Devonshire House is as busy this afternoon, but it is no longer gay. In the yard is a long wooden shed, with a corrugated iron roof; there are two doors on opposite sides, like barn doors, and black against the light of the farther door I can see men sitting at a table, and boy scouts running upon errands. The yard is filled with motors again, and there is a buzz of coming and going. Yesterday a man brought a sort of double-decked portable stretcher, with a place above and below, and a group stood round it and talked about it for a long time. For this is the headquarters of the Red Cross Society. So, in one short month, has life changed, here in London. A month ago I toiled up the narrow stairs of a little outhouse behind the Poetry Bookshop, and in an atmosphere of overwhelming sentimentality, listened to Mr. Rupert Brooke whispering his poems. To himself, it seemed, as nobody else could hear him. It was all artificial and precious. One longed to shout, to chuck up one's hat in the street when one got outside; anything, to show that one was not quite a mummy, yet. Now, I could weep for those poor, silly people. After all they were happy; the world they lived in was secure. Today this horrible thing has fallen upon them, and not for fifty years, say those who know, can Europe recover herself and continue her development. Was the world too "precious", did it need these violent realities to keep its vitality alive? History may have something to say about that; we who are here can only see the pity and waste of it. So little expectation of war was there, so academic the "conversations" between the powers seemed, that on the Friday, preceding the declaration of war, we went down to Dorchester and Bath for a week-end outing. It was rather a shock to find the market-place at Salisbury filled with cannon, and the town echoing with soldiers. The waiter at the inn, however, assured us that it was only manoeuvres. But the next day our chauffeur, who had been fraternizing with the soldiers, told us that it was not manoeuvres; they had started for manoeuvres, but had been turned round, and were now on their way back to their barracks.