Papers written by Hodgkin, Ernest P. (Doctor, b.1908 - d.1998) - Part 3

SONNET

To R. Sidney and J . Foss, on their engagement.

 

To some of us love come in eager youth

When each with character as yet unshaped

Can grow to other, till in very truth

Two are one being with Love's mantle draped.

And some there are to whom in pride of life

Love comes, well tested in youth's passionate fires,

 

To bind two kindred souls as man and wife;

A sweet communion that the heart desires.

And others yet, when passion's part is played.

Discover late in life a love that binds

Them with a bond undreamt in youth, arrayed

In thoughtful garb; a marriage of true minds.

May you too know this joy all else above

Whose friendship here has ripened into love.

May 1945

 

THE BUTTERFLY

I saw a painted butterfly

Upon the reeds at break of day,

And stooping heard her softly sigh,

'Oh who will come and play!'.

 

But no one answered to her call;

The summer dawn was fresh and chill,

Until the sun, a fi ery ball,

Crept up behind the hill;

 

When flapping slow a butterfly

Sailed past on jewelled wings, and they

Swirled up into the lucent sky

To dance the livelong day.

Apri 1945

[*1942*] VOX POPULI 'Kempas'

To preserve his finer feelings with some measure
of urbanity,
In other words to keep within the pale,
In a concentrated atmosphere of masculine humanity
Is the duty of the self-respecting male.
We should guard against unpardonable lapses from
propriety
Which at present may be neither here nor there
But will hardly be acceptable if uttered in
society
Or practised in the presence of the fair.

No conversation gathers weight, no statement gains
finality,
No fiction is converted into fact
By being interspersed through^^out with homosexuality
Or coupled with the reproductive act.
Unwarranted aspersions on a gentleman's paternity
Though facetious or intended as a joke
Are like similar misgivings in regards to his
maternity
Anathema to really decent folk.

You can read of the pudenda in books on gynae-

cology
Or in scientific journals of the kind
And may revel in excreta in works on physiology
Which nobody can reasonably mind
But it's wrong to seek in such as these, with gay
familiarity,
Some likeness to a character or face
For a really apt comparison connotes some simil-

arity
Which hardly can be claimed in either case.

l seek no approbation, just because you seek to
flatter me,
So if you find there sentiments a bore,
Dismiss them as two articles of masculine anatomy,
And carry on exactly as before.
But if when we get out again, oracular sanguinity,
Engendered in this atmosphere of crime
Should over turn the apple cart twixt you and your
affinity
Don't say I did'nt warn you at the time.

I don't know who Kempas was.

19

VOX POPULI 

To preserve his finer feelings with some measure of urbanity,
In other words to keep within the pale,
In a concentrated atmosphere of masculine humanity
Is the duty of the self-respecting male.
We should guard against unpardonable lapses from propriety
Which at present may be neither here nor there
But will hardly be acceptable if uttered in society
Or practised in the presence of the fair.

No conversation gathers weight, no statement gains finality,
No fiction is converted into fact
By being interspersed throughout with homosexuality
Or coupled with the reproductive act.
Unwarranted aspersions on a gentleman's paternity
Though facetious or intended as a joke
Are like similar misgivings in regards to his maternity
Anathema to really decent folk.

You can read of the pudenda in books on gynaecology
Or in scientific journals of the kind
And may revel in excreta in works on physiology
Which nobody can reasonably mind
But it's wrong to seek in such as these, with gay familiarity,
Some likeness to a character or face
For a really apt comparison connotes some similarity
Which hardly can be claimed in either case.

l seek no approbation, just because you seek to flatter me,
So if you find these sentiments a bore,
Dismiss them as two articles of masculine anatomy,
And carry on exactly as before.
But if when we get out again, oracular sanguinity,
Engendered in this atmosphere of crime
Should overturn the apple cart twixt you and your affinity
Don't say I didn't warn you at the time.

 

'Kempas'

THE - Dunioussal

The Dunioussal is a fearsome beast,

A curiosity that's rarely found out east,

It's breeding place or so I have been told,

Is in the Highlands where, if you are bold,

You may discover it in its native haunts,

 

Pages 1 to 26

1

CHANGI 26th. April, 1942

 

My darling,

I decided that I would not do as so many are doing and keep a diary
because I am not particualarly anxious to remember the happenings of the
past few weeks; on the other hand I know that you will want to know all 
about it. So before all the events surrounding the fall of Singapore
quite go from my memory I will try and record them and the happenings
of the subsequent weeks as they affected me. I do not suppose that the
political events interest you particularly, and in any case they are
probably best omitted from which may at some time have to be censored.

You may possibly have heard something of my doings after you left,
from Elsie or Mrs. Shelley, so very little I expect. They went at the
end of January and until then continued to live with the Shelleys at
College Rad. At this distance of time there is nothing that stands
out particularly during those weeks, I worked hard, chiefly at a new
edition of my Keys for identifying Anophelines, went out in the field
a certain amount with John's crowd but apart from that hung about the
college and house mostly - there was nothing to take me away. As it
seemed   he xxx   time things got rather hot there  , there was a good
deal of   mbling on either side and one or two came most uncomfortably
close, but no one in the house was ever hurt. Nevertheless I was very
thankful you got away when you did as the kids would have been very
frightened on one or two occasions. Things became gradually more and
more difficult, the bread failed for a few days, green vegetables
became quite unobtainable and I know Mrs. Shelley had a pretty difficult
time doing the shopping. But although of course we continued to camp
out we never really wanted for anything important. Faris continued to

denude the house, and a bomb at the foot of the bank in from of the 
house finally removed all the black out; if the bank had not been there the
bombt would have done much more serious damage. I heard subsequently that
a bomb or shell finally disposed of all Faris ' carefully packed barang,
but I can't vouch. for that myself. We made a very efficient shelter lined
inside the front door with sand bags and the dining room table, we
filled the sand bags from one of the bunkers on the golf course and I
carried them up the hill - hard labour!
I found the Shelleys good company, though needless to say I would have
liked to have spanked the children quite often. Ginger and Spike both
turned up to say good bye to you soon after you had gone,and if I remem- 

ber rightly I saw George Tice once or twice. I suppose that he got
away and you may have heard from him. I went into the town little,
there was little to take me there except my frantic efforts to get as
much money off to you as I could before the crash, the town was not an
attractive place during the morning hate, everyone went to earth during
alerts whether or no there were planes about so that it was difficult
to get anything done. I spent one raid in company with Dr. Morris in
the basement of Whiteaways and then foolishly returned via the Docks
only to be caught by another alert, although fortunately uneventful. I
went to get enlargements of the phot^^os of the kids that we sent home
for Christmas, only to find that the shop had disappeared the previous
day; so all I have are the ones we sent the previous Christmas. Why on
earth I did not give you the camera to take away with you I do not know,
but then if I had known when you went that Singapore would fall there
are lots of other things that I would have given you to take; it is no
use crying over spilt milk.

 

2.

When Elsie, Joan and the Shelleys left at the end of January I
went to live with Jack, the two Johns and Routley (also in John's shop)
at Nassim Road. John S. did not stay long but returned to the College
so as to be near the men. We got on quite well together, violent
arguments - mostly political - droven me out of the house many evenings,
but generally I found work to do and sometimes went to call on James
and Brunty at the end of the Road. It was a delightful place to live
in until it became uncomfortably near the frontt line and we had to
move out - back to the College. The shelter that Elsie had pinned her
faith on was a miserable affair, if there had been a bomb within 100
yards all the sand bags would have fallen in on her; one of the first
things I did was to rebuild it.  We also dug a slit trench in the g
garden, but fortunately never had any real need to use either. We slept
downstairs, all four of us in one room; I thought I was scared of bombs
but I could not compete with Routley who went scuttering for shelter at
the least thing, Jack on the other hand I was convinced would move too
late if anything did come our way! Incidentally I doubt if Elsie/and
Joan would ever have got away if he had not been pushed by all his
friends. He used to get me very wild because I could not get him up
early in the morning, if he had his own way    was never ready to leave
until about the time of the first alert, in which we were inevitably
caught either at the house or on our way to the College. However, by
dint of much bullying I eventually got him away by 7.45 which was rather
an achievement!

During the week ^^{or more} we were at Nassim road, work at the college was
necessarily rather disturbed. I think the planes must have used the
College as a landmark for letting off their bombs for the docks, anyway

1

they always seemed to come directly overhead and you could never be
quite certain that they would not let the eggs go too soon one time.
I am afraid I got a bit jittery about that time and I found it difficult
to settle down to accurate scientific drawings, in between running up
and down stairs to take shelter in the passage or library. At that
time the College was already sheltering a considerable number of people
who either could not or would not live in their own homes and the passage
was/fixed up with bunks - complete with bugs. Consecutive work was
generally possible during the afternoon^, and the/evenings were almost
always peaceful. About the middle of that week it must have been that
the oil tanks at the Naval Base were fired, Singapore was already very
smoky, but after that an indescribable air of gloom hung over the whole
town / blotting out the sun and making everything xxxxx filthy, it was
almost like   eng in Manchester if it had not been for the contrast of
the green grass and trees. The gloom became worse as the smoke from
burning buildings was added to that from the burning oil/tanks, but that
was during the last week. We knew well enough the night when the Japs
landed on the island, the barrage was terrific, though it let up towards
the early morning, the next night was much the same and after ^^{the sound of that} bombing
and shell fire seemed to be almost continuous. Looking back it is
extraordinary to think how normally we carried on in the midst of it all
but I cannot say that I should care to go through it all again, although
we were never in any real danger, or at any rate not then.

It must have been about the 10th. February that we left Nassim
road; for the last few nights there had been occasional shots nearby and
no one seemed to know just where the Japs were. For myself I did not
care to run the risk of waking up one morning to find that I was in the
2

3.
front line. The fighting was like that, there does not seem to have
been a definite line, or if there was one on our side there were certain-

ly Japs behind it often enough. Jack and John Reid stayed on a night
longer than Routley and myself, but they spent an uncomfortable night
and when they went back later in the day it was to find a platoon
stalking a sniper in the trees at the end of the road. The servants at
Nassim Road had been very pleasant and the cook had fed us amazingly
well in spite of the difficulties. By contrast the picknicing at the
College was rather a comedown. The lady who had been doing the catering
for canteen pushed off, ( she had done itvery well,) quite without
warning and thi^ⁿgs would have been very difficult if the stewards from
the Empress of Asia had not been billited on the College. As it was
they cooked as best they could on charcoal stoves in the College and
for the rest opened tins so that we fared very well under the difficult
circumstances, thanks to the foresight of Dr, Allen who had laid up
large stores of food there. The building was very crowded, the subor-

dinate staff with many of their families camped out in the central
passage, the European staff and many hangers on such as myself occupied
the rooms on the ground floor aor camped out in the passages and labs,
while the Empress staff ^^{live in} several of the larger rooms on the upper floors.
Richard Green abrogated unto himself two rooms on the y top floor and
established himself with a complete suite of furniture brought there
at the expense of more important barang, and made himself thoroughly
comfortable and most unpopular.

I don't think that I can have stayed many nights in the College
because I soon discovered that the Hospital was in desperate need of
assistance. I concluded that with the Japs on thte island it was not
much use my continuting placidly to prepare for the projected advance