THE PRIVATE BUCHMAN

In the days before his stroke he walked in the country whenever he could, and he also loved horse-riding. His last ride seems to have been in December 1940. With half a dozen others he had spent ten days in Mexico. On their way back north they stayed at a hacienda which took guests. 'We breakfasted at a magnificent huge oak table,' recalls John Cotton Wood, who was one of the party, 'and then Frank took us outside where horses were waiting for us. We climbed into our saddles, and off we rode around the ranch with Frank in the lead.'

Even after his stroke he enjoyed walking, when he could be got to do it. 'He took delight in the world of nature around him,' writes Wood. 'He noticed the fine tracery of twigs and branches of a tree. He noticed the birds. Whether he was walking in a lovely park overlooking San Francisco's Golden Gate or in an orchard in the Tyrolean hills of northern Italy, he would often be lost in wonder at what his eyes and senses took in. He would sometimes simply stand and stare with his mouth open.'

'He was very fastidious in his living, without being demanding on those round him,' writes Loudon Hamilton. 'He spotted, and preferred, quality.'3 This instinct for the genuine encompassed both people and objects. 'What an awful man that is,' he remarked once after a visitor had left. 'He makes conversation.'

He did love beautiful things. Sir Neil Cochran-Patrick had in his Ayrshire home some fine pieces of china which had long been in the family. He was astonished when Buchman could tell him where each piece originated. When my wife and I gave him a crystal bowl full of wild Swiss flowers, his eyes lit up with genuine appreciation. But his judgement could be overruled by the desire to encourage an individual. A certain lady presented him with an imposing Italian marble statue of one of the Muses, to be put in 45 Berkeley Square. Some of his friends thought it a little overwhelming and Mrs Nell Glover, the talented Yorkshirewoman who was blending the furnishing of the house into a harmonious whole, told him so. 'That is great art, and I know,' he replied. 'It stays.' And it did, in a corner of the front hall.*

(* He was right. When 45 Berkeley Square was sold the statue was bought by the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge.)

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