The foot-fall of J. L-M.(Ceaseless Turmoil: Diaries 1988-1992)(Book Review)

James Lees-Milne Ceaseless Turmoil: Diaries 1988-1992, edited by Michael Bloch. John Murray, 339 pages, 25 [pounds sterling]

In a low-keyed and immensely subtle way, James Lees-Milne was one of the most effective Englishmen of his time. In 1988, the year in which he turned eighty, he was still talked of as "the man from the National Trust." Though no longer strictly exact, this was both a convenient and prestigious appellation. He had turned England's National Trust into a nationwide talking point.

It had therefore been an exciting moment for me in 1942 when a still youthful fellow lodger of mine in a great London house announced himself to me as "Jim Lees-Milne." No. 96 Cheyne Walk had belonged to Whistler, and it was said that Oscar Wilde's son had had his wedding reception in the big room overlooking the Thames on the second floor. During World War II, when Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears were close neighbors, I asked them to give a recital in that big room for the repair of Chelsea Old Church (lately damaged by bombing). They said "Yes" in an instant, and would not hear of taking a fee. The concert drew enthusiasts not only from London but also from Paris and was a landmark in the history of the house.

Quite apart from the festivities at which it excelled, this was a glorious house to come back to in the evening and an amusing one to have breakfast in. Breakfasts were early, for this was still wartime and we all had to leave between 8:30 and 9, but a lasting camaraderie resulted. And in the end those hurried encounters were worth many a more formal meeting. After breakfast, Jim would leave the house at once, take the train to his appointment for the day, and make the last part of the trip on a rented bicycle to save the Trust's money.

The National Trust was as always aiming to look after one more of England's great private palaces. But its ambition was also to look after the smaller private houses in which England is incomparably rich. To this day there are elderly householders who think that "a word from Mr. Lees-Milne" would have enabled them to live in privileged security for the rest of their lives.

Jim kept the Trust in the news, while never promoting his own activities. That he himself was so often in the news was not always acceptable to the Trust. Nor did it escape notice that Lees-Milne's own books, though directly relevant to the achievements of the Trust, have never been on view in the Trust's bookshops.

Jim Lecs-Milne had always wanted to be a widely published author, and in 1990 a novel that he had been writing for years reached publication. It was about a German count, a prisoner of war in England during World War I, who seduced first an English schoolboy and then the boy's mother. That the book did not find favor surprised and saddened the author.