To George Sturgis
Hotel Bristol
Rome
May 14. 1925
The Spring here has been unusually cool and rainy. I am still wearing winter clothes, and expect to stay at least until June 1– when I shall go to Paris; but all my plans are unsettled, owing to the instability of the female will, on which for the moment I seem to be dependent. I was going to England to stay with the Chetwynds—but Mrs Chetwynd is going to Dartmoor—no, on the whole, to Ireland. I was going to Switzerland to see Mrs Toy (who has suddenly invaded Europe) but Mrs Toy has grown homesick and doesn’t know what she will do or where she will be. I was going to Spain, but heaven knows what may happen first. In any case, Mercedes, with three lady-friends and the unhappy husband of one of them, announces that she will arrive in Rome on a pilgrimage on May 23rd. I am clay in the potter’s hand; but I daresay in time I shall recover my independence and return to my natural and reposeful level.
Strong is already in Paris, having gone in his motor-car from Florence in 8 1⁄2 days, and says he is expecting me at the apartment, where he is much enjoying the electric heating which his daughter Margaret had installed there against his will: but probably I shall go to a hotel, as Margaret herself may turn up at any moment—another case of La donna è mobile, especially with an auto-mobile, if you will excuse an Italian pun. For Margaret has one of her own much better than her father’s.
Yours afftly,
G Santayana
From The Letters of George Santayana: Book Three, 1921-1927. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2002.
Location of manuscript: The Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge MA