Strange ideas

Saturday, July 10th., Cadogan Dquare, London.

Y. came at 6.55, leaving a bag marked in large letters "Foreign Office". In some talk after dinner I found that he had strangely unscientific ideas. Some pamphlet of Haldane's had actually persuaded him that there was a prospect in the future of making synthetic babies, and he really believed that some very low form of animal life had actually been made by synthesis. He stuck to it. It had not occurred to him that any such feat would have made an absolutely unique stir in the world, and make such a step in knowledge as no other step could be compared to. He began to argue like this: "But nobody thirty years ago would have believed about wireless." He hadn't seen that the two things were not comparable, wireless being purely a mechanical affair. In short I was shocked by his attitude. later, he gave in.

Additionally for July 10th., see 'Meeting Miss Thomasson'

I went to tea at Miss Thomasson's on Saturday and met Hofbauer one of the most famous young painters in Paris today. A handsome, very blond man of about 30, and fully aware that he is handsome. Vain, and yet charmingly so, and not too much so. He spoke scarcely any English, and had better manners than most painters. Afterwards at the Cafe de Versailles, Kelly told me that he was inordinately and devilishly clever, but idle; also that his big picture in this year's Salon, 'Coin de Bataille', bought by the state, was painted quite without models.