Correspondence from George MacNie Cowie to Aleister Crowley

 

     

 

14 Glenisla Gardens, Edinburgh.

 

 

Oct 18. [1916]

 

 

Your long letter of no date whateffer arrived this a.m. in time to be answered. It now takes over a month to get replies, either it is the delay caused by the exam[ination] of mails, or I miss the mail I suppose myself to be catching.

     

By dispensing with lunch I shall be able to refer to your points categorically and get this one away early (There's nothing to grouse about, really, lunch is always a very moveable feast, and a cup of tea is brought me regularly every afternoon.)

     

(1) About the Manifesto, absolutely the best point is the one more specifically explained in the Epistle to L.B.K. [Lindley Keasbey] [The Law of Thelema] that the higher a man's rank and authority the less material reward he should receive. This should be consistently carried out amongst ourselves. I shouldn't mind being a victim and you will sternly be relegated to Wild Woodbines and Dandelion. It should solve the biggest social problem.

     

(2) I quite agree about M.D. [Mary Davies]. She's a good soul and a good sort altogether, and her gift, which appears to amount to ability to knock about on the plane next to the material, is quite genuine. But I quite recognise that when it comes to 'good' people we can't have it supposed that the whole show is directed by a Regent Str[eet] clairvoyant, no offence to Mary meant. Then, she's apt to get a bit noisy. Very little wine excites her, and I had to lift a warning finger on one occasion, when the proofs of the Manifesto were being read to the assembled B[rethren] after Lodge. We ought to be able to get away from Regent St in a year. I wish I could get on really friendly terms with Dora [Vogt] and help push her on myself. When she is V degree, I could diplomatically explain to M.D. that honours should go round and also that we want her (M.D.) to have a rest, so Dora and A.W. [Anna Wright] if we can get her, might control things.

     

We shall always owe Mary a lot for this start. I don't really see how at all I could have managed anything without her willing help, and even then should have done little without S.L. [William Steff-Langston]. It was such a relief to find we had at least one man of his type—At the time I was dismantling 33 [Avenue Studios], I knew of no one save Hammond [Benjamin Charles Hammond]—It would only have meant irritation. But when it can be done without hurt to her feelings, we must try to form quite a new Lodge with a less pooty designation, or more simply make the new premises Grand Lodge.

     

(3) Your suggestion as to raising a combination in this place is no good—utterly useless unless spread over the whole printing trade. The noblest of the handicrafts, no trade is so subject to ruinous and cut-throat competition. It is par excellence a subject for a Guild, the difficulty is always the small master, or the sneaks who, e.g. set up a press of their own on Loch Ness side, to work on the cheap.

     

(4) Althea [Althea Hobbs], in spite of hustling, does not seem to have got at the MSS yet but I hope you'll have them by this mail. I know too well the difficulty of digging things out and the expense. V of S [Voice of the Silence]—see letter. She has section I only. I have II and III here, but can't move until she sends her portion as styles and size for the remainder.

     

(5) S.L. Even with permission, it would be some time before I let him read D.N.D. [De Natura Deorum] One wants to be quite sure. He's perhaps too old to be considered my 'heir' in the Knowledge? I was wondering. I will keep in mind what you say, but he is content and interested for the present.

     

Gerald Rae Fraser's [George Gerald Rae-Fraser] last letter was not very encouraging, but I replied wishing to keep up a friendly correspondence. I shall make the L.B.K. Epistle an excuse to write again and try to interest him. I don't know just what his attainments or grade of knowledge are. It is manifest that he can't give us any active help at present, but monetary would be as good.

     

(6) Braidwood. I hope he's not a fair specimen of the S[outh] A[frican] B[rethren]. In London he asked me, when I gave him a copy of the L of L [Law of Liberty], who Nuit was. Was it the French word for night? I've heard from him this week, nothing in it, but I am making him useful looking up addresses for me at his club. I didn't think of G.B.G. [George Bernard Shaw] whose works I only know of by hearsay, but I thought I could interest Wells, Brodie Innes [J.W. Brodie-Innes] and sich. His letter was curiously full of adulation of my h K and "a little lady who brightens everything". He caught me huddled in a heap at the foot of the stair case with this Illumination on top of me. It's a neighbour's wife, h K had let her in just as I was coming down stairs. She hadn't seen me for weeks and rushed at me as she would do, even where here husband there. I mischievously pretended to be overwhelmed and collapsed backward. Down she came on top of me and Braidwood unexpectedly emerged from the parlour upon this touching scene.

     

(6) Adulation? Ph that's all right. You don't get enough from me, certainly to do you any damage.

     

(7) Change not the style of a letter? I was very particular and rather nonplussed when you yourself altered l[ittle] C[apitals] to caps in "Love is" etc. However I concluded that quotations didn't matter and left it at that. But I should have gone on as I were.

     

As mentioned I sent Stansfield Jones [Charles Stansfeld Jones] a rough copy of the S[outh] A[frican] letter, but was careful to take all sting out of it by stating that I had no instructions to send it, that it was merely a copy to enlighten him as to the general policy and that I was quite aware of his difficulties.

 

[Note: The remainder of this letter may be part of another letter.]

 

To revert yet agin to that very tough mutton the Bro[ther][1] there's something inexplicable to me in your attitude. I've always appreciated your freedom from snobbery. But to defend the un-sportsmanlike, the 'no gentleman' the liar from sordid self interest I couldn't expect from you, nor do I believe it. I don't care an iron cross for the ha' penny papers, our Brother Noah Von Claypole's own words condemn him. The origin of the feud may be as you say, I don't know, but that isn't the point whateffer. I can in a way understand your indifference to individual suffering. As you may see it, it's all a game of God playing with himself, so to speak: the Comedy of Pan. But there doesn't seem any good reason to defend and cheer on the inflictor of suffering and say all his meanness is but an invention of the ha' penny press.

     

My feeling is that it can only do us harm and stop progress here, if we are regarded as pro-McArthyites.[2] That's certain and that's all. I've already apologised handsome for any apparent and unintentional insults to the Order but isn't your 'getting your shirt out' an admission that the vilest insult nowadays is to call any one a McArthy ?

     

This is not very coherent I'm afraid racing to finish these notes, lunch time nearly up, and Brer Belly going unsatisfied and mail time at hand. Sanctify McArthy! But of course what your real attitude is, I dunno, I hope for the best.

 

 

1—[This is all to do with Crowley's pro-German activities. Gerald Yorke.]

2—[For 'McArthy' read 'German'. Gerald Yorke.]

 

 

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