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154. Princess Badrulbadour: the heroine of one of the Arabian Nights stories.

155. Thou art to all… Herrick: lines 1–2 of ‘To the Willow Tree’ by the English Cavalier poet Robert Herrick (1591–1674).

156. National Reserve Committee: an imaginary committee reflecting pre-1914 Anglo-German tensions.

157. Deborah… hagiology: there has been no St Deborah, indicating that Dowell is not ‘up in’ hagiology, Catholic or otherwise. In the Bible there are references to Rebekah’s nurse Deborah (Gen. 35:8 and 24:.59) and the Deborah who was famed as a military leader (Judges 4 and 5), but neither seems appropriate here.

158. ‘Domine, nunc dimittis… in peace’: ‘Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace’ (Latin). From the evening prayer, the last monastic office of the day. Its source is the biblical Song of Simeon, Luke 2:29.

159. the Craw: La Crau is the name of the flat and featureless plain between Tarascon and Marseilles.

160. ‘Credo in unum Deum Omnipotentem’: ‘I believe in one God Almighty’ (Latin). Nancy omits the word Patrem (‘Father’) after Deum. From the Nicene Creed.

161. Aden: now the main port and commercial centre of Yemen, Aden was taken by the British in 1839 and was an important coaling station for steamships on the route to and from India via the Suez Canal (opened 1869).

162. Kandy: was an important independent monarchy in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka). It was the last Sinhalese kingdom to be subjugated by a colonial power, the British, in 1818. Kandy is also a town on the Kandy Plateau in central Sri Lanka, and this is where Dowell has in mind. It was the capital of the Sinhalese kings between c.1480 and 1815.

163. Timbuctoo: or Timbuktu, is a town in the African republic of Mali (until 1959 the country was known as French Sudan) on the River Niger.

164. making love to her: that is, paying suit to her, with not even the faintest hint of the more recent, purely carnal meaning of the phrase.

165. the peace of God which passes all understanding: Philippians 4:7: ‘And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.’

166. Thou hast conquered, O pale Galilean: line 25 of ‘Hymn to Proserpine’ by Algernon Charles Swinburne (1837–1909). The ‘pale Galilean’ is Jesus Christ. Swinburne was a friend of Ford’s grandfather, the painter Ford Madox Brown (1821–93) and was very kind to Ford when he was a boy.

167. Tartarus: in Greek myth, the place in the Underworld where the wicked suffer punishment for their misdeeds on earth.

168. the Hampshire territorials: the British Army’s Territorial Force (known after 1921 as the Territorial Army) was established following the Territorial and Reserve Forces Act, 1907.

Table of Contents

Cover

About the Author

Title Page

Copyright Page

Contents

Introduction

Dedication

The Good Soldier

Part One

I

II

III

IV

V

VI

Part Two

I

II

Part Three

I

II

III

IV

V

Part Four

I

II

III

IV

V

VI

Notes