The Secret Chronicles of Henry Dashwood, Vol. 2

Foreword

Readers of this admittedly uninhibited narrative may be surprised that until the fifth year of my education at the Albion Academy for the Sons of Gentlefolk, I loathed to put pen to paper on any subject, unless absolutely necessary, and preferred to spend my time on the playing field. However, all this changed with a vengeance when my eccentric uncle, Sir Robert Bacon, presented me with a large desk diary with the promise of a Kodak Brownie for Christmas – on the condition that I penned a full, unexpurgated daily entry in its leather-bound pages. 'Schooldays are the happiest days of your life,' he had solemnly intoned as he stood warming himself in front of the fireplace in my study. 'Record in toto every item of the day's doings, my boy, and in later years you will obtain tremendous joy in remembering the fun of these carefree years.' My schooldays ended months ago, but I am finding that old habits die hard and the only way that I can scratch 'the insatiate itch of scribbling', as Juvenal described the disease which afflicted so many of his friends, is to put aside an hour or so every day to set down even the most intimate details of my personal life. Fortunately the first decade of the new century has produced an abundance of gallant literature which proclaims the delights of the pleasures of the flesh. To these fellow scribes, I dedicate this short journey down the lane of lusty memories.