diff options
Diffstat (limited to '2830-h/2830-h.htm')
| -rw-r--r-- | 2830-h/2830-h.htm | 2017 |
1 files changed, 2017 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/2830-h/2830-h.htm b/2830-h/2830-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..79fce0d --- /dev/null +++ b/2830-h/2830-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,2017 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII" /> +<title>Reginald</title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + P { margin-top: .75em; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + H1, H2 { + text-align: center; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + } + H3, H4 { + text-align: left; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; + } + BODY{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + TD { vertical-align: top; } + .blkquot {margin-left: 4em; margin-right: 4em;} /* block indent */ + + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + + .pagenum {position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; + color: gray;} + + .citation {vertical-align: super; + font-size: .8em; + text-decoration: none;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> +</head> +<body> +<h2> +<a href="#startoftext">Reginald, by Saki</a> +</h2> +<pre> +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Reginald, by Saki + + +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: Reginald + + +Author: Saki + + + +Release Date: August 30, 2006 [eBook #2830] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK REGINALD*** +</pre> +<p><a name="startoftext"></a></p> +<p>Transcribed from the 1911 Methuen & Co. (third) edition by +David Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org. Proofing by Margaret +and David Price.</p> +<h1>REGINALD</h1> +<p style="text-align: center">BY<br /> +SAKI<br /> +(H. H. MUNRO)</p> +<p style="text-align: center">THIRD EDITION</p> +<p style="text-align: center">METHUEN & CO. LTD.<br /> +36 ESSEX STREET W.C.<br /> +LONDON</p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>First Published</i> . . . +<i>September 1904</i></p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Second Edition</i> . . . <i>July +1905</i></p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>Third Edition</i> . . . +<i>1911</i></p> +<p style="text-align: center"><i>These sketches originally +appeared in the</i> “<i>Westminster Gazette</i>,” +<i>to the courtesy of the Proprietor of which the author is +indebted for permission to republish them</i>.</p> +<p>Contents:</p> +<p>Reginald</p> +<p>Reginald on Christmas Presents</p> +<p>Reginald on the Academy</p> +<p>Reginald at the Theatre</p> +<p>Reginald’s Peace Poem</p> +<p>Reginald’s Choir Treat</p> +<p>Reginald on Worries</p> +<p>Reginald on House-Parties</p> +<p>Reginald at the Carlton</p> +<p>Reginald on Besetting Sins</p> +<p>Reginald’s Drama</p> +<p>Reginald on Tariffs</p> +<p>Reginald’s Christmas Revel</p> +<p>Reginald’s Rubaiyat</p> +<p>The Innocence of Reginald</p> +<h2>REGINALD</h2> +<p>I did it—I who should have known better. I +persuaded Reginald to go to the McKillops’ garden-party +against his will.</p> +<p>We all make mistakes occasionally.</p> +<p>“They know you’re here, and they’ll think it +so funny if you don’t go. And I want particularly to +be in with Mrs. McKillop just now.”</p> +<p>“I know, you want one of her smoke Persian kittens as a +prospective wife for Wumples—or a husband, is +it?” (Reginald has a magnificent scorn for details, +other than sartorial.) “And I am expected to undergo +social martyrdom to suit the connubial +exigencies”—</p> +<p>“Reginald! It’s nothing of the kind, only +I’m sure Mrs. McKillop Would be pleased if I brought +you. Young men of your brilliant attractions are rather at +a premium at her garden-parties.”</p> +<p>“Should be at a premium in heaven,” remarked +Reginald complacently.</p> +<p>“There will be very few of you there, if that is what +you mean. But seriously, there won’t be any great +strain upon your powers of endurance; I promise you that you +shan’t have to play croquet, or talk to the +Archdeacon’s wife, or do anything that is likely to bring +on physical prostration. You can just wear your sweetest +clothes and moderately amiable expression, and eat +chocolate-creams with the appetite of a <i>blasé</i> +parrot. Nothing more is demanded of you.”</p> +<p>Reginald shut his eyes. “There will be the +exhaustingly up-to-date young women who will ask me if I have +seen <i>San Toy</i>; a less progressive grade who will yearn to +hear about the Diamond Jubilee—the historic event, not the +horse. With a little encouragement, they will inquire if I +saw the Allies march into Paris. Why are women so fond of +raking up the past? They’re as bad as tailors, who +invariably remember what you owe them for a suit long after +you’ve ceased to wear it.”</p> +<p>“I’ll order lunch for one o’clock; that will +give you two and a half hours to dress in.”</p> +<p>Reginald puckered his brow into a tortured frown, and I knew +that my point was gained. He was debating what tie would go +with which waistcoat.</p> +<p>Even then I had my misgivings.</p> +<p>* * * * *</p> +<p>During the drive to the McKillops’ Reginald was +possessed with a great peace, which was not wholly to be +accounted for by the fact that he had inveigled his feet into +shoes a size too small for them. I misgave more than ever, +and having once launched Reginald on to the McKillops’ +lawn, I established him near a seductive dish of <i>marrons +glacés</i>, and as far from the Archdeacon’s wife as +possible; as I drifted away to a diplomatic distance I heard with +painful distinctness the eldest Mawkby girl asking him if he had +seen <i>San Toy</i>.</p> +<p>It must have been ten minutes later, not more, and I had been +having <i>quite</i> an enjoyable chat with my hostess, and had +promised to lend her <i>The Eternal City</i> and my recipe for +rabbit mayonnaise, and was just about to offer a kind home for +her third Persian kitten, when I perceived, out of the corner of +my eye, that Reginald was not where I had left him, and that the +<i>marrons glacés</i> were untasted. At the same +moment I became aware that old Colonel Mendoza was essaying to +tell his classic story of how he introduced golf into India, and +that Reginald was in dangerous proximity. There are +occasions when Reginald is caviare to the Colonel.</p> +<p>“When I was at Poona in ’76”—</p> +<p>“My dear Colonel,” purred Reginald, “fancy +admitting such a thing! Such a give-away for one’s +age! I wouldn’t admit being on this planet in +’76.” (Reginald in his wildest lapses into +veracity never admits to being more than twenty-two.)</p> +<p>The Colonel went to the colour of a fig that has attained +great ripeness, and Reginald, ignoring my efforts to intercept +him, glided away to another part of the lawn. I found him a +few minutes later happily engaged in teaching the youngest +Rampage boy the approved theory of mixing absinthe, within full +earshot of his mother. Mrs. Rampage occupies a prominent +place in local Temperance movements.</p> +<p>As soon as I had broken up this unpromising +<i>tête-à-tête</i> and settled Reginald where +he could watch the croquet players losing their tempers, I +wandered off to find my hostess and renew the kitten negotiations +at the point where they had been interrupted. I did not +succeed in running her down at once, and eventually it was Mrs. +McKillop who sought me out, and her conversation was not of +kittens.</p> +<p>“Your cousin is discussing <i>Zaza</i> with the +Archdeacon’s wife; at least, he is discussing, she is +ordering her carriage.”</p> +<p>She spoke in the dry, staccato tone of one who repeats a +French exercise, and I knew that as far as Millie McKillop was +concerned, Wumples was devoted to a lifelong celibacy.</p> +<p>“If you don’t mind,” I said hurriedly, +“I think we’d like our carriage ordered too,” +and I made a forced march in the direction of the +croquet-ground.</p> +<p>I found everyone talking nervously and feverishly of the +weather and the war in South Africa, except Reginald, who was +reclining in a comfortable chair with the dreamy, far-away look +that a volcano might wear just after it had desolated entire +villages. The Archdeacon’s wife was buttoning up her +gloves with a concentrated deliberation that was fearful to +behold. I shall have to treble my subscription to her +Cheerful Sunday Evenings Fund before I dare set foot in her house +again.</p> +<p>At that particular moment the croquet players finished their +game, which had been going on without a symptom of finality +during the whole afternoon. Why, I ask, should it have +stopped precisely when a counter-attraction was so +necessary? Everyone seemed to drift towards the area of +disturbance, of which the chairs of the Archdeacon’s wife +and Reginald formed the storm-centre. Conversation flagged, +and there settled upon the company that expectant hush that +precedes the dawn—when your neighbours don’t happen +to keep poultry.</p> +<p>“What did the Caspian Sea?” asked Reginald, with +appalling suddenness.</p> +<p>There were symptoms of a stampede. The +Archdeacon’s wife looked at me. Kipling or someone +has described somewhere the look a foundered camel gives when the +caravan moves on and leaves it to its fate. The peptonised +reproach in the good lady’s eyes brought the passage +vividly to my mind.</p> +<p>I played my last card.</p> +<p>“Reginald, it’s getting late, and a sea-mist is +coming on.” I knew that the elaborate curl over his +right eyebrow was not guaranteed to survive a sea-mist.</p> +<p>* * * * *</p> +<p>“Never, never again, will I take you to a +garden-party. Never . . . You behaved abominably . . . What +did the Caspian see?”</p> +<p>A shade of genuine regret for misused opportunities passed +over Reginald’s face.</p> +<p>“After all,” he said, “I believe an apricot +tie would have gone better with the lilac waistcoat.”</p> +<h2>REGINALD ON CHRISTMAS PRESENTS</h2> +<p>I wish it to be distinctly understood (said Reginald) that I +don’t want a “George, Prince of Wales” +Prayer-book as a Christmas present. The fact cannot be too +widely known.</p> +<p>There ought (he continued) to be technical education classes +on the science of present-giving. No one seems to have the +faintest notion of what anyone else wants, and the prevalent +ideas on the subject are not creditable to a civilised +community.</p> +<p>There is, for instance, the female relative in the country who +“knows a tie is always useful,” and sends you some +spotted horror that you could only wear in secret or in Tottenham +Court Road. It <i>might</i> have been useful had she kept +it to tie up currant bushes with, when it would have served the +double purpose of supporting the branches and frightening away +the birds—for it is an admitted fact that the ordinary +tomtit of commerce has a sounder æsthetic taste than the +average female relative in the country.</p> +<p>Then there are aunts. They are always a difficult class +to deal with in the matter of presents. The trouble is that +one never catches them really young enough. By the time one +has educated them to an appreciation of the fact that one does +not wear red woollen mittens in the West End, they die, or +quarrel with the family, or do something equally +inconsiderate. That is why the supply of trained aunts is +always so precarious.</p> +<p>There is my Aunt Agatha, <i>par exemple</i>, who sent me a +pair of gloves last Christmas, and even got so far as to choose a +kind that was being worn and had the correct number of +buttons. But—<i>they were nines</i>! I sent +them to a boy whom I hated intimately: he didn’t wear them, +of course, but he could have—that was where the bitterness +of death came in. It was nearly as consoling as sending +white flowers to his funeral. Of course I wrote and told my +aunt that they were the one thing that had been wanting to make +existence blossom like a rose; I am afraid she thought me +frivolous—she comes from the North, where they live in the +fear of Heaven and the Earl of Durham. (Reginald affects an +exhaustive knowledge of things political, which furnishes an +excellent excuse for not discussing them.) Aunts with a +dash of foreign extraction in them are the most satisfactory in +the way of understanding these things; but if you can’t +choose your aunt, it is wisest in the long-run to choose the +present and send her the bill.</p> +<p>Even friends of one’s own set, who might be expected to +know better, have curious delusions on the subject. I am +<i>not</i> collecting copies of the cheaper editions of Omar +Khayyam. I gave the last four that I received to the +lift-boy, and I like to think of him reading them, with +FitzGerald’s notes, to his aged mother. Lift-boys +always have aged mothers; shows such nice feeling on their part, +I think.</p> +<p>Personally, I can’t see where the difficulty in choosing +suitable presents lies. No boy who had brought himself up +properly could fail to appreciate one of those decorative bottles +of liqueurs that are so reverently staged in Morel’s +window—and it wouldn’t in the least matter if one did +get duplicates. And there would always be the supreme +moment of dreadful uncertainty whether it was <i>crême de +menthe</i> or Chartreuse—like the expectant thrill on +seeing your partner’s hand turned up at bridge. +People may say what they like about the decay of Christianity; +the religious system that produced green Chartreuse can never +really die.</p> +<p>And then, of course, there are liqueur glasses, and +crystallised fruits, and tapestry curtains, and heaps of other +necessaries of life that make really sensible presents—not +to speak of luxuries, such as having one’s bills paid, or +getting something quite sweet in the way of jewellery. +Unlike the alleged Good Woman of the Bible, I’m not above +rubies. When found, by the way, she must have been rather a +problem at Christmas-time; nothing short of a blank cheque would +have fitted the situation. Perhaps it’s as well that +she’s died out.</p> +<p>The great charm about me (concluded Reginald) is that I am so +easily pleased. But I draw the line at a “Prince of +Wales” Prayer-book.</p> +<h2>REGINALD ON THE ACADEMY</h2> +<p>“One goes to the Academy in self-defence,” said +Reginald. “It is the one topic one has in common with +the Country Cousins.”</p> +<p>“It is almost a religious observance with them,” +said the Other. “A kind of artistic Mecca, and when +the good ones die they go”—</p> +<p>“To the Chantrey Bequest. The mystery is +<i>what</i> they find to talk about in the country.”</p> +<p>“There are two subjects of conversation in the country: +Servants, and Can fowls be made to pay? The first, I +believe, is compulsory, the second optional.”</p> +<p>“As a function,” resumed Reginald, “the +Academy is a failure.”</p> +<p>“You think it would be tolerable without the +pictures?”</p> +<p>“The pictures are all right, in their way; after all, +one can always <i>look</i> at them if one is bored with +one’s surroundings, or wants to avoid an imminent +acquaintance.”</p> +<p>“Even that doesn’t always save one. There is +the inevitable female whom you met once in Devonshire, or the +Matoppo Hills, or somewhere, who charges up to you with the +remark that it’s funny how one always meets people one +knows at the Academy. Personally, I <i>don’t</i> +think it funny.”</p> +<p>“I suffered in that way just now,” said Reginald +plaintively, “from a woman whose word I had to take that +she had met me last summer in Brittany.”</p> +<p>“I hope you were not too brutal?”</p> +<p>“I merely told her with engaging simplicity that the art +of life was the avoidance of the unattainable.”</p> +<p>“Did she try and work it out on the back of her +catalogue?”</p> +<p>“Not there and then. She murmured something about +being ‘so clever.’ Fancy coming to the Academy +to be clever!”</p> +<p>“To be clever in the afternoon argues that one is dining +nowhere in the evening.”</p> +<p>“Which reminds me that I can’t remember whether I +accepted an invitation from you to dine at Kettner’s +to-night.”</p> +<p>“On the other hand, I can remember with startling +distinctness not having asked you to.”</p> +<p>“So much certainty is unbecoming in the young; so +we’ll consider that settled. What were you talking +about? Oh, pictures. Personally, I rather like them; +they are so refreshingly real and probable, they take one away +from the unrealities of life.”</p> +<p>“One likes to escape from oneself +occasionally.”</p> +<p>“That is the disadvantage of a portrait; as a rule, +one’s bitterest friends can find nothing more to ask than +the faithful unlikeness that goes down to posterity as +oneself. I hate posterity—it’s so fond of +having the last word. Of course, as regards portraits, +there are exceptions.”</p> +<p>“For instance?”</p> +<p>“To die before being painted by Sargent is to go to +heaven prematurely.”</p> +<p>“With the necessary care and impatience, you may avoid +that catastrophe.”</p> +<p>“If you’re going to be rude,” said Reginald, +“I shall dine with you to-morrow night as well. The +chief vice of the Academy,” he continued, “is its +nomenclature. Why, for instance, should an obvious +trout-stream with a palpable rabbit sitting in the foreground be +called ‘an evening dream of unbeclouded peace,’ or +something of that sort?”</p> +<p>“You think,” said the Other, “that a name +should economise description rather than stimulate +imagination?”</p> +<p>“Properly chosen, it should do both. There is my +lady kitten at home, for instance; I’ve called it +Derry.”</p> +<p>“Suggests nothing to my imagination but protracted +sieges and religious animosities. Of course, I don’t +know your kitten”—</p> +<p>“Oh, you’re silly. It’s a sweet name, +and it answers to it—when it wants to. Then, if there +are any unseemly noises in the night, they can be explained +succinctly: Derry and Toms.”</p> +<p>“You might almost charge for the advertisement. +But as applied to pictures, don’t you think your system +would be too subtle, say, for the Country Cousins?”</p> +<p>“Every reformation must have its victims. You +can’t expect the fatted calf to share the enthusiasm of the +angels over the prodigal’s return. Another darling +weakness of the Academy is that none of its luminaries must +‘arrive’ in a hurry. You can see them coming +for years, like a Balkan trouble or a street improvement, and by +the time they have painted a thousand or so square yards of +canvas, their work begins to be recognised.”</p> +<p>“Someone who Must Not be Contradicted said that a man +must be a success by the time he’s thirty, or +never.”</p> +<p>“To have reached thirty,” said Reginald, “is +to have failed in life.”</p> +<h2>REGINALD AT THE THEATRE</h2> +<p>“After all,” said the Duchess vaguely, +“there are certain things you can’t get away +from. Right and wrong, good conduct and moral rectitude, +have certain well-defined limits.”</p> +<p>“So, for the matter of that,” replied Reginald, +“has the Russian Empire. The trouble is that the +limits are not always in the same place.”</p> +<p>Reginald and the Duchess regarded each other with mutual +distrust, tempered by a scientific interest. Reginald +considered that the Duchess had much to learn; in particular, not +to hurry out of the Carlton as though afraid of losing +one’s last ’bus. A woman, he said, who is +careless of disappearances is capable of leaving town before +Goodwood, and dying at the wrong moment of an unfashionable +disease.</p> +<p>The Duchess thought that Reginald did not exceed the ethical +standard which circumstances demanded.</p> +<p>“Of course,” she resumed combatively, +“it’s the prevailing fashion to believe in perpetual +change and mutability, and all that sort of thing, and to say we +are all merely an improved form of primeval ape—of course +you subscribe to that doctrine?”</p> +<p>“I think it decidedly premature; in most people I know +the process is far from complete.”</p> +<p>“And equally of course you are quite +irreligious?”</p> +<p>“Oh, by no means. The fashion just now is a Roman +Catholic frame of mind with an Agnostic conscience: you get the +mediæval picturesqueness of the one with the modern +conveniences of the other.”</p> +<p>The Duchess suppressed a sniff. She was one of those +people who regard the Church of England with patronising +affection, as if it were something that had grown up in their +kitchen garden.</p> +<p>“But there are other things,” she continued, +“which I suppose are to a certain extent sacred even to +you. Patriotism, for instance, and Empire, and Imperial +responsibility, and blood-is-thicker-than-water, and all that +sort of thing.”</p> +<p>Reginald waited for a couple of minutes before replying, while +the Lord of Rimini temporarily monopolised the acoustic +possibilities of the theatre.</p> +<p>“That is the worst of a tragedy,” he observed, +“one can’t always hear oneself talk. Of course +I accept the Imperial idea and the responsibility. After +all, I would just as soon think in Continents as anywhere +else. And some day, when the season is over and we have the +time, you shall explain to me the exact blood-brotherhood and all +that sort of thing that exists between a French Canadian and a +mild Hindoo and a Yorkshireman, for instance.”</p> +<p>“Oh, well, ‘dominion over palm and pine,’ +you know,” quoted the Duchess hopefully; “of course +we mustn’t forget that we’re all part of the great +Anglo-Saxon Empire.”</p> +<p>“Which for its part is rapidly becoming a suburb of +Jerusalem. A very pleasant suburb, I admit, and quite a +charming Jerusalem. But still a suburb.”</p> +<p>“Really, to be told one’s living in a suburb when +one is conscious of spreading the benefits of civilisation all +over the world! Philanthropy—I suppose you will say +<i>that</i> is a comfortable delusion; and yet even you must +admit that whenever want or misery or starvation is known to +exist, however distant or difficult of access, we instantly +organise relief on the most generous scale, and distribute it, if +need be, to the uttermost ends of the earth.”</p> +<p>The Duchess paused, with a sense of ultimate triumph. +She had made the same observation at a drawing-room meeting, and +it had been extremely well received.</p> +<p>“I wonder,” said Reginald, “if you have ever +walked down the Embankment on a winter night?”</p> +<p>“Gracious, no, child! Why do you ask?”</p> +<p>“I didn’t; I only wondered. And even your +philanthropy, practised in a world where everything is based on +competition, must have a debit as well as a credit account. +The young ravens cry for food.”</p> +<p>“And are fed.”</p> +<p>“Exactly. Which presupposes that something else is +fed upon.”</p> +<p>“Oh, you’re simply exasperating. +You’ve been reading Nietzsche till you haven’t got +any sense of moral proportion left. May I ask if you are +governed by <i>any</i> laws of conduct whatever?”</p> +<p>“There are certain fixed rules that one observes for +one’s own comfort. For instance, never be flippantly +rude to any inoffensive grey-bearded stranger that you may meet +in pine forests or hotel smoking-rooms on the Continent. It +always turns out to be the King of Sweden.”</p> +<p>“The restraint must be dreadfully irksome to you. +When I was younger, boys of your age used to be nice and +innocent.”</p> +<p>“Now we are only nice. One must specialise in +these days. Which reminds me of the man I read of in some +sacred book who was given a choice of what he most desired. +And because he didn’t ask for titles and honours and +dignities, but only for immense wealth, these other things came +to him also.”</p> +<p>“I am sure you didn’t read about him in any sacred +book.”</p> +<p>“Yes; I fancy you will find him in Debrett.”</p> +<h2>REGINALD’S PEACE POEM</h2> +<p>“I’m writing a poem on Peace,” said +Reginald, emerging from a sweeping operation through a tin of +mixed biscuits, in whose depths a macaroon or two might yet be +lurking.</p> +<p>“Something of the kind seems to have been attempted +already,” said the Other.</p> +<p>“Oh, I know; but I may never have the chance +again. Besides, I’ve got a new fountain pen. I +don’t pretend to have gone on any very original lines; in +writing about Peace the thing is to say what everybody else is +saying, only to say it better. It begins with the usual +ornithological emotion—</p> +<blockquote><p>‘When the widgeon westward winging<br /> +Heard the folk Vereeniginging,<br /> +Heard the shouting and the singing’”—</p> +</blockquote> +<p>“Vereeniginging is good, but why widgeon?”</p> +<p>“Why not? Anything that winged westward would +naturally begin with a <i>w</i>.”</p> +<p>“Need it wing westward?”</p> +<p>“The bird must go somewhere. You wouldn’t +have it hang around and look foolish. Then I’ve +brought in something about the heedless hartebeest galloping over +the deserted veldt.”</p> +<p>“Of course you know it’s practically extinct in +those regions?”</p> +<p>“I can’t help <i>that</i>, it gallops so +nicely. I make it have all sorts of unexpected +yearnings—</p> +<blockquote><p>‘Mother, may I go and maffick,<br /> +Tear around and hinder traffic?’</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Of course you’ll say there would be no traffic worth +bothering about on the bare and sun-scorched veldt, but +there’s no other word that rhymes with maffick.”</p> +<p>“Seraphic?”</p> +<p>Reginald considered. “It might do, but I’ve +got a lot about angels later on. You must have angels in a +Peace poem; I know dreadfully little about their +habits.”</p> +<p>“They can do unexpected things, like the +hartebeest.”</p> +<p>“Of course. Then I turn on London, the City of +Dreadful Nocturnes, resonant with hymns of joy and +thanksgiving—</p> +<blockquote><p>‘And the sleeper, eye unlidding,<br /> +Heard a voice for ever bidding<br /> +Much farewell to Dolly Gray;<br /> +Turning weary on his truckle-<br /> +Bed he heard the honey-suckle<br /> +Lauded in apiarian lay.’</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Longfellow at his best wrote nothing like that.”</p> +<p>“I agree with you.”</p> +<p>“I wish you wouldn’t. I’ve a sweet +temper, but I can’t stand being agreed with. And +I’m so worried about the aasvogel.”</p> +<p>Reginald stared dismally at the biscuit-tin, which now +presented an unattractive array of rejected cracknels.</p> +<p>“I believe,” he murmured, “if I could find a +woman with an unsatisfied craving for cracknels, I should marry +her.”</p> +<p>“What is the tragedy of the aasvogel?” asked the +Other sympathetically.</p> +<p>“Oh, simply that there’s no rhyme for it. I +thought about it all the time I was dressing—it’s +dreadfully bad for one to think whilst one’s +dressing—and all lunch-time, and I’m still hung up +over it. I feel like those unfortunate automobilists who +achieve an unenviable motoriety by coming to a hopeless stop with +their cars in the most crowded thoroughfares. I’m +afraid I shall have to drop the aasvogel, and it did give such +lovely local colour to the thing.”</p> +<p>“Still you’ve got the heedless +hartebeest.”</p> +<p>“And quite a decorative bit of moral +admonition—when you’ve worried the meaning +out—</p> +<blockquote><p>‘Cease, War, thy bubbling madness that the +wine shares,<br /> +And bid thy legions turn their swords to mine shares.’</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Mine shares seems to fit the case better than +ploughshares. There’s lots more about the blessings +of Peace, shall I go on reading it?”</p> +<p>“If I must make a choice, I think I would rather they +went on with the war.”</p> +<h2>REGINALD’S CHOIR TREAT</h2> +<p>“Never,” wrote Reginald to his most darling +friend, “be a pioneer. It’s the Early Christian +that gets the fattest lion.”</p> +<p>Reginald, in his way, was a pioneer.</p> +<p>None of the rest of his family had anything approaching Titian +hair or a sense of humour, and they used primroses as a table +decoration.</p> +<p>It follows that they never understood Reginald, who came down +late to breakfast, and nibbled toast, and said disrespectful +things about the universe. The family ate porridge, and +believed in everything, even the weather forecast.</p> +<p>Therefore the family was relieved when the vicar’s +daughter undertook the reformation of Reginald. Her name +was Amabel; it was the vicar’s one extravagance. +Amabel was accounted a beauty and intellectually gifted; she +never played tennis, and was reputed to have read +Maeterlinck’s <i>Life of the Bee</i>. If you abstain +from tennis <i>and</i> read Maeterlinck in a small country +village, you are of necessity intellectual. Also she had +been twice to Fécamp to pick up a good French accent from +the Americans staying there; consequently she had a knowledge of +the world which might be considered useful in dealings with a +worldling.</p> +<p>Hence the congratulations in the family when Amabel undertook +the reformation of its wayward member.</p> +<p>Amabel commenced operations by asking her unsuspecting pupil +to tea in the vicarage garden; she believed in the healthy +influence of natural surroundings, never having been in Sicily, +where things are different.</p> +<p>And like every woman who has ever preached repentance to +unregenerate youth, she dwelt on the sin of an empty life, which +always seems so much more scandalous in the country, where people +rise early to see if a new strawberry has happened during the +night.</p> +<p>Reginald recalled the lilies of the field, “which simply +sat and looked beautiful, and defied competition.”</p> +<p>“But that is not an example for us to follow,” +gasped Amabel.</p> +<p>“Unfortunately, we can’t afford to. You +don’t know what a world of trouble I take in trying to +rival the lilies in their artistic simplicity.”</p> +<p>“You are really indecently vain of your +appearance. A good life is infinitely preferable to good +looks.”</p> +<p>“You agree with me that the two are incompatible. +I always say beauty is only sin deep.”</p> +<p>Amabel began to realise that the battle is not always to the +strong-minded. With the immemorial resource of her sex, she +abandoned the frontal attack, and laid stress on her unassisted +labours in parish work, her mental loneliness, her +discouragements—and at the right moment she produced +strawberries and cream. Reginald was obviously affected by +the latter, and when his preceptress suggested that he might +begin the strenuous life by helping her to supervise the annual +outing of the bucolic infants who composed the local choir, his +eyes shone with the dangerous enthusiasm of a convert.</p> +<p>Reginald entered on the strenuous life alone, as far as Amabel +was concerned. The most virtuous women are not proof +against damp grass, and Amabel kept her bed with a cold. +Reginald called it a dispensation; it had been the dream of his +life to stage-manage a choir outing. With strategic +insight, he led his shy, bullet-headed charges to the nearest +woodland stream and allowed them to bathe; then he seated himself +on their discarded garments and discoursed on their immediate +future, which, he decreed, was to embrace a Bacchanalian +procession through the village. Forethought had provided +the occasion with a supply of tin whistles, but the introduction +of a he-goat from a neighbouring orchard was a brilliant +afterthought. Properly, Reginald explained, there should +have been an outfit of panther skins; as it was, those who had +spotted handkerchiefs were allowed to wear them, which they did +with thankfulness. Reginald recognised the impossibility, +in the time at his disposal, of teaching his shivering neophytes +a chant in honour of Bacchus, so he started them off with a more +familiar, if less appropriate, temperance hymn. After all, +he said, it is the spirit of the thing that counts. +Following the etiquette of dramatic authors on first nights, he +remained discreetly in the background while the procession, with +extreme diffidence and the goat, wound its way lugubriously +towards the village. The singing had died down long before +the main street was reached, but the miserable wailing of pipes +brought the inhabitants to their doors. Reginald said he +had seen something like it in pictures; the villagers had seen +nothing like it in their lives, and remarked as much freely.</p> +<p>Reginald’s family never forgave him. They had no +sense of humour.</p> +<h2>REGINALD ON WORRIES</h2> +<p>I have (said Reginald) an aunt who worries. She’s +not really an aunt—a sort of amateur one, and they +aren’t really worries. She is a social success, and +has no domestic tragedies worth speaking of, so she adopts any +decorative sorrows that are going, myself included. In that +way she’s the antithesis, or whatever you call it, to those +sweet, uncomplaining women one knows who have seen trouble, and +worn blinkers ever since. Of course, one just loves them +for it, but I must confess they make me uncomfy; they remind one +so of a duck that goes flapping about with forced cheerfulness +long after its head’s been cut off. Ducks have +<i>no</i> repose. Now, my aunt has a shade of hair that +suits her, and a cook who quarrels with the other servants, which +is always a hopeful sign, and a conscience that’s absentee +for about eleven months of the year, and only turns up at Lent to +annoy her husband’s people, who are considerably Lower than +the angels, so to speak: with all these natural +advantages—she says her particular tint of bronze is a +natural advantage, and there can be no two opinions as to the +advantage—of course she has to send out for her +afflictions, like those restaurants where they haven’t got +a licence. The system has this advantage, that you can fit +your unhappinesses in with your other engagements, whereas real +worries have a way of arriving at meal-times, and when +you’re dressing, or other solemn moments. I knew a +canary once that had been trying for months and years to hatch +out a family, and everyone looked upon it as a blameless +infatuation, like the sale of Delagoa Bay, which would be an +annual loss to the Press agencies if it ever came to pass; and +one day the bird really did bring it off, in the middle of family +prayers. I say the middle, but it was also the end: you +can’t go on being thankful for daily bread when you are +wondering what on earth very new canaries expect to be fed +on.</p> +<p>At present she’s rather in a Balkan state of mind about +the treatment of the Jews in Roumania. Personally, I think +the Jews have estimable qualities; they’re so kind to their +poor—and to our rich. I daresay in Roumania the cost +of living beyond one’s income isn’t so great. +Over here the trouble is that so many people who have money to +throw about seem to have such vague ideas where to throw +it. That fund, for instance, to relieve the victims of +sudden disasters—what is a sudden disaster? +There’s Marion Mulciber, who <i>would</i> think she could +play bridge, just as she would think she could ride down a hill +on a bicycle; on that occasion she went to a hospital, now +she’s gone into a Sisterhood—lost all she had, you +know, and gave the rest to Heaven. Still, you can’t +call it a sudden calamity; <i>that</i> occurred when poor dear +Marion was born. The doctors said at the time that she +couldn’t live more than a fortnight, and she’s been +trying ever since to see if she could. Women are so +opinionated.</p> +<p>And then there’s the Education Question—not that I +can see that there’s anything to worry about in that +direction. To my mind, education is an absurdly over-rated +affair. At least, one never took it very seriously at +school, where everything was done to bring it prominently under +one’s notice. Anything that is worth knowing one +practically teaches oneself, and the rest obtrudes itself sooner +or later. The reason one’s elders know so +comparatively little is because they have to unlearn so much that +they acquired by way of education before we were born. Of +course I’m a believer in Nature-study; as I said to Lady +Beauwhistle, if you want a lesson in elaborate artificiality, +just watch the studied unconcern of a Persian cat entering a +crowded salon, and then go and practise it for a fortnight. +The Beauwhistles weren’t born in the Purple, you know, but +they’re getting there on the instalment system—so +much down, and the rest when you feel like it. They have +kind hearts, and they never forget birthdays. I forget what +he was, something in the City, where the patriotism comes from; +and she—oh, well, her frocks are built in Paris, but she +wears them with a strong English accent. So public-spirited +of her. I think she must have been very strictly brought +up, she’s so desperately anxious to do the wrong thing +correctly. Not that it really matters nowadays, as I told +her: I know some perfectly virtuous people who are received +everywhere.</p> +<h2>REGINALD ON HOUSE-PARTIES</h2> +<p>The drawback is, one never really <i>knows</i> one’s +hosts and hostesses. One gets to know their fox-terriers +and their chrysanthemums, and whether the story about the go-cart +can be turned loose in the drawing-room, or must be told +privately to each member of the party, for fear of shocking +public opinion; but one’s host and hostess are a sort of +human hinterland that one never has the time to explore.</p> +<p>There was a fellow I stayed with once in Warwickshire who +farmed his own land, but was otherwise quite steady. Should +never have suspected him of having a soul, yet not very long +afterwards he eloped with a lion-tamer’s widow and set up +as a golf-instructor somewhere on the Persian Gulf; dreadfully +immoral, of course, because he was only an indifferent player, +but still, it showed imagination. His wife was really to be +pitied, because he had been the only person in the house who +understood how to manage the cook’s temper, and now she has +to put “D.V.” on her dinner invitations. Still, +that’s better than a domestic scandal; a woman who leaves +her cook never wholly recovers her position in Society.</p> +<p>I suppose the same thing holds good with the hosts; they +seldom have more than a superficial acquaintance with their +guests, and so often just when they do get to know you a bit +better, they leave off knowing you altogether. There was +<i>rather</i> a breath of winter in the air when I left those +Dorsetshire people. You see, they had asked me down to +shoot, and I’m not particularly immense at that sort of +thing. There’s such a deadly sameness about +partridges; when you’ve missed one, you’ve missed the +lot—at least, that’s been my experience. And +they tried to rag me in the smoking-room about not being able to +hit a bird at five yards, a sort of bovine ragging that suggested +cows buzzing round a gadfly and thinking they were teasing +it. So I got up the next morning at early dawn—I know +it was dawn, because there were lark-noises in the sky, and the +grass looked as if it had been left out all night—and +hunted up the most conspicuous thing in the bird line that I +could find, and measured the distance, as nearly as it would let +me, and shot away all I knew. They said afterwards that it +was a tame bird; that’s simply <i>silly</i>, because it was +awfully wild at the first few shots. Afterwards it quieted +down a bit, and when its legs had stopped waving farewells to the +landscape I got a gardener-boy to drag it into the hall, where +everybody must see it on their way to the breakfast-room. I +breakfasted upstairs myself. I gathered afterwards that the +meal was tinged with a very unchristian spirit. I suppose +it’s unlucky to bring peacock’s feathers into a +house; anyway, there was a blue-pencilly look in my +hostess’s eye when I took my departure.</p> +<p>Some hostesses, of course, will forgive anything, even unto +pavonicide (is there such a word?), as long as one is +nice-looking and sufficiently unusual to counterbalance some of +the others; and there <i>are</i> others—the girl, for +instance, who reads Meredith, and appears at meals with unnatural +punctuality in a frock that’s made at home and repented at +leisure. She eventually finds her way to India and gets +married, and comes home to admire the Royal Academy, and to +imagine that an indifferent prawn curry is for ever an effective +substitute for all that we have been taught to believe is +luncheon. It’s then that she is really dangerous; but +at her worst she is never quite so bad as the woman who fires +<i>Exchange and Mart</i> questions at you without the least +provocation. Imagine the other day, just when I was doing +my best to understand half the things I was saying, being asked +by one of those seekers after country home truths how many fowls +she could keep in a run ten feet by six, or whatever it +was! I told her whole crowds, as long as she kept the door +shut, and the idea didn’t seem to have struck her before; +at least, she brooded over it for the rest of dinner.</p> +<p>Of course, as I say, one never really <i>knows</i> one’s +ground, and one may make mistakes occasionally. But then +one’s mistakes sometimes turn out assets in the long-run: +if we had never bungled away our American colonies we might never +have had the boy from the States to teach us how to wear our hair +and cut our clothes, and we must get our ideas from somewhere, I +suppose. Even the Hooligan was probably invented in China +centuries before we thought of him. England must wake up, +as the Duke of Devonshire said the other day; wasn’t +it? Oh, well, it was someone else. Not that I ever +indulge in despair about the Future; there always have been men +who have gone about despairing of the Future, and when the Future +arrives it says nice, superior things about their having acted +according to their lights. It is dreadful to think that +other people’s grandchildren may one day rise up and call +one amiable.</p> +<p>There are moments when one sympathises with Herod.</p> +<h2>REGINALD AT THE CARLTON</h2> +<p>“A most variable climate,” said the Duchess; +“and how unfortunate that we should have had that very cold +weather at a time when coal was so dear! So distressing for +the poor.”</p> +<p>“Someone has observed that Providence is always on the +side of the big dividends,” remarked Reginald.</p> +<p>The Duchess ate an anchovy in a shocked manner; she was +sufficiently old-fashioned to dislike irreverence towards +dividends.</p> +<p>Reginald had left the selection of a feeding-ground to her +womanly intuition, but he chose the wine himself, knowing that +womanly intuition stops short at claret. A woman will +cheerfully choose husbands for her less attractive friends, or +take sides in a political controversy without the least knowledge +of the issues involved—but no woman ever cheerfully chose a +claret.</p> +<p>“Hors d’œuvres have always a pathetic +interest for me,” said Reginald: “they remind me of +one’s childhood that one goes through, wondering what the +next course is going to be like—and during the rest of the +menu one wishes one had eaten more of the hors +d’œuvres. Don’t you love watching the +different ways people have of entering a restaurant? There +is the woman who races in as though her whole scheme of life were +held together by a one-pin despotism which might abdicate its +functions at any moment; it’s really a relief to see her +reach her chair in safety. Then there are the people who +troop in with an-unpleasant-duty-to-perform air, as if they were +angels of Death entering a plague city. You see that type +of Briton very much in hotels abroad. And nowadays there +are always the Johannesbourgeois, who bring a Cape-to-Cairo +atmosphere with them—what may be called the Rand Manner, I +suppose.”</p> +<p>“Talking about hotels abroad,” said the Duchess, +“I am preparing notes for a lecture at the Club on the +educational effects of modern travel, dealing chiefly with the +moral side of the question. I was talking to Lady +Beauwhistle’s aunt the other day—she’s just +come back from Paris, you know. Such a sweet +woman”—</p> +<p>“And so silly. In these days of the over-education +of women she’s quite refreshing. They say some people +went through the siege of Paris without knowing that France and +Germany were at war; but the Beauwhistle aunt is credited with +having passed the whole winter in Paris under the impression that +the Humberts were a kind of bicycle . . . Isn’t there a +bishop or somebody who believes we shall meet all the animals we +have known on earth in another world? How frightfully +embarrassing to meet a whole shoal of whitebait you had last +known at Prince’s! I’m sure in my nervousness I +should talk of nothing but lemons. Still, I daresay they +would be quite as offended if one hadn’t eaten them. +I know if I were served up at a cannibal feast I should be +dreadfully annoyed if anyone found fault with me for not being +tender enough, or having been kept too long.”</p> +<p>“My idea about the lecture,” resumed the Duchess +hurriedly, “is to inquire whether promiscuous Continental +travel doesn’t tend to weaken the moral fibre of the social +conscience. There are people one knows, quite nice people +when they are in England, who are so <i>different</i> when they +are anywhere the other side of the Channel.”</p> +<p>“The people with what I call Tauchnitz morals,” +observed Reginald. “On the whole, I think they get +the best of two very desirable worlds. And, after all, they +charge so much for excess luggage on some of those foreign lines +that it’s really an economy to leave one’s reputation +behind one occasionally.”</p> +<p>“A scandal, my dear Reginald, is as much to be avoided +at Monaco or any of those places as at Exeter, let us +say.”</p> +<p>“Scandal, my dear Irene—I may call you Irene, +mayn’t I?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know that you have known me long enough +for that.”</p> +<p>“I’ve known you longer than your god-parents had +when they took the liberty of calling you that name. +Scandal is merely the compassionate allowance which the gay make +to the humdrum. Think how many blameless lives are +brightened by the blazing indiscretions of other people. +Tell me, who is the woman with the old lace at the table on our +left? Oh, <i>that</i> doesn’t matter; it’s +quite the thing nowadays to stare at people as if they were +yearlings at Tattersall’s.”</p> +<p>“Mrs. Spelvexit? Quite a charming woman; separated +from her husband”—</p> +<p>“Incompatibility of income?”</p> +<p>“Oh, nothing of that sort. By miles of frozen +ocean, I was going to say. He explores ice-floes and +studies the movements of herrings, and has written a most +interesting book on the home-life of the Esquimaux; but naturally +he has very little home-life of his own.”</p> +<p>“A husband who comes home with the Gulf Stream +<i>would</i> be rather a tied-up asset.”</p> +<p>“His wife is exceedingly sensible about it. She +collects postage-stamps. Such a resource. Those +people with her are the Whimples, very old acquaintances of mine; +they’re always having trouble, poor things.”</p> +<p>“Trouble is not one of those fancies you can take up and +drop at any moment; it’s like a grouse-moor or the +opium-habit—once you start it you’ve got to keep it +up.”</p> +<p>“Their eldest son was such a disappointment to them; +they wanted him to be a linguist, and spent no end of money on +having him taught to speak—oh, dozens of +languages!—and then he became a Trappist monk. And +the youngest, who was intended for the American marriage market, +has developed political tendencies, and writes pamphlets about +the housing of the poor. Of course it’s a most +important question, and I devote a good deal of time to it myself +in the mornings; but, as Laura Whimple says, it’s as well +to have an establishment of one’s own before agitating +about other people’s. She feels it very keenly, but +she always maintains a cheerful appetite, which I think is so +unselfish of her.”</p> +<p>“There are different ways of taking +disappointment. There was a girl I knew who nursed a +wealthy uncle through a long illness, borne by her with Christian +fortitude, and then he died and left his money to a swine-fever +hospital. She found she’d about cleared stock in +fortitude by that time, and now she gives drawing-room +recitations. That’s what I call being +vindictive.”</p> +<p>“Life is full of its disappointments,” observed +the Duchess, “and I suppose the art of being happy is to +disguise them as illusions. But that, my dear Reginald, +becomes more difficult as one grows older.”</p> +<p>“I think it’s more generally practised than you +imagine. The young have aspirations that never come to +pass, the old have reminiscences of what never happened. +It’s only the middle-aged who are really conscious of their +limitations—that is why one should be so patient with +them. But one never is.”</p> +<p>“After all,” said the Duchess, “the +disillusions of life may depend on our way of assessing it. +In the minds of those who come after us we may be remembered for +qualities and successes which we quite left out of the +reckoning.”</p> +<p>“It’s not always safe to depend on the +commemorative tendencies of those who come after us. There +may have been disillusionments in the lives of the mediæval +saints, but they would scarcely have been better pleased if they +could have foreseen that their names would be associated nowadays +chiefly with racehorses and the cheaper clarets. And now, +if you can tear yourself away from the salted almonds, +we’ll go and have coffee under the palms that are so +necessary for our discomfort.”</p> +<h2>REGINALD ON BESETTING SINS: THE WOMAN WHO TOLD THE TRUTH</h2> +<p>There was once (said Reginald) a woman who told the +truth. Not all at once, of course, but the habit grew upon +her gradually, like lichen on an apparently healthy tree. +She had no children—otherwise it might have been +different. It began with little things, for no particular +reason except that her life was a rather empty one, and it is so +easy to slip into the habit of telling the truth in little +matters. And then it became difficult to draw the line at +more important things, until at last she took to telling the +truth about her age; she said she was forty-two and five +months—by that time, you see, she was veracious even to +months. It may have been pleasing to the angels, but her +elder sister was not gratified. On the Woman’s +birthday, instead of the opera-tickets which she had hoped for, +her sister gave her a view of Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives, +which is not quite the same thing. The revenge of an elder +sister may be long in coming, but, like a South-Eastern express, +it arrives in its own good time.</p> +<p>The friends of the Woman tried to dissuade her from +over-indulgence in the practice, but she said she was wedded to +the truth; whereupon it was remarked that it was scarcely logical +to be so much together in public. (No really provident +woman lunches regularly with her husband if she wishes to burst +upon him as a revelation at dinner. He must have time to +forget; an afternoon is not enough.) And after a while her +friends began to thin out in patches. Her passion for the +truth was not compatible with a large visiting-list. For +instance, she told Miriam Klopstock <i>exactly</i> how she looked +at the Ilexes’ ball. Certainly Miriam had asked for +her candid opinion, but the Woman prayed in church every Sunday +for peace in our time, and it was not consistent.</p> +<p>It was unfortunate, everyone agreed, that she had no family; +with a child or two in the house, there is an unconscious check +upon too free an indulgence in the truth. Children are +given us to discourage our better emotions. That is why the +stage, with all its efforts, can never be as artificial as life; +even in an Ibsen drama one must reveal to the audience things +that one would suppress before the children or servants.</p> +<p>Fate may have ordained the truth-telling from the commencement +and should justly bear some of the blame; but in having no +children the Woman was guilty, at least, of contributory +negligence.</p> +<p>Little by little she felt she was becoming a slave to what had +once been merely an idle propensity; and one day she knew. +Every woman tells ninety per cent. of the truth to her +dressmaker; the other ten per cent. is the irreducible minimum of +deception beyond which no self-respecting client +trespasses. Madame Draga’s establishment was a +meeting-ground for naked truths and over-dressed fictions, and it +was here, the Woman felt, that she might make a final effort to +recall the artless mendacity of past days. Madame herself +was in an inspiring mood, with the air of a sphinx who knew all +things and preferred to forget most of them. As a War +Minister she might have been celebrated, but she was content to +be merely rich.</p> +<p>“If I take it in here, and—Miss Howard, one +moment, if you please—and there, and round like +this—so—I really think you will find it quite +easy.”</p> +<p>The Woman hesitated; it seemed to require such a small effort +to simply acquiesce in Madame’s views. But habit had +become too strong. “I’m afraid,” she +faltered, “it’s just the least little bit in the +world too”—</p> +<p>And by that least little bit she measured the deeps and +eternities of her thraldom to fact. Madame was not best +pleased at being contradicted on a professional matter, and when +Madame lost her temper you usually found it afterwards in the +bill.</p> +<p>And at last the dreadful thing came, as the Woman had foreseen +all along that it must; it was one of those paltry little truths +with which she harried her waking hours. On a raw Wednesday +morning, in a few ill-chosen words, she told the cook that she +drank. She remembered the scene afterwards as vividly as +though it had been painted in her mind by Abbey. The cook +was a good cook, as cooks go; and as cooks go she went.</p> +<p>Miriam Klopstock came to lunch the next day. Women and +elephants never forget an injury.</p> +<h2>REGINALD’S DRAMA</h2> +<p>Reginald closed his eyes with the elaborate weariness of one +who has rather nice eyelashes and thinks it useless to conceal +the fact.</p> +<p>“One of these days,” he said, “I shall write +a really great drama. No one will understand the drift of +it, but everyone will go back to their homes with a vague feeling +of dissatisfaction with their lives and surroundings. Then +they will put up new wall-papers and forget.”</p> +<p>“But how about those that have oak panelling all over +the house?” said the Other.</p> +<p>“They can always put down new stair-carpets,” +pursued Reginald, “and, anyhow, I’m not responsible +for the audience having a happy ending. The play would be +quite sufficient strain on one’s energies. I should +get a bishop to say it was immoral and beautiful—no +dramatist has thought of that before, and everyone would come to +condemn the bishop, and they would stay on out of sheer +nervousness. After all, it requires a great deal of moral +courage to leave in a marked manner in the middle of the second +act, when your carriage isn’t ordered till twelve. +And it would commence with wolves worrying something on a lonely +waste—you wouldn’t see them, of course; but you would +hear them snarling and scrunching, and I should arrange to have a +wolfy fragrance suggested across the footlights. It would +look so well on the programmes, ‘Wolves in the first act, +by Jamrach.’ And old Lady Whortleberry, who never +misses a first night, would scream. She’s always been +nervous since she lost her first husband. He died quite +abruptly while watching a county cricket match; two and a half +inches of rain had fallen for seven runs, and it was supposed +that the excitement killed him. Anyhow, it gave her quite a +shock; it was the first husband she’d lost, you know, and +now she always screams if anything thrilling happens too soon +after dinner. And after the audience had heard the +Whortleberry scream the thing would be fairly +launched.”</p> +<p>“And the plot?”</p> +<p>“The plot,” said Reginald, “would be one of +those little everyday tragedies that one sees going on all round +one. In my mind’s eye there is the case of the +Mudge-Jervises, which in an unpretentious way has quite an Enoch +Arden intensity underlying it. They’d only been +married some eighteen months or so, and circumstances had +prevented their seeing much of each other. With him there +was always a foursome or something that had to be played and +replayed in different parts of the country, and she went in for +slumming quite as seriously as if it was a sport. With her, +I suppose, it was. She belonged to the Guild of the Poor +Dear Souls, and they hold the record for having nearly reformed a +washerwoman. No one has ever really reformed a washerwoman, +and that is why the competition is so keen. You can rescue +charwomen by fifties with a little tea and personal magnetism, +but with washerwomen it’s different; wages are too +high. This particular laundress, who came from Bermondsey +or some such place, was really rather a hopeful venture, and they +thought at last that she might be safely put in the window as a +specimen of successful work. So they had her paraded at a +drawing-room “At Home” at Agatha Camelford’s; +it was sheer bad luck that some liqueur chocolates had been +turned loose by mistake among the refreshments—really +liqueur chocolates, with very little chocolate. And of +course the old soul found them out, and cornered the entire +stock. It was like finding a whelk-stall in a desert, as +she afterwards partially expressed herself. When the +liqueurs began to take effect, she started to give them +imitations of farmyard animals as they know them in +Bermondsey. She began with a dancing bear, and you know +Agatha doesn’t approve of dancing, except at Buckingham +Palace under proper supervision. And then she got up on the +piano and gave them an organ monkey; I gather she went in for +realism rather than a Maeterlinckian treatment of the +subject. Finally, she fell into the piano and said she was +a parrot in a cage, and for an impromptu performance I believe +she was very word-perfect; no one had heard anything like it, +except Baroness Boobelstein who has attended sittings of the +Austrian Reichsrath. Agatha is trying the Rest-cure at +Buxton.”</p> +<p>“But the tragedy?”</p> +<p>“Oh, the Mudge-Jervises. Well, they were getting +along quite happily, and their married life was one continuous +exchange of picture-postcards; and then one day they were thrown +together on some neutral ground where foursomes and washerwomen +overlapped, and discovered that they were hopelessly divided on +the Fiscal Question. They have thought it best to separate, +and she is to have the custody of the Persian kittens for nine +months in the year—they go back to him for the winter, when +she is abroad. There you have the material for a tragedy +drawn straight from life—and the piece could be called +‘The Price They Paid for Empire.’ And of course +one would have to work in studies of the struggle of hereditary +tendency against environment and all that sort of thing. +The woman’s father could have been an Envoy to some of the +smaller German Courts; that’s where she’d get her +passion for visiting the poor, in spite of the most careful +upbringing. <i>C’est le premier pa qui compte</i>, as +the cuckoo said when it swallowed its foster-parent. That, +I think, is quite clever.”</p> +<p>“And the wolves?”</p> +<p>“Oh, the wolves would be a sort of elusive undercurrent +in the background that would never be satisfactorily +explained. After all, life teems with things that have no +earthly reason. And whenever the characters could think of +nothing brilliant to say about marriage or the War Office, they +could open a window and listen to the howling of the +wolves. But that would be very seldom.”</p> +<h2>REGINALD ON TARIFFS</h2> +<p>I’m not going to discuss the Fiscal Question (said +Reginald); I wish to be original. At the same time, I think +one suffers more than one realises from the system of free +imports. I should like, for instance, a really prohibitive +duty put upon the partner who declares on a weak red suit and +hopes for the best. Even a free outlet for compressed +verbiage doesn’t balance matters. And I think there +should be a sort of bounty-fed export (is that the right +expression?) of the people who impress on you that you ought to +take life seriously. There are only two classes that really +can’t help taking life seriously—schoolgirls of +thirteen and Hohenzollerns; they might be exempt. Albanians +come under another heading; they take life whenever they get the +opportunity. The one Albanian that I was ever on speaking +terms with was rather a decadent example. He was a +Christian and a grocer, and I don’t fancy he had ever +killed anybody. I didn’t like to question him on the +subject—that showed my delicacy. Mrs. Nicorax says I +have no delicacy; she hasn’t forgiven me about the +mice. You see, when I was staying down there, a mouse used +to cake-walk about my room half the night, and none of their +silly patent traps seemed to take its fancy as a bijou residence, +so I determined to appeal to the better side of it—which +with mice is the inside. So I called it Percy, and put +little delicacies down near its hole every night, and that kept +it quiet while I read Max Nordau’s <i>Degeneration</i> and +other reproving literature, and went to sleep. And now she +says there is a whole colony of mice in that room.</p> +<p>That isn’t where the indelicacy comes in. She went +out riding with me, which was entirely her own suggestion, and as +we were coming home through some meadows she made a quite +unnecessary attempt to see if her pony would jump a rather messy +sort of brook that was there. It wouldn’t. It +went with her as far as the water’s edge, and from that +point Mrs. Nicorax went on alone. Of course I had to fish +her out from the bank, and my riding-breeches are not cut with a +view to salmon-fishing—it’s rather an art even to +ride in them. Her habit-skirt was one of those open +questions that need not be adhered to in emergencies, and on this +occasion it remained behind in some water-weeds. She wanted +me to fish about for that too, but I felt I had done enough +Pharaoh’s daughter business for an October afternoon, and I +was beginning to want my tea. So I bundled her up on to her +pony, and gave her a lead towards home as fast as I cared to +go. What with the wet and the unusual responsibility, her +abridged costume did not stand the pace particularly well, and +she got quite querulous when I shouted back that I had no pins +with me—and no string. Some women expect so much from +a fellow. When we got into the drive she wanted to go up +the back way to the stables, but the ponies <i>know</i> they +always get sugar at the front door, and I never attempt to hold a +pulling pony; as for Mrs. Nicorax, it took her all she knew to +keep a firm hand on her seceding garments, which, as her maid +remarked afterwards, were more <i>tout</i> than +<i>ensemble</i>. Of course nearly the whole house-party +were out on the lawn watching the sunset—the only day this +month that it’s occurred to the sun to show itself, as Mrs. +Nic. viciously observed—and I shall never forget the +expression on her husband’s face as we pulled up. +“My darling, this is too much!” was his first spoken +comment; taking into consideration the state of her toilet, it +was the most brilliant thing I had ever heard him say, and I went +into the library to be alone and scream. Mrs. Nicorax says +I have no delicacy.</p> +<p>Talking about tariffs, the lift-boy, who reads extensively +between the landings, says it won’t do to tax raw +commodities. What, exactly, is a raw commodity? Mrs. +Van Challaby says men are raw commodities till you marry them; +after they’ve struck Mrs. Van C., I can fancy they pretty +soon become a finished article. Certainly she’s had a +good deal of experience to support her opinion. She lost +one husband in a railway accident, and mislaid another in the +Divorce Court, and the current one has just got himself squeezed +in a Beef Trust. “What was he doing in a Beef Trust, +anyway?” she asked tearfully, and I suggested that perhaps +he had an unhappy home. I only said it for the sake of +making conversation; which it did. Mrs. Van Challaby said +things about me which in her calmer moments she would have +hesitated to spell. It’s a pity people can’t +discuss fiscal matters without getting wild. However, she +wrote next day to ask if I could get her a Yorkshire terrier of +the size and shade that’s being worn now, and that’s +as near as a woman can be expected to get to owning herself in +the wrong. And she will tie a salmon-pink bow to its +collar, and call it “Reggie,” and take it with her +everywhere—like poor Miriam Klopstock, who <i>would</i> +take her Chow with her to the bathroom, and while she was bathing +it was playing at she-bears with her garments. Miriam is +always late for breakfast, and she wasn’t really missed +till the middle of lunch.</p> +<p>However, I’m not going any further into the Fiscal +Question. Only I should like to be protected from the +partner with a weak red tendency.</p> +<h2>REGINALD’S CHRISTMAS REVEL</h2> +<p>They say (said Reginald) that there’s nothing sadder +than victory except defeat. If you’ve ever stayed +with dull people during what is alleged to be the festive season, +you can probably revise that saying. I shall never forget +putting in a Christmas at the Babwolds’. Mrs. Babwold +is some relation of my father’s—a sort of +to-be-left-till-called-for cousin—and that was considered +sufficient reason for my having to accept her invitation at about +the sixth time of asking; though why the sins of the father +should be visited by the children—you won’t find any +notepaper in that drawer; that’s where I keep old menus and +first-night programmes.</p> +<p>Mrs. Babwold wears a rather solemn personality, and has never +been known to smile, even when saying disagreeable things to her +friends or making out the Stores list. She takes her +pleasures sadly. A state elephant at a Durbar gives one a +very similar impression. Her husband gardens in all +weathers. When a man goes out in the pouring rain to brush +caterpillars off rose-trees, I generally imagine his life indoors +leaves something to be desired; anyway, it must be very +unsettling for the caterpillars.</p> +<p>Of course there were other people there. There was a +Major Somebody who had shot things in Lapland, or somewhere of +that sort; I forget what they were, but it wasn’t for want +of reminding. We had them cold with every meal almost, and +he was continually giving us details of what they measured from +tip to tip, as though he thought we were going to make them warm +under-things for the winter. I used to listen to him with a +rapt attention that I thought rather suited me, and then one day +I quite modestly gave the dimensions of an okapi I had shot in +the Lincolnshire fens. The Major turned a beautiful Tyrian +scarlet (I remember thinking at the time that I should like my +bathroom hung in that colour), and I think that at that moment he +almost found it in his heart to dislike me. Mrs. Babwold +put on a first-aid-to-the-injured expression, and asked him why +he didn’t publish a book of his sporting reminiscences; it +would be <i>so</i> interesting. She didn’t remember +till afterwards that he had given her two fat volumes on the +subject, with his portrait and autograph as a frontispiece and an +appendix on the habits of the Arctic mussel.</p> +<p>It was in the evening that we cast aside the cares and +distractions of the day and really lived. Cards were +thought to be too frivolous and empty a way of passing the time, +so most of them played what they called a book game. You +went out into the hall—to get an inspiration, I +suppose—then you came in again with a muffler tied round +your neck and looked silly, and the others were supposed to guess +that you were “Wee MacGreegor.” I held out +against the inanity as long as I decently could, but at last, in +a lapse of good-nature, I consented to masquerade as a book, only +I warned them that it would take some time to carry out. +They waited for the best part of forty minutes, while I went and +played wineglass skittles with the page-boy in the pantry; you +play it with a champagne cork, you know, and the one who knocks +down the most glasses without breaking them wins. I won, +with four unbroken out of seven; I think William suffered from +over-anxiousness. They were rather mad in the drawing-room +at my not having come back, and they weren’t a bit pacified +when I told them afterwards that I was “At the end of the +passage.”</p> +<p>“I never did like Kipling,” was Mrs. +Babwold’s comment, when the situation dawned upon +her. “I couldn’t see anything clever in +<i>Earthworms out of Tuscany</i>—or is that by +Darwin?”</p> +<p>Of course these games are very educational, but, personally, I +prefer bridge.</p> +<p>On Christmas evening we were supposed to be specially festive +in the Old English fashion. The hall was horribly draughty, +but it seemed to be the proper place to revel in, and it was +decorated with Japanese fans and Chinese lanterns, which gave it +a very Old English effect. A young lady with a confidential +voice favoured us with a long recitation about a little girl who +died or did something equally hackneyed, and then the Major gave +us a graphic account of a struggle he had with a wounded +bear. I privately wished that the bears would win sometimes +on these occasions; at least they wouldn’t go vapouring +about it afterwards. Before we had time to recover our +spirits, we were indulged with some thought-reading by a young +man whom one knew instinctively had a good mother and an +indifferent tailor—the sort of young man who talks +unflaggingly through the thickest soup, and smooths his hair +dubiously as though he thought it might hit back. The +thought-reading was rather a success; he announced that the +hostess was thinking about poetry, and she admitted that her mind +was dwelling on one of Austin’s odes. Which was near +enough. I fancy she had been really wondering whether a +scrag-end of mutton and some cold plum-pudding would do for the +kitchen dinner next day. As a crowning dissipation, they +all sat down to play progressive halma, with milk-chocolate for +prizes. I’ve been carefully brought up, and I +don’t like to play games of skill for milk-chocolate, so I +invented a headache and retired from the scene. I had been +preceded a few minutes earlier by Miss Langshan-Smith, a rather +formidable lady, who always got up at some uncomfortable hour in +the morning, and gave you the impression that she had been in +communication with most of the European Governments before +breakfast. There was a paper pinned on her door with a +signed request that she might be called particularly early on the +morrow. Such an opportunity does not come twice in a +lifetime. I covered up everything except the signature with +another notice, to the effect that before these words should meet +the eye she would have ended a misspent life, was sorry for the +trouble she was giving, and would like a military funeral. +A few minutes later I violently exploded an air-filled paper bag +on the landing, and gave a stage moan that could have been heard +in the cellars. Then I pursued my original intention and +went to bed. The noise those people made in forcing open +the good lady’s door was positively indecorous; she +resisted gallantly, but I believe they searched her for bullets +for about a quarter of an hour, as if she had been an historic +battlefield.</p> +<p>I hate travelling on Boxing Day, but one must occasionally do +things that one dislikes.</p> +<h2>REGINALD’S RUBAIYAT</h2> +<p>The other day (confided Reginald), when I was killing time in +the bathroom and making bad resolutions for the New Year, it +occurred to me that I would like to be a poet. The chief +qualification, I understand, is that you must be born. +Well, I hunted up my birth certificate, and found that I was all +right on that score, and then I got to work on a Hymn to the New +Year, which struck me as having possibilities. It suggested +extremely unusual things to absolutely unlikely people, which I +believe is the art of first-class catering in any +department. Quite the best verse in it went something like +this—</p> +<blockquote><p>“Have you heard the groan of a gravelled +grouse,<br /> +Or the snarl of a snaffled snail<br /> +(Husband or mother, like me, or spouse),<br /> +Have you lain a-creep in the darkened house<br /> +Where the wounded wombats wail?”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>It was quite improbable that anyone had, you know, and +that’s where it stimulated the imagination and took people +out of their narrow, humdrum selves. No one has ever called +me narrow or humdrum, but even I felt worked up now and then at +the thought of that house with the stricken wombats in it. +It simply wasn’t nice. But the editors were unanimous +in leaving it alone; they said the thing had been done before and +done worse, and that the market for that sort of work was +extremely limited.</p> +<p>It was just on the top of that discouragement that the Duchess +wanted me to write something in her album—something +Persian, you know, and just a little bit decadent—and I +thought a quatrain on an unwholesome egg would meet the +requirements of the case. So I started in with—</p> +<blockquote><p>“Cackle, cackle, little hen,<br /> +How I wonder if and when<br /> +Once you laid the egg that I<br /> +Met, alas! too late. Amen.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The Duchess objected to the Amen, which I thought gave an air +of forgiveness and <i>chose jugée</i> to the whole thing; +also she said it wasn’t Persian enough, as though I were +trying to sell her a kitten whose mother had married for love +rather than pedigree. So I recast it entirely, and the new +version read—</p> +<blockquote><p>“The hen that laid thee moons ago, who +knows<br /> +In what Dead Yesterday her shades repose;<br /> +To some election turn thy waning span<br /> +And rain thy rottenness on fiscal foes.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>I thought there was enough suggestion of decay in that to +satisfy a jackal, and to me there was something infinitely +pathetic and appealing in the idea of the egg having a sort of +St. Luke’s summer of commercial usefulness. But the +Duchess begged me to leave out any political allusions; +she’s the president of a Women’s Something or other, +and she said it might be taken as an endorsement of deplorable +methods. I never can remember which Party Irene discourages +with her support, but I shan’t forget an occasion when I +was staying at her place and she gave me a pamphlet to leave at +the house of a doubtful voter, and some grapes and things for a +woman who was suffering from a chill on the top of a patent +medicine. I thought it much cleverer to give the grapes to +the former and the political literature to the sick woman, and +the Duchess was quite absurdly annoyed about it afterwards. +It seems the leaflet was addressed “To those about to +wobble”—I wasn’t responsible for the silly +title of the thing—and the woman never recovered; anyway, +the voter was completely won over by the grapes and jellies, and +I think that should have balanced matters. The Duchess +called it bribery, and said it might have compromised the +candidate she was supporting; he was expected to subscribe to +church funds and chapel funds, and football and cricket clubs and +regattas, and bazaars and beanfeasts and bellringers, and poultry +shows and ploughing matches, and reading-rooms and choir outings, +and shooting trophies and testimonials, and anything of that +sort; but bribery would not have been tolerated.</p> +<p>I fancy I have perhaps more talent for electioneering than for +poetry, and I was really getting extended over this quatrain +business. The egg began to be unmanageable, and the Duchess +suggested something with a French literary ring about it. I +hunted back in my mind for the most familiar French classic that +I could take liberties with, and after a little exercise of +memory I turned out the following:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“Hast thou the pen that once the gardener +had?<br /> +I have it not; and know, these pears are bad.<br /> +Oh, larger than the horses of the Prince<br /> +Are those the general drives in Kaikobad.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Even that didn’t altogether satisfy Irene; I fancy the +geography of it puzzled her. She probably thought Kaikobad +was an unfashionable German spa, where you’d meet +matrimonial bargain-hunters and emergency Servian kings. My +temper was beginning to slip its moorings by that time. I +look rather nice when I lose my temper. (I hoped you would +say I lose it very often. I mustn’t monopolise the +conversation.)</p> +<p>“Of course, if you want something really Persian and +passionate, with red wine and bulbuls in it,” I went on to +suggest; but she grabbed the book away from me.</p> +<p>“Not for worlds. Nothing with red wine or passion +in it. Dear Agatha gave me the album, and she would be +mortified to the quick”—</p> +<p>I said I didn’t believe Agatha had a quick, and we got +quite heated in arguing the matter. Finally, the Duchess +declared I shouldn’t write anything nasty in her book, and +I said I wouldn’t write anything in her nasty book, so +there wasn’t a very wide point of difference between +us. For the rest of the afternoon I pretended to be +sulking, but I was really working back to that quatrain, like a +fox-terrier that’s buried a deferred lunch in a private +flower-bed. When I got an opportunity I hunted up +Agatha’s autograph, which had the front page all to itself, +and, copying her prim handwriting as well as I could, I inserted +above it the following Thibetan fragment:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“With Thee, oh, my Beloved, to do a +dâk<br /> +(a dâk I believe is a sort of uncomfortable +post-journey)<br /> +On the pack-saddle of a grunting yak,<br /> +With never room for chilling chaperone,<br /> +’Twere better than a Panhard in the Park.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>That Agatha would get on to a yak in company with a lover even +in the comparative seclusion of Thibet is unthinkable. I +very much doubt if she’d do it with her own husband in the +privacy of the Simplon tunnel. But poetry, as I’ve +remarked before, should always stimulate the imagination.</p> +<p>By the way, when you asked me the other day to dine with you +on the 14th, I said I was dining with the Duchess. Well, +I’m not. I’m dining with you.</p> +<h2>THE INNOCENCE OF REGINALD</h2> +<p>Reginald slid a carnation of the newest shade into the +buttonhole of his latest lounge coat, and surveyed the result +with approval. “I am just in the mood,” he +observed, “to have my portrait painted by someone with an +unmistakable future. So comforting to go down to posterity +as ‘Youth with a Pink Carnation’ in +catalogue—company with ‘Child with Bunch of +Primroses,’ and all that crowd.”</p> +<p>“Youth,” said the Other, “should suggest +innocence.”</p> +<p>“But never act on the suggestion. I don’t +believe the two ever really go together. People talk +vaguely about the innocence of a little child, but they take +mighty good care not to let it out of their sight for twenty +minutes. The watched pot never boils over. I knew a +boy once who really was innocent; his parents were in Society, +but they never gave him a moment’s anxiety from his +infancy. He believed in company prospectuses, and in the +purity of elections, and in women marrying for love, and even in +a system for winning at roulette. He never quite lost his +faith in it, but he dropped more money than his employers could +afford to lose. When last I heard of him, he was believing +in his innocence; the jury weren’t. All the same, I +really am innocent just now of something everyone accuses me of +having done, and so far as I can see, their accusations will +remain unfounded.”</p> +<p>“Rather an unexpected attitude for you.”</p> +<p>“I love people who do unexpected things. +Didn’t you always adore the man who slew a lion in a pit on +a snowy day? But about this unfortunate innocence. +Well, quite long ago, when I’d been quarrelling with more +people than usual, you among the number—it must have been +in November, I never quarrel with you too near Christmas—I +had an idea that I’d like to write a book. It was to +be a book of personal reminiscences, and was to leave out +nothing.”</p> +<p>“Reginald!”</p> +<p>“Exactly what the Duchess said when I mentioned it to +her. I was provoking and said nothing, and the next thing, +of course, was that everyone heard that I’d written the +book and got it in the press. After that, I might have been +a gold-fish in a glass bowl for all the privacy I got. +People attacked me about it in the most unexpected places, and +implored or commanded me to leave out things that I’d +forgotten had ever happened. I sat behind Miriam Klopstock +one night in the dress circle at His Majesty’s, and she +began at once about the incident of the Chow dog in the bathroom, +which she insisted must be struck out. We had to argue it +in a disjointed fashion, because some of the people wanted to +listen to the play, and Miriam takes nines in voices. They +had to stop her playing in the ‘Macaws’ Hockey Club +because you could hear what she thought when her shins got mixed +up in a scrimmage for half a mile on a still day. They are +called the Macaws because of their blue-and-yellow costumes, but +I understand there was nothing yellow about Miriam’s +language. I agreed to make one alteration, as I pretended I +had got it a Spitz instead of a Chow, but beyond that I was +firm. She megaphoned back two minutes later, ‘You +promised you would never mention it; don’t you ever keep a +promise?’ When people had stopped glaring in our +direction, I replied that I’d as soon think of keeping +white mice. I saw her tearing little bits out of her +programme for a minute or two, and then she leaned back and +snorted, ‘You’re not the boy I took you for,’ +as though she were an eagle arriving at Olympus with the wrong +Ganymede. That was her last audible remark, but she went on +tearing up her programme and scattering the pieces around her, +till one of her neighbours asked with immense dignity whether she +should send for a wastepaper basket. I didn’t stay +for the last act.”</p> +<p>“Then there is Mrs.—oh, I never can remember her +name; she lives in a street that the cabmen have never heard of, +and is at home on Wednesdays. She frightened me horribly +once at a private view by saying mysteriously, ‘I +oughtn’t to be here, you know; this is one of my +days.’ I thought she meant that she was subject to +periodical outbreaks and was expecting an attack at any +moment. So embarrassing if she had suddenly taken it into +her head that she was Cesar Borgia or St. Elizabeth of +Hungary. That sort of thing would make one unpleasantly +conspicuous even at a private view. However, she merely +meant to say that it was Wednesday, which at the moment was +incontrovertible. Well, she’s on quite a different +tack to the Klopstock. She doesn’t visit anywhere +very extensively, and, of course, she’s awfully keen for me +to drag in an incident that occurred at one of the Beauwhistle +garden-parties, when she says she accidentally hit the shins of a +Serene Somebody or other with a croquet mallet and that he swore +at her in German. As a matter of fact, he went on +discoursing on the Gordon-Bennett affair in French. (I +never can remember if it’s a new submarine or a +divorce. Of course, how stupid of me!) To be +disagreeably exact, I fancy she missed him by about two +inches—over-anxiousness, probably—but she likes to +think she hit him. I’ve felt that way with a +partridge which I always imagine keeps on flying strong, out of +false pride, till it’s the other side of the hedge. +She said she could tell me everything she was wearing on the +occasion. I said I didn’t want my book to read like a +laundry list, but she explained that she didn’t mean those +sort of things.”</p> +<p>“And there’s the Chilworth boy, who can be +charming as long as he’s content to be stupid and wear what +he’s told to; but he gets the idea now and then that +he’d like to be epigrammatic, and the result is like +watching a rook trying to build a nest in a gale. Since he +got wind of the book, he’s been persecuting me to work in +something of his about the Russians and the Yalu Peril, and is +quite sulky because I won’t do it.”</p> +<p>“Altogether, I think it would be rather a brilliant +inspiration if you were to suggest a fortnight in +Paris.”</p> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK REGINALD***</p> +<pre> + + +***** This file should be named 2830-h.htm or 2830-h.zip****** + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/8/3/2830 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://www.gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +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 + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/pglaf. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://www.gutenberg.org/about/contact + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: +http://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + +</pre></body> +</html> |