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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/20779-8.txt b/20779-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..821f4d8 --- /dev/null +++ b/20779-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2242 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, +October 27, 1920, by Various + +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: Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, October 27, 1920 + +Author: Various + +Editor: Owen Seaman + +Release Date: March 8, 2007 [EBook #20779] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PUNCH *** + + + + +Produced by V. L. Simpson, Jonathan Ingram and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net. This +file is gratefully uploaded to the PG collection in honor +of Distributed Proofreaders having posted over 10,000 +ebooks. + + + + + + + +PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. + +VOL. 159 + + +October 27, 1920. + + +CHARIVARIA. + + +Some idea of the evils consequent on a coal strike can be obtained when +we hear there was talk of a football match in the North having to be +cancelled. + +* * * + +Mr. Lloyd George is certainly most unlucky. As a result of the coal +strike the New World has again been postponed. + +* * * + +We are assured that everything has been done to safeguard our food +supply. We ourselves have heard of one grocer who has sufficient fresh +eggs to last him for many months. + +* * * + +"Large numbers of South Wales miners left by train yesterday for the +seaside," says _Lloyd's News_. Unfortunately they did not travel by the +Datum Line. + +* * * + +The Opera House at Covent Garden is to be used as a cinema theatre. +Meanwhile the House of Commons remains firm. + +* * * + +_The Daily Mail_ Prize Hat has now been chosen, though it is not yet +definitely decided whether the wearing of it will be made compulsory. If +it is, we understand that Mr. Winston Churchill will apply for +exemption. + +* * * + +Thieves have broken into the railway station at Blaenau Festiniog and +stolen a quantity of chocolate. Apparently with the idea of confusing +the police, they left the name of the station behind them. + +* * * + +Twenty-one persons have been injured as the result of the explosion of a +bomb in a first-class carriage on the Brazil Central Railway. The +culprit, we understand, has written to the company expressing regret, +but pointing out that no seat was available in a third-class carriage. + +* * * + +A ship's cook has been fined twenty shillings for refusing to join his +ship, his excuse being that he had seen a rat as big as a cat in the +cabin. It was pointed out to him that only ship's officers are entitled +to see rats in the cabin. + +* * * + +A company has been formed at Stockholm for storing wind power. There +should be a great demand for the insides of some puff pastry that we +know of. + +* * * + +An American has invented an aeroplane capable of remaining in the air +for hours and hours. This is nothing to Mr. Asquith's Irish solution, +which is guaranteed to remain in the air for years and years. + +* * * + +Brides are getting rather tired of Harris's lilies, says a writer in +_The Daily Graphic_. It is only natural that brides should become rather +bored if they always wear the same sort of flowers every time they're +married. + +* * * + +Mr. E. Van Ingen, a New York merchant now in London, boasts that he has +crossed the Atlantic one hundred and sixty-eight times. It may be +against the Prohibition laws, but we fancy it would be cheaper if he +kept a few bottles of the stuff in New York. + +* * * + +A medical man advises people to use dried milk on health grounds. We +have felt for some time that what was wanted was a really good +waterproof milk. + +* * * + +Mr. E. A. Douse has spent forty-two years in a Cheshire post-office. It +is only fair to say that the young lady behind the counter didn't notice +him standing there all that time. + +* * * + +A Hertfordshire farmer, says _The Daily Mail_, has counted one hundred +and twenty-three grains of wheat in one ear. Our contemporary has not +yet decided what can be done about it. + +* * * + +"What is the right age for a man to marry?" asks Miss Gertie +Wentworth-James. The answer is, Not yet. + +* * * + +While addressing a meeting of miners an extremist declared that the idle +rich were the cause of all industrial troubles. It has since been +reported that several of the audience immediately proceeded home and +told themselves off in front of a mirror. + +* * * + +We understand that the miners greatly desire that Ireland will remain +quiet for a short period, and thus refrain from distracting public +attention from their cause. + +* * * + +"Lord Northcliffe," says _The New York World_, "is always in advance of +public opinion." This is a fitting rejoinder to those who tell us that +he is always behind _The Times_. + +* * * + +We cull the following from a speech of Senator Harding: "As I note the +cornfields I am reminded that we still plough the land and plant and +cultivate the fields in order to grow crops." We would remind the +Senator that, with the Elections drawing daily nearer, the habit of +making such sweeping and unguarded statements as the above is extremely +dangerous. + +* * * + +We advise all readers to stick to their own particular newspaper, as a +sudden change might upset the "net sales" which are being so carefully +compiled at the present moment. + +* * * + +The up-to-date song-writer, says a musical journal, must strike a sad +and soulful note this season. We are already engaged in writing "The +Scotsman's Farewell to his Corkscrew." + +* * * + +A theatrical writer informs us that _The Laughing Husband_ will be +revived this year. Not in our suburb, unless the cost of living drops +considerably. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Betty._ "Grandma, I Know My Twelve Times." + +_Grandma._ "Do You, Dear? Well, What Are Twelve Times Thirteen?" + +_Betty._ "Don't Be Silly, Grandma. There Isn't Such A Thing."] + + * * * * * + + "The modern Hydra, embracing innumerable adverse factors, would + appear at least as many headed as the ancient, for as fast as one is + more or less effectively decapitated up comes another to upset the + applecart." + + _Financial Paper._ + +Classical students will, of course, remember how cleverly Hercules made +use of this habit of the Hydra to secure the apples of the Hesperides. + + * * * * * + +THE DINING GLADIATOR; + +OR, WAR TO THE KNIFE (AND FORK). + +(_Being further Extracts from a certain Diary._) + +II. + +WROTE an even better article than ever, on indigestion as a determining +factor in national _moral_. Pointed out how important it is, if we are +to think coolly, that we should eat discreetly. Sufficiently, of course, +but with thought. + +At the Tribunal all the afternoon, busily combing out. + +To the Hippodrome in the evening. A most diverting show. + +* * * + +NORTHCLIFFE is becoming impossible and I must find another paper. +Several of my best commas cut out of to-day's article. All reference to +the necessity for immediately beheading ASQUITH omitted yesterday. Was +comforted by lunch at the Carlton with DORIS KEANE, GERTIE MILLAR and +SCATTERS. We had some good jokes. + +* * * + +The news of my resignation from _The Times_ has set my telephone ringing +all the morning with congratulations, requests for interviews and offers +of employment. Also some attractive invitations to dinner and week-ends. +The War for the moment seems to be forgotten. Wonderful, the power of +the printed word! + +* * * + +My first article in _The Morning Post_, distributing blame and praise +with my usual deadly accuracy. Wonder what poor NORTHCLIFFE is doing +without me. + +* * * + +Received long letter from HAIG asking for instructions, which I sent by +return. + +Lunched at the Carlton with some charming musical-comedy actresses. To +the Tribunal after. Dined at the National Sporting Club and saw a good +fight. + +* * * + +A visit from an Italian personage of consequence, who told me that my +articles are the talk of Italy. If writing could win wars, he said, my +pen would have done it. + +* * * + +L. G. came up to Carryon Hall heavily masked. I gave him an excellent +dinner and some equally good advice, and he left much heartened. + +* * * + +Dined at Lady RANDOLPH'S. A merry crowd there. Every one very gay and +amusing; but we forgot that WINSTON was our hostess's son and castigated +him badly. Lady JULIET said that with some people, no matter what they +begin to talk about, even with Cabinet Ministers, it all comes back to +food. + +* * * + +Wrote a careful article pointing out that we must have at least one +hundred more divisions in the West before next Friday. + +* * * + +I was gratified to learn to-day that in consequence of my articles _The +Morning Post_ has doubled its circulation, while _The Times_ hardly +sells a copy. + +* * * + +Lunched with MASSINGHAM of _The Nation_, who eats more sensibly than he +writes. + +In Paris. Saw CLEMENCEAU at the War Ministry. His table was littered +with papers and reports, amongst which he pointed out laughingly one of +my articles. I can't think why he laughed. Lunched at Voisin's. + +* * * + +Left for rapid tour of inspection to British H.Q. Found much to put +right. Issued an Order of the Day to soldiers of all ranks. The Germans, +hearing of my presence, made desperate attempts to bomb me, but failed. +Food at the Front not very alluring. + +Yesterday's article, I learn, put the wind up the War Cabinet, and great +things may result. All my pleasure spoilt, however, by breaking a tooth +on a pellet in a Ritz grouse. + +* * * + +Visited the French H.Q. and was pleased with FOCH, whom I asked to run +over to Carryon when he was ever in any doubt. Sent home a powerful +article which, when it is reproduced in all the French papers, as it +will be, should encourage him and improve his position. + +* * * + +Dined at Lady RIDLEY'S. A very cheery party and much chaff. Mrs. ASQUITH +said that she was writing her reminiscences. I made no mention of my +diary, but if I don't get it out in book form before hers I'm not the +Colonel of the Nuts. + +* * * + +To-day's article should bring things to a head very shortly. Shall be +very glad when it is over and I can rest a little. Took some bicarbonate +of soda. + +* * * + +Armistice signed. Spent the day in a kind of triumphal procession from +restaurant to restaurant, at each of which I was hailed with applause. + +* * * + +Reached Versailles and let the news be known. A visible quickening up +already to be noted. + +* * * + +Sent for President WILSON, but something must have prevented his coming. +Lunched at Paillard's and dined at Larue's. Saw an amusing Palais Royal +farce. + +* * * + +_June 28th_, 1920.--Treaty of Peace, for which I have worked so long, +signed at last. Now I can utter my _Nunc Dimittis_, having accomplished +the two ends I had in view--to bring the first world War to a more or +less satisfactory finish and to make it dangerous for any but the deaf +and dumb to dine out. + +E. V. L. + + * * * * * + +THE LATE WORM + +(_Being a correction of "A Ballad of the Early Worm," "Punch," October +6th_). + + OH ye whose hearts were rent with pain + A few short weeks ago, + Is it unkind to harp again + Upon that tale of woe? + + You know the tale--in _Punch_, I mean-- + Pathetic every word; + Three wormlets fought to stand between + Pa and the Early Bird. + + You sorrowed for their non-success + (By use of triple strength + They saved their father's life--ah yes-- + But not his total length). + + You thought, of course--I know you did-- + That Father left his hole, + A briskly virtuous annelid, + To take an early stroll. + + Well, now just go and read a book + Called _Vegetable Mould + And Earthworms_ (DARWIN); if you look + You'll find that you've been sold. + + It's not my own, it's DARWIN'S firm + Authority I cite: + _There never is an early worm; + Pa had been out all night._ + + He swaggered forth at eventide + And stayed till dawn next day; + For I will not attempt to hide + That _worms behave that way._ + + So pious folk like you and me + Should not be filled with woe + At thought of Father's tragedy; + _His morals were so low._ + + * * * * * + +Our Courtly Contemporaries. + + "The Earl of Athlone walked away on foot, as is the simple way of + our Royal Family." _Sunday Paper._ + + * * * * * +"High-backed chair of Tudor period, about +1660."--_Advt. in Daily Paper._ + +We don't question its genuineness, but infer that it has been subjected +to Restoration. + + * * * * * + + "Furnished House, consisting of dining, drawing, eight breakfast + rooms, etc." _Sunday Paper._ + +Would suit a large family inclined to be short-tempered in the morning. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: A TOO-FREE COUNTRY. + +ALIEN RIOTER. "DOWN WITH EVERYBODY!" + +P.C. JOHN BULL. "WELL, WE'LL MAKE A START WITH YOU."] + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: PEOPLE WE ADMIRE. + +THE HERO WHO KEEPS UP HIS ARMY EXERCISES, STRIKE OR NO STRIKE.] + + * * * * * + +A LETTER TO THE BACK-BLOCKS. + +DEAR GINGER,--So you have bought a very promising little gold-mine from +a rollicking Irish nobleman called Patrick Terence O'Ryan, who is +retiring on Mayo to take up the paternal estates. H-m!--have you? And +you think you yourself will be retiring home presently on the proceeds +of the said mine? H-m! again. There is a certain familiarity in your +description of the gentleman. Tell me, has this Hibernian philanthropist +a slight squint, a broken nose and a tendency to lisp in moments of +excitement? + +I think I see you nod. + +Ginger, I once bought a mine from that man. His name was Algernon Maddox +Cholmondely _then_, and he was homeward bound to assume the ancestral +acres in Flint. He escorted me down the hole and displayed visible gold +sparkling all along the reef. A week after he had gone I found that he +had put it there with a shot-gun--an old "salter's" trick, but new to me +at the time. You are not likely to be seeing Patrick Algernon Terence +Maddox O'Ryan-Cholmondely again, but, if you should, remember me to him, +please--with the business end of a pick-axe. Always delighted to keep in +touch with old friends. + +Ginger, _you never can tell_. This is not an original remark. One of our +brainy boys--George Bernard, unless I err--thought of it before I did; +went away into the wilderness, wrapped his grey-matter in wet Jaeger +bandages, subsisted on a diet of premasticated grape-nuts and produced +this aphorism. And there's a world of truth in it, my son. You certainly +never can. + +One fine morning last August (yes, there was _one_), I stepped out of my +diggings in an obscure Cornish fishing-village to find a gentleman +busily engaged strangling a lady on the cliff side. He had her by the +throat and was gradually forcing her over the edge. Once in Bristol I +interposed in a slogging contest between husband and wife and was very +properly chastised for my interference, not only by the happy pair but +by the entire street, who had valuable bets laid on the event. That, you +say, should have been a lesson to me. But you know me, Ginger, +impetuous, chivalrous, brave; I simply couldn't stand there and watch a +defenceless woman--moreover a good-looking woman--foully done to death +like that. I flung myself upon the villain--that is to say I spoke to +him about it. + +"Oh, dash it, old bean," I said, "draw it mild!" + +Somebody shouted something behind me, but I didn't catch its purport for +the sufficient reason that at that moment the long-suffering cliff gave +way and we all went overboard, all three of us, he, she and it--me. + +Fortunately the drop wasn't terrific--not more than four feet or so--and +the tide happened to be in at the time, which was very decent of it. My +first thought as I came to the surface--or, at any rate, _one_ of my +first thoughts--was "What of the woman?" I struck out for the poor +creature. At the same moment she struck out for me, and, what is more, +she got me too, clean between the eyes--a straight left-hander. + +"Out of my way, fathead!" she hissed and went on for the shore under +her own steam at about forty knots an hour. I was washed up myself, +along with a quantity of other jetsam, a few minutes later, to be met by +a small furious man with a heliotrope complexion and white spats who +wagged bunches of typescript under my nose and informed me that I had +absolutely ruined about twenty million feet of the Flickerscope +Company's five-reel paralyser, "The Smuggler's Bride." + +Of course you say that you saw what was coming all along. Of course you +did. But wait a moment. + +Yesterday afternoon I was strolling down a certain fashionable street +when a loud explosion occurred in a near-by shop and a cloud of acrid +grey smoke came rolling out. Being by nature as inquisitive as a +chipmunk I was on the point of shoving my head round the door-jamb to +see what was up when caution prompted me to turn round. Yes, there they +were, of course, a tall, thin youth winding away at a cine-camera like +an Italian at a barrel-organ, and beside him a heavy-weight Israelite, +dancing a war-dance, waving bunches of typescript and howling at me to +stand clear. I had very near ruined a further mile or two of film. + +I sprang out of range, and then, wishing to atone for my previous +blunders and prove that I really had no malevolent intentions towards a +struggling industry, I went round and assisted the caracoling producer +in stemming the crowd. Among others I stemmed a pushful policeman. I +didn't notice he was a policeman until he was biting the dust, with my +stick between his legs. However an instantaneous application of palm-oil +made it all right between us, and he squatted half-stunned on the kerb, +nursing his brow with one hand, my five bob with the other and took no +further interest in the proceedings. And very interesting they were, +too. + +Three masked men dashed out of the shop laden with booty and were +pursued by a fourth, whom they knocked on the head and left lying for +dead on the pavement. Most realistic. The crowd, led by me, cheered like +mad. Then the thieves jumped into a waiting car and were whirled away. +That done, the photographer and his step-dancing friend leapt into a +second car and were whirled away also. Once more we cheered. I made a +short speech to the effect that everything was all right with the +British Cinema business and, after leading a few more cheers for myself, +came home. + +"Well," you say, "all very jolly and so on, but what about it?" + +There's this about it, old companion, just this, that I am very probably +spending a meditative winter in gaol. The charge is that I did aid and +abet a peculiarly ingenious gang of desperadoes to blow a jeweller's +safe, knock the jeweller on the head and get safely away with the stuff. +I am even accused of obstructing the police. An inspector has been round +to see me this morning and he tells me there is practically no hope. He +advises me, as between friends, to make a clean breast of it, return the +boodle, betray my accomplices, plead mental deficiency and trust to the +clemency of the Court. It's pretty rough, after making all arrangements +for spending a cheerful Christmas in Algiers, to have it changed to cold +porridge in Parkhurst or Princetown. Of the two I hope it'll be +Parkhurst, for Princetown, so _habitués_ tell me, is no place for a +growing lad when the wintry winds do blow. + +Thine, _de profundis_ PATLANDER. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Mistress._ "WOULD YOU LIKE TO GO OUT THIS AFTERNOON, +MABEL?" + +_Mabel._ "I _AM_ GOING OUT."] + + * * * * * + +Rhymes of Unrest. + + There was a young miner of Ayr + Who gave himself up to despair; + For he said, "If we're paid + On our 'get,' I'm afraid + That I canna ca' canny no mair." + + "Strike while the iron is hot," + Said the wise old saw of old; + But the miners say, "What rot! + Strike while the weather's cold." + + * * * * * + + "The art of decoration is alien to painting in this--that you must + mix your colours with your brains."--_Daily Paper._ + +We await a reply from the intellectuals of Chelsea. + + * * * * * + + "There is one building now being erected, within a few miles of + Manchester as the cock crows."--_Provincial Paper._ + +We are unfamiliar with this method of mensuration. + + * * * * * + +ABOUT CONFERENCES. + +WE may not have coal, but we can have conferences. A conference is the +most typically English thing that there is. The old Anglo-Saxons had +them and called them moots. Why they called them a silly name like that, +when "conferences" would have done just as well, one can't imagine; but +they had their notions and stuck to them. They would have called +Parliament a moot; in fact they did. They called it a moot of wise men. +Sarcastic beggars, these Anglo-Saxons! + +The advantages of having a conference about everything are almost too +numerous to explain. For one thing, suppose Smith is coming to see you +at 2.30 P.M. "It's no use his waiting now," you say. "I've got a +conference at 3. Tell him to come back at 5.30." And when he comes back +at 5.30 of course the conference is still going on, so you don't have to +see him at all. + +There is nothing again that makes you feel so deliciously important as +being at a conference. You may be a leader of quite an insignificant +body of workers, like the Nutcracker-Teeth Makers' Union, but you rub +shoulders at a conference with men whose names are a household word +throughout the whole of Great Britain, amongst those who have houses. +The distinguished and the undistinguished lay their heads together; the +spat-wearing get their feet mixed with the non-spat-wearing; though +there is rather a fake, mind you, about this spat-wearing business, for +it may simply mean that the uppers are very badly worn, or that only +that very bright pink pair of socks came home from the wash this week, +or even that there are no socks underneath at all. + +But anyhow, at a conference, Tom, Dick and Harry hobnob with Bob, James +and George, and all are equal, except perhaps the chairman, who has two +more pens in front of him and a much larger ash-tray. Mr. BEVIN and Sir +ERIC GEDDES smile affably across at each other, and the PRIME MINISTER +and Mr. CRAMP find out how much they have in common, such as love of +poetry and pelargoniums. The mine-owner offers the miners' +representative a cigarette, and the miners' representative says to the +mine-owner, "Many thanks, old boy; but I'll have one of my own." And +after it is over they all go out and stand arm-in-arm in a long row to +be photographed for the papers, and are read next morning from left to +right. It is the ambition of every properly constituted Englishman to +wake up some morning and find that his portrait is being read from left +to right; but how few succeed. + +The total output of conferences in this country during one year has +never been computed yet, but it is supposed to exceed that of any +country in the world, except Red India. If there were to be a strike of +conferents or conferees, whatever they are called, in England, it is +impossible to say what would happen. But it might be possible to lay +down a datum line--a shilling extra for the first million words above +two hundred and fifty million per shift, and two shillings more for +every million words above that. Fortunately this will never be +necessary, for people who confer are so fond of conferences that they +will never down chairs. + +And no wonder. Only a very strong man can hew coal, and only a very +reckless one can make a speech, but almost anyone can confer if he has a +large enough ash-tray; and there seems no reason why more people +shouldn't confer. Everybody is interested in conferences, whatever they +are about, and the British public ought to be admitted to this kind of +thing. One is always reading in the paper that the sound commonsense or +the traditional sense of fair play of the great British public will +support the miners in any just claim; but this claim is not just or just +isn't, or something of that sort. But how do they know what the great +British public will feel about it? They aren't there, are they? There +ought to be representatives of the G.B.P. on all these conferences. They +ought to be chosen from a rota, like jurymen. Very likely one of them +would have found out what a datum line is, anyway. There's a man who +comes up in the train with me in the morning who thinks he knows, but +unfortunately he gets out at Croydon so we haven't found out yet. + +By having a lot more conferences and having a lot of representatives +from the public on them all, and paying them well for it, one could +practically settle the unemployment problem for the winter. If the +Government can only be brought to see that this is the only +statesmanlike course, and the sole course consistent with the +Anglo-Saxon sense of justice, and capable of leading to a satisfactory +Exploration of Avenues, Finding of Bridges and Discovery of Ways Out, we +may all achieve our life's ambition some day and open the morning paper +to find that we are being read at last from left to right. "Mr. ROBERT +WILLIAMS, Mr. LLOYD GEORGE, Mr. J. H. THOMAS, Lord RIDDELL," and so on +and so on, till you come at last to "J. Smith, Esq., R.B.P.," smiling +the widest of all. R.B.P.'s, I think, should wear a distinguishing +mark--a single spat perhaps. EVOE. + + * * * * * + +MORE SECRET HISTORY. + + [According to a report in a daily paper, at the recent Peace + Conference held at Spa, where the delegates were royally + entertained in the matter of hotel accommodation, meals, + etc., the cigar bill (which has been sent in to the League + of Nations and sent out again) amounted to three thousand + two hundred pounds. What the delegates could not smoke they + seem to have taken away with them.] + + 'TIS sweet in darkish times like these to see a + Rent in the veil which keeps the public blind, + And thus obtain a pretty shrewd idea + Of what goes on behind; + + To note how quite an innocent report'll + Reveal apparent trifles which befall, + Proving that men whom we supposed immortal + Are human after all. + + But here, while I can hardly call you blameful + For smoking "free" cigars with so much zest, + Frankly I feel 'twas little short of shameful + To go and pinch the rest. + + I can forgive your huge hotel expenses; + Your beef was rightly of a super-cut; + A modicum of wine does whet the senses; + But those cigars--tut, tut! + + For there's a finer aid to meditation, + Much more appropriate, in my humble view, + When Nation nestles cheek by jowl with Nation, + And far, far cheaper too. + + So, if you'd really slay Bellona's bow-wows, + Might I suggest your vicious ways should cease, + And that in future you conduct your pow-wows + Over the pipe of peace. + + * * * * * + +An Affectionate Diminutive. + + "Lord Buxton, who retired this summer from the post of High + Commissioner and Governor-General of South Africa, has been made an + early."--_Daily Paper._ + + * * * * * + +A correspondent, referring to Mr. Punch's quotation (from an Australian +paper) of the title of a song, "It was a Lover and His Last," suggests +"_Ne_ suitor _ultra crepidam._" + + * * * * * + +On the coal strike:-- + + "We look to the Government to keep all doors open. We look to the + public to keep cool."--_Westminster Gazette._ + +The public should have no difficulty in doing its part if the Government +do theirs. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: + +TRANSPORT: PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE.] + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Giles._ "I DIDN'T 'ARDLY AGREE WI' THE VICAR IN WOT 'E +SAID ABOUT THEM EARLY MARTYRS BEIN' THROWN TO THE LIONS AN' BURNT AT THE +STAKE AN' LIVIN' ON FOR EVER." + +_Curate._ "WHY NOT?" + +_Giles._ "WELL, ZUR, NO CONSTITOOTION COULD STAND IT."] + + * * * * * + +THE CONSPIRATORS. + +V. + +MY DEAR CHARLES,--Let me remind you that the Bolshevist conspirator has +to stir up conflagrations in other countries without leaving his own. +Passports and things are put in to make it more difficult when he comes +to getting his inflammable material and directions for use over the +frontier. So he has to invent a way over the obstacles. + +The first prize is awarded to the following: Secret instructions are +printed in Arabic and the pages containing them are bound up in a five +hundred page book in that language. The courier, an Oriental, carries +this book openly in his hand when he presents himself at the frontier. +It is ten to one that an innocent-looking book, thus carried, will not +be suspected; a hundred to one against there being an official capable +of reading it; five hundred to three against that official trying one of +the guilty pages, if he is there and duly suspicious. Yet, with a +hundred and sixty-six thousand chances against it, our Little Man got +hold of those instructions. + +The Sherlock Holmes of fiction is a gaunt figure, with a hatchet face, +spare of flesh. Our Little Man is a chubby lad, standing about four foot +ten in his stockinged feet, rubicund and corpulent, and he wears a +mackintosh with a very mackintoshy smell in all weathers. He never did a +day's work, and he never means to try, but he is a genius at getting it +out of others. Some say he is of Swiss origin, some say he is American, +and some say that surely he must be Chinese; he was never certain +himself until Czecho-Slovak was invented, and he plumped for that. He +has the degree of Master of Arts; what arts I don't know; probably the +black ones. His inner knowledge of the human species seems to give him +plenty to laugh at. He notices everything, forgets nothing, and there is +never a weakness in a man but he is on to it. He made up his mind that +those secret instructions were passing and set about to find how they +passed and what they were. He was too lazy to begin at the beginning, so +he began at the end. He called in person, as a commercial traveller, at +the suspected office of destination, and in the short time available +ascertained that the door-keeper who turned him out was a patriotic and +fervent admirer of the wine of the country. + +Our Little Man had no vulgar idea of getting the secret out of him by +making him drunk. If there was a secret it wouldn't be in the +door-keeper. But he and that door-keeper got to drinking together and +the door-keeper did all the paying; the drinking and the paying went on +by progressive degrees till the door-keeper had no money and only a +still almighty thirst left. The Little Man left him with his thirst for +a few days, until it became intolerable, and the door-keeper insisted +that something simply must be done about it. The Little Man regretted +that he could not give the necessary money to finance further orgies, +but he would gladly advance it. Four nights got the door-keeper well in +his debt, and our Little Man then began to talk about repayment. The +door-keeper said he had no money; the Little Man said he must get it. +Off whom? His employer. + +How was the door-keeper to get his employer's money off him? By selling +him a safe. Our Little Man then divulged that he was in reality a +commercial traveller in safes; if the door-keeper would get his employer +to buy one of his safes the Little Man would forgive him his debt by way +of commission. He felt sure that the Head of the Office had a weakness +for precautions. The door-keeper, now enthusiastic, said he should just +think he had! The Little Man felt he was getting warm. The door-keeper +put the deal through and prevailed upon his master to instal a really +safe safe in the office, instead of the old one. You had only to look at +it to see it was impregnable by fire, water or the King's Enemies. But +one set of keys stayed with the Little Man. + +The drinking (by both) and the paying (by the door-keeper) were resumed. +When the debt was again large enough the Little Man imposed new terms. +This time he wanted to see the Head of the Office himself, to put +further deals through. The door-keeper thought deeply, but could see no +harm in this. The Little Man was thus introduced into the presence, and +startled it by pointing to the safe and offering to do burglar on it any +night of the week. The Head was manifestly concerned. + +"We have here," said the Little Man, producing two formidable slabs of +steel hinged together and leaving room between them when locked for a +wad of papers only--"we have here a special strong box exactly suited +for the storage of your bank-notes. Put them in this box, and the box in +the safe, and then you really are ahead of your enemies." + +The Head bought. He gave the Little Man less money than he had spent on +the strong box, and the Little Man gave him less keys than he was +entitled to. The drinking and the debt were resumed, and, when it came +to a question of settlement for the third time, the Little Man pointed +out to the door-keeper that, if he hadn't the money to repay, then he +must steal it. He now divulged that he was not really a broker, but a +breaker of safes and strong boxes. He handed the door-keeper a key of +his employer's safe. In the safe would be found the strong box. In the +strong box would be found some notes of high value, unless he was very +much mistaken. + +So the door-keeper went and opened the safe and returned. And the Little +Man opened the strong box, and he _was_ very much mistaken. There was +never a note there; just half-a-dozen pages torn out of a book printed +in Arabic. + +He was so angry that he gave the strong box one on the lid for itself, +with the result that he couldn't lock it again. However, he said he had +a friend who could lock or unlock anything, and he left the door-keeper +drinking, for the first time at the Little Man's expense, while he took +off the box to be repaired by his friend. The latter happened to be in +the next room with a camera. The pages were photographed; the Little Man +returned to the door-keeper with the strong box, now capable of being +re-locked; the door-keeper returned to the office and put back the +strong box, locked, into the safe, which he also locked, and was wiping +the sweat off his forehead and congratulating himself that no one was +the worse, when he was startled to find a policeman had been watching +him all the time. + +But he proved to be a very amenable policeman. He said he would take no +action before he and the door-keeper had had time to talk it over next +day. By the time that talk came the photographs had been developed, +printed and translated. But the policeman did not wish to bore the +door-keeper with the tiresome details. To put it quite shortly the +policeman thought it was a most excellent crime, worthy of repetition at +intervals. + +Yours ever, HENRY. + +(_To be continued._) + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: CONCENTRATION.] + + * * * * * + +NEW RHYMES FOR OLD CHILDREN. + +THE ----. + + I NEVER know why it should be + So rude to talk about the ----. + What funny folk we are! + I think we've got the jealous hump + Because we see we'll never jump + So skilfully and far. + For, if one's nibbled by a gnat + Or harvest-bugs or things like that, + One seldom keeps it dark; + One may enlarge upon the tale + If one is gobbled by a whale + Or swallowed by a shark; + But if you speak about the bite + Of this abandoned parasite + You're very, very rash; + So sure is it to raise a frown + I dare not even write it down; + I simply put a ----. + None but an entomologist + Will quite admit the things exist, + And generally _they_ insist + On using other names; + For, when at night Professors leap + Out of their scientific sleep + Because these little devils keep + Playing their usual games, + They never shout, "It seems to be + A something, something, something ----!" + (The word is never used, you see, + Except by artisans); + No, as they fling the bedclothes high + They give a wild but cultured cry, + "Confound it! Botheration! Hi! + A _Pulex irritans_!" A. P. H. + + * * * * * + +Our Ruthless Motorists. + + "Triumph 1920 4 h.p. Model H, also Baby, both brand new; sacrifice, + £5 off each." + +_Motor Journal._ + + * * * * * + + "It was intended to hold mock trials in order to familiarise women + with court procedure and 'legal shibboleths.' + + When I saw her to-day, Miss ---- said that 'techniaclities' would + have been a better word."--_Evening Paper._ + +We hate to contradict a lady, but we cannot agree. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Aggrieved Profiteeress_ (_studying photographs of the +Peerage_). "WELL, I DON'T SEE AS THEY'VE ANY CALL TO LOOK THAT 'AUGHTY. +LIKE AS NOT ME AN' YOU'D BE WEARIN' CORONETS THIS MINUTE IF ALL OUR +ANCESTORS 'ADN'T A-BEEN CUT OFF IN THE WARS OF THE ROSES, OR +SOMETHINK."] + + * * * * * + +WORKING FOR PEACE. + +(_Extracts from the Diary of Mr. John Robert Boffkins, Trade Union +Leader._) + +_Monday._--Rose with a heart over-flowing with love towards my +fellow-men. Industrial strife must cease. Strikes are a barbarous and +futile method of redressing wrong. Rather think that an increase in +wages of two shillings a day would appeal to our members. Must inquire. + +_Tuesday._--Have confirmed my opinion that a two-shillings' increase +would appeal to our members. They all seem enthusiastic over the +suggestion. They appear to be under the impression that the idea is +their own. It is not. It is mine. If it materialises I shall be most +popular. But I am all for peace. A strike is out of the question. I +shall spare no effort to prevent one. + +_Wednesday._--Presented formal demand to employers to-day. Told our +members they must be firm to the bitter end. The two-shillings' increase +is their strict due, and, if we present a united front, the grasping +capitalist will be brought to his knees. Am working night and day for +peace. + +_Thursday._--Pointed out to the employers that a strike is inevitable +unless they give way. We can make no concession. My whole energies are +concentrated on preventing a strike. Told our members that unless they +remain firm the employers will crush them. A strike would be a national +calamity and might spell ruin to the country. + +_Friday._--The possibility of a strike looms larger. Can nothing be done +to prevent it? Informed the employers that we declined to abate one iota +of our claim. "All or nothing" is our motto. Also refused to go to +arbitration. Warned the employers that a strike means starvation for +women and children. The prospect appals me. + +_Saturday._--The employers, who seem to be determined on a strike, have +offered the men two shillings if they will consider the question of +working five days a week instead of four. We refused their offer and +demanded that our claim should be conceded unconditionally by noon, +failing which our members would cease work. + +_Later._--The strike has commenced. Heaven knows that I did everything +to prevent it which human being could do. The capitalists seem to have +made up their minds to force civil war and all its horrors upon the +country. The spectacle of little children starving causes me acute +distress. + + * * * * * + +A GUIDE TO GREATNESS. + + [Mr. JACOB EPSTEIN maintains in _The Daily Mail_ that a man + to be a creative genius must lead an orderly domesticated + life.] + + I COURTED the Muse as a stripling, + Immured in a Bloomsbury flat, + And yearned for the kudos of KIPLING + For fees that were frequent and fat; + But editors, far from discerning + The worth of the pearls that I placed + At their feet, had a way of returning + The same with indelicate haste. + + But, espousing, a year or two later, + The sweetest and neatest of wives, + I found, after peeling a tater + Or imparting a polish to knives, + I could scribble with frenzy and passion, + That the breaking of coal would inspire, + In a truly remarkable fashion, + My soul with celestial fire. + + Serenity reigns in the household; + I've cancelled my grudge against Fate; + My lyrical efforts are now sold + At a simply phenomenal rate; + And, whether I'm laying the lino + Or bathing the babes, I regard + The job as a cushy one: _I_ know + The way to succeed as a bard. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: THE SCALES OF JUSTICE. + +SIR ROBERT HORNE. "I WANT TO KEEP THE BALANCE. NOW THEN, BOTH TOGETHER." + +THE MINER. "NO. _YOU_ BEGIN--AND THEN PERHAPS I'LL THINK ABOUT IT."] + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _P. C. GREENWOOD._ "ARRAH! GET OUT WID YEZ AND LET THE +LADY PASS."] + + * * * * * + +ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT. + +_Tuesday, October 19th._--A start was made with half a hundred +Questions, and, considering that most of them had been in cold storage +since before the Recess, it was surprising how fresh they remained. +Persia and Mesopotamia--not to mention Ireland--are still unsettled; the +Turkish Treaty is not yet ratified; the cost of living continues to +rise, and the ratio of unemployment has alarmingly advanced, especially +in the case of ex-service men. + +These last are to be found work in the building trades, with, it is +hoped, the assistance of the trade unions, but, if that hope is +disappointed, then without it. The country requires half-a-million +houses built. "Here are men who could assist," said the PRIME MINISTER, +"and we propose that they should be allowed to assist." + +Over a prospect already sufficiently bleak there broods the shadow of +the coal-strike. Sir ROBERT HORNE, in presenting the case for the +Government, was admirably clear but, perhaps naturally, a little cold. +Only when the new lighting arrangement had flooded the House with +artificial sunshine did the Minister warm up a little and hint that a +way of peace might yet be found. + +I wonder if it was by accident or artifice that Mr. BRACE began his plea +for the miners with the admission that they had only dropped the demand +for the reduction of fourteen shillings and twopence in the price of +domestic coal when they discovered that "the money was not there." +Anyhow the laughter that ensued served to put Members into a good temper +and to cause them to lend a friendly ear to his suggestion that the two +shillings advance, though in his view only "dust in the balance," should +be "temporarily" conceded, pending the establishment of a tribunal which +should permanently settle the conditions of the mining industry. The +increase of output which everyone desired would then be brought about. + +Most of the speakers who followed seemed to think that Mr. BRACE had +sown the seed of a settlement. It was left to the PRIME MINISTER, who +evidently did not relish the task, to awaken the House from its +beautiful dream. He pointed out that to accept the proposal would be to +give the miners what they had originally claimed, without any guarantee +that the greater output would be forthcoming. If it were not forthcoming +and the two shillings were taken away, what would happen? "A strike," +cried someone. "Precisely," said Mr. LLOYD GEORGE; only it would have +been provoked by the Government instead of by the miners. He was not +prepared to do business on those lines. + +And so the debate came to an end rather than a conclusion. + +_Wednesday, October 20th._--The Peers plunged into the morasses of the +Irish Question. Lord CREWE asked for an official inquiry into the +alleged "reprisals" and particularly instanced the attacks upon the +creameries. Rather than that Ireland should be "pacified" by such +methods as these he would see her engaged in civil war, "fairly +conducted on both sides." From these words it may be gathered that his +lordship's knowledge of civil war is happily not extensive. + +Furnished with a voluminous brief from the Irish Office, Lord CURZON +made a long reply, the purport of which was that many of the reprisals +were bogus, many were actions undertaken in self-defence, while the rest +were generally due to men "seeing red" after their comrades had been +brutally murdered. The Government did not palliate such cases, and had +instituted inquiries and taken disciplinary action against the +offenders, when known; but they were not prepared to set up a public +inquiry such as Lord CREWE had demanded. It would only substitute "a +competition in perjury" for the present "competition in murder"--a +somewhat infelicitous phrase by which, as he subsequently explained, he +did not mean to imply, as Lord PARMOOR suggested, that police and rebels +were engaged in a murderous rivalry. + +Simultaneously the House of Commons was engaged upon an identically +similar debate. Mr. ARTHUR HENDERSON was as lugubrious as Lord CREWE in +presenting the indictment and distinctly less adroit in selecting his +facts. His theory was that the Government had provoked the Sinn Fein +outrages by its treatment of the people. Why, women had been prevented +from taking their eggs to market! + +Sir HAMAR GREENWOOD spoke from the same brief as Lord CURZON, but threw +far more passion and vigour into its recital. There had been some +reprisals, he admitted, but they were as nothing compared to the horrors +that had provoked them; and he protested against the notion that "the +heroes of yesterday"--the R.I.C. is mainly recruited from ex-service +men--had turned into murderers. As for the creameries, he had never seen +a tittle of evidence that they had been destroyed by servants of the +Crown, and he warned the House not to believe the stories put out by the +propaganda bureau of the Irish Republican Army. He was still a convinced +Home Ruler--an Ulster hot-gospeller had accused him of being a Sinn +Feiner with a Papist wife!--but the first thing to do was to break the +reign of terror and end the rule of the assassin. That they were doing, +and there was no case for Mr. HENDERSON'S "insulting resolution." + +The Opposition for the moment seemed stunned by the CHIEF SECRETARY'S +sledge-hammer speech. No one rose from the Front Bench and +Lieutenant-Commander KENWORTHY had to overcome his modesty and step into +the breach. Later on, Lord ROBERT CECIL, on the strength of information +supplied by an American journalist, supported the demand for an +inquiry. So did Mr. ASQUITH, on the ground that it would be in the +interests of the Government of Ireland itself; but this argument was +obviously weakened by Mr. BONAR LAW'S reminder that in 1913 and 1914 Mr. +ASQUITH himself had deprecated inquiries in somewhat similar +circumstances. The Government had a very good division, 346 to 79; but +there were many abstentions. + +_Thursday, October 21st._--It was, no doubt, by way of brightening an +unutterably gloomy week that Mr. L'ESTRANGE MALONE, who has not hitherto +been known as a humourist, invited the Government to intercede at +Washington for the release of the notorious JAMES LARKIN, now +languishing in an American gaol. Inasmuch as LARKIN had been convicted +for having advocated the overthrow of the United States by violence, Mr. +HARMSWORTH did not think H.M. Government were called upon to intervene. +Mr. MALONE understood from this that the Government had no sympathy with +British subjects in foreign lands, and so he got another laugh. + +Commander BELLAIRS thought it would be a good idea if the League of +Nations, pending the discharge of its more important functions, were to +offer rewards for world-benefiting discoveries such as a prophylactic +against potato-blight. Sir JOHN REES saw his chance and took it. "Does +the League," he inquired, "declare to win on Phosphates, Peace or +Potatoes?"--thus supplying proof positive that he owes his precise +pronunciation to past practice with "prunes and prisms." + +It was rather impudent of Mr. ADAMSON, who has just been instrumental in +throwing out of work some hundreds of thousands of his fellow-citizens, +to initiate a debate on unemployment. Most of the speakers endeavoured +to throw the blame on "the other fellow"--the Government on the trade +unions, the trade unionists on the employers, and the employers on the +Government. A welcome exception was Mr. HOPKINSON, who boldly blamed the +short-sighted selfishness of some of his own class. Employés would not +work their hardest to "make the boss a millionaire." As a fitting +_finale_ to an inconclusive debate the PRIME MINISTER announced that in +order to force a settlement of the coal-strike the railwaymen--Mr. +THOMAS, apparently, dissenting--had threatened to join the unemployed. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Harassed Secretary._ "I SAY, YOU NEEDN'T MAKE BUNKERS, +YOU KNOW."] + + * * * * * + +Our Erudite Contemporaries. + + "Willard was game and well trained, and in stature he was Goliath to + the Daniel of Dempsey."--_Evening Paper._ + +A DAVID come to judgment! + + * * * * * + + "The rate plague has developed to an alarming extent in Thanet, and + considerable anxiety is felt, especially as there appears to be no + effective preparation of poison to exterminate them."--_Evening + Paper._ + +And Thanet is not the only place. + + * * * * * + +THE TYPE-SLINGER. + + BITING and keen as any razor + The fluent pen of LOVAT FRASER; + And swift as arrows, thick as hail, + His outbursts in _The Daily Mail_, + Exposing in impassioned phrase + The PREMIER'S wild and wicked ways. + And yet the PREMIER doesn't squirm, + No, not a bit--the pachyderm! + But goes about with cheerful mien, + As if such things had never been. + + So LOVAT FRASER grows emphatic + In efforts to be more dogmatic, + And down the column, once a week, + _His shrill italics fairly shriek._ + But does the PREMIER bow his back + And go and give himself the sack? + Not he. Indeed, for all he troubles, + His critic might be blowing bubbles. + + It's up to LOVAT FRASER now + To make an even bigger row; + I'd like to see the sturdy fellow + Write articles that simply bellow. + I think the PREMIER might perhaps + Shiver and possibly collapse + IF LOVAT GOT TO WORK IN "CAPS." + + * * * * * + +The Black Swan of Avon. + +"A NATIVE DRAMA +Entitled +'Inu vere ki pani' + + (Popularly known as Merchant of Venice, but beautified and enlarged + to local taste), Interspersed with Popular Dialogues, latest Songs, + etc. Will (D. V.) be rendered by the ---- Guild."--_West African + Poster._ + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: WHAT OUR BOHEMIANS HAVE TO PUT UP WITH. + +_Shabbily-dressed person._ "I'VE LOST THE TICKET, BUT I LEFT A HAT. +THAT'S IT OVER THERE." + +_Attendant._ "I MUST ASK YOU TO FIND THE TICKET, SIR, PLEASE. THE HAT +THAT YOU INDICATE IS QUITE NEW."] + + * * * * * + +THE REVIVAL OF OLLENDORFF. + +FROM the memories of my mid-Victorian childhood, before the instruction +of a governess had reached a point at which the plunge was made into a +preparatory school, three names emerge with remarkable distinctness. +"Little Arthur," from whom I derived my earliest knowledge of the +History of England; "Henry," by whom I was grounded in the rudiments of +the dead Latin tongue (but who must be carefully distinguished from +JAMES HENRY, the Virgilian, who in turn had nothing whatever to do with +HENRY JAMES the novelist), and OLLENDORFF, the illustrious author of a +series of manuals for the teaching of living foreign languages. + +OLLENDORFF, I fear, is not even the shadow of a name to the present +generation. There is no mention of him in _The Encyclopædia Britannica_ +or in _Chambers_. Even in his own country he seems to have lapsed into +obscurity, and in MENDEL'S voluminous _Conversations-Lexikon_ there is +only a brief reference to the Ollendorffian method, but no account of +the man or his history. + +Yet he must have existed; OLLENDORFF cannot have been a mere symbol. And +as students of SHAKSPEARE have endeavoured to reconstruct the man from +his plays so I feel sure that the character of OLLENDORFF, his interests +and politics, might very well be reconstructed from a study of his +dialogues. One must admit that his Teutonic patronymic is an obstacle to +his revival, but that difficulty can be surmounted by the adoption of an +_alias_. For example, by the omission of one of the "f's" and the +transposition of one other letter his name, read backwards, becomes +Frondello, which is at once euphonious and void of all racial offence. + +The Ollendorffian method, it may be noted for the benefit of the +ignorant, did not merely depend on the employment of question and +answer; it aimed at conveying information drawn from the homely affairs +of daily life and the relations between persons belonging to different +trades and occupations. "Have you," OLLENDORFF would ask, "the hat of +the gardener's son?" And when this had been duly and correctly +translated into German or French the pupil proceeded to the answer, "No, +but I have the boots of the grocer's brother-in-law." + +I think OLLENDORFF built better than he knew; or perhaps he did know. A +strong vein of Socialism runs through all his examples, which seem to +show a lively appreciation of the Communistic principle. To him there +was nothing wrong or dangerous in this mutual interchange and enjoyment +of property. He drew no hard-and-fast lines between _meum_ and _tuum_. +We cannot help thinking that, at a time when so much depends on the +fusion of classes, a new edition of these immortal dialogues, brought up +to date so as to meet the exigencies of the new poor, the new rich, the +old aristocracy and the new plutocracy, would be fraught with the most +salutary results. + +The following are some crude suggestions of the lines on which the +revision might be carried out:-- + +"Have you the leathern waistcoat of the taxi-driver?--"No, but I have +the reach-me-down trousers of an inferior quality to those worn by the +village postman." + +"Have you the smooth-running automobile of the prosperous grocer?"--"No, +but I have the loan of the push-bicycle of my former under-gardener's +uncle." + +"Are you going to marry the beautiful daughter of the shoemaker?"--"Yes, +and her brother has just become engaged to the widow of my cousin the +marquis." + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Mr. Arthur Wontner_ (_to himself_). "WELL, I DON'T THINK +MUCH OF YOUR TASTE IN CLOTHES."] + + * * * * * + +AT THE PLAY. + +"THE ROMANTIC AGE." + +I HOPE that Mr. ALAN MILNE is a good enough critic to agree with me in +thinking that this is the best play he has so far given us. Not that the +idea of it is as new as that of his _Mr. Pim_ or his _Wurzel-Flummery_, +but because, without sacrificing his lightness of touch and his sense of +fun, he has, for the first time, produced a serious scheme. + +People will tell you that his Second Act was the weak spot in the play; +that the others were brilliant, but that this one, for its first half, +was tedious and delayed the action. They will say this because they are +familiar with A. A. M.'s humour, but not with his sentiment. Yet it was +in this middle Act that he gave us the best passage of all, in +presenting the philosophy of his pedlar, which had in it something of +the dewy freshness of the early morning scene in the wood ("morning's at +seven," as _Pippa_--not _Mr. Pim_--said _en passant_). There was no real +delay in the action here, for the pedlar was providing the hero with the +argument without which he could never have persuaded the lady to yield; +could never have made her understand that Romance is not confined to the +trunk-and-hose period, or any age, so named, of chivalry, but is to be +found wherever there is a true companionship of hearts. Unfortunately +the effect of this passage was a little spoilt by what had just gone +before--a rather slow and superfluous scene with the village idiot--and +some of the audience imagined that the author was still marking time. + +Mr. MILNE has an individual manner so distinct that he can well afford +to acknowledge his debt to Sir JAMES BARRIE. As in _Mary Rose_, so here +(though there are no supernatural forces at work) we have the sharp +contrast between commonplace life, as lived by the rest, and the life of +Fairyland, as coming within the vision of one only. And we were reminded +too of the Midsummer-madness that overtook the company in _Dear Brutus_. +I won't say that it wasn't natural enough for _Melisande_, under the +fascination of a moonlit Midsummer Eve, to imagine, when she chanced +upon a gentleman in fancy dress of the right period, that at last she +had realised her dream of a hero of romance; but she was stark +Midsummer-mad to suppose, when she met him early next morning with his +costume unchanged, that he would keep it on till he came to tea with the +family, and then, still wearing it, waft her off to Faerie. + +But not even BARRIE has ever made a better scene than that which showed +us the disillusionment of the visionary when she is confronted with her +blue-and-gold hero of romance now transformed into a plain Stock +Exchange man, his air of banality enhanced by the last word in golf +suitings. The humour of this scene, in which she made conventional +conversation without any real effort to conceal her sense of the bathos +of the situation, was very perfect. The relatively simple humour of the +match-making mother--not so simple, all the same, as its spontaneity +made it appear--had the distinction which one expects of Mr. MILNE; but +this was far the funniest feature in the play. + +It would have been an easy matter to make cheap fun, as MARK TWAIN did +in _A Yankee at the Court of King Arthur_, out of the popular view of +the Age of Romance, but A. A. M. avoided that obvious lure. Indeed, in +his natural anxiety not to be taken too seriously in his first attempt +to be serious, he rather tended to make light of his own theory of +modern romance, laying a little too much stress at the end on the +culinary aspect of conjugal felicity. + +I am not sure that Mr. ARTHUR WONTNER (to whom my best wishes for his +new managership) quite realised, in his doublet and long hose, my idea +of a figure of mediæval romance. In fact I am free to confess that I +disagreed with _Melisande_ and preferred him in his golf-clothes. But +perhaps that was part of the idea, and Mr. MILNE meant me to feel like +that. Miss BARBARA HOFFE'S _Melisande_--a difficult part, because she +was the only other-worldly person in the play and the only one in +desperate earnest--was very cleverly handled. In her most exalted +moments of poetic rapture she was never too precious, and when called +upon for a touch of corrective humour was quick to respond. + +Miss LOTTIE VENNE laid herself out in her inimitable way for a broad +interpretation of the visionary's very earthly mother; indeed once or +twice she almost laid herself out of the picture; but she still remained +irresistible. As a pair of light-hearted young lovers Miss DOROTHY +TETLEY and Mr. JOHN WILLIAMS played really well in parts that were not +nearly so easy as they looked. And there was the dry humour of Mr. +BROMLEY-DAVENPORT, as the father (I fear he must have missed the romance +of twin souls) and the open-air charm of Mr. NICHOLSON'S performance as +_Gentleman Susan_, the pedlar. In a word, my grateful compliments +embrace as good a cast as ever caught--and held--the spirit of an +author. + +"PRISCILLA AND THE PROFLIGATE." + +When you have been jilted by _Cynthia_ at the church-door and, two days +afterwards, in a fit of pique marry _Priscilla_ at sight (of course you +can't always get a _Priscilla_ to consent to this arrangement; but _Mr. +Bensley Stuart Gore_ had a young ward at school who wanted her freedom; +so that was all right), you may think to persuade the Faithless One that +you have given solid proof of your indifference to her. But you mustn't +dash off to Africa an hour after your wedding with the declared +intention of being eaten by wild men or wilder beasts, because, if you +do that, you give your scheme away and _Cynthia_ will have the +satisfaction of knowing that she has driven you to desperate courses. +Yet that is what _Mr. Bensley Stuart Gore_ did (he was the "Profligate" +of the title, though he never gave any noticeable sign of profligacy). + +After this strain on my credulity I felt prepared for anything, and was +not in the least surprised to find him, six years older and still +intact, on the terrace of the Hotel Casa Bellini, by the dear old shores +of Lake Maggiore, which, as the programme advised me, is in Italy. It +seemed, too, the most natural thing in the world that the author, Miss +LAURA WILDIG, should have collected _Priscilla_ and _Cynthia_ (the +latter in tow of a third-rate millionaire husband whom she loathed) at +the same address. + +It was at this juncture that _Mr. Bensley Stuart Gore_ was inspired +with a Great Thought. In order to set _Priscilla_ free (I ought to say +that he hadn't recognised her) he would elope with _Cynthia_. How +_Priscilla_ set out to frustrate this noble sacrifice and secure her +husband for herself; how she bribed the caretaker to lock him up with +her in the "Bloody Turret" of an adjacent ruin; how subsequently, at 2 +A.M., in the public lounge of the hotel, she tried to work upon his +emotions by appearing in a black night-dress (surely this rather vulgar +form of allurement is _démodé_ by now even in the suburbs, or, anyhow, +is not so freshly daring as she seemed to think it), I will leave you to +imagine. Even Miss IRIS HOEY'S nice soft voice and pleasant _câlineries_ +could not quite carry off this rather machine-made trifle. If anything +saved it, it was the acting of Mr. FRANK DENTON as _Jimmy Forde_. +Starting as _Bensley's_ "best man," he missed the wedding ceremony +through going to the wrong church, but after that he stuck close to his +friend for the remainder of the plot, and greatly endeared himself to +the audience by the excellent way in which he played the silly ass. + +As for _Bensley_ himself, you might have thought that he had a +sufficiently chequered career, yet Mr. CYRIL RAYMOND got very little +colour out of the part. For the rest, Mr. H. DE LANGE, as the +millionaire, got a certain amount out of the subject of his wife's +indigestion, which was a sort of _leit-motif_ with him; but most of the +colour seemed to have gone into the scenery, admirably designed and +painted by Mr. MCCLEERY and Mr. WALTER HANN. + +O. S. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Diner._ "I SAY, WAITER, I'VE ASKED THREE TIMES FOR +POTATOES." + +_Waiter_ (_still under the influence of military discipline_). "BEG +PARDON, SIR, BUT I'M TOLD OFF TO CONCENTRATE ON THE CABBAGE."] + + * * * * * + +"LOGS TO BURN." + + "_Logs to burn; logs to burn; + Logs to save the coal a turn._" + + HERE's a word to make you wise + When you hear the wood-man's cries; + Never heed his usual tale + That he has splendid logs for sale, + But read these lines and really learn + The proper kinds of logs to burn. + + Oak logs will warm you well + If they're old and dry; + Larch logs of pine woods smell, + But the sparks will fly. + Beech logs for Christmas-time, + Yew logs heat well; + "Scotch" logs it is a crime + For anyone to sell. + Birch logs will burn too fast, + Chestnut scarce at all; + Hawthorn logs are good to last + If cut in the Fall. + Holly logs will burn like wax, + You should burn them green; + Elm logs like smouldering flax, + No flame to be seen. + Pear logs and apple logs, + They will scent your room; + Cherry logs across the dogs + Smell like flowers in bloom. + But Ash logs, all smooth and grey, + Burn them green or old; + Buy up all that come your way, + They're worth their weight in gold. + + * * * * * + +"GIRL EYE-MAKER." + +_Picture-title in Daily Paper._ + +Perhaps we ought to mention that the eyes she makes are artificial, +not "glad." + + * * * * * + +Our Discreet Press. + + "Mystery surrounds the Russo-Polish peace negotiations at Riga. + According to a Central News message from Warsaw Marshal Pilsudski + has had a conference with??????????, the Premier, as to whether + demobilisation should take place shortly."--_Evening Paper._ + + * * * * * + + "When he [Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree] was prepared to play _Martin + Chuzzlewit_ he wrote to me (and doubtless explained to others) that + he was going to present _Mr. Micawber_ as 'a sort of + fairy.'"--_Sunday Paper._ + +We suppose if Sir HERBERT had staged _David Copperfield_ he would have +cast himself for the husband of _Mrs. Harris_. + + * * * * * + +THE PRIVATE FILM. + +MY attention has been drawn to the most recent and perhaps the most +terrible development of the Cinema by an advertisement, from which I +take the following extracts:-- + + HAVE YOUR OWN FILM TAKEN. + + THE MOST MODERN METHOD OF GAINING PUBLICITY. + + _To Members of Parliament, Mayors, Lecturers and other Public Men + and Women._ + + "The Cinema has become the cheapest, the surest and most rapid road + to publicity. It is estimated that a third of the population attend + the Cinema once a week. Messrs. Mump and Gump have therefore fitted + up a special studio for film work, in which you can now have your + own film taken, representing you in any action you may desire. This + method of publicity is specially recommended to Members of + Parliament. For instance one can be filmed writing a letter, which + can be closed down and handed to a messenger, which action can be + followed by the letter itself being thrown on the screen.... Think + what this means to a prospective Candidate when he goes to a + constituency where he is unknown. He takes with him twenty or more + films. Your constituents must see and know you before you can hope + for their vote. The Cinema introduces your personality and your + policy. + + "Your film will cost you-- + First reel ... Three guineas. + Each extra reel. One guinea." + + +The more I see of business-men the less they seem to me to know about +business. I never read an advertisement without thinking, "How much +better I (or even you) could have done that!" Yet they will tell you +that it is their advertisements which make the money. It only shows.... +However. Messrs. Mump and Gump, for instance, have scarcely skimmed the +surface possibilities of their brilliant notion. This invention is going +to make politics tolerable at last. No man minds being in the House of +Commons; it is being in his constituency which is so dreadful. _And now +he need never go there._ + +For instance, when the constituency is tired of the letter-film, he can +be filmed making a speech, which can be taken down and handed to a +typist, which action can be followed by the speech itself being thrown +on the screen--in instalments. The constituency will enjoy this, because +it will take much less time to read it than it would to listen to it, +and they can argue out loud about the meaning of Early English phrases +like Datum-line and Functional Representation. In fact they can go on +arguing during the _Whips of Sin_ which will follow. + +As for the public man, it won't take him two minutes to be filmed making +the speech, unless, of course, he has any very complicated gestures; and +it won't take him any time at all to compose it, because the private +secretary will do that; and the private secretary will be able to make +sure that his joke about JEREBOAM is not turned into a joke about +JEHOSHAPHAT at the last minute, or simply shelved in favour of a +peroration on rainbows. After the speech the M.P. can be filmed opening +a flowershow and, if necessary, writing a cheque to the local +hortiphilist society, which cheque can be thrown on the screen amid loud +applause, but need not, of course, go any further. + +There is one other point, but it is rather a delicate matter: Messrs. +Mump and Gump say to the prospective Candidate, "Your constituents must +see and know you before you can hope for their vote." Are they quite +right? I have seen a good many Candidates in my time, and I can think of +some to whom I should have said, "Your constituents must _never_ see you +if you hope for a single vote." I mean, when one looks round the present +House of Commons, one really marvels how.... But perhaps I had better +not go on with that. The point is that a Candidate of that kind never +_need_ be seen by his constituents now. A handsome young private +secretary, uniformed and beribboned, and the film does the rest. + +Then I rather resent the assumption that Members of Parliament, Mayors, +Lecturers and Actors are the only people who require publicity. I should +have thought that those who spend their time writing things in the +public Press, which are read by the public (if anybody), might have had +at least the courtesy title of Public Man. Anyhow, I am going to have +three guineas' worth. The only question is, what sort of picture will +most thoroughly "get" my personality before a third of the population +once a week? The moment when I am most characteristic is when I am lying +in a hot bath, and to-morrow is Sunday; but I doubt if even a sixth of +the population would be really keen on that. I don't mind writing a +letter or two, only, if it meant an extra reel every time I decided to +write it to-morrow instead, it would be rather a costly advertisement. + +Really, I suppose, one ought to be done _At Work in His Study_; but even +that would require a good deal of faking. Ought one, for instance, to +remove the golf-balls and the cocoa-cup (and the rhyming dictionary) +from The Desk? Then I always write with a decayed pencil, and that would +look so bad. Messrs. Mump and Gump would have to throw in a quill-pen. +And I have no Study. I work in the drawingroom, when the children are +not playing in it. To go into The Study I simply walk over to my table +and put up a large notice: "THE STUDY. DO NOT SPEAK TO ME. I AM +THINKING." Do you think that had better be in the film? + +Or I wonder if a Comic would be more effective--a Shaving reel or a +Dressing reel? It is the small incidents of every-day life that one +should look to for the key to the character of a Public Man; and once a +whole third of the population had seen for themselves what pain it gives +me to put links and studs and all those things in a clean shirt, they +would understand the strange note of melancholy which runs through this +article. + +But of course an author should have several different reels +corresponding to the different kinds of work which he wants to +publicitise. (That is a new word which I have just invented, but you +will find it in common use in a month or two.) People like Mr. BELLOC +will probably require the full politician's ration of twenty or more, +but the ordinary writer might rub along with four or five. + +When his _Pug, Wog and Pussy_ is on the market there will be a Family +reel, in which he is pretending to be a tree and the children are +climbing it. And when he has just published _The Cruise of the Cow_; +or, _Seven Hours at Sea_, he will be seen with an intense expression +tying a bowline on a bight or madly hauling on the throat-halyard--at +Messrs. Mump and Gump's specially-equipped ponds. And for his +passionate romance, _The Borrowed Bride_---- But I don't know what he +will do then. + +And even now we have not exhausted the list of Public Men. There are +clergymen. Don't you feel that some of those sermons might be thrown on +the screen--and left there? A. P. H. + + * * * * * + +The Merry Bishop. + + The Dean of CAPE TOWN with a critical frown + To the jests of St. Albans' gay Bishop demurs; + But the Bishop denies the offence and implies + 'Tis the way of all asses to nibble at FURSE. + + * * * * * + + "Harvest Festival celebrations took place at St. John's Church on + Sunday evening, when the choir rendered the anthem 'Praise the young + ladies of the choir.'"--_Yorkshire Paper._ + +And we have no doubt they deserved it. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Butcher_ (_at conclusion of scathing criticism of +horse_). "WELL, THAT'S MY OPINION, ANYWAY. AND I OUGHT TO KNOW SOMETHING +BY NOW ABOUT A BIT OF 'ORSEFLESH WHEN I SEES IT." + +_Groom._ "YES--AND SO OUGHT YOUR CUSTOMERS TOO."] + + * * * * * + +OUR BOOKING-OFFICE. + +(_By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned Clerks._) + +How you regard Miss MAY SINCLAIR'S latest story, _The Romantic_ +(COLLINS), will entirely depend upon your attitude towards the +long-vexed question of the permissible in art. If you hold that all life +(which in this association generally means something disagreeable) is +its legitimate province and that genius can transmute an ugly study of +morbid pathology into a romance, you will admire the force of this vivid +little book; otherwise, I warn you frankly, you are like to be repelled +by the whole business. The title, to begin with, is an irony as grim as +anything that follows, in what sense you will find as the story reveals +itself. _The Romantic_ is a picture--what do I say? a vivisection--of +cowardice, seen through the horrified eyes of a woman who loved the +subject of it. The scene is the Belgian battlefields, to which _John +Conway_, being unfitted for active service, had taken out a +motor-ambulance, with _Charlotte Redhead_ as one of his drivers. All the +background of this part of the tale is wonderfully realised, a thing of +actual and unforgetable experience. Here gradually the first tragedy of +_Conway_ is made clear, though shielded and ignored as long as possible +by the loyalty of fellow-workers and the obstinate disbelief of the +girl. Perhaps you think I am making too much of it all; treacherous +nerves were the lot of many spiritually noble men in that hell. But +little by little conviction of a deeper, less understandable, horror +creeps upon the reader, only to be explained and confirmed on the last +page. To be honest, _The Romantic_ is an ugly, a detestably ugly book, +but of its cleverness there can be no question. + + * * * * * + +It would appear that Mr. A. E. W. MASON is another of those who hold +that the day of war-novels is not yet done. Anyhow, _The Summons_ +(HODDER AND STOUGHTON) shows him dealing out all the old familiar cards, +spies and counter-spies, submarines and petrol bases and secret ink. It +must be admitted that the result is unexpectedly archaic. Perhaps also +Mr. MASON hardly gives himself a fair chance. The "summons" to his hero +(who, being familiar with the Spanish coast, is required when War breaks +out to use this knowledge for submarine-thwarting) is too long delayed, +and all the non-active service part of the tale suffers from a very dull +love-interest and some even more dreary racing humour. Archaic or not, +however, _Hillyard's_ anti-spy adventures, in an exquisite setting that +the author evidently knows as well as his hero, are good fun enough. But +the home scenes had (for me at least) a lack of grip and conviction by +no means to be looked for from a writer of Mr. MASON'S experience. His +big thrill, the suicide of the lady who first sends by car to the local +paper the story of her end and then waits to confirm this by telephone +before making it true, left me incredulous. I'm afraid _The Summons_ can +hardly be said to have found Mr. MASON in his customary form. + + * * * * * + +"To write another person's life-history in the first person, and yet +give to it the verisimilitude of a genuine autobiography, would under +ordinary circumstances be a difficult if not impossible undertaking." So +Mr. C. E. GOULDSBURY tells us in a note to _Reminiscences of a Stowaway_ +(CHAPMAN AND HALL), and most of us will cordially agree with him. But, +after reading this volume of reminiscences, I think you will also agree +that Mr. GOULDSBURY has acquitted himself admirably of a most difficult +task. The man into whose skin, if I may so express it, he has +temporarily tried to fit himself was Mr. ALEXANDER DOUGLAS LARYMORE, who +started his adventurous career as a stowaway in an "old iron tub," and +eventually became Inspector-General of Jails in India. For nearly forty +years Mr. GOULDSBURY was Mr. LARYMORE'S intimate friend, and has had +sufficient data at his disposal to do justice to what was a remarkably +full and interesting life. Possibly those of us who retain a tender spot +in our hearts for stowaways may regret that Mr. LARYMORE grew tired of +the sea; but his adventures were as numerous and amusing on land as on +water, and they are also valuable for the strong light they throw on the +India of some years ago. Mr. GOULDSBURY has at once provided a lasting +tribute to the memory of his friend and written a book which both in +style and matter would be hard to beat. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _The King._ "LOOK HERE--THIS THRONE WON'T DO; IT IS +IMPOSSIBLE FOR US TO LOOK DIGNIFIED IN IT." + +_The Artificer._ "I'M SORRY, YOUR MAJESTY. THERE MUST BE SOME MISTAKE. I +GOT IT IN MY 'EAD THAT YOUR MAJESTY ORDERED A _LOUNGE_ THRONE."] + + * * * * * + +Are you a victim to the _Tarzan_ habit? Perhaps your eye may have been +caught by the word on bookstalls as the generic title of an increasing +pile of volumes; but knowing, like myself, that all things explain +themselves in time, you may have been content to leave it at that. +Meanwhile, however, the thing has continued to spread, till on the +wrapper of _Tarzan the Untamed_ (METHUEN), which now at last finds me +out, its publishers are able to number its devotees in millions. Well, +of course the outstanding fact about such popularity is that in face of +it any affectation of superiority becomes simply silly. One has got to +accept this creation of Mr. EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS as among the definite +literary phenomena of our time. In the immediate spasm before me +_Tarzan_ (who is, if you need telling, a kind of horribly exaggerated +_Mowgli_ after a diet of the Food of the Gods) is represented as placing +himself at the disposal of the British forces in East Africa, and +attacking the Germans with man-eating lions. The rather chastening +feature of which was my own unexpected enjoyment of the idea. Even, for +one disconcerting moment, like the persons in the admonitory anecdotes +who taste opium "just for fun," I began to feel that perhaps.... However +it passed, and the temptation has not returned. Meanwhile the real +nature of Tarzanism, whether some sinister possession or simply the +age-long appetite for the monstrous, just now a little out of hand, +remains as far from solution as ever. + + * * * * * + +Mr. HORACE BLEACKLEY, whose last excursion into political fiction was a +description of an opéra-bouffe Labour Government in action, addresses +himself, in _The Monster_ (HEINEMANN), to a more serious theme. His +monster is the factory system, and if I say that this witty novel will +provide the ignorant and comfortable with instruction as well as +entertainment I hope I shan't have done him any harm. The author, while +making his points against the system, notes truly enough that the risen +ranker, the one who had been through the dreadful mill, with its +ninety-hour working week for children, became the hardest master during +that wonderful period of the Manchesterising of England which laid the +train for the explosions of our present discontents. He reminds us also +of that admirable speech, made about every ten years for the last +hundred or so in the House with the same fervour and conviction, to the +effect that any change in conditions or wages would surely mean the +complete ruin of the country. A comforting speech, that! Perhaps Mr. +BLEACKLEY, presenting three generations from Peterloo to the Jubilee of +QUEEN VICTORIA, covers too much ground for full effect, but he has +pleasantly gilded a wholesome pill for pleasant people. Good luck to +him. + + * * * * * + +I did not take the publishers' statement that _Pengard Awake_ (METHUEN) +was "entirely unlike Mr. STRAUS'S previous stories" as a recommendation, +however alluring it was intended to be, for he has good and enjoyable +work to his credit. I doubt, indeed, if he has yet written a book more +acceptable to the novel-reading public than this tale of "action, +mystery and wonderful adventures" (again I quote from the paper +wrapper). Possibly in a so-called mystery book the author ought to have +his readers guessing all the time, but if I was not perpetually engaged +in this rather exhausting pursuit I was, at any rate, intrigued. +_Pengard_, who is also _Sylvester_, and yet is neither the one nor the +other, may be too much for your saner moments of credulity. But Mr. +STRAUS tells his queer story so plausibly and with so light a touch that +even though you may affect to scoff at his dashing improbabilities you +cannot escape their attraction. Indeed Mr. STRAUS'S adventure into +fields hitherto strange to him has been so successful that I am inclined +to ask him to continue cultivating them. + + * * * * * + +Life's Little Contradictions. + +"Now mind, you know, if I kill you it's nothing, but if you kill me, by +Jingo, it's murder." This remark was put by JOHN LEECH into the lips of +a small Special Constable, represented as menacing a gigantic ruffian, +and was not, as you might think, addressed by a Sinn Feiner to a member +of the Royal Irish Constabulary. + + * * * * * + +Messrs. W. H. Smith & Son. + +Mr. Punch wishes to offer the most sincere congratulations to his old +friends on the occasion of the centenary of their firm. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume +159, October 27, 1920, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PUNCH *** + +***** This file should be named 20779-8.txt or 20779-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/0/7/7/20779/ + +Produced by V. L. Simpson, Jonathan Ingram and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net. 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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: Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, October 27, 1920 + +Author: Various + +Editor: Owen Seaman + +Release Date: March 8, 2007 [EBook #20779] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PUNCH *** + + + + +Produced by V. L. Simpson, Jonathan Ingram and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net. This +file is gratefully uploaded to the PG collection in honor +of Distributed Proofreaders having posted over 10,000 +ebooks. + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<h1>PUNCH,<br> OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.</h1> + +<h2>VOL. 159</h2> + +<hr class="full"> + +<h2>October 27, 1920.</h2> + +<hr class="full"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page321" id="page321"></a>[pg +321]</span></p> + +<h2>CHARIVARIA.</h2> + +<p><span class="smcap">Some</span> idea of the evils consequent on a +coal strike can be obtained when we hear there was talk of a football +match in the North having to be cancelled.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Mr. <span class="smcap">Lloyd George</span> is certainly most +unlucky. As a result of the coal strike the New World has again been +postponed.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>We are assured that everything has been done to safeguard our food +supply. We ourselves have heard of one grocer who has sufficient fresh +eggs to last him for many months.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>"Large numbers of South Wales miners left by train yesterday for +the seaside," says <i>Lloyd’s News</i>. Unfortunately they did +not travel by the Datum Line.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>The Opera House at Covent Garden is to be used as a cinema theatre. +Meanwhile the House of Commons remains firm.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p><i>The Daily Mail</i> Prize Hat has now been chosen, though it is +not yet definitely decided whether the wearing of it will be made +compulsory. If it is, we understand that +Mr. <span class="smcap">Winston Churchill</span> will apply for +exemption.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Thieves have broken into the railway station at Blaenau Festiniog +and stolen a quantity of chocolate. Apparently with the idea of +confusing the police, they left the name of the station behind +them.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Twenty-one persons have been injured as the result of the explosion +of a bomb in a first-class carriage on the Brazil Central Railway. The +culprit, we understand, has written to the company expressing regret, +but pointing out that no seat was available in a third-class +carriage.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>A ship’s cook has been fined twenty shillings for refusing to +join his ship, his excuse being that he had seen a rat as big as a cat +in the cabin. It was pointed out to him that only ship’s +officers are entitled to see rats in the cabin.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>A company has been formed at Stockholm for storing wind power. +There should be a great demand for the insides of some puff pastry +that we know of.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>An American has invented an aeroplane capable of remaining in the +air for hours and hours. This is nothing to +Mr. <span class="smcap">Asquith’s</span> Irish solution, which +is guaranteed to remain in the air for years and years.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Brides are getting rather tired of Harris’s lilies, says a +writer in +<i>The Daily Graphic</i>. It is only natural that brides should become +rather bored if they always wear the same sort of flowers every time +they’re married.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Mr. E. <span class="smcap">Van Ingen</span>, a New York merchant +now in London, boasts that he has crossed the Atlantic one hundred and +sixty-eight times. It may be against the Prohibition laws, but we +fancy it would be cheaper if he kept a few bottles of the stuff in New +York.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>A medical man advises people to use dried milk on health grounds. +We have felt for some time that what was wanted was a really good +waterproof milk.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Mr. E. A. <span class="smcap">Douse</span> has spent forty-two +years in a Cheshire post-office. It is only fair to say that the young +lady behind the counter didn’t notice him standing there all +that time.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>A Hertfordshire farmer, says <i>The Daily Mail</i>, has counted one +hundred and twenty-three grains of wheat in one ear. Our contemporary +has not yet decided what can be done about it.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>"What is the right age for a man to marry?" asks +Miss <span class="smcap">Gertie Wentworth-James</span>. The answer is, +Not yet.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>While addressing a meeting of miners an extremist declared that the +idle rich were the cause of all industrial troubles. It has since been +reported that several of the audience immediately proceeded home and +told themselves off in front of a mirror.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>We understand that the miners greatly desire that Ireland will +remain quiet for a short period, and thus refrain from distracting +public attention from their cause.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>"Lord Northcliffe," says <i>The New York World</i>, "is always in +advance of public opinion." This is a fitting rejoinder to those who +tell us that he is always behind <i>The Times</i>.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>We cull the following from a speech of +Senator <span class="smcap">Harding</span>: "As I note the cornfields +I am reminded that we still plough the land and plant and cultivate +the fields in order to grow crops." We would remind the Senator that, +with the Elections drawing daily nearer, the habit of making such +sweeping and unguarded statements as the above is extremely +dangerous.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>We advise all readers to stick to their own particular newspaper, +as a sudden change might upset the "net sales" which are being so +carefully compiled at the present moment.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>The up-to-date song-writer, says a musical journal, must strike a +sad and soulful note this season. We are already engaged in writing +"The Scotsman’s Farewell to his Corkscrew."</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>A theatrical writer informs us that <i>The Laughing Husband</i> +will be revived this year. Not in our suburb, unless the cost of +living drops considerably.</p> + +<hr> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a href="images/321.png"> +<img src="images/321th.png" alt=""></a> + +<p><i>Betty.</i> "<span class="smcap">Grandma, I know my twelve +times</span>."</p> + +<p><i>Grandma.</i> "<span class="smcap">Do you, dear? Well, what are +twelve times thirteen</span>?"</p> + +<p><i>Betty.</i> "<span class="smcap">Don’t be silly, Grandma. +There isn’t such a thing</span>."</p> +</div> + +<hr> + +<blockquote><p>"The modern Hydra, embracing innumerable adverse +factors, would appear at least as many headed as the ancient, for as +fast as one is more or less effectively decapitated up comes another +to upset the applecart."</p> + +<p><i>Financial Paper.</i></p> +</blockquote> +<p>Classical students will, of course, remember how cleverly Hercules +made use of this habit of the Hydra to secure the apples of the +Hesperides.</p> + +<hr class="full"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page322" id="page322"></a>[pg +322]</span></p> + +<h2>THE DINING GLADIATOR;</h2> + +<p class="center"><span class="smcap">or, War to the Knife (and +Fork)</span>.</p> + +<p class="center">(<i>Being further Extracts from a certain Diary.</i>)</p> + +<p class="center">II.</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">Wrote</span> an even better article than ever, +on indigestion as a determining factor in national <i>moral</i>. +Pointed out how important it is, if we are to think coolly, that we +should eat discreetly. Sufficiently, of course, but with thought.</p> + +<p>At the Tribunal all the afternoon, busily combing out.</p> + +<p>To the Hippodrome in the evening. A most diverting show.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p><span class="smcap">Northcliffe</span> is becoming impossible and I +must find another paper. Several of my best commas cut out of +to-day’s article. All reference to the necessity for immediately +beheading <span class="smcap">Asquith</span> omitted yesterday. Was +comforted by lunch at the Carlton with <span class="smcap">Doris +Keane</span>, <span class="smcap">Gertie Millar</span> and +<span class="smcap">Scatters</span>. We had some good jokes.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>The news of my resignation from <i>The Times</i> has set my +telephone ringing all the morning with congratulations, requests for +interviews and offers of employment. Also some attractive invitations +to dinner and week-ends. The War for the moment seems to be forgotten. +Wonderful, the power of the printed word!</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>My first article in <i>The Morning Post</i>, distributing blame and +praise with my usual deadly accuracy. Wonder what +poor <span class="smcap">Northcliffe</span> is doing without me.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Received long letter from <span class="smcap">Haig</span> asking +for instructions, which I sent by return.</p> + +<p>Lunched at the Carlton with some charming musical-comedy actresses. +To the Tribunal after. Dined at the National Sporting Club and saw a +good fight.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>A visit from an Italian personage of consequence, who told me that +my articles are the talk of Italy. If writing could win wars, he said, +my pen would have done it.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>L. G. came up to Carryon Hall heavily masked. I gave him an +excellent dinner and some equally good advice, and he left much +heartened.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Dined at Lady <span class="smcap">Randolph’s</span>. A merry +crowd there. Every one very gay and amusing; but we forgot +that <span class="smcap">Winston</span> was our hostess’s son +and castigated him badly. Lady <span class="smcap">Juliet</span> said +that with some people, no matter what they begin to talk about, even +with Cabinet Ministers, it all comes back to food.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Wrote a careful article pointing out that we must have at least one +hundred more divisions in the West before next Friday.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>I was gratified to learn to-day that in consequence of my +articles <i>The Morning Post</i> has doubled its circulation, +while <i>The Times</i> hardly sells a copy.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Lunched with <span class="smcap">Massingham</span> of <i>The +Nation</i>, who eats more sensibly than he writes.</p> + +<p>In Paris. Saw <span class="smcap">Clemenceau</span> at the War +Ministry. His table was littered with papers and reports, amongst +which he pointed out laughingly one of my articles. I can’t +think why he laughed. Lunched at Voisin’s.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Left for rapid tour of inspection to British H.Q. Found much to put +right. Issued an Order of the Day to soldiers of all ranks. The +Germans, hearing of my presence, made desperate attempts to bomb me, +but failed. Food at the Front not very alluring.</p> + +<p>Yesterday’s article, I learn, put the wind up the War +Cabinet, and great things may result. All my pleasure spoilt, however, +by breaking a tooth on a pellet in a Ritz grouse.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Visited the French H.Q. and was pleased +with <span class="smcap">Foch</span>, whom I asked to run over to +Carryon when he was ever in any doubt. Sent home a powerful article +which, when it is reproduced in all the French papers, as it will be, +should encourage him and improve his position.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Dined at Lady <span class="smcap">Ridley’s</span>. A very +cheery party and much chaff. Mrs. <span class="smcap">Asquith</span> +said that she was writing her reminiscences. I made no mention of my +diary, but if I don’t get it out in book form before hers +I’m not the Colonel of the Nuts.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>To-day’s article should bring things to a head very shortly. +Shall be very glad when it is over and I can rest a little. Took some +bicarbonate of soda.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Armistice signed. Spent the day in a kind of triumphal procession +from restaurant to restaurant, at each of which I was hailed with +applause.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Reached Versailles and let the news be known. A visible quickening +up already to be noted.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p>Sent for President <span class="smcap">Wilson</span>, but something +must have prevented his coming. Lunched at Paillard’s and dined +at Larue’s. Saw an amusing Palais Royal farce.</p> + +<hr class="short"> + +<p><i>June 28th</i>, 1920.—Treaty of Peace, for which I have +worked so long, signed at last. Now I can utter my <i>Nunc +Dimittis</i>, having accomplished the two ends I had in view—to +bring the first world War to a more or less satisfactory finish and to +make it dangerous for any but the deaf and dumb to dine out.</p> + +<p>E. V. L.</p> + +<hr> + +<h2>THE LATE WORM</h2> + +<p class="center">(<i>Being a correction of "A Ballad of the Early +Worm," "Punch," October 6th</i>).</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><span class="smcap">Oh</span> ye whose hearts were rent with pain<br></span> +<span class="i2">A few short weeks ago,<br></span> +<span class="i0">Is it unkind to harp again<br></span> +<span class="i2">Upon that tale of woe?<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">You know the tale—in <i>Punch</i>, I mean—<br></span> +<span class="i2">Pathetic every word;<br></span> +<span class="i0">Three wormlets fought to stand between<br></span> +<span class="i2">Pa and the Early Bird.<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">You sorrowed for their non-success<br></span> +<span class="i2">(By use of triple strength<br></span> +<span class="i0">They saved their father’s life—ah yes—<br></span> +<span class="i2">But not his total length).<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">You thought, of course—I know you did—<br></span> +<span class="i2">That Father left his hole,<br></span> +<span class="i0">A briskly virtuous annelid,<br></span> +<span class="i2">To take an early stroll.<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Well, now just go and read a book<br></span> +<span class="i2">Called <i>Vegetable Mould</i><br></span> +<span class="i0"><i>And Earthworms</i> (<span class="smcap">Darwin</span>); if you look<br></span> +<span class="i2">You’ll find that you’ve been sold.<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It’s not my own, it’s <span class="smcap">Darwin’s</span> firm<br></span> +<span class="i2">Authority I cite:<br></span> +<span class="i0"><i>There never is an early worm;</i><br></span> +<span class="i2"><i>Pa had been out all night.</i><br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He swaggered forth at eventide<br></span> +<span class="i2">And stayed till dawn next day;<br></span> +<span class="i0">For I will not attempt to hide<br></span> +<span class="i2">That <i>worms behave that way</i>.<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So pious folk like you and me<br></span> +<span class="i2">Should not be filled with woe<br></span> +<span class="i0">At thought of Father’s tragedy;<br></span> +<span class="i2"><i>His morals were so low.</i><br></span> +</div></div> + +<hr> + +<h2>Our Courtly Contemporaries.</h2> + +<blockquote><p>"The Earl of Athlone walked away on foot, as is the +simple way of our Royal Family." <i>Sunday Paper.</i></p></blockquote> + +<hr class="short"> + +<blockquote><p>"High-backed chair of Tudor period, about +1660."—<i>Advt. in Daily Paper.</i></p> + +<p>We don’t question its genuineness, but infer that it has been +subjected to Restoration.</p> +</blockquote> + +<hr class="short"> + +<blockquote><p>"Furnished House, consisting of dining, drawing, eight +breakfast rooms, etc." <i>Sunday Paper.</i></p> + +<p>Would suit a large family inclined to be short-tempered in the +morning.</p></blockquote> + +<hr class="full"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page323" id="page323"></a>[pg +323]</span></p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a href="images/323.png"> +<img src="images/323th.png" alt=""> +</a> +<h3>A TOO-FREE COUNTRY.</h3> + +<p><span class="smcap">Alien Rioter</span>. "DOWN WITH EVERYBODY!"</p> + +<p>P.C. <span class="smcap">John Bull</span>. "WELL, WE’LL MAKE +A START WITH YOU."</p> +</div> + +<hr class="full"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page324" id="page324"></a>[pg +324]</span></p> + +<div> +<a href="images/324.png"> +<img src="images/324th.png" alt=""> +</a> + +<h3>PEOPLE WE ADMIRE.</h3> + +<p class="center">THE HERO WHO KEEPS UP HIS ARMY EXERCISES, STRIKE OR NO STRIKE.</p> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h2>A LETTER TO THE BACK-BLOCKS.</h2> + +<p><span class="smcap">Dear Ginger</span>,—So you have bought a +very promising little gold-mine from a rollicking Irish nobleman +called Patrick Terence O’Ryan, who is retiring on Mayo to take +up the paternal estates. H-m!—have you? And you think you +yourself will be retiring home presently on the proceeds of the said +mine? H-m! again. There is a certain familiarity in your description +of the gentleman. Tell me, has this Hibernian philanthropist a slight +squint, a broken nose and a tendency to lisp in moments of +excitement?</p> + +<p>I think I see you nod.</p> + +<p>Ginger, I once bought a mine from that man. His name was Algernon +Maddox Cholmondely <i>then</i>, and he was homeward bound to assume +the ancestral acres in Flint. He escorted me down the hole and +displayed visible gold sparkling all along the reef. A week after he +had gone I found that he had put it there with a shot-gun—an old +"salter’s" trick, but new to me at the time. You are not likely +to be seeing Patrick Algernon Terence Maddox O’Ryan-Cholmondely +again, but, if you should, remember me to him, please—with the +business end of a pick-axe. Always delighted to keep in touch with old +friends.</p> + +<p>Ginger, <i>you never can tell</i>. This is not an original remark. +One of our brainy boys—George Bernard, unless I +err—thought of it before I did; went away into the wilderness, +wrapped his grey-matter in wet Jaeger bandages, subsisted on a diet of +premasticated grape-nuts and produced this aphorism. And there’s +a world of truth in it, my son. You certainly never can.</p> + +<p>One fine morning last August (yes, there was <i>one</i>), I stepped +out of my diggings in an obscure Cornish fishing-village to find a +gentleman busily engaged strangling a lady on the cliff side. He had +her by the throat and was gradually forcing her over the edge. Once in +Bristol I interposed in a slogging contest between husband and wife +and was very properly chastised for my interference, not only by the +happy pair but by the entire street, who had valuable bets laid on the +event. That, you say, should have been a lesson to me. But you know +me, Ginger, impetuous, chivalrous, brave; I simply couldn’t +stand there and watch a defenceless woman—moreover a +good-looking woman—foully done to death like that. I flung +myself upon the villain—that is to say I spoke to him about +it.</p> + +<p>"Oh, dash it, old bean," I said, "draw it mild!"</p> + +<p>Somebody shouted something behind me, but I didn’t catch its +purport for the sufficient reason that at that moment the +long-suffering cliff gave way and we all went overboard, all three of +us, he, she and it—me.</p> + +<p>Fortunately the drop wasn’t terrific—not more than four +feet or so—and the tide happened to be in at the time, which was +very decent of it. My first thought as I came to the surface—or, +at any rate, <i>one</i> of my first thoughts—was "What of the +woman?" I struck out for the poor creature. At the same moment she +struck out for me, and, what is more, she got me too, clean between +the eyes—a straight left-hander.</p> + + +<div class="figright"> +<a href="images/325.png"> +<img src="images/325th.png" alt=""> +</a> + +<p><i>Mistress.</i> "<span class="smcap">Would you like to go out this +afternoon, Mabel</span>?"</p> + +<p><i>Mabel.</i> "<span class="smcap">I <i>am</i> going +out</span>."</p> +</div> + +<p>"Out of my way, fathead!" she +hissed <span class="pagenum"><a name="page325" id="page325"></a>[pg +325]</span>and went on for the shore under her own steam at about +forty knots an hour. I was washed up myself, along with a quantity of +other jetsam, a few minutes later, to be met by a small furious man +with a heliotrope complexion and white spats who wagged bunches of +typescript under my nose and informed me that I had absolutely ruined +about twenty million feet of the Flickerscope Company’s +five-reel paralyser, "The Smuggler’s Bride."</p> + +<p>Of course you say that you saw what was coming all along. Of course +you did. But wait a moment.</p> + +<p>Yesterday afternoon I was strolling down a certain fashionable +street when a loud explosion occurred in a near-by shop and a cloud of +acrid grey smoke came rolling out. Being by nature as inquisitive as a +chipmunk I was on the point of shoving my head round the door-jamb to +see what was up when caution prompted me to turn round. Yes, there +they were, of course, a tall, thin youth winding away at a cine-camera +like an Italian at a barrel-organ, and beside him a heavy-weight +Israelite, dancing a war-dance, waving bunches of typescript and +howling at me to stand clear. I had very near ruined a further mile or +two of film.</p> + +<p>I sprang out of range, and then, wishing to atone for my previous +blunders and prove that I really had no malevolent intentions towards +a struggling industry, I went round and assisted the caracoling +producer in stemming the crowd. Among others I stemmed a pushful +policeman. I didn’t notice he was a policeman until he was +biting the dust, with my stick between his legs. However an +instantaneous application of palm-oil made it all right between us, +and he squatted half-stunned on the kerb, nursing his brow with one +hand, my five bob with the other and took no further interest in the +proceedings. And very interesting they were, too.</p> + +<p>Three masked men dashed out of the shop laden with booty and were +pursued by a fourth, whom they knocked on the head and left lying for +dead on the pavement. Most realistic. The crowd, led by me, cheered +like mad. Then the thieves jumped into a waiting car and were whirled +away. That done, the photographer and his step-dancing friend leapt +into a second car and were whirled away also. Once more we cheered. I +made a short speech to the effect that everything was all right with +the British Cinema business and, after leading a few more cheers for +myself, came home.</p> + +<p>"Well," you say, "all very jolly and so on, but what about it?"</p> + +<p>There’s this about it, old companion, just this, that I am +very probably spending a meditative winter in gaol. The charge is that +I did aid and abet a peculiarly ingenious gang of desperadoes to blow +a jeweller’s safe, knock the jeweller on the head and get safely +away with the stuff. I am even accused of obstructing the police. An +inspector has been round to see me this morning and he tells me there +is practically no hope. He advises me, as between friends, to make a +clean breast of it, return the boodle, betray my accomplices, plead +mental deficiency and trust to the clemency of the Court. It’s +pretty rough, after making all arrangements for spending a cheerful +Christmas in Algiers, to have it changed to cold porridge in Parkhurst +or Princetown. Of the two I hope it’ll be Parkhurst, for +Princetown, so <i>habitués</i> tell me, is no place for a +growing lad when the wintry winds do blow.</p> + +<p>Thine, <i>de +profundis</i> <span class="smcap">Patlander</span>.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h2>Rhymes of Unrest.</h2> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There was a young miner of Ayr<br></span> +<span class="i0">Who gave himself up to despair;<br></span> +<span class="i2">For he said, "If we’re paid<br></span> +<span class="i2">On our ’get,’ I’m afraid<br></span> +<span class="i0">That I canna ca’ canny no mair."<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Strike while the iron is hot,"<br></span> +<span class="i2">Said the wise old saw of old;<br></span> +<span class="i0">But the miners say, "What rot!<br></span> +<span class="i2">Strike while the weather’s cold."<br></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<blockquote><p>"The art of decoration is alien to painting in +this—that you must mix your colours with your +brains."—<i>Daily Paper.</i></p> + +<p>We await a reply from the intellectuals of Chelsea.</p> +</blockquote> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<blockquote><p>"There is one building now being erected, within a few +miles of Manchester as the cock crows."—<i>Provincial +Paper.</i></p> + +<p>We are unfamiliar with this method of mensuration.</p> +</blockquote> + +<hr class="full"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page326" id="page326"></a>[pg +326]</span></p> + +<h2>ABOUT CONFERENCES.</h2> + +<p><span class="smcap">We</span> may not have coal, but we can have +conferences. A conference is the most typically English thing that +there is. The old Anglo-Saxons had them and called them moots. Why +they called them a silly name like that, when "conferences" would have +done just as well, one can’t imagine; but they had their notions +and stuck to them. They would have called Parliament a moot; in fact +they did. They called it a moot of wise men. Sarcastic beggars, these +Anglo-Saxons!</p> + +<p>The advantages of having a conference about everything are almost +too numerous to explain. For one thing, suppose Smith is coming to see +you at 2.30 <span class="smcap">p.m.</span> "It’s no use his +waiting now," you say. "I’ve got a conference at 3. Tell him to +come back at 5.30." And when he comes back at 5.30 of course the +conference is still going on, so you don’t have to see him at +all.</p> + +<p>There is nothing again that makes you feel so deliciously important +as being at a conference. You may be a leader of quite an +insignificant body of workers, like the Nutcracker-Teeth Makers’ +Union, but you rub shoulders at a conference with men whose names are +a household word throughout the whole of Great Britain, amongst those +who have houses. The distinguished and the undistinguished lay their +heads together; the spat-wearing get their feet mixed with the +non-spat-wearing; though there is rather a fake, mind you, about this +spat-wearing business, for it may simply mean that the uppers are very +badly worn, or that only that very bright pink pair of socks came home +from the wash this week, or even that there are no socks underneath at +all.</p> + +<p>But anyhow, at a conference, Tom, Dick and Harry hobnob with Bob, +James and George, and all are equal, except perhaps the chairman, who +has two more pens in front of him and a much larger ash-tray. +Mr. <span class="smcap">Bevin</span> and Sir +<span class="smcap">Eric Geddes</span> smile affably across at each other, and the <span class="smcap">Prime Minister</span> +and Mr. <span class="smcap">Cramp</span> find out how much they have in common, such as love of +poetry and pelargoniums. The mine-owner offers the miners’ +representative a cigarette, and the miners’ representative says to the +mine-owner, "Many thanks, old boy; but I’ll have one of my own." And +after it is over they all go out and stand arm-in-arm in a long row to +be photographed for the papers, and are read next morning from left to +right. It is the ambition of every properly constituted Englishman to +wake up some morning and find that his portrait is being read from left +to right; but how few succeed.</p> + +<p>The total output of conferences in this country during one year has +never been computed yet, but it is supposed to exceed that of any +country in the world, except Red India. If there were to be a strike +of conferents or conferees, whatever they are called, in England, it +is impossible to say what would happen. But it might be possible to +lay down a datum line—a shilling extra for the first million +words above two hundred and fifty million per shift, and two shillings +more for every million words above that. Fortunately this will never +be necessary, for people who confer are so fond of conferences that +they will never down chairs.</p> + +<p>And no wonder. Only a very strong man can hew coal, and only a very +reckless one can make a speech, but almost anyone can confer if he has +a large enough ash-tray; and there seems no reason why more people +shouldn’t confer. Everybody is interested in conferences, +whatever they are about, and the British public ought to be admitted +to this kind of thing. One is always reading in the paper that the +sound commonsense or the traditional sense of fair play of the great +British public will support the miners in any just claim; but this +claim is not just or just isn’t, or something of that sort. But +how do they know what the great British public will feel about it? +They aren’t there, are they? There ought to be representatives +of the G.B.P. on all these conferences. They ought to be chosen from a +rota, like jurymen. Very likely one of them would have found out what +a datum line is, anyway. There’s a man who comes up in the train +with me in the morning who thinks he knows, but unfortunately he gets +out at Croydon so we haven’t found out yet.</p> + +<p>By having a lot more conferences and having a lot of +representatives from the public on them all, and paying them well for +it, one could practically settle the unemployment problem for the +winter. If the Government can only be brought to see that this is the +only statesmanlike course, and the sole course consistent with the +Anglo-Saxon sense of justice, and capable of leading to a satisfactory +Exploration of Avenues, Finding of Bridges and Discovery of Ways Out, +we may all achieve our life’s ambition some day and open the +morning paper to find that we are being read at last from left to +right. "Mr. <span class="smcap">Robert Williams</span>, +Mr. <span class="smcap">Lloyd George</span>, Mr. J. +H. <span class="smcap">Thomas</span>, +Lord <span class="smcap">Riddell</span>," and so on and so on, till +you come at last to "J. Smith, Esq., R.B.P.," smiling the widest of +all. R.B.P.’s, I think, should wear a distinguishing +mark—a single spat perhaps. <span class="smcap">Evoe</span>.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h2>MORE SECRET HISTORY.</h2> + +<p class="note">[According to a report in a daily paper, at the recent Peace +Conference held at Spa, where the delegates were royally entertained +in the matter of hotel accommodation, meals, etc., the cigar bill +(which has been sent in to the League of Nations and sent out again) +amounted to three thousand two hundred pounds. What the delegates +could not smoke they seem to have taken away with them.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’<span class="smcap">Tis</span> sweet in darkish times like these to see a<br></span> +<span class="i2">Rent in the veil which keeps the public blind,<br></span> +<span class="i0">And thus obtain a pretty shrewd idea<br></span> +<span class="i2">Of what goes on behind;<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To note how quite an innocent report’ll<br></span> +<span class="i2">Reveal apparent trifles which befall,<br></span> +<span class="i0">Proving that men whom we supposed immortal<br></span> +<span class="i2">Are human after all.<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But here, while I can hardly call you blameful<br></span> +<span class="i2">For smoking "free" cigars with so much zest,<br></span> +<span class="i0">Frankly I feel ’twas little short of shameful<br></span> +<span class="i2">To go and pinch the rest.<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I can forgive your huge hotel expenses;<br></span> +<span class="i2">Your beef was rightly of a super-cut;<br></span> +<span class="i0">A modicum of wine does whet the senses;<br></span> +<span class="i2">But those cigars—tut, tut!<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For there’s a finer aid to meditation,<br></span> +<span class="i2">Much more appropriate, in my humble view,<br></span> +<span class="i0">When Nation nestles cheek by jowl with Nation,<br></span> +<span class="i2">And far, far cheaper too.<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So, if you’d really slay Bellona’s bow-wows,<br></span> +<span class="i2">Might I suggest your vicious ways should cease,<br></span> +<span class="i0">And that in future you conduct your pow-wows<br></span> +<span class="i2">Over the pipe of peace.<br></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h2>An Affectionate Diminutive.</h2> + +<blockquote><p>"Lord Buxton, who retired this summer from the post of +High Commissioner and Governor-General of South Africa, has been made +an early."—<i>Daily Paper.</i></p></blockquote> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<blockquote><p>A correspondent, referring to Mr. Punch’s +quotation (from an Australian paper) of the title of a song, "It was a +Lover and His Last," suggests "<i>Ne</i> suitor <i>ultra +crepidam.</i>"</p></blockquote> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<p>On the coal strike:—</p> + +<blockquote><p>"We look to the Government to keep all doors open. We +look to the public to keep cool."—<i>Westminster +Gazette.</i></p></blockquote> + +<p>The public should have no difficulty in doing its part if the +Government do theirs.</p> + +<hr class="full"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page327" id="page327"></a>[pg +327]</span></p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a href="images/327.png"> +<img src="images/327th.png" alt=""> +</a> + +<h3>TRANSPORT: PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE.</h3> +</div> + +<hr class="full"> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page328" id="page328"></a>[pg +328]</span></p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a href="images/328.png"> +<img src="images/328th.png" alt=""></a> + +<p><i>Giles.</i> "<span class="smcap">I didn’t +’ardly agree wi’ the Vicar in wot ’e said about them +early martyrs bein’ thrown to the lions an’ burnt at the +stake an’ livin’ on for ever</span>."</p> + +<p><i>Curate.</i> "<span class="smcap">Why not?</span>"</p> + +<p><i>Giles.</i> "<span class="smcap">Well, Zur, no constitootion +could stand it</span>."</p> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h2>THE CONSPIRATORS.</h2> + +<p class="caption">V.</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">My dear Charles</span>,—Let me remind you +that the Bolshevist conspirator has to stir up conflagrations in other +countries without leaving his own. Passports and things are put in to +make it more difficult when he comes to getting his inflammable +material and directions for use over the frontier. So he has to invent +a way over the obstacles.</p> + +<p>The first prize is awarded to the following: Secret instructions +are printed in Arabic and the pages containing them are bound up in a +five hundred page book in that language. The courier, an Oriental, +carries this book openly in his hand when he presents himself at the +frontier. It is ten to one that an innocent-looking book, thus +carried, will not be suspected; a hundred to one against there being +an official capable of reading it; five hundred to three against that +official trying one of the guilty pages, if he is there and duly +suspicious. Yet, with a hundred and sixty-six thousand chances against +it, our Little Man got hold of those instructions.</p> + +<p>The Sherlock Holmes of fiction is a gaunt figure, with a hatchet +face, spare of flesh. Our Little Man is a chubby lad, standing about +four foot ten in his stockinged feet, rubicund and corpulent, and he +wears a mackintosh with a very mackintoshy smell in all weathers. He +never did a day’s work, and he never means to try, but he is a +genius at getting it out of others. Some say he is of Swiss origin, +some say he is American, and some say that surely he must be Chinese; +he was never certain himself until Czecho-Slovak was invented, and he +plumped for that. He has the degree of Master of Arts; what arts I +don’t know; probably the black ones. His inner knowledge of the +human species seems to give him plenty to laugh at. He notices +everything, forgets nothing, and there is never a weakness in a man +but he is on to it. He made up his mind that those secret instructions +were passing and set about to find how they passed and what they were. +He was too lazy to begin at the beginning, so he began at the end. He +called in person, as a commercial traveller, at the suspected office +of destination, and in the short time available ascertained that the +door-keeper who turned him out was a patriotic and fervent admirer of +the wine of the country.</p> + +<p>Our Little Man had no vulgar idea of getting the secret out of him +by making him drunk. If there was a secret it wouldn’t be in the +door-keeper. But he and that door-keeper got to drinking together and +the door-keeper did all the paying; the drinking and the paying went +on by progressive degrees till the door-keeper had no money and only a +still almighty thirst left. The Little Man left him with his thirst +for a few days, until it became intolerable, and the door-keeper +insisted that something simply must be done about it. The Little Man +regretted that he could not give the necessary money to finance +further orgies, but he would gladly advance it. Four nights got the +door-keeper well in his debt, and our Little Man then began to talk +about repayment. The door-keeper said he had no money; the Little Man +said he must get it. Off whom? His employer.</p> + +<p>How was the door-keeper to get his employer’s money off him? +By selling him a safe. Our Little Man then divulged that he was in +reality a commercial traveller in safes; if the door-keeper would get +his employer to buy one of his safes the Little Man would forgive him +his debt by way of commission. He felt sure that the Head of the +Office had a weakness for precautions. The door-keeper, now +enthusiastic, said he should just think he had! The Little Man felt he +was getting warm. The door-keeper put the deal through and prevailed +upon his master to instal a really safe safe in the office, instead of +the old one. You had only to look at it to see it was impregnable by +fire, water or the King’s Enemies. But one set of keys stayed +with the Little Man.</p> + +<p>The drinking (by both) and the paying (by the door-keeper) were +resumed. When the debt was again large enough the Little Man imposed +new terms. This time he wanted to see the Head of the Office himself, +to put further deals through. The door-keeper thought deeply, but +could see no harm in this. The Little Man was thus introduced into the +presence, and startled it by pointing to the safe and offering to do +burglar on it any night of the week. The Head was manifestly +concerned.</p> + +<p>"We have here," said the Little Man, producing two formidable slabs +of steel hinged together and leaving room between them when locked for +a wad of papers only—"we have here a special strong box exactly +suited for the storage of your bank-notes. Put them in this box, and +the box in the safe, and then you really are ahead of your +enemies."</p> + +<p>The Head bought. He gave the Little Man less money than he had +spent on the strong box, and the Little Man gave him less keys than he +was entitled to. The drinking and the debt were resumed, and, when it +came to a question of settlement for the third time, the Little Man +pointed out to the door-keeper that, if he hadn’t the money to +repay, then he must steal it. He now divulged that he was not really a +broker, but a breaker of safes and strong boxes. He handed the +door-keeper a key of his employer’s safe. In the safe would be +found the strong box. In the strong box would be found some notes of +high value, unless he was very much mistaken.</p> + +<p>So the door-keeper went and opened the safe and returned. And the +Little Man opened the strong box, and +he <i>was</i> <span class="pagenum"><a name="page329" +id="page329"></a>[pg 329]</span>very much mistaken. There was never a +note there; just half-a-dozen pages torn out of a book printed in +Arabic.</p> + +<p>He was so angry that he gave the strong box one on the lid for +itself, with the result that he couldn’t lock it again. However, +he said he had a friend who could lock or unlock anything, and he left +the door-keeper drinking, for the first time at the Little Man’s +expense, while he took off the box to be repaired by his friend. The +latter happened to be in the next room with a camera. The pages were +photographed; the Little Man returned to the door-keeper with the +strong box, now capable of being re-locked; the door-keeper returned +to the office and put back the strong box, locked, into the safe, +which he also locked, and was wiping the sweat off his forehead and +congratulating himself that no one was the worse, when he was startled +to find a policeman had been watching him all the time.</p> + +<p>But he proved to be a very amenable policeman. He said he would +take no action before he and the door-keeper had had time to talk it +over next day. By the time that talk came the photographs had been +developed, printed and translated. But the policeman did not wish to +bore the door-keeper with the tiresome details. To put it quite +shortly the policeman thought it was a most excellent crime, worthy of +repetition at intervals.</p> + +<p> +Yours ever, <span class="smcap">Henry</span>.<br> +</p> + +<p class="center">(<i>To be continued.</i>)</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a href="images/329.png"> +<img src="images/329th.png" alt=""> +</a> + +<h3>CONCENTRATION.</h3> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h2>NEW RHYMES FOR OLD CHILDREN.</h2> + +<p class="center"><span class="smcap">The</span> ——.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><span class="smcap">I never</span> know why it should be<br></span> +<span class="i0">So rude to talk about the ——.<br></span> +<span class="i2">What funny folk we are!<br></span> +<span class="i0">I think we’ve got the jealous hump<br></span> +<span class="i0">Because we see we’ll never jump<br></span> +<span class="i2">So skilfully and far.<br></span> +<span class="i0">For, if one’s nibbled by a gnat<br></span> +<span class="i0">Or harvest-bugs or things like that,<br></span> +<span class="i2">One seldom keeps it dark;<br></span> +<span class="i0">One may enlarge upon the tale<br></span> +<span class="i0">If one is gobbled by a whale<br></span> +<span class="i2">Or swallowed by a shark;<br></span> +<span class="i0">But if you speak about the bite<br></span> +<span class="i0">Of this abandoned parasite<br></span> +<span class="i2">You’re very, very rash;<br></span> +<span class="i0">So sure is it to raise a frown<br></span> +<span class="i0">I dare not even write it down;<br></span> +<span class="i2">I simply put a ——.<br></span> +<span class="i0">None but an entomologist<br></span> +<span class="i0">Will quite admit the things exist,<br></span> +<span class="i0">And generally <i>they</i> insist<br></span> +<span class="i2">On using other names;<br></span> +<span class="i0">For, when at night Professors leap<br></span> +<span class="i0">Out of their scientific sleep<br></span> +<span class="i0">Because these little devils keep<br></span> +<span class="i2">Playing their usual games,<br></span> +<span class="i0">They never shout, "It seems to be<br></span> +<span class="i0">A something, something, something ——!"<br></span> +<span class="i0">(The word is never used, you see,<br></span> +<span class="i2">Except by artisans);<br></span> +<span class="i0">No, as they fling the bedclothes high<br></span> +<span class="i0">They give a wild but cultured cry,<br></span> +<span class="i0">"Confound it! Botheration! Hi!<br></span> +<span class="i2">A <i>Pulex irritans</i>!" A. P. H.<br></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h3>Our Ruthless Motorists.</h3> + +<blockquote><p>"Triumph 1920 4 h.p. Model H, also Baby, both brand +new; sacrifice, £5 off each."</p> + +<p><i>Motor Journal.</i></p></blockquote> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<blockquote><p>"It was intended to hold mock trials in order to +familiarise women with court procedure and ’legal +shibboleths.’</p> + +<p>When I saw her to-day, Miss —— said that +’techniaclities’ would have been a better +word."—<i>Evening Paper.</i></p></blockquote> + +<p>We hate to contradict a lady, but we cannot agree.</p> + +<hr class="full"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page330" id="page330"></a>[pg +330]</span></p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a href="images/330.png"> +<img src="images/330th.png" alt=""> +</a> + +<p><i>Aggrieved Profiteeress</i> (<i>studying photographs of the +Peerage</i>). "<span class="smcap">Well, I don’t see as +they’ve any call to look that ’aughty. Like as not me +an’ you’d be wearin’ coronets this minute if all our +ancestors ’adn’t a-been cut off in the Wars of the Roses, +or somethink</span>."</p> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h3>WORKING FOR PEACE.</h3> + +<p class="center">(<i>Extracts from the Diary of Mr. John Robert Boffkins, Trade +Union Leader.</i>)</p> + +<p><i>Monday.</i>—Rose with a heart over-flowing with love +towards my fellow-men. Industrial strife must cease. Strikes are a +barbarous and futile method of redressing wrong. Rather think that an +increase in wages of two shillings a day would appeal to our members. +Must inquire.</p> + +<p><i>Tuesday.</i>—Have confirmed my opinion that a +two-shillings’ increase would appeal to our members. They all +seem enthusiastic over the suggestion. They appear to be under the +impression that the idea is their own. It is not. It is mine. If it +materialises I shall be most popular. But I am all for peace. A strike +is out of the question. I shall spare no effort to prevent one.</p> + +<p><i>Wednesday.</i>—Presented formal demand to employers +to-day. Told our members they must be firm to the bitter end. The +two-shillings’ increase is their strict due, and, if we present +a united front, the grasping capitalist will be brought to his knees. +Am working night and day for peace.</p> + +<p><i>Thursday.</i>—Pointed out to the employers that a strike +is inevitable unless they give way. We can make no concession. My +whole energies are concentrated on preventing a strike. Told our +members that unless they remain firm the employers will crush them. A +strike would be a national calamity and might spell ruin to the +country.</p> + +<p><i>Friday.</i>—The possibility of a strike looms larger. Can +nothing be done to prevent it? Informed the employers that we declined +to abate one iota of our claim. "All or nothing" is our motto. Also +refused to go to arbitration. Warned the employers that a strike means +starvation for women and children. The prospect appals me.</p> + +<p><i>Saturday.</i>—The employers, who seem to be determined on +a strike, have offered the men two shillings if they will consider the +question of working five days a week instead of four. We refused their +offer and demanded that our claim should be conceded unconditionally +by noon, failing which our members would cease work.</p> + +<p><i>Later.</i>—The strike has commenced. Heaven knows that I +did everything to prevent it which human being could do. The +capitalists seem to have made up their minds to force civil war and +all its horrors upon the country. The spectacle of little children +starving causes me acute distress.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h3>A GUIDE TO GREATNESS.</h3> + +<p class="note">[Mr. <span class="smcap">Jacob Epstein</span> +maintains in <i>The Daily Mail</i> that a man to be a creative genius +must lead an orderly domesticated life.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I <span class="smcap">courted</span> the Muse as a stripling,<br></span> +<span class="i2">Immured in a Bloomsbury flat,<br></span> +<span class="i0">And yearned for the kudos of <span class="smcap">Kipling</span><br></span> +<span class="i2">For fees that were frequent and fat;<br></span> +<span class="i0">But editors, far from discerning<br></span> +<span class="i2">The worth of the pearls that I placed<br></span> +<span class="i0">At their feet, had a way of returning<br></span> +<span class="i2">The same with indelicate haste.<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, espousing, a year or two later,<br></span> +<span class="i2">The sweetest and neatest of wives,<br></span> +<span class="i0">I found, after peeling a tater<br></span> +<span class="i2">Or imparting a polish to knives,<br></span> +<span class="i0">I could scribble with frenzy and passion,<br></span> +<span class="i2">That the breaking of coal would inspire,<br></span> +<span class="i0">In a truly remarkable fashion,<br></span> +<span class="i2">My soul with celestial fire.<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Serenity reigns in the household;<br></span> +<span class="i2">I’ve cancelled my grudge against Fate;<br></span> +<span class="i0">My lyrical efforts are now sold<br></span> +<span class="i2">At a simply phenomenal rate;<br></span> +<span class="i0">And, whether I’m laying the lino<br></span> +<span class="i2">Or bathing the babes, I regard<br></span> +<span class="i0">The job as a cushy one: <i>I</i> know<br></span> +<span class="i2">The way to succeed as a bard.<br></span> +</div></div> + +<hr class="full"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page331" id="page331"></a>[pg +331]</span></p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a href="images/331.png"> +<img src="images/331th.png" alt=""> +</a> + +<h3>THE SCALES OF JUSTICE.</h3> + +<p><span class="smcap">Sir Robert Horne</span>. "I WANT TO KEEP THE +BALANCE. NOW THEN, BOTH TOGETHER."</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">The Miner</span>. "NO. <i>YOU</i> +BEGIN—AND THEN PERHAPS I’LL THINK ABOUT IT."</p> +</div> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page332" id="page332"></a>[pg +332]</span></p> + +<hr class="full"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page333" id="page333"></a>[pg +333]</span></p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a href="images/333.png"> +<img src="images/333th.png" alt=""> +</a> + +<p><i><span class="smcap">P. C. Greenwood.</span></i> +"<span class="smcap">Arrah! Get out wid yez and let the lady +pass</span>."</p> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h2>ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.</h2> + +<p><i>Tuesday, October 19th.</i>—A start was made with half a +hundred Questions, and, considering that most of them had been in cold +storage since before the Recess, it was surprising how fresh they +remained. Persia and Mesopotamia—not to mention +Ireland—are still unsettled; the Turkish Treaty is not yet +ratified; the cost of living continues to rise, and the ratio of +unemployment has alarmingly advanced, especially in the case of +ex-service men.</p> + +<p>These last are to be found work in the building trades, with, it is +hoped, the assistance of the trade unions, but, if that hope is +disappointed, then without it. The country requires half-a-million +houses built. "Here are men who could assist," said +the <span class="smcap">Prime Minister</span>, "and we propose that +they should be allowed to assist."</p> + +<p>Over a prospect already sufficiently bleak there broods the shadow +of the coal-strike. Sir <span class="smcap">Robert Horne</span>, in +presenting the case for the Government, was admirably clear but, +perhaps naturally, a little cold. Only when the new lighting +arrangement had flooded the House with artificial sunshine did the +Minister warm up a little and hint that a way of peace might yet be +found.</p> + +<p>I wonder if it was by accident or artifice that +Mr. <span class="smcap">Brace</span> began his plea for the miners +with the admission that they had only dropped the demand for the +reduction of fourteen shillings and twopence in the price of domestic +coal when they discovered that "the money was not there." Anyhow the +laughter that ensued served to put Members into a good temper and to +cause them to lend a friendly ear to his suggestion that the two +shillings advance, though in his view only "dust in the balance," +should be "temporarily" conceded, pending the establishment of a +tribunal which should permanently settle the conditions of the mining +industry. The increase of output which everyone desired would then be +brought about.</p> + +<p>Most of the speakers who followed seemed to think that +Mr. <span class="smcap">Brace</span> had sown the seed of a +settlement. It was left to the <span class="smcap">Prime +Minister</span>, who evidently did not relish the task, to awaken the +House from its beautiful dream. He pointed out that to accept the +proposal would be to give the miners what they had originally claimed, +without any guarantee that the greater output would be forthcoming. If +it were not forthcoming and the two shillings were taken away, what +would happen? "A strike," cried someone. "Precisely," said +Mr. <span class="smcap">Lloyd George</span>; only it would have been +provoked by the Government instead of by the miners. He was not +prepared to do business on those lines.</p> + +<p>And so the debate came to an end rather than a conclusion.</p> + +<p><i>Wednesday, October 20th.</i>—The Peers plunged into the +morasses of the Irish Question. Lord <span class="smcap">Crewe</span> +asked for an official inquiry into the alleged "reprisals" and +particularly instanced the attacks upon the creameries. Rather than +that Ireland should be "pacified" by such methods as these he would +see her engaged in civil war, "fairly conducted on both sides." From +these words it may be gathered that his lordship’s knowledge of +civil war is happily not extensive.</p> + +<p>Furnished with a voluminous brief from the Irish Office, +Lord <span class="smcap">Curzon</span> made a long reply, the purport +of which was that many of the reprisals were bogus, many were actions +undertaken in self-defence, while the rest were generally due to men +"seeing red" after their comrades had been brutally murdered. The +Government did not palliate such cases, and had instituted inquiries +and taken disciplinary action against the offenders, when known; but +they were not prepared to set up a public inquiry such as +Lord <span class="smcap">Crewe</span> had demanded. It would only +substitute "a competition in perjury" for the present "competition in +murder"—a somewhat infelicitous phrase by which, as he +subsequently explained, he did not mean to imply, as +Lord <span class="smcap">Parmoor</span> suggested, that police and +rebels were engaged in a murderous rivalry.</p> + +<p>Simultaneously the House of Commons was engaged upon an identically +similar debate. Mr. <span class="smcap">Arthur Henderson</span> was as +lugubrious as Lord <span class="smcap">Crewe</span> in presenting the +indictment and distinctly less adroit in selecting his facts. His +theory was that the Government had provoked the Sinn Fein outrages by +its treatment of the people. Why, women had been prevented from taking +their eggs to market!</p> + +<p>Sir <span class="smcap">Hamar Greenwood</span> spoke from the same +brief as Lord <span class="smcap">Curzon</span>, but threw far more +passion and vigour into its recital. There had been some reprisals, he +admitted, but they were as nothing compared to the horrors that had +provoked them; and he protested against the notion that "the heroes of +yesterday"—the R.I.C. is mainly recruited from ex-service +men—had turned into murderers. As for the creameries, he had +never seen a tittle of evidence that they had been destroyed by +servants of the Crown, and he warned the House not to believe the +stories put out by the propaganda bureau of the Irish Republican Army. +He was still a convinced Home Ruler—an Ulster hot-gospeller had +accused him of being a Sinn Feiner with a Papist wife!—but the +first thing to do was to break the reign of terror and end the rule of +the assassin. That they were doing, and there was no case for +Mr. <span class="smcap">Henderson’s</span> "insulting +resolution."</p> + +<p>The Opposition for the moment seemed stunned by +the <span class="smcap">Chief Secretary’s</span> sledge-hammer +speech. No one rose from the Front Bench and +Lieutenant-Commander <span class="smcap">Kenworthy</span> had to +overcome his modesty and step into the breach. Later on, +Lord <span class="smcap">Robert Cecil</span>, on the strength of +information supplied by an American journalist, supported the demand +for an inquiry. So did Mr. <span class="smcap">Asquith</span>, on the +ground that it would be in the interests of the Government of Ireland +itself; but this argument was obviously weakened by +Mr. <span class="smcap">Bonar Law’s</span> reminder that in 1913 +and 1914 Mr. +<span class="smcap">Asquith</span> himself had deprecated inquiries in somewhat similar +circumstances. The Government had a very good division, 346 to 79; but +there were many abstentions.</p> + +<p><i>Thursday, October 21st</i>.—It was, no doubt, by way of +brightening an unutterably gloomy week that +Mr. <span class="smcap">L’Estrange Malone</span>, who has not +hitherto been known as a humourist, invited the Government to +intercede at Washington for the release of the +notorious <span class="smcap">James Larkin</span>, now languishing in +an American gaol. Inasmuch as <span class="smcap">Larkin</span> had +been convicted for having advocated the overthrow of the United States +by violence, Mr. +<span class="smcap">Harmsworth</span> did not think H.M. Government were called upon to intervene. +Mr. <span class="smcap">Malone</span> understood from this that the Government had no sympathy with +British subjects in foreign lands, and so he got another laugh.</p> + +<p>Commander <span class="smcap">Bellairs</span> thought it would be a +good idea if the League of Nations, pending the discharge of its more +important functions, were to offer rewards for world-benefiting +discoveries such as a prophylactic against potato-blight. +Sir <span class="smcap">John Rees</span> saw his chance and took it. +"Does the League," he inquired, "declare to win on Phosphates, Peace +or Potatoes?"—thus supplying proof positive that he owes his +precise pronunciation to past practice with "prunes and prisms."</p> + +<p>It was rather impudent of Mr. <span class="smcap">Adamson</span>, +who has just been instrumental in throwing out of work some hundreds +of thousands of his fellow-citizens, to initiate a debate on +unemployment. Most of the speakers endeavoured to throw the blame on +"the other fellow"—the Government on the trade unions, the trade +unionists on the employers, and the employers on the Government. A +welcome exception was Mr. <span class="smcap">Hopkinson</span>, who +boldly blamed the short-sighted selfishness of some of his own class. +Employés would not work their hardest to "make the boss a +millionaire." As a fitting +<i>finale</i> to an inconclusive debate the <span class="smcap">Prime Minister</span> announced that in +order to force a settlement of the coal-strike the railwaymen—Mr. +<span class="smcap">Thomas</span>, apparently, dissenting—had threatened to join the unemployed.</p> + +<hr class="full"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page334" id="page334"></a>[pg +334]</span></p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a href="images/334.png"> +<img src="images/334th.png" alt=""> +</a> + +<p><i>Harassed Secretary</i>. "<span class="smcap">I say, you +needn’t make bunkers, you know</span>."</p> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h3>Our Erudite Contemporaries.</h3> + +<blockquote><p>"Willard was game and well trained, and in stature he +was Goliath to the Daniel of Dempsey."—<i>Evening +Paper.</i></p></blockquote> + +<p>A <span class="smcap">David</span> come to judgment!</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<blockquote><p>"The rate plague has developed to an alarming extent in +Thanet, and considerable anxiety is felt, especially as there appears +to be no effective preparation of poison to exterminate +them."—<i>Evening Paper.</i></p></blockquote> + +<p>And Thanet is not the only place.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h3>THE TYPE-SLINGER.</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><span class="smcap">Biting</span> and keen as any razor<br></span> +<span class="i0">The fluent pen of <span class="smcap">Lovat Fraser</span>;<br></span> +<span class="i0">And swift as arrows, thick as hail,<br></span> +<span class="i0">His outbursts in <i>The Daily Mail</i>,<br></span> +<span class="i0">Exposing in impassioned phrase<br></span> +<span class="i0">The <span class="smcap">Premier’s</span> wild and wicked ways.<br></span> +<span class="i0">And yet the <span class="smcap">Premier</span> doesn’t squirm,<br></span> +<span class="i0">No, not a bit—the pachyderm!<br></span> +<span class="i0">But goes about with cheerful mien,<br></span> +<span class="i0">As if such things had never been.<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So <span class="smcap">Lovat Fraser</span> grows emphatic<br></span> +<span class="i0">In efforts to be more dogmatic,<br></span> +<span class="i0">And down the column, once a week,<br></span> +<span class="i0"><i>His shrill italics fairly shriek</i>.<br></span> +<span class="i0">But does the <span class="smcap">Premier</span> bow his back<br></span> +<span class="i0">And go and give himself the sack?<br></span> +<span class="i0">Not he. Indeed, for all he troubles,<br></span> +<span class="i0">His critic might be blowing bubbles.<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It’s up to <span class="smcap">Lovat Fraser</span> now<br></span> +<span class="i0">To make an even bigger row;<br></span> +<span class="i0">I’d like to see the sturdy fellow<br></span> +<span class="i0">Write articles that simply bellow.<br></span> +<span class="i0">I think the <span class="smcap">Premier</span> might perhaps<br></span> +<span class="i0">Shiver and possibly collapse<br></span> +<span class="i0"><span class="smcap">If Lovat got to work in "caps."</span><br></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h3>The Black Swan of Avon.</h3> + +<p class="center"> +“A <span class="smcap">Native Drama</span><br> Entitled<br> +’Inu vere ki pani’<br> +</p> + +<blockquote><p>(Popularly known as Merchant of Venice, but beautified +and enlarged to local taste), Interspersed with Popular Dialogues, +latest Songs, etc. Will (D. V.) be rendered by the —— +Guild.”—<i>West African Poster</i>.</p></blockquote> + +<hr class="full"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page335" id="page335"></a>[pg +335]</span></p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a href="images/335.png"> +<img src="images/335th.png" alt=""> +</a> + +<h3>WHAT OUR BOHEMIANS HAVE TO PUT UP WITH.</h3> + +<p><i>Shabbily-dressed person</i>. "<span class="smcap">I’ve +lost the ticket, but I left a hat. That’s it over +there</span>."</p> + +<p><i>Attendant</i>. "<span class="smcap">I must ask you to find the +ticket, Sir, please. The hat that you indicate is quite +new</span>."</p> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h2>THE REVIVAL OF OLLENDORFF.</h2> + +<p><span class="smcap">From</span> the memories of my mid-Victorian +childhood, before the instruction of a governess had reached a point +at which the plunge was made into a preparatory school, three names +emerge with remarkable distinctness. "Little Arthur," from whom I +derived my earliest knowledge of the History of England; "Henry," by +whom I was grounded in the rudiments of the dead Latin tongue (but who +must be carefully distinguished from +<span class="smcap">James Henry</span>, the Virgilian, who in turn had nothing whatever to do with +<span class="smcap">Henry James</span> the novelist), and <span class="smcap">Ollendorff</span>, the illustrious author of a +series of manuals for the teaching of living foreign languages.</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">Ollendorff</span>, I fear, is not even the +shadow of a name to the present generation. There is no mention of him +in <i>The Encyclopædia Britannica</i> or in <i>Chambers</i>. +Even in his own country he seems to have lapsed into obscurity, and +in <span class="smcap">Mendel’s</span> +voluminous <i>Conversations-Lexikon</i> there is only a brief +reference to the Ollendorffian method, but no account of the man or +his history.</p> + +<p>Yet he must have existed; <span class="smcap">Ollendorff</span> +cannot have been a mere symbol. And as students +of <span class="smcap">Shakspeare</span> have endeavoured to +reconstruct the man from his plays so I feel sure that the character +of <span class="smcap">Ollendorff</span>, his interests and politics, +might very well be reconstructed from a study of his dialogues. One +must admit that his Teutonic patronymic is an obstacle to his revival, +but that difficulty can be surmounted by the adoption of an +<i>alias</i>. For example, by the omission of one of the "f’s" and the +transposition of one other letter his name, read backwards, becomes +Frondello, which is at once euphonious and void of all racial offence.</p> + +<p>The Ollendorffian method, it may be noted for the benefit of the +ignorant, did not merely depend on the employment of question and +answer; it aimed at conveying information drawn from the homely +affairs of daily life and the relations between persons belonging to +different trades and occupations. "Have +you," <span class="smcap">Ollendorff</span> would ask, "the hat of the +gardener’s son?" And when this had been duly and correctly +translated into German or French the pupil proceeded to the answer, +"No, but I have the boots of the grocer’s brother-in-law."</p> + +<p>I think <span class="smcap">Ollendorff</span> built better than he +knew; or perhaps he did know. A strong vein of Socialism runs through +all his examples, which seem to show a lively appreciation of the +Communistic principle. To him there was nothing wrong or dangerous in +this mutual interchange and enjoyment of property. He drew no +hard-and-fast lines between <i>meum</i> and <i>tuum</i>. We cannot +help thinking that, at a time when so much depends on the fusion of +classes, a new edition of these immortal dialogues, brought up to date +so as to meet the exigencies of the new poor, the new rich, the old +aristocracy and the new plutocracy, would be fraught with the most +salutary results.</p> + +<p>The following are some crude suggestions of the lines on which the +revision might be carried out:—</p> + +<p>"Have you the leathern waistcoat of the taxi-driver?—""No, +but I have the reach-me-down trousers of an inferior quality to those +worn by the village postman."</p> + +<p>"Have you the smooth-running automobile of the prosperous +grocer?"—"No, but I have the loan of the push-bicycle of my +former under-gardener’s uncle."</p> + +<p>"Are you going to marry the beautiful daughter of the +shoemaker?"—"Yes, and her brother has just become engaged to the +widow of my cousin the marquis."</p> + +<hr class="full"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page336" id="page336"></a>[pg +336]</span></p> + + +<h2>AT THE PLAY.</h2> + +<p class="center"><span class="smcap">"The Romantic Age."</span></p> + +<div class="figleft"> +<a href="images/336.png"> +<img src="images/336th.png" alt=""> +</a> +<p><i>Mr. Arthur Wontner</i> (<i>to himself</i>). +<span class="smcap">"Well, I don’t think much of your taste in +clothes</span>."</p> +</div> + +<p>I <span class="smcap">hope</span> that Mr. <span class="smcap">Alan +Milne</span> is a good enough critic to agree with me in thinking that +this is the best play he has so far given us. Not that the idea of it +is as new as that of his <i>Mr. Pim</i> or his <i>Wurzel-Flummery</i>, +but because, without sacrificing his lightness of touch and his sense +of fun, he has, for the first time, produced a serious scheme.</p> + +<p>People will tell you that his Second Act was the weak spot in the +play; that the others were brilliant, but that this one, for its first +half, was tedious and delayed the action. They will say this because +they are familiar with A. A. M.’s humour, but not with his +sentiment. Yet it was in this middle Act that he gave us the best +passage of all, in presenting the philosophy of his pedlar, which had +in it something of the dewy freshness of the early morning scene in +the wood ("morning’s at seven," as <i>Pippa</i>—not <i>Mr. +Pim</i>—said <i>en passant</i>). There was no real delay in the +action here, for the pedlar was providing the hero with the argument +without which he could never have persuaded the lady to yield; could +never have made her understand that Romance is not confined to the +trunk-and-hose period, or any age, so named, of chivalry, but is to be +found wherever there is a true companionship of hearts. Unfortunately +the effect of this passage was a little spoilt by what had just gone +before—a rather slow and superfluous scene with the village +idiot—and some of the audience imagined that the author was +still marking time.</p> + +<p>Mr. <span class="smcap">Milne</span> has an individual manner so +distinct that he can well afford to acknowledge his debt to +Sir <span class="smcap">James Barrie</span>. As in <i>Mary Rose</i>, +so here (though there are no supernatural forces at work) we have the +sharp contrast between commonplace life, as lived by the rest, and the +life of Fairyland, as coming within the vision of one only. And we +were reminded too of the Midsummer-madness that overtook the company +in <i>Dear Brutus</i>. I won’t say that it wasn’t natural +enough for <i>Melisande</i>, under the fascination of a moonlit +Midsummer Eve, to imagine, when she chanced upon a gentleman in fancy +dress of the right period, that at last she had realised her dream of +a hero of romance; but she was stark Midsummer-mad to suppose, when +she met him early next morning with his costume unchanged, that he +would keep it on till he came to tea with the family, and then, still +wearing it, waft her off to Faerie.</p> + +<p>But not even <span class="smcap">Barrie</span> has ever made a +better scene than that which showed us the disillusionment of the +visionary when she is confronted with her blue-and-gold hero of +romance now transformed into a plain Stock Exchange man, his air of +banality enhanced by the last word in golf suitings. The humour of +this scene, in which she made conventional conversation without any +real effort to conceal her sense of the bathos of the situation, was +very perfect. The relatively simple humour of the match-making +mother—not so simple, all the same, as its spontaneity made it +appear—had the distinction which one expects of +Mr. <span class="smcap">Milne</span>; but this was far the funniest +feature in the play.</p> + +<p>It would have been an easy matter to make cheap fun, +as <span class="smcap">Mark Twain</span> did in <i>A Yankee at the +Court of King Arthur</i>, out of the popular view of the Age of +Romance, but A. A. M. avoided that obvious lure. Indeed, in his +natural anxiety not to be taken too seriously in his first attempt to +be serious, he rather tended to make light of his own theory of modern +romance, laying a little too much stress at the end on the culinary +aspect of conjugal felicity.</p> + +<p>I am not sure that Mr. <span class="smcap">Arthur Wontner</span> +(to whom my best wishes for his new managership) quite realised, in +his doublet and long hose, my idea of a figure of mediæval +romance. In fact I am free to confess that I disagreed +with <i>Melisande</i> and preferred him in his golf-clothes. But +perhaps that was part of the idea, and +Mr. <span class="smcap">Milne</span> meant me to feel like that. +Miss <span class="smcap">Barbara +Hoffe’s</span> <i>Melisande</i>—a difficult part, because +she was the only other-worldly person in the play and the only one in +desperate earnest—was very cleverly handled. In her most exalted +moments of poetic rapture she was never too precious, and when called +upon for a touch of corrective humour was quick to respond.</p> + +<p>Miss <span class="smcap">Lottie Venne</span> laid herself out in +her inimitable way for a broad interpretation of the visionary’s +very earthly mother; indeed once or twice she almost laid herself out +of the picture; but she still remained irresistible. As a pair of +light-hearted young lovers Miss <span class="smcap">Dorothy +Tetley</span> and Mr. <span class="smcap">John Williams</span> played +really well in parts that were not nearly so easy as they looked. And +there was the dry humour of Mr. +<span class="smcap">Bromley-Davenport</span>, as the father (I fear he must have missed the romance +of twin souls) and the open-air charm of Mr. <span class="smcap">Nicholson’s</span> performance as +<i>Gentleman Susan</i>, the pedlar. In a word, my grateful compliments +embrace as good a cast as ever caught—and held—the spirit of an +author.</p> + +<p class="center"><span class="smcap">"Priscilla and the +Profligate."</span></p> + +<p>When you have been jilted by <i>Cynthia</i> at the church-door and, +two days afterwards, in a fit of pique marry <i>Priscilla</i> at sight +(of course you can’t always get a <i>Priscilla</i> to consent to +this arrangement; but <i>Mr. Bensley Stuart Gore</i> had a young ward +at school who wanted her freedom; so that was all right), you may +think to persuade the Faithless One that you have given solid proof of +your indifference to her. But you mustn’t dash off to Africa an +hour after your wedding with the declared intention of being eaten by +wild men or wilder beasts, because, if you do that, you give your +scheme away and <i>Cynthia</i> will have the satisfaction of knowing +that she has driven you to desperate courses. Yet that is what <i>Mr. +Bensley Stuart Gore</i> did (he was the "Profligate" of the title, +though he never gave any noticeable sign of profligacy).</p> + +<p>After this strain on my credulity I felt prepared for anything, and +was not in the least surprised to find him, six years older and still +intact, on the terrace of the Hotel Casa Bellini, by the dear old +shores of Lake Maggiore, which, as the programme advised me, is in +Italy. It seemed, too, the most natural thing in the world that the +author, Miss +<span class="smcap">Laura Wildig</span>, should have +collected <i>Priscilla</i> and <i>Cynthia</i> (the latter in tow of a +third-rate millionaire husband whom she loathed) at the same +address.</p> + +<p>It was at this juncture +that <i>Mr. <span class="pagenum"><a name="page337" +id="page337"></a>[pg 337]</span>Bensley Stuart Gore</i> was inspired +with a Great Thought. In order to set <i>Priscilla</i> free (I ought +to say that he hadn’t recognised her) he would elope +with <i>Cynthia</i>. How +<i>Priscilla</i> set out to frustrate this noble sacrifice and secure +her husband for herself; how she bribed the caretaker to lock him up +with her in the "Bloody Turret" of an adjacent ruin; how subsequently, +at 2 +<span class="smcap">a.m.</span>, in the public lounge of the hotel, +she tried to work upon his emotions by appearing in a black +night-dress (surely this rather vulgar form of allurement +is <i>démodé</i> by now even in the suburbs, or, anyhow, +is not so freshly daring as she seemed to think it), I will leave you +to imagine. Even Miss <span class="smcap">Iris Hoey’s</span> +nice soft voice and pleasant <i>câlineries</i> could not quite +carry off this rather machine-made trifle. If anything saved it, it +was the acting of Mr. <span class="smcap">Frank Denton</span> +as <i>Jimmy Forde</i>. Starting as <i>Bensley’s</i> "best man," +he missed the wedding ceremony through going to the wrong church, but +after that he stuck close to his friend for the remainder of the plot, +and greatly endeared himself to the audience by the excellent way in +which he played the silly ass.</p> + +<p>As for <i>Bensley</i> himself, you might have thought that he had a +sufficiently chequered career, yet Mr. <span class="smcap">Cyril +Raymond</span> got very little colour out of the part. For the rest, +Mr. H. <span class="smcap">de Lange</span>, as the millionaire, got a +certain amount out of the subject of his wife’s indigestion, +which was a sort of <i>leit-motif</i> with him; but most of the colour +seemed to have gone into the scenery, admirably designed and painted +by Mr. <span class="smcap">McCleery</span> and +Mr. <span class="smcap">Walter Hann</span>.</p> + +<p>O. S.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a href="images/337.png"> +<img src="images/337th.png" alt=""> +</a> +<p><i>Diner.</i> "<span class="smcap">I say, waiter, I’ve asked +three times for potatoes</span>."</p> + +<p><i>Waiter</i> (<i>still under the influence of military +discipline</i>). "<span class="smcap">Beg pardon, Sir, but I’m +told off to concentrate on the cabbage</span>."</p> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h3>"LOGS TO BURN."</h3> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza center"> +<span class="i0">"<i>Logs to burn; logs to burn;</i><br></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Logs to save the coal a turn.</i>"<br></span> +</div> +<div class="stanza"> + +<span class="i0"><span class="smcap">Here</span>’s a word to make you wise<br></span> +<span class="i0">When you hear the wood-man’s cries;<br></span> +<span class="i0">Never heed his usual tale<br></span> +<span class="i0">That he has splendid logs for sale,<br></span> +<span class="i0">But read these lines and really learn<br></span> +<span class="i0">The proper kinds of logs to burn.<br></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oak logs will warm you well<br></span> +<span class="i2">If they’re old and dry;<br></span> +<span class="i0">Larch logs of pine woods smell,<br></span> +<span class="i2">But the sparks will fly.<br></span> +<span class="i0">Beech logs for Christmas-time,<br></span> +<span class="i2">Yew logs heat well;<br></span> +<span class="i0">"Scotch" logs it is a crime<br></span> +<span class="i2">For anyone to sell.<br></span> +<span class="i0">Birch logs will burn too fast,<br></span> +<span class="i2">Chestnut scarce at all;<br></span> +<span class="i0">Hawthorn logs are good to last<br></span> +<span class="i2">If cut in the Fall.<br></span> +<span class="i0">Holly logs will burn like wax,<br></span> +<span class="i2">You should burn them green;<br></span> +<span class="i0">Elm logs like smouldering flax,<br></span> +<span class="i2">No flame to be seen.<br></span> +<span class="i0">Pear logs and apple logs,<br></span> +<span class="i2">They will scent your room;<br></span> +<span class="i0">Cherry logs across the dogs<br></span> +<span class="i2">Smell like flowers in bloom.<br></span> +<span class="i0">But Ash logs, all smooth and grey,<br></span> +<span class="i2">Burn them green or old;<br></span> +<span class="i0">Buy up all that come your way,<br></span> +<span class="i2">They’re worth their weight in gold.<br></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h3>"GIRL EYE-MAKER."</h3> + +<p class="center"><i>Picture-title in Daily Paper</i>.</p> + +<p>Perhaps we ought to mention that the eyes she makes are artificial, +not "glad."</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h3>Our Discreet Press.</h3> + +<blockquote><p>"Mystery surrounds the Russo-Polish peace negotiations +at Riga. According to a Central News message from Warsaw Marshal +Pilsudski has had a conference with??????????, the Premier, as to +whether demobilisation should take place shortly."—<i>Evening +Paper.</i></p></blockquote> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<blockquote><p>"When he [Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree] was prepared to +play <i>Martin Chuzzlewit</i> he wrote to me (and doubtless explained +to others) that he was going to present <i>Mr. Micawber</i> as +’a sort of fairy.’"—<i>Sunday +Paper.</i></p></blockquote> + +<p>We suppose if Sir <span class="smcap">Herbert</span> had +staged <i>David Copperfield</i> he would have cast himself for the +husband of <i>Mrs. Harris</i>.</p> + +<hr class="full"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page338" id="page338"></a>[pg +338]</span></p> + +<h2>THE PRIVATE FILM.</h2> + +<p><span class="smcap">My</span> attention has been drawn to the most +recent and perhaps the most terrible development of the Cinema by an +advertisement, from which I take the following extracts:—</p> + +<p>"HAVE YOUR OWN FILM TAKEN.</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">The most Modern Method of gaining +Publicity</span>.</p> + +<p><i>To Members of Parliament, Mayors, Lecturers and other Public Men +and Women</i>.</p> + +<p>"The Cinema has become the cheapest, the surest and most rapid +road to publicity. It is estimated that a third of the population +attend the Cinema once a week. Messrs. Mump and Gump have therefore +fitted up a special studio for film work, in which you can now have +your own film taken, representing you in any action you may desire. +This method of publicity is specially recommended to Members of +Parliament. For instance one can be filmed writing a letter, which can +be closed down and handed to a messenger, which action can be followed +by the letter itself being thrown on the screen.... Think what this +means to a prospective Candidate when he goes to a constituency where +he is unknown. He takes with him twenty or more films. Your +constituents must see and know you before you can hope for their vote. +The Cinema introduces your personality and your policy.</p> + +<blockquote><p> +"Your film will cost you—<br> +First reel ... Three guineas.<br> +Each extra reel. One guinea."<br> +</p></blockquote> + +<p>The more I see of business-men the less they seem to me to know +about business. I never read an advertisement without thinking, "How +much better I (or even you) could have done that!" Yet they will tell +you that it is their advertisements which make the money. It only +shows.... However. Messrs. Mump and Gump, for instance, have scarcely +skimmed the surface possibilities of their brilliant notion. This +invention is going to make politics tolerable at last. No man minds +being in the House of Commons; it is being in his constituency which +is so dreadful. <i>And now he need never go there.</i></p> + +<p>For instance, when the constituency is tired of the letter-film, he +can be filmed making a speech, which can be taken down and handed to a +typist, which action can be followed by the speech itself being thrown +on the screen—in instalments. The constituency will enjoy this, +because it will take much less time to read it than it would to listen +to it, and they can argue out loud about the meaning of Early English +phrases like Datum-line and Functional Representation. In fact they +can go on arguing during the <i>Whips of Sin</i> which will +follow.</p> + +<p>As for the public man, it won’t take him two minutes to be +filmed making the speech, unless, of course, he has any very +complicated gestures; and it won’t take him any time at all to +compose it, because the private secretary will do that; and the +private secretary will be able to make sure that his joke +about <span class="smcap">Jereboam</span> is not turned into a joke +about +<span class="smcap">Jehoshaphat</span> at the last minute, or simply shelved in favour of a +peroration on rainbows. After the speech the M.P. can be filmed opening +a flowershow and, if necessary, writing a cheque to the local +hortiphilist society, which cheque can be thrown on the screen amid loud +applause, but need not, of course, go any further.</p> + +<p>There is one other point, but it is rather a delicate matter: +Messrs. Mump and Gump say to the prospective Candidate, "Your +constituents must see and know you before you can hope for their +vote." Are they quite right? I have seen a good many Candidates in my +time, and I can think of some to whom I should have said, "Your +constituents must <i>never</i> see you if you hope for a single vote." +I mean, when one looks round the present House of Commons, one really +marvels how.... But perhaps I had better not go on with that. The +point is that a Candidate of that kind never +<i>need</i> be seen by his constituents now. A handsome young private +secretary, uniformed and beribboned, and the film does the rest.</p> + +<p>Then I rather resent the assumption that Members of Parliament, +Mayors, Lecturers and Actors are the only people who require +publicity. I should have thought that those who spend their time +writing things in the public Press, which are read by the public (if +anybody), might have had at least the courtesy title of Public Man. +Anyhow, I am going to have three guineas’ worth. The only +question is, what sort of picture will most thoroughly "get" my +personality before a third of the population once a week? The moment +when I am most characteristic is when I am lying in a hot bath, and +to-morrow is Sunday; but I doubt if even a sixth of the population +would be really keen on that. I don’t mind writing a letter or +two, only, if it meant an extra reel every time I decided to write it +to-morrow instead, it would be rather a costly advertisement.</p> + +<p>Really, I suppose, one ought to be done <i>At Work in His +Study</i>; but even that would require a good deal of faking. Ought +one, for instance, to remove the golf-balls and the cocoa-cup (and the +rhyming dictionary) from The Desk? Then I always write with a decayed +pencil, and that would look so bad. Messrs. Mump and Gump would have +to throw in a quill-pen. And I have no Study. I work in the +drawingroom, when the children are not playing in it. To go into The +Study I simply walk over to my table and put up a large notice: +"<span class="smcap">The Study. Do not Speak to Me. I am +Thinking</span>." Do you think that had better be in the film?</p> + +<p>Or I wonder if a Comic would be more effective—a Shaving reel +or a Dressing reel? It is the small incidents of every-day life that +one should look to for the key to the character of a Public Man; and +once a whole third of the population had seen for themselves what pain +it gives me to put links and studs and all those things in a clean +shirt, they would understand the strange note of melancholy which runs +through this article.</p> + +<p>But of course an author should have several different reels +corresponding to the different kinds of work which he wants to +publicitise. (That is a new word which I have just invented, but you +will find it in common use in a month or two.) People like +Mr. <span class="smcap">Belloc</span> will probably require the full +politician’s ration of twenty or more, but the ordinary writer +might rub along with four or five.</p> + +<p>When his <i>Pug, Wog and Pussy</i> is on the market there will be a +Family reel, in which he is pretending to be a tree and the children +are climbing it. And when he has just published <i>The Cruise of the +Cow; or, Seven Hours at Sea</i>, he will be seen with an intense +expression tying a bowline on a bight or madly hauling on the +throat-halyard—at Messrs. Mump and Gump’s +specially-equipped ponds. And for his passionate romance, <i>The +Borrowed Bride</i>—— But I don’t know what he will +do then.</p> + +<p>And even now we have not exhausted the list of Public Men. There +are clergymen. Don’t you feel that some of those sermons might +be thrown on the screen—and left there? A. P. H.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h3>The Merry Bishop.</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Dean of <span class="smcap">Cape Town</span> with a critical frown<br></span> +<span class="i2">To the jests of St. Albans’ gay Bishop demurs;<br></span> +<span class="i0">But the Bishop denies the offence and implies<br></span> +<span class="i2">’Tis the way of all asses to nibble at <span class="smcap">Furse</span>.<br></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<blockquote><p>"Harvest Festival celebrations took place at St. +John’s Church on Sunday evening, when the choir rendered the +anthem ’Praise the young ladies of the +choir.’"—<i>Yorkshire Paper.</i></p></blockquote> + +<p>And we have no doubt they deserved it.</p> + +<hr class="full"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page339" id="page339"></a>[pg +339]</span></p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a href="images/339.png"> +<img src="images/339th.png" alt=""> +</a> + +<p><i>Butcher</i> (<i>at conclusion of scathing criticism of +horse</i>). "<span class="smcap">Well, that’s my opinion, +anyway. And I ought to know something by now about a bit of +’orseflesh when I sees it</span>."</p> + +<p><i>Groom.</i> "<span class="smcap">Yes—and so ought your +customers too</span>."</p> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h2>OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.</h2> + +<p class="center">(<i>By Mr. Punch’s Staff of Learned Clerks.</i>)</p> + +<p>How you regard Miss <span class="smcap">May Sinclair’s</span> +latest story, <i>The Romantic</i> +(<span class="smcap">Collins</span>), will entirely depend upon your +attitude towards the long-vexed question of the permissible in art. If +you hold that all life (which in this association generally means +something disagreeable) is its legitimate province and that genius can +transmute an ugly study of morbid pathology into a romance, you will +admire the force of this vivid little book; otherwise, I warn you +frankly, you are like to be repelled by the whole business. The title, +to begin with, is an irony as grim as anything that follows, in what +sense you will find as the story reveals itself. <i>The Romantic</i> +is a picture—what do I say? a vivisection—of cowardice, +seen through the horrified eyes of a woman who loved the subject of +it. The scene is the Belgian battlefields, to which <i>John +Conway</i>, being unfitted for active service, had taken out a +motor-ambulance, with <i>Charlotte Redhead</i> as one of his drivers. +All the background of this part of the tale is wonderfully realised, a +thing of actual and unforgetable experience. Here gradually the first +tragedy of +<i>Conway</i> is made clear, though shielded and ignored as long as possible +by the loyalty of fellow-workers and the obstinate disbelief of the +girl. Perhaps you think I am making too much of it all; treacherous +nerves were the lot of many spiritually noble men in that hell. But +little by little conviction of a deeper, less understandable, horror +creeps upon the reader, only to be explained and confirmed on the last +page. To be honest, <i>The Romantic</i> is an ugly, a detestably ugly book, +but of its cleverness there can be no question.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<p>It would appear that Mr. A. E. W. <span class="smcap">Mason</span> +is another of those who hold that the day of war-novels is not yet +done. Anyhow, <i>The Summons</i> (<span class="smcap">Hodder and +Stoughton</span>) shows him dealing out all the old familiar cards, +spies and counter-spies, submarines and petrol bases and secret ink. +It must be admitted that the result is unexpectedly archaic. Perhaps +also Mr. <span class="smcap">Mason</span> hardly gives himself a fair +chance. The "summons" to his hero (who, being familiar with the +Spanish coast, is required when War breaks out to use this knowledge +for submarine-thwarting) is too long delayed, and all the non-active +service part of the tale suffers from a very dull love-interest and +some even more dreary racing humour. Archaic or not, +however, <i>Hillyard’s</i> anti-spy adventures, in an exquisite +setting that the author evidently knows as well as his hero, are good +fun enough. But the home scenes had (for me at least) a lack of grip +and conviction by no means to be looked for from a writer of +Mr. <span class="smcap">Mason’s</span> experience. His big +thrill, the suicide of the lady who first sends by car to the local +paper the story of her end and then waits to confirm this by telephone +before making it true, left me incredulous. I’m afraid <i>The +Summons</i> can hardly be said to have found +Mr. <span class="smcap">Mason</span> in his customary form.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page340" id="page340"></a>[pg +340]</span></p> + +<p>"To write another person’s life-history in the first person, +and yet give to it the verisimilitude of a genuine autobiography, +would under ordinary circumstances be a difficult if not impossible +undertaking." So Mr. C. E. <span class="smcap">Gouldsbury</span> tells +us in a note to <i>Reminiscences of a Stowaway</i> +(<span class="smcap">Chapman and Hall</span>), and most of us will +cordially agree with him. But, after reading this volume of +reminiscences, I think you will also agree that +Mr. <span class="smcap">Gouldsbury</span> has acquitted himself +admirably of a most difficult task. The man into whose skin, if I may +so express it, he has temporarily tried to fit himself was +Mr. <span class="smcap">Alexander Douglas Larymore</span>, who started +his adventurous career as a stowaway in an "old iron tub," and +eventually became Inspector-General of Jails in India. For nearly +forty years Mr. <span class="smcap">Gouldsbury</span> was +Mr. <span class="smcap">Larymore’s</span> intimate friend, and +has had sufficient data at his disposal to do justice to what was a +remarkably full and interesting life. Possibly those of us who retain +a tender spot in our hearts for stowaways may regret that +Mr. <span class="smcap">Larymore</span> grew tired of the sea; but his +adventures were as numerous and amusing on land as on water, and they +are also valuable for the strong light they throw on the India of some +years ago. Mr. <span class="smcap">Gouldsbury</span> has at once +provided a lasting tribute to the memory of his friend and written a +book which both in style and matter would be hard to beat.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<a href="images/340.png"> +<img src="images/340th.png" alt=""> +</a> + +<p><i>The King.</i> "<span class="smcap">Look here—this throne +won’t do; it is impossible for us to look dignified in +it</span>."</p> + +<p><i>The Artificer.</i> "<span class="smcap">I’m sorry, your +Majesty. There must be some mistake. I got it in my ’ead that +your Majesty ordered a <i>lounge</i> throne</span>."</p> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<p>Are you a victim to the <i>Tarzan</i> habit? Perhaps your eye may +have been caught by the word on bookstalls as the generic title of an +increasing pile of volumes; but knowing, like myself, that all things +explain themselves in time, you may have been content to leave it at +that. Meanwhile, however, the thing has continued to spread, till on +the wrapper of <i>Tarzan the Untamed</i> +(<span class="smcap">Methuen</span>), which now at last finds me out, +its publishers are able to number its devotees in millions. Well, of +course the outstanding fact about such popularity is that in face of +it any affectation of superiority becomes simply silly. One has got to +accept this creation of Mr. <span class="smcap">Edgar Rice +Burroughs</span> as among the definite literary phenomena of our time. +In the immediate spasm before me +<i>Tarzan</i> (who is, if you need telling, a kind of horribly exaggerated +<i>Mowgli</i> after a diet of the Food of the Gods) is represented as placing +himself at the disposal of the British forces in East Africa, and +attacking the Germans with man-eating lions. The rather chastening +feature of which was my own unexpected enjoyment of the idea. Even, for +one disconcerting moment, like the persons in the admonitory anecdotes +who taste opium "just for fun," I began to feel that perhaps.... However +it passed, and the temptation has not returned. Meanwhile the real +nature of Tarzanism, whether some sinister possession or simply the +age-long appetite for the monstrous, just now a little out of hand, +remains as far from solution as ever.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<p>Mr. <span class="smcap">Horace Bleackley</span>, whose last +excursion into political fiction was a description of an +opéra-bouffe Labour Government in action, addresses himself, +in <i>The Monster</i> (<span class="smcap">Heinemann</span>), to a +more serious theme. His monster is the factory system, and if I say +that this witty novel will provide the ignorant and comfortable with +instruction as well as entertainment I hope I shan’t have done +him any harm. The author, while making his points against the system, +notes truly enough that the risen ranker, the one who had been through +the dreadful mill, with its ninety-hour working week for children, +became the hardest master during that wonderful period of the +Manchesterising of England which laid the train for the explosions of +our present discontents. He reminds us also of that admirable speech, +made about every ten years for the last hundred or so in the House +with the same fervour and conviction, to the effect that any change in +conditions or wages would surely mean the complete ruin of the +country. A comforting speech, that! Perhaps Mr. +<span class="smcap">Bleackley</span>, presenting three generations from Peterloo to the Jubilee of +<span class="smcap">Queen Victoria</span>, covers too much ground for full effect, but he has +pleasantly gilded a wholesome pill for pleasant people. Good luck to +him.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<p>I did not take the publishers’ statement that <i>Pengard +Awake</i> (<span class="smcap">Methuen</span>) was "entirely unlike +Mr. <span class="smcap">Straus’s</span> previous stories" as a +recommendation, however alluring it was intended to be, for he has +good and enjoyable work to his credit. I doubt, indeed, if he has yet +written a book more acceptable to the novel-reading public than this +tale of "action, mystery and wonderful adventures" (again I quote from +the paper wrapper). Possibly in a so-called mystery book the author +ought to have his readers guessing all the time, but if I was not +perpetually engaged in this rather exhausting pursuit I was, at any +rate, intrigued. +<i>Pengard</i>, who is also <i>Sylvester</i>, and yet is neither the one nor the +other, may be too much for your saner moments of credulity. But Mr. +<span class="smcap">Straus</span> tells his queer story so plausibly and with so light a touch that +even though you may affect to scoff at his dashing improbabilities you +cannot escape their attraction. Indeed Mr. <span class="smcap">Straus’s</span> adventure into +fields hitherto strange to him has been so successful that I am inclined +to ask him to continue cultivating them.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h3>Life’s Little Contradictions.</h3> + +<p>"Now mind, you know, if I kill you it’s nothing, but if you +kill me, by Jingo, it’s murder." This remark was put +by <span class="smcap">John Leech</span> into the lips of a small +Special Constable, represented as menacing a gigantic ruffian, and was +not, as you might think, addressed by a Sinn Feiner to a member of the +Royal Irish Constabulary.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;"> + +<h3>Messrs. W. H. Smith & Son.</h3> + +<p>Mr. Punch wishes to offer the most sincere congratulations to his +old friends on the occasion of the centenary of their firm.</p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume +159, October 27, 1920, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PUNCH *** + +***** This file should be named 20779-h.htm or 20779-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/0/7/7/20779/ + +Produced by V. L. Simpson, Jonathan Ingram and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net. 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b/20779-page-images.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..9b07db3 --- /dev/null +++ b/20779-page-images.zip diff --git a/20779.txt b/20779.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..167472e --- /dev/null +++ b/20779.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2242 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, +October 27, 1920, by Various + +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: Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, October 27, 1920 + +Author: Various + +Editor: Owen Seaman + +Release Date: March 8, 2007 [EBook #20779] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PUNCH *** + + + + +Produced by V. L. Simpson, Jonathan Ingram and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net. This +file is gratefully uploaded to the PG collection in honor +of Distributed Proofreaders having posted over 10,000 +ebooks. + + + + + + + +PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. + +VOL. 159 + + +October 27, 1920. + + +CHARIVARIA. + + +Some idea of the evils consequent on a coal strike can be obtained when +we hear there was talk of a football match in the North having to be +cancelled. + +* * * + +Mr. Lloyd George is certainly most unlucky. As a result of the coal +strike the New World has again been postponed. + +* * * + +We are assured that everything has been done to safeguard our food +supply. We ourselves have heard of one grocer who has sufficient fresh +eggs to last him for many months. + +* * * + +"Large numbers of South Wales miners left by train yesterday for the +seaside," says _Lloyd's News_. Unfortunately they did not travel by the +Datum Line. + +* * * + +The Opera House at Covent Garden is to be used as a cinema theatre. +Meanwhile the House of Commons remains firm. + +* * * + +_The Daily Mail_ Prize Hat has now been chosen, though it is not yet +definitely decided whether the wearing of it will be made compulsory. If +it is, we understand that Mr. Winston Churchill will apply for +exemption. + +* * * + +Thieves have broken into the railway station at Blaenau Festiniog and +stolen a quantity of chocolate. Apparently with the idea of confusing +the police, they left the name of the station behind them. + +* * * + +Twenty-one persons have been injured as the result of the explosion of a +bomb in a first-class carriage on the Brazil Central Railway. The +culprit, we understand, has written to the company expressing regret, +but pointing out that no seat was available in a third-class carriage. + +* * * + +A ship's cook has been fined twenty shillings for refusing to join his +ship, his excuse being that he had seen a rat as big as a cat in the +cabin. It was pointed out to him that only ship's officers are entitled +to see rats in the cabin. + +* * * + +A company has been formed at Stockholm for storing wind power. There +should be a great demand for the insides of some puff pastry that we +know of. + +* * * + +An American has invented an aeroplane capable of remaining in the air +for hours and hours. This is nothing to Mr. Asquith's Irish solution, +which is guaranteed to remain in the air for years and years. + +* * * + +Brides are getting rather tired of Harris's lilies, says a writer in +_The Daily Graphic_. It is only natural that brides should become rather +bored if they always wear the same sort of flowers every time they're +married. + +* * * + +Mr. E. Van Ingen, a New York merchant now in London, boasts that he has +crossed the Atlantic one hundred and sixty-eight times. It may be +against the Prohibition laws, but we fancy it would be cheaper if he +kept a few bottles of the stuff in New York. + +* * * + +A medical man advises people to use dried milk on health grounds. We +have felt for some time that what was wanted was a really good +waterproof milk. + +* * * + +Mr. E. A. Douse has spent forty-two years in a Cheshire post-office. It +is only fair to say that the young lady behind the counter didn't notice +him standing there all that time. + +* * * + +A Hertfordshire farmer, says _The Daily Mail_, has counted one hundred +and twenty-three grains of wheat in one ear. Our contemporary has not +yet decided what can be done about it. + +* * * + +"What is the right age for a man to marry?" asks Miss Gertie +Wentworth-James. The answer is, Not yet. + +* * * + +While addressing a meeting of miners an extremist declared that the idle +rich were the cause of all industrial troubles. It has since been +reported that several of the audience immediately proceeded home and +told themselves off in front of a mirror. + +* * * + +We understand that the miners greatly desire that Ireland will remain +quiet for a short period, and thus refrain from distracting public +attention from their cause. + +* * * + +"Lord Northcliffe," says _The New York World_, "is always in advance of +public opinion." This is a fitting rejoinder to those who tell us that +he is always behind _The Times_. + +* * * + +We cull the following from a speech of Senator Harding: "As I note the +cornfields I am reminded that we still plough the land and plant and +cultivate the fields in order to grow crops." We would remind the +Senator that, with the Elections drawing daily nearer, the habit of +making such sweeping and unguarded statements as the above is extremely +dangerous. + +* * * + +We advise all readers to stick to their own particular newspaper, as a +sudden change might upset the "net sales" which are being so carefully +compiled at the present moment. + +* * * + +The up-to-date song-writer, says a musical journal, must strike a sad +and soulful note this season. We are already engaged in writing "The +Scotsman's Farewell to his Corkscrew." + +* * * + +A theatrical writer informs us that _The Laughing Husband_ will be +revived this year. Not in our suburb, unless the cost of living drops +considerably. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Betty._ "Grandma, I Know My Twelve Times." + +_Grandma._ "Do You, Dear? Well, What Are Twelve Times Thirteen?" + +_Betty._ "Don't Be Silly, Grandma. There Isn't Such A Thing."] + + * * * * * + + "The modern Hydra, embracing innumerable adverse factors, would + appear at least as many headed as the ancient, for as fast as one is + more or less effectively decapitated up comes another to upset the + applecart." + + _Financial Paper._ + +Classical students will, of course, remember how cleverly Hercules made +use of this habit of the Hydra to secure the apples of the Hesperides. + + * * * * * + +THE DINING GLADIATOR; + +OR, WAR TO THE KNIFE (AND FORK). + +(_Being further Extracts from a certain Diary._) + +II. + +WROTE an even better article than ever, on indigestion as a determining +factor in national _moral_. Pointed out how important it is, if we are +to think coolly, that we should eat discreetly. Sufficiently, of course, +but with thought. + +At the Tribunal all the afternoon, busily combing out. + +To the Hippodrome in the evening. A most diverting show. + +* * * + +NORTHCLIFFE is becoming impossible and I must find another paper. +Several of my best commas cut out of to-day's article. All reference to +the necessity for immediately beheading ASQUITH omitted yesterday. Was +comforted by lunch at the Carlton with DORIS KEANE, GERTIE MILLAR and +SCATTERS. We had some good jokes. + +* * * + +The news of my resignation from _The Times_ has set my telephone ringing +all the morning with congratulations, requests for interviews and offers +of employment. Also some attractive invitations to dinner and week-ends. +The War for the moment seems to be forgotten. Wonderful, the power of +the printed word! + +* * * + +My first article in _The Morning Post_, distributing blame and praise +with my usual deadly accuracy. Wonder what poor NORTHCLIFFE is doing +without me. + +* * * + +Received long letter from HAIG asking for instructions, which I sent by +return. + +Lunched at the Carlton with some charming musical-comedy actresses. To +the Tribunal after. Dined at the National Sporting Club and saw a good +fight. + +* * * + +A visit from an Italian personage of consequence, who told me that my +articles are the talk of Italy. If writing could win wars, he said, my +pen would have done it. + +* * * + +L. G. came up to Carryon Hall heavily masked. I gave him an excellent +dinner and some equally good advice, and he left much heartened. + +* * * + +Dined at Lady RANDOLPH'S. A merry crowd there. Every one very gay and +amusing; but we forgot that WINSTON was our hostess's son and castigated +him badly. Lady JULIET said that with some people, no matter what they +begin to talk about, even with Cabinet Ministers, it all comes back to +food. + +* * * + +Wrote a careful article pointing out that we must have at least one +hundred more divisions in the West before next Friday. + +* * * + +I was gratified to learn to-day that in consequence of my articles _The +Morning Post_ has doubled its circulation, while _The Times_ hardly +sells a copy. + +* * * + +Lunched with MASSINGHAM of _The Nation_, who eats more sensibly than he +writes. + +In Paris. Saw CLEMENCEAU at the War Ministry. His table was littered +with papers and reports, amongst which he pointed out laughingly one of +my articles. I can't think why he laughed. Lunched at Voisin's. + +* * * + +Left for rapid tour of inspection to British H.Q. Found much to put +right. Issued an Order of the Day to soldiers of all ranks. The Germans, +hearing of my presence, made desperate attempts to bomb me, but failed. +Food at the Front not very alluring. + +Yesterday's article, I learn, put the wind up the War Cabinet, and great +things may result. All my pleasure spoilt, however, by breaking a tooth +on a pellet in a Ritz grouse. + +* * * + +Visited the French H.Q. and was pleased with FOCH, whom I asked to run +over to Carryon when he was ever in any doubt. Sent home a powerful +article which, when it is reproduced in all the French papers, as it +will be, should encourage him and improve his position. + +* * * + +Dined at Lady RIDLEY'S. A very cheery party and much chaff. Mrs. ASQUITH +said that she was writing her reminiscences. I made no mention of my +diary, but if I don't get it out in book form before hers I'm not the +Colonel of the Nuts. + +* * * + +To-day's article should bring things to a head very shortly. Shall be +very glad when it is over and I can rest a little. Took some bicarbonate +of soda. + +* * * + +Armistice signed. Spent the day in a kind of triumphal procession from +restaurant to restaurant, at each of which I was hailed with applause. + +* * * + +Reached Versailles and let the news be known. A visible quickening up +already to be noted. + +* * * + +Sent for President WILSON, but something must have prevented his coming. +Lunched at Paillard's and dined at Larue's. Saw an amusing Palais Royal +farce. + +* * * + +_June 28th_, 1920.--Treaty of Peace, for which I have worked so long, +signed at last. Now I can utter my _Nunc Dimittis_, having accomplished +the two ends I had in view--to bring the first world War to a more or +less satisfactory finish and to make it dangerous for any but the deaf +and dumb to dine out. + +E. V. L. + + * * * * * + +THE LATE WORM + +(_Being a correction of "A Ballad of the Early Worm," "Punch," October +6th_). + + OH ye whose hearts were rent with pain + A few short weeks ago, + Is it unkind to harp again + Upon that tale of woe? + + You know the tale--in _Punch_, I mean-- + Pathetic every word; + Three wormlets fought to stand between + Pa and the Early Bird. + + You sorrowed for their non-success + (By use of triple strength + They saved their father's life--ah yes-- + But not his total length). + + You thought, of course--I know you did-- + That Father left his hole, + A briskly virtuous annelid, + To take an early stroll. + + Well, now just go and read a book + Called _Vegetable Mould + And Earthworms_ (DARWIN); if you look + You'll find that you've been sold. + + It's not my own, it's DARWIN'S firm + Authority I cite: + _There never is an early worm; + Pa had been out all night._ + + He swaggered forth at eventide + And stayed till dawn next day; + For I will not attempt to hide + That _worms behave that way._ + + So pious folk like you and me + Should not be filled with woe + At thought of Father's tragedy; + _His morals were so low._ + + * * * * * + +Our Courtly Contemporaries. + + "The Earl of Athlone walked away on foot, as is the simple way of + our Royal Family." _Sunday Paper._ + + * * * * * +"High-backed chair of Tudor period, about +1660."--_Advt. in Daily Paper._ + +We don't question its genuineness, but infer that it has been subjected +to Restoration. + + * * * * * + + "Furnished House, consisting of dining, drawing, eight breakfast + rooms, etc." _Sunday Paper._ + +Would suit a large family inclined to be short-tempered in the morning. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: A TOO-FREE COUNTRY. + +ALIEN RIOTER. "DOWN WITH EVERYBODY!" + +P.C. JOHN BULL. "WELL, WE'LL MAKE A START WITH YOU."] + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: PEOPLE WE ADMIRE. + +THE HERO WHO KEEPS UP HIS ARMY EXERCISES, STRIKE OR NO STRIKE.] + + * * * * * + +A LETTER TO THE BACK-BLOCKS. + +DEAR GINGER,--So you have bought a very promising little gold-mine from +a rollicking Irish nobleman called Patrick Terence O'Ryan, who is +retiring on Mayo to take up the paternal estates. H-m!--have you? And +you think you yourself will be retiring home presently on the proceeds +of the said mine? H-m! again. There is a certain familiarity in your +description of the gentleman. Tell me, has this Hibernian philanthropist +a slight squint, a broken nose and a tendency to lisp in moments of +excitement? + +I think I see you nod. + +Ginger, I once bought a mine from that man. His name was Algernon Maddox +Cholmondely _then_, and he was homeward bound to assume the ancestral +acres in Flint. He escorted me down the hole and displayed visible gold +sparkling all along the reef. A week after he had gone I found that he +had put it there with a shot-gun--an old "salter's" trick, but new to me +at the time. You are not likely to be seeing Patrick Algernon Terence +Maddox O'Ryan-Cholmondely again, but, if you should, remember me to him, +please--with the business end of a pick-axe. Always delighted to keep in +touch with old friends. + +Ginger, _you never can tell_. This is not an original remark. One of our +brainy boys--George Bernard, unless I err--thought of it before I did; +went away into the wilderness, wrapped his grey-matter in wet Jaeger +bandages, subsisted on a diet of premasticated grape-nuts and produced +this aphorism. And there's a world of truth in it, my son. You certainly +never can. + +One fine morning last August (yes, there was _one_), I stepped out of my +diggings in an obscure Cornish fishing-village to find a gentleman +busily engaged strangling a lady on the cliff side. He had her by the +throat and was gradually forcing her over the edge. Once in Bristol I +interposed in a slogging contest between husband and wife and was very +properly chastised for my interference, not only by the happy pair but +by the entire street, who had valuable bets laid on the event. That, you +say, should have been a lesson to me. But you know me, Ginger, +impetuous, chivalrous, brave; I simply couldn't stand there and watch a +defenceless woman--moreover a good-looking woman--foully done to death +like that. I flung myself upon the villain--that is to say I spoke to +him about it. + +"Oh, dash it, old bean," I said, "draw it mild!" + +Somebody shouted something behind me, but I didn't catch its purport for +the sufficient reason that at that moment the long-suffering cliff gave +way and we all went overboard, all three of us, he, she and it--me. + +Fortunately the drop wasn't terrific--not more than four feet or so--and +the tide happened to be in at the time, which was very decent of it. My +first thought as I came to the surface--or, at any rate, _one_ of my +first thoughts--was "What of the woman?" I struck out for the poor +creature. At the same moment she struck out for me, and, what is more, +she got me too, clean between the eyes--a straight left-hander. + +"Out of my way, fathead!" she hissed and went on for the shore under +her own steam at about forty knots an hour. I was washed up myself, +along with a quantity of other jetsam, a few minutes later, to be met by +a small furious man with a heliotrope complexion and white spats who +wagged bunches of typescript under my nose and informed me that I had +absolutely ruined about twenty million feet of the Flickerscope +Company's five-reel paralyser, "The Smuggler's Bride." + +Of course you say that you saw what was coming all along. Of course you +did. But wait a moment. + +Yesterday afternoon I was strolling down a certain fashionable street +when a loud explosion occurred in a near-by shop and a cloud of acrid +grey smoke came rolling out. Being by nature as inquisitive as a +chipmunk I was on the point of shoving my head round the door-jamb to +see what was up when caution prompted me to turn round. Yes, there they +were, of course, a tall, thin youth winding away at a cine-camera like +an Italian at a barrel-organ, and beside him a heavy-weight Israelite, +dancing a war-dance, waving bunches of typescript and howling at me to +stand clear. I had very near ruined a further mile or two of film. + +I sprang out of range, and then, wishing to atone for my previous +blunders and prove that I really had no malevolent intentions towards a +struggling industry, I went round and assisted the caracoling producer +in stemming the crowd. Among others I stemmed a pushful policeman. I +didn't notice he was a policeman until he was biting the dust, with my +stick between his legs. However an instantaneous application of palm-oil +made it all right between us, and he squatted half-stunned on the kerb, +nursing his brow with one hand, my five bob with the other and took no +further interest in the proceedings. And very interesting they were, +too. + +Three masked men dashed out of the shop laden with booty and were +pursued by a fourth, whom they knocked on the head and left lying for +dead on the pavement. Most realistic. The crowd, led by me, cheered like +mad. Then the thieves jumped into a waiting car and were whirled away. +That done, the photographer and his step-dancing friend leapt into a +second car and were whirled away also. Once more we cheered. I made a +short speech to the effect that everything was all right with the +British Cinema business and, after leading a few more cheers for myself, +came home. + +"Well," you say, "all very jolly and so on, but what about it?" + +There's this about it, old companion, just this, that I am very probably +spending a meditative winter in gaol. The charge is that I did aid and +abet a peculiarly ingenious gang of desperadoes to blow a jeweller's +safe, knock the jeweller on the head and get safely away with the stuff. +I am even accused of obstructing the police. An inspector has been round +to see me this morning and he tells me there is practically no hope. He +advises me, as between friends, to make a clean breast of it, return the +boodle, betray my accomplices, plead mental deficiency and trust to the +clemency of the Court. It's pretty rough, after making all arrangements +for spending a cheerful Christmas in Algiers, to have it changed to cold +porridge in Parkhurst or Princetown. Of the two I hope it'll be +Parkhurst, for Princetown, so _habitues_ tell me, is no place for a +growing lad when the wintry winds do blow. + +Thine, _de profundis_ PATLANDER. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Mistress._ "WOULD YOU LIKE TO GO OUT THIS AFTERNOON, +MABEL?" + +_Mabel._ "I _AM_ GOING OUT."] + + * * * * * + +Rhymes of Unrest. + + There was a young miner of Ayr + Who gave himself up to despair; + For he said, "If we're paid + On our 'get,' I'm afraid + That I canna ca' canny no mair." + + "Strike while the iron is hot," + Said the wise old saw of old; + But the miners say, "What rot! + Strike while the weather's cold." + + * * * * * + + "The art of decoration is alien to painting in this--that you must + mix your colours with your brains."--_Daily Paper._ + +We await a reply from the intellectuals of Chelsea. + + * * * * * + + "There is one building now being erected, within a few miles of + Manchester as the cock crows."--_Provincial Paper._ + +We are unfamiliar with this method of mensuration. + + * * * * * + +ABOUT CONFERENCES. + +WE may not have coal, but we can have conferences. A conference is the +most typically English thing that there is. The old Anglo-Saxons had +them and called them moots. Why they called them a silly name like that, +when "conferences" would have done just as well, one can't imagine; but +they had their notions and stuck to them. They would have called +Parliament a moot; in fact they did. They called it a moot of wise men. +Sarcastic beggars, these Anglo-Saxons! + +The advantages of having a conference about everything are almost too +numerous to explain. For one thing, suppose Smith is coming to see you +at 2.30 P.M. "It's no use his waiting now," you say. "I've got a +conference at 3. Tell him to come back at 5.30." And when he comes back +at 5.30 of course the conference is still going on, so you don't have to +see him at all. + +There is nothing again that makes you feel so deliciously important as +being at a conference. You may be a leader of quite an insignificant +body of workers, like the Nutcracker-Teeth Makers' Union, but you rub +shoulders at a conference with men whose names are a household word +throughout the whole of Great Britain, amongst those who have houses. +The distinguished and the undistinguished lay their heads together; the +spat-wearing get their feet mixed with the non-spat-wearing; though +there is rather a fake, mind you, about this spat-wearing business, for +it may simply mean that the uppers are very badly worn, or that only +that very bright pink pair of socks came home from the wash this week, +or even that there are no socks underneath at all. + +But anyhow, at a conference, Tom, Dick and Harry hobnob with Bob, James +and George, and all are equal, except perhaps the chairman, who has two +more pens in front of him and a much larger ash-tray. Mr. BEVIN and Sir +ERIC GEDDES smile affably across at each other, and the PRIME MINISTER +and Mr. CRAMP find out how much they have in common, such as love of +poetry and pelargoniums. The mine-owner offers the miners' +representative a cigarette, and the miners' representative says to the +mine-owner, "Many thanks, old boy; but I'll have one of my own." And +after it is over they all go out and stand arm-in-arm in a long row to +be photographed for the papers, and are read next morning from left to +right. It is the ambition of every properly constituted Englishman to +wake up some morning and find that his portrait is being read from left +to right; but how few succeed. + +The total output of conferences in this country during one year has +never been computed yet, but it is supposed to exceed that of any +country in the world, except Red India. If there were to be a strike of +conferents or conferees, whatever they are called, in England, it is +impossible to say what would happen. But it might be possible to lay +down a datum line--a shilling extra for the first million words above +two hundred and fifty million per shift, and two shillings more for +every million words above that. Fortunately this will never be +necessary, for people who confer are so fond of conferences that they +will never down chairs. + +And no wonder. Only a very strong man can hew coal, and only a very +reckless one can make a speech, but almost anyone can confer if he has a +large enough ash-tray; and there seems no reason why more people +shouldn't confer. Everybody is interested in conferences, whatever they +are about, and the British public ought to be admitted to this kind of +thing. One is always reading in the paper that the sound commonsense or +the traditional sense of fair play of the great British public will +support the miners in any just claim; but this claim is not just or just +isn't, or something of that sort. But how do they know what the great +British public will feel about it? They aren't there, are they? There +ought to be representatives of the G.B.P. on all these conferences. They +ought to be chosen from a rota, like jurymen. Very likely one of them +would have found out what a datum line is, anyway. There's a man who +comes up in the train with me in the morning who thinks he knows, but +unfortunately he gets out at Croydon so we haven't found out yet. + +By having a lot more conferences and having a lot of representatives +from the public on them all, and paying them well for it, one could +practically settle the unemployment problem for the winter. If the +Government can only be brought to see that this is the only +statesmanlike course, and the sole course consistent with the +Anglo-Saxon sense of justice, and capable of leading to a satisfactory +Exploration of Avenues, Finding of Bridges and Discovery of Ways Out, we +may all achieve our life's ambition some day and open the morning paper +to find that we are being read at last from left to right. "Mr. ROBERT +WILLIAMS, Mr. LLOYD GEORGE, Mr. J. H. THOMAS, Lord RIDDELL," and so on +and so on, till you come at last to "J. Smith, Esq., R.B.P.," smiling +the widest of all. R.B.P.'s, I think, should wear a distinguishing +mark--a single spat perhaps. EVOE. + + * * * * * + +MORE SECRET HISTORY. + + [According to a report in a daily paper, at the recent Peace + Conference held at Spa, where the delegates were royally + entertained in the matter of hotel accommodation, meals, + etc., the cigar bill (which has been sent in to the League + of Nations and sent out again) amounted to three thousand + two hundred pounds. What the delegates could not smoke they + seem to have taken away with them.] + + 'TIS sweet in darkish times like these to see a + Rent in the veil which keeps the public blind, + And thus obtain a pretty shrewd idea + Of what goes on behind; + + To note how quite an innocent report'll + Reveal apparent trifles which befall, + Proving that men whom we supposed immortal + Are human after all. + + But here, while I can hardly call you blameful + For smoking "free" cigars with so much zest, + Frankly I feel 'twas little short of shameful + To go and pinch the rest. + + I can forgive your huge hotel expenses; + Your beef was rightly of a super-cut; + A modicum of wine does whet the senses; + But those cigars--tut, tut! + + For there's a finer aid to meditation, + Much more appropriate, in my humble view, + When Nation nestles cheek by jowl with Nation, + And far, far cheaper too. + + So, if you'd really slay Bellona's bow-wows, + Might I suggest your vicious ways should cease, + And that in future you conduct your pow-wows + Over the pipe of peace. + + * * * * * + +An Affectionate Diminutive. + + "Lord Buxton, who retired this summer from the post of High + Commissioner and Governor-General of South Africa, has been made an + early."--_Daily Paper._ + + * * * * * + +A correspondent, referring to Mr. Punch's quotation (from an Australian +paper) of the title of a song, "It was a Lover and His Last," suggests +"_Ne_ suitor _ultra crepidam._" + + * * * * * + +On the coal strike:-- + + "We look to the Government to keep all doors open. We look to the + public to keep cool."--_Westminster Gazette._ + +The public should have no difficulty in doing its part if the Government +do theirs. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: + +TRANSPORT: PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE.] + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Giles._ "I DIDN'T 'ARDLY AGREE WI' THE VICAR IN WOT 'E +SAID ABOUT THEM EARLY MARTYRS BEIN' THROWN TO THE LIONS AN' BURNT AT THE +STAKE AN' LIVIN' ON FOR EVER." + +_Curate._ "WHY NOT?" + +_Giles._ "WELL, ZUR, NO CONSTITOOTION COULD STAND IT."] + + * * * * * + +THE CONSPIRATORS. + +V. + +MY DEAR CHARLES,--Let me remind you that the Bolshevist conspirator has +to stir up conflagrations in other countries without leaving his own. +Passports and things are put in to make it more difficult when he comes +to getting his inflammable material and directions for use over the +frontier. So he has to invent a way over the obstacles. + +The first prize is awarded to the following: Secret instructions are +printed in Arabic and the pages containing them are bound up in a five +hundred page book in that language. The courier, an Oriental, carries +this book openly in his hand when he presents himself at the frontier. +It is ten to one that an innocent-looking book, thus carried, will not +be suspected; a hundred to one against there being an official capable +of reading it; five hundred to three against that official trying one of +the guilty pages, if he is there and duly suspicious. Yet, with a +hundred and sixty-six thousand chances against it, our Little Man got +hold of those instructions. + +The Sherlock Holmes of fiction is a gaunt figure, with a hatchet face, +spare of flesh. Our Little Man is a chubby lad, standing about four foot +ten in his stockinged feet, rubicund and corpulent, and he wears a +mackintosh with a very mackintoshy smell in all weathers. He never did a +day's work, and he never means to try, but he is a genius at getting it +out of others. Some say he is of Swiss origin, some say he is American, +and some say that surely he must be Chinese; he was never certain +himself until Czecho-Slovak was invented, and he plumped for that. He +has the degree of Master of Arts; what arts I don't know; probably the +black ones. His inner knowledge of the human species seems to give him +plenty to laugh at. He notices everything, forgets nothing, and there is +never a weakness in a man but he is on to it. He made up his mind that +those secret instructions were passing and set about to find how they +passed and what they were. He was too lazy to begin at the beginning, so +he began at the end. He called in person, as a commercial traveller, at +the suspected office of destination, and in the short time available +ascertained that the door-keeper who turned him out was a patriotic and +fervent admirer of the wine of the country. + +Our Little Man had no vulgar idea of getting the secret out of him by +making him drunk. If there was a secret it wouldn't be in the +door-keeper. But he and that door-keeper got to drinking together and +the door-keeper did all the paying; the drinking and the paying went on +by progressive degrees till the door-keeper had no money and only a +still almighty thirst left. The Little Man left him with his thirst for +a few days, until it became intolerable, and the door-keeper insisted +that something simply must be done about it. The Little Man regretted +that he could not give the necessary money to finance further orgies, +but he would gladly advance it. Four nights got the door-keeper well in +his debt, and our Little Man then began to talk about repayment. The +door-keeper said he had no money; the Little Man said he must get it. +Off whom? His employer. + +How was the door-keeper to get his employer's money off him? By selling +him a safe. Our Little Man then divulged that he was in reality a +commercial traveller in safes; if the door-keeper would get his employer +to buy one of his safes the Little Man would forgive him his debt by way +of commission. He felt sure that the Head of the Office had a weakness +for precautions. The door-keeper, now enthusiastic, said he should just +think he had! The Little Man felt he was getting warm. The door-keeper +put the deal through and prevailed upon his master to instal a really +safe safe in the office, instead of the old one. You had only to look at +it to see it was impregnable by fire, water or the King's Enemies. But +one set of keys stayed with the Little Man. + +The drinking (by both) and the paying (by the door-keeper) were resumed. +When the debt was again large enough the Little Man imposed new terms. +This time he wanted to see the Head of the Office himself, to put +further deals through. The door-keeper thought deeply, but could see no +harm in this. The Little Man was thus introduced into the presence, and +startled it by pointing to the safe and offering to do burglar on it any +night of the week. The Head was manifestly concerned. + +"We have here," said the Little Man, producing two formidable slabs of +steel hinged together and leaving room between them when locked for a +wad of papers only--"we have here a special strong box exactly suited +for the storage of your bank-notes. Put them in this box, and the box in +the safe, and then you really are ahead of your enemies." + +The Head bought. He gave the Little Man less money than he had spent on +the strong box, and the Little Man gave him less keys than he was +entitled to. The drinking and the debt were resumed, and, when it came +to a question of settlement for the third time, the Little Man pointed +out to the door-keeper that, if he hadn't the money to repay, then he +must steal it. He now divulged that he was not really a broker, but a +breaker of safes and strong boxes. He handed the door-keeper a key of +his employer's safe. In the safe would be found the strong box. In the +strong box would be found some notes of high value, unless he was very +much mistaken. + +So the door-keeper went and opened the safe and returned. And the Little +Man opened the strong box, and he _was_ very much mistaken. There was +never a note there; just half-a-dozen pages torn out of a book printed +in Arabic. + +He was so angry that he gave the strong box one on the lid for itself, +with the result that he couldn't lock it again. However, he said he had +a friend who could lock or unlock anything, and he left the door-keeper +drinking, for the first time at the Little Man's expense, while he took +off the box to be repaired by his friend. The latter happened to be in +the next room with a camera. The pages were photographed; the Little Man +returned to the door-keeper with the strong box, now capable of being +re-locked; the door-keeper returned to the office and put back the +strong box, locked, into the safe, which he also locked, and was wiping +the sweat off his forehead and congratulating himself that no one was +the worse, when he was startled to find a policeman had been watching +him all the time. + +But he proved to be a very amenable policeman. He said he would take no +action before he and the door-keeper had had time to talk it over next +day. By the time that talk came the photographs had been developed, +printed and translated. But the policeman did not wish to bore the +door-keeper with the tiresome details. To put it quite shortly the +policeman thought it was a most excellent crime, worthy of repetition at +intervals. + +Yours ever, HENRY. + +(_To be continued._) + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: CONCENTRATION.] + + * * * * * + +NEW RHYMES FOR OLD CHILDREN. + +THE ----. + + I NEVER know why it should be + So rude to talk about the ----. + What funny folk we are! + I think we've got the jealous hump + Because we see we'll never jump + So skilfully and far. + For, if one's nibbled by a gnat + Or harvest-bugs or things like that, + One seldom keeps it dark; + One may enlarge upon the tale + If one is gobbled by a whale + Or swallowed by a shark; + But if you speak about the bite + Of this abandoned parasite + You're very, very rash; + So sure is it to raise a frown + I dare not even write it down; + I simply put a ----. + None but an entomologist + Will quite admit the things exist, + And generally _they_ insist + On using other names; + For, when at night Professors leap + Out of their scientific sleep + Because these little devils keep + Playing their usual games, + They never shout, "It seems to be + A something, something, something ----!" + (The word is never used, you see, + Except by artisans); + No, as they fling the bedclothes high + They give a wild but cultured cry, + "Confound it! Botheration! Hi! + A _Pulex irritans_!" A. P. H. + + * * * * * + +Our Ruthless Motorists. + + "Triumph 1920 4 h.p. Model H, also Baby, both brand new; sacrifice, + L5 off each." + +_Motor Journal._ + + * * * * * + + "It was intended to hold mock trials in order to familiarise women + with court procedure and 'legal shibboleths.' + + When I saw her to-day, Miss ---- said that 'techniaclities' would + have been a better word."--_Evening Paper._ + +We hate to contradict a lady, but we cannot agree. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Aggrieved Profiteeress_ (_studying photographs of the +Peerage_). "WELL, I DON'T SEE AS THEY'VE ANY CALL TO LOOK THAT 'AUGHTY. +LIKE AS NOT ME AN' YOU'D BE WEARIN' CORONETS THIS MINUTE IF ALL OUR +ANCESTORS 'ADN'T A-BEEN CUT OFF IN THE WARS OF THE ROSES, OR +SOMETHINK."] + + * * * * * + +WORKING FOR PEACE. + +(_Extracts from the Diary of Mr. John Robert Boffkins, Trade Union +Leader._) + +_Monday._--Rose with a heart over-flowing with love towards my +fellow-men. Industrial strife must cease. Strikes are a barbarous and +futile method of redressing wrong. Rather think that an increase in +wages of two shillings a day would appeal to our members. Must inquire. + +_Tuesday._--Have confirmed my opinion that a two-shillings' increase +would appeal to our members. They all seem enthusiastic over the +suggestion. They appear to be under the impression that the idea is +their own. It is not. It is mine. If it materialises I shall be most +popular. But I am all for peace. A strike is out of the question. I +shall spare no effort to prevent one. + +_Wednesday._--Presented formal demand to employers to-day. Told our +members they must be firm to the bitter end. The two-shillings' increase +is their strict due, and, if we present a united front, the grasping +capitalist will be brought to his knees. Am working night and day for +peace. + +_Thursday._--Pointed out to the employers that a strike is inevitable +unless they give way. We can make no concession. My whole energies are +concentrated on preventing a strike. Told our members that unless they +remain firm the employers will crush them. A strike would be a national +calamity and might spell ruin to the country. + +_Friday._--The possibility of a strike looms larger. Can nothing be done +to prevent it? Informed the employers that we declined to abate one iota +of our claim. "All or nothing" is our motto. Also refused to go to +arbitration. Warned the employers that a strike means starvation for +women and children. The prospect appals me. + +_Saturday._--The employers, who seem to be determined on a strike, have +offered the men two shillings if they will consider the question of +working five days a week instead of four. We refused their offer and +demanded that our claim should be conceded unconditionally by noon, +failing which our members would cease work. + +_Later._--The strike has commenced. Heaven knows that I did everything +to prevent it which human being could do. The capitalists seem to have +made up their minds to force civil war and all its horrors upon the +country. The spectacle of little children starving causes me acute +distress. + + * * * * * + +A GUIDE TO GREATNESS. + + [Mr. JACOB EPSTEIN maintains in _The Daily Mail_ that a man + to be a creative genius must lead an orderly domesticated + life.] + + I COURTED the Muse as a stripling, + Immured in a Bloomsbury flat, + And yearned for the kudos of KIPLING + For fees that were frequent and fat; + But editors, far from discerning + The worth of the pearls that I placed + At their feet, had a way of returning + The same with indelicate haste. + + But, espousing, a year or two later, + The sweetest and neatest of wives, + I found, after peeling a tater + Or imparting a polish to knives, + I could scribble with frenzy and passion, + That the breaking of coal would inspire, + In a truly remarkable fashion, + My soul with celestial fire. + + Serenity reigns in the household; + I've cancelled my grudge against Fate; + My lyrical efforts are now sold + At a simply phenomenal rate; + And, whether I'm laying the lino + Or bathing the babes, I regard + The job as a cushy one: _I_ know + The way to succeed as a bard. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: THE SCALES OF JUSTICE. + +SIR ROBERT HORNE. "I WANT TO KEEP THE BALANCE. NOW THEN, BOTH TOGETHER." + +THE MINER. "NO. _YOU_ BEGIN--AND THEN PERHAPS I'LL THINK ABOUT IT."] + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _P. C. GREENWOOD._ "ARRAH! GET OUT WID YEZ AND LET THE +LADY PASS."] + + * * * * * + +ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT. + +_Tuesday, October 19th._--A start was made with half a hundred +Questions, and, considering that most of them had been in cold storage +since before the Recess, it was surprising how fresh they remained. +Persia and Mesopotamia--not to mention Ireland--are still unsettled; the +Turkish Treaty is not yet ratified; the cost of living continues to +rise, and the ratio of unemployment has alarmingly advanced, especially +in the case of ex-service men. + +These last are to be found work in the building trades, with, it is +hoped, the assistance of the trade unions, but, if that hope is +disappointed, then without it. The country requires half-a-million +houses built. "Here are men who could assist," said the PRIME MINISTER, +"and we propose that they should be allowed to assist." + +Over a prospect already sufficiently bleak there broods the shadow of +the coal-strike. Sir ROBERT HORNE, in presenting the case for the +Government, was admirably clear but, perhaps naturally, a little cold. +Only when the new lighting arrangement had flooded the House with +artificial sunshine did the Minister warm up a little and hint that a +way of peace might yet be found. + +I wonder if it was by accident or artifice that Mr. BRACE began his plea +for the miners with the admission that they had only dropped the demand +for the reduction of fourteen shillings and twopence in the price of +domestic coal when they discovered that "the money was not there." +Anyhow the laughter that ensued served to put Members into a good temper +and to cause them to lend a friendly ear to his suggestion that the two +shillings advance, though in his view only "dust in the balance," should +be "temporarily" conceded, pending the establishment of a tribunal which +should permanently settle the conditions of the mining industry. The +increase of output which everyone desired would then be brought about. + +Most of the speakers who followed seemed to think that Mr. BRACE had +sown the seed of a settlement. It was left to the PRIME MINISTER, who +evidently did not relish the task, to awaken the House from its +beautiful dream. He pointed out that to accept the proposal would be to +give the miners what they had originally claimed, without any guarantee +that the greater output would be forthcoming. If it were not forthcoming +and the two shillings were taken away, what would happen? "A strike," +cried someone. "Precisely," said Mr. LLOYD GEORGE; only it would have +been provoked by the Government instead of by the miners. He was not +prepared to do business on those lines. + +And so the debate came to an end rather than a conclusion. + +_Wednesday, October 20th._--The Peers plunged into the morasses of the +Irish Question. Lord CREWE asked for an official inquiry into the +alleged "reprisals" and particularly instanced the attacks upon the +creameries. Rather than that Ireland should be "pacified" by such +methods as these he would see her engaged in civil war, "fairly +conducted on both sides." From these words it may be gathered that his +lordship's knowledge of civil war is happily not extensive. + +Furnished with a voluminous brief from the Irish Office, Lord CURZON +made a long reply, the purport of which was that many of the reprisals +were bogus, many were actions undertaken in self-defence, while the rest +were generally due to men "seeing red" after their comrades had been +brutally murdered. The Government did not palliate such cases, and had +instituted inquiries and taken disciplinary action against the +offenders, when known; but they were not prepared to set up a public +inquiry such as Lord CREWE had demanded. It would only substitute "a +competition in perjury" for the present "competition in murder"--a +somewhat infelicitous phrase by which, as he subsequently explained, he +did not mean to imply, as Lord PARMOOR suggested, that police and rebels +were engaged in a murderous rivalry. + +Simultaneously the House of Commons was engaged upon an identically +similar debate. Mr. ARTHUR HENDERSON was as lugubrious as Lord CREWE in +presenting the indictment and distinctly less adroit in selecting his +facts. His theory was that the Government had provoked the Sinn Fein +outrages by its treatment of the people. Why, women had been prevented +from taking their eggs to market! + +Sir HAMAR GREENWOOD spoke from the same brief as Lord CURZON, but threw +far more passion and vigour into its recital. There had been some +reprisals, he admitted, but they were as nothing compared to the horrors +that had provoked them; and he protested against the notion that "the +heroes of yesterday"--the R.I.C. is mainly recruited from ex-service +men--had turned into murderers. As for the creameries, he had never seen +a tittle of evidence that they had been destroyed by servants of the +Crown, and he warned the House not to believe the stories put out by the +propaganda bureau of the Irish Republican Army. He was still a convinced +Home Ruler--an Ulster hot-gospeller had accused him of being a Sinn +Feiner with a Papist wife!--but the first thing to do was to break the +reign of terror and end the rule of the assassin. That they were doing, +and there was no case for Mr. HENDERSON'S "insulting resolution." + +The Opposition for the moment seemed stunned by the CHIEF SECRETARY'S +sledge-hammer speech. No one rose from the Front Bench and +Lieutenant-Commander KENWORTHY had to overcome his modesty and step into +the breach. Later on, Lord ROBERT CECIL, on the strength of information +supplied by an American journalist, supported the demand for an +inquiry. So did Mr. ASQUITH, on the ground that it would be in the +interests of the Government of Ireland itself; but this argument was +obviously weakened by Mr. BONAR LAW'S reminder that in 1913 and 1914 Mr. +ASQUITH himself had deprecated inquiries in somewhat similar +circumstances. The Government had a very good division, 346 to 79; but +there were many abstentions. + +_Thursday, October 21st._--It was, no doubt, by way of brightening an +unutterably gloomy week that Mr. L'ESTRANGE MALONE, who has not hitherto +been known as a humourist, invited the Government to intercede at +Washington for the release of the notorious JAMES LARKIN, now +languishing in an American gaol. Inasmuch as LARKIN had been convicted +for having advocated the overthrow of the United States by violence, Mr. +HARMSWORTH did not think H.M. Government were called upon to intervene. +Mr. MALONE understood from this that the Government had no sympathy with +British subjects in foreign lands, and so he got another laugh. + +Commander BELLAIRS thought it would be a good idea if the League of +Nations, pending the discharge of its more important functions, were to +offer rewards for world-benefiting discoveries such as a prophylactic +against potato-blight. Sir JOHN REES saw his chance and took it. "Does +the League," he inquired, "declare to win on Phosphates, Peace or +Potatoes?"--thus supplying proof positive that he owes his precise +pronunciation to past practice with "prunes and prisms." + +It was rather impudent of Mr. ADAMSON, who has just been instrumental in +throwing out of work some hundreds of thousands of his fellow-citizens, +to initiate a debate on unemployment. Most of the speakers endeavoured +to throw the blame on "the other fellow"--the Government on the trade +unions, the trade unionists on the employers, and the employers on the +Government. A welcome exception was Mr. HOPKINSON, who boldly blamed the +short-sighted selfishness of some of his own class. Employes would not +work their hardest to "make the boss a millionaire." As a fitting +_finale_ to an inconclusive debate the PRIME MINISTER announced that in +order to force a settlement of the coal-strike the railwaymen--Mr. +THOMAS, apparently, dissenting--had threatened to join the unemployed. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Harassed Secretary._ "I SAY, YOU NEEDN'T MAKE BUNKERS, +YOU KNOW."] + + * * * * * + +Our Erudite Contemporaries. + + "Willard was game and well trained, and in stature he was Goliath to + the Daniel of Dempsey."--_Evening Paper._ + +A DAVID come to judgment! + + * * * * * + + "The rate plague has developed to an alarming extent in Thanet, and + considerable anxiety is felt, especially as there appears to be no + effective preparation of poison to exterminate them."--_Evening + Paper._ + +And Thanet is not the only place. + + * * * * * + +THE TYPE-SLINGER. + + BITING and keen as any razor + The fluent pen of LOVAT FRASER; + And swift as arrows, thick as hail, + His outbursts in _The Daily Mail_, + Exposing in impassioned phrase + The PREMIER'S wild and wicked ways. + And yet the PREMIER doesn't squirm, + No, not a bit--the pachyderm! + But goes about with cheerful mien, + As if such things had never been. + + So LOVAT FRASER grows emphatic + In efforts to be more dogmatic, + And down the column, once a week, + _His shrill italics fairly shriek._ + But does the PREMIER bow his back + And go and give himself the sack? + Not he. Indeed, for all he troubles, + His critic might be blowing bubbles. + + It's up to LOVAT FRASER now + To make an even bigger row; + I'd like to see the sturdy fellow + Write articles that simply bellow. + I think the PREMIER might perhaps + Shiver and possibly collapse + IF LOVAT GOT TO WORK IN "CAPS." + + * * * * * + +The Black Swan of Avon. + +"A NATIVE DRAMA +Entitled +'Inu vere ki pani' + + (Popularly known as Merchant of Venice, but beautified and enlarged + to local taste), Interspersed with Popular Dialogues, latest Songs, + etc. Will (D. V.) be rendered by the ---- Guild."--_West African + Poster._ + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: WHAT OUR BOHEMIANS HAVE TO PUT UP WITH. + +_Shabbily-dressed person._ "I'VE LOST THE TICKET, BUT I LEFT A HAT. +THAT'S IT OVER THERE." + +_Attendant._ "I MUST ASK YOU TO FIND THE TICKET, SIR, PLEASE. THE HAT +THAT YOU INDICATE IS QUITE NEW."] + + * * * * * + +THE REVIVAL OF OLLENDORFF. + +FROM the memories of my mid-Victorian childhood, before the instruction +of a governess had reached a point at which the plunge was made into a +preparatory school, three names emerge with remarkable distinctness. +"Little Arthur," from whom I derived my earliest knowledge of the +History of England; "Henry," by whom I was grounded in the rudiments of +the dead Latin tongue (but who must be carefully distinguished from +JAMES HENRY, the Virgilian, who in turn had nothing whatever to do with +HENRY JAMES the novelist), and OLLENDORFF, the illustrious author of a +series of manuals for the teaching of living foreign languages. + +OLLENDORFF, I fear, is not even the shadow of a name to the present +generation. There is no mention of him in _The Encyclopaedia Britannica_ +or in _Chambers_. Even in his own country he seems to have lapsed into +obscurity, and in MENDEL'S voluminous _Conversations-Lexikon_ there is +only a brief reference to the Ollendorffian method, but no account of +the man or his history. + +Yet he must have existed; OLLENDORFF cannot have been a mere symbol. And +as students of SHAKSPEARE have endeavoured to reconstruct the man from +his plays so I feel sure that the character of OLLENDORFF, his interests +and politics, might very well be reconstructed from a study of his +dialogues. One must admit that his Teutonic patronymic is an obstacle to +his revival, but that difficulty can be surmounted by the adoption of an +_alias_. For example, by the omission of one of the "f's" and the +transposition of one other letter his name, read backwards, becomes +Frondello, which is at once euphonious and void of all racial offence. + +The Ollendorffian method, it may be noted for the benefit of the +ignorant, did not merely depend on the employment of question and +answer; it aimed at conveying information drawn from the homely affairs +of daily life and the relations between persons belonging to different +trades and occupations. "Have you," OLLENDORFF would ask, "the hat of +the gardener's son?" And when this had been duly and correctly +translated into German or French the pupil proceeded to the answer, "No, +but I have the boots of the grocer's brother-in-law." + +I think OLLENDORFF built better than he knew; or perhaps he did know. A +strong vein of Socialism runs through all his examples, which seem to +show a lively appreciation of the Communistic principle. To him there +was nothing wrong or dangerous in this mutual interchange and enjoyment +of property. He drew no hard-and-fast lines between _meum_ and _tuum_. +We cannot help thinking that, at a time when so much depends on the +fusion of classes, a new edition of these immortal dialogues, brought up +to date so as to meet the exigencies of the new poor, the new rich, the +old aristocracy and the new plutocracy, would be fraught with the most +salutary results. + +The following are some crude suggestions of the lines on which the +revision might be carried out:-- + +"Have you the leathern waistcoat of the taxi-driver?--"No, but I have +the reach-me-down trousers of an inferior quality to those worn by the +village postman." + +"Have you the smooth-running automobile of the prosperous grocer?"--"No, +but I have the loan of the push-bicycle of my former under-gardener's +uncle." + +"Are you going to marry the beautiful daughter of the shoemaker?"--"Yes, +and her brother has just become engaged to the widow of my cousin the +marquis." + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Mr. Arthur Wontner_ (_to himself_). "WELL, I DON'T THINK +MUCH OF YOUR TASTE IN CLOTHES."] + + * * * * * + +AT THE PLAY. + +"THE ROMANTIC AGE." + +I HOPE that Mr. ALAN MILNE is a good enough critic to agree with me in +thinking that this is the best play he has so far given us. Not that the +idea of it is as new as that of his _Mr. Pim_ or his _Wurzel-Flummery_, +but because, without sacrificing his lightness of touch and his sense of +fun, he has, for the first time, produced a serious scheme. + +People will tell you that his Second Act was the weak spot in the play; +that the others were brilliant, but that this one, for its first half, +was tedious and delayed the action. They will say this because they are +familiar with A. A. M.'s humour, but not with his sentiment. Yet it was +in this middle Act that he gave us the best passage of all, in +presenting the philosophy of his pedlar, which had in it something of +the dewy freshness of the early morning scene in the wood ("morning's at +seven," as _Pippa_--not _Mr. Pim_--said _en passant_). There was no real +delay in the action here, for the pedlar was providing the hero with the +argument without which he could never have persuaded the lady to yield; +could never have made her understand that Romance is not confined to the +trunk-and-hose period, or any age, so named, of chivalry, but is to be +found wherever there is a true companionship of hearts. Unfortunately +the effect of this passage was a little spoilt by what had just gone +before--a rather slow and superfluous scene with the village idiot--and +some of the audience imagined that the author was still marking time. + +Mr. MILNE has an individual manner so distinct that he can well afford +to acknowledge his debt to Sir JAMES BARRIE. As in _Mary Rose_, so here +(though there are no supernatural forces at work) we have the sharp +contrast between commonplace life, as lived by the rest, and the life of +Fairyland, as coming within the vision of one only. And we were reminded +too of the Midsummer-madness that overtook the company in _Dear Brutus_. +I won't say that it wasn't natural enough for _Melisande_, under the +fascination of a moonlit Midsummer Eve, to imagine, when she chanced +upon a gentleman in fancy dress of the right period, that at last she +had realised her dream of a hero of romance; but she was stark +Midsummer-mad to suppose, when she met him early next morning with his +costume unchanged, that he would keep it on till he came to tea with the +family, and then, still wearing it, waft her off to Faerie. + +But not even BARRIE has ever made a better scene than that which showed +us the disillusionment of the visionary when she is confronted with her +blue-and-gold hero of romance now transformed into a plain Stock +Exchange man, his air of banality enhanced by the last word in golf +suitings. The humour of this scene, in which she made conventional +conversation without any real effort to conceal her sense of the bathos +of the situation, was very perfect. The relatively simple humour of the +match-making mother--not so simple, all the same, as its spontaneity +made it appear--had the distinction which one expects of Mr. MILNE; but +this was far the funniest feature in the play. + +It would have been an easy matter to make cheap fun, as MARK TWAIN did +in _A Yankee at the Court of King Arthur_, out of the popular view of +the Age of Romance, but A. A. M. avoided that obvious lure. Indeed, in +his natural anxiety not to be taken too seriously in his first attempt +to be serious, he rather tended to make light of his own theory of +modern romance, laying a little too much stress at the end on the +culinary aspect of conjugal felicity. + +I am not sure that Mr. ARTHUR WONTNER (to whom my best wishes for his +new managership) quite realised, in his doublet and long hose, my idea +of a figure of mediaeval romance. In fact I am free to confess that I +disagreed with _Melisande_ and preferred him in his golf-clothes. But +perhaps that was part of the idea, and Mr. MILNE meant me to feel like +that. Miss BARBARA HOFFE'S _Melisande_--a difficult part, because she +was the only other-worldly person in the play and the only one in +desperate earnest--was very cleverly handled. In her most exalted +moments of poetic rapture she was never too precious, and when called +upon for a touch of corrective humour was quick to respond. + +Miss LOTTIE VENNE laid herself out in her inimitable way for a broad +interpretation of the visionary's very earthly mother; indeed once or +twice she almost laid herself out of the picture; but she still remained +irresistible. As a pair of light-hearted young lovers Miss DOROTHY +TETLEY and Mr. JOHN WILLIAMS played really well in parts that were not +nearly so easy as they looked. And there was the dry humour of Mr. +BROMLEY-DAVENPORT, as the father (I fear he must have missed the romance +of twin souls) and the open-air charm of Mr. NICHOLSON'S performance as +_Gentleman Susan_, the pedlar. In a word, my grateful compliments +embrace as good a cast as ever caught--and held--the spirit of an +author. + +"PRISCILLA AND THE PROFLIGATE." + +When you have been jilted by _Cynthia_ at the church-door and, two days +afterwards, in a fit of pique marry _Priscilla_ at sight (of course you +can't always get a _Priscilla_ to consent to this arrangement; but _Mr. +Bensley Stuart Gore_ had a young ward at school who wanted her freedom; +so that was all right), you may think to persuade the Faithless One that +you have given solid proof of your indifference to her. But you mustn't +dash off to Africa an hour after your wedding with the declared +intention of being eaten by wild men or wilder beasts, because, if you +do that, you give your scheme away and _Cynthia_ will have the +satisfaction of knowing that she has driven you to desperate courses. +Yet that is what _Mr. Bensley Stuart Gore_ did (he was the "Profligate" +of the title, though he never gave any noticeable sign of profligacy). + +After this strain on my credulity I felt prepared for anything, and was +not in the least surprised to find him, six years older and still +intact, on the terrace of the Hotel Casa Bellini, by the dear old shores +of Lake Maggiore, which, as the programme advised me, is in Italy. It +seemed, too, the most natural thing in the world that the author, Miss +LAURA WILDIG, should have collected _Priscilla_ and _Cynthia_ (the +latter in tow of a third-rate millionaire husband whom she loathed) at +the same address. + +It was at this juncture that _Mr. Bensley Stuart Gore_ was inspired +with a Great Thought. In order to set _Priscilla_ free (I ought to say +that he hadn't recognised her) he would elope with _Cynthia_. How +_Priscilla_ set out to frustrate this noble sacrifice and secure her +husband for herself; how she bribed the caretaker to lock him up with +her in the "Bloody Turret" of an adjacent ruin; how subsequently, at 2 +A.M., in the public lounge of the hotel, she tried to work upon his +emotions by appearing in a black night-dress (surely this rather vulgar +form of allurement is _demode_ by now even in the suburbs, or, anyhow, +is not so freshly daring as she seemed to think it), I will leave you to +imagine. Even Miss IRIS HOEY'S nice soft voice and pleasant _calineries_ +could not quite carry off this rather machine-made trifle. If anything +saved it, it was the acting of Mr. FRANK DENTON as _Jimmy Forde_. +Starting as _Bensley's_ "best man," he missed the wedding ceremony +through going to the wrong church, but after that he stuck close to his +friend for the remainder of the plot, and greatly endeared himself to +the audience by the excellent way in which he played the silly ass. + +As for _Bensley_ himself, you might have thought that he had a +sufficiently chequered career, yet Mr. CYRIL RAYMOND got very little +colour out of the part. For the rest, Mr. H. DE LANGE, as the +millionaire, got a certain amount out of the subject of his wife's +indigestion, which was a sort of _leit-motif_ with him; but most of the +colour seemed to have gone into the scenery, admirably designed and +painted by Mr. MCCLEERY and Mr. WALTER HANN. + +O. S. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Diner._ "I SAY, WAITER, I'VE ASKED THREE TIMES FOR +POTATOES." + +_Waiter_ (_still under the influence of military discipline_). "BEG +PARDON, SIR, BUT I'M TOLD OFF TO CONCENTRATE ON THE CABBAGE."] + + * * * * * + +"LOGS TO BURN." + + "_Logs to burn; logs to burn; + Logs to save the coal a turn._" + + HERE's a word to make you wise + When you hear the wood-man's cries; + Never heed his usual tale + That he has splendid logs for sale, + But read these lines and really learn + The proper kinds of logs to burn. + + Oak logs will warm you well + If they're old and dry; + Larch logs of pine woods smell, + But the sparks will fly. + Beech logs for Christmas-time, + Yew logs heat well; + "Scotch" logs it is a crime + For anyone to sell. + Birch logs will burn too fast, + Chestnut scarce at all; + Hawthorn logs are good to last + If cut in the Fall. + Holly logs will burn like wax, + You should burn them green; + Elm logs like smouldering flax, + No flame to be seen. + Pear logs and apple logs, + They will scent your room; + Cherry logs across the dogs + Smell like flowers in bloom. + But Ash logs, all smooth and grey, + Burn them green or old; + Buy up all that come your way, + They're worth their weight in gold. + + * * * * * + +"GIRL EYE-MAKER." + +_Picture-title in Daily Paper._ + +Perhaps we ought to mention that the eyes she makes are artificial, +not "glad." + + * * * * * + +Our Discreet Press. + + "Mystery surrounds the Russo-Polish peace negotiations at Riga. + According to a Central News message from Warsaw Marshal Pilsudski + has had a conference with??????????, the Premier, as to whether + demobilisation should take place shortly."--_Evening Paper._ + + * * * * * + + "When he [Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree] was prepared to play _Martin + Chuzzlewit_ he wrote to me (and doubtless explained to others) that + he was going to present _Mr. Micawber_ as 'a sort of + fairy.'"--_Sunday Paper._ + +We suppose if Sir HERBERT had staged _David Copperfield_ he would have +cast himself for the husband of _Mrs. Harris_. + + * * * * * + +THE PRIVATE FILM. + +MY attention has been drawn to the most recent and perhaps the most +terrible development of the Cinema by an advertisement, from which I +take the following extracts:-- + + HAVE YOUR OWN FILM TAKEN. + + THE MOST MODERN METHOD OF GAINING PUBLICITY. + + _To Members of Parliament, Mayors, Lecturers and other Public Men + and Women._ + + "The Cinema has become the cheapest, the surest and most rapid road + to publicity. It is estimated that a third of the population attend + the Cinema once a week. Messrs. Mump and Gump have therefore fitted + up a special studio for film work, in which you can now have your + own film taken, representing you in any action you may desire. This + method of publicity is specially recommended to Members of + Parliament. For instance one can be filmed writing a letter, which + can be closed down and handed to a messenger, which action can be + followed by the letter itself being thrown on the screen.... Think + what this means to a prospective Candidate when he goes to a + constituency where he is unknown. He takes with him twenty or more + films. Your constituents must see and know you before you can hope + for their vote. The Cinema introduces your personality and your + policy. + + "Your film will cost you-- + First reel ... Three guineas. + Each extra reel. One guinea." + + +The more I see of business-men the less they seem to me to know about +business. I never read an advertisement without thinking, "How much +better I (or even you) could have done that!" Yet they will tell you +that it is their advertisements which make the money. It only shows.... +However. Messrs. Mump and Gump, for instance, have scarcely skimmed the +surface possibilities of their brilliant notion. This invention is going +to make politics tolerable at last. No man minds being in the House of +Commons; it is being in his constituency which is so dreadful. _And now +he need never go there._ + +For instance, when the constituency is tired of the letter-film, he can +be filmed making a speech, which can be taken down and handed to a +typist, which action can be followed by the speech itself being thrown +on the screen--in instalments. The constituency will enjoy this, because +it will take much less time to read it than it would to listen to it, +and they can argue out loud about the meaning of Early English phrases +like Datum-line and Functional Representation. In fact they can go on +arguing during the _Whips of Sin_ which will follow. + +As for the public man, it won't take him two minutes to be filmed making +the speech, unless, of course, he has any very complicated gestures; and +it won't take him any time at all to compose it, because the private +secretary will do that; and the private secretary will be able to make +sure that his joke about JEREBOAM is not turned into a joke about +JEHOSHAPHAT at the last minute, or simply shelved in favour of a +peroration on rainbows. After the speech the M.P. can be filmed opening +a flowershow and, if necessary, writing a cheque to the local +hortiphilist society, which cheque can be thrown on the screen amid loud +applause, but need not, of course, go any further. + +There is one other point, but it is rather a delicate matter: Messrs. +Mump and Gump say to the prospective Candidate, "Your constituents must +see and know you before you can hope for their vote." Are they quite +right? I have seen a good many Candidates in my time, and I can think of +some to whom I should have said, "Your constituents must _never_ see you +if you hope for a single vote." I mean, when one looks round the present +House of Commons, one really marvels how.... But perhaps I had better +not go on with that. The point is that a Candidate of that kind never +_need_ be seen by his constituents now. A handsome young private +secretary, uniformed and beribboned, and the film does the rest. + +Then I rather resent the assumption that Members of Parliament, Mayors, +Lecturers and Actors are the only people who require publicity. I should +have thought that those who spend their time writing things in the +public Press, which are read by the public (if anybody), might have had +at least the courtesy title of Public Man. Anyhow, I am going to have +three guineas' worth. The only question is, what sort of picture will +most thoroughly "get" my personality before a third of the population +once a week? The moment when I am most characteristic is when I am lying +in a hot bath, and to-morrow is Sunday; but I doubt if even a sixth of +the population would be really keen on that. I don't mind writing a +letter or two, only, if it meant an extra reel every time I decided to +write it to-morrow instead, it would be rather a costly advertisement. + +Really, I suppose, one ought to be done _At Work in His Study_; but even +that would require a good deal of faking. Ought one, for instance, to +remove the golf-balls and the cocoa-cup (and the rhyming dictionary) +from The Desk? Then I always write with a decayed pencil, and that would +look so bad. Messrs. Mump and Gump would have to throw in a quill-pen. +And I have no Study. I work in the drawingroom, when the children are +not playing in it. To go into The Study I simply walk over to my table +and put up a large notice: "THE STUDY. DO NOT SPEAK TO ME. I AM +THINKING." Do you think that had better be in the film? + +Or I wonder if a Comic would be more effective--a Shaving reel or a +Dressing reel? It is the small incidents of every-day life that one +should look to for the key to the character of a Public Man; and once a +whole third of the population had seen for themselves what pain it gives +me to put links and studs and all those things in a clean shirt, they +would understand the strange note of melancholy which runs through this +article. + +But of course an author should have several different reels +corresponding to the different kinds of work which he wants to +publicitise. (That is a new word which I have just invented, but you +will find it in common use in a month or two.) People like Mr. BELLOC +will probably require the full politician's ration of twenty or more, +but the ordinary writer might rub along with four or five. + +When his _Pug, Wog and Pussy_ is on the market there will be a Family +reel, in which he is pretending to be a tree and the children are +climbing it. And when he has just published _The Cruise of the Cow_; +or, _Seven Hours at Sea_, he will be seen with an intense expression +tying a bowline on a bight or madly hauling on the throat-halyard--at +Messrs. Mump and Gump's specially-equipped ponds. And for his +passionate romance, _The Borrowed Bride_---- But I don't know what he +will do then. + +And even now we have not exhausted the list of Public Men. There are +clergymen. Don't you feel that some of those sermons might be thrown on +the screen--and left there? A. P. H. + + * * * * * + +The Merry Bishop. + + The Dean of CAPE TOWN with a critical frown + To the jests of St. Albans' gay Bishop demurs; + But the Bishop denies the offence and implies + 'Tis the way of all asses to nibble at FURSE. + + * * * * * + + "Harvest Festival celebrations took place at St. John's Church on + Sunday evening, when the choir rendered the anthem 'Praise the young + ladies of the choir.'"--_Yorkshire Paper._ + +And we have no doubt they deserved it. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _Butcher_ (_at conclusion of scathing criticism of +horse_). "WELL, THAT'S MY OPINION, ANYWAY. AND I OUGHT TO KNOW SOMETHING +BY NOW ABOUT A BIT OF 'ORSEFLESH WHEN I SEES IT." + +_Groom._ "YES--AND SO OUGHT YOUR CUSTOMERS TOO."] + + * * * * * + +OUR BOOKING-OFFICE. + +(_By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned Clerks._) + +How you regard Miss MAY SINCLAIR'S latest story, _The Romantic_ +(COLLINS), will entirely depend upon your attitude towards the +long-vexed question of the permissible in art. If you hold that all life +(which in this association generally means something disagreeable) is +its legitimate province and that genius can transmute an ugly study of +morbid pathology into a romance, you will admire the force of this vivid +little book; otherwise, I warn you frankly, you are like to be repelled +by the whole business. The title, to begin with, is an irony as grim as +anything that follows, in what sense you will find as the story reveals +itself. _The Romantic_ is a picture--what do I say? a vivisection--of +cowardice, seen through the horrified eyes of a woman who loved the +subject of it. The scene is the Belgian battlefields, to which _John +Conway_, being unfitted for active service, had taken out a +motor-ambulance, with _Charlotte Redhead_ as one of his drivers. All the +background of this part of the tale is wonderfully realised, a thing of +actual and unforgetable experience. Here gradually the first tragedy of +_Conway_ is made clear, though shielded and ignored as long as possible +by the loyalty of fellow-workers and the obstinate disbelief of the +girl. Perhaps you think I am making too much of it all; treacherous +nerves were the lot of many spiritually noble men in that hell. But +little by little conviction of a deeper, less understandable, horror +creeps upon the reader, only to be explained and confirmed on the last +page. To be honest, _The Romantic_ is an ugly, a detestably ugly book, +but of its cleverness there can be no question. + + * * * * * + +It would appear that Mr. A. E. W. MASON is another of those who hold +that the day of war-novels is not yet done. Anyhow, _The Summons_ +(HODDER AND STOUGHTON) shows him dealing out all the old familiar cards, +spies and counter-spies, submarines and petrol bases and secret ink. It +must be admitted that the result is unexpectedly archaic. Perhaps also +Mr. MASON hardly gives himself a fair chance. The "summons" to his hero +(who, being familiar with the Spanish coast, is required when War breaks +out to use this knowledge for submarine-thwarting) is too long delayed, +and all the non-active service part of the tale suffers from a very dull +love-interest and some even more dreary racing humour. Archaic or not, +however, _Hillyard's_ anti-spy adventures, in an exquisite setting that +the author evidently knows as well as his hero, are good fun enough. But +the home scenes had (for me at least) a lack of grip and conviction by +no means to be looked for from a writer of Mr. MASON'S experience. His +big thrill, the suicide of the lady who first sends by car to the local +paper the story of her end and then waits to confirm this by telephone +before making it true, left me incredulous. I'm afraid _The Summons_ can +hardly be said to have found Mr. MASON in his customary form. + + * * * * * + +"To write another person's life-history in the first person, and yet +give to it the verisimilitude of a genuine autobiography, would under +ordinary circumstances be a difficult if not impossible undertaking." So +Mr. C. E. GOULDSBURY tells us in a note to _Reminiscences of a Stowaway_ +(CHAPMAN AND HALL), and most of us will cordially agree with him. But, +after reading this volume of reminiscences, I think you will also agree +that Mr. GOULDSBURY has acquitted himself admirably of a most difficult +task. The man into whose skin, if I may so express it, he has +temporarily tried to fit himself was Mr. ALEXANDER DOUGLAS LARYMORE, who +started his adventurous career as a stowaway in an "old iron tub," and +eventually became Inspector-General of Jails in India. For nearly forty +years Mr. GOULDSBURY was Mr. LARYMORE'S intimate friend, and has had +sufficient data at his disposal to do justice to what was a remarkably +full and interesting life. Possibly those of us who retain a tender spot +in our hearts for stowaways may regret that Mr. LARYMORE grew tired of +the sea; but his adventures were as numerous and amusing on land as on +water, and they are also valuable for the strong light they throw on the +India of some years ago. Mr. GOULDSBURY has at once provided a lasting +tribute to the memory of his friend and written a book which both in +style and matter would be hard to beat. + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: _The King._ "LOOK HERE--THIS THRONE WON'T DO; IT IS +IMPOSSIBLE FOR US TO LOOK DIGNIFIED IN IT." + +_The Artificer._ "I'M SORRY, YOUR MAJESTY. THERE MUST BE SOME MISTAKE. I +GOT IT IN MY 'EAD THAT YOUR MAJESTY ORDERED A _LOUNGE_ THRONE."] + + * * * * * + +Are you a victim to the _Tarzan_ habit? Perhaps your eye may have been +caught by the word on bookstalls as the generic title of an increasing +pile of volumes; but knowing, like myself, that all things explain +themselves in time, you may have been content to leave it at that. +Meanwhile, however, the thing has continued to spread, till on the +wrapper of _Tarzan the Untamed_ (METHUEN), which now at last finds me +out, its publishers are able to number its devotees in millions. Well, +of course the outstanding fact about such popularity is that in face of +it any affectation of superiority becomes simply silly. One has got to +accept this creation of Mr. EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS as among the definite +literary phenomena of our time. In the immediate spasm before me +_Tarzan_ (who is, if you need telling, a kind of horribly exaggerated +_Mowgli_ after a diet of the Food of the Gods) is represented as placing +himself at the disposal of the British forces in East Africa, and +attacking the Germans with man-eating lions. The rather chastening +feature of which was my own unexpected enjoyment of the idea. Even, for +one disconcerting moment, like the persons in the admonitory anecdotes +who taste opium "just for fun," I began to feel that perhaps.... However +it passed, and the temptation has not returned. Meanwhile the real +nature of Tarzanism, whether some sinister possession or simply the +age-long appetite for the monstrous, just now a little out of hand, +remains as far from solution as ever. + + * * * * * + +Mr. HORACE BLEACKLEY, whose last excursion into political fiction was a +description of an opera-bouffe Labour Government in action, addresses +himself, in _The Monster_ (HEINEMANN), to a more serious theme. His +monster is the factory system, and if I say that this witty novel will +provide the ignorant and comfortable with instruction as well as +entertainment I hope I shan't have done him any harm. The author, while +making his points against the system, notes truly enough that the risen +ranker, the one who had been through the dreadful mill, with its +ninety-hour working week for children, became the hardest master during +that wonderful period of the Manchesterising of England which laid the +train for the explosions of our present discontents. He reminds us also +of that admirable speech, made about every ten years for the last +hundred or so in the House with the same fervour and conviction, to the +effect that any change in conditions or wages would surely mean the +complete ruin of the country. A comforting speech, that! Perhaps Mr. +BLEACKLEY, presenting three generations from Peterloo to the Jubilee of +QUEEN VICTORIA, covers too much ground for full effect, but he has +pleasantly gilded a wholesome pill for pleasant people. Good luck to +him. + + * * * * * + +I did not take the publishers' statement that _Pengard Awake_ (METHUEN) +was "entirely unlike Mr. STRAUS'S previous stories" as a recommendation, +however alluring it was intended to be, for he has good and enjoyable +work to his credit. I doubt, indeed, if he has yet written a book more +acceptable to the novel-reading public than this tale of "action, +mystery and wonderful adventures" (again I quote from the paper +wrapper). Possibly in a so-called mystery book the author ought to have +his readers guessing all the time, but if I was not perpetually engaged +in this rather exhausting pursuit I was, at any rate, intrigued. +_Pengard_, who is also _Sylvester_, and yet is neither the one nor the +other, may be too much for your saner moments of credulity. But Mr. +STRAUS tells his queer story so plausibly and with so light a touch that +even though you may affect to scoff at his dashing improbabilities you +cannot escape their attraction. Indeed Mr. STRAUS'S adventure into +fields hitherto strange to him has been so successful that I am inclined +to ask him to continue cultivating them. + + * * * * * + +Life's Little Contradictions. + +"Now mind, you know, if I kill you it's nothing, but if you kill me, by +Jingo, it's murder." This remark was put by JOHN LEECH into the lips of +a small Special Constable, represented as menacing a gigantic ruffian, +and was not, as you might think, addressed by a Sinn Feiner to a member +of the Royal Irish Constabulary. + + * * * * * + +Messrs. W. H. Smith & Son. + +Mr. Punch wishes to offer the most sincere congratulations to his old +friends on the occasion of the centenary of their firm. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume +159, October 27, 1920, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PUNCH *** + +***** This file should be named 20779.txt or 20779.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/0/7/7/20779/ + +Produced by V. L. Simpson, Jonathan Ingram and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net. 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