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diff --git a/17508-h/17508-h.htm b/17508-h/17508-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9e362bb --- /dev/null +++ b/17508-h/17508-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,7196 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of Certain Personal Matters, by H.G. Wells. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + .pagenum { + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; + } /* page numbers */ + + .indexpage {text-align: right; + position : absolute; + left: 82%; + } + + .indexlist {margin-left: 0%; + margin-right: 14%; + } + .blockquote{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + font-size : smaller; + } + .bbox {border: solid 2px;} + + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + .u {text-decoration: underline;} + + .caption {font-weight: bold;} + + .figcenter {margin: auto; text-align: center;} + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span.i0 {display: block; margin-left: 0em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i4 {display: block; margin-left: 4em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Certain Personal Matters, by H. G. Wells + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Certain Personal Matters + +Author: H. G. Wells + +Release Date: January 12, 2006 [EBook #17508] +[Last updated: November 1, 2015] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CERTAIN PERSONAL MATTERS *** + + + + +Produced by Malcolm Farmer and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + + +<hr width="full" /> +<h2>CERTAIN<br /> +PERSONAL<br /> +MATTERS</h2> +<h4>By</h4> +<h3>H.G. WELLS</h3> + +<hr width="100%"/> + +<h4>Front Cover:</h4> +<div class="figcenter"><img src="./images/frontcover.png" width="575" height="795" +title="Front Cover of Book (illustrating The Coal-scuttle p.145)" alt="Front Cover of Book" /> +</div> + +<hr /> +<h3>CERTAIN<br /> +PERSONAL<br /> +MATTERS</h3> +<h5>By</h5> +<h4>H.G. WELLS</h4> +<h5><i>Author of the "Time Machine"</i></h5> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<p> +LONDON<br /> +T. FISHER UNWIN<br /> +PATERNOSTER SQUARE</p> +<p> +<i>Price One Shilling</i><br /> +<i>Also issued in Cloth, price 2s.</i> +</p> + +<hr width="100%" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span> +<h1>CERTAIN PERSONAL MATTERS</h1> + +<h3>BY</h3> + +<h2>H.G. WELLS</h2> + + +<p>LONDON</p> + +<p>T. FISHER UNWIN</p> + +<p>PATERNOSTER SQUARE, E.C.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span> + +<h4>CONTENTS</h4> + + +<p class="indexlist"> +<span class="indexpage">PAGE</span><br /> +<br /> +THOUGHTS ON CHEAPNESS AND MY AUNT CHARLOTTE +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_7">7</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE TROUBLE OF LIFE +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_12">12</a></span><br /> +<br /> +ON THE CHOICE OF A WIFE +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_18">18</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE HOUSE OF DI SORNO +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_22">22</a></span><br /> +<br /> +OF CONVERSATION +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_27">27</a></span><br /> +<br /> +IN A LITERARY HOUSEHOLD +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_32">32</a></span><br /> +<br /> +ON SCHOOLING AND THE PHASES OF MR. SANDSOME +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_36">36</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE POET AND THE EMPORIUM +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_40">40</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE LANGUAGE OF FLOWERS +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_45">45</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE LITERARY REGIMEN +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_49">49</a></span><br /> +<br /> +<span class="indextext">HOUSE-HUNTING AS AN OUTDOOR AMUSEMENT</span> +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_54">54</a></span><br /> +<br /> +OF BLADES AND BLADERY +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_59">59</a></span><br /> +<br /> +OF CLEVERNESS +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_63">63</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE POSE NOVEL +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_67">67</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE VETERAN CRICKETER +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_71">71</a></span><br /> +<br /> +CONCERNING A CERTAIN LADY +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_76">76</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE SHOPMAN +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_80">80</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE BOOK OF CURSES +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_85">85</a></span><br /> +<br /> +DUNSTONE'S DEAR LADY +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_90">90</a></span><br /> +<br /> +EUPHEMIA'S NEW ENTERTAINMENT (<i>this is illustrated</i>) +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_94">94</a></span><br /> +<br /> +FOR FREEDOM OF SPELLING +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_98">98</a></span><br /> +<br /> +INCIDENTAL THOUGHTS ON A BALD HEAD +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_104">104</a></span><br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span><br /> +OF A BOOK UNWRITTEN +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_108">108</a></span><br /> +<br /> +<span class="indextext">THE EXTINCTION OF MAN</span> +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_115">115</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE WRITING OF ESSAYS +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_120">120</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE PARKES MUSEUM +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_124">124</a></span><br /> +<br /> +BLEAK MARCH IN EPPING FOREST +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_128">128</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE THEORY OF QUOTATION +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_132">132</a></span><br /> +<br /> +ON THE ART OF STAYING AT THE SEASIDE +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_135">135</a></span><br /> +<br /> +CONCERNING CHESS +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_140">140</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE COAL-SCUTTLE +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_145">145</a></span><br /> +<br /> +BAGARROW +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_150">150</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE BOOK OF ESSAYS DEDICATORY +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_155">155</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THROUGH A MICROSCOPE +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_159">159</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE PLEASURE OF QUARRELLING +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_164">164</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE AMATEUR NATURE-LOVER +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_169">164</a></span><br /> +<br /> +FROM AN OBSERVATORY +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_174">174</a></span><br /> +<br /> +THE MODE IN MONUMENTS +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_177">177</a></span><br /> +<br /> +HOW I DIED +<span class="indexpage"><a href="#Page_182">183</a></span><br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> + +<h2><a name="CERTAIN_PERSONAL_MATTERS" id="CERTAIN_PERSONAL_MATTERS"></a>CERTAIN PERSONAL MATTERS</h2> + + +<hr /> +<h3><a name="THOUGHTS_ON_CHEAPNESS_AND_MY_AUNT_CHARLOTTE" id="THOUGHTS_ON_CHEAPNESS_AND_MY_AUNT_CHARLOTTE"></a>THOUGHTS ON CHEAPNESS AND MY AUNT CHARLOTTE</h3> + + +<p>The world mends. In my younger days people believed +in mahogany; some of my readers will remember it—a +heavy, shining substance, having a singularly close +resemblance to raw liver, exceedingly heavy to move, and +esteemed on one or other count the noblest of all woods. +Such of us as were very poor and had no mahogany +pretended to have mahogany; and the proper hepatite +tint was got by veneering. That makes one incline to +think it was the colour that pleased people. In those +days there was a word "trashy," now almost lost to the +world. My dear Aunt Charlotte used that epithet when, +in her feminine way, she swore at people she did not like. +"Trashy" and "paltry" and "Brummagem" was the very +worst she could say of them. And she had, I remember, +an intense aversion to plated goods and bronze halfpence. +The halfpence of her youth had been vast and corpulent +red-brown discs, which it was folly to speak of as small +change. They were fine handsome coins, and almost as +inconvenient as crown-pieces. I remember she corrected +me once when I was very young. "Don't call a penny a +copper, dear," she said; "copper is a metal. The pennies +they have nowadays are bronze." It is odd how our +childish impressions cling to us. I still regard bronze as a +kind of upstart intruder, a mere trashy pretender among +metals.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span></p> + +<p>All my Aunt Charlotte's furniture was thoroughly good, +and most of it extremely uncomfortable; there was not a +thing for a little boy to break and escape damnation in the +household. Her china was the only thing with a touch of +beauty in it—at least I remember nothing else—and each +of her blessed plates was worth the happiness of a mortal +for days together. And they dressed me in a Nessus suit +of valuable garments. I learned the value of thoroughly +good things only too early. I knew the equivalent of a +teacup to the very last scowl, and I have hated good, +handsome property ever since. For my part I love cheap +things, trashy things, things made of the commonest +rubbish that money can possibly buy; things as vulgar +as primroses, and as transitory as a morning's frost.</p> + +<p>Think of all the advantages of a cheap possession—cheap +and nasty, if you will—compared with some valuable +substitute. Suppose you need this or that. "Get a good +one," advises Aunt Charlotte; "one that will last." You +do—and it does last. It lasts like a family curse. These +great plain valuable things, as plain as good women, as +complacently assured of their intrinsic worth—who does +not know them? My Aunt Charlotte scarcely had a new +thing in her life. Her mahogany was avuncular; her +china remotely ancestral; her feather beds and her +bedsteads!—they were haunted; the births, marriages, +and deaths associated with the best one was the history +of our race for three generations. There was more in her +house than the tombstone rectitude of the chair-backs +to remind me of the graveyard. I can still remember +the sombre aisles of that house, the vault-like shadows, +the magnificent window curtains that blotted out the +windows. Life was too trivial for such things. She +never knew she tired of them, but she did. That was the +secret of her temper, I think; they engendered her sombre +Calvinism, her perception of the trashy quality of human +life. The pretence that they were the accessories to +human life was too transparent. <i>We</i> were the accessories; +we minded them for a little while, and then we passed +away. They wore us out and cast us aside. We were the +changing scenery; they were the actors who played on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> +through the piece. It was even so with clothing. We +buried my other maternal aunt—Aunt Adelaide—and +wept, and partly forgot her; but her wonderful silk +dresses—they would stand alone—still went rustling +cheerfully about an ephemeral world.</p> + +<p>All that offended my sense of proportion, my feeling +of what is due to human life, even when I was a little boy. +I want things of my own, things I can break without +breaking my heart; and, since one can live but once, I want +some change in my life—to have this kind of thing and +then that. I never valued Aunt Charlotte's good old +things until I sold them. They sold remarkably well: +those chairs like nether millstones for the grinding away +of men; the fragile china—an incessant anxiety until +accident broke it, and the spell of it at the same time; +those silver spoons, by virtue of which Aunt Charlotte +went in fear of burglary for six-and-fifty years; the bed +from which I alone of all my kindred had escaped; the +wonderful old, erect, high-shouldered, silver-faced clock.</p> + +<p>But, as I say, our ideas are changing—mahogany has +gone, and repp curtains. Articles are made for man, nowadays, +and not man, by careful early training, for articles. +I feel myself to be in many respects a link with the past. +Commodities come like the spring flowers, and vanish again. +"Who steals my watch steals trash," as some poet has +remarked; the thing is made of I know not what metal, and +if I leave it on the mantel for a day or so it goes a deep +blackish purple that delights me exceedingly. My grandfather's +hat—I understood when I was a little boy that I +was to have that some day. But now I get a hat for ten +shillings, or less, two or three times a year. In the old +days buying clothes was well-nigh as irrevocable as +marriage. Our flat is furnished with glittering things—wanton +arm-chairs just strong enough not to collapse +under you, books in gay covers, carpets you are free to +drop lighted fusees upon; you may scratch what you like, +upset your coffee, cast your cigar ash to the four quarters +of heaven. Our guests, at anyrate, are not snubbed by +our furniture. It knows its place.</p> + +<p>But it is in the case of art and adornment that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> +cheapness is most delightful. The only thing that +betrayed a care for beauty on the part of my aunt was +her dear old flower garden, and even there she was not +above suspicion. Her favourite flowers were tulips, rigid +tulips with opulent crimson streaks. She despised +wildings. Her ornaments were simply displays of the +precious metal. Had she known the price of platinum +she would have worn that by preference. Her chains and +brooches and rings were bought by weight. She would +have turned her back on Benvenuto Cellini if he was not +22 carats fine. She despised water-colour art; her +conception of a picture was a vast domain of oily brown +by an Old Master. The Babbages at the Hall had a +display of gold plate swaggering in the corner of the +dining-room; and the visitor (restrained by a plush +rope from examining the workmanship) was told the +value, and so passed on. I like my art unadorned: +thought and skill, and the other strange quality that +is added thereto, to make things beautiful—and nothing +more. A farthing's worth of paint and paper, and, behold! +a thing of beauty!—as they do in Japan. And if it +should fall into the fire—well, it has gone like yesterday's +sunset, and to-morrow there will be another.</p> + +<p>These Japanese are indeed the apostles of cheapness. +The Greeks lived to teach the world beauty, the Hebrews +to teach it morality, and now the Japanese are hammering +in the lesson that men may be honourable, daily life +delightful, and a nation great without either freestone +houses, marble mantelpieces, or mahogany sideboards. I +have sometimes wished that my Aunt Charlotte could have +travelled among the Japanese nation. She would, I know, +have called it a "parcel of trash." Their use of paper—paper +suits, paper pocket-handkerchiefs—would have +made her rigid with contempt. I have tried, but I cannot +imagine my Aunt Charlotte in paper underclothing. Her +aversion to paper was extraordinary. Her Book of Beauty +was printed on satin, and all her books were bound in +leather, the boards regulated rather than decorated with a +severe oblong. Her proper sphere was among the ancient +Babylonians, among which massive populace even the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> +newspapers were built of brick. She would have +compared with the King's daughter whose raiment was +of wrought gold. When I was a little boy I used to think +she had a mahogany skeleton. However, she is gone, poor +old lady, and at least she left me her furniture. Her +ghost was torn in pieces after the sale—must have been. +Even the old china went this way and that. I took what +was perhaps a mean revenge of her for the innumerable +black-holeings, bread-and-water dinners, summary chastisements, +and impossible tasks she inflicted upon me for +offences against her too solid possessions. You will see it +at Woking. It is a light and graceful cross. It is a +mere speck of white between the monstrous granite paperweights +that oppress the dead on either side of her. +Sometimes I am half sorry for that. When the end comes +I shall not care to look her in the face—she will be so +humiliated.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_TROUBLE_OF_LIFE" id="THE_TROUBLE_OF_LIFE"></a>THE TROUBLE OF LIFE</h3> + + +<p>I do not know whether this will awaken a sympathetic +lassitude in, say, fifty per cent. of its readers, or whether +my experience is unique and my testimony simply curious. +At anyrate, it is as true as I can make it. Whether +this is a mere mood, and a certain flagrant exhilaration my +true attitude towards things, or this is my true attitude +and the exuberant phase a lapse from it, I cannot say. +Probably it does not matter. The thing is that I find life +an extremely troublesome affair. I do not want to make +any railing accusations against life; it is—to my taste—neither +very sad nor very horrible. At times it is distinctly +amusing. Indeed, I know nothing in the same line that can +quite compare with it. But there is a difference between +general appreciation and uncritical acceptance. At times +I find life a Bother.</p> + +<p>The kind of thing that I object to is, as a good example, +all the troublesome things one has to do every morning +in getting up. There is washing. This is an age of +unsolicited personal confidences, and I will frankly confess +that if it were not for Euphemia I do not think I should +wash at all. There is a vast amount of humbug about +washing. Vulgar people not only profess a passion for +the practice, but a physical horror of being unwashed. It +is a sort of cant. I can understand a sponge bath being a +novelty the first time and exhilarating the second and +third. But day after day, week after week, month after +month, and nothing to show at the end of it all! Then +there is shaving. I have to get shaved because Euphemia +hates me with a blue jowl, and I will admit I hate myself. +Yet, if I were left alone, I do not think my personal taste +would affect my decision; I will say that for myself.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> +Either I hack about with a blunt razor—my razors are +always blunt—until I am a kind of Whitechapel Horror, +and with hair in tufts upon my chin like the top of a +Bosjesman's head, or else I have to spend all the morning +being dabbed about the face by a barber with damp hands. +In either case it is a repulsive thing to have, eating into +one's time when one might be living; and I have calculated +that all the hair I have lost in this way, put end to end, +would reach to Berlin. All that vital energy thrown +away! However, "Thorns and bristles shall it bring forth +to thee." I suppose it is part of the primal curse, and +I try and stand it like a man. But the thing is a bother +all the same.</p> + +<p>Then after shaving comes the hunt for the collar-stud. +Of all idiotic inventions the modern collar is the worst. +A man who has to write things for such readers as mine +cannot think over-night of where he puts his collar-stud; +he has to keep his mind at an altogether higher level. +Consequently he walks about the bedroom, thinking hard, +and dropping things about: here a vest and there a collar, +and sowing a bitter harvest against the morning. Or he +sits on the edge of the bed jerking his garments this way +and that. "I shot a slipper in the air," as the poet sings, +and in the morning it turns up in the most impossible +quarters, and where you least expect it. And, talking of +going to bed, before Euphemia took the responsibility over, +I was always forgetting to wind my watch. But now that +is one of the things she neglects.</p> + +<p>Then, after getting up, there is breakfast. Autolycus of +the <i>Pall Mall Gazette</i> may find heaven there, but I am +differently constituted. There is, to begin with the essence +of the offence—the stuff that has to be eaten somehow. +Then there is the paper. Unless it is the face of a +fashionable beauty, I know of nothing more absolutely +uninteresting than a morning paper. You always expect +to find something in it, and never do. It wastes half my +morning sometimes, going over and over the thing, and +trying to find out why they publish it. If I edited a +daily I think I should do like my father does when he +writes to me. "Things much the same," he writes; "the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> +usual fussing about the curate's red socks"—a long letter +for him. The rest margin. And, by the bye, there are +letters every morning at breakfast, too!</p> + +<p>Now I do not grumble at letters. You can read them +instead of getting on with your breakfast. They are +entertaining in a way, and you can tear them up at the +end, and in that respect at least they are better than +people who come to see you. Usually, too, you need not +make a reply. But sometimes Euphemia gets hold of +some still untorn, and says in her dictatorial way that +they <i>have</i> to be answered—insists—says I <i>must</i>. Yet she +knows that nothing fills me with a livelier horror than +having to answer letters. It paralyses me. I waste whole +days sometimes mourning over the time that I shall have +to throw away presently, answering some needless impertinence—requests +for me to return books lent to me; +reminders from the London Library that my subscription +is overdue; proposals for me to renew my ticket at the +stores—Euphemia's business really; invitations for me to +go and be abashed before impertinent distinguished people: +all kinds of bothering things.</p> + +<p>And speaking of letters and invitations brings me +round to friends. I dislike most people; in London they +get in one's way in the street and fill up railway carriages, +and in the country they stare at you—but I <i>hate</i> my +friends. Yet Euphemia says I <i>must</i> "keep up" my +friends. They would be all very well if they were really +true friends and respected my feelings and left me alone, +just to sit quiet. But they come wearing shiny clothes, +and mop and mow at me and expect me to answer their +gibberings. Polite conversation always appears to me to +be a wicked perversion of the blessed gift of speech, +which, I take it, was given us to season our lives rather +than to make them insipid. New friends are the worst +in this respect. With old friends one is more at home; +you give them something to eat or drink, or look at, or +something—whatever they seem to want—and just turn +round and go on smoking quietly. But every now and +then Euphemia or Destiny inflicts a new human being +upon me. I do not mean a baby, though the sentence<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> +has got that turn somehow, but an introduction; and the +wretched thing, all angles and offence, keeps bobbing +about me and discovering new ways of worrying me, +trying, I believe, to find out what topics interest me, +though the fact is no topics interest me. Once or twice, +of course, I have met human beings I think I could have +got on with very well, after a time; but in this mood, at +least, I doubt if any human being is quite worth the +bother of a new acquaintance.</p> + +<p>These are just sample bothers—shaving, washing, +answering letters, talking to people. I could specify +hundreds more. Indeed, in my sadder moments, it seems +to me life is all compact of bothers. There are the +details of business—knowing the date approximately (an +incessant anxiety) and the time of day. Then, having to +buy things. Euphemia does most of this, it is true, but +she draws the line at my boots and gloves and hosiery +and tailoring. Then, doing up parcels and finding pieces +of string or envelopes or stamps—which Euphemia might +very well manage for me. Then, finding your way back +after a quiet, thoughtful walk. Then, having to get +matches for your pipe. I sometimes dream of a better +world, where pipe, pouch, and matches all keep together +instead of being mutually negatory. But Euphemia is +always putting everything into some hiding-hole or other, +which she calls its "place." Trivial things in their way, +you may say, yet each levying so much toll on my brain +and nervous system, and demanding incessant vigilance +and activity. I calculated once that I wasted a masterpiece +upon these mountainous little things about every +three months of my life. Can I help thinking of them, +then, and asking why I suffer thus? And can I avoid +seeing at last how it is they hang together?</p> + +<p>For there is still one other bother, a kind of <i>bother +botherum</i>, to tell of, though I hesitate at the telling. It +brings this rabble herd of worries into line and makes +them formidable; it is, so to speak, the Bother +Commander-in-Chief. Well! Euphemia. I simply worship +the ground she treads upon, mind, but at the same time +the truth is the truth. Euphemia is a bother. She is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> +a brave little woman, and helps me in every conceivable +way. But I wish she would not. It is so obviously all +her doing. She makes me get up of a morning—I would +not stand as much from anybody else—and keeps a sharp +eye on my chin and collar. If it were not for her I could +sit about always with no collar or tie on in that old +jacket she gave to the tramp, and just smoke and grow +a beard and let all the bothers slide. I would never +wash, never shave, never answer any letters, never go to +see any friends, never do any work—except, perhaps, an +insulting postcard to a publisher now and again. I would +just sit about.</p> + +<p>Sometimes I think this may be peculiar in me. At +other times I fancy I am giving voice to the secret feeling +of every member of my sex. I suspect, then, that we +would all do as the noble savage does, take our things +off and lie about comfortable, if only someone had the +courage to begin. It is these women—all love and +reverence to Euphemia notwithstanding—who make us +work and bother us with Things. They keep us decent, +and remind us we have a position to support. And +really, after all, this is not my original discovery! There +is the third chapter of Genesis, for instance. And then +who has not read Carlyle's gloating over a certain +historical suit of leather? It gives me a queer thrill of +envy, that Quaker Fox and his suit of leather. Conceive +it, if you can! One would never have to quail under the +scrutiny of a tailor any more. Thoreau, too, come to +think of it, was, by way of being a prophet, a pioneer +in this Emancipation of Man from Bothery.</p> + +<p>Then the silent gentry who brew our Chartreuse; +what are they in retirement for? Looking back into +history, with the glow of discovery in my eyes, I find +records of wise men—everyone acknowledged they were +wise men—who lived apart. In every age the same +associate of solitude, silence, and wisdom. The holy +hermits!... I grant it, they professed to flee wickedness +and seek after righteousness, but now my impression is +that they fled bothers. We all know they had an intense +aversion to any savour of domesticity, and they never<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> +shaved, washed, dined, visited, had new clothes. Holiness, +indeed! They were <i>viveurs</i>.... We have witnessed +Religion without Theology, and why not an Unsectarian +Thebaid? I sometimes fancy it needs only one brave +man to begin.... If it were not for the fuss Euphemia +would make I certainly should. But I know she would +come and worry me worse than St. Anthony was worried +until I put them all on again, and that keeps me from +the attempt.</p> + +<p>I am curious whether mine is the common experience. +I fancy, after all, I am only seeing in a clearer way, +putting into modern phrase, so to speak, an observation +old as the Pentateuch. And looking up I read upon a +little almanac with which Euphemia has cheered my +desk:—</p> + +<div class="blockquote"> +"The world was sad" (sweet sadness!)<br /> +"The garden was a wild" (a picturesque wild)<br /> +"And man the hermit" (he made no complaint)<br /> +"Till the woman smiled."—<span class="smcap">Campbell</span>.<br /> +</div> + +<p>[And very shortly after he had, as you know, all that +bother about the millinery.]</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> +<h3><a name="ON_THE_CHOICE_OF_A_WIFE" id="ON_THE_CHOICE_OF_A_WIFE"></a>ON THE CHOICE OF A WIFE</h3> + + +<p>Wife-choosing is an unending business. This sounds +immoral, but what I mean will be clearer in the context. +People have lived—innumerable people—exhausted +experience, and yet other people keep on coming to hand, +none the wiser, none the better. It is like a waterfall +more than anything else in the world. Every year one +has to turn to and warn another batch about these stale +old things. Yet it is one's duty—the last thing that +remains to a man. And as a piece of worldly wisdom, +that has nothing to do with wives, always leave a few +duties neglected for the comfort of your age. There +are such a lot of other things one can do when one is +young.</p> + +<p>Now, the kind of wife a young fellow of eight- or nine-and-twenty +insists on selecting is something of one-and-twenty +or less, inexperienced, extremely pretty, graceful, and well +dressed, not too clever, accomplished; but I need not go +on, for the youthful reader can fill in the picture himself +from his own ideal. Every young man has his own ideal, +as a matter of course, and they are all exactly alike. Now, +I do not intend to repeat all the stale old saws of out-of-date +wiseacres. Most of them are even more foolish than +the follies they reprove. Take, for instance, the statement +that "beauty fades." Absurd; everyone knows perfectly +well that, as the years creep on, beauty simply gets more +highly coloured. And then, "beauty is only skin-deep." +Fantastically wrong! Some of it is not that; and, for the +rest, is a woman like a toy balloon?—just a surface? To +hear that proverb from a man is to know him at once for +a phonographic kind of fool. The fundamental and +enduring grace of womanhood goes down to the skeleton;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> +you cannot have a pretty face without a pretty skull, just +as you cannot have one without a good temper.</p> + +<p>Yet all the same there is an excellent reason why one +should shun beauty in a prospective wife, at anyrate +obvious beauty—the kind of beauty people talk about, +and which gets into the photographers' windows. The +common beautiful woman has a style of her own, a +favourite aspect. After all, she cannot be perfect. She +comes upon you, dazzles you, marries you; there is a time +of ecstasy. People envy you, continue to envy you. After +a time you envy yourself—yourself of the day before +yesterday. For the imperfection, the inevitable imperfection—in +one case I remember it was a smile—becomes +visible to you, becomes your especial privilege. That is the +real reason. No beauty is a beauty to her husband. But +with the plain woman—the thoroughly plain woman—it is +different. At first—I will not mince matters—her ugliness +is an impenetrable repulse. Face it. After a time little +things begin to appear through the violent discords: little +scraps of melody—a shy tenderness in her smile that peeps +out at you and vanishes, a something that is winning, +looking out of her eyes. You find a waviness of her hair +that you never saw at the beginning, a certain surprising, +pleasing, enduring want of clumsiness in part of her ear. +And it is yours. You can see she strikes the beholder +with something of a shock; and while the beauty of the +beauty is common for all the world to rejoice in, you will +find in your dear, plain wife beauty enough and to spare; +exquisite—for it is all your own, your treasure-trove, your +safely-hidden treasure....</p> + +<p>Then, in the matter of age; though young fellows do +not imagine it, it is very easy to marry a wife too young. +Marriage has been defined as a foolish bargain in which +one man provides for another man's daughter, but there +is no reason why this should go so far as completing her +education. If your conception of happiness is having +something pretty and innocent and troublesome about you, +something that you can cherish and make happy, a pet +rabbit is in every way preferable. At the worst that will +nibble your boots. I have known several cases of the girl-<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span>wife, +and it always began like an idyll, charmingly; the +tenderest care on one hand, winsome worship on the other—until +some little thing, a cut chin or a missing paper, +startled the pure and natural man out of his veneer, +dancing and blaspheming, with the most amazing consequences. +Only a proven saint should marry a girl-wife, +and his motives might be misunderstood. The idyllic wife +is a beautiful thing to read about, but in practice idylls +should be kept episodes; in practice the idyllic life is a +little too like a dinner that is all dessert. A common +man, after a time, tires of winsome worship; he craves +after companionship, and a sympathy based on experience. +The ordinary young man, with the still younger wife, I +have noticed, continues to love her with all his heart—and +spends his leisure telling somebody else's wife all +about it. If in these days of blatant youth an experienced +man's counsel is worth anything, it would be to marry a +woman considerably older than oneself, if one must marry +at all. And while upon this topic—and I have lived long—the +ideal wife, I am persuaded, from the close observation +of many years, is invariably, by some mishap, a +widow....</p> + +<p>Avoid social charm. It was the capacity for entertaining +visitors that ruined Paradise. It grows upon a woman. +An indiscriminating personal magnetism is perhaps the +most dreadful vice a wife can have. You think you have +married the one woman in the world, and you find you +have married a host—that is to say, a hostess. Instead +of making a home for you she makes you something +between an ethnographical museum and a casual ward. +You find your rooms littered with people and teacups and +things, strange creatures that no one could possibly care +for, that seem scarcely to care for themselves. You go +about the house treading upon chance geniuses, and get +tipped by inexperienced guests. And even when she does +not entertain, she is continually going out. I do not deny +that charming people are charming, that their company +should be sought, but seeking it in marriage is an +altogether different matter.</p> + +<p>Then, I really must insist that young men do not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> +understand the real truth about accomplishments. There +comes a day when the most variegated wife comes +to the end of her tunes, and another when she ends them +for the second time; <i>Vita longa, ars brevis</i>—at least, as +regards the art of the schoolgirl. It is only like marrying +a slightly more complicated barrel-organ. And, for +another point, watch the young person you would honour +with your hand for the slightest inkling of economy or +tidiness. Young men are so full of poetry and emotion +that it does not occur to them how widely the sordid vices +are distributed in the other sex. If you are a hotel +proprietor, or a school proprietor, or a day labourer, such +weaknesses become a strength, of course, but not otherwise. +For a literary person—if perchance you are a literary person—it +is altogether too dreadful. You are always getting +swept and garnished, straightened up and sent out to +be shaved. And home—even your study—becomes a +glittering, spick-and-span mechanism. But you know the +parable of the seven devils?</p> + +<p>To conclude, a summary. The woman you choose +should be plain, as plain as you can find, as old or older +than yourself, devoid of social gifts or accomplishments, +poor—for your self-respect—and with a certain amiable +untidiness. Of course no young man will heed this, but +at least I have given my counsel, and very excellent +reasons for that counsel. And possibly I shall be able to +remind him that I told him as much, in the course of a +few years' time. And, by the bye, I had almost forgotten! +Never by any chance marry a girl whose dresses do up at +the back, unless you can afford her a maid or so of her +own.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_HOUSE_OF_DI_SORNO" id="THE_HOUSE_OF_DI_SORNO"></a>THE HOUSE OF DI SORNO</h3> + +<p>A MANUSCRIPT FOUND IN A BOX</p> + + +<p>And the box, Euphemia's. Brutally raided it was by an +insensate husband, eager for a tie and too unreasonably +impatient to wait an hour or so until she could get home +and find it for him. There was, of course, no tie at all in +that box, for all his stirring—as anyone might have +known; but, if there was no tie, there were certain papers +that at least suggested a possibility of whiling away the +time until the Chooser and Distributer of Ties should +return. And, after all, there is no reading like your +accidental reading come upon unawares.</p> + +<p>It was a discovery, indeed, that Euphemia <i>had</i> papers. +At the first glance these close-written sheets suggested a +treasonable Keynote, and the husband gripped it with a +certain apprehension mingling with his relief at the opiate +of reading. It was, so to speak, the privilege of police he +exercised, so he justified himself. He began to read. But +what is this? "She stood on the balcony outside the +window, while the noblest-born in the palace waited on +her every capricious glance, and watched for an unbending +look to relieve her hauteur, but in vain." None of your +snippy-snappy Keynote there!</p> + +<p>Then he turned over a page or so of the copy, doubting +if the privilege of police still held good. Standing out by +virtue of a different ink, and coming immediately after +"bear her to her proud father," were the words, "How +many yards of carpet ¾ yds. wide will cover room, width +16 ft., length 27½ ft.?" Then he knew he was in the +presence of the great romance that Euphemia wrote when +she was sixteen. He had heard something of it before.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> +He held it doubtfully in his hands, for the question of +conscience still troubled him. "Bah!" he said abruptly, +"not to find it irresistible was to slight the authoress and +her skill." And with that he sat plump down among the +things in the box very comfortably and began reading, and, +indeed, read until Euphemia arrived. But she, at the +sight of his head and legs, made several fragmentary and +presumably offensive remarks about crushing some hat or +other, and proceeded with needless violence to get him out +of the box again. However, that is my own private +trouble. We are concerned now with the merits of +Euphemia's romance.</p> + +<p>The hero of the story is a Venetian, named (for some +unknown reason) Ivan di Sorno. So far as I ascertained, +he is the entire house of Di Sorno referred to in the title. +No other Di Sornos transpired. Like others in the story, +he is possessed of untold wealth, tempered by a profound +sorrow, for some cause which remains unmentioned, but +which is possibly internal. He is first displayed "pacing +a sombre avenue of ilex and arbutus that reflected with +singular truth the gloom of his countenance," and "toying +sadly with the jewelled hilt of his dagger." He meditates +upon his loveless life and the burthen of riches. Presently +he "paces the long and magnificent gallery," where a +"hundred generations of Di Sornos, each with the same +flashing eye and the same marble brow, look down with +the same sad melancholy upon the beholder"—a truly +monotonous exhibition. It would be too much for anyone, +day after day. He decides that he will travel. +Incognito.</p> + +<p>The next chapter is headed "In Old Madrid," and Di +Sorno, cloaked to conceal his grandeur, "moves sad and +observant among the giddy throng." But "Gwendolen"—the +majestic Gwendolen of the balcony—"marked his +pallid yet beautiful countenance." And the next day at +the bull-fight she "flung her bouquet into the arena, and +turning to Di Sorno"—a perfect stranger, mind you—"smiled +commandingly." "In a moment he had flung +himself headlong down among the flashing blades of the +toreadors and the trampling confusion of bulls, and in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> +another he stood before her, bowing low with the recovered +flowers in his hand. 'Fair sir,' she said, 'methinks my +poor flowers were scarce worth your trouble.'" A very +proper remark. And then suddenly I put the manuscript +down.</p> + +<p>My heart was full of pity for Euphemia. Thus had she +gone a-dreaming. A man of imposing physique and flashing +eye, who would fling you oxen here and there, and +vault in and out of an arena without catching a breath, +for his lady's sake—and here I sat, the sad reality, a lean +and slippered literary pretender, and constitutionally +afraid of cattle.</p> + +<p>Poor little Euphemia! For after all is said and done, +and the New Woman gibed out of existence, I am afraid +we do undeceive these poor wives of ours a little after the +marrying is over. It may be they have deceived themselves, +in the first place, but that scarcely affects their +disappointment. These dream-lovers of theirs, these +monsters of unselfishness and devotion, these tall fair +Donovans and dark worshipping Wanderers! And then +comes the rabble rout of us poor human men, damning at +our breakfasts, wiping pens upon our coat sleeves, smelling +of pipes, fearing our editors, and turning Euphemia's +private boxes into public copy. And they take it so +steadfastly—most of them. They never let us see the +romance we have robbed them of, but turn to and make +the best of it—and us—with such sweet grace. Only now +and then—as in the instance of a flattened hat—may a +cry escape them. And even then——</p> + +<p>But a truce to reality! Let us return to Di Sorno.</p> + +<p>This individual does not become enamoured of Gwendolen, +as the crude novel reader might anticipate. He +answers her "coldly," and his eye rests the while on her +"tirewoman, the sweet Margot." Then come scenes of +jealousy and love, outside a castle with heavily mullioned +windows. The sweet Margot, though she turns out to be +the daughter of a bankrupt prince, has one characteristic +of your servant all the world over—she spends all her +time looking out of the window. Di Sorno tells her of his +love on the evening of the bull-fight, and she cheerfully<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> +promises to "learn to love him," and therafter he spends +all his days and nights "spurring his fiery steed down the +road" that leads by the castle containing the young +scholar. It becomes a habit with him—in all, he does it +seventeen times in three chapters. Then, "ere it is too +late," he implores Margot to fly.</p> + +<p>Gwendolen, after a fiery scene with Margot, in which +she calls her a "petty minion,"—pretty language for a +young gentlewoman,—"sweeps with unutterable scorn from +the room," never, to the reader's huge astonishment, to +appear in the story again, and Margot flies with Di Sorno +to Grenada, where the Inquisition, consisting apparently +of a single monk with a "blazing eye," becomes extremely +machinatory. A certain Countess di Morno, who intends +to marry Di Sorno, and who has been calling into the +story in a casual kind of way since the romance began, +now comes prominently forward. She has denounced +Margot for heresy, and at a masked ball the Inquisition, +disguised in a yellow domino, succeeds in separating the +young couple, and in carrying off "the sweet Margot" to +a convent.</p> + +<p>"Di Sorno, half distraught, flung himself into a cab +and drove to all the hotels in Grenada" (he overlooked +the police station), and, failing to find Margot, becomes +mad. He goes about ejaculating "Mad, mad!" than +which nothing could be more eloquent of his complete +mental inversion. In his paroxysms the Countess di +Morno persuades him to "lead her to the altar," but on +the way (with a certain indelicacy they go to church in +the same conveyance) she lets slip a little secret. So Di +Sorno jumps out of the carriage, "hurling the crowd +apart," and, "flourishing his drawn sword," "clamoured at +the gate of the Inquisition" for Margot. The Inquisition, +represented by the fiery-eyed monk, "looked over the +gate at him." No doubt it felt extremely uncomfortable.</p> + +<p>Now it was just at this thrilling part that Euphemia +came home, and the trouble about the flattened hat began. +I never flattened her hat. It was in the box, and so +was I; but as for deliberate flattening—— It was just +a thing that happened. She should not write such<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> +interesting stories if she expects me to go on tiptoe +through the world looking about for her hats. To have +that story taken away just at that particular moment +was horrible. There was fully as much as I had read still +to come, so that a lot happened after this duel of Sword +<i>v.</i> Fiery Eye. I know from a sheet that came out of +place that Margot stabbed herself with a dagger ("richly +jewelled"), but of all that came between I have not the +faintest suspicion. That is the peculiar interest of it. +At this particular moment the one book I want to read in +all the world is the rest of this novel of Euphemia's. +And simply, on the score of a new hat needed, she keeps +it back and haggles!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> +<h3><a name="OF_CONVERSATION" id="OF_CONVERSATION"></a>OF CONVERSATION</h3> + +<p>AN APOLOGY</p> + + +<p>I must admit that in conversation I am not a brilliant +success. Partly, indeed, that may be owing to the +assiduity with which my aunt suppressed my early essays +in the art: "Children," she said, "should be seen but not +heard," and incontinently rapped my knuckles. To a +larger degree, however, I regard it as intrinsic. This +tendency to silence, to go out of the rattle and dazzle of +the conversation into a quiet apart, is largely, I hold, the +consequence of a certain elevation and breadth and +tenderness of mind; I am no blowfly to buzz my way +through the universe, no rattle that I should be expected +to delight my fellow-creatures by the noises I produce. +I go about to this social function and that, deporting +myself gravely and decently in silence, taking, if possible, +a back seat; and, in consequence of that, people who do +not understand me have been heard to describe me as a +"stick," as "shy," and by an abundance of the like unflattering +terms. So that I am bound almost in self-justification +to set down my reasons for this temperance +of mine in conversation.</p> + +<p>Speech, no doubt, is a valuable gift, but at the same +time it is a gift that may be abused. What is regarded +as polite conversation is, I hold, such an abuse. Alcohol, +opium, tea, are all very excellent things in their way; +but imagine continuous alcohol, an incessant opium, or to +receive, ocean-like, a perennially flowing river of tea! +That is my objection to this conversation: its continuousness. +You have to keep on. You find three or four +people gathered together, and instead of being restful and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> +recreative, sitting in comfortable attitudes and at peace +with themselves and each other, and now and again, +perhaps three or four times in an hour, making a +worthy and memorable remark, they are all haggard and +intent upon keeping this fetish flow agoing. A +fortuitous score of cows in a field are a thousand times +happier than a score of people deliberately assembled for +the purposes of happiness. These conversationalists say +the most shallow and needless of things, impart aimless information, +simulate interest they do not feel, and generally +impugn their claim to be considered reasonable creatures. +Why, when people assemble without hostile intentions, it +should be so imperative to keep the trickling rill of talk +running, I find it impossible to imagine. It is a vestige +of the old barbaric times, when men murdered at sight +for a mere whim; when it was good form to take off your +sword in the antechamber, and give your friend your +dagger-hand, to show him it was no business visit. +Similarly, you keep up this babblement to show your +mind has no sinister concentration, not necessarily +because you have anything to say, but as a guarantee of +good faith. You have to make a noise all the time, like +the little boy who was left in the room with the plums. +It is the only possible explanation.</p> + +<p>To a logical mind there is something very distressing in +this social law of gabble. Out of regard for Mrs. A, let +us say, I attend some festival she has inaugurated. There +I meet for the first time a young person of pleasant +exterior, and I am placed in her company to deliver her +at a dinner-table, or dance her about, or keep her out of +harm's way, in a cosy nook. She has also never seen me +before, and probably does not want particularly to see me +now. However, I find her nice to look at, and she has +taken great pains to make herself nice to look at, and +why we cannot pass the evening, I looking at her and she +being looked at, I cannot imagine. But no; we must +talk. Now, possibly there are topics she knows about and +I do not—it is unlikely, but suppose so; on these topics +she requires no information. Again, I know about other +topics things unknown to her, and it seems a mean and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> +priggish thing to broach these, since they put her at a +disadvantage. Thirdly, comes a last group of subjects +upon which we are equally informed, and upon which, +therefore, neither of us is justified in telling things to +the other. This classification of topics seems to me +exhaustive.</p> + +<p>These considerations, I think, apply to all conversations. +In every conversation, every departure must +either be a presumption when you talk into your antagonist's +special things, a pedantry when you fall back +upon your own, or a platitude when you tell each other +things you both know. I don't see any other line a +conversation can take. The reason why one has to keep +up the stream of talk is possibly, as I have already +suggested, to manifest goodwill. And in so many cases +this could be expressed so much better by a glance, a +deferential carriage, possibly in some cases a gentle +pressure of the hand, or a quiet persistent smile. And +suppose there is some loophole in my reasoning—though +I cannot see it—and that possible topics exist, how +superficial and unexact is the best conversation to a +second-rate book!</p> + +<p>Even with two people you see the objection, but when +three or four are gathered together the case is infinitely +worse to a man of delicate perceptions. Let us suppose—I +do not grant it—that there is a possible sequence of +things to say to the person A that really harmonise with +A and yourself. Grant also that there is a similar +sequence between yourself and B. Now, imagine yourself +and A and B at the corners of an equilateral triangle set +down to talk to each other. The kind of talk that A +appreciates is a discord with B, and similarly B's sequence +is impossible in the hearing of A. As a matter of fact, a +real conversation of three people is the most impossible +thing in the world. In real life one of the three always +drops out and becomes a mere audience, or a mere partisan. +In real life you and A talk, and B pretends to +be taking a share by interjecting interruptions, or one +of the three talks a monologue. And the more subtle +your sympathy and the greater your restraint from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> +self-assertion, the more incredible triple and quadruple +conversation becomes.</p> + +<p>I have observed that there is even nowadays a certain +advance towards my views in this matter. Men may not +pick out antagonists, and argue to the general audience +as once they did: there is a tacit taboo of controversy, +neither may you talk your "shop," nor invite your +antagonist to talk his. There is also a growing feeling +against extensive quotations or paraphrases from the +newspapers. Again, personalities, scandal, are, at least +in theory, excluded. This narrows the scope down to the +"last new book," "the last new play," "impressions de +voyage," and even here it is felt that any very ironical or +satirical remarks, anything unusual, in fact, may disconcert +your adversary. You ask: Have you read the <i>Wheels +of Chance</i>? The answer is "Yes." "Do you like it?" +"A little vulgar, I thought." And so forth. Most of this +is stereo. It is akin to responses in church, a prescription, +a formula. And, following out this line of thought, I +have had a vision of the twentieth century dinner. At a +distance it is very like the nineteenth century type; the +same bright light, the same pleasant deglutition, the same +hum of conversation; but, approaching, you discover each +diner has a little drum-shaped body under his chin—his +phonograph. So he dines and babbles at his ease. In +the smoking-room he substitutes his anecdote record. I +imagine, too, the suburban hostess meeting the new +maiden: "I hope, dear, you have brought a lot of conversation," +just as now she asks for the music. For my own +part, I must confess I find this dinner conversation particularly +a bother. If I could eat with my eye it would +be different.</p> + +<p>I lose a lot of friends through this conversational +difficulty. They think it is my dulness or my temper, +when really it is only my refined mind, my subtlety of +consideration. It seems to me that when I go to see a +man, I go to see him—to enjoy his presence. If he is my +friend, the sight of him healthy and happy is enough for +me. I don't want him to keep his vocal cords, and I +don't want to keep my own vocal cords, in incessant<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> +vibration all the time I am in his company. If I go to +see a man, it distracts me to have to talk and it distracts +me to hear him talking. I can't imagine why one should +not go and sit about in people's rooms, without bothering +them and without their bothering you to say all these +stereotyped things. Quietly go in, sit down, look at your +man until you have seen him enough, and then go. Why +not?</p> + +<p>Let me once more insist that this keeping up a conversation +is a sign of insecurity, of want of confidence. All +those who have had real friends know that when the +friendship is assured the gabble ceases. You are not at +the heart of your friend, if either of you cannot go off +comfortably to sleep in the other's presence. Speech was +given us to make known our needs, and for imprecation, +expostulation, and entreaty. This pitiful necessity we are +under, upon social occasions, to say something—however +inconsequent—is, I am assured, the very degradation of +speech.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> +<h3><a name="IN_A_LITERARY_HOUSEHOLD" id="IN_A_LITERARY_HOUSEHOLD"></a>IN A LITERARY HOUSEHOLD</h3> + + +<p>In the literary household of fiction and the drama, things +are usually in a distressing enough condition. The +husband, as you know, has a hacking cough, and the wife +a dying baby, and they write in the intervals of these cares +among the litter of the breakfast things. Occasionally a +comic, but sympathetic, servant brings in an armful—"heaped +up and brimming over"—of rejected MSS., for, +in the dramatic life, it never rains but it pours. Instead +of talking about editors in a bright and vigorous fashion, +as the recipients of rejections are wont, the husband +groans and covers his face with his hands, and the wife, +leaving the touching little story she is writing—she posts +this about 9 p.m., and it brings in a publisher and £100 +or so before 10.30—comforts him by flopping suddenly +over his shoulder. "Courage," she says, stroking his +hyacinthine locks (whereas all real literary men are more +or less grey or bald). Sometimes, as in <i>Our Flat</i>, comic +tradesmen interrupt the course of true literature with +their ignoble desire for cash payment, and sometimes, as +in <i>Our Boys</i>, uncles come and weep at the infinite +pathos of a bad breakfast egg. But it's always a very +sordid, dusty, lump-in-your-throaty affair, and no doubt it +conduces to mortality by deterring the young and impressionable +from literary vices. As for its truth, that is +another matter altogether.</p> + +<p>Yet it must not be really imagined that a literary +household is just like any other. There is the brass +paper-fastener, for instance. I have sometimes thought +that Euphemia married me with an eye to these conveniences. +She has two in her grey gloves, and one (with +the head inked) in her boot in the place of a button.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> +Others I suspect her of. Then she fastened the lamp +shade together with them, and tried one day to introduce +them instead of pearl buttons as efficient anchorage for +cuffs and collars. And she made a new handle for the +little drawer under the inkstand with one. Indeed, the +literary household is held together, so to speak, by paper-fasteners, +and how other people get along without them +we are at a loss to imagine.</p> + +<p>And another point, almost equally important, is that +the husband is generally messing about at home. That +is, indeed, to a superficial observer, one of the most +remarkable characteristics of the literary household. +Other husbands are cast out in the morning to raven for +income and return to a home that is swept and garnished +towards the end of the day; but the literary husband is +ever in possession. His work must not be disturbed +even when he is merely thinking. The study is consequently +a kind of domestic cordite factory, and you are +never certain when it may explode. The concussion of a +dust-pan and brush may set it going, the sweeping of a +carpet in the room upstairs. Then behold a haggard, +brain-weary man, fierce and dishevelled, and full of +shattered masterpiece—expostulating. Other houses +have their day of cleaning out this room, and their day +for cleaning out that; but in the literary household there +is one uniform date for all such functions, and that is +"to-morrow." So that Mrs. Mergles makes her purifying +raids with her heart in her mouth, and has acquired a +way of leaving the pail and brush, or whatever artillery +she has with her, in a manner that unavoidably engages +the infuriated brute's attention and so covers her retreat.</p> + +<p>It is a problem that has never been probably solved, +this discord of order and orderly literary work. Possibly +it might be done by making the literary person live +elsewhere or preventing literary persons from having +households. However it might be done, it is not done. +This is a thing innocent girls exposed to the surreptitious +proposals of literary men do not understand. They think +it will be very fine to have photographs of themselves and +their "cosy nooks" published in magazines, to illustrate<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> +the man's interviews, and the full horror of having this +feral creature always about the house, and scarcely ever +being able to do any little thing without his knowing it, +is not brought properly home to them until escape is +impossible.</p> + +<p>And then there is the taint of "copy" everywhere. +That is really the fundamental distinction. It is the +misfortune of literary people, that they have to write +about something. There is no reason, of course, why they +should, but the thing is so. Consequently, they are always +looking about them for something to write about. They +cannot take a pure-minded interest in anything in earth or +heaven. Their servant is no servant, but a character; +their cat is a possible reservoir of humorous observation; +they look out of window and see men as columns walking. +Even the sanctity of their own hearts, their self-respect, +their most private emotions are disregarded. The wife is +infected with the taint. Her private opinion of her +husband she makes into a short story—forgets its origin +and shows it him with pride—while the husband decants +his heart-beats into occasional verse and minor poetry. It +is amazing what a lot of latter-day literature consists of +such breaches of confidence. And not simply latter-day +literature.</p> + +<p>The visitor is fortunate who leaves no marketable +impression behind. The literary entertainers eye you +over, as if they were dealers in a slave mart, and speculate +on your uses. They try to think how you would do as a +scoundrel, and mark your little turns of phrase and kinks +of thought to that end. The innocent visitor bites his +cake and talks about theatres, while the meditative person +in the arm-chair may be in imagination stabbing him, or +starving him on a desert island, or even—horrible to tell!—flinging +him headlong into the arms of the young lady to +the right and "covering her face with a thousand passionate +kisses." A manuscript in the rough of Euphemia's, that +I recently suppressed, was an absolutely scandalous example +of this method of utilising one's acquaintances. +Mrs. Harborough, who was indeed Euphemia's most +confidential friend for six weeks and more, she had made<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> +to elope with Scrimgeour—as steady and honourable a +man as we know, though unpleasant to Euphemia on +account of his manner of holding his teacup. I believe +there really was something—quite harmless, of course—between +Mrs. Harborough and Scrimgeour, and that, +imparted in confidence, had been touched up with vivid +colour here and there and utilised freely. Scrimgeour is +represented as always holding teacups in his peculiar way, +so that anyone would recognise him at once. Euphemia calls +that character. Then Harborough, who is really on excellent +terms with his wife, and, in spite of his quiet manner, +a very generous and courageous fellow, is turned aside +from his headlong pursuit of the fugitives across +Wimbledon Common—they elope, by the bye, on Scrimgeour's +tandem bicycle—by the fear of being hit by a golf +ball. I pointed out to Euphemia that these things were +calculated to lose us friends, and she promises to destroy +the likeness; but I have no confidence in her promise. +She will probably clap a violent auburn wig on Mrs. +Harborough and make Scrimgeour squint and give +Harborough a big beard. The point that she won't grasp +is, that with that fatal facility for detail, which is one of +the most indisputable proofs of woman's intellectual inferiority, +she has reproduced endless remarks and mannerisms +of these excellent people with more than photographic +fidelity. But this is really a private trouble, though it +illustrates very well the shameless way in which those +who have the literary taint will bring to market their +most intimate affairs.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> +<h3><a name="ON_SCHOOLING_AND_THE_PHASES_OF_MR_SANDSOME" id="ON_SCHOOLING_AND_THE_PHASES_OF_MR_SANDSOME"></a>ON SCHOOLING AND THE PHASES OF MR. SANDSOME</h3> + + +<p>I do not know if you remember your "dates." Indeed, I +do not know if anyone does. My own memory is of a +bridge; like that bridge of Goldsmith's, standing firm and +clear on its hither piers and then passing into a cloud. +In the beginning of days was "William the Conqueror, +1066," and the path lay safe and open to Henry the +Second; then came Titanic forms of kings, advancing and +receding, elongating and dwindling, exchanging dates, +losing dates, stealing dates from battles and murders and +great enactments—even inventing dates, vacant years that +were really no dates at all. The things I have suffered—prisons, +scourgings, beating with rods, wild masters, in +bounds often, a hundred lines often, standing on forms +and holding out books often—on account of these dates! +I knew, and knew well before I was fifteen, what these +"heredity" babblers are only beginning to discover—that +the past is the curse of the present. But I never knew +my dates—never. And I marvel now that all little boys +do not grow up to be Republicans, seeing how much they +suffer for the mere memory of Kings.</p> + +<p>Then there were pedigrees, and principal parts and +conjugations, and county towns. Every county had a +county town, and it was always on a river. Mr. Sandsome +never allowed us a town without that colophon. I +remember in my early manhood going to Guildford on the +Wey, and trying to find that unobtrusive rivulet. I went +over the downs for miles. It is not only the Wey I have +had a difficulty in finding. There are certain verses—Heaven +help me, but I have forgotten them!—about "<i>i</i><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> +vel <i>e</i> dat" (<i>was</i> it dat?) "utrum malis"—if I remember +rightly—and all that about <i>amo, amas, amat</i>. There was +a multitude of such things I acquired, and they lie now, +in the remote box-rooms and lumber recesses of my mind, +a rusting armoury far gone in decay. I have never been +able to find a use for them. I wonder even now why Mr. +Sandsome equipped me with them. Yet he seemed to be +in deadly earnest about this learning, and I still go in +doubt. In those early days he impressed me, chiefly in +horizontal strips, with the profoundest respect for his +mental and physical superiority. I credited him then, +and still incline to believe he deserved to be credited, with +a sincere persuasion that unless I learnt these things I +should assuredly go—if I may be frank—to the devil. It +may be so. I may be living in a fool's paradise, prospering—like +that wicked man the Psalmist disliked. Some +unsuspected gulf may open, some undreamt-of danger +thrust itself through the phantasmagoria of the universe, +and I may learn too late the folly of forgetting my +declensions.</p> + +<p>I remember Mr. Sandsome chiefly as sitting at his desk, +in a little room full of boys, a humming hive whose air +was thick with dust, as the slanting sunbeams showed. +When we were not doing sums or writing copies, we were +always learning or saying lessons. In the early morning +Mr. Sandsome sat erect and bright, his face animated, +his ruddy eyes keen and observant, the cane hanging but +uncertainly upon its hook. There was a standing up of +classes, a babble of repetition, now and then a crisis. How +long the days were then! I have heard that scientific +people—Professor C. Darwin is their leader, unless I err—which +probably I do, for names and dates I have hated +from my youth up—say the days grow longer. Anyhow, +whoever says it, it is quite wrong. But as the lank hours +of that vast schooltime drawled on, Mr. Sandsome lost +energy, drooped like a flower,—especially if the day was +at all hot,—his sandy hair became dishevelled, justice +became nerveless, hectic, and hasty. Finally came copybooks; +and yawns and weird rumblings from Mr. Sandsome. +And so the world aged to the dinner-hour.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span></p> + +<p>When I had been home—it was a day school, for my +aunt, who had an appetite for such things, knew that +boarding-schools were sinks of iniquity—and returned, I +had Mr. Sandsome at another phase. He had dined—for +we were simple country folk. The figurative suggestions +of that "phase" are irresistible—the lunar quality. May +I say that Mr. Sandsome was at his full? We now stood +up, thirty odd of us altogether, to read, reading out of +books in a soothing monotone, and he sat with his reading-book +before him, ruddy as the setting sun, and slowly, +slowly settling down. But now and then he would jerk +back suddenly into staring wakefulness as though he were +fishing—with himself as bait—for schoolboy crimes in the +waters of oblivion—and fancied a nibble. That was a +dangerous time, full of anxiety. At last he went right +under and slept, and the reading grew cheerful, full of +quaint glosses and unexpected gaps, leaping playfully from +boy to boy, instead of travelling round with a proper +decorum. But it never ceased, and little Hurkley's silly +little squeak of a voice never broke in upon its mellow +flow. (It took a year for Hurkley's voice to break.) Any +such interruption and Mr. Sandsome woke up and into his +next phase forthwith—a disagreeable phase always, and +one we made it our business to postpone as long as +possible.</p> + +<p>During that final period, the last quarter, Mr. Sandsome +was distinctly malignant. It was hard to do right; +harder still to do wrong. A feverish energy usually +inspired our government. "Let us try to get some work +done," Mr. Sandsome would say—and I have even known +him teach things then. More frequently, with a needless +bitterness, he set us upon impossible tasks, demanding a +colossal tale of sums perhaps, scattering pens and paper +and sowing the horrors of bookkeeping, or chastising us +with the scorpions of parsing and translation. And even +in wintry weather the little room grew hot and stuffy, and +we terminated our schoolday, much exhausted, with minds +lax, lounging attitudes, and red ears. What became of +Mr. Sandsome after the giving-out of home-work, the +concluding prayer, and the aftermath of impositions, I do<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> +not know. I stuffed my books, such as came to hand—very +dirty they were inside, and very neat out with my +Aunt Charlotte's chintz covers—into my green baize bag, +and went forth from the mysteries of schooling into the +great world, up the broad white road that went slanting +over the Down.</p> + +<p>I say "the mysteries of schooling" deliberately. I +wondered then, I wonder still, what it was all for. Reading, +almost my only art, I learnt from Aunt Charlotte; a +certain facility in drawing I acquired at home and took to +school, to my own undoing. "Undoing," again, is deliberate—it +was no mere swish on the hand, gentle reader. +But the things I learnt, more or less partially, at school, +lie in my mind, like the "Sarsen" stones of Wiltshire—great, +disconnected, time-worn chunks amidst the natural +herbage of it. "The Rivers of the East Coast; the Tweed, +the Tyne, the Wear, the Tees, the Humber"—why is that, +for instance, sticking up among my ferns and wild flowers? +It is not only useless but misleading, for the Humber is +not another Tweed. I sometimes fancy the world may be +mad—yet that seems egotistical. The fact remains that +for the greater part of my young life Mr. Sandsome got an +appetite upon us from nine till twelve, and digested his +dinner, at first placidly and then with petulance, from two +until five—and we thirty odd boys were sent by our +twenty odd parents to act as a sort of chorus to his +physiology. And he was fed (as I judge) more than +sufficiently, clothed, sheltered, and esteemed on account of +this relation. I think, after all, there must have been +something in that schooling. I can't believe the world +mad. And I have forgotten it—or as good as forgotten it—all! +At times I feel a wild impulse to hunt up all those +chintz-covered books, and brush up my dates and +paradigms, before it is too late.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_POET_AND_THE_EMPORIUM" id="THE_POET_AND_THE_EMPORIUM"></a>THE POET AND THE EMPORIUM</h3> + + +<p>"I am beginning life," he said, with a sigh. "Great +Heavens! I have spent a day—<i>a day!</i>—in a shop. +Three bedroom suites and a sideboard are among the +unanticipated pledges of our affection. Have you lithia? +For a man of twelve limited editions this has been a +terrible day."</p> + +<p>I saw to his creature comforts. His tie was hanging +outside his waistcoat, and his complexion was like white +pasteboard that has got wet. "Courage," said I. "It +will not occur again——"</p> + +<p>"It will," said he. "We have to get there again tomorrow. +We have—what is it?—carpets, curtains——"</p> + +<p>He produced his tablets. I was amazed. Those +receptacles of choice thoughts!</p> + +<p>"The amber sunlight splashing through the leaky—leafy +interlacing green," he read. "No!—that's not it. +Ah, here! Curtains! Drawing-room—not to cost more +than thirty shillings! And there's all the Kitchen Hardware! +(Thanks.) Dining-room chairs—query—rush +bottoms? What's this? G.L.I.S.—ah! "Glistering +thro' deeps of glaucophane"—that's nothing. Mem. to see +can we afford Indian needlework chairs—57s. 6d.? It's +dreadful, Bellows!"</p> + +<p>He helped himself to a cigarette.</p> + +<p>"Find the salesman pleasant?" said I.</p> + +<p>"Delightful. Assumed I was a spendthrift millionaire +at first. Produced in an off-hand way an eighty-guinea +bedroom suite—we're trying to do the entire business, +you know, on about two hundred pounds. Well—that's +ten editions, you know. Came down, with evidently +dwindling respect, to things that were still ruinously<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> +expensive. I told him we wanted an idyll—love in a +cottage, and all that kind of thing. He brushed that on +one side, said idols were upstairs in the Japanese Department, +and that perhaps we might <i>do</i> with a servant's set +of bedroom furniture. Do with a set! He was a gloomy +man with (I should judge) some internal pain. I tried to +tell him that there was quite a lot of middle-class people +like myself in the country, people of limited or precarious +means, whose existence he seemed to ignore; assured him +some of them led quite beautiful lives. But he had no +ideas beyond wardrobes. I quite forgot the business of +shopping in an attempt to kindle a little human enthusiasm +in his heart. We were in a great vast place full of +wardrobes, with a remote glittering vista of brass bedsteads—skeleton +beds, you know—and I tried to inspire him +with some of the poetry of his emporium; tried to make +him imagine these beds and things going east and west, +north and south, to take sorrow, servitude, joy, worry, +failing strength, restless ambition in their impartial +embraces. He only turned round to Annie, and asked +her if she thought she could <i>do</i> with 'enamelled.' But I +was quite taken with my idea——Where is it? I left +Annie to settle with this misanthrope, amidst his raw +frameworks of the Homes of the Future."</p> + +<p>He fumbled with his tablets. "Mats for hall—not to +exceed 3s. 9d.... Kerbs ... inquire tiled hearth ... Ah! +Here we are: 'Ballade of the Bedroom Suite':—</p> + +<div class="blockquote"> +"'Noble the oak you are now displaying,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Subtly the hazel's grainings go,</span><br /> +Walnut's charm there is no gainsaying,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Red as red wine is your rosewood's glow;</span><br /> +Brave and brilliant the ash you show,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Rich your mahogany's hepatite shine,</span><br /> +Cool and sweet your enamel: But oh!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>Where are the wardrobes of Painted Pine?</i>'</span><br /> +</div> + +<p>"They have 'em in the catalogue at five guineas, with a +picture—quite as good they are as the more expensive +ones. To judge by the picture."</p> + +<p>"But that's scarcely the idea you started with," I +began.</p> + +<p>"Not; it went wrong—ballades often do. The pre<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span>occupation +of the 'Painted Pine' was too much for me. +What's this? 'N.B.—Sludge sells music stools at—' +No. Here we are (first half unwritten):—</p> + +<div class="blockquote"> +"'White enamelled, like driven snow,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Picked with just one delicate line.</span><br /> +Price you were saying is? Fourteen!—No!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>Where are the wardrobes of Painted Pine</i>?'</span> +</div> + +<p>"Comes round again, you see! Then <i>L'Envoy</i>:—</p> + +<div class="blockquote"> +"'Salesman, sad is the truth I trow:<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Winsome walnut can never be mine.</span><br /> +Poets are cheap. And their poetry. So<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>Where are the wardrobes of Painted Pine?</i>'</span> +</div> + +<p>"Prosaic! As all true poetry is, nowadays. But, how I +tired as the afternoon moved on! At first I was interested +in the shopman's amazing lack of imagination, and the +glory of that fond dream of mine—love in a cottage, you +know—still hung about me. I had ideas come—like that +Ballade—and every now and then Annie told me to write +notes. I think my last gleam of pleasure was in choosing +the drawing-room chairs. There is scope for fantasy in +chairs. Then——"</p> + +<p>He took some more whisky.</p> + +<p>"A kind of grey horror came upon me. I don't know +if I can describe it. We went through vast vistas of +chairs, of hall-tables, of machine-made pictures, of +curtains, huge wildernesses of carpets, and ever this cold, +unsympathetic shopman led us on, and ever and again +made us buy this or that. He had a perfectly grey eye—the +colour of an overcast sky in January—and he seemed +neither to hate us nor to detest us, but simply to despise +us, to feel such an overwhelming contempt for our petty +means and our petty lives, as an archangel might feel for +an apple-maggot. It made me think...."</p> + +<p>He lit a fresh cigarette.</p> + +<p>"I had a kind of vision. I do not know if you will +understand. The Warehouse of Life, with our Individual +Fate hurrying each of us through. Showing us with a +covert sneer all the good things that we cannot afford. A +magnificent Rosewood love affair, for instance, deep and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> +rich, fitted complete, some hours of perfect life, some acts +of perfect self-sacrifice, perfect self-devotion.... You ask +the price."</p> + +<p>He shrugged his shoulders.</p> + +<p>"Where are the wardrobes of Painted Pine?" I quoted.</p> + +<p>"That's it. All the things one might do, if the purse of +one's courage were not so shallow. If it wasn't for the +lack of that coinage, Bellows, every man might be +magnificent. There's heroism, there's such nobility as no +one has ever attained to, ready to hand. Anyone, if it +were not for this lack of means, might be a human god +in twenty-four hours.... You see the article. You +cannot buy it. No one buys it. It stands in the +emporium, I suppose, for show—on the chance of a +millionaire. And the shopman waves his hand to it on +your way to the Painted Pine.</p> + +<p>"Then you meet other couples and solitary people +going about, each with a gloomy salesman leading. The +run of them look uncomfortable; some are hot about the +ears and in the spiteful phase of ill-temper; all look sick +of the business except the raw new-comers. It's the only +time they will ever select any furniture, their first chance +and their last. Most of their selections are hurried a +little. The salesman must not be kept all day.... Yet +it goes hard with you if you buy your Object in Life and +find it just a 'special line' made to sell.... We're all +amateurs at living, just as we are all amateurs at +furnishing—or dying. Some of the poor devils one +meets carry tattered little scraps of paper, and fumble +conscientiously with stumpy pencils. It's a comfort to +see how you go, even if you do have to buy rubbish. 'If +we have <i>this</i> so good, dear, I don't know <i>how</i> we shall +manage in the kitchen,' says the careful housewife.... +So it is we do our shopping in the Great Emporium."</p> + +<p>"You will have to rewrite your Ballade," said I, "and +put all that in."</p> + +<p>"I wish I could," said the poet.</p> + +<p>"And while you were having these very fine moods?"</p> + +<p>"Annie and the shopman settled most of the furniture +between them. Perhaps it's just as well. I was never<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> +very good at the practical details of life.... Cigarette's +out! Have you any more matches?"</p> + +<p>"Horribly depressed you are!" I said.</p> + +<p>"There's to-morrow. Well, well...."</p> + +<p>And then he went off at a tangent to tell me what he +expected to make by his next volume of poems, and so +came to the congenial business of running down his +contemporaries, and became again the cheerful little Poet +that I know.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_LANGUAGE_OF_FLOWERS" id="THE_LANGUAGE_OF_FLOWERS"></a>THE LANGUAGE OF FLOWERS</h3> + + +<p>During the early Victorian revival of chivalry the +Language of Flowers had some considerable vogue. The +Romeo of the mutton-chop whiskers was expected to keep +this delicate symbolism in view, and even to display his +wit by some dainty conceits in it. An ignorance of the +code was fraught with innumerable dangers. A sprig of +lilac was a suggestion, a moss-rosebud pushed the matter, +was indeed evidence to go to court upon; and unless +Charlotte parried with white poplar—a by no means +accessible flower—or apricot blossom, or failing these +dabbed a cooling dock-leaf at the fellow, he was at her +with tulip, heliotrope, and honeysuckle, peach-blossom, +white jonquil, and pink, and a really overpowering and +suffocating host of attentions. I suppose he got at last +to three-cornered notes in the vernacular; and meanwhile +what could a poor girl do? There was no downright +"No!" in the language of flowers, nothing equivalent to +"Go away, please," no flower for "Idiot!" The only +possible defence was something in this way: "Your +cruelty causes me sorrow," "Your absence is a pleasure." +For this, according to the code of Mr. Thomas Miller +(third edition, 1841, with elegantly coloured plates) you +would have to get a sweet-pea blossom for Pleasure, +wormwood for Absence, and indicate Sorrow by the yew, +and Cruelty by the stinging-nettle. There is always a +little risk of mixing your predicates in this kind of communication, +and he might, for instance, read that his +Absence caused you Sorrow, but he could scarcely miss +the point of the stinging-nettle. That and the gorse +carefully concealed were about the only gleams of humour +possible in the language. But then it was the appointed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> +tongue of lovers, and while their sickness is upon them +they have neither humour nor wit.</p> + +<p>This Mr. Thomas Miller wrote abundant flowers of +language in his book, and the plates were coloured by +hand. By the bye, what a blessed thing colour-printing +is! These hand-tinted plates, to an imaginative person, +are about as distressing as any plates can very well be. +Whenever I look at these triumphs of art over the +beauties of nature, with all their weary dabs of crimson, +green, blue, and yellow, I think of wretched, anæmic girls +fading their youth away in some dismal attic over a +publisher's, toiling through the whole edition tint by tint, +and being mocked the while by Mr. Miller's alliterative +erotics. And they <i>are</i> erotics! In one place he writes, +"Beautiful art thou, O Broom! on the breezy bosom of +the bee-haunted heath"; and throughout he buds and +blossoms into similar delights. He wallows in doves and +coy toyings and modest blushes, and bowers and meads. +He always adds, "Wonderful boy!" to Chatterton's name +as if it were a university degree (W.B.), and he invariably +refers to Moore as the Bard of Erin, and to Milton as the +Bard of Paradise—though Bard of the Bottomless Pit +would be more appropriate. However, we are not concerned +with Mr. Miller's language so much as with a +very fruitful suggestion he throws out, that "it is surely +worth while to trace a resemblance between the flower +and the emblem it represents" (a turn like that is nothing +to Mr. Miller) "which shall at least have some show of +reason in it."</p> + +<p>Come to think of it, there is something singularly +unreasonable about almost all floral symbolism. There is +your forget-me-not, pink in the bud, and sapphire in the +flower, with a fruit that breaks up into four, the very +picture of inconstancy and discursiveness. Yet your lover, +with a singular blindness, presents this to his lady when +they part. Then the white water-lily is supposed to +represent purity of heart, and, mark you, it is white +without and its centre is all set about with innumerable +golden stamens, while in the middle lies, to quote the +words of that distinguished botanist, Mr. Oliver, "a fleshy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> +disc." Could there be a better type of sordid and +mercenary deliberation maintaining a fair appearance? +The tender apple-blossom, rather than Pretence, is surely +a reminder of Eden and the fall of love's devotion into +inflated worldliness. The poppy which flaunts its violent +colours athwart the bearded corn, and which frets and +withers like the Second Mrs. Tanqueray so soon as you +bring it to the shelter of a decent home, is made the +symbol of Repose. One might almost think Aimé Martin +and the other great authorities on this subject wrote in a +mood of irony.</p> + +<p>The daisy, too, presents you Innocence, "companion of +the milk-white lamb," Mr. Miller calls it. I am sorry for +the milk-white lamb. It was one of the earliest discoveries +of systematic botany that the daisy is a fraud, a complicated +impostor. <i>The daisy is not a flower at all.</i> It +is a favourite trap in botanical examinations, a snare for +artless young men entering the medical profession. Each +of the little yellow things in the centre of the daisy is +a flower in itself,—if you look at one with a lens you will +find it not unlike a cowslip flower,—and the white rays +outside are a great deal more than the petals they ought +to be if the Innocence theory is to hold good. There is +no such thing as an innocent flower; they are all so many +deliberate advertisements to catch the eye of the undecided +bee, but any flower almost is simpler than this +one. We would make it the emblem of artistic deception, +and the confidence trick expert should wear it as +his crest.</p> + +<p>The violet, again, is a greatly overrated exemplar. It +stimulates a certain bashfulness, hangs its head, and passed +as modest among our simple grandparents. Its special +merit is its perfume, and it pretends to wish to hide that +from every eye. But, withal, the fragrance is as far-reaching +as any I know. It droops ingenuously. "How <i>could</i> +you come to me," it seems to say, "when all these really +brilliant flowers invite you?" Mere fishing for compliments. +All the while it is being sweet, to the very best +of its undeniable ability. Then it comes, too, in early +spring, without a chaperon, and catches our hearts fresh<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> +before they are jaded with the crowded beauties of May. +A really modest flower would wait for the other flowers +to come first. A subtle affectation is surely a different +thing from modesty. The violet is simply artful, the +young widow among flowers, and to hold up such a flower +as an example is not doing one's duty by the young. For +true modesty commend me to the agave, which flowers +once only in half a hundred years, as one may see for +oneself at the Royal Botanical Gardens.</p> + +<p>Enough has been said to show what scope there is for +revision of this sentimental Volapuk. Mr. Martin himself +scarcely goes so far as I have done, though I have +merely worked out his suggestion. His only revolutionary +proposal is to displace the wind star by the "rathe primrose" +for Forsaken, on the strength of a quotation familiar +to every reader of Mason's little text-book on the English +language. For the rest he followed his authorities, and +has followed them now to the remote recesses of the +literary lumber-room and into the twopenny book-box. +From that receptacle one copy of him was disinterred +only a day or so ago; a hundred and seventy pages of +prose, chiefly alliterative, several coloured plates, enthusiastic +pencil-marking of a vanished somebody, and, +besides, an early Victorian flavour of dust and a dim +vision of a silent conversation in a sunlit flower garden—altogether +I think very cheap at twopence. The fashion +has changed altogether now. In these days we season +our love-making with talk about heredity, philanthropy, +and sanitation, and present one another with Fabian +publications instead of wild flowers. But in the end, I +fancy, the business comes to very much the same thing.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_LITERARY_REGIMEN" id="THE_LITERARY_REGIMEN"></a>THE LITERARY REGIMEN</h3> + + +<p>At the risk of offending the young beginner's illusions, he +must be reminded of one or two homely but important +facts bearing upon literary production. Homely as they +are, they explain much that is at first puzzling. This +perplexing question of distinction; the quality of being +somehow <i>fresh</i>—individual. Really it is a perfectly +simple matter. It is common knowledge that, after a +prolonged fast, the brain works in a feeble manner, the +current of one's thoughts is pallid and shallow, it is +difficult to fix the attention and impossible to mobilise +the full forces of the mind. On the other hand, immediately +after a sound meal, the brain feels massive, but +static. Tea is conducive to a gentle flow of pleasing +thoughts, and anyone who has taken Easton's syrup of +the hypophosphites will recall at once the state of cerebral +erethrism, of general mental alacrity, that followed on +a dose. Again, champagne (followed perhaps by a soupçon +of whisky) leads to a mood essentially humorous and +playful, while about three dozen oysters, taken fasting, +will in most cases produce a profound and even ominous +melancholy. One might enlarge further upon this topic, +on the brutalising influence of beer, the sedative quality +of lettuce, the stimulating consequences of curried chicken; +but enough has been said to point our argument. It is, +that such facts as this can surely indicate only one +conclusion, and that is the entire dependence of literary +qualities upon the diet of the writer.</p> + +<p>I may remind the reader, in confirmation of this +suggestion, of what is perhaps the most widely known +fact about Carlyle, that on one memorable occasion he +threw his breakfast out of the window. Why did he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> +throw his breakfast out of the window? Surely his +friends have cherished the story out of no petty love of +depreciatory detail? There are, however, those who +would have us believe it was mere childish petulance +at a chilly rasher or a hard-boiled egg. Such a supposition +is absurd. On the other hand, what is more natural than +an outburst of righteous indignation at the ruin of some +carefully studied climax of feeding? The thoughtful +literary beginner who is not altogether submerged in +foolish theories of inspiration and natural genius will, we +fancy, see pretty clearly that I am developing what is +perhaps after all the fundamental secret of literary +art.</p> + +<p>To come now to more explicit instructions. It is +imperative, if you wish to write with any power and +freshness at all, that you should utterly ruin your +digestion. Any literary person will confirm this statement. +At any cost the thing must be done, even if you +have to live on German sausage, onions, and cheese to do +it. So long as you turn all your dietary to flesh and +blood you will get no literature out of it. "We learn in +suffering what we teach in song." This is why men who +live at home with their mothers, or have their elder sisters +to see after them, never, by any chance, however great +their literary ambition may be, write anything but minor +poetry. They get their meals at regular hours, and done +to a turn, and that plays the very devil—if you will +pardon the phrase—with one's imagination.</p> + +<p>A careful study of the records of literary men in the +past, and a considerable knowledge of living authors, +suggests two chief ways of losing one's digestion and +engendering literary capacity. You go and live in humble +lodgings,—we could name dozens of prominent men who +have fed a great ambition in this way,—or you marry a +nice girl who does not understand housekeeping. The +former is the more efficacious method, because, as a rule, +the nice girl wants to come and sit on your knee all day, +and that is a great impediment to literary composition. +Belonging to a club—even a literary club—where you can +dine is absolute ruin to the literary beginner. Many a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> +bright young fellow, who has pushed his way, or has been +pushed by indiscreet friends, into the society of successful +literary men, has been spoilt by this fatal error, and he +has saved his stomach to lose his reputation.</p> + +<p>Having got rid of your digestion, then, the common +condition of all good literature, the next thing is to +arrange your dietary for the particular literary effect you +desire. And here we may point out the secrecy observed +in such matters by literary men. Stevenson fled to Samoa +to hide his extremely elaborate methods, and to keep his +kitchen servants out of the reach of bribery. Even Sir +Walter Besant, though he is fairly communicative to the +young aspirant, has dropped no hints of the plain, pure, +and wholesome menu he follows. Sala professed to eat +everything, but that was probably his badinage. Possibly +he had one staple, and took the rest as condiment. Then +what did Shakespeare live on? Bacon? And Mr. Barrie, +though he has written a delightful book about his pipe +and tobacco, full of suggestion to the young humorist, +lets out nothing or next to nothing of his meat and drink. +His hints about pipes are very extensively followed, and +nowadays every ambitious young pressman smokes in +public at least one well-burnt briar with an eccentric +stem—even at some personal inconvenience. But this +jealous reticence on the part of successful men—you +notice they never let even the interviewer see their +kitchens or the débris of a meal—necessarily throws one +back upon rumour and hypothesis in this matter. Mr. +Andrew Lang, for instance, is popularly associated with +salmon, but that is probably a wilful delusion. Excessive +salmon, far from engendering geniality, will be found in +practice a vague and melancholy diet, tending more +towards the magnificent despondency of Mr. Hall +Caine.</p> + +<p>Nor does Mr. Haggard feed entirely on raw meat. +Indeed, for lurid and somewhat pessimistic narrative, +there is nothing like the ordinary currant bun, eaten new +and in quantity. A light humorous style is best attained +by soda-water and dry biscuits, following café-noir. The +soda-water may be either Scotch or Irish as the taste<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> +inclines. For a florid, tawdry style the beginner must +take nothing but boiled water, stewed vegetables, and an +interest in the movements against vivisection, opium, +alcohol, tobacco, sarcophagy, and the male sex.</p> + +<p>For contributions to the leading reviews, boiled pork +and cabbage may be eaten, with bottled beer, followed +by apple dumpling. This effectually suppresses any +tendency to facetiousness, or what respectable English +people call <i>double entendre</i>, and brings you <i>en rapport</i> with +the serious people who read these publications. So soon +as you begin to feel wakeful and restless discontinue +writing. For what is vulgarly known as the <i>fin-de-siècle</i> +type of publication, on the other hand, one should limit +oneself to an aërated bread shop for a week or so, with +the exception of an occasional tea in a literary household. +All people fed mainly on scones become clever. And +this regimen, with an occasional debauch upon macaroons, +chocolate, and cheap champagne, and brisk daily walks +from Oxford Circus, through Regent Street, Piccadilly, +and the Green Park, to Westminster and back, should +result in an animated society satire.</p> + +<p>It is not known what Mr. Kipling takes to make him +so peculiar. Many of us would like to know. Possibly +it is something he picked up in the jungle—berries or +something. A friend who made a few tentative experiments +to this end turned out nothing beyond a will, and +that he dictated and left incomplete. (It was scarcely +on the lines of an ordinary will, being blasphemous, and +mentioning no property except his inside.) For short +stories of the detective type, strong cold tea and hard +biscuits are fruitful eating, while for a social science +novel one should take an abundance of boiled rice and +toast and water.</p> + +<p>However, these remarks are mainly by way of suggestion. +Every writer in the end, so soon as his digestion is +destroyed, must ascertain for himself the peculiar diet +that suits him best—that is, which disagrees with him +the most. If everything else fails he might try some +chemical food. "Jabber's Food for Authors," by the bye, +well advertised, and with portraits of literary men, in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> +their drawing-rooms, "Fed entirely on Jabber's Food," +with medical certificates of its unwholesomeness, and +favourable and expurgated reviews of works written on +it, ought to be a brilliant success among literary aspirants. +A small but sufficient quantity of arsenic might with +advantage be mixed in.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> +<h3><a name="HOUSE-HUNTING_AS_AN_OUTDOOR_AMUSEMENT" id="HOUSE-HUNTING_AS_AN_OUTDOOR_AMUSEMENT"></a>HOUSE-HUNTING AS AN OUTDOOR AMUSEMENT</h3> + + +<p>Since Adam and Eve went hand in hand out of the gates +of Paradise, the world has travailed under an infinite +succession of house-hunts. To-day in every eligible +suburb you may see New Adams and New Eves by the +score, with rusty keys and pink order-forms in hand, +wandering still, in search of the ideal home. To them +it is anything but an amusement. Most of these poor +pilgrims look simply tired, some are argumentative in +addition, but all are disappointed, anxious, and unhappy, +their hands dirty with prying among cisterns, and their +garments soiled from cellar walls. All, in the exaltation +of the wooing days, saw at least the indistinct reflection +of the perfect house, but now the Quest is irrevocably in +hand they seek and do not find. And such a momentous +question it is to them. Are they not choosing the background, +the air and the colour, as it were, of the next +three or four years, the cardinal years, too! of their lives?</p> + +<p>Perhaps the exquisite exasperation of the business for +the man who hunts among empty houses for a home is, +that it is so entirely a choice of second-hand, or at least +ready-made goods. To me, at least, there is a decided +suggestion of the dead body in your empty house that +has once been occupied. Here, like pale ghosts upon the +wall paper, are outlined the pictures of the departed +tenant; here are the nails of the invisible curtains, this +dent in the wall is all that is sensible of a vanished +piano. I could fancy all these things creeping back to +visibility as the light grew dim. Someone was irritable +in the house, perhaps, and a haunting fragrance of de<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span>parted +quarrels is to be found in the loose door-handles, +and the broken bell-pull. Then the blind in the bedroom +has a broken string. He was a beer-drinker, for the drip +of the tap has left its mark in the cellar; a careless man, +for this wall is a record of burst water-pipes; and rough +in his methods, as his emendation of the garden gate—a +remedy rather worse than the disease—shows. The mark +of this prepotent previous man is left on the house from +cellar to attic. It is his house really, not mine. And +against these haunting individualities set the horrible +wholesale flavour, the obvious dexterous builder's economies +of a new house. Yet, whatever your repulsion may be, +the end is always the same. After you have asked for +your ideal house a hundred times or so you begin to see +you do not get it. You go the way of your kind. All +houses are taken in despair.</p> + +<p>But such disgusts as this are for the man who really +aims at taking a house. The artist house-hunter knows +better than that. He hunts for the hunt's sake, and does +not mar his work with a purpose. Then house-hunting +becomes a really delightful employment, and one strangely +neglected in this country. I have heard, indeed, of old +ladies who enlivened the intervals of their devotions in +this manner, but to the general run of people the thing is +unknown. Yet a more entertaining way of spending a +half-holiday—having regard to current taste—it should +be difficult to imagine. An empty house is realistic +literature in the concrete, full of hints and allusions if a +little wanting in tangible humanity, and it outdoes the +modern story in its own line, by beginning as well as +ending in a note of interrogation. That it is not more +extensively followed I can only explain by supposing +that its merits are generally unsuspected. In which case +this book should set a fashion.</p> + +<p>One singular thing the house-hunter very speedily +discovers is, that the greater portion of the houses in this +country are owned by old gentlemen or old ladies who +live next door. After a certain age, and especially upon +retired tradespeople, house property, either alone or in +common with gardening, exercises an irresistible fascina<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span>tion. +You always know you are going to meet a landlord +or landlady of this type when you read on your order to +view, "Key next door but one." Calling next door but +one, you are joined after the lapse of a few minutes by a +bald, stout gentleman, or a lady of immemorial years, who +offers to go over "the property" with you. Apparently +the intervals between visits to view are spent in slumber, +and these old people come out refreshed and keen to +scrutinise their possible new neighbours. They will tell +you all about the last tenant, and about the present tenants +on either side, and about themselves, and how all the other +houses in the neighbourhood are damp, and how they +remember when the site of the house was a cornfield, and +what they do for their rheumatism. As one hears them +giving a most delightful vent to their loquacity, the artistic +house-hunter feels all the righteous self-applause of a +kindly deed. Sometimes they get extremely friendly. +One old gentleman—to whom anyone under forty must +have seemed puerile—presented the gentle writer with +three fine large green apples as a kind of earnest of his +treatment: apples, no doubt, of some little value, since +they excited the audible envy of several little boys before +they were disposed of.</p> + +<p>Sometimes the landlord has even superintended the +building of the house himself, and then it often has +peculiar distinctions—no coal cellar, or a tower with +turrets, or pillars of ornamental marble investing the +portico with disproportionate dignity. One old gentleman, +young as old gentlemen go, short of stature, of an +agreeable red colour, and with short iron-grey hair, had a +niche over the front door containing a piece of statuary. +It gave one the impression of the Venus of Milo in +chocolate pyjamas. "It was nood at first," said the landlord, +"but the neighbourhood is hardly educated up to +art, and objected. So I gave it that brown paint."</p> + +<p>On one expedition the artistic house-hunter was accompanied +by Euphemia. Then it was he found Hill Crest, a +vast edifice at the incredible rent of £40 a year, with +which a Megatherial key was identified. It took the two +of them, not to mention an umbrella, to turn this key.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> +The rent was a mystery, and while they were in the +house—a thunderstorm kept them there some time—they +tried to imagine the murder. From the top windows +they could see the roofs of the opposite houses in plan.</p> + +<p>"I wonder how long it would take to get to the top of +the house from the bottom?" said Euphemia.</p> + +<p>"Certainly longer than we could manage every day," +said the artistic house-hunter. "Fancy looking for my +pipe in all these rooms. Starting from the top bedroom +at the usual time, I suppose one would arrive downstairs +to breakfast about eleven, and then we should have to be +getting upstairs again by eight o'clock if we wanted any +night's rest worth having. Or we might double or treble +existence, live a Gargantuan life to match the house, make +our day of forty-eight hours instead of twenty-four. By +doubling everything we should not notice the hole it made +in our time getting about the place. Perhaps by making +dinner last twice as long, eating twice as much, and doing +everything on the scale of two to one, we might adapt +ourselves to our environment in time, grow twice as big."</p> + +<p>"<i>Then</i> we might be very comfortable here," said +Euphemia.</p> + +<p>They went downstairs again. By that time it was +thundering and raining heavily. The rooms were dark +and gloomy. The big side door, which would not shut +unless locked from the outside, swayed and banged as the +gusts of wind swept round the house. But they had a +good time in the front kitchen, playing cricket with an +umbrella and the agent's order crumpled into a ball. +Presently the artistic house-hunter lifted Euphemia on +to the tall dresser, and they sat there swinging their feet +patiently until the storm should leave off and release +them.</p> + +<p>"I should feel in this kitchen," said Euphemia, "like +one of my little dolls must have felt in the dolls'-house +kitchen I had once. The top of her head just reached the +level of the table. There were only four plates on the +dresser, but each was about half her height across——"</p> + +<p>"Your reminiscences are always entertaining," said the +artistic house-hunter; "still they fail to explain the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> +absorbing mystery of this house being to let at £40 a +year." The problem raised his curiosity, but though he +made inquiries he found no reason for the remarkably low +rent or the continued emptiness of the house. It was a +specimen puzzle for the house-hunter. A large house +with a garden of about half an acre, and with accommodation +for about six families, going begging for £40 a year. +Would it let at eighty? Some such problem, however, +turns up in every house-hunt, and it is these surprises +that give the sport its particular interest and delight. +Always provided the mind is not unsettled by any ulterior +notion of settling down.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> +<h3><a name="OF_BLADES_AND_BLADERY" id="OF_BLADES_AND_BLADERY"></a>OF BLADES AND BLADERY</h3> + + +<p>The Blade is not so much a culture as a temperament, and +Bladery—if the thing may have the name—a code of +sentiments rather than a ritual. It is the rococo school +of behaviour, the flamboyant gentleman, the gargoyle life. +The Blade is the tribute innocence pays to vice. He may +look like a devil and belong to a church. And the +clothing of the Blade, being symbolical, is a very important +part of him. It must show not only a certain tastiness, +but also decision in the accent, courage in the pattern, and +a Dudley Hardihood of outline. A Blade must needs +take the colour of his social standing, but all Blades have +the same essential qualities. And all Blades have this +quality, that they despise and contemn other Blades from +the top downward. (But where the bottommost Blade +comes no man can tell.)</p> + +<p>A well-bred Blade—though he be a duke—tends to +wear his hat tilted a little over the right eyebrow, and a +piece of hair is pulled coquettishly down just below the +brim. His collar is high, and a very large bow is worn +slightly askew. This may be either cream-coloured or +deep blue, with spots of white, or it may be red, or buff, +but not green, because of badinage. The Blade of the +middle class displays a fine gold watch-chain, and his jacket +and vest may be of a rough black cloth or blue serge. +The trousering may be of a suit with the jacket, or +tasteful, and the shoes must be long. The betting man, +adorned, is a perfect Blade. There is often a large and +ornamental stick, which is invariably carried head downwards. +And note, that the born Blade instinctively +avoids any narrowness of pose. In walking he thrusts +out his shoulders, elbows, and knees, and it is rather the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> +thing to dominate a sphere of influence beyond this by +swinging his stick. At first the beginner will find this +weapon a little apt to slip from the hand and cause +inconvenience to the general public; but he must not +mind that. After a few such misadventures he will +acquire dexterity.</p> + +<p>All Blades smoke—publicly at least. To smoke a +white meerschaum in the streets, however, is very inferior +form. The proper smoking is a briar, and, remember, it +is not smart to have a new pipe. So soon as he buys it, +the Blade takes his pipe home, puts it on a glowing fire +to burn the rim, scrapes this away, burns it again, and so +on until it looks a sullen desperado of a pipe—a pipe with +a wild past. Sometimes he cannot smoke a pipe. In +this case he may—for his stomach's sake—smoke a +cigarette. And, besides, there is something cynical about +a cigarette. For the very young Blade there are certain +makes of cigarette that burn well—they are mixed with +nitre—and these may be smoked by holding them in the +left hand and idly swinging them to and fro in the air. +If it were not for the public want of charity, I would +recommend a well-known brand. A Blade may always +escape a cigar by feigning a fastidious taste. "None of +your Cabanas" is rather good style.</p> + +<p>The Blade, it must be understood—especially by the +Blade's friends—spends his time in a whirl of dissipation. +That is the symbolism of the emphatic obliquity of the +costume. First, he drinks. The Blade at Harrow, according +to a reliable authority, drinks cherry brandy and even +champagne; other Blades consume whisky-and-soda; the +less costly kind of Blade does it on beer. And here the +beginner is often at a loss. Let us say he has looked up +the street and down, ascertained that there are no aunts +in the air, and then plunged into his first public-house. +How shall he ask for his liquor? "I will take a glass of +ale, if you please, Miss," seems tame for a Blade. It may +be useful to know a more suitable formula. Just at +present, we may assure the Blade neophyte, it is all the +rage to ask for "Two of swipes, ducky." Go in boldly, +bang down your money as loudly as possible, and shout<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> +that out at the top of your voice. If it is a barman, +though, you had better not say "ducky." The slang will, +we can assure him, prove extremely effective.</p> + +<p>Then the Blade gambles; but over the gambling of the +Blade it is well to draw a veil—a partially translucent +and coquettish veil, through which we can see the thing +dimly, and enhanced in its enormity. You must patronise +the Turf, of course, and have money on horses, or you are +no Blade at all, but a mere stick. The Harrow Blade has +his book on all the big races in the calendar; and the +great and noble game of Nap—are not Blades its worshippers +wherever the sun shines and a pack of cards is +obtainable? Baccarat, too. Many a glorious Blade has +lost his whole term's pocket-money at a single sitting at +that noble game. And the conversation of the Blade +must always be brilliant in the extreme, like the flashing +of steel in the sunlight. It is usually cynical and worldly, +sometimes horrible enough to make a governess shudder, +but always epigrammatic. Epigrams and neat comparisons +are much easier to make than is vulgarly supposed. +"Schoolmasters hang about the crops of knowledge like +dead crows about a field, examples and warnings to greedy +souls." "Marriage is the beginning of philosophy, and +the end is, 'Do not marry.'" "All women are constant, +but some discover mistakes." "One is generally repentant +when one is found out, and remorseful when one can't do +it again." A little practice, and this kind of thing may +be ground out almost without thinking. Occasionally, in +your conversation with ladies, you may let an oath slip. +(Better not let your aunt hear you.) Apologise humbly +at once, of course. But it will give them a glimpse of the +lurid splendour of your private life.</p> + +<p>And that brings us to the central thing of the Blade's +life, the eternal Feminine! Pity them, be a little sorry for +them—the poor souls cannot be Blades. They must e'en +sit and palpitate while the Blade flashes. The accomplished +Blade goes through life looking unspeakable wickedness +at everything feminine he meets, old and young, rich and +poor, one with another. He reeks with intrigue. Every +Blade has his secrets and mysteries in this matter—remorse<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> +even for crimes. You do not know all that his handsome +face may hide. Even he does not know. He may have +sat on piers and talked to shop-girls, kissed housemaids, +taken barmaids to music halls, conversed with painted +wickedness in public places—nothing is too much for him. +And oh! the reckless protestations of love he has made, +the broken promises, the broken hearts! Yet men must +be Blades, though women may weep; and every Blade +must take his barmaid to a music hall at least once, even +if she be taller than himself. Until then his manhood is +not assured.</p> + +<p>Just one hint in conclusion. A Blade who collects +stamps, or keeps tame rabbits, or eats sweets, oranges, or +apples in the streets, or calls names publicly after his +friends, is no Blade at all, but a boy still. So, with our +blessing, he swaggers on his way and is gone. A Don +Juan as fresh as spring, a rosebud desperado. May he +never come upon just cause for repentance!</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> +<h3><a name="OF_CLEVERNESS" id="OF_CLEVERNESS"></a>OF CLEVERNESS</h3> + +<p>ÀPROPOS OF ONE CRICHTON</p> + + +<p>Crichton is an extremely clever person—abnormally, +indeed almost unnaturally, so. He is not merely clever +at this or that, but clever all round; he gives you no +consolations. He goes about being needlessly brilliant. +He caps your jests and corrects your mistakes, and does +your special things over again in newer and smarter ways. +Any really well-bred man who presumed so far would at +least be plain or physically feeble, or unhappily married +by way of apology, but the idea of so much civility seems +never to have entered Crichton's head. He will come +into a room where we are jesting perhaps, and +immediately begin to flourish about less funny perhaps +but decidedly more brilliant jests, until at last we retire +one by one from the conversation and watch him with +savage, weary eyes over our pipes. He invariably beats +me at chess, invariably. People talk about him and ask +my opinion of him, and if I venture to criticise him they +begin to look as though they thought I was jealous. +Grossly favourable notices of his books and his pictures +crop up in the most unlikely places; indeed I have +almost given up newspapers on account of him. Yet, +after all——</p> + +<p>This cleverness is not everything. It never pleases +me, and I doubt sometimes if it pleases anyone. +Suppose you let off some clever little thing, a subtlety of +expression, a paradox, an allusive suggestive picture; +how does it affect ordinary people? Those who are less +clever than yourself, the unspecialised, unsophisticated +average people, are simply annoyed by the puzzle you set<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> +them; those who are cleverer find your cleverness mere +obvious stupidity; and your equals, your competitors in +cleverness, are naturally your deadly rivals. The fact is +this cleverness, after all, is merely egotism in its worst +and unwisest phase. It is an incontinence of brilliance, +graceless and aggressive, a glaring swagger. The drunken +helot of cleverness is the creature who goes about making +puns. A mere step above comes the epigram, the isolated +epigram framed and glazed. Then such impressionist art +as Crichton's pictures, mere puns in paint. What they +mean is nothing, they arrest a quiet decent-minded man +like myself with the same spasmodic disgust as a pun in +literature—the subject is a transparent excuse; they are +mere indecent and unedifying exhibitions of himself. He +thinks it is something superlative to do everything in a +startling way. He cannot even sign his name without +being offensive. He lacks altogether the fundamental +quality of a gentleman, the magnanimity to be commonplace. +I——</p> + +<p>On the score of personal dignity, why should a young +man of respectable antecedents and some natural capacity +stoop to this kind of thing? To be clever is the last +desperate resort of the feeble, it is the merit of the +ambitious slave. You cannot conquer <i>vi et armis</i>, you +cannot stomach a decent inferiority, so you resort to lively, +eccentric, and brain-wearying brilliance to ingratiate +yourself. The cleverest animal by far is the monkey, and +compare that creature's undignified activity with the +mountainous majesty of the elephant!</p> + +<p>And I cannot help thinking, too, that cleverness must +be the greatest obstacle a man can possibly have in his +way upward in the world. One never sees really clever +people in positions of trust, never widely influential or +deeply rooted. Look, for instance, at the Royal Academy, +at the Judges, at—— But there! The very idea of +cleverness is an all-round readiness and looseness that is +the very negation of stability.</p> + +<p>Whenever Crichton has been particularly exasperating, +getting himself appreciated in a new quarter, or rising +above his former successes, I find some consolation in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> +thinking of my Uncle Augustus. He was the glory of our +family. Even Aunt Charlotte's voice drooped a little in +the mention of his name. He was conspicuous for an +imposing and even colossal stupidity: he rose to eminence +through it, and, what is more, to wealth and influence. +He was as reliable, as unlikely to alter his precise position, +or do anything unexpected, as the Pyramids of Egypt. +I do not know any topic upon which he was not +absolutely uninformed, and his contributions to conversation, +delivered in that ringing baritone of his, +were appallingly dull. Often I have seen him utterly +flatten some cheerful clever person of the Crichton type +with one of his simple garden-roller remarks—plain, solid, +and heavy, which there was no possibility either of meeting +or avoiding. He was very successful in argument, and +yet he never fenced. He simply came down. It was, so +to speak, a case of small sword <i>versus</i> the avalanche. His +moral inertia was tremendous. He was never excited, +never anxious, never jaded; he was simply massive. +Cleverness broke upon him like shipping on an ironbound +coast. His monument is like him—a plain large obelisk +of coarse granite, unpretending in its simple ugliness and +prominent a mile off. Among the innumerable little +white sorrows of the cemetery it looks exactly as he used +to look among clever people.</p> + +<p>Depend upon it cleverness is the antithesis of greatness. +The British Empire, like the Roman, was built up by dull +men. It may be we shall be ruined by clever ones. +Imagine a regiment of lively and eccentric privates! +There never was a statesman yet who had not some +ballast of stupidity, and it seems to me that part at least +of the essentials of a genius is a certain divine dulness. +The people we used to call the masters—Shakespeare, +Raphael, Milton, and so forth—had a certain simplicity +Crichton lacks. They do not scintillate nearly so much +as he does, and they do not give that same uncomfortable +feeling of internal strain. Even Homer nods. +There are restful places in their work, broad meadows +of breezy flatness, calms. But Crichton has no Pacific +Ocean to mitigate his everlasting weary passage of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> +Cape Horn: it is all point and prominence, point and +prominence.</p> + +<p>No doubt this Crichton is having a certain vogue now, +but it cannot last. I wish him no evil, of course, but I +cannot help thinking he will presently have had his day. +This epoch of cleverness must be very near its last flare. +The last and the abiding thought of humanity is peace. +A dull man will presently be sought like the shadow of +a great rock in a thirsty land. Dulness will be the New +Genius. "Give us dull books," people will cry, "great +dull restful pictures. We are weary, very weary." This +hectic, restless, incessant phase in which we travail—<i>fin-de-siècle</i>, +"decadent," and all the rest of it—will pass +away. A chubby, sleepy literature, large in aim, colossal +in execution, rotund and tranquil will lift its head. And +this Crichton will become a classic, Messrs. Mudie will +sell surplus copies of his works at a reduction, and I shall +cease to be worried by his disgusting success. +</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_POSE_NOVEL" id="THE_POSE_NOVEL"></a>THE POSE NOVEL</h3> + + +<p>I watched the little spurts of flame jet out from between +the writhing pages of my manuscript, watched the sheets +coil up in their fiery anguish and start one from another. +I helped the fire to the very vitals of the mass by poking +the brittle heap, and at last the sacrifice was over, the +flames turned from pink to blue and died out, the red +glow gave place to black, little luminous red streaks coiled +across the charred sheets and vanished at the margins, +and only the ashes of my inspiration remained. The ink +was a lustrous black on the dull blackness of the burnt +paper. I could still read this much of my indiscretion +remaining, "He smiled at them all and said nothing."</p> + +<p>"Fool!" I said, and stirred the crackling mass into a +featureless heap of black scraps. Then with my chin on +my fists and elbows on knees I stared at the end of my +labours.</p> + +<p>I suppose, after all, there has been some profit out of +the thing. Satan finds some mischief still for idle hands +to do, and one may well thank Heaven it was only a +novel. Still, it means many days out of my life, and I +would be glad to find some positive benefit accruing. +Clearly, in the first place, I have eased my mind of some +execrable English. I am cleaner now by some dozen +faulty phrases that I committed and saw afterwards in all +the nakedness of typewriting. (Thank Heaven for typewriting! +Were it not for that, this thing had gone to +the scoffing of some publisher's reader, and another had +known my shame.) And I shall not write another pose +novel.</p> + +<p>I am inclined to think these pose novels the wild oats +of authorship. We sit down in the heyday of our youth<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> +to write the masterpiece. Obviously, it must be a novel +about a man and a woman, and something as splendid as +we can conceive of in that way. We look about us. We +do not go far for perfection. One of the brace holds the +pen and the other is inside his or her head; and so Off! +to the willing pen. Only a few years ago we went +slashing among the poppies with a walking-stick, and +were, we said boldly and openly, Harolds and Hectors +slaying our thousands. Now of course we are grown up +to self-respect, and must needs be a little disingenuous +about it. But as the story unfolds there is no mistaking +the likeness, in spite of the transfiguration. This bold, +decided man who performs such deeds of derring-do in +the noisome slum, knocks down the burly wife-beater, +rescues an unmistakable Miss Clapton from the knife of a +Lascar, and is all the while cultivating a virtuous consumption +that stretches him on an edifying, pathetic, and +altogether beautiful deathbed in the last chapter—— +My dear Authorling, cry my friends, we hear the squeak +of that little voice of yours in every word he utters. Is +<i>that</i> what you aspire to be, that twopence-coloured edition +of yourself? Heaven defend you from your desires!</p> + +<p>Yet there was a singular fascination in writing the +book; to be in anticipation my own sympathetic historian, +to joy with my joys yet to come, and sorrow with my +sorrows, to bear disaster like a man, and at last to close +my own dear eyes, and with a swelling heart write my +own epitaph. The pleasure remained with me until I +reached the end. How admirably I strutted in front of +myself! And I and the better self of me that was +flourishing about in the book—we pretended not to know +each other for what we were. He was myself with a wig +and a sham visiting card, and I owed it to myself to +respect my disguise. I made him with very red hair—my +hair is fairly dark—and shifted his university from +London to Cambridge. Clearly it could not be the same +person, I argued. But I endowed him with all the +treasures of myself; I made him say all the good things +I might have said had I thought of them opportunely, +and all the noble thoughts that occurred to me afterwards<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> +occurred to him at the time. He was myself—myself +at a premium, myself without any drawbacks, the quintessence +and culmination of me. And yet somehow when +he came back from the typewriter he seemed a bit of +an ass.</p> + +<p>Probably every tadpole author writes a pose novel—at +least I hope so for the sake of my self-respect. Most, +after my fashion, burn the thing, or benevolent publishers +lose it. It is an ill thing if by some accident the tadpole +tale survives the tadpole stage. The authoress does the +feminine equivalent, but I should judge either that she +did it more abundantly or else that she burned less. Has +she never swept past you with a scornful look, disdained +you in all the pride of her beauty, rippled laughter at +you, or amazed you with her artless girlishness? And +even after the early stages some of the trick may survive, +unless I read books with malice instead of charity. I +must confess, though, that I have a weakness for finding +mine author among his puppets. I conceive him always +taking the best parts, like an actor-manager or a little +boy playing with his sisters. I do not read many novels +with sincere belief, and I like to get such entertainment +from them as I can. So that these artless little self-revelations +are very sweet and precious to me among all +the lay figures, tragedy and comedy. Since the deception +is transparent I make the most of the transparency, and +love to see the clumsy fingers on the strings of the +marionettes. And this will be none the less pleasant now +that I have so narrowly escaped giving this entertainment +to others.</p> + +<p>I suppose this stage is a necessary one. We begin +with ignorance and the imagination, the material of the +pose novel. Later come self-knowledge, disappointments +and self-consciousness, and the prodigals of fiction stay +themselves upon the husks of epigram and cynicism, and +in the place of artless aspiration are indeed in plain black +and white very desperate characters. It is after all only +another pose—the pose of not posing. We, the common +clay of the world of letters, must needs write in this way, +because we cannot forget our foolish little selves in our<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> +work. But some few there are who sit as gods above +their private universes, and write without passion or +vanity. At least, so I have been told. These be the true +artists of letters, the white windows upon the truth of +things. We by comparison are but stained glass in our +own honour, and do but obstruct the view with our halos +and attitudes. Yet even Shakespeare, the critics tell us—and +they say they know—posed in the character of +Hamlet.</p> + +<p>After all, the pose novel method has at times attained +to the level of literature. Charlotte Brontë might possibly +have found no other topic had she disdained the plain +little woman with a shrewish tongue; and where had +Charles Kingsley been if the vision of a curate rampant +had not rejoiced his heart? Still, I am not sorry that +this novel is burned. Even now it was ridiculous, and +the time might have come when this book, full of high, +if foolish aims, and the vain vast promise of well-meaning +youth, had been too keen a reproach to be endured. Three +volumes of good intentions! It is too much. There was +more than a novel burning just now. After this I shall +be in a position to take a humorist's view of life.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_VETERAN_CRICKETER" id="THE_VETERAN_CRICKETER"></a>THE VETERAN CRICKETER</h3> + + +<p>My old cricketer was seized, he says, some score of years +ago now, by sciatica, clutched indeed about the loins thereby, +and forcibly withdrawn from the practice of the art; +since when a certain predisposition to a corpulent habit +has lacked its natural check of exercise, and a broadness +almost Dutch has won upon him. Were it not for this, +which renders his contours and his receding aspect unseemly, +he would be indeed a venerable-looking person, +having a profile worthy of a patriarch, tinged though it +may be with an unpatriarchal jollity, and a close curly +beard like that of King David. He lives by himself in +a small cottage outside the village—hating women with +an unaccountable detestation—and apparently earns a +precarious livelihood, and certainly the sincere aversion +of the country side, by umpiring in matches, and playing +whist and "Nap" with such as will not be so discreet and +economical as to bow before his superior merit.</p> + +<p>His neighbours do not like him, because he will not +take their cricket or their whist seriously, because he +will persist in offering counsel and the stimulus of his +gift of satire. All whist than his he avers is "Bumble-puppy." +His umpiring is pedagogic in tone; he fails to +see the contest in the game. To him, who has heard his +thousands roar as the bails of the best of All England went +spinning, these village matches are mere puerile exercises +to be corrected. His corrections, too, are Olympian, done, +as it were, in red ink, vivid, and without respect of +persons. Particularly he gibes. He never uses vulgar +bad language himself, but has a singular power of +engendering it in others. He has a word "gaby," which +he will sometimes enlarge to "stuppid gaby," the which,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> +flung neatly into a man who has just missed a catch, will +fill the same with a whirl of furious curses difficult to +restrain. And if perchance one should escape, my ancient +cricketer will be as startled as Cadmus at the crop he has +sown. And not only startled but pained at human wickedness +and the follies of a new generation. "Why can't +you play without swearing, Muster Gibbs?" he will say, +catching the whispered hope twenty yards away, and +proclaiming it to a censorious world. And so Gibbs, +our grocer and draper, and one made much of by the +vicar, is shamed before the whole parish, and damned even +as he desired.</p> + +<p>To our vicar, a well-meaning, earnest, and extremely +nervous man, he displays a methodical antagonism. Our +vicar is the worst of all possible rural vicars—unripe, a +glaring modern, no classical scholar, no lover of nature, +offensively young and yet not youthful, an indecent +politician. He was meant to labour amid Urban Myriads, +to deal with Social Evils, Home Rule, the Woman Question, +and the Reunion of Christendom, attend Conferences and +go with the <i>Weltgeist</i>—damn him!—wherever the <i>Weltgeist</i> +is going. He presents you jerkily—a tall lean man of +ascetic visage and ample garments, a soul clothed not so +much in a fleshy body as in black flaps that ever trail +behind its energy. Where they made him Heaven knows. +No university owns him. It may be he is a renegade +Dissenting minister, neither good Church nor wholesome +Nonconformity. Him my cricketer regards with malignant +respect. Respect he shows by a punctilious touching +of his hat brim, directed to the sacred office; all the +rest is malignity, and aimed at the man that fills it. +They come into contact on the cricket-field, and on the +committee of our reading-room. For our vicar, in spite +of a tendency to myopia, conceives it his duty to encourage +cricket by his participation. <i>Duty</i>—to encourage cricket! +So figure the scene to yourself. The sunlit green, and +a match in progress,—the ball has just snipped a stump +askew,—my ancient, leaning on a stout cabbage stick, and +with the light overcoat that is sacred to umpires upon +his arm.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span></p> + +<p>"<i>Out</i>, Billy Durgan," says he, and adds, <i>ex cathedrâ</i>, +"and one you ought to ha' hit for four."</p> + +<p>Then appears our vicar in semi-canonicals, worn "to +keep up his position," or some such folly, nervous about +the adjustment of his hat and his eyeglasses. He +approaches the pitch, smiling the while to show his +purely genial import and to anticipate and explain any +amateurish touches. He reaches the wicket and poses +himself, as the convenient book he has studied directs. +"You'll be caught, Muster Shackleforth, if you keep your +shoulder up like that," says the umpire. "Ya-a-ps! that's +worse!"—forgetting himself in his zeal for attitude. And +then a voice cries "Play!"</p> + +<p>The vicar swipes wildly, cuts the ball for two, and +returns to his wicket breathless but triumphant. Next +comes a bye, and then over. The misguided cleric, ever +pursuing a theory of foolish condescension to his betters +at the game, and to show there is no offence at the +"Yaaps," takes the opportunity, although panting, of +asking my ancient if his chicks—late threatened with +staggers—are doing well. What would he think if my +cricketer retaliated by asking, in the pause before the +sermon, how the vicarage pony took his last bolus? The +two men do not understand one another. My cricketer +waves the hens aside, and revenges himself, touching his +hat at intervals, by some offensively obvious remarks—as +to a mere beginner—about playing with a straight bat. +And the field sniggers none too furtively. I sympathise +with his malice. Cricket is an altogether too sacred thing +to him to be tampered with on merely religious grounds. +However, our vicar gets himself caught at the first +opportunity, and so being removed from my veteran's +immediate environment, to their common satisfaction, the +due ritual of the great game is resumed.</p> + +<p>My ancient cricketer abounds in reminiscence of the +glorious days that have gone for ever. He can still +recall the last echoes of the "throwing" controversy that +agitated Nyren, when over-arm bowling began, and though +he never played himself in a beaver hat, he can, he says, +recollect seeing matches so played. In those days every<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span>one +wore tall hats—the policeman, the milkman, workmen +of all sorts. Some people I fancy must have bathed in +them and gone to bed wearing them. He recalls the +Titans of that and the previous age, and particularly +delights in the legend of Noah Mann, who held it a light +thing to walk twenty miles from Northchapel to Hambledon +to practise every Tuesday afternoon, and wander back +after dark. He himself as a stripling would run a matter +of four miles, after a day's work in the garden where he +was employed, to attend an hour's practice over the downs +before the twilight made the balls invisible. And afterwards +came Teutonic revelry or wanderings under the +summer starlight, as the mood might take him. For +there was a vein of silent poetry in the youth of +this man.</p> + +<p>He hates your modern billiard-table pitch, and a batting +of dexterous snickery. He likes "character" in a +game, gigantic hitting forward, bowler-planned leg +catches, a cunning obliquity in a wicket that would send +the balls mysteriously askew. But dramatic breaks are +now a thing unknown in trade cricket. One legend of +his I doubt; he avers that once at Brighton, in a match +between Surrey and Sussex, he saw seven wickets bowled +by some such aid in two successive overs. I have never +been able to verify this. I believe that, as a matter of +fact, the thing has never occurred, but he tells it often +in a fine crescendo of surprise, and the refrain, "Out <span class="smcap">he</span> +came." His first beginning is a cheerful anecdote of a +crew of "young gentlemen" from Cambridge staying at +the big house, and a challenge to the rustic talent of +"me and Billy Hall," who "played a bit at that time," +"of me and Billy Hall" winning the pitch and going in +first, of a memorable if uncivil stand at the wickets +through a long hot afternoon, and a number of young +gentlemen from Cambridge painfully discovering local +talent by exhaustive fielding in the park, a duty they +honourably discharged.</p> + +<p>I am fond of my old cricketer, in spite of a certain +mendacious and malign element in him. His yarns of +gallant stands and unexpected turns of fortune, of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> +memorable hits and eccentric umpiring, albeit tending +sometimes incredibly to his glory, are full of the flavour +of days well spent, of bright mornings of play, sunlit +sprawlings beside the score tent, warmth, the flavour of +bitten grass stems, and the odour of crushed turf. One +seems to hear the clapping hands of village ancients, and +their ululations of delight. One thinks of stone jars with +cool drink swishing therein, of shouting victories and +memorable defeats, of eleven men in a drag, and tuneful +and altogether glorious home-comings by the light of +the moon. His were the Olympian days of the sport, +when noble squires were its patrons, and every village a +home and nursery of stalwart cricketers, before the epoch +of special trains, gate-money, star elevens, and the tumultuous +gathering of idle cads to jabber at a game they +cannot play.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> +<h3><a name="CONCERNING_A_CERTAIN_LADY" id="CONCERNING_A_CERTAIN_LADY"></a>CONCERNING A CERTAIN LADY</h3> + + +<p>This lady wears a blue serge suit and a black hat, without +flippancy; she is a powerfully built lady and generally +more or less flushed, and she is aunt, apparently, to a +great number of objectionable-looking people. I go in +terror of her. Yet the worm will turn at last, and so +will the mild, pacific literary man. Her last outrage was +too much even for my patience. It was committed at +Gloucester Road Station the other afternoon. I was +about to get into a train for Wimbledon,—and there are +only two of them to the hour,—and, so far as I could see, +the whole world was at peace with me. I felt perfectly +secure. The ægis of the <i>pax Britannica</i>—if you will +pardon the expression—was over me. For the moment +the thought of the lady in the blue serge was quite out +of my mind. I had just bought a newspaper, and had +my hand on the carriage door. The guard was fluttering +his flag.</p> + +<p>Then suddenly she swooped out of space, out of the +infinite unknown, and hit me. She always hits me when +she comes near me, and I infer she hits everyone she +comes across. She hit me this time in the chest with her +elbow and knocked me away from the door-handle. She +hit me very hard; indeed, she was as fierce as I have +ever known her. With her there were two nieces and a +nephew, and the nephew hit me too. He was a horrid +little boy in an Eton suit of the kind that they do not +wear at Eton, and he hit me with his head and pushed +at me with his little pink hands. The nieces might have +been about twenty-two and thirteen respectively, and I +infer that they were apprenticed to her. All four people +seemed madly excited. "It's just starting!" they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> +screamed, and the train was, indeed, slowly moving. +Their object—so far as they had an object and were not +animated by mere fury—appeared to be to assault me +and then escape in the train. The lady in blue got in +and then came backwards out again, sweeping the smaller +girl behind her upon the two others, who were engaged +in hustling me. "It's 'smoking!'" she cried. I could +have told her that, if she had asked instead of hitting me. +The elder girl, by backing dexterously upon me, knocked +my umbrella out of my hand, and when I stooped to pick +it up the little boy knocked my hat off. I will confess +they demoralised me with their archaic violence. I had +some thought of joining in their wild amuck, whooping, +kicking out madly, perhaps assaulting a porter,—I think +the lady in blue would have been surprised to find what +an effective addition to her staff she had picked up,—but +before I could collect my thoughts sufficiently to do any +definite thing the whole affair was over. A porter was +slamming doors on them, the train was running fast out +of the station, and I was left alone with an unmannerly +newsboy and an unmannerly porter on the platform. I +waited until the porter was out of the way, and then I +hit the newsboy for laughing at me, but even with that +altercation it was a tedious wait for the next train to +Wimbledon.</p> + +<p>This is the latest of my encounters with this lady, but +it has decided me to keep silence no longer. She has +been persecuting me now for years in all parts of London. +It may be I am her only victim, but, on the other hand, +she may be in the habit of annoying the entire class of +slender and inoffensive young men. If so, and they will +communicate with me through the publishers of this +little volume, we might do something towards suppressing +her, found an Anti-Energetic-Lady-League, or something +of that sort. For if there was ever a crying wrong that +clamoured for suppression it is this violent woman.</p> + +<p>She is, even now, flagrantly illegal. She might be +given in charge for hitting people at any time, and be +warned, or fined, or given a week. But somehow it is +only when she is overpast and I am recovering my wits<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> +that I recollect that she might be dealt with in this way. +She is the chartered libertine of British matrons, and +assaulteth where she listeth. The blows I have endured +from her? She fights people who are getting into 'buses. +It is no mere accidental jostling, but a deliberate +shouldering, poking with umbrellas, and clawing. It is +her delight to go to the Regent Circus corner of Piccadilly, +about half-past seven in the evening, accompanied by a +genteel rout of daughters, and fill up whole omnibuses +with them. At that hour there are work-girls and tired +clerks, and the like worn-out anæmic humanity trying to +get home for an hour or so of rest before bed, and they +crowd round the 'buses very eagerly. They are little +able to cope with her exuberant vitality, being ill-nourished +and tired from the day's work, and she simply mows +through them and fills up every vacant place they covet +before their eyes. Then, I can never count change even +when my mind is tranquil, and she knows that, and +swoops threateningly upon me in booking offices and +stationers' shops. When I am dodging cabs at crossings +she will appear from behind an omnibus or carriage and +butt into me furiously. She holds her umbrella in her +folded arms just as the Punch puppet does his staff, and +with as deadly effect. Sometimes she discards her +customary navy blue and puts on a glittering bonnet with +bead trimmings, and goes and hurts people who are +waiting to enter the pit at theatres, and especially to hurt +me. She is fond of public shows, because they afford +such possibilities of hurting me. Once I saw her standing +partly on a seat and partly on another lady in the church +of St. George's, Hanover Square, partly, indeed, watching +a bride cry, but chiefly, I expect, scheming how she could +get round to me and hurt me. Then there was an +occasion at the Academy when she was peculiarly +aggressive. I was sitting next my lame friend when she +marked me. Of course she came at once and sat right +upon us. "Come along, Jane," I heard her say, as I +struggled to draw my flattened remains from under her; +"this gentleman will make room."</p> + +<p>My friend was not so entangled and had escaped on the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> +other side. She noticed his walk. "Oh, don't <i>you</i> get +up," she said. "<i>This</i> gentleman," she indicated my +convulsive struggles to free myself, "will do that. <i>I did +not see that you were a cripple</i>."</p> + +<p>It may be some of my readers will recognise the lady +now. It can be—for the honour of womankind—only +one woman. She is an atavism, a survival of the age of +violence, a Palæolithic squaw in petticoats. I do not +know her name and address or I would publish it. I do +not care if she kills me the next time she meets me, for +the limits of endurance have been passed. If she kills +me I shall die a martyr in the cause of the Queen's peace. +And if it is only one woman, then it was the same lady, +more than half intoxicated, that I saw in the Whitechapel +Road cruelly ill-treating a little costermonger. If it was +not she it was certainly her sister, and I do not care who +knows it.</p> + +<p>What to do with her I do not know. A League, after +all, seems ineffectual; she would break up any League. I +have thought of giving her in charge for assault, but I +shrink from the invidious publicity of that. Still, I am +in grim earnest to do something. I think at times that +the compulsory adoption of a narrow doorway for churches +and places of public entertainment might be some protection +for quiet, inoffensive people. How she would +rage outside to be sure! Yet that seems a great undertaking.</p> + +<p>But this little paper is not so much a plan of campaign +as a preliminary defiance. Life is a doubtful boon while +one is never safe from assault, from hitting and shoving, +from poking with umbrellas, being sat upon, and used as +a target for projectile nephews and nieces. I warn her—possibly +with a certain quaver in my voice—that I am +in revolt. If she hits me again—— I will not say the +precise thing I will do, but I warn her, very solemnly and +deliberately, that she had better not hit me again.</p> + +<p>And so for the present the matter remains.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_SHOPMAN" id="THE_SHOPMAN"></a>THE SHOPMAN</h3> + + +<p>If I were really opulent, I would not go into a shop at all—I +would have a private secretary. If I were really +determined, Euphemia would do these things. As it is, +I find buying things in a shop the most exasperating of +all the many trying duties of life. I am sometimes +almost tempted to declare myself Adamite to escape it. +The way the shopman eyes you as you enter his den, the +very spread of his fingers, irritate me. "What can I have +the pleasure?" he says, bowing forward at me, and with +his eye on my chin—and so waits.</p> + +<p>Now I hate incomplete sentences, and confound his +pleasure! I don't go into a shop to give a shopman +pleasure. But your ordinary shopman must needs +pretend you delight and amuse him. I say, trying to +display my dislike as plainly as possible, "Gloves." +"Gloves, yessir," he says. Why should he? I suppose +he thinks I require to be confirmed in my persuasion that +I want gloves. "Calf—kid—dogskin?" How should <i>I</i> +know the technicalities of his traffic? "Ordinary gloves," +I say, disdaining his petty distinctions. "About what +price, sir?" he asks.</p> + +<p>Now that always maddens me. Why should I be +expected to know the price of gloves? I'm not a +commercial traveller nor a wholesale dealer, and I don't +look like one. Neither am I constitutionally parsimonious +nor petty. I am a literary man, unworldly, and I wear +long hair and a soft hat and a peculiar overcoat to indicate +the same to ordinary people. Why, I say, should I know +the price of gloves? I know they are some ordinary +price—elevenpence-halfpenny, or three-and-six, or seven-and-six, +or something—one of those prices that everything<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> +is sold at—but further I don't go. Perhaps I say elevenpence-halfpenny +at a venture.</p> + +<p>His face lights up with quiet malice. "Don't keep +them, sir," he says. I can tell by his expression that I +am ridiculously low, and so being snubbed. I think of +trying with three-and-six, or seven-and-six; the only +other probable prices for things that I know, except a +guinea and five pounds. Then I see the absurdity of the +business, and my anger comes surging up.</p> + +<p>"Look here!" I say, as bitterly as possible. "I don't +come here to play at Guessing Games. Never mind +your prices. I want some gloves. Get me some!"</p> + +<p>This cows him a little, but very little. "May I ask +your size, sir?" he says, a trifle more respectfully.</p> + +<p>One would think I spent all my time remembering the +size of my gloves. However, it is no good resenting it. +"It's either seven or nine," I say in a tired way.</p> + +<p>He just begins another question, and then he catches +my eye and stops and goes away to obtain some gloves, +and I get a breathing space. But why do they keep on +with this cross-examination? If I knew exactly what I +wanted—description, price, size—I should not go to a shop +at all, it would save me such a lot of trouble just to send +a cheque to the Stores. The only reason why I go into a +tradesman's shop is because I don't know what I want +exactly, am in doubt about the name or the size, or the +price, or the fashion, and want a specialist to help me. +The only reason for having shopmen instead of automatic +machines is that one requires help in buying things. +When I want gloves, the shopman ought to understand +his business sufficiently well to know better than I do +what particular kind of gloves I ought to be wearing, and +what is a fair price for them. I don't see why I should +teach him what is in fashion and what is not. A doctor +does not ask you what kind of operation you want and +what price you will pay for it. But I really believe +these outfitter people would let me run about London +wearing white cotton gloves and a plaid comforter without +lifting a finger to prevent me.</p> + +<p>And, by the bye, that reminds me of a scandalous trick<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> +these salesmen will play you. Sometimes they have not +the thing you want, and then they make you buy other +things. I happen to have, through no fault of my own, a +very small head, and consequently for one long summer I +wore a little boy's straw hat about London with the colours +of a Paddington Board School, simply because a rascal +outfitter hadn't my size in a proper kind of headgear, +and induced me to buy the thing by specious representations. +He must have known perfectly well it was not +what I ought to wear. It seems never to enter into a +shopman's code of honour that he ought to do his best for +his customer. Since that, however, I have noticed lots of +people about who have struck me in a new light as +triumphs of the salesman, masterpieces in the art of +incongruity; age in the garb of youth, corpulence put off +with the size called "slender men's"; unhappy, gentle, +quiet men with ties like oriflammes, breasts like a kingfisher's, +and cataclysmal trouser patterns. Even so, if the +shopkeeper had his will, should we all be. Those poor +withered maiden ladies, too, who fill us with a kind of +horror, with their juvenile curls, their girlish crudity of +colouring, their bonnets, giddy, tottering, hectic. It overcomes +me with remorse to think that I myself have +accused them of vanity and folly. It overcomes me with +pain to hear the thoughtless laugh aloud after them, in +the public ways. For they are simply short-sighted +trustful people, the myopic victims of the salesman +and saleswoman. The little children gibe at them, pelt +even.... And somewhere in the world a draper goes +unhung.</p> + +<p>However, the gloves are bought. I select a pair +haphazard, and he pretends to perceive they fit perfectly +by putting them over the back of my hand. I make him +assure me of the fit, and then buy the pair and proceed to +take my old ones off and put the new on grimly. If they +split or the fingers are too long—glovemakers have the +most erratic conceptions of the human finger—I have to +buy another pair.</p> + +<p>But the trouble only begins when you have bought your +thing. "Nothing more, sir?" he says. "Nothing," I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> +say. "Braces?" he says. "No, thank you," I say. "Collars, +cuffs?" He looks at mine swiftly but keenly, and with +an unendurable suspicion.</p> + +<p>He goes on, item after item. Am I in rags, that I +should endure this thing? And I get sick of my +everlasting "No, thank you"—the monotony shows up +so glaringly against his kaleidoscope variety. I feel all +the unutterable pettiness, the mean want of enterprise +of my poor little purchase compared with the catholic +fling he suggests. I feel angry with myself for being +thus played upon, furiously angry with him. "<i>No, no!</i>" +I say.</p> + +<p>"These tie-holders are new." He proceeds to show me +his infernal tie-holders. "They prevent the tie puckering," +he says with his eye on mine. It's no good. "How +much?" I say.</p> + +<p>This whets him to further outrage. "Look here, my +man!" I say at last, goaded to it, "I came here for gloves. +After endless difficulties I at last induced you to let me +have gloves. I have also been intimidated, by the most +shameful hints and insinuations, into buying that <i>beastly</i> +tie-holder. I'm not a child that I don't know my own +needs. Now <i>will</i> you let me go? How much do you +want?"</p> + +<p>That usually checks him.</p> + +<p>The above is a fair specimen of a shopman—a favourable +rendering. There are other things they do, but I simply +cannot write about them because it irritates me so to think +of them. One infuriating manœuvre is to correct your +pronunciation. Another is to make a terrible ado about +your name and address—even when it is quite a well-known +name.</p> + +<p>After I have bought things at a shop I am quite unfit +for social intercourse. I have to go home and fume. +There was a time when Euphemia would come and discuss +my purchase with a certain levity, but on one +occasion....</p> + +<p>Some day these shopmen will goad me too far. It's +almost my only consolation, indeed, to think what I am +going to do when I do break out. There is a salesman<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> +somewhere in the world, he going on his way and I on +mine, who will, I know, prove my last straw. It may be +he will read this—amused—recking little of the mysteries +of fate.... Is killing a salesman murder, like killing a +human being?</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_BOOK_OF_CURSES" id="THE_BOOK_OF_CURSES"></a>THE BOOK OF CURSES</h3> + + +<p>Professor Gargoyle, you must understand, has travelled +to and fro in the earth, culling flowers of speech: a kind +of recording angel he is, but without any sentimental +tears. To be plain, he studies swearing. His collection, +however, only approaches completeness in the western +departments of European language. Going eastward he +found such an appalling and tropical luxuriance of these +ornaments as to despair at last altogether of even a representative +selection. "They do not curse," he says, "at +door-handles, and shirt-studs, and such other trifles as will +draw down the meagre discharge of an Occidental, but +when they do begin——</p> + +<p>"I hired a promising-looking man at Calcutta, and after +a month or so refused to pay his wages. He was unable +to get at me with the big knife he carried, because the +door was locked, so he sat on his hams outside under the +verandah, from a quarter-past six in the morning until +nearly ten, cursing—cursing in one steady unbroken flow—an +astonishing spate of blasphemy. First he cursed my +family, from me along the female line back to Eve, and +then, having toyed with me personally for a little while, +he started off along the line of my possible posterity to +my remotest great-grandchildren. Then he cursed me by +this and that. My hand ached taking it down, he was +so very rich. It was a perfect anthology of Bengali +blasphemy—vivid, scorching, and variegated. Not two +alike. And then he turned about and dealt with different +parts of me. I was really very fortunate in him. Yet +it was depressing to think that all this was from one +man, and that there are six hundred million people in +Asia." +</p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> +<p>"Naturally," said the Professor in answer to my question, +"these investigations involve a certain element of danger. +The first condition of curse-collecting is to be unpopular, +especially in the East, where comminatory swearing alone +is practised, and you have to offend a man very grievously +to get him to disgorge his treasure. In this country, +except among ladies in comparatively humble circumstances, +anything like this fluent, explicit, detailed, and +sincere cursing, aimed, missile-fashion, at a personal +enemy, is not found. It was quite common a few +centuries ago; indeed, in the Middle Ages it was part of +the recognised procedure. Aggrieved parties would issue +a father's curse, an orphan's curse, and so forth, much as +we should take out a county court summons. And it +played a large part in ecclesiastical policy too. At one +time the entire Church militant here on earth was +swearing in unison, and the Latin tongue, at the Republic +of Venice—a very splendid and imposing spectacle. It +seems to me a pity to let these old customs die out so +completely. I estimate that more than half these Gothic +forms have altogether passed out of memory. There must +have been some splendid things in Erse and Gaelic too; +for the Celtic mind, with its more vivid sense of colour, +its quicker transitions, and deeper emotional quality, has +ever over-cursed the stolid Teuton. But it is all getting +forgotten.</p> + +<p>"Indeed, your common Englishman now scarcely curses +at all. A more colourless and conventional affair than +what in England is called swearing one can scarcely +imagine. It is just common talk, with some half-dozen +orthodox bad words dropped in here and there in the +most foolish and illogical manner. Fancy having orthodox +unorthodox words! I remember one day getting into a +third-class smoking carriage on the Metropolitan Railway +about one o'clock, and finding it full of rough working men. +Everything they said was seasoned with one incredibly +stupid adjective, and no doubt they thought they were +very desperate characters. At last I asked them not to +say that word again. One forthwith asked me 'What +the ——'—I really cannot quote these puerilities—'what<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> +the idiotic <i>cliché</i> that mattered to me?' So I looked at +him quietly over my glasses, and I began. It was a +revelation to these poor fellows. They sat open-mouthed, +gasping. Then those that were nearest me began to edge +away, and at the very next station they all bundled out +of the carriage before the train stopped, as though I had +some infectious disease. And the thing was just a rough +imperfect rendering of some mere commonplaces, passing +the time of day as it were, with which the heathen of +Aleppo used to favour the servants of the American +missionary. Indeed," said Professor Gargoyle, "if it were +not for women there would be nothing in England that +one could speak of as swearing at all."</p> + +<p>"I say," said I, "is not that rather rough on the +ladies?"</p> + +<p>"Not at all; they have agreed to consider certain +words, for no very good reason, bad words. It is a pure +convention; it has little or nothing to do with the actual +meaning, because for every one of these bad words there +is a paraphrase or synonym considered to be quite suitable +for polite ears. Hence the feeblest creature can always +produce a sensation by breaking the taboo. But women +are learning how to undo this error of theirs now. The +word 'damn,' for instance, is, I hear, being admitted freely +into the boudoir and feminine conversation; it is even +considered a rather prudish thing to object to this word. +Now, men, especially feeble men, hate doing things that +women do. As a consequence, men who go about saying +'damn' are now regarded by their fellow-men as only a +shade less effeminate than those who go about saying 'nasty' +and 'horrid.' The subtler sex will not be long in noticing +what has happened to this objectionable word. When +they do they will, of course, forthwith take up all the others. +It will be a little startling perhaps at first, but in the end +there will be no swearing left. I have no doubt there +will be those who will air their petty wit on the pioneer +women, but where a martyr is wanted a woman can +always be found to offer herself. She will clothe herself +in cursing, like the ungodly, and perish in that Nessus +shirt, a martyr to pure language. And then this dull cad<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> +swearing—a mere unnecessary affectation of coarseness—will +disappear. And a very good job too.</p> + +<p>"There is a pretty department of the subject which I +might call grace swearing. 'Od's fish,' cried the king, +when he saw the man climbing Salisbury spire; 'he shall +have a patent for it—no one else shall do it.' One might +call such little things Wardour Street curses. 'Od's +bodkins' is a ladylike form, and 'Od's possles' a variety +I met in the British Museum. Every gentleman once +upon a time aspired to have his own particular grace +curse, just as he liked to have his crest, and his bookplate, +and his characteristic signature. It fluttered +pleasantly into his conversation, as Mr. Whistler's butterfly +comes into his pictures—a signature and a delight. +'Od's butterfly!' I have sometimes thought of a little +book of grace-words and heraldic curses, printed with +wide margins on the best of paper. Its covers should be +of soft red leather, stamped with little gold flowers. It +might be made a birthday book, or a pocket diary—'Daily +Invocations.'</p> + +<p>"Coming back to wrathy swearing, I must confess I +am sorry to see it decay. It was such a thoroughly +hygienic and moral practice. You see, if anything +annoying happens to a man, or if any powerful emotion +seizes him, his brain under the irritation begins to disengage +energy at a tremendous rate. He has to use all +his available force of control in keeping the energy in. +Some of it will leak away into the nerves of his face and +distort his features, some may set his tear-glands at work, +some may travel down his vagus nerve and inhibit his +heart's action so that he faints, or upset the blood-vessels +in his head and give him a stroke. Or if he pens it up, +without its reaching any of these vents, it may rise at last +to flood-level, and you will have violent assaults, the +breaking of furniture, 'murther' even. For all this +energy a good flamboyant, ranting swear is Nature's outlet. +All primitive men and most animals swear. It is an +emotional shunt. Your cat swears at you because she +does not want to scratch your face. And the horse, +because he cannot swear, drops dead. So you see my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> +reason for regretting the decay of this excellent and most +wholesome practice....</p> + +<p>"However, I must be getting on. Just now I am +travelling about London paying cabmen their legal fares. +Sometimes one picks up a new variant, though much of +it is merely stereo."</p> + +<p>And with that, flinging a playful curse at me, he disappeared +at once into the tobacco smoke from which I +had engendered him. An amusing and cheerful person +on the whole, though I will admit his theme was a little +undesirable.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> +<h3><a name="DUNSTONES_DEAR_LADY" id="DUNSTONES_DEAR_LADY"></a>DUNSTONE'S DEAR LADY</h3> + + +<p>The story of Dunstone is so slight, so trivial in its +cardinal incidents, such a business of cheap feathers and +bits of ribbon on the surface, that I should hesitate to tell +it, were it not for its Inwardness, what one might call the +symbolism of the thing. Frankly, I do not clearly see +what that symbolism is, but I feel it hovering in some +indefinable way whenever I recall his case. It is one of +those things that make a man extend his arm and twiddle +his fingers, and say, blinking, "Like <i>that</i>, you know." So +do not imagine for one moment that this is a shallow +story, simply because it is painted, so to speak, not in +heart's blood but in table claret.</p> + +<p>Dunstone was a strong, quiet kind of man—a man of +conspicuous mediocrity, and rising rapidly, therefore, in +his profession. He was immensely industrious, and a +little given to melancholia in private life. He smoked +rather too many cigars, and took his social occasions +seriously. He dressed faultlessly, with a scrupulous +elimination of style. Unlike Mr. Grant Allen's ideal man, +he was not constitutionally a lover; indeed, he seemed +not to like the ordinary girl at all—found her either too +clever or too shallow, lacking a something. I don't think +<i>he</i> knew quite what it was. Neither do I—it is a case for +extended hand and twiddling fingers. Moreover, I don't +think the ordinary girl took to Dunstone very much.</p> + +<p>He suffered, I fancy, from a kind of mental greyness; +he was all subtle tones; the laughter of girls jarred upon +him; foolish smartness or amiable foolishness got on his +nerves; he detested, with equal sincerity, bright dressing, +artistic dabbling, piety, and the glow of health. And +when, as his confidential friend—confidential, that is, so<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> +far as his limits allowed—I heard that he intended to +marry, I was really very much surprised.</p> + +<p>I expected something quintessential; I was surprised +to find she was a visiting governess. Harringay, the +artist, thought there was nothing in her, but Sackbut, the +art critic, was inclined to admire her bones. For my own +part, I took rather a liking to her. She was small and +thin, and, to be frank, I think it was because she hardly +got enough to eat—of the delicate food she needed. She +was shabby, too, dressed in rusty mourning—she had +recently lost her mother. But she had a sweet, low voice, +a shrinking manner, rather a graceful carriage, I thought, +and, though she spoke rarely, all she said was sweet and +sane. She struck me as a refined woman in a blatant age. +The general effect of her upon me was favourable; upon +Dunstone it was tremendous. He lost a considerable +proportion of his melancholia, and raved at times like a +common man. He called her in particular his "Dear +Lady" and his "Sweet Lady," things that I find eloquent of +what he found in her. What that was I fancy I understand, +and yet I cannot say it quite. One has to resort to +the extended arm and fingers vibratile.</p> + +<p>Before he married her—which he did while she was still +in half-mourning—there was anxiety about her health, +and I understood she needed air and exercise and strengthening +food. But she recovered rapidly after her marriage, +her eyes grew brighter, we saw less of Sackbut's "delicious +skeleton." And then, in the strangest way, she began to +change. It is none of my imagining; I have heard the +change remarked upon by half a dozen independent +observers. Yet you would think a girl of three-and-twenty +(as she certainly was) had attained her development +as a woman. I have heard her compared to a winter +bud, cased in its sombre scales, until the sun shone, and +the warm, moist winds began to blow. I noticed first +that the delicate outline of her cheek was filling, and +then came the time when she reverted to colour in her +dress.</p> + +<p>Her first essays were charitably received. Her years of +struggle, her year of mourning, had no doubt dwarfed her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span> +powers in this direction; presently her natural good taste +would reassert itself. But the next effort and the next +were harder to explain. It was not the note of nervousness +or inexperience we saw; there was an undeniable +decision, and not a token of shame. The little black +winter bud grew warm-coloured above, and burst suddenly +into extravagant outlines and chromatic confusion. +Harringay, who is a cad, first put what we were all feeling +into words. "I've just seen Dunstone and his donah," he +said. Clearly she was one of those rare women who +cannot dress. And that was not all. A certain +buoyancy, hitherto unsuspected, crept into her manner, as +the corpuscles multiplied in her veins—an archness. She +talked more, and threw up a spray of playfulness. And, +with a growing energy, she began to revise the exquisite +æsthetic balance of Dunstone's house. She even enamelled +a chair.</p> + +<p>For a year or so I was in the East. When I returned +Mrs. Dunstone amazed me. In some odd way she had +grown, she had positively grown. She was taller, broader, +brighter—infinitely brighter. She wore a diamond brooch +in the afternoon. The "delicious skeleton" had vanished +in plumpness. She moved with emphasis. Her eye—which +glittered—met mine bravely, and she talked as one +who would be heard. In the old days you saw nothing +but a rare timid glance from under the pretty lids. She +talked now of this and that, of people of "good family," +and the difficulty of getting a suitable governess for her +little boy. She said she objected to meeting people "one +would not care to invite to one's house." She swamped +me with tea and ruled the conversation, so that Dunstone +and I, who were once old friends, talked civil twaddle for +the space of one hour—theatres, concerts, and assemblies +chiefly—and then parted again. The furniture had all +been altered—there were two "cosy nooks" in the room +after the recipe in the <i>Born Lady</i>. It was plain to me, it +is plain to everyone, I find, that Mrs. Dunstone is, in the +sun of prosperity, rapidly developing an extremely florid +vulgarity. And afterwards I discovered that she had +forgotten her music, and evidently enjoyed her meals. Yet<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> +I for one can witness that five years ago there was <i>that</i> +about her—I can only extend my arm with quivering +digits. But it was something very sweet and dainty, +something that made her white and thoughtful, and +marked her off from the rest of womankind. I sometimes +fancy it may have been anæmia in part, but it was +certainly poverty and mourning in the main.</p> + +<p>You may think that this is a story of disillusionment. +When I first heard the story, I thought so too. But, so +far as Dunstone goes, that is not the case. It is rare that +I see him now, but the other day we smoked two cigars +apiece together. And in a moment of confidence he +spoke of her. He said how anxious he felt for her health, +called her his "Dainty Little Lady," and spoke of the +coarseness of other women. I am afraid this is not a +very eventful story, and yet there is <i>that</i>—— That very +convenient gesture, an arm protruded and flickering +fingers, conveys my meaning best. Perhaps you will +understand.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> +<h3><a name="EUPHEMIAS_NEW_ENTERTAINMENT" id="EUPHEMIAS_NEW_ENTERTAINMENT"></a>EUPHEMIA'S NEW ENTERTAINMENT</h3> + + +<p>Euphemia has great ideas of putting people at their ease, +a thousand little devices for thawing the very stiffest +among them with a home-like glow. Far be it from me +to sing her praises, but I must admit that at times she is +extremely successful in this—at times almost too +successful. That tea-cake business, for instance. No +doubt it's a genial expedient to make your guests toast +his own tea-cake: down he must go upon his knees upon +your hearthrug, and his poses will melt away like the +dews of the morning before the rising sun. Nevertheless, +when it comes to roasting a gallant veteran like Major +Augustus, deliberately roasting him, in spite of the facts +that he has served his country nobly through thirty +irksome years of peace, and that he admires Euphemia +with a delicate fervour—roasting him, I say, alive, as if +he were a Strasburg goose, or suddenly affixing a delicate +young genius to the hither end of a toasting-fork while +he is in the midst of a really very subtle and tender +conversation, the limits of social warmth seem to be +approaching dangerously near. However, this scarcely +concerns Euphemia's new entertainment.</p> + +<p>This new entertainment is modelling in clay. Euphemia +tells me it is to be quite the common thing this winter. It +is intended especially for the evening, after a little dinner. +As the reader is aware, the evening after a little dinner +is apt to pall. A certain placid contentment creeps over +people. I don't know in what organ originality resides; +but it's a curious thing, and one I must leave to the +consideration of psychologists, that people's output of +original remarks appears to be obstructed in some way +after these gastronomic exercises. Then a little dinner<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> +always confirms my theory of the absurdity of polygonal +conversation. Music and songs, too, have their drawbacks, +especially gay songs; they invariably evoke a vaporous +melancholy. Card-playing Euphemia objects to because +her uncle, the dean, is prominent in connection with some +ridiculous association for the suppression of gambling; +and in what are called "games" no rational creature +esteeming himself an immortal soul would participate. In +this difficulty it was that Euphemia—decided, I fancy, by +the possession of certain really very becoming aprons—took +up this business of clay-modelling.</p> + +<p>You have a lump of greyish clay and a saucer of water +and certain small tools of wood (for which I cannot +discover the slightest use in the world) given you, and +Euphemia puts on a very winning bib. Then, moistening +the clay until it acquires sufficient plasticity, and +incidentally splashing your cuffs and coat-sleeves with an +agreeably light tinted mud, you set to work. At first +people are a little disgusted at the apparent dirtiness of +the employment, and also perhaps rather diffident. The +eldest lady says weakly deprecatory things, and the +feeblest male is jocular after his wont. But it is remarkable +how soon the charm of this delightful occupation +seizes hold of you. For really the sensations of moulding +this plastic matter into shape are wonderfully and quite +unaccountably pleasing. It is ever so much easier than +drawing things—"anyone can do it," as the advertisement +people say—and the work is so much more substantial in +its effects. Technical questions arise. In moulding +a head, do you take a lump and fine it down, or do +you dab on the features after the main knob of it is +shaped?</p> + +<p>So soon as your guests realise the plastic possibilities +before them, a great silence, a delicious absorption comes +over them. Some rash person states that he is moulding +an Apollo, or a vase, or a bust of Mr. Gladstone, or an +elephant, or some such animal. The wiser ones go to +work in a speculative spirit, aiming secretly at this +perhaps, but quite willing to go on with that, if Providence +so wills it. Buddhas are good subjects; there is a certain<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> +genial rotundity not difficult to attain, and the pyramidal +build of the idol is well suited to the material. You can +start a Buddha, and hedge to make it a loaf of bread if +the features are unsatisfactory. For slender objects a +skeletal substructure of bent hairpins or matches is +advisable. The innate egotism of the human animal +becomes very conspicuous. "His tail is too large," says +the lady with the fish, in self-criticism. "I haven't put +his tail on yet—that's his trunk," answers the young man +with the elephant.</p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="./images/img-096.png" width="550" height="297" +title="Clay Models" alt="Clay Models" /> +</div> + +<p>It's a pretty sight to see the first awakening of the +artistic passion in your guests—the flush of discovery, the +glow of innocent pride as the familiar features of Mr. +Gladstone emerge from the bust of Clytie. An accidental +stroke of the thumbnail develops new marvels of +expression. (By the bye, it's just as well to forbid +deliberate attempts at portraiture.) And I know no more +becoming expression for everyone than the look of intent +and pleasing effort—a divine touch almost—that comes +over the common man modelling. For my own part, I +feel a being infinitely my own superior when I get my +fingers upon the clay. And, incidentally, how much +pleasanter this is than writing articles—to see the work +grow altogether under your hands; to begin with the large +masses and finish with the details, as every artist should! +Just to show how easy the whole thing is, I append a little +sketch of the first work I ever did. I had had positively<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> +no previous instruction. Unfortunately the left ear of the +animal—a cat, by the bye—has fallen off. (The figure to +the left is the back view of a Buddha.)</p> + +<p>However, I have said enough to show the charm of the +new amusement. It will prove a boon to many a troubled +hostess. The material is called modelling-clay, and one +may buy it of any dealer in artists' materials, several +pounds for sixpence. This has to be renewed at intervals, +as a good deal is taken away by the more careless among +your guests upon their clothes.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> +<h3><a name="FOR_FREEDOM_OF_SPELLING" id="FOR_FREEDOM_OF_SPELLING"></a>FOR FREEDOM OF SPELLING</h3> + +<p>THE DISCOVERY OF AN ART</p> + + +<p>It is curious that people do not grumble more at having +to spell correctly. Yet one may ask, Do we not a little +over-estimate the value of orthography? This is a +natural reflection enough when the maker of artless happy +phrases has been ransacking the dictionary for some +elusive wretch of a word which in the end proves to be +not yet naturalised, or technical, or a mere local vulgarity; +yet one does not often hear the idea canvassed in polite +conversation. Dealers in small talk, of the less prolific +kind, are continually falling back upon the silk hat or +dress suit, or some rule of etiquette or other convention +as a theme, but spelling seems to escape them. The +suspicion seems quaint, but one may almost fancy that an +allusion to spelling savoured a little of indelicacy. It +must be admitted, though where the scruples come from +would be hard to say, that there is a certain diffidence +even here in broaching my doubts in the matter. For +some inexplicable reason spelling has become mixed up +with moral feeling. One cannot pretend to explain +things in a little paper of this kind; the fact is so. +Spelling is not appropriate or inappropriate, elegant or +inelegant; it is right or wrong. We do not greatly blame +a man for turn-down collars when the vogue is erect; +nor, in these liberal days, for theological eccentricity; but +we esteem him "Nithing" and an outcast if he but drop +a "p" from opportunity. It is not an anecdote, but a +scandal, if we say a man cannot spell his own name. +There is only one thing esteemed worse before we come<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span> +to the deadly crimes, and that is the softening of language +by dropping the aspirate.</p> + +<p>After all, it is an unorthodox age. We are all horribly +afraid of being bourgeois, and unconventionality is the +ideal of every respectable person. It is strange that we +should cling so steadfastly to correct spelling. Yet again, +one can partly understand the business, if one thinks of +the little ways of your schoolmaster and schoolmistress. +This sanctity of spelling is stamped upon us in our earliest +years. The writer recalls a period of youth wherein six +hours a week were given to the study of spelling, and four +hours to all other religious instruction. So important is +it, that a writer who cannot spell is almost driven to +abandon his calling, however urgent the thing he may +have to say, or his need of the incidentals of fame. Yet +in the crisis of such a struggle rebellious thoughts may +arise. Even this: Why, after all, should correct spelling +be the one absolutely essential literary merit? For it is +less fatal for an ambitious scribe to be as dull as Hoxton +than to spell in diverse ways.</p> + +<p>Yet correct spelling of English has not been traced to +revelation; there was no grammatical Sinai, with a +dictionary instead of tables of stone. Indeed, we do not +even know certainly when correct spelling began, which +word in the language was first spelt the right way, and by +whom. Correct spelling may have been evolved, or it +may be the creation of some master mind. Its inventor, +if it had an inventor, is absolutely forgotten. Thomas +Cobbett would have invented it, but that he was born +more than two centuries too late, poor man. All that we +certainly know is that, contemporaneously with the rise of +extreme Puritanism, the belief in orthography first spread +among Elizabethan printers, and with the Hanoverian +succession the new doctrine possessed the whole length +and breadth of the land. At that time the world passed +through what extension lecturers call, for no particular +reason, the classical epoch. Nature—as, indeed, all the +literature manuals testify—was in the remotest background +then of human thought. The human mind, in a mood of +the severest logic, brought everything to the touchstone<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span> +of an orderly reason; the conception of "correctness" +dominated all mortal affairs. For instance, one's natural +hair with its vagaries of rat's tails, duck's tails, errant curls, +and baldness, gave place to an orderly wig, or was at least +decently powdered. The hoop remedied the deficiencies +of the feminine form, and the gardener clipped his yews +into respectability. All poetry was written to one +measure in those days, and a Royal Academy with a lady +member was inaugurated that art might become at least +decent. Dictionaries began. The crowning glory of +Hanoverian literature was a Great Lexicographer.</p> + +<p>In those days it was believed that the spelling of every +English word had been settled for all time. Thence to +the present day, though the severities then inaugurated, +so far as metre and artistic composition are concerned, +been generously relaxed—though we have had a +Whistler, a Walt Whitman, and a Wagner—the rigours +of spelling have continued unabated. There is just one +right way of spelling, and all others are held to be not +simply inelegant or undesirable, but wrong; and unorthodox +spelling, like original morality, goes hand in hand with +shame.</p> + +<p>Yet even at the risk of shocking the religious convictions +of some, may not one ask whether spelling is in truth a +matter of right and wrong at all? Might it not rather +be an art? It is too much to advocate the indiscriminate +sacking of the alphabet, but yet it seems plausible that +there is a happy medium between a reckless debauch +of errant letters and our present dead rigidity. For some +words at anyrate may there not be sometimes one way +of spelling a little happier, sometimes another? We do +something of this sort even now with our "phantasy" and +"fantasie," and we might do more. How one would spell +this word or that would become, if this latitude were conceded, +a subtle anxiety of the literary exquisite. People +are scarcely prepared to realise what shades of meaning +may be got by such a simple device. Let us take a simple +instance. You write, let us say, to all your cousins, many +of your friends, and even, it may be, to this indifferent +intimate and that familiar enemy, "My dear So-and-so."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> +But at times you feel even as you write, sometimes, that +there is something too much and sometimes something +lacking. You may even get so far in the right way +occasionally as to write, "My dr. So-and-so," when your +heart is chill. And people versed in the arts of social +intercourse know the subtle insult of misspelling a +person's name, or flicking it off flippantly with a mere +waggling wipe of the pen. But these are mere +beginnings.</p> + +<p>Let the reader take a pen in hand and sit down and +write, "My very dear wife." Clean, cold, and correct +this is, speaking of orderly affection, settled and stereotyped +long ago. In such letters is butcher's meat also +"very dear." Try now, "Migh verrie deare Wyfe." Is +it not immediately infinitely more soft and tender? Is +there not something exquisitely pleasant in lingering over +those redundant letters, leaving each word, as it were, +with a reluctant caress? Such spelling is a soft, domestic, +lovingly wasteful use of material. Or, again, if you have +no wife, or object to an old-fashioned conjugal tenderness, +try "Mye owne sweete dearrest Marrie." There is the +tremble of a tenderness no mere arrangement of trim +everyday letters can express in those double <i>r's</i>. "Sweete" +my ladie must be; sweet! why pump-water and inferior +champagne, spirits of nitrous ether and pancreatic juice +are "sweet." For my own part I always spell so, with +lots of f's and g's and such like tailey, twirley, loopey things, +when my heart is in the tender vein. And I hold that a +man who will not do so, now he has been shown how to +do it, is, in plain English, neither more nor less than a prig. +The advantages of a varied spelling of names are very +great. Industrious, rather than intelligent, people have +given not a little time, and such minds as they have, to +the discussion of the right spelling of our great poet's +name. But he himself never dreamt of tying himself +down to one presentation of himself, and was—we have +his hand for it—Shakespeare, Shakspear, Shakespear, +Shakspeare, and so forth, as the mood might be. +It would be almost as reasonable to debate whether +Shakespeare smiled or frowned. My dear friend Sim<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span>mongues +is the same. He is "Sims," a mere slash of the +pen, to those he scorns, Simmonds or Simmongs to his +familiars, and Simmons, A.T. Simmons, Esq., to all +Europe.</p> + +<p>From such mere introductory departures from precision, +such petty escapades as these, we would we might seduce +the reader into an utter debauch of spelling. But a +sudden Mænad dance of the letters on the page, gleeful +and iridescent spelling, a wild rush and procession of +howling vowels and clattering consonants, might startle +the half-won reader back into orthodoxy. Besides, there +is another reader—the printer's reader—to consider. For +if an author let his wit run to these matters, he must +write elaborate marginal exhortations to this authority, +begging his mercy, to let the little flowers of spelling +alone. Else the plough of that Philistine's uniformity +will utterly root them out.</p> + +<p>Such high art of spelling as is thus hinted at is an art +that has still to gather confidence and brave the light of +publicity. A few, indeed, practise it secretly for love—in +letters and on spare bits of paper. But, for the most +part, people do not know that there is so much as an art +of spelling possible; the tyranny of orthography lies so +heavily on the land. Your common editors and their +printers are a mere orthodox spelling police, and at the +least they rigorously blot out all the delightful frolics +of your artist in spelling before his writings reach the +public eye. But commonly, as I have proved again and +again, the slightest lapse into rococo spelling is sufficient +to secure the rejection of a manuscript without further +ado.</p> + +<p>And to end,—a word about Phonographers. It may +be that my title has led the reader to anticipate some +mention of these before. They are a kind of religious +sect, a heresy from the orthodox spelling. They bind +one another by their mysteries and a five-shilling subscription +in a "soseiti to introduis an impruvd method +of spelinj." They come across the artistic vision, they +and their Soseiti, with an altogether indefinable offence. +Perhaps the essence of it is the indescribable meanness<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> +of their motive. For this phonography really amounts +to a study of the cheapest way of spelling words. These +phonographers are sweaters of the Queen's English, living +meanly on the selvage of honest mental commerce by +clipping the coin of thought. But enough of them. They +are mentioned here only to be disavowed. They would +substitute one narrow orthodoxy for another, and I +would unfold the banner of freedom. Spell, my brethren, +as you will! Awake, arise, O language living in chains; +let Butter's spelling be our Bastille! So with a prophetic +vision of liberated words pouring out of the +dungeons of a spelling-book, this plea for freedom concludes. +What trivial arguments there are for a uniform +spelling I must leave the reader to discover. This is no +place to carp against the liberation I foresee, with the +glow of the dawn in my eyes.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> +<h3><a name="INCIDENTAL_THOUGHTS_ON_A_BALD_HEAD" id="INCIDENTAL_THOUGHTS_ON_A_BALD_HEAD"></a>INCIDENTAL THOUGHTS ON A BALD HEAD</h3> + + +<p>I was asked to go, quite suddenly, and found myself there +before I had time to think of what it might be. I understood +her to say it was a meeting of some "Sunday +society," some society that tried to turn the Sabbath +from a day of woe to a day of rejoicing. "St. George's +Hall, Langham Place," a cab, and there we were. I +thought they would be picturesque Pagans. But the +entertainment was the oddest it has ever been my lot +to see, a kind of mystery. The place was dark, except +for a big circle of light on a screen, and a dismal man +with a long stick was talking about the effects of alcohol +on your muscles. He talked and talked, and people went +to sleep all about us. Euphemia's face looked so very +pretty in the dim light that I tried to talk to her and +hold her hand, but she only said "Ssh!" And then +they began showing pictures on the screen—the most +shocking things!—stomachs, and all that kind of thing. +They went on like that for an hour, and then there was +a lot of thumping with umbrellas, and they turned the +lights up and we went home. Curious way of spending +Sunday afternoon, is it not?</p> + +<p>But you may imagine I had a dismal time all that +hour. I understood the people about me were Sceptics, +the kind of people who don't believe things—a singular +class, and, I am told, a growing one. These excellent +people, it seems, have conscientious objections to going +to chapel or church, but at the same time the devotional +habit of countless generations of pious forerunners is +strong in them. Consequently they have invented things +like these lectures to go to, with a professor instead of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> +a priest, and a lantern slide of a stomach by way of +altar-piece; and alcohol they make their Devil, and their +god is Hygiene—a curious and instructive case of mental +inertia. I understand, too, there are several other temples +of this Cult in London—South Place Chapel and Essex +Hall, for instance, where they worship the Spirit of the +Innermost. But the thing that struck me so oddly was +the number of bald heads glimmering faintly in the +reflected light from the lantern circle. And that set me +thinking upon a difficulty I have never been able to +surmount.</p> + +<p>You see these people, and lots of other people, too, +believe in a thing they call Natural Selection. They +think, as part of that belief, that men are descended +from hairy simian ancestors; assert that even a hundred +thousand years ago the ancestor was hairy—hairy, heavy, +and almost as much a brute as if he lived in Mr. Arthur +Morrison's Whitechapel. For my own part I think it a +pretty theory, and would certainly accept it were it not +for one objection. The thing I cannot understand is how +our ancestor lost that hair. I see no reason why he +should not have kept his hair on. According to the +theory of natural selection, materially favourable variations +survive, unfavourable disappear; the only way in +which the loss is to be accounted for is by explaining it +as advantageous; but where is the advantage of losing +your hair? The disadvantages appear to me to be innumerable. +A thick covering of hair, like that of a +Capuchin monkey, would be an invaluable protection +against sudden changes of temperature, far better than +any clothing can be. Had I that, for instance, I should +be rid of the perpetual cold in the head that so disfigures +my life; and the multitudes who die annually of chills, +bronchitis, and consumption, and most of those who suffer +from rheumatic pains, neuralgia, and so forth, would not +so die and suffer. And in the past, when clothing was +less perfect and firing a casual commodity, the disadvantages +of losing hair were all the greater. In very hot +countries hair is perhaps even more important in saving +the possessor from the excessive glare of the sun. Before<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> +the invention of the hat, thick hair on the head at least +was absolutely essential to save the owner of the skull +from sunstroke. That, perhaps, explains why the hair +has been retained there, and why it is going now that we +have hats, but it certainly does not explain why it has +gone from the rest of the body.</p> + +<p>One—remarkably weak—explanation has been propounded: +an appeal to our belief in human vanity. He +picked it out by the roots, because he thought he was +prettier without. But that is no reason at all. Suppose +he did, it would not affect his children. Professor +Weismann has at least convinced scientific people of +this: that the characters acquired by a parent are rarely, +if ever, transmitted to its offspring. An individual given +to such wanton denudation would simply be at a disadvantage +with his decently covered fellows, would fall +behind in the race of life, and perish with his kind. +Besides, if man has been at such pains to uncover his +skin, why have quite a large number of the most respected +among us such a passionate desire to have it covered up +again?</p> + +<p>Yet that is the only attempted explanation I have +ever come upon, and the thing has often worried me. +I think it is just as probably a change in dietary. I have +noticed that most of your vegetarians are shock-headed, +ample-bearded men, and I have heard the Ancestor was +vegetarian. Or it may be, I sometimes fancy, a kind of +inherent disposition on the part of your human animal +to dwindle. That came back in my memory vividly as +I looked at the long rows of Sceptics, typical Advanced +people, and marked their glistening crania. I recalled +other losses. Here is Humanity, thought I, growing +hairless, growing bald, growing toothless, unemotional, +irreligious, losing the end joint of the little toe, dwindling +in its osseous structures, its jawbone and brow ridges, +losing all the full, rich curvatures of its primordial +beauty.</p> + +<p>It seems almost like what the scientific people call a +Law. And by strenuous efforts the creature just keeps +pace with his losses—devises clothes, wigs, artificial teeth,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> +paddings, shoes—what civilised being could use his bare +feet for his ordinary locomotion? Imagine him on a +furze-sprinkled golf links. Then stays, an efficient substitute +for the effete feminine backbone. So the thing +goes on. Long ago his superficies became artificial, and +now the human being shrinks like a burning cigar, and +the figure he has abandoned remains distended with +artificial ashes, dead dry protections against the exposures +he so unaccountably fears. Will he go on shrinking, I +wonder?—become at last a mere lurking atomy in his +own recesses, a kind of hermit crab, the bulk of him a +complex mechanism, a thing of rags and tatters and +papier-maché, stolen from the earth and the plant-world +and his fellow beasts? And at last may he not disappear +altogether, none missing him, and a democracy of honest +machinery, neatly clad and loaded up with sound principles +of action, walk to and fro in a regenerate world? +Thus it was my mind went dreaming in St. George's +Hall. But presently, as I say, came the last word about +stomachs, and the bald men woke up, rattled their +umbrellas, said it was vastly interesting, and went toddling +off home in an ecstasy of advanced Liberalism. And +we two returned to the place whence we came.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> +<h3><a name="OF_A_BOOK_UNWRITTEN" id="OF_A_BOOK_UNWRITTEN"></a>OF A BOOK UNWRITTEN</h3> + + +<p>Accomplished literature is all very well in its way, no +doubt, but much more fascinating to the contemplative +man are the books that have not been written. These +latter are no trouble to hold; there are no pages to turn +over. One can read them in bed on sleepless nights +without a candle. Turning to another topic, primitive +man in the works of the descriptive anthropologist is +certainly a very entertaining and quaint person, but the +man of the future, if we only had the facts, would appeal +to us more strongly. Yet where are the books? As +Ruskin has said somewhere, <i>à propos</i> of Darwin, it is not +what man has been, but what he will be, that should +interest us.</p> + +<p>The contemplative man in his easy-chair, pondering +this saying, suddenly beholds in the fire, through the +blue haze of his pipe, one of these great unwritten +volumes. It is large in size, heavy in lettering, seemingly +by one Professor Holzkopf, presumably Professor at +Weissnichtwo. "The Necessary Characters of the Man +of the Remote Future deduced from the Existing Stream +of Tendency" is the title. The worthy Professor is +severely scientific in his method, and deliberate and +cautious in his deductions, the contemplative man discovers +as he pursues his theme, and yet the conclusions +are, to say the least, remarkable. We must figure the +excellent Professor expanding the matter at great length, +voluminously technical, but the contemplative man—since +he has access to the only copy—is clearly at liberty +to make such extracts and abstracts as he chooses for the +unscientific reader. Here, for instance, is something of +practicable lucidity that he considers admits of quotation.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> +"The theory of evolution," writes the Professor, "is +now universally accepted by zoologists and botanists, and +it is applied unreservedly to man. Some question, indeed, +whether it fits his soul, but all agree it accounts for his +body. Man, we are assured, is descended from ape-like +ancestors, moulded by circumstances into men, and these +apes again were derived from ancestral forms of a lower +order, and so up from the primordial protoplasmic jelly. +Clearly then, man, unless the order of the universe has +come to an end, will undergo further modification in the +future, and at last cease to be man, giving rise to some +other type of animated being. At once the fascinating +question arises, What will this being be? Let us consider +for a little the plastic influences at work upon our species.</p> + +<p>"Just as the bird is the creature of the wing, and is all +moulded and modified to flying, and just as the fish is the +creature that swims, and has had to meet the inflexible +conditions of a problem in hydrodynamics, so man is the +creature of the brain; he will live by intelligence, and not +by physical strength, if he live at all. So that much that +is purely 'animal' about him is being, and must be, +beyond all question, suppressed in his ultimate development. +Evolution is no mechanical tendency making for +perfection, according to the ideas current in the year of +grace 1897; it is simply the continual adaptation of +plastic life, for good or evil, to the circumstances that +surround it.... We notice this decay of the animal part +around us now, in the loss of teeth and hair, in the +dwindling hands and feet of men, in their smaller jaws, +and slighter mouths and ears. Man now does by wit and +machinery and verbal agreement what he once did by +bodily toil; for once he had to catch his dinner, capture +his wife, run away from his enemies, and continually +exercise himself, for love of himself, to perform these +duties well. But now all this is changed. Cabs, trains, +trams, render speed unnecessary, the pursuit of food +becomes easier; his wife is no longer hunted, but rather, +in view of the crowded matrimonial market, seeks him +out. One needs wits now to live, and physical activity +is a drug, a snare even; it seeks artificial outlets, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> +overflows in games. Athleticism takes up time and +cripples a man in his competitive examinations, and in +business. So is your fleshly man handicapped against +his subtler brother. He is unsuccessful in life, does not +marry. The better adapted survive."</p> + +<p>The coming man, then, will clearly have a larger brain, +and a slighter body than the present. But the Professor +makes one exception to this. "The human hand, since it +is the teacher and interpreter of the brain, will become +constantly more powerful and subtle as the rest of the +musculature dwindles."</p> + +<p>Then in the physiology of these children of men, with +their expanding brains, their great sensitive hands and +diminishing bodies, great changes were necessarily worked. +"We see now," says the Professor, "in the more intellectual +sections of humanity an increasing sensitiveness to +stimulants, a growing inability to grapple with such a +matter as alcohol, for instance. No longer can men drink +a bottleful of port; some cannot drink tea; it is too +exciting for their highly-wrought nervous systems. The +process will go on, and the Sir Wilfrid Lawson of some +near generation may find it his duty and pleasure to make +the silvery spray of his wisdom tintinnabulate against the +tea-tray. These facts lead naturally to the comprehension +of others. Fresh raw meat was once a dish for a king. +Now refined persons scarcely touch meat unless it is +cunningly disguised. Again, consider the case of turnips; +the raw root is now a thing almost uneatable, but once +upon a time a turnip must have been a rare and fortunate +find, to be torn up with delirious eagerness and devoured +in ecstasy. The time will come when the change will +affect all the other fruits of the earth. Even now, only +the young of mankind eat apples raw—the young always +preserving ancestral characteristics after their disappearance +in the adult. Some day even boys will regard apples +without emotion. The boy of the future, one must +believe, will gaze on an apple with the same unspeculative +languor with which he now regards a flint"—in the +absence of a cat.</p> + +<p>"Furthermore, fresh chemical discoveries came into<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span> +action as modifying influences upon men. In the prehistoric +period even, man's mouth had ceased to be an +instrument for grasping food; it is still growing continually +less prehensile, his front teeth are smaller, his lips thinner +and less muscular; he has a new organ, a mandible not of +irreparable tissue, but of bone and steel—a knife and fork. +There is no reason why things should stop at partial artificial +division thus afforded; there is every reason, on the +contrary, to believe my statement that some cunning +exterior mechanism will presently masticate and insalivate +his dinner, relieve his diminishing salivary glands and +teeth, and at last altogether abolish them."</p> + +<p>Then what is not needed disappears. What use is +there for external ears, nose, and brow ridges now? The +two latter once protected the eye from injury in conflict +and in falls, but in these days we keep on our legs, and at +peace. Directing his thoughts in this way, the reader +may presently conjure up a dim, strange vision of the +latter-day face: "Eyes large, lustrous, beautiful, soulful; +above them, no longer separated by rugged brow ridges, +is the top of the head, a glistening, hairless dome, terete +and beautiful; no craggy nose rises to disturb by its +unmeaning shadows the symmetry of that calm face, no +vestigial ears project; the mouth is a small, perfectly +round aperture, toothless and gumless, jawless, unanimal, +no futile emotions disturbing its roundness as it lies, like +the harvest moon or the evening star, in the wide firmament +of face." Such is the face the Professor beholds in +the future.</p> + +<p>Of course parallel modifications will also affect the body +and limbs. "Every day so many hours and so much +energy are required for digestion; a gross torpidity, a +carnal lethargy, seizes on mortal men after dinner. This +may and can be avoided. Man's knowledge of organic +chemistry widens daily. Already he can supplement the +gastric glands by artificial devices. Every doctor who +administers physic implies that the bodily functions may +be artificially superseded. We have pepsine, pancreatine, +artificial gastric acid—I know not what like mixtures. Why, +then, should not the stomach be ultimately superannuated<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> +altogether? A man who could not only leave his dinner +to be cooked, but also leave it to be masticated and +digested, would have vast social advantages over his food-digesting +fellow. This is, let me remind you here, the +calmest, most passionless, and scientific working out of the +future forms of things from the data of the present. At +this stage the following facts may perhaps stimulate your +imagination. There can be no doubt that many of the +Arthropods, a division of animals more ancient and even +now more prevalent than the Vertebrata, have undergone +more phylogenetic modification"—a beautiful phrase—"than +even the most modified of vertebrated animals. +Simple forms like the lobsters display a primitive structure +parallel with that of the fishes. However, in such a form +as the degraded 'Chondracanthus,' the structure has +diverged far more widely from its original type than in +man. Among some of these most highly modified +crustaceans the whole of the alimentary canal—that is, +all the food-digesting and food-absorbing parts—form a +useless solid cord: the animal is nourished—it is a +parasite—by absorption of the nutritive fluid in which it +swims. Is there any absolute impossibility in supposing +man to be destined for a similar change; to imagine him +no longer dining, with unwieldy paraphernalia of servants +and plates, upon food queerly dyed and distorted, but +nourishing himself in elegant simplicity by immersion in +a tub of nutritive fluid?</p> + +<p>"There grows upon the impatient imagination a +building, a dome of crystal, across the translucent surface +of which flushes of the most glorious and pure prismatic +colours pass and fade and change. In the centre of this +transparent chameleon-tinted dome is a circular white +marble basin filled with some clear, mobile, amber liquid, +and in this plunge and float strange beings. Are they +birds?</p> + +<p>"They are the descendants of man—at dinner. Watch +them as they hop on their hands—a method of progression +advocated already by Bjornsen—about the pure white +marble floor. Great hands they have, enormous brains, +soft, liquid, soulful eyes. Their whole muscular system,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> +their legs, their abdomens, are shrivelled to nothing, a +dangling, degraded pendant to their minds."</p> + +<p>The further visions of the Professor are less alluring.</p> + +<p>"The animals and plants die away before men, except +such as he preserves for his food or delight, or such as +maintain a precarious footing about him as commensals +and parasites. These vermin and pests must succumb +sooner or later to his untiring inventiveness and incessantly +growing discipline. When he learns (the +chemists are doubtless getting towards the secret now) to +do the work of chlorophyll without the plant, then his +necessity for other animals and plants upon the earth will +disappear. Sooner or later, where there is no power of +resistance and no necessity, there comes extinction. In +the last days man will be alone on the earth, and his food +will be won by the chemist from the dead rocks and the +sunlight.</p> + +<p>"And—one may learn the full reason in that explicit +and painfully right book, the <i>Data of Ethics</i>—the +irrational fellowship of man will give place to an intellectual +co-operation, and emotion fall within the scheme +of reason. Undoubtedly it is a long time yet, but a long +time is nothing in the face of eternity, and every man +who dares think of these things must look eternity in the +face."</p> + +<p>Then the earth is ever radiating away heat into space, +the Professor reminds us. And so at last comes a vision +of earthly cherubim, hopping heads, great unemotional +intelligences, and little hearts, fighting together perforce +and fiercely against the cold that grips them tighter and +tighter. For the world is cooling—slowly and inevitably +it grows colder as the years roll by. "We must imagine +these creatures," says the Professor, "in galleries and +laboratories deep down in the bowels of the earth. The +whole world will be snow-covered and piled with ice; all +animals, all vegetation vanished, except this last branch +of the tree of life. The last men have gone even deeper, +following the diminishing heat of the planet, and vast +metallic shafts and ventilators make way for the air they +need."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span></p> + +<p>So with a glimpse of these human tadpoles, in their +deep close gallery, with their boring machinery ringing +away, and artificial lights glaring and casting black +shadows, the Professor's horoscope concludes. Humanity +in dismal retreat before the cold, changed beyond recognition. +Yet the Professor is reasonable enough, his facts are +current science, his methods orderly. The contemplative +man shivers at the prospect, starts up to poke the fire, +and the whole of this remarkable book that is not written +vanishes straightway in the smoke of his pipe. This is +the great advantage of this unwritten literature: there is +no bother in changing the books. The contemplative +man consoles himself for the destiny of the species with +the lost portion of Kubla Khan.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_EXTINCTION_OF_MAN" id="THE_EXTINCTION_OF_MAN"></a>THE EXTINCTION OF MAN</h3> + + +<p>It is part of the excessive egotism of the human animal +that the bare idea of its extinction seems incredible to it. +"A world without <i>us</i>!" it says, as a heady young +Cephalaspis might have said it in the old Silurian sea. +But since the Cephalaspis and the Coccostëus many a fine +animal has increased and multiplied upon the earth, +lorded it over land or sea without a rival, and passed at +last into the night. Surely it is not so unreasonable to +ask why man should be an exception to the rule. From +the scientific standpoint at least any reason for such +exception is hard to find.</p> + +<p>No doubt man is undisputed master at the present time—at +least of most of the land surface; but so it has been +before with other animals. Let us consider what light +geology has to throw upon this. The great land and sea +reptiles of the Mesozoic period, for instance, seem to have +been as secure as humanity is now in their pre-eminence. +But they passed away and left no descendants when the +new orders of the mammals emerged from their obscurity. +So, too, the huge Titanotheria of the American continent, +and all the powerful mammals of Pleistocene South +America, the sabre-toothed lion, for instance, and the +Machrauchenia suddenly came to a finish when they were +still almost at the zenith of their rule. <i>And in no case +does the record of the fossils show a really dominant species +succeeded by its own descendants</i>. What has usually +happened in the past appears to be the emergence of some +type of animal hitherto rare and unimportant, and the +extinction, not simply of the previously ruling species, +but of most of the forms that are at all closely related to +it. Sometimes, indeed, as in the case of the extinct giants<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> +of South America, they vanished without any considerable +rivals, victims of pestilence, famine, or, it may be, of that +cumulative inefficiency that comes of a too undisputed +life. So that the analogy of geology, at anyrate, is +against this too acceptable view of man's certain tenure +of the earth for the next few million years or so.</p> + +<p>And, after all, even now man is by no means such a +master of the kingdoms of life as he is apt to imagine. +The sea, that mysterious nursery of living things, is for +all practical purposes beyond his control. The low-water +mark is his limit. Beyond that he may do a little with +seine and dredge, murder a few million herrings a year as +they come in to spawn, butcher his fellow air-breather, +the whale, or haul now and then an unlucky king-crab or +strange sea-urchin out of the deep water, in the name of +science; but the life of the sea as a whole knows him not, +plays out its slow drama of change and development +unheeding him, and may in the end, in mere idle sport, +throw up some new terrestrial denizens, some new +competitor for space to live in and food to live upon, that +will sweep him and all his little contrivances out of +existence, as certainly and inevitably as he has swept +away auk, bison, and dodo during the last two hundred +years.</p> + +<p>For instance, there are the Crustacea. As a group the +crabs and lobsters are confined below the high-water +mark. But experiments in air-breathing are no doubt in +progress in this group—we already have tropical land-crabs—and +as far as we know there is no reason why in +the future these creatures should not increase in size and +terrestrial capacity. In the past we have the evidence of +the fossil <i>Paradoxides</i> that creatures of this kind may at +least attain a length of six feet, and, considering their +intense pugnacity, a crab of such dimensions would be as +formidable a creature as one could well imagine. And +their amphibious capacity would give them an advantage +against us such as at present is only to be found in the +case of the alligator or crocodile. If we imagine a shark +that could raid out upon the land, or a tiger that could +take refuge in the sea, we should have a fair suggestion of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span> +what a terrible monster a large predatory crab might +prove. And so far as zoological science goes we must, at +least, admit that such a creature is an evolutionary +possibility.</p> + +<p>Then, again, the order of the Cephalopods, to which +belong the cuttle-fish and the octopus (sacred to Victor +Hugo), may be, for all we can say to the contrary, an +order with a future. Their kindred, the Gastropods, +have, in the case of the snail and slug, learnt the trick of +air-breathing. And not improbably there are even now +genera of this order that have escaped the naturalist, or +even well-known genera whose possibilities in growth +and dietary are still unknown. Suppose some day a +specimen of a new species is caught off the coast of Kent. +It excites remark at a Royal Society soirée, engenders a +Science Note or so, "A Huge Octopus!" and in the next +year or so three or four other specimens come to hand, +and the thing becomes familiar. "Probably a new and +larger variety of <i>Octopus</i> so-and-so, hitherto supposed to +be tropical," says Professor Gargoyle, and thinks he has +disposed of it. Then conceive some mysterious boating +accidents and deaths while bathing. A large animal of +this kind coming into a region of frequent wrecks might +so easily acquire a preferential taste for human nutriment, +just as the Colorado beetle acquired a new taste for the +common potato and gave up its old food-plants some years +ago. Then perhaps a school or pack or flock of <i>Octopus +gigas</i> would be found busy picking the sailors off a stranded +ship, and then in the course of a few score years it might +begin to stroll up the beaches and batten on excursionists. +Soon it would be a common feature of the watering-places—possibly +at last commoner than excursionists. Suppose +such a creature were to appear—and it is, we repeat, a +possibility, if perhaps a remote one—how could it be +fought against? Something might be done by torpedoes; +but, so far as our past knowledge goes, man has no means +of seriously diminishing the numbers of any animal of the +most rudimentary intelligence that made its fastness in +the sea.</p> + +<p>Even on land it is possible to find creatures that with a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> +little modification might become excessively dangerous to +the human ascendency. Most people have read of the +migratory ants of Central Africa, against which no man +can stand. On the march they simply clear out whole +villages, drive men and animals before them in headlong +rout, and kill and eat every living creature they can +capture. One wonders why they have not already spread +the area of their devastations. But at present no doubt +they have their natural checks, of ant-eating birds, or +what not. In the near future it may be that the +European immigrant, as he sets the balance of life swinging +in his vigorous manner, may kill off these ant-eating +animals, or otherwise unwittingly remove the checks that +now keep these terrible little pests within limits. And +once they begin to spread in real earnest, it is hard to see +how their advance could be stopped. A world devoured +by ants seems incredible now, simply because it is not +within our experience; but a naturalist would have a dull +imagination who could not see in the numerous species +of ants, and in their already high intelligence, far more +possibility of strange developments than we have in the +solitary human animal. And no doubt the idea of the +small and feeble organism of man, triumphant and omnipresent, +would have seemed equally incredible to an +intelligent mammoth or a palæolithic cave bear.</p> + +<p>And, finally, there is always the prospect of a new +disease. As yet science has scarcely touched more than +the fringe of the probabilities associated with the minute +fungi that constitute our zymotic diseases. But the bacilli +have no more settled down into their final quiescence +than have men; like ourselves, they are adapting themselves +to new conditions and acquiring new powers. The +plagues of the Middle Ages, for instance, seem to have +been begotten of a strange bacillus engendered under +conditions that sanitary science, in spite of its panacea +of drainage, still admits are imperfectly understood, and +for all we know even now we may be quite unwittingly +evolving some new and more terrible plague—a plague +that will not take ten or twenty or thirty per cent., as +plagues have done in the past, but the entire hundred.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span></p> + +<p>No; man's complacent assumption of the future is too +confident. We think, because things have been easy for +mankind as a whole for a generation or so, we are going +on to perfect comfort and security in the future. We +think that we shall always go to work at ten and leave +off at four, and have dinner at seven for ever and ever. +But these four suggestions, out of a host of others, must +surely do a little against this complacency. Even now, +for all we can tell, the coming terror may be crouching +for its spring and the fall of humanity be at hand. In +the case of every other predominant animal the world has +ever seen, I repeat, the hour of its complete ascendency +has been the eve of its entire overthrow. But if some +poor story-writing man ventures to figure this sober +probability in a tale, not a reviewer in London but will +tell him his theme is the utterly impossible. And, when +the thing happens, one may doubt if even then one will +get the recognition one deserves.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_WRITING_OF_ESSAYS" id="THE_WRITING_OF_ESSAYS"></a>THE WRITING OF ESSAYS</h3> + + +<p>The art of the essayist is so simple, so entirely free from +canons of criticism, and withal so delightful, that one +must needs wonder why all men are not essayists. +Perhaps people do not know how easy it is. Or perhaps +beginners are misled. Rightly taught it may be learnt +in a brief ten minutes or so, what art there is in it. And +all the rest is as easy as wandering among woodlands on +a bright morning in the spring.</p> + +<p>Then sit you down if you would join us, taking paper, +pens, and ink; and mark this, your pen is a matter of +vital moment. For every pen writes its own sort of +essay, and pencils also after their kind. The ink perhaps +may have its influence too, and the paper; but paramount +is the pen. This, indeed, is the fundamental +secret of essay-writing. Wed any man to his proper +pen, and the delights of composition and the birth of +an essay are assured. Only many of us wander through +the earth and never meet with her—futile and lonely +men.</p> + +<p>And, of all pens, your quill for essays that are literature. +There is a subtle informality, a delightful easiness, +perhaps even a faint immorality essentially literary, about +the quill. The quill is rich in suggestion and quotation. +There are quills that would quote you Montaigne and +Horace in the hands of a trades-union delegate. And +those quirky, idle noises this pen makes are delightful, +and would break your easy fluency with wit. All the +classical essayists wrote with a quill, and Addison used +the most expensive kind the Government purchased. +And the beginning of the inferior essay was the dawn of +the cheap steel pen.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span></p> + +<p>The quill nibs they sell to fit into ordinary pen-holders +are no true quills at all, lacking dignity, and may even +lead you into the New Humour if you trust overmuch to +their use. After a proper quill commend me to a +stumpy BB pencil; you get less polish and broader +effects, but you are still doing good literature. Sometimes +the work is close—Mr. George Meredith, for +instance, is suspected of a soft pencil—and always it is +blunter than quill work and more terse. With a hard +pencil no man can write anything but a graceless style—a +kind of east wind air it gives—and smile you cannot. +So that it is often used for serious articles in the +half-crown reviews.</p> + +<p>There follows the host of steel pens. That bald, clear, +scientific style, all set about with words like "evolution" +and "environment," which aims at expressing its meaning +with precision and an exemplary economy of words, is +done with fine steel nibs—twelve a penny at any +stationer's. The J pen to the lady novelist, and the +stylograph to the devil—your essayist must not touch +the things. So much for the pen. If you cannot +write essays easily, that is where the hitch comes in. +Get a box of a different kind of pen and begin again, +and so on again and again until despair or joy arrests +you.</p> + +<p>As for a typewriter, you could no more get an essay +out of a typewriter than you could play a sonata upon +its keys. No essay was ever written with a typewriter +yet, nor ever will be. Besides its impossibility, the +suggestion implies a brutal disregard of the division of +labour by which we live and move and have our being. +If the essayist typewrite, the unemployed typewriter, who +is commonly a person of superior education and capacity, +might take to essays, and where is your living then? +One might as reasonably start at once with the Linotype +and print one's wit and humour straight away. And +taking the invasion of other trades one step further one +might, after an attempt to sell one's own newspaper, even +get to the pitch of having to read it oneself. No; even +essayists must be reasonable. If its mechanical clitter-<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span>clatter +did not render composition impossible, the typewriter +would still be beneath the honour of a literary +man.</p> + +<p>Then for the paper. The luxurious, expensive, small-sized +cream-laid note is best, since it makes your essay +choice and compact; and, failing that, ripped envelopes +and the backs of bills. Some men love ruled paper, +because they can write athwart the lines, and some take +the fly-leaves of their friends' books. But whosoever +writes on cheap sermon paper full of hairs should write +far away from the woman he loves, lest he offend +her ears. It is good, however, for a terse, forcible +style.</p> + +<p>The ink should be glossy black as it leaves your pen, +for polished English. Violet inks lead to sham sentiment, +and blue-black to vulgarity. Red ink essays are often +good, but usually unfit for publication.</p> + +<p>This is as much almost as anyone need know to begin +essay writing. Given your proper pen and ink, or pencil +and paper, you simply sit down and write the thing. +The value of an essay is not its matter, but its mood. +You must be comfortable, of course; an easy-chair with +arm-rests, slippers, and a book to write upon are usually +employed, and you must be fed recently, and your body +clothed with ease rather than grandeur. For the rest, +do not trouble to stick to your subject, or any subject; +and take no thought for the editor or the reader, for +your essay should be as spontaneous as the lilies of the +field.</p> + +<p>So long as you do not begin with a definition you may +begin anyhow. An abrupt beginning is much admired, +after the fashion of the clown's entry through the +chemist's window. Then whack at your reader at once, +hit him over the head with the sausages, brisk him up +with the poker, bundle him into the wheelbarrow, and +so carry him away with you before he knows where you +are. You can do what you like with a reader then, if +you only keep him nicely on the move. So long as +you are happy your reader will be so too. But one +law must be observed: an essay, like a dog that wishes<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> +to please, must have a lively tail, short but as waggish +as possible. Like a rocket, an essay goes only with +fizzle and sparks at the end of it. And, know, that to +stop writing is the secret of writing an essay; the +essay that the public loves dies young</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_PARKES_MUSEUM" id="THE_PARKES_MUSEUM"></a>THE PARKES MUSEUM</h3> + +<p>THE PLACE TO SPEND A HAPPY DAY</p> + + +<p>By way of jest, my morning daily paper constantly includes +in its menu of "To-day" the Parkes Museum, +Margaret Street, adding, seductively, "free"; and no +doubt many a festive Jonas Chuzzlewit has preened +himself for a sight-seeing, and all unaware of the +multitudes of Margaret Streets—surely only Charlottes +of that ilk are more abundant—has started forth, he +and his feminine, to find this Parkes Museum. One +may even conceive a rare Bank Holiday thoughtfully +put aside for the quest, and spent all vainly in the +asking of policemen, and in traversing this vast and +tiresome metropolis, from Margaret Street to Margaret +Street, the freshness of the morning passing into the +dry heat of the day, fatigue spreading from the feet +upwards, discussion, difference, denial, "words," and a +day of recreation dying at last into a sunset of lurid +sulks. Such possibility was too painful to think of, +and a philanthropic inquirer has at last by persistent +investigation won the secret of the Missing Museum +and opened the way to it for all future investigators.</p> + +<p>The Margaret Street in question is an apparently +derelict thoroughfare, opening into Great Portland Street. +Immemorial dust is upon its pavements, and a profound +silence broods over its vacant roadway. The blinds +of its houses are mostly down, and, where the blackness +of some window suggests a dark interior, no face appears +to reassure us in our doubt of humanity within. It may +be that somewhen in the past the entire population of +this street set out on a boating party up the river,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> +and was overset by steam launches, and so never +returned, or perchance it has all been locked up for +a long term of imprisonment—though the houses seem +almost too respectable for that; or the glamour of the +Sleeping Beauty is upon it all. Certainly we saw +the figure of a porter in an attitude of repose in the +little glass lodge in the museum doorway. He <i>may</i> +have been asleep. But we feared to touch him—and +indeed slipped very stealthily by him—lest he should +suddenly crumble into dust.</p> + +<p>And so to the Museum and its wonders. This Parkes +Museum is a kind of armoury of hygiene, a place full of +apparatus for being healthy—in brief, a museum of +sanitary science. To that large and growing class of +people who take no thought of anything but what they +eat and what they drink, and wherewithal they should be +clothed, it should prove intensely interesting. Apart from +the difficulty of approach we cannot understand how it +is so neglected by an intelligent public. You can see +germicides and a model convict prison, Pentonville cells +in miniature, statistical diagrams and drain pipes—if only +there was a little more about heredity, it would be exactly +the kind of thing that is popular in literature now, +as literature goes. And yet excepting ourselves and the +sleeping porter—if he was sleeping—and the indistinct +and motionless outline, visible through a glass door, of a +human body sitting over a book, there was not a suggestion +or memory of living humanity about the place.</p> + +<p>The exhibits of food are especially remarkable. We +cleaned the glass case with our sleeves and peered at the most +appetising revelations. There are dozens of little bottles +hermetically sealed, containing such curios as a sample of +"Bacon Common (Gammon) Uncooked," and then the same +cooked—it looked no nicer cooked—Irish sausage, pork +sausage, black pudding, Welsh mutton, and all kinds of +rare and exquisite feeding. There are ever so many cases +of this kind of thing. We saw, for instance, further along, +several good specimens of the common oyster shell (<i>Ostrea +edulis</i>), cockle shells, and whelks, both "almonds" and +"whites," and then came breadstuffs. The breadstuffs are<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> +particularly impressive, of a grey, scientific aspect, a hard, +hoary antiquity. We always knew that stale bread was +good for one, but yet the Parkes Museum startled us with +the antique pattern it recommended. There was a muffin, +too, identified and labelled, but without any Latin name, a +captured crumpet, a collection of buns, a dinner-roll, and +a something novel to us, called Pumpernickel, that we +had rather be without, or rather—for the expression is +ambiguous—that we had rather not be without, but +altogether remote from. And all these things have been +tested by an analyst, with the most painful results. +Nitrogen, oxygen, hydrogen, and the like nasty chemical +things seem indeed to have occurred in everything he +touched. Those sturdy mendicants who go about complaining +that they cannot get food should visit this +Parkes Museum and see what food is really like, and +learn contentment with their lot.</p> + +<p>There were no real vegetables, but only the ideals of a +firm of seedsmen, made of wax and splendidly coloured, +with something of the boldness and vigour of Michael +Angelo about the modelling of them. And among other +food stuffs were sweetmeats and yellow capers, liver +flukes, British wines, and snuff. At last we felt replete +with food stuffs, and went on to see the models to +illustrate ventilation, and the exhibits of hygienic +glazed tiles arranged around a desert lecture-theatre. +Hygienic tiles stimulate the eye vigorously rather than +relax it by any æsthetic weakness; and the crematory +appliances are so attractive as they are, and must have +such an added charm of neatness and brightness when +alight, that one longs to lose a relative or so forthwith, for +the mere pleasure of seeing them in operation.</p> + +<p>A winding staircase designed upon hygienic principles, +to bump your head at intervals, takes one to a little iron +gallery full of the most charming and varied display of +cooking-stoves and oil-lamps. Here, also, there are +flaunted the resources of civilisation for the Prevention of +Accidents, which resources are four, namely, a patent fire-escape, +a patent carriage pole, a coal plate, and a dog +muzzle. But the labels, though verbose, are scarcely full<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> +enough. They do not tell you, for instance, if you wish +to prevent cramp while bathing, whether the dog muzzle +or the coal plate should be employed, nor do they show +how the fire-escape will prevent the explosion of a +paraffin lamp. However, this is a detail. We feel +assured that no intelligent person will regret a visit to this +most interesting and instructive exhibition. It offers you +valuable hints how to live, and suggests the best and +tidiest way in which you can, when dead, dispose of your +body. We feel assured that the public only needs this +intimation of its whereabouts to startle the death-like +slumbers of Margaret Street with an unaccustomed tumult. +And the first to arrive will, no doubt, find legibly and +elegantly written in the dust that covers the collection +the record of its discovery by Euphemia and me.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> +<h3><a name="BLEAK_MARCH_IN_EPPING_FOREST" id="BLEAK_MARCH_IN_EPPING_FOREST"></a>BLEAK MARCH IN EPPING FOREST</h3> + + +<p>All along the selvage of Epping Forest there was +excitement. Before the swallows, before the violets, long +before the cuckoo, with only untimely honeysuckle bushes +showing a trace of green, two trippers had been seen +traversing the district, making their way towards High +Beech, and settling awhile near the Forest Hotel. +Whether they were belated survivals from last season or +exceptionally early hatchings of the coming year, was a +question of considerable moment to the natives, and has +since engaged the attention of the local Natural History +Society. But we know that, as a matter of fact, they +were of little omen, being indeed but insignificant people +from Hampstead and not true trippers at all, who were +curious to see this forest in raw winter.</p> + +<p>For some have argued that there is no Epping Forest +at all in the winter-time; that it is, in fact, taken up and +put away, and that agriculture is pursued there. Others +assert that the Forest is shrouded with wrappers, even as a +literary man's study is shrouded by dusty women when +they clean him out. Others, again, have supposed that +it is a delightful place in winter, far more delightful +than in summer, but that this is not published, +because no writing man hath ever been there in the cold +season. And much more of unreal speculation, but +nothing which bore upon it the stamp of truth. So these +two—and I am one of the two—went down to Epping +Forest to see that it was still there, and how it fared in +the dismal weather.</p> + +<p>The sky was a greasy grey that guttered down to the +horizon, and the wind smote damp and chill. There was +a white fringe of ice in the cart-wheel ruts, but withal<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> +the frost was not so crisp as to prevent a thin and +slippery glaze of softened clay upon the road. The +decaying triumphal arch outside the station sadly lacked +a coat of paint, and was indistinctly regretful of remote +royal visits and processions gone for ever. Then we +passed shuddering by many vacant booths that had once +resounded with the revelry of ninepenny teas and the +gingerbeer cork's staccato, and their forms were piled +together and their trestles overturned. And the wind +ravened, and no human beings were to be seen. So up +the hill to the left, and along the road leading by +devious windings between the black hedges and through +clay wallows to the hilly part round High Beech.</p> + +<p>But upon the shoulder of a hill we turned to a gate to +scrape off the mud that made our boots unwieldy. At +that moment came a threadbare place in the cloudy +curtain that was sweeping across the sun, and our shadows +showed themselves for an instant to comfort us. The +amber patch of sunlight presently slipped from us and +travelled down the meadows towards the distant blue of +the hills by Waltham Abbey, touching with miraculous +healing a landscape erst dead and shrouded in grey. This +transitory gleam of light gladdened us mightily at the +time, but it made the after-sky seem all the darker.</p> + +<p>So through the steep and tortuous village to High +Beech, and then leaving the road we wandered in among +big trees and down slopes ankle deep with rustling leaves +towards Chingford again. Here was pleasanter walking +than the thawing clay, but now and then one felt the +threat of an infinite oozy softness beneath the stiff frozen +leaves. Once again while we were here the drifting haze +of the sky became thinner, and the smooth green-grey +beech stems and rugged oak trunks were brightly illuminated. +But only for a moment, and thereafter the sky +became not simply unsympathetic but ominous. And the +misery of the wind grew apace.</p> + +<p>Presently we wandered into that sinister corner of the +Forest where the beech trees have grown so closely +together that they have had perforce to lift their branches +vertically. Divested of leaves, the bare grey limbs of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> +these seem strangely restless. These trees, reaching so +eagerly upward, have an odd resemblance to the weird +figures of horror in which William Blake delighted—arms, +hands, hair, all stretch intensely to the zenith. They +seem to be straining away from the spot to which they +are rooted. It is a Laocoon grouping, a wordless concentrated +struggle for the sunlight, and disagreeably +impressive. The trippers longed to talk and were +tongue-tied; they looked now and then over their shoulders. +They were glad when the eerie influence was passed, +though they traversed a morass to get away from it.</p> + +<p>Then across an open place, dismal with the dun hulls +of lost cows and the clatter of their bells, over a brook +full of dead leaves and edged with rusty clay, through a +briery thicket that would fain have detained us, and so to +a pathway of succulent green, that oozed black under our +feet. Here some poor lost wayfarer has blazed his way +with rustic seats, now rheumatic and fungus-eaten. And +here, too, the wind, which had sought us howling, found +us at last, and stung us sharply with a shower of +congealing raindrops. This grew to a steady downfall as +the open towards Chingford station was approached at +last, after devious winding in the Forest. Then, coming +upon the edge of the wood and seeing the lone station +against the grey sky, we broke into a shout and began +running. But it is dismal running on imperfectly frozen +clay, in rain and a gusty wind. We slipped and floundered, +and one of us wept sore that she should never see her +home again. And worse, the only train sleeping in the +station was awakened by our cries, and, with an eldritch +shriek at the unseasonable presence of trippers, fled +incontinently Londonward.</p> + +<p>Smeared with clay and dead leaves almost beyond +human likeness, we staggered into the derelict station, and +found from an outcast porter that perhaps another train +might after the lapse of two hours accumulate sufficiently +to take us back to Gospel Oak and a warm world again. +So we speered if there were amusements to be got in this +place, and he told us "some very nice walks." To refrain +from homicide we left the station, and sought a vast red<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> +hotel that loomed through the drift on a steep hill, and in +the side of this a door that had not been locked. Happily +one had been forgotten, and, entering at last, we roused a +hibernating waiter, and he exhumed us some of his winter +victual. In this way we were presently to some degree +comforted, and could play chess until a train had been +sent for our relief. And this did at last happen, and +towards the hour of dinner we rejoined our anxious friends, +and all the evening time we boasted of a pleasant day and +urged them to go even as we had gone.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_THEORY_OF_QUOTATION" id="THE_THEORY_OF_QUOTATION"></a>THE THEORY OF QUOTATION</h3> + + +<p>The nobler method of quotation is not to quote at all. +For why should one repeat good things that are already +written? Are not the words in their fittest context in the +original? Clearly, then, your new setting cannot be quite +so congruous, which is, forthwith, an admission of +incongruity. Your quotation is evidently a plug in a leak, +an apology for a gap in your own words. But your +vulgar author will even go out of his way to make the +clothing of his thoughts thus heterogeneous. He counts +every stolen scrap he can work in an improvement—a +literary caddis worm. Yet would he consider it improvement +to put a piece of even the richest of old tapestry or +gold embroidery into his new pair of breeks?</p> + +<p>The passion for quotation is peculiar to literature. We +do not glory to quote our costume, dress in cast-off court +robes, or furnish our houses from the marine store. +Neither are we proud of alien initials on the domestic +silver. We like things new and primarily our own. We +have a wholesome instinct against infection, except, it +seems, in the matter of ideas. An authorling will +deliberately inoculate his copy with the inverted comma +bacillus, till the page swims unsteadily, counting the fever +a glow of pure literary healthiness. Yet this reproduction, +rightly considered, is merely a proof that his appetite for +books has run beyond his digestion. Or his industry may +be to seek. You expect an omelette, and presently up +come the unbroken eggs. A tissue of quotation wisely +looked at is indeed but a motley garment, eloquent either +of a fool, or an idle knave in a fool's disguise.</p> + +<p>Nevertheless at times—the truth must be told—we +must quote. As for admitting that we have quoted, that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> +is another matter altogether. But the other man's phrase +will lie at times so close in one's mind to the trend of +one's thoughts, that, all virtue notwithstanding, they must +needs run into the groove of it. There are phrases that +lie about in the literary mind like orange peel on a +pavement. You are down on them before you know +where you are. But does this necessitate acknowledgment +to the man, now in Hades, who sucked that orange +and strewed the peel in your way? Rather, is it not +more becoming to be angry at his careless anticipation?</p> + +<p>One may reasonably look at it in this way. What +business has a man to think of things right in front +of you, poke his head, as it were, into your light? What +right has he to set up dams and tunnel out swallow-holes +to deflect the current of your thoughts? Surely you may +remove these obstructions, if it suits you, and put them +where you will. Else all literature will presently be +choked up, and the making of books come to an end. +One might as well walk ten miles out of one's way because +some deaf oaf or other chose to sit upon a necessary stile. +Surely Shakespeare or Lamb, or what other source you +contemplate, has had the thing long enough? Out of the +road with them. Turn and turn about.</p> + +<p>And inverted commas are so inhospitable. If you <i>must</i> +take in another man's offspring, you should surely try to +make the poor foundlings feel at home. Away with such +uncharitable distinctions between the children of the +house and the stranger within your gates. I never see +inverted commas but I think of the necessary persecuted +mediæval Jew in yellow gabardine.</p> + +<p>At least, never put the name of the author you quote. +Think of the feelings of the dead. Don't let the poor +spirit take it to heart that its monumental sayings would +pass unrecognised without your advertisement. You mean +well, perhaps, but it is in the poorest taste. Yet I have +seen Patience on a Monument honourably awarded to +William Shakespeare, and fenced in by commas from all +intercourse with the general text.</p> + +<p>There is something so extremely dishonest, too, in +acknowledging quotations. Possibly the good people who<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> +so contrive that such signatures as "Shakespeare," "Homer," +or "St. Paul," appear to be written here and there to +parts of their inferior work, manage to justify the proceeding +in their conscience; but it is uncommonly like hallmarking +pewter on the strength of an infinitesimal tinge of +silver therein. The point becomes at once clear if we +imagine some obscure painter quoting the style of Raphael +and fragments of his designs, and acknowledging his +indebtedness by appending the master's signature. Blank +forgery! And a flood of light was thrown on the matter +by a chance remark of one of Euphemia's aunts—she is a +great reader of pure fiction—anent a popular novel: "I +am sure it must be a nice book," said she, "or she could not +get all these people to write the mottoes for the chapters."</p> + +<p>No, it is all very well to play with one's conscience. I +have known men so sophisticated as to assert that unacknowledged +quotation was wrong. But very few really +reasonable people will, I think, refuse to agree with me +that the only artistic, the only kindly, and the only +honest method of quotation is plagiary. If you cannot +plagiarise, surely it were better not to quote.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> +<h3><a name="ON_THE_ART_OF_STAYING_AT_THE_SEASIDE" id="ON_THE_ART_OF_STAYING_AT_THE_SEASIDE"></a>ON THE ART OF STAYING AT THE SEASIDE</h3> + +<p>A MEDITATION AT EASTBOURNE</p> + + +<p>To stay at the seaside properly, one should not think. +But even in staying at the seaside there are intervals, +waking moments when meals come, even if there are no +appointed meal-times. Moreover, now and then, one must +go to buy tobacco, a matter one can trust to no hireling, +lest he get it dry. It cannot be always seaside, even as it +cannot be always May, and through the gaps thought +creeps in. Going over the cliff and along the parade, and +down by the circulating library to the cigar divan, where +they sell Parique tobacco, the swinging of one's legs seems +to act like a pendulum to the clockwork of one's brain. +One meditates all the way, and chiefly on how few people +there are who can really—to a critical adept—be said to +stay at the seaside.</p> + +<p>People seem to think that one can take a ticket to +Eastbourne, or Bognor, or Ventnor, and come and stay at +the seaside straight away, just as I have known new-hatched +undergraduates tell people they were going to +play billiards. Thousands and thousands of people think +they have stayed at the seaside, and have not, just as +thousands of people erroneously imagine they have played +whist. For the latter have played not whist, but Bumble-puppy, +and the former have only frequented a watering-place +for a time. Your true staying at the seaside is an +art, demanding not only railway fares but special aptitude, +and, moreover, needing culture, like all worthy arts.</p> + +<p>The most insurmountable difficulty of the beginner is +the classical simplicity of the whole thing. To stay at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> +the seaside properly you just spread yourself out on the +extreme edge of the land and let the sunlight soak in. +Your eyes are fixed upon the horizon. Some have it that +your head should be towards the sea, but the best +authorities think that this determines blood to that +region, and so stimulates thought. This is all the positive +instruction; the rest is prohibition. You must not think, +and you must not move, neither may you go to sleep. In +a few minutes the adept becomes as a god, even as a god +that sits upon the lotus leaf. New light and colour come +into the sky and sea, and the surges chant his praises. +But those who are not of the elect get pins and needles +all over them.</p> + +<p>It must be freely admitted that staying at the seaside +such as this, staying at the seaside in its perfection, is a +thing for a select few. You want a broad stretch of beach +and all the visible sea to yourself. You cannot be disturbed +by even the most idyllic children trying to bury +you with sand and suchlike playfulness, nor by boatloads +of the democracy rowing athwart your sea and sky. And +the absence of friend or wife goes without saying. I +notice down here a very considerable quantity of evidently +married pairs, and the huge majority of the rest of the +visitors run in couples, and are to all appearances engaged. +If they are not, I would submit that they ought to be. +Probably there is a certain satisfaction in sitting by the +sea with the girl you are in love with, or your wife for +the matter of that, just as many people undoubtedly find +tea with milk and sugar very nice. But the former is no +more the way to get the full and perfect pleasure of staying +at the seaside than the latter is the way to get the full +and perfect flavour of the tea. True staying at the seaside +is neither the repetition of old conversations in new surroundings +nor the exposure of one's affections to ozone. +It is something infinitely higher. It is pure quiescence. +It is the experience of a waking inanition savouring of +Buddha and the divine.</p> + +<p>Now, staying at the seaside is so rarely done well, +because of the littleness of man. To do it properly needs +many of the elements of greatness. Your common man,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> +while he has life in him, can let neither himself nor the +universe alone. He must be asserting himself in some +way, even if it is only by flinging pebbles at a stick. +That self-forgetfulness which should be a delight is a +terror to him. He brings dogs down to the beach to +stand between him and the calm of nature, and yelp. He +does worse than that.</p> + +<p>The meditative man going daily over by the cliff and +along the parade, to get his ounce of tobacco, has a sad +spectacle of what human beings may be driven to in this +way. One sees altogether some hundreds of people there +who have heard perhaps that staying at the seaside is +good, and who have, anyhow, got thus far towards it, and +stopped. They have not the faintest idea how to make +themselves happy. The general expression is veiled +curiosity. They sit—mostly with their backs to the sea—talking +poorly of indifferent topics and watching one +another. Most obviously they want hints of what to do +with themselves. Behind them is a bank of flowers like +those in Battersea Park, and another parallel parade, and +beyond are bathing-machines. The pier completely cuts +the horizon out of the background. There is a stout lady, +in dark blue, bathing. The only glances directed seaward +are furtive ones at her. Many seem to be doubting +whether this is not what they came down for. Others +lean dubiously to the invitations of the boatmen. Others +again listen to vocalists and dramatic outcasts who, for +ha'pence, render obvious the reason of their professional +degradation. It seems eccentric to travel seventy or +eighty miles to hear a man without a voice demonstrate +that he is unfit to have one, but they do. Anyone +curious in these matters need only go to a watering-place +to see and, what is worse, to hear for himself. After an +excursion train to Eastbourne, upwards of a thousand +people have been seen thus heaped together over an +oblong space of a mile long by twenty yards wide. Only +three miles away there was a towering white cliff overhanging +a practically desert beach; and one seagull +circled above one solitary, motionless, supine man, really +staying at the seaside.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span></p> + +<p>You cannot walk six miles anywhere along the south +coast without coming upon one of these heaps of people, +called a watering-place. There will be a town of houses +behind wherein the people lodge, until, as they think, +they have stayed a sufficient time at the sea, and they +return, hot, cross, and mystified, to London. The sea front +will be bricked or paved for a mile or so, and there will +be rows of boats and bathing-machines, and other +contrivances to screen off the view of the sea. And, as +we have indicated, watering-places and staying by the +seaside are incompatible things. The true stayer by the +seaside goes into the watering-place because he must; +because there is little food, and that uncooked, and no +tobacco, between the cliffs and the sea. Having purchased +what he needs he flees forth again. What time the whole +selvage of England becomes watering-place, there will be +no more staying by the seaside at all in the land. But +this is a gloomy train of thought that we will not pursue.</p> + +<p>There have been those who assert that one end of +staying at the seaside is bathing; but it is easy to show +that this is not so. Your proper bathing-place is up the +river, where the trees bend to the green and brown +shadows of the water. There the bath is sweet, fresh out +of the sky, or but just filtered through the blue hills of +the distant water-shed; and it is set about with flowers. +But the sea—the sea has stood there since the beginning +of things, and with small prospect of change, says Mr. +Kipling, to all eternity. The water in the sea, geologists +tell us, has <i>not been changed for fifty million years</i>! The +same chemist who sets me against all my food with his +chemical names speaks of the sea as a weak solution of +drowned men. Be that as it may, it leaves the skin +harsh with salt, and the hair sticky. Moreover, it is such +a promiscuous bathing-place. However, we need scarcely +depreciate the sea as a bath, for what need is there of +that when the river is clearly better? No one can deny +that the river is better. People who bathe in the sea +bathe by mistake, because they have come to the side of +the sea, and know not how else to use it.</p> + +<p>So, too, with the boating. It is hard to imagine how<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> +human beings who have drifted down streams, and +watched the brown fish in the shallows, and peered +through the tall sedges at the forget-me-nots, and fought +with the ropes of the water-lilies, and heard the ripple under +the bows, can ever think of going to and fro, pitching +spasmodically, in front of a watering-place. And as for +fishing—they catch fish at sea, indeed, but it is not fishing +at all; neither rods nor flies have they, and there is an +end to that matter.</p> + +<p>An Eastbourne meditative man returning to where he +stays, with his daily ounce of tobacco already afire, sees +in the streets what are called by the natives "cherry-bangs," +crowded with people, and, further, cabriolets and +such vehicles holding parties and families. The good +folks are driving away from the sea for the better part of +the day, going to Battle and other places inland. The +puzzle of what to do with their sea is too much for them, +and they are going away for a little to rest their minds. +Regarded as a centre of drives one might think an inland +place would be preferable to a seaside town, which at +best commands but a half-circle. However that may be, +the fact remains that one of the chief occupations of your +common visitor to the seaside is going away from it. +Than this fact there can be nothing more conclusive in +support of my argument that ordinary people are +absolutely ignorant and incapable of staying by the +seaside.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> +<h3><a name="CONCERNING_CHESS" id="CONCERNING_CHESS"></a>CONCERNING CHESS</h3> + + +<p>The passion for playing chess is one of the most unaccountable +in the world. It slaps the theory of natural +selection in the face. It is the most absorbing of +occupations, the least satisfying of desires, an aimless +excrescence upon life. It annihilates a man. You have, +let us say, a promising politician, a rising artist, that you +wish to destroy. Dagger or bomb are archaic, clumsy, +and unreliable—but teach him, inoculate him with chess! +It is well, perhaps, that the right way of teaching chess is +so little known, that consequently in most cases the plot +fails in the performance, the dagger turns aside. Else we +should all be chess-players—there would be none left to do +the business of the world. Our statesmen would sit with +pocket boards while the country went to the devil, our +army would bury itself in chequered contemplation, our +bread-winners would forget their wives in seeking after +impossible mates. The whole world would be disorganised. +I can fancy this abominable hypnotism so wrought into +the constitution of men that the cabmen would go trying +to drive their horses in Knights' moves up and down +Charing Cross Road. And now and again a suicide +would come to hand with the pathetic inscription pinned +to his chest: "I checked with my Queen too soon. I +cannot bear the thought of it." There is no remorse like +the remorse of chess.</p> + +<p>Only, happily, as we say, chess is taught the wrong +way round. People put out the board before the learner +with all the men in battle array, sixteen a side, with six +different kinds of moves, and the poor wretch is simply +crushed and appalled. A lot of things happen, mostly +disagreeable, and then a mate comes looming up through<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> +the haze of pieces. So he goes away awestricken but +unharmed, secretly believing that all chess-players are +humbugs, and that intelligent chess, which is neither +chancy nor rote-learned, is beyond the wit of man. But +clearly this is an unreasonable method of instruction. +Before the beginner can understand the beginning of the +game he must surely understand the end; how can he +commence playing until he knows what he is playing for? +It is like starting athletes on a race, and leaving them to +find out where the winning-post is hidden.</p> + +<p>Your true teacher of chess, your subtle chess-poisoner, +your cunning Comus who changes men to chess-players, +begins quite the other way round. He will, let us say, +give you King, Queen, and Pawn placed out in careless +possible positions. So you master the militant possibilities +of Queen and Pawn without perplexing complications. +Then King, Queen, and Bishop perhaps; King, Queen, and +Knight; and so on. It ensures that you always play a +winning game in these happy days of your chess childhood, +and taste the one sweet of chess-playing, the delight of +having the upper hand of a better player. Then to more +complicated positions, and at last back to the formal +beginning. You begin to see now to what end the array +is made, and understand why one Gambit differeth from +another in glory and virtue. And the chess mania of +your teacher cleaveth to you thenceforth and for evermore.</p> + +<p>It is a curse upon a man. There is no happiness in +chess—Mr. St. George Mivart, who can find happiness in +the strangest places, would be at a loss to demonstrate it +upon the chess-board. The mild delight of a pretty mate +is the least unhappy phase of it. But, generally, you find +afterwards that you ought to have mated two moves +before, or at the time that an unforeseen reply takes your +Queen. No chess-player sleeps well. After the painful +strategy of the day one fights one's battles over again. +You see with more than daylight clearness that it was +the Rook you should have moved, and not the Knight. +No! it is impossible! no common sinner innocent of +chess knows these lower deeps of remorse. Vast desert<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> +boards lie for the chess-player beyond the gates of horn. +Stalwart Rooks ram headlong at one, Knights hop sidelong, +one's Pawns are all tied, and a mate hangs threatening +and never descends. And once chess has been begun +in the proper way, it is flesh of your flesh, bone of your +bone; you are sold, and the bargain is sealed, and the evil +spirit hath entered in.</p> + +<p>The proper outlet for the craving is the playing of +games, and there is a class of men—shadowy, unhappy, +unreal-looking men—who gather in coffee-houses, and +play with a desire that dieth not, and a fire that is not +quenched. These gather in clubs and play Tournaments, +such tournaments as he of the Table Round could never +have imagined. But there are others who have the vice +who live in country places, in remote situations—curates, +schoolmasters, rate collectors—who go consumed from day +to day and meet no fit companion, and who must needs +find some artificial vent for their mental energy. No one +has ever calculated how many sound Problems are possible, +and no doubt the Psychical Research people would be glad +if Professor Karl Pearson would give his mind to the +matter. All the possible dispositions of the pieces come +to such a vast number, however, that, according to the +theory of probability, and allowing a few thousand +arrangements each day, the same problem ought never to +turn up more than twice in a century or so. As a matter +of fact—it is probably due to some flaw in the theory of +probability—the same problem has a way of turning up +in different publications several times in a month or so. +It may be, of course, that, after all, quite "sound" +problems are limited in number, and that we keep on +inventing and reinventing them; that, if a record were +kept, the whole system, up to four or five moves, might be +classified, and placed on record in the course of a few +score years. Indeed, if we were to eliminate those with +conspicuously bad moves, it may be we should find the +number of reasonable games was limited enough, and that +even our brilliant Lasker is but repeating the inspirations +of some long-buried Persian, some mute inglorious Hindoo, +dead and forgotten ages since. It may be over every<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> +game there watches the forgotten forerunners of the +players, and that chess is indeed a dead game, a haunted +game, played out centuries ago, even, as beyond all cavil, +is the game of draughts.</p> + +<p>The artistic temperament, the gay irresponsible cast of +mind, does what it can to lighten the gravity of this too +intellectual game. To a mortal there is something +indescribably horrible in these champions with their four +moves an hour—the bare thought of the mental operations +of the fifteen minutes gives one a touch of headache. +Compulsory quick moving is the thing for gaiety, and +that is why, though we revere Steinitz and Lasker, it is +Bird we love. His victories glitter, his errors are magnificent. +The true sweetness of chess, if it ever can be sweet, +is to see a victory snatched, by some happy impertinence, +out of the shadow of apparently irrevocable disaster. +And talking of cheerfulness reminds me of Lowson's +historical game of chess. Lowson said he had been cheerful +sometimes—but, drunk! Perish the thought! Challenged, +he would have proved it by some petty tests of +pronunciation, some Good Templar's shibboleths. He +offered to walk along the kerb, to work any problem in +mathematics we could devise, finally to play MacBryde +at chess. The other gentleman was appointed judge, and +after putting the antimacassar over his head ("jush +wigsh") immediately went to sleep in a disorderly heap +on the sofa. The game was begun very solemnly, so I +am told. MacBryde, in describing it to me afterwards, +swayed his hands about with the fingers twiddling in a +weird kind of way, and said the board went like that. +The game was fierce but brief. It was presently discovered +that both kings had been taken. Lowson was +hard to convince, but this came home to him. "Man," +he is reported to have said to MacBryde, "I'm just drunk. +There's no doubt in the matter. I'm feeling very ashamed +of myself." It was accordingly decided to declare the +game drawn. The position, as I found it next morning, +is an interesting one. Lowson's Queen was at K Kt 6, +his Bishop at Q B 3, he had several Pawns, and his Knight +occupied a commanding position at the intersection of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> +four squares. MacBryde had four Pawns, two Rooks, a +Queen, a draught, and a small mantel ornament arranged +in a rough semicircle athwart the board. I have no +doubt chess exquisites will sneer at this position, but in +my opinion it is one of the cheerfulest I have ever seen. +I remember I admired it very much at the time, in spite +of a slight headache, and it is still the only game of chess +that I recall with undiluted pleasure. And yet I have +played many games.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_COAL-SCUTTLE" id="THE_COAL-SCUTTLE"></a>THE COAL-SCUTTLE</h3> + +<p>A STUDY IN DOMESTIC ÆSTHETICS</p> + + +<p>Euphemia, who loves to have home dainty and delightful, +would have no coals if she could dispense with them, +much less a coal-scuttle. Indeed, it would seem she +would have no fireplace at all, if she had her will. All +the summer she is happy, and the fireplace is anything +but the place for a fire; the fender has vanished, the +fireirons are gone, it is draped and decorated and disguised. +So would dear Euphemia drape and disguise +the whole iron framework of the world, with that decorative +and decent mind of hers, had she but the scope. +There are exotic ferns there, spreading their fanlike +fronds, and majolica glows and gleams; and fabrics, of +which Morris is the actual or spiritual begetter, delight +the eye. In summer-time our fireplace is indeed a thing +of beauty, but, alas for the solar system! it is not a joy +for ever. The sun at last recedes beyond the equinoxes, +and the black bogey who has slept awakens again. +Euphemia restores the fender kerb and the brazen dogs and +the fireirons that will clatter; and then all the winter, whenever +she sits before the fire, her trouble is with her. Even +when the red glow of the fire lights up her features most +becomingly, and flattery is in her ear, every now and then +a sidelong glance at her ugly foe shows that the thought +of it is in her mind, and that the crumpled roseleaf, if +such a phrase may be used for a coal-scuttle, insists on +being felt. And she has even been discovered alone, sitting +elbows on knees, and chin on her small clenched fist, +frowning at it, puzzling how to circumvent the one enemy +of her peace.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span></p> + +<p>"<i>It</i>" is what Euphemia always calls this utensil, when +she can bring herself to give the indescribable an imperfect +vent in speech. But commonly the feeling is too deep for +words. Her war with this foeman in her household, this +coarse rebel in her realm of soft prettiness, is one of those +silent ones, those grim struggles without outcry or threat +or appeal for quarter that can never end in any compromise, +never find a rest in any truce, except the utter +defeat of her antagonist. And how she has tried—the +happy thoughts, the faint hopes, the new departures and +outflanking movements! And even to-day there the thing +defies her—a coal-box, with a broad smile that shows its +black teeth, thick and squat, filling a snug corner and +swaggering in unmanly triumph over the outrage upon +her delicacy that it commits.</p> + +<p>One of Euphemia's brightest ideas was to burn wood. +Logs make even a picturesque pile in a corner—look +"uncommon." But there are objections to wood. Wood +finely divided burns with gay quirks and jets of flame, +and making cheerful crackling noises the while; but its +warmth and brightness are as evanescent as love's young +dream. And your solid log has a certain irritating inertness. +It is an absentee fuel, spending its fire up the +chimney, and after its youthful clouds of glory turns but +a cheerless side of black and white char towards the room. +And, above all, the marital mind is strangely exasperated +by the log. Smite it with the poker, and you get but a +sullen resonance, a flight of red sparks, a sense of an +unconquerable toughness. It is worse than coke. The +crisp fracture of coal, the spitting flames suddenly leaping +into existence from the shiny new fissures, are altogether +wanting. Old-seasoned timber burns indeed most delightfully, +but then it is as ugly as coal, and withal very dear. +So Euphemia went back to coal again with a sigh. +Possibly if Euphemia had been surrounded by the wealth +she deserves this trouble would not have arisen. A silent +servant, bearing the due dose of fresh fuel, would have +come gliding from a mysterious Beneath, restored the +waning animation of the grate, and vanished noiselessly +again. But this was beyond the range of Euphemia's<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> +possibilities. And so we are face to face with this problem +of the scuttle again.</p> + +<p>At first she would feign there was no such thing as coal. +It was too horrible. Only a Zola would admit it. It was +the epoch of concealment. The thing purchased was like +a little cupboard on four legs; it might have held any +convenient trifle; and there was a shelf upon the top and +a book of poetry and a piece of crackled Satsuma. You +took a little brass handle and pulled it down, and the +front of the little cupboard came forward, and there you +found your coal. But a dainty little cupboard can no +more entertain black coal and inelegant firewood and +keep its daintiness than a mind can entertain black +thoughts and yet be sweet. This cabinet became demoralised +with amazing quickness; it became incontinent +with its corruptions, a hinge got twisted, and after a time +it acquired the habit of suddenly, and with an unpleasant +oscillatory laughing noise, opening of its own accord and +proclaiming its horrid secret to Euphemia's best visitors. +An air of wickedness, at once precocious and senile, came +upon it; it gaped and leered at Euphemia as the partner +of her secret with such a familiar air of "I and you" that +she could stand it no longer, and this depraved piece of +furniture was banished at last from her presence, and +relegated to its proper sphere of sham gentility below +stairs, where it easily passed itself upon the cook as an +exquisite. Euphemia tried to be sensible then, and +determined, since she must have coal in her room, to let +no false modesty intervene, but to openly proclaim its +presence to all the world.</p> + +<p>The next thing, therefore, was a cylinder of brass, +broadly open above, saying to the world, as it were, +"Look! I contain coal." And there were brass tongs +like sugar tongs wherewith Euphemia would regale the +fire and brighten it up, handing it a lump at a time in the +prettiest way. But brass dints. The brazen thing was +quiet and respectable enough upstairs, but ever and again +it went away to be filled. What happened on these +holiday jaunts Euphemia has never ascertained. But a +chance blow or worse cause ran a crease athwart the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> +forehead of the thing, and below an almost imperceptible +bulging hinted at a future corpulency. And there was +complaint of the quantity of polishing it needed, and an +increasing difficulty in keeping it bright. And except +when it was full to the brim, the lining was unsightly; +and this became more so. One day Ithuriel must have +visited Euphemia's apartment, and the tarnished brilliancy +of the thing stood confessed. For some days there was an +interregnum, and a coal-scuttle from downstairs—a black +unstable thing on flat foot and with a vast foolish nether +lip—did its duty with inelegant faithfulness.</p> + +<p>Then Euphemia had a really pretty fancy. She procured +one of those big open garden baskets and painted it a pleasant +brown, and instead of a garden fork she had a little half +horticultural scoop. In this basket she kept her coals, +and she tied a pink ribbon on the handle. One might +fancy she had been in some dewy garden and had dug a +few coals as one might dig up bulbs, and brought them in +and put them down. It attracted attention from all her +visitors, and set a kind of fashion in the neighbourhood. +For a time Euphemia was almost contented. But one +day a malignant woman called, and looked at this device +through her gilt eye-glasses, while she secretly groped in +the dark of her mind for an unpleasant thing to say. +Then suddenly she remarked, "Why not put your coal in +a bassinette? Or keep it <i>all</i> on the floor?" Euphemia's +face fell. The thing was undeniably very like a cradle, in +the light of this suggestion; the coal certainly did seem +a little out of place there; and besides, if there were more +than three or four lumps they had a way of tumbling over +the edge upon the carpet when the fire was replenished. +The tender shoot of Euphemia's satisfaction suddenly +withered and died.</p> + +<p>So the struggle has gone on. Sometimes it has been a +wrought iron tripod with a subtle tendency to upset in +certain directions; sometimes a coal-box; once even the +noisy old coal-box of japanned tin, making more noise +than a Salvation Army service, and strangely decorated +with "art" enamels, had a turn. At present Euphemia +is enduring a walnut "casket," that since its first week of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span> +office has displayed an increasing indisposition to shut. +But things cannot stay like this. The worry and anxiety +and vexation, Euphemia declares, are making her old +before her time. A delicate woman should not be left +alone to struggle against brazen monsters. A closed gas +stove is happily impossible, but the husband of the +household is threatened with one of those beastly sham +fires, wherein gas jets flare among firebrick—a mechanical +fire without vitality or variety, that never dances nor +crackles nor blazes, a monotonous horror, a fire you cannot +poke. That is what it will certainly come to if the +problem remains unsolved.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span> +<h3><a name="BAGARROW" id="BAGARROW"></a>BAGARROW</h3> + + +<p>Frankly, I detest this Bagarrow. Yet it is quite +generally conceded that Bagarrow is a very well-meaning +fellow. But the trouble is to understand him. To do +that I have been at some pains, and yet I am still a mere +theorist. An anthropometric estimate of the man fails to +reveal any reason for the distinction of my aversion. He +is of passable height, breadth, and density, and, save for +a certain complacency of expression, I find no salient +objection in his face. He has bluish eyes and a whitish +skin, and average-coloured hair—none of them distinctly +indictable possessions. It is something in his interior +and unseen mechanism, I think, that must be wrong; +some internal lesion that finds expression in his acts.</p> + +<p>His mental operations, indeed, were at first as inconceivable +to me as a crab's or a cockchafer's. That is where +all the trouble came in. For that reason alone they +fascinated me and aggrieved me. From the conditions of +our acquaintance—we were colleagues—I had to study +him with some thoroughness, observing him under these +circumstances and those. I have, by the bye, sometimes +wondered idly how he would react to alcohol—a fluid he +avoids. It would, I am sure, be an entirely novel and +remarkable kind of Drunk, and I am also certain it would +be an offensive one. But I can't imagine it; I have no +data. I could as soon evolve from my inner consciousness +an intoxicated giraffe. But, as I say, this interesting +experience has hitherto been denied me.</p> + +<p>Now my theory of Bagarrow is this, that he has a kind +of disease in his ideals, some interruption of nutrition that +has left them small and emasculate. He aims, it appears, +at a state called "Really Nice" or the "True Gentleman,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> +the outward and visible signs of which are a conspicuous +quietness of costume, gloves in all weathers, and a tightly-rolled +umbrella. But coupled in some way with this is a +queer smack of the propagandist, a kind of dwarfed +prophetic passion. That is the particular oddness of him. +He displays a timid yet persistent desire to foist this +True Gentleman of his upon an unwilling world, to make +you Really Nice after his own pattern. I always suspect +him of trying to convert me by stealth when I am not +looking.</p> + +<p>So far as I can see, Bagarrow's conception of this True +Gentleman of his is at best a compromise, mainly holiness, +but a tinted kind of holiness—goodness in clean cuffs and +with something neat in ties. He renounces the flesh and +the devil willingly enough, but he wants to keep up a +decent appearance. Now a stark saint I can find +sympathy for. I respect your prophet unkempt and in a +hair shirt denouncing Sin—and mundane affairs in +general—with hoarse passion and a fiery hate. I would +not go for my holidays with nor make a domestic pet of +such a man, but I respect him. But Bagarrow's pose is +different. Bagarrow would call that carrying things to +extremes. His is an unobtrusive virtue, a compromising +dissent, inaggressive aggressions on sin. So I take it. +And at times he puts it to you in a drawling argument, +a stream of Bagarrowisms, until you have to hurt his +feelings—happily he is always getting his feelings hurt—just +to stop the flow of him.</p> + +<p>"Life," said Bagarrow, in a moment of expansiveness, +"is scarcely worth living unless you are doing good to +someone." That I take to be the keystone of him. "I +want to be a Good Influence upon all the people I meet." +I do not think it has ever dawned upon him that he +himself is any way short of perfection; and, so far as I +can see, the triumph and end of his good influence is +cleanliness of cuff, compactness of umbrella, and general +assimilation to the Bagarrow ideal.</p> + +<p>Hear him upon one's social duties—this living soul in +this world of wonders! "In moderation," said Bagarrow, +opening out to questions on that matter, "social relaxation<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span> +is desirable, and I will even go so far as to admit that I +think it well to have at hand some pleasant expedient for +entertaining people and passing the time. A humorous +song or a recitation—provided it is in really good taste—is +harmless enough, and sometimes it may even be turned +to good account. And everyone should try to master +some instrument or other. The flute, perhaps, is as +convenient as any; for the fiddle and piano, you know, are +difficult and expensive to learn, and require constant +practice. A little legerdemain is also a great acquisition +for a man. Some may differ from me in that," continued +Bagarrow, "but I see no harm in it. There are hundreds +of perfectly proper and innocent tricks with coins and bits +of paper, and pieces of string, that will make an evening +pass most delightfully. One may get quite a little +reputation as an entertainer with these things."</p> + +<p>"And it is," pursued Bagarrow, quite glowing with +liberality, "just a little pharisaical to object to card tricks. +There are quantities of really quite clever and +mathematical things that one may do with a chosen card, +dealing the pack into heaps and counting slowly. Of +course it is not for mere pleasuring that I learn these +things. It gives anyone with a little tact an opportunity +for stopping card-playing. When the pack is brought in, and +all the party are intent upon gaming, you may seize your +opportunity and take the cards, saying, 'Let me show you +a little trick,' or, 'Have you seen Maskelyne's new trick +with the cards?' Before anyone can object you are displaying +your skill to their astonished eyes, and in their +wonder at your cleverness the objectionable game may be +indefinitely postponed."</p> + +<p>"Yet so set at times is your gambler upon his abominable +pursuit," says Bagarrow, "that in practice even this +ingenious expedient has been known to fail." He tried it +once, it seems, in a race train to Kempton Park, and +afterwards he had to buy a new hat. That incident, +indeed, gives you the very essence of Bagarrow in his +insidious attacks on evil. I remember that on another +occasion he went out of his way to promise a partially +intoxicated man a drink; and taking him into a public-<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span>house +ordered two lemon squashes! Drinks! He liked +lemon squash himself and he did not like beer, and he +thought he had only to introduce the poor fallen creature +to the delights of temperance to ensure his conversion +there and then. I think he expected the man to fall +upon him, crying "My benefactor!" But he did not say +"My benefactor," at anyrate, though he fell upon him, +cheerfully enough.</p> + +<p>To avoid the appearance of priggishness, which he +dreads with some reason, he even went so far as to +procure a herb tobacco, which he smokes with the +help of frequent sulphur matches. This he recommends +to us strongly. "Won't you try it?" he says, with a +winning smile. "Just once." And he is the only man I +ever met who drinks that facetious fluid, non-alcoholic +beer. Once he proposed to wean me upon that from my +distinctive vice, which led indeed to our first rupture. +"<i>I</i> find it delicious," he said in pathetic surprise.</p> + +<p>It is one of his most inveterate habits to tell you +quietly what he does, or would do under the +circumstances. Seeing you at Kipling, he will propound +the proposition that "all true literature has a distinct +aim." His test of literary merit is "What good does it +do you?" He is a great lender of books, especially of +Carlyle and Ruskin, which authors for some absolutely +inscrutable reason he considers provocative of Bagarrowism, +and he goes to the County Council lectures on dairy-work, +because it encourages others to improve themselves. +But I have said enough to display him, and of Bagarrow +at least—as I can well testify—it is easy to have more +than enough. Indeed, after whole days with him I have +gone home to dream of the realisation of his ideals, a sort +of Bagarrow millennium, a world of Bagarrows. All +kinds of men—Falstaffs, Don Quixotes, Alan Stewarts, +John the Baptists, John Knoxes, Quilps, and Benvenuto +Cellinis—all, so to speak, Bagarrowed, all with clean +cuffs, tight umbrellas, and temperate ways, passing +to and fro in a regenerate earth.</p> + +<p>And so he goes on his way through this wonderful +universe with his eyes fixed upon two or three secondary<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span> +things, without the lust or pride of life, without curiosity +or adventure, a mere timid missionary of a religion of +"Nicer Ways," a quiet setter of a good example. I can +assure you this is no exaggeration, but a portrait. It +seems to me that the thing must be pathological, that he +and this goodness of his have exactly the same claim upon +Lombroso, let us say, as the born criminal. He is born +good, a congenital good example, a sufferer from atrophy +of his original sin. The only hope I can see for +Bagarrow, short of murder, is forcible trepanning. He +ought to have the seat of his ideals lanced, and all this +wash about doing good to people by stealth taken away. +It may be he might prove a very decent fellow then—if +there was anything left of him, that is.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_BOOK_OF_ESSAYS_DEDICATORY" id="THE_BOOK_OF_ESSAYS_DEDICATORY"></a>THE BOOK OF ESSAYS DEDICATORY</h3> + + +<p>I have been bothered about this book this three months. +I have written scarcely anything since Llewellyn asked +me for it, for when he asked me I had really nothing on +hand. I had just published every line I had ever written, +at my own expense, with Prigsbys. Yet three months +should suffice for one of Llewellyn's books, which consist +chiefly of decorous fly-leaves and a dedication or so, and +margins. Of course you know Llewellyn's books—the +most delightful things in the market: the sweetest covers, +with little gilt apples and things carelessly distributed +over luminous grey, and bright red initials, and all these +delightful fopperies. But it was the very slightness of +these bibelots that disorganised me. And perhaps, also, +the fact that no one has ever asked me for a book before.</p> + +<p>I had no trouble with the title though—"Lichens." I +have wondered the thing was never used before. Lichens, +variegated, beautiful, though on the most arid foundations, +half fungoid, half vernal—the very name for a booklet +of modern verse. And that, of course, decided the key +of the cover and disposed of three or four pages. +A fly-leaf, a leaf with "Lichens" printed fair and +beautiful a little to the left of the centre, then a title-page—"Lichens. +By H.G. Wells. London: MDCCCXCV. +Stephen Llewellyn." Then a restful blank page, and then—the +Dedication. It was the dedication stopped me. The +title-page, it is true, had some points of difficulty. Should +the Christian name be printed in full or not, for instance; +but it had none of the fatal fascination of the dedicatory +page. I had, so to speak, to look abroad among the ranks +of men, and make one of those fretful forgotten millions—immortal. +It seemed a congenial task.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span></p> + +<p>I went to work forthwith.</p> + +<p>It was only this morning that I realised the magnitude +of my accumulations. Ever since then—it was three +months ago—I have been elaborating this Dedication. I +turned the pile over, idly at first. Presently I became +interested in tracing my varying moods, as they had +found a record in the heap.</p> + +<p>This struck me—</p> + +<div class="figcenter"><img src="./images/img-156.png" height="244" width="260" +alt="Handwritten dedication, To my Dearest Friend (successive names crossed out)" +title="To my Dearest Friend" /></div> + +<p>Then again, a little essay in gratitude came to hand—</p> + +<div class="blockquote" style="text-align: center;"> +<span class="smcap">To<br /> +Professor Augustus Flood</span>,<br /> +Whose Admirable Lectures on<br /> +Palæontology<br /> +First turned my Attention to<br /> +Literature.<br /> +</div> + +<p>There was a tinge of pleasantry in the latter that +pleased me very greatly when I wrote it, and I find +immediately overlying it another essay in the same +line—</p> + +<div class="blockquote" style="text-align: center;"> +To the Latter-day Reviewer,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">These Pearls.</span><br /> +</div> + +<p>For some days I was smitten with the idea of dedicat<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span>ing +my little booklet to one of my numerous personal +antagonists, and conveying some subtly devised insult +with an air of magnanimity. I thought, for instance, of +Blizzard—</p> + +<div class="blockquote" style="text-align: center;"> +<span class="smcap">Sir Joseph Blizzard</span>,<br /> +The most distinguished, if not the greatest, of contemporary<br /> +anatomists. +</div> + +<p>I think it was "X.L.'s" book, <i>Aut Diabolus aut +Nihil</i>, that set me upon another line. There is, after +all, your reader to consider in these matters, your average +middle-class person to impress in some way. They say +the creature is a snob, and absolutely devoid of any +tinge of humour, and I must confess that I more than +half believe it. At anyrate, it was that persuasion +inspired—</p> + +<div class="blockquote" style="text-align: center;"> +To the Countess of X.,<br /> +In Memory of Many Happy Days. +</div> + +<p>I know no Countess of X., as a matter of fact, but if the +public is such an ass as to think better of my work for +the suspicion, I do not care how soon I incur it. And +this again is a pretty utilisation of the waste desert of +politics—</p> + +<div class="blockquote"><p><span class="smcap">My Dear Salisbury</span>,— Pray accept this unworthy tribute of my +affectionate esteem.</p></div> + +<p>There were heaps of others. And looking at those +heaps it suddenly came sharp and vivid before my mind +that there—there was the book I needed, already written! +A blank page, a dedication, a blank page, a dedication, +and so on. I saw no reason to change the title. It only +remained to select the things, and the book was done. I +set to work at once, and in a very little while my bibelot +was selected. There were dedications fulsome and fluid, +dedications acrid and uncharitable, dedications in verse +and dedications in the dead languages: all sorts and +conditions of dedications, even the simple "To J.H. +Gabbles"—so suggestive of the modest white stones of +the village churchyard. Altogether I picked out one<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> +hundred and three dedications. At last only one thing +remained to complete the book. And that was—the +Dedication. You will scarcely credit it, but that worries +me still....</p> + +<p>I am almost inclined to think that Dedications are +going out of fashion.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THROUGH_A_MICROSCOPE" id="THROUGH_A_MICROSCOPE"></a>THROUGH A MICROSCOPE</h3> + +<p>SOME MORAL REFLECTIONS</p> + + +<p>This dabbler person has recently disposed of his camera +and obtained a microscope—a short, complacent-looking +implement it is, of brass—and he goes about everywhere +now with little glass bottles in his pocket, ready to jump +upon any stray polly-woggle he may find, and hale it +home and pry into its affairs. Within his study window +are perhaps half a dozen jars and basins full of green +scum and choice specimens of black mud in which his +victims live. He persists in making me look through +this instrument, though I would rather I did not. It +seems to me a kind of impropriety even when I do it. +He gets innumerable things in a drop of green water, +and puts it on a glass slip under the object glass, and, of +course, they know nothing of the change in their condition, +and go on living just as they did before they were observed. +It makes me feel at times like a public moralist, +or Peeping Tom of Coventry, or some such creature.</p> + +<p>Certainly there are odd things enough in the water. +Among others, certain queer green things that are neither +plants nor animals. Most of the time they are plants, +quiet green threads matted together, but every now and +then the inside comes out of one, so to speak, and starts +off with a fine red eye and a long flickering tail, to see +the world. The dabbler says it's quite a usual thing +among the lower plants—<i>Algæ</i> he calls them, for some +reason—to disgorge themselves in this way and go swimming +about; but it has quite upset my notions of things. +If the lower plants, why not the higher? It may be my +abominable imagination, but since he told me about these<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> +—swarm spores I think he called them—I don't feel +nearly so safe with my geraniums as I did.</p> + +<p>A particularly objectionable thing in these water drops, +the dabbler insists upon my spying at is the furious +activity of everything you see in them. You look down +his wretched tube, and there, bright and yellow with the +lamplight in the round field of the microscope, is a perfect +riot of living things. Perhaps it's the water he got from +Hampstead, and a dozen flat things the shape of shortbreads +will be fussing about. They are all quite transparent +and colourless, and move about like galleys by +means of a lot of minute oars that stick out all over +them. Never a moment's rest. And, presently, one sees +that even the green plant threads are wriggling across +the field. The dabbler tries to moralise on this in the +vein of Charles Kingsley, and infer we have much to +learn from these ridiculous creatures; but, so far as I can +see, it's a direct incentive to sloth to think how low in +the scale of creation these things are, in spite of all their +fussing. If they had sat about more and thought, they +might be fishing the dabbler out of ponds and examining +him instead of his examining them. Your energetic people +might do worse things than have a meditative half-hour +at the microscope. Then there are green things with a +red spot and a tail, that creep about like slugs, and are +equally transparent. <i>Euglena viridis</i> the dabbler calls +them, which seems unnecessary information. In fact +all the things he shows me are transparent. Even the +little one-eyed Crustacea, the size of a needle-point, that +discredit the name of Cyclops. You can see their +digestion and muscle and nerve, and, in fact, everything. +It's at least a blessing we are not the same. Fancy the +audible comments of the temperance advocate when you +get in the bus! No use pulling yourself together then. +"Pretty full!" And "Look," people would say, "his +wife gives him cold mutton."</p> + +<p>Speaking of the name of Cyclops reminds me that these +scientific people have been playing a scurvy trick upon +the classics behind our backs. It reminds one of Epistemon's +visit to Hades, when he saw Alexander a patcher<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> +of clouts and Xerxes a crier of mustard. Aphrodite, the +dabbler tells me, is a kind of dirty mud-worm, and much +dissected by spectacled pretenders to the London B.Sc.; +every candidate, says the syllabus, must be able to dissect, +to the examiner's satisfaction, and demonstrate upon +Aphrodite, Nereis, Palæmon. Were the gods ever so +insulted? Then the snaky Medusa and Pandora, our +mother, are jelly-fish; Astræa is still to be found on coral +reefs, a poor thing, and much browsed upon by parrot +fish; and Doris and Tethys and Cydippe are sea slugs. +It's worse than Heine's vision of the gods grown old. +They can't be content with the departed gods merely. +Evadne is a water flea—they'll make something out of +Mrs. Sarah Grand next; and Autolycus, my Autolycus! +is a polymorphic worm, whatever subtlety of insult +"polymorphic worm" may convey.</p> + +<p>However, I wander from the microscope. These shortbread +things are fussing about hither and thither across +the field, and now and then an amœba comes crawling +into view. These are invertebrate jelly-like things of no +particular shape, and they keep on thrusting out a part +here, and withdrawing a part there, and changing and +advancing just as though they were popular democratic +premiers. Then diatoms keep gliding athwart the circle. +These diatoms are, to me at least, the most perplexing +things in the universe. Imagine a highly ornamental +thing in white and brown, the shape of a spectacle case, +without any limbs or other visible means of progression, +and without any wriggling of the body, or indeed any +apparent effort at all, gliding along at a smart pace. +That's your diatom. The dabbler really knows nothing +of how they do it. He mumbles something about Bütschli +and Grenfell. Imagine the thing on a larger scale, +Cleopatra's Needle, for instance, travelling on its side up +the Thames Embankment, and all unchaperoned, at the +rate of four or five miles an hour.</p> + +<p>There's another odd thing about these microscope +things which redeems, to some extent at least, their +singular frankness. To use the decorous phrase of the +text-book, "They multiply by fission." Your amœba or<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> +vorticella, as the case may be, splits in two. Then there +are two amœbæ or vorticellæ. In this way the necessity +of the family, that middle-class institution so abhorrent to +the artistic mind, is avoided. In my friend's drop of +ditch-water, as in heaven, there is neither marrying nor +giving in marriage. There are no waste parents, which +should appeal to the scholastic mind, and the simple +protozoon has none of that fitful fever of falling in love, +that distressingly tender state that so bothers your mortal +man. They go about their business with an enviable +singleness of purpose, and when they have eaten and +drunk, and attained to the fulness of life, they divide and +begin again with renewed zest the pastime of living.</p> + +<p>In a sense they are immortal. For we may look at +this matter in another light, and say our exuberant +protozoon has shed a daughter, and remains. In that case +the amœba I look at may have crawled among the slime +of the Silurian seas when the common ancestor of myself +and the royal family was an unassuming mud-fish like +those in the reptile house in the Zoo. His memoirs +would be interesting. The thought gives a solemn tint +to one's meditations. If the dabbler wash him off this +slide into his tube of water again, this trivial creature +may go on feeding and growing and dividing, and presently +be thrown away to wider waters, and so escape to live ... after +I am dead, after my masterpieces are forgotten, +after our Empire has passed away, after the human animal +has passed through I know not what vicissitudes. It may +be he will still, with the utmost nonchalance, be pushing +out his pseudopodia, and ingesting diatoms when the +fretful transitory life of humanity has passed altogether +from the earth. One may catch him in specimen tubes +by the dozen; but still, when one thinks of this, it is +impossible to deny him a certain envious, if qualified, +respect.</p> + +<p>And all the time these creatures are living their +vigorous, fussy little lives; in this drop of water they are +being watched by a creature of whose presence they do +not dream, who can wipe them all out of existence with a +stroke of his thumb, and who is withal as finite, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> +sometimes as fussy and unreasonably energetic, as themselves. +He sees them, and they do not see him, because +he has senses they do not possess, because he is too +incredibly vast and strange to come, save as an overwhelming +catastrophe, into their lives. Even so, it may +be, the dabbler himself is being curiously observed.... +The dabbler is good enough to say that the suggestion is +inconceivable. I can imagine a decent amœba saying the +same thing.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_PLEASURE_OF_QUARRELLING" id="THE_PLEASURE_OF_QUARRELLING"></a>THE PLEASURE OF QUARRELLING</h3> + + +<p>Your cultivated man is apt to pity the respectable poor, +on the score of their lack of small excitements, and even +in the excess of his generous sympathy to go a Toynbee-Halling +in their cause. And Sir Walter Besant once +wrote a book about Hoxton, saying, among other things, +how monotonous life was there. That is your modern +fallacy respecting the lower middle class. One might +multiply instances. The tenor of the pity is always the +same.</p> + +<p>"No music," says the cultivated man, "no pictures, no +books to read nor leisure to read in. How can they pass +their lives?"</p> + +<p>The answer is simple enough, as Emily Brontë knew. +They quarrel. And an excellent way of passing the time +it is; so excellent, indeed, that the pity were better +inverted. But we all lack the knowledge of our chiefest +needs. In the first place, and mainly, it is hygienic to +quarrel, it disengages floods of nervous energy, the pulse +quickens, the breathing is accelerated, the digestion improved. +Then it sets one's stagnant brains astir and +quickens the imagination; it clears the mind of vapours, as +thunder clears the air. And, finally, it is a natural function +of the body. In his natural state man is always quarrelling—by +instinct. Not to quarrel is indeed one of the +vices of our civilisation, one of the reasons why we are +neurotic and anæmic, and all these things. And, at last, +our enfeebled palates have even lost the capacity for +enjoying a "jolly good row."</p> + +<p>There can be no more melancholy sight in the world +than that of your young man or young woman suffering +from suppressed pugnacity. Up to the end of the school<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> +years it was well with them; they had ample scope for +this wholesome commerce, the neat give and take of +offence. In the family circle, too, there are still plentiful +chances of acquiring the taste. Then, suddenly, they +must be gentle and considerate, and all the rest of it. A +wholesome shindy, so soon as toga and long skirts arrive, +is looked upon as positively wrong; even the dear old +institution of the "cut" is falling into disrepute. The +quarrelling is all forced back into the system, as it were; +it poisons the blood. This is why our literature grows +sinister and bitter, and our daughters yearn after this and +that, write odd books, and ride about on bicycles in +remarkable clothes. They have shut down the safety +valve, they suffer from the present lamentable increase of +gentleness. They must find some outlet, or perish. If +they could only put their arms akimbo and tell each +other a piece of their minds for a little, in the ancient +way, there can be not the slightest doubt that much of +this <i>fin-de-siècle</i> unwholesomeness would disappear.</p> + +<p>Possibly this fashion of gentleness will pass. Yet it +has had increasing sway now for some years. An unhealthy +generation has arisen—among the more educated class at +least—that quarrels little, regards the function as a vice +or a nuisance, as the East-ender does a taste for fine art +or literature. We seem indeed to be getting altogether +out of the way of it. Rare quarrels, no doubt, occur to +everyone, but rare quarrelling is no quarrelling at all. +Like beer, smoking, sea-bathing, cycling, and the like +delights, you cannot judge of quarrelling by the early +essay. But to show how good it is—did you ever know a +quarrelsome person give up the use? Alcohol you may +wean a man from, and Barrie says he gave up the +Arcadia Mixture, and De Quincey conquered opium. +But once you are set as a quarreller you quarrel and +quarrel till you die.</p> + +<p>How to quarrel well and often has ever been something +of an art, and it becomes more of an art with the general +decline of spirit. For it takes two to make a quarrel. +Time was when you turned to the handiest human being, +and with small care or labour had the comfortable warmth<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> +you needed in a minute or so. There was theology, even +in the fifties it was ample cause with two out of three you +met. Now people will express a lamentable indifference. +Then politics again, but a little while ago fat for the fire +of any male gathering, is now a topic of mere tepidity. +So you are forced to be more subtle, more patient in your +quarrelling. You play like a little boy playing cricket +with his sisters, with those who do not understand. A +fellow-votary is a rare treat. As a rule you have to lure +and humour your antagonist like a child. The wooing is +as intricate and delicate as any wooing can well be. To +quarrel now, indeed, requires an infinity of patience. +The good old days of thumb-biting—"Do you bite your +thumbs at us, sir?" and so to clash and stab—are gone +for ever.</p> + +<p>There are certain principles in quarrelling, however, +that the true quarreller ever bears in mind, and which, +duly observed, do much to facilitate encounters. In the +first place, cultivate Distrust. Have always before you +that this is a wicked world, full of insidious people, and +you never know what villainous encroachments upon you +may be hidden under fair-seeming appearances. That is +the flavour of it. At the first suspicion, "stick up for +your rights," as the vulgar say. And see that you do it +suddenly. Smite promptly, and the surprise and sting of +your injustice should provoke an excellent reply. And +where there is least ground for suspicion, there, remember, +is the most. The right hand of fellowship extended +towards you is one of the best openings you have. "Not +such a fool," is the kind of attitude to assume, and "You +don't put upon <i>me</i> so easy." Your adversary resents this +a little, and, rankling, tries to explain. You find a +personal inference in the expostulation.</p> + +<p>Next to a wariness respecting your interests is a keen +regard for your honour. Have concealed in the privacy +of your mind a code of what is due to you. Expand or +modify it as occasion offers. Be as it were a collector of +what are called "slights," and never let one pass you. +Watch your friend in doorways, passages; when he eats +by you, when he drinks with you, when he addresses you,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span> +when he writes you letters. It will be hard if you cannot +catch him smuggling some deadly insult into your presence. +Tax him with it. He did not think, forsooth! Tell him +no gentleman would do such a thing, thinkingly or not; +that you certainly will not stand it again. Say you will +show him. He will presently argue or contradict. So to +your climax.</p> + +<p>Then, again, there is the personal reference. "Meaning +me, sir?" Your victim with a blithe heart babbles of +this or that. You let him meander here and there, +watching him as if you were in ambush. Presently he +comes into your spring. "Of course," you say, "I saw +what you were driving at just this minute, when you +mentioned mustard in salad dressing, but if I am peppery +I am not mean. And if I have a thing to say I say it +straight out." A good gambit this, and well into him +from the start. The particular beauty of this is that you +get him apologetic at first, and can score heavily before +he rises to the defensive.</p> + +<p>Then, finally, there is your abstract cause, once very +fruitful indeed, but now sadly gone in decay, except +perhaps in specialist society. As an example, let there +be one who is gibing genially at some topic or other, at +Japanese king-crabs, or the inductive process, or any +other topic which cannot possibly affect you one atom. +Then is the time to drop all these merely selfish interests, +and to champion the cause of truth. Fall upon him in a +fine glow of indignation, and bring your contradiction +across his face—whack!—so that all the table may hear. +Tell him, with his pardon, that the king-crab is no more +a crab than you are a jelly-fish, or that Mill has been +superseded these ten years. Ask: "How can you say +such things?" From thence to his general knowledge is +a short flight, and so to his veracity, his reasoning powers, +his mere common sense. "Let me tell you, sir," is the +special incantation for the storm.</p> + +<p>These are the four chief ways of quarrelling, the four +gates to this delightful city. For it is delightful, once +your 'prentice days are past. In a way it is like a cold +bath on a winter's morning, and you glow all day. In a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> +way it is like football, as the nimble aggravation dances +to and fro. In a way it is like chess. Indeed, all games +of skill are watered quarrels, quarrel and soda, come to +see them in a proper light. And without quarrelling you +have not fully appreciated your fellow-man. For in the +ultimate it is the train and complement of Love, the +shadow that rounds off the delight we take in poor +humanity. It is the vinegar and pepper of existence, and +long after our taste for sweets has vanished it will be the +solace of our declining years.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_AMATEUR_NATURE-LOVER" id="THE_AMATEUR_NATURE-LOVER"></a>THE AMATEUR NATURE-LOVER</h3> + + +<p>It is possible that an education entirely urban is not the +best conceivable preparation for descriptive articles upon +the country. On the other hand, your professional +nature-lover is sometimes a little over-familiar with his +subject. He knows the names of all the things, and he +does not spare you. Besides, he is subtle. The prominent +features are too familiar to him, and he goes into details. +What respectable townsman, for instance, knows what +"scabiosa" is? It sounds very unpleasant. Then the +professional nature-lover assumes that you know trees. +No Englishman can tell any tree from any other tree, +except a very palpable oak or poplar. So that we may at +least, as an experiment, allow a good Londoner to take his +unsophisticated eyes out into the sweet country for once, +and try his skill at nature-loving, though his botany has +been learned over the counter of flower-shops, and his +zoology on Saturday afternoons when they have the band +in the Gardens. He makes his way, then, over by Epsom +Downs towards Sutton, trying to assimilate his mood to +the proper flavour of appreciation as he goes, and with a +little notebook in the palm of his hand to assist an ill-trained +memory. And the burthen of his song is of +course the autumn tints.</p> + +<p>The masses of trees towards Epsom and Ewell, with the +red houses and Elizabethan façades peeping through their +interstices, contain, it would seem, every conceivable +colour, except perhaps sky-blue; there are brilliant +yellow trees, and a kind of tree of the most amazing +gamboge green, almost the green of spring come back, and +tan-coloured trees, deep brown, red, and deep crimson +trees. Here and there the wind has left its mark, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span> +the grey-brown branches and their purple tracery of +twigs, with a suggestion of infinite depth behind, show +through the rents in the leafy covering. There are deep +green trees—the amateur nature-lover fancies they may +be yews—with their dense warm foliage arranged in +horizontal masses, like the clouds low down in a sunset; +and certain other evergreens, one particularly, with a +bluish-green covering of upstanding needles, are intensely +conspicuous among the flame tints around. On a distant +church tower, and nearer, disputing the possession of a +gabled red house with a glowing creeper, is some ivy; and +never is the perennial green of ivy so delightful as it is +now, when all else is alight with the sombre fire of the +sunset of the year....</p> + +<p>The amateur nature-lover proceeds over the down, +appreciating all this as hard as he can appreciate, and +anon gazing up at the grey and white cloud shapes +melting slowly from this form to that, and showing lakes, +and wide expanses, and serene distances of blue between +their gaps. And then he looks round him for a zoological +item. Underfoot the grass of the down is recovering +from the summer drought and growing soft and green +again, and plentiful little flattened snail shells lie about, +and here and there a late harebell still nods in the breeze. +Yonder bolts a rabbit, and then something whizzes by the +amateur nature-lover's ear.</p> + +<p>They shoot here somewhere, he remembers suddenly; +and then looking round, in a palpitating state, is reassured +by the spectacle of a lone golfer looming over the brow +of the down, and gesticulating black and weird against +the sky. The Londoner, with an abrupt affectation of +nonchalance, flings himself flat upon his back, and so +remains comparatively safe until the golfer has passed. +These golfers are strange creatures, rabbit-coloured, except +that many are bright red about the middle, and they +repel and yet are ever attracted by a devil in the shape of +a little white ball, which leads them on through toothed +briars, sharp furzes, pricking goss, and thorns; cursing +the thing, weeping even, and anon laughing at their own +foolish rambling; muttering, heeding no one to the right<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> +or left of their career,—demented creatures, as though +these balls were their souls, that they ever sought to +lose, and ever repented losing. And silent, ever at the +heel of each, is a familiar spirit, an eerie human hedgehog, +all set about with walking-sticks, a thing like a +cylindrical umbrella-stand with a hat and boots and +a certain suggestion of leg. And so they pass and are +gone.</p> + +<p>Rising, the amateur nature-lover finds he has been +reclining on a puff-ball. These puff-balls are certainly +the most remarkable example of adaptation to circumstances +known to English botanists. They grow abundantly +on golf grounds, and are exactly like golf-balls in +external appearance. They are, however, Pharisees and +whited sepulchres, and within they are full of a soft mess +of a most unpleasant appearance—the amateur nature-lover +has some on him now—which stuff contains the +spores. It is a case of what naturalists call "mimicry"—one +of nature's countless adaptations. The golf-player +smites these things with force, covering himself with +ridicule—and spores, and so disseminating this far-sighted +and ingenious fungus far and wide about the links.</p> + +<p>The amateur nature-lover passes off the down, and +towards Banstead village. He is on the watch for +characteristic objects of the countryside, and rustling +through the leaves beneath a chestnut avenue he comes +upon an old boot. It is a very, very old boot, all its +blacking washed off by the rain, and two spreading chestnut +leaves, yellow they are with blotches of green, with +their broad fingers extended, rest upon it, as if they would +protect and altogether cover the poor old boot in its last +resting-place. It is as if Mother Nature, who lost sight +of her product at the tanner's yard, meant to claim her own +trampled child again at last, after all its wanderings. So +we go on, noting a sardine tin gleaming brightly in the +amber sunlight, through a hazel hedge, and presently +another old boot. Some hawthorn berries, some hoary +clematis we notice—and then another old boot. Altogether, +it may be remarked, in this walk the amateur +nature-lover saw eleven old boots, most of them dropped<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> +in the very sweetest bits of hedge tangle and grassy corner +about Banstead.</p> + +<p>It is natural to ask, "Whence come all these old boots?" +They are, as everyone knows, among the commonest objects +in a country walk, so common, indeed, that the professional +nature-lover says very little about them. They cannot +grow there, they cannot be dropped from above—they are +distinctly earth-worn boots. I have inquired of my own +domestic people, and caused inquiry to be made in a large +number of households, and there does not appear to be +any regular custom of taking boots away to remote and +picturesque spots to abandon them. Some discarded +boots of my own were produced, but they were quite +different from the old boot of the outer air. These home-kept +old boots were lovely in their way, hoary with mould +running into the most exquisite tints of glaucophane and +blue-grey, but it was a different way altogether from that +of the wild boot.</p> + +<p>A friend says, that these boots are cast away by tramps. +People, he states, give your tramp old boots and hats in +great profusion, and the modesty of the recipient drives +him to these picturesque and secluded spots to effect the +necessary change. But no nature-lover has ever observed +the tramp or tramp family in the act of changing their +clothes, and since there are even reasons to suppose that +their garments are not detachable, it seems preferable to +leave the wayside boot as a pleasant flavouring of mystery +to our ramble. Another point, which also goes to explode +this tramp theory, is that these countryside boots <i>never +occur in pairs</i>, as any observer of natural history can +testify....</p> + +<p>So our Cockney Jefferies proceeds, presently coming +upon a cinder path. They use cinders a lot about Sutton, +to make country paths with; it gives you an unexpected +surprise the first time it occurs. You drop suddenly out +of a sweetly tangled lane into a veritable bit of the Black +Country, and go on with loathing in your soul for your +fellow-creatures. There is also an abundance of that last +product of civilisation, barbed wire. Oh that I were +Gideon! with thorns and briers of the wilderness would<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> +I teach these elders of Sutton! But a truce to dark +thoughts!</p> + +<p>We take our last look at the country from the open +down above Sutton. Blue hills beyond blue hills recede +into the remote distance; from Banstead Down one can +see into Oxfordshire. Windsor Castle is in minute blue +silhouette to the left, and to the right and nearer is the +Crystal Palace. And closer, clusters red-roofed Sutton +and its tower, then Cheam, with its white spire, and +further is Ewell, set in a variegated texture of autumn +foliage. Water gleams—a silver thread—at Ewell, and +the sinking sun behind us catches a window here and +there, and turns it into an eye of flame. And so to +Sutton station and home to Cockneydom once more.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> +<h3><a name="FROM_AN_OBSERVATORY" id="FROM_AN_OBSERVATORY"></a>FROM AN OBSERVATORY</h3> + + +<p>It will be some time yet before the rising of the moon. +Looking down from the observatory one can see the pathways +across the park dotted out in yellow lamps, each +with a fringe of dim green; and further off, hot and bright, +is the tracery of the illuminated streets, through which +the people go to and fro. Save for an occasional stirring, or +a passing voice speaking out of the dimness beneath me, +the night is very still. Not a cloud is to be seen in the +dark midwinter sky to hide one speck of its broad smears +of star dust and its shining constellations.</p> + +<p>As the moon rises, heaven will be flooded with blue +light, and one after another the stars will be submerged +and lost, until only a solitary shining pinnacle of brightness +will here and there remain out of the whole host of +them. It is curious to think that, were the moon but a +little brighter and truly the ruler of the night, rising to +its empire with the setting of the sun, we should never +dream of the great stellar universe in which our little +solar system swims—or know it only as a traveller's tale, +a strange thing to be seen at times in the Arctic Circle. +Nay, if the earth's atmosphere were some few score miles +higher, a night-long twilight would be drawn like an +impenetrable veil across the stars. By a mere accident +of our existence we see their multitude ever and again, +when the curtains of the daylight and moonlight, and of +our own narrow pressing necessities, are for a little while +drawn back. Then, for an interval, we look, as if out of a +window, into the great deep of heaven. So far as physical +science goes, there is nothing in the essential conditions of +our existence to necessitate that we should have these +transitory glimpses of infinite space. We can imagine<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> +men just like ourselves without such an outlook. But it +happens that we have it.</p> + +<p>If we had not this vision, if we had always so much +light in the sky that we could not perceive the stars, our +lives, so far as we can infer, would be very much as they +are now; there would still be the same needs and desires, +the same appliances for our safety and satisfaction; this +little gaslit world below would scarcely miss the stars +now, if they were blotted out for ever. But our science +would be different in some respects had we never seen +them. We should still have good reason, in Foucault's +pendulum experiment, for supposing that the world +rotated upon its axis, and that the sun was so far +relatively fixed; but we should have no suspicion of the +orbital revolution of the world. Instead we should ascribe +the seasonal differences to a meridional movement of the +sun. Our spectroscopic astronomy—so far as it refers to +the composition of the sun and moon—would stand +precisely where it does, but the bulk of our mathematical +astronomy would not exist. Our calendar would still be +in all essential respects as it is now; our year with the +solstices and equinoxes as its cardinal points. The texture +of our poetry might conceivably be the poorer without its +star spangles; our philosophy, for the want of a nebular +hypothesis. These would be the main differences. Yet, +to those who indulge in speculative dreaming, how much +smaller life would be with a sun and a moon and a blue +beyond for the only visible, the only thinkable universe. +And it is, we repeat, from the scientific standpoint a mere +accident that the present—the daylight—world periodically +opens, as it were, and gives us this inspiring glimpse of the +remoteness of space.</p> + +<p>One may imagine countless meteors and comets +streaming through the solar system, unobserved by those +who dwelt under such conditions as have just been +suggested, or some huge dark body from the outer depths +sweeping straight at that little visible universe, and all +unsuspected by the inhabitants. One may imagine the +scientific people of such a world, calm in their assurance +of the permanence of things, incapable almost of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span> +conceiving any disturbing cause. One may imagine how +an imaginative writer who doubted that permanence +would be pooh-poohed. "Cannot we see to the uttermost +limits of space?" they might argue, "and is it not +altogether blue and void?" Then, as the unseen visitor +draws near, begin the most extraordinary perturbations. +The two known heavenly bodies suddenly fail from their +accustomed routine. The moon, hitherto invariably full, +changes towards its last quarter—and then, behold! for +the first time the rays of the greater stars visibly pierce +the blue canopy of the sky. How suddenly—painfully +almost—the minds of thinking men would be enlarged +when this rash of the stars appeared.</p> + +<p>And what then if <i>our</i> heavens were to open? Very thin +indeed is the curtain between us and the unknown. There +is a fear of the night that is begotten of ignorance and +superstition, a nightmare fear, the fear of the impossible; +and there is another fear of the night—of the starlit night—that +comes with knowledge, when we see in its true +proportion this little life of ours with all its phantasmal +environment of cities and stores and arsenals, and the +habits, prejudices, and promises of men. Down there in +the gaslit street such things are real and solid enough, the +only real things, perhaps; but not up here, not under the +midnight sky. Here for a space, standing silently upon +the dim, grey tower of the old observatory, we may clear +our minds of instincts and illusions, and look out upon the +real.</p> + +<p>And now to the eastward the stars are no longer +innumerable, and the sky grows wan. Then a faint +silvery mist appears above the housetops, and at last in +the midst of this there comes a brilliantly shining line—the +upper edge of the rising moon.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> +<h3><a name="THE_MODE_IN_MONUMENTS" id="THE_MODE_IN_MONUMENTS"></a>THE MODE IN MONUMENTS</h3> + +<p>STRAY THOUGHTS IN HIGHGATE CEMETERY</p> + + +<p>On a sharp, sunlight morning, when the white clouds are +drifting swiftly across the luminous blue sky, there is no +finer walk about London than the Highgate ridge. One +may stay awhile on the Archway looking down upon the +innumerable roofs of London stretching southward into +the haze, and shining here and there with the reflection of +the rising sun, and then wander on along the picturesque +road by the college of Saint Aloysius to the new Catholic +church, and so through the Waterlow Park to the +cemetery. The Waterlow Park is a pleasant place, full of +children and aged persons in perambulators during the +middle hours of the day, and in the summer evening time +a haunt of young lovers; but your early wanderer finds it +solitary save for Vertumnus, who, with L.C.C. on the +front of him, is putting in crocuses. So we wander down +to the little red lodge, whence a sinuous road runs to +Hampstead, and presently into the close groves of monuments +that whiten the opposite slope.</p> + +<p>How tightly these white sepulchres are packed here! +How different this congestion of sorrow from the mossy +latitude of God's Acre in the country! The dead are +crammed together as closely as the living seemed in that +bird's-eye view from the Archway. There is no ample +shadow of trees, no tangled corners where mother earth +may weave flower garlands over her returning children. +The monuments positively jostle and elbow each other for +frontage upon the footways. And they are so rawly clean +and assertive. Most of them are conspicuously new +whitened, with freshly-blackened or newly-gilt inscriptions,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> +bare of lichen, moss, or mystery, and altogether so restless +that it seems to the meditative man that the struggle for +existence, for mere standing room and a show in the +world, still rages among the dead. The unstable slope of +the hill, with its bristling array of obelisks, crosses and +urns, craning one above another, is as directly opposed to +the restfulness of the village churchyard with its serene +outspreading yews as midday Fleet Street to a Sabbath +evening amidst the Sussex hills. This cemetery is, indeed, +a veritable tumult of tombs.</p> + +<p>Another thing that presently comes painfully home +to one is the lack of individuality among all these dead. +Not a necessary lack of individuality so much as a deliberate +avoidance of it. As one wanders along the steep, narrow +pathways one is more and more profoundly impressed by +the wholesale flavour of the mourning, the stereotyping of +the monuments. The place is too modern for <i>memento +mori</i> and the hour-glass and the skull. Instead, Slap +& Dash, that excellent firm of monumental masons, +everywhere crave to be remembered. Truly, the firm of +Slap & Dash have much to answer for among these +graves, and they do not seem to be ashamed of it.</p> + +<p>From one elevated point in this cemetery one can +count more than a hundred urns, getting at last weary +and confused with the receding multitude. The urn is +not dissimilar to the domestic mantel ornament, and +always a stony piece of textile fabric is feigned to be +thrown over its shoulder. At times it is wreathed in +stony flowers. The only variety is in the form. Sometimes +your urn is broad and squat, a Silenus among urns; +sometimes fragile and high-shouldered, like a slender old +maid; here an "out-size" in urns stalwart and strong, and +there a dwarf peeping quaintly from its wrapping. The +obelisks, too, run through a long scale of size and refinement. +But the curious man finds no hidden connection between +the carriage of the monument and the character of the dead. +Messrs. Slap & Dash apparently take the urn or obelisk +that comes readiest to hand. One wonders dimly why +mourners have this overwhelming proclivity for Messrs. +Slap & Dash and their obelisk and urn.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span></p> + +<p>The reason why the firm produces these articles may be +guessed at. They are probably easy to make, and require +scarcely any skill. The contemplative man has a dim +vision of a grimy shed in a back street, where a human +being passes dismally through life the while he chips out +an unending succession of these cheap urns and obelisks +for his employers' retailing. But the question why +numberless people will profane the memory of their +departed by these public advertisements of Slap & Dash, +and their evil trade, is a more difficult problem. For +surely nothing could be more unmeaning or more +ungainly than the monumental urn, unless it be the +monumental obelisk. The plain cross, by contrast, has +the tenderest meaning, and is a simple and fitting +monument that no repetition can stale.</p> + +<p>The artistic cowardice of the English is perhaps the +clue to the mystery. Your Englishman is always afraid +to commit himself to criticism without the refuge of a +<i>tu quoque</i>. He is covered dead, just as he is covered +living, with the "correct thing." A respectable stock-in-trade +is proffered him by the insinuating shopman, to +whom it is our custom to go. He is told this is selling +well, or that is much admired. Heaven defend that he +should admire on his own account! He orders the stock +urn or the stock slab because it is large and sufficiently +expensive for his means and sorrow, and because he +knows of nothing better. So we mourn as the stonemason +decrees, or after the example and pattern of the Smiths +next door. But some day it will dawn upon us that a +little thought and a search after beauty are far more +becoming than an order and a cheque to the nearest +advertising tradesman. Or it may be we shall conclude +that the anonymous peace of a grassy mould is better +than his commercial brutalities, and so there will be an +end of him.</p> + +<p>One may go from end to end of this cemetery and find +scarcely anything beautiful, appropriate, or tender. A +lion, ill done, and yet to some degree impressive, lies +complacently above a menagerie keeper, and near this +is a tomb of some imagination, with reliefs of the life of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> +Christ. In one place a grotesque horse, with a head disproportionately +vast, is to be seen. Perhaps among all +these monuments the one to Mrs. Blake is the most +pleasing. It is a simply and quaintly executed kneeling +figure, with a certain quiet and pathetic reverence of pose +that is strangely restful against the serried vulgarity +around it.</p> + +<p>But the tradesman ghoul will not leave us; he follows +us up and down, indecently clamouring his name and +address, and at last turns our meditation to despair. +Certain stock devices become as painful as popular +autotypes. There is the lily broken on its stalk; we +meet it here on a cross and there on an obelisk, presently +on the pedestal of an urn. There is the hand pointing +upward, here balanced on the top of an obelisk and +there upon a cross. The white-robed angel, free from the +remotest shadow of expression, meets us again and again. +"All this is mine," says the tradesman ghoul. "Behold +the names of me—Slap & Dash here, the Ugliness +Company there, and this the work of the Cheap and +Elegant Funeral Association. This is where we slew the +art of sculpture. These are our trophies that sculpture is +no more. All this marble might have been beautiful, all +this sorrow might have been expressive, had it not been for +us. See, this is our border, No. A 5, and our pedestal +No. E, and our second quality urn, along of a nice +appropriate text—a pretty combination and a cheap +one. Or we can do it you better in border A 3, and +pedestal C, and a larger urn or a hangel——"</p> + +<p>The meditative man is seized with a dismal horror, and +retreats to the gates. Even there a wooden advertisement +grins broadly at him in his discomfiture, and shouts a +name athwart his route. And so down the winding road +to the valley, and then up Parliament Hill towards +Hampstead and its breeze-whipped ponds. And the +mind of him is full of a dim vision of days that have been, +when sculptor and stonemason were one, when the artist +put his work in the porch for all the world to see, when +people had leisure to think how things should be done and +heart to do them well, when there was beauty in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> +business of life and dignity in death. And he wonders +rather hopelessly if people will ever rise up against these +damnable tradesmen who ruin our arts, make our lives +costly and dismal, and advertise, advertise even on our +graves</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> +<h3><a name="HOW_I_DIED" id="HOW_I_DIED"></a>HOW I DIED</h3> + + +<p>It is now ten years ago since I received my death +warrant. All these ten years I have been, and I am, +and shall be, I hope, for years yet, a Doomed Man. It +only occurred to me yesterday that I had been dodging—missing +rather than dodging—the common enemy for such +a space of time. <i>Then</i>, I know, I respected him. It +seemed he marched upon me, inexorable, irresistible; even +at last I felt his grip upon me. I bowed in the shadow. +And he passed. Ten years ago, and once since, he and I +have been very near. But now he seems to me but a +blind man, and we, with all our solemn folly of medicine +and hygiene, but players in a game of Blind Man's Buff. +The gaunt, familiar hand comes out suddenly, swiftly, +this time surely? And it passes close to my shoulder; I +hear someone near me cry, and it is over.... Another +ream of paper; there is time at least for the Great Book +still.</p> + +<p>Very close to the tragedy of life is the comedy, +brightest upon the very edge of the dark, and I remember +now with a queer touch of sympathetic amusement +my dear departed self of the middle eighties. How the +thing staggered me! I was full of the vast ambition of +youth; I was still at the age when death is quite +out of sight, when life is still an interminable vista +of years; and then suddenly, with a gout of blood +upon my knuckle, with a queer familiar taste in +my mouth, that cough which had been a bother became +a tragedy, and this world that had been so solid grew +faint and thin. I saw through it; saw his face near to my +own; suddenly found him beside me, when I had been +dreaming he was far beyond there, far away over the hills.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span></p> + +<p>My first phase was an immense sorrow for myself. +It was a purely selfish emotion. You see I had been +saving myself up, denying myself half the pride of life +and most of its indulgence, drilling myself like a drill-sergeant, +with my eyes on those now unattainable hills. +Had I known it was to end so soon, I should have +planned everything so differently. I lay in bed mourning +my truncated existence. Then presently the sorrow +broadened. They were so sorry, so genuinely sorry for +me. And they considered me so much now. I had this +and that they would never have given me before—the +stateliest bedding, the costliest food. I could feel from +my bed the suddenly disorganised house, the distressed +friends, the new-born solicitude. Insensibly a realisation +of enhanced importance came to temper my regrets for +my neglected sins. The lost world, that had seemed so +brilliant and attractive, dwindled steadily as the days of +my illness wore on. I thought more of the world's loss, +and less of my own.</p> + +<p>Then came the long journey; the princely style of it! +the sudden awakening on the part of external humanity, +which had hitherto been wont to jostle me, to help itself +before me, to turn its back upon me, to my importance. +"He has a diseased lung—cannot live long"....</p> + +<p>I was going into the dark and I was not afraid—with +ostentation. I still regard that, though now with scarcely +so much gravity as heretofore, as a very magnificent +period in my life. For nearly four months I was dying +with immense dignity. Plutarch might have recorded it. +I wrote—in touchingly unsteady pencil—to all my +intimate friends, and indeed to many other people. I +saw the littleness of hate and ambition. I forgave my +enemies, and they were subdued and owned to it. How +they must regret these admissions! I made many +memorable remarks. This lasted, I say, nearly four +months.</p> + +<p>The medical profession, which had pronounced my +death sentence, reiterated it steadily—has, indeed, done +so now this ten years. Towards the end of those four +months, however, dying lost its freshness for me. I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> +began to detect a certain habitual quality in my service. +I had exhausted all my memorable remarks upon the +subject, and the strain began to tell upon all of us.</p> + +<p>One day in the spring-time I crawled out alone, carefully +wrapped, and with a stick, to look once more—perhaps +for the last time—on sky and earth, and the first +scattered skirmishers of the coming army of flowers. It +was a day of soft wind, when the shadows of the clouds +go sweeping over the hills. Quite casually I happened +upon a girl clambering over a hedge, and her dress had +caught in a bramble, and the chat was quite impromptu +and most idyllic. I remember she had three or four +wood anemones in her hand—"wind stars" she called +them, and I thought it a pretty name. And we talked +of this and that, with a light in our eyes, as young folks +will.</p> + +<p>I quite forgot I was a Doomed Man. I surprised +myself walking home with a confident stride that jarred +with the sudden recollection of my funereal circumstances. +For a moment I tried in vain to think what it was had +slipped my memory. Then it came, colourless and remote. +"Oh! Death.... He's a Bore," I said; "I've +done with him," and laughed to think of having done with +him.</p> + +<p>"And why not so?" said I.</p> + + +<h4>THE END</h4> +<br /> +<br /> + +<p><i>This book appeared some years ago at another price and in another +form. The Publisher believes that its present guise will bring it +within the reach of all and sundry, who, while delighting in the +marriage of</i> wit <i>with</i> wisdom, <i>cannot complete the trilogy with the +third desideratum of</i> wealth.</p> +<br /> +<br /> +<p><b>PRINTED BY MORRISON AND GIBB LIMITED, EDINBURGH</b></p> + + +<hr /> +<h4>Back Cover:</h4> +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="./images/backcover.png" width="600" height="972" +title="Advertisement" +alt="Advertisement for Norman Stacey Ltd. (text below)" /> +</div> + +<p>To Furnish Smartly +Without Disturbing Capital</p> + +<p>By means of a perfectly +simple plan (commended +by the Editor +of <i>Truth</i> and many others) +you may furnish your +House, Chambers, or Flat +throughout,—and to the +extent of Linen, Silver, +and Cutlery,—<span class="u">Out of +Income without drawing +upon Capital</span> by dividing +the initial outlay into 6, +12, or 24 monthly, or 12 +quarterly payments. At +any period the option may +be exercised of paying off +the balance, and so take +advantage of the Cash +Discount.</p> + +<p>A beautifully coloured +Catalogue given on personal +application.</p> + + +<p> +CONSULT:<br /> +NORMAN & STACEY, Ltd.,<br /> +<i>Artistic House Furnishers</i>,<br /> +118, Queen Victoria St., E.C.<br /> +</p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Certain Personal Matters, by H. G. 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