degree a 'dignity' worthy of someone like Mr Marshall - or come to that, my

father. Indeed, why should I deny it? For all its sad associations, whenever I

recall that evening today, I find I do so with a large sense of triumph.

 

Day Two - Afternoon

 

Mortimer's Pond, Dorset

 

IT would seem there is a whole dimension to the question 'what is a 'great'

butler?' I have hitherto not properly considered. It is, I must say, a rather

unsettling experience to realize this about a matter so close to my heart,

particularly one I have given much thought to over the years. But it strikes me

I may have been a little hasty before in dismissing certain aspects of the Hayes

Society's criteria for membership. I have no wish, let me make clear, to retract

any of my ideas on 'dignity' and its crucial link with 'greatness'. But I have

been thinking a little more about that other pronouncement made by the Hayes

Society - namely the admission that it was a prerequisite for membership of the

Society that 'the applicant be attached to a distinguished household'. My

feeling remains, no less than before, that this represents a piece of unthinking

snobbery on the part of the Society. However, it occurs to me that perhaps what

one takes objection to is, specifically, the outmoded understanding of what a

'distinguished household' is, rather than to the general principle being

expressed. Indeed, now that I think further on the matter, I believe it may well

be true to say it is a prerequisite of greatness that one 'be attached to a

distinguished household' - so long as one takes 'distinguished' here to have a