Sir – Late evening on July 15, I was walking from Oxford station pulling a large tool bag of books and carrying four other items of luggage. I had just turned into Walton Street when I became the ‘victim’ of an unprovoked act of kindness.

A young woman on a bicycle pulled up alongside and said, “Can you manage, may I help you?”

“That’s extremely kind of you” I said and she put one of my bags in the carrier on the back of her bike. That made it easier to cope with the rest of the luggage, but what was much more appreciated was the experience of being on the receiving end of this extraordinary act of generosity and the enjoyable conversation for the next quarter of an hour.

When we arrived at where I live I said, “I feel I should reciprocate in some way.”

“No, not at all” she said, or words to that effect.

I didn’t ask her name nor did I introduce myself. We might never meet again; that is the wonderful thing, that one person can help another, a total stranger, and then walk away.

It would have been easy to have responded to the initial offer by saying, “It’s OK, I can manage, thanks” in a reserved English way but then both sides would have lost out. Another positive aspect of the incident was that my helper was less than half my age.

Outside of families and the education system how often do people of different generations engage in conversation? All too rarely, it seems to me.

This is a great weakness in our society. More contact across generations can only result in benefits for both sides, I believe.

Although it was midnight before I got to bed that night, I woke at five feeling even more positive than usual and the back pain I had had for the previous few days all but gone. Coincidence or the power of kindness?

Robert Milne, Oxford