Wednesday.

Last Thursday I told you that I'd left half a dozen bids with grandson Matthew on today's Sotheby's Arms and Armour sale. This morning I 'phoned Matthew to 'up' one of the bids (on a large sporting crossbow) a little. He 'phoned just before 5p.m. to tell me that bidding in general had been high, but that he'd successfully bid for the crossbow, and bought it for quite a lot less than I'd authorized him to bid this morning. He'd been underbidder on three of the other bids, but two of the items had doubled their top estimate. I asked him if he'd had any problems and he said only one. When the hammer had fallen to him for the crossbow, he'd got his bidding paddle in the catalogue, and the man next to him had to tell him to hold the paddle up so the auctioneer could see the number on it. He'd also gone to the accounts office on his own initiative, got the invoice, and was able to tell me the exact sum I now owed Sotheby's. I think he'd done very well, and told him so.

The top photo is of the rose bed outside my potting shed/forge, and shows my two anvils (the smaller one slotted into the larger). I very rarely need them nowadays, but when the need arises nothing else will do. The lower picture shows sweet peas which are now being swarmed over by scarlet runner beans, so that later this year we should be well supplied with beans. I've also put in with them a few Morning Glory/Ipomea - 'heavenly blue', which I try and grow most years (with varying success). We'll see.