,