A Reminiscence of John Masefield

CORLISS LAMONT

■ Y SPECIAL interest in the letters and manuscripts of
John Masefield is the natural sequel to events and rela¬
tionships extending back to my boyhood more than
fifty years ago.

In 1916 Masefield came to the United States to lecture and to
arouse sympathy for England's great effort in \\'orld War I. At
that time my parents, the late Thomas W. and Florence C. La-
mont, who were already supporting the cause of the Allies, became
acquainted with the poet. That acquaintance soon flowered into
close friendship with both Masefield and his wife Constance—
a friendship that lasted as long as my father and mother lived.

My parents introduced me to the Masefields when I went for
a year's study at New College, Oxford, after my graduation from
Harvard College in 1924. I would often bicycle the two or three
miles to their house on Boar's Hill for tea or supper, and then
coast back to Oxford down the long incline. Masefield was always
most kind and gracious towards me. He would frequently read
some of his poems aloud after supper, commenting on them as he
went along. I never knew a man with such a beautiful and melodi¬
ous voice.

When I got back to my lodgings at Oxford (I had a room in
Julian Huxley's house), I would look up the poems in my Mase¬
field volumes and write his comments, insofar as I could remem¬
ber them, in the margins. To me, Masefield was the finest English
poet of the twentieth century.

My own friendship with the Poet Laureate grew over the years
and we corresponded frequently. He moved to another house,
near Oxford at Abingdon, that looked out on the narrow upper
reaches of the Thames River. On visits to England every few
years, I made a point of going to call on Masefield. He was a con-

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