... I suggested that he write for Oldham's Press, which I was advising, a biography of Mountjoy: Elizabethan General. This was a congenial subject, w… - A. L. Rowse

I consoled myself with a rare bout of gossip with the piano-tuner, rather a dear little man, with up-turned, waved mustaches, bright bird-like eyes, a slightly lisping manner of speech, which recalled his great days in London and rubbing shoulders with celebrities. He had been piano-tuner to some well-known pianist — I think — of a previous generation. From him I heard the gossip of county society, and life at , our cathedral city.

The most elaborate of these were those of Christmas 1594, of which we have a detailed, somewhat tedious account — for what amused the Elizabethans does not much amuse us (Shakespeare and Ben Jonson excepted).

The fact of our being an island has been a great advantage all through our later history. It has given us the benefit of a time-lag, imposed a bulwark between us and the too violent impact of forces from outside. We were given time to work out our own solutions, to absorb the shock of new ideas and movements, to bide our own time and interpose with effect in Europe when the moment was ripe. Since the last war people have got into the habit of underestimating the importance of our insularity; they have been apt to say that the development of air power has annihilated it. Air power has, of course, made an immense difference; but it has not annihilated it. It was our insularity that saved us in 1940.