TheCompleteMemoirsOfGeorgeSherston

with high-explosive shells. As regards Aunt Evelyn
(who had a pretty poor opinion of the Kaiser), the
Morning Post had now put her in full possession of the
facts about my peace-propagating manifesto. No
doubt she was delighted to know that I was well out
of harm's way. The Under-Secretary of State had
informed the House of Commons that I was suffering
from a nervous breakdown and not responsible for
my actions, which was good enough for Aunt Evelyn,
and, as Rivers remarked, very much what I might
have expected. Very soon I was slicing ray tee-shots
into the long grass on the nearest golf course. "I don't
know what I'm doing," I exclaimed (referring to my
swing and not to my recent political activity).

For me, the War felt as if it were a long way off
while the summer of 1917 was coming to an end.
Except for keeping an eye on the casualty lists, I did
my best to turn my back on the entire business. Once,
when I saw that one of my best friends had been
killed, I lapsed into angry self-pity, and told myself
that the War was "a sham and a stinking lie", and
succeeded in feeling bitter against the unspecific
crowd of non-combatants who believed that to go
through with it to the end was the only way out. But
on the whole I was psychologically passive—content
to mark time on the golf links and do some steady
reading after dinner. The fact remained that, when
I awoke in the morning, my first conscious thought
was no longer an unreprieved awareness that the War
would go on indefinitely and that sooner or later I
should be killed or mutilated. The prospect of being
imprisoned as a war-resister had also evaporated. To

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