E-text prepared by Jonathan Ingram
and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
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PUNCH,
OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

Vol. 159.

October 6, 1920.

CHARIVARIA.

“Motorists,” says a London magistrate,
“cannot go about knocking people
down and killing them every day.”
We agree. Once should be enough for
the most grasping pedestrian.

“A Kensington lady,” we read, “has
just engaged a parlourmaid who is
only three feet seven inches in height.”
The shortage of servants is becoming
most marked.

A play called The Man
Who Went to Work is
shortly to be produced in
the West End. It sounds
like a farce.

A police-sergeant of Ealing
is reported to have summoned
six hundred motorists
since March. There is
some talk of his being presented
with the illuminated
addresses of another three
hundred.

All the recent photographs
of Sir Eric Geddes
show him with a very broad
smile. “And I know who
he’s laughing at,” writes a
railway traveller.

With reference to the Press
controversy between Mr.
H.G. Wells and Mr. Henry
Arthur Jones, we understand
that they have decided
to shake hands and be
enemies.

“In New Zealand,” says
a weekly paper, “there is a
daisy which is often mistaken
for a sheep by the
shepherds.” This is the sort
of statement that the Prohibitionist
likes to make a
note of.

A statistician informs us that a man’s
body contains enough lime to whitewash
a small room. It should be
pointed out however that it is illegal
for a wife to break up her husband for
decorative purposes.

The Manchester Communist Party
have decided to have nothing whatever
to do with Parliament. We understand
that the Premier has now decided to
sell his St. Bernard dog.

“There are no very rich people in England,”
says a gossip-writer. We can
only say we know a club porter who
recently stated that he had a cousin
who knew a miner who … but we
fear it was only gossip.

“It is possible for people to do
quite well without a stomach,” says a
Parisian doctor. Judged by the high
prices, we know a grocer who seems to
think along the same lines.

Special aeroplanes to carry fish from
Holland to this country are to run in
the winter. The idea of keeping the
fish long enough to enable them to
cross under their own power has been
abandoned.

An Ashford gardener has grown a
cabbage which measures twelve feet
across. It is said to be uninhabited.

The Rules of Golf Committee now
suggest a standard ball for England and
America. The question of a standard
long-distance expletive for foozlers is
held over.

A youth charged at a police-court in
the South of London with stealing five
hundred cigars, valued at threepence
each, admitted that he had smoked
twenty-six of them. We are glad to learn
that no further punishment was ordered.

The Waste Trade World states that
there is a great demand for rubbish.
Editors, however, don’t seem to be
moving with the times.

Off Folkestone, a few days ago, a
trawler captured a blue-nosed shark.
Complaints about the temperature of
the sea have been very common among
bathers this year.

“No one has yet been
successful in filming an actual
murder,” states a Picture-goers’
Journal. It certainly
does seem a pity that
our murderers are so terribly
self-conscious in the presence
of a cinematograph
man.

The Daily Express states
that Mrs. Bamberger has
decided not to appeal against
her sentence. If that be so,
this high-handed decision
will be bitterly resented by
certain of the audience who
were in court during the trial
and eagerly looked forward
to the next edition.

A Daily Mail reader writes
to our contemporary to say
that he found forty-two
toads in his garden last
week. We can only suppose
that they were there in ignorance
of the fact that he
took in The Daily Mail.

A pike weighing twenty-six
pounds, upon being hooked
by a Cheshire fisherman,
pulled him into the canal.
His escape was much regretted
by the fish, who had
decided to have him stuffed.

It is possible that Mr. Tom Mann,
the secretary of the A.S.E., will shortly
retire under the age limit. It is rumoured
that members have started to
collect for a souvenir strike as a parting
tribute.

Bus Conductor (after passenger’s torrents of invective on the subject of
increased fare). “Right-o, Ma. I’ll tell ’em everythink you’ve
said wen I takes the chair at the next directors’ meeting.”

The Ethiopian Again.

“COAL STILL BLACK.”

Heading in “Church Family Newspaper.”

“The output in the first quarter this year
was at the rate of 248,000,000 million tons
a year. It fell in the second quarter to
232,000,000. Between and beyond these lines
there is an ample margin for bargaining.”—Evening Paper.

Abundantly ample.

LESSONS FROM NATURE.

To an Autumn Primrose.

O.S.

THE MINERS’ OPERA.

About a week ago, when they took Titterby away to the
large red-brick establishment which he now adorns, certain
papers which were left lying in his study passed into my
hands, for I was almost his only friend. It had long been
Titterby’s belief that a great future lay before the librettist
who should produce topical light operas on the Gilbert
and Sullivan model, dealing with our present-day economic
crises. The thing became an idée fixe, as the French say,
or, as we lamely put it in English, a fixed idea. There can
be no doubt that he was engaged in the terrible task of
fitting the current coal dispute to fantastic verse when
a brain-cell unhappily buckled, and he was found destroying
the works of his grand piano with a coal-scoop.

Most of the MS. in my possession is blurred and undecipherable,
full of erasures, random stage-directions and
marginal notes, amongst which occasional passages such
as the following “emerge” (as Mr. Smillie would say):—

Difficult though my task may be I feel it the duty of
friendship to attempt to give the public some faint outline
of this fascinating and curious work. Scenarios, dramatis
personæ and choruses had evidently caused the author
inordinate trouble, for at the top of one sheet I find:—

“ACT I.

Interior of a coal-mine. Groups of colliers with lanterns
and picks (? tongs). Enter Chorus of female consumers.“

Then follows this note:—

“Mem. Can one dance in coal-mine? Look up coal
in ‘Ency. Brit.’ Also cellar flap;”

and later on, at the end of a passage which evidently described
the dresses of the principal female characters introduced,
we have the words:—

Nothing in this Act survives in a legible form, but in Act II.
we are slightly more fortunate:—

“Scene.—Downing Street (it begins). Enter mixed Chorus
of private secretaries, female shorthand writers and representatives
of the Press, followed by Sir Robert
Horne, Mr. Robert Williams and Mr. Smillie.“

What happens after this I can only roughly surmise, but
most probably Mr. Smillie proves false to Britannia and
flirts for some time with Anarchy, egged on by Mr. Williams
and urged by Sir Robert Horne to return to his earlier
flame. At any rate, after a little, the handwriting grows
clearer, and I read:—

There seems to have been some doubt as to how the
Prime Minister’s entrance should be effected, for at this
point we get the marginal note: “? From door of No. 10.
? On wings. ? Trap door. ? Riding St. Bernard Dog.“

But the difficulty was evidently settled, and the Chorus
begins again:—

Of the arguments used by Mr. Lloyd George after this
spirited encouragement no record remains but the following
passage:—

[Exeunt Mr. Lloyd George and Mr. Smillie arm-in-arm,
R. (? followed by St. Bernard) and return
C. Exeunt L. and return C. again, and so on.

Apparently they have, for later on we get—

And the Chorus of course chimes in:—

And there is a note at the side: “Chorus to wave arms upwards
and outwards, indicating increased production of coal.“

It seems to have been at some time after this, and probably
in Act III., that Titterby went, if I may put it so
vulgarly, off the hooks. I think he must have got on to
the conference between the mineowners and the representatives
of the miners, and struggled until the gas became
too thick for him. At any rate, after several unreadable
pages, the following unhappy fragment stands out clear:—

“Mr. Smillie still stands irresolute, running his fingers
through his hair.

Enter Datum-Line. (? can Datum-Line be personified?
? comic. ? check trousers. ? red whiskers.)”

Nothing more has been written, and it must have been
at this point, I suppose, that Titterby got up and assaulted
his piano. It all seems very sad.

Evoe.

A PROSPECTIVE JONAH?

The Captain (to Sir Eric Geddes). “I SOMETIMES WONDER WHETHER A MAN OF YOUR
ABILITY OUGHT NOT TO FIND A BETTER OPENING.”

[It is rumoured that the Ministry of Transport is to have a limited existence.]

Lady. “No cod left, Mr. Brown?”

    Fishmonger (confidentially). “Well, Mrs. Snipps, I’ll oblige you. I
always keeps a bit up my sleeve for reg’lar customers.“

CONSOLATION.

R.F.

“I trust it may be sufficient to convince readers that Mr. Chesterton is
continued at foot of next column.”—Sunday Paper.

At last the ever-recurring problem of where to put the rest
of Mr. Chesterton has been solved.

Fed-up Owner (to holiday Artist). “Charming, my dear young lady—charming—with
one important omission. You’ve forgotten to put in the notice on the
tree.“

THE LITTLE MOA

(and how much it is).

I have been reading a lot about
Polynesia lately, and the conclusion
has been forced upon me that dining out
in that neighbourhood might be rather
confusing to a stranger.

Imagine yourself at one of these
Antipodean functions. Your host is
seated at the head of the table with a
large fowl before him. Looking pleasantly
in your direction he says:—

“Will you have a little moa?”

Not being well up in the subject of
exotic fauna you will be tempted to
make one of the following replies:—

(1) (With Alice in Wonderland in
your mind) “How can I possibly have
more when I haven’t had anything at
all yet?”

(2) “Yes, please, a lot more, or just
a little more,” as capacity and appetite
dictate.

(3) “No, thank you.”

The objection to reply No. 1 is that
it may cause unpleasantness, or your
host may retort, “I didn’t ask you if
you would have a little more moa,” and
thus increase your embarrassment.

No. 2 is a more suitable rejoinder,
but probably No. 3 is the safest reply,
as some of these big birds require a lot
of mastication.

In the event of your firing off No. 3,
your host glances towards the hostess
and says—

“Oo, then” (pronounced “oh-oh”).

To your startled senses comes the
immediate suggestion, “Is the giver of
the feast demented, or is he merely rude?”

Just as you are meditating an excuse
for leaving the table and the house, your
hostess saves the situation by saying
sweetly, “Do let me give you a little
oo,” playfully tapping with a carvingknife
the breastbone of a winged creature
recumbent on a dish in front of her.

It gradually dawns upon you that
you are among strange birds quite outside
the pale of the English Game Laws,
and that you will have to take a sporting
chance.

While you are still in the act of
wavering the son of the house says,
“Try a little huia.”

If you like the look of this specimen
of Polynesian poultry you signify your
acceptance in the customary manner;
otherwise, in parliamentary phraseology,
“The Oos have it.”

For my own part I fancy that, unless
or until some of these unusual fowls
are extinct, I shall not visit Polynesia,
but rest content with Purley. Our
dinner-parties may be dull, but at least
one knows one’s way about among the
dishes.

A BALLAD OF THE EARLY WORM.

When the Young Lead the Young.

“Lady Nurse or Nursery Governess (young)
wanted for post near Ventnor, I.W., for boy
2½ years. Experience, similar age, and happy
disposition essential.”—Weekly Paper.

“Oxford, Tuesday.

The Royal Commission on Oxford and Cambridge
Universities began its Oxford session
this afternoon in the Extermination Schools.”—Daily Paper.

Absit omen!

THE CONSPIRATORS.

II.

My dear Charles,—The Third International
is not a Rugby football match.
It is a corporation of thrusters whose
prospectus announces that it will very
shortly have your blood, having first acquired
exclusive rights in your money.
Have you two acres and a cow? Have
you seven pounds three and threepence
in the Post-Office Savings Bank? Have
you any blood? Very well, then; this
concerns you.

There was a meeting of shareholders
in Moscow as recently as July last.
The Chairman said: “Gentlemen—I beg
your pardon, Comrades,—I am happy
to be able to report promising developments.
Our main enterprise in Russia,
for technical reasons with which I will
not now trouble you, is not for the moment
profit-producing; but we have
been able to promote some successful
ventures abroad. In all parts of the
civilised world—and Ireland—we may
anticipate a distribution of assets in the
near future.” And among those assets
to be parcelled out are, I may say, your
acres, your cow, your savings and yourself.

There followed a meeting of the
Executive Committee (I wish they
would avoid that tactless word “executive,”
don’t you?). Simple and brisk
instructions were drafted for foreign
agents, bidding them get on with it and
not spare themselves, or in any case not
spare anyone else. These were inscribed
on linen, which was folded over, with
the writing inside, and neatly hemmed.
Shortly afterwards a number of earnest
young men wearing tall collars and an
air of exaggerated innocence sought to
cross various frontiers and were surprised
and offended when rough and
rude officials stole their collars and set
about taking them to pieces.

I hate to speak slightingly of anyone,
but these world-revolutionaries have no
business to be so young. According to
my view a professor of anarchy and assassination
ought to be a man of middle-age
with stiff stubble on his chin. He
has no business to be a pale and perspiring
youth, tending to long back hair
and apt to be startled by the slightest
sound when he is alone. And what a
lot of them write poetry, and such poetry
too! That is the manner of the man
who is going to seize your house and
usurp your cow, while you will be
lucky if you are allowed a place on a
perch in your own fowl-house.

We had an opportunity of seeing
them in procession when a consignment
of these world-revolutionaries drove off
in state from Berne about the time of
the Armistice. I told you, last week,
that we had a Legation of them, very
kindly lent by the Moscow management,
and I also told you that our
Italian juggler had let us into the secret
of their midnight lucubrations, of which
we had duly informed the officials interested
in such matters. We had front
places when the motor lorry called for
them and the military escort arrived to
assist all the passengers to take, and
keep, their seats. Into the lorry were
packed the Minister Plenipotentiary
and Envoy Extraordinary, the Chargé
d’Affaires, the First Secretary, the
Second Secretary, the Third Secretary,
the Legal and Spiritual Advisers and
the Lady Typist. Their features were
not easy to distinguish; when the Bolshevists
assume dominion over us they
will not nationalize our soap. One
or two fell out, but were carefully replaced
by willing hands and bayonets;
and so home.

Now that is a sight you don’t often
see: a Diplomatique Corps being returned
to store in a motor lorry. The
disappointing thing about them was
that, for all their fiery propaganda and
for all their drastic resolutions, never
a one of them produced so much as
a squib-cracker. The only people to
derive any excitement from the affair
were the small children, who took it
for a circus.

The best they could do for us was a
general strike. What all this had to do
with trades or unions nobody seemed
to know, least of all the workers. But
there was an attractive sound about
the then novel phrase, “Direct Action,”
and it gave a sense of useful business
to that otherwise over-portly word,
“Proletariat.” And the local politicians,
promised good jobs in Lenin’s millennium,
made great use of the phrase,
“Dictatorship of the Proletariat.” Thus
many an honest workman joined in
under the belief that it meant an
extra hour’s holiday on Saturdays, an
extra hour in bed on Mondays and an
extra bob or two of wages.

While it lasts, even a bloodless revolution
can be very tiresome; almost as
disquieting as a general election. Everybody
who isn’t revoluting is mobilised
to keep the revolution from being molested.
There are no trams, because the
drivers are demonstrating; no shops,
because the shopmen are mobilised; no
anything, because everyone is out watching
the fun. So you go into the square
to watch also. You see little groups of
revolutionaries looking sullen and laboriously
class-hating. You see a lot of
soldiers looking very ordinary but trying
not to. The riff-raff scowl at the
soldiers, who are ordered out to shoot
at them. The soldiers scowl at the riff-raff
at whom they are ordered not to
shoot. And, for some reason which the
experts have not yet fathomed, it always
pours with rain.

When we had succeeded in persuading
the soldier who was posted to guard
our hotel that we were not the proletariat
and might safely be let pass, we
found a gathering of inside-knowledge
people discussing the situation. The
Government ought to have known all
about it long before—how the Bolshevists
were stirring up trouble. “They
did,” said we; “we told them.” There
was a silence at this, but a smile on the
face of the audience which we at first
mistook for incredulity. We referred
darkly to our private information, derived,
as I told you in my last, from the
Italian juggler. “Did he do juggling
tricks with your ink-pots too?” asked the
French element. “How much money
did you give him?” asked all the other
elements. “And I suppose he also told
you,” said the Italian officer, “that he
had no confidence in his own people
and that the British alone enjoyed his
respect?”

At this moment the Americans came
in and asked us to quit arguing and
attend while they told us how they had
unearthed the great plot…. When
together we reckoned up the Italian
juggler’s net takings we realised that it
is an ill revolution which brings no
one any good.

Yours ever,    
Henry.

(To be continued.)

CUBBIN’ THRO’ THE RYE.

[Suggested by a recently reported incident
in the Midlands, when a pack divided, one
part getting out of hand and running among
standing crops.]

Brave News for Pussyfoot.

“A good many Church-people at home have
been pressing teetotalism, and are now pressing
Prohibition, and it is possible that they
may succeed about the time when the moon
grows cold.”—Weekly Paper.

THE MAN YOU GIVE A GAME TO.

“Right-o. If yer wants a fight I’m ready. An’ as we’ve only one pair
o’ gloves, an’ you’re the youngest, I’ll be a sport an’ let you wear ’em.”

THE MYSTERY OF THE APPLE-PIE BEDS.

(Leaves from a holiday diary.)

I.

An outrage has occurred in the hotel.
Late on Monday night ten innocent
visitors discovered themselves the possessors
of apple-pie beds. The beds were
not of the offensive hair-brush variety,
but they were very cleverly constructed,
the under-sheet being pulled up in the
good old way and turned over at the top
as if it were the top-sheet.

I had one myself. The lights go out
at eleven and I got into bed in the dark.
When one is very old and has not been
to school for a long time or had an
apple-pie bed for longer still, there is
something very uncanny in the sensation,
especially if it is dark. I did not like it
at all. My young
brother-in-law, Denys,
laughed immoderately
in the other bed at my
flounderings and imprecations.
He did
not have one. I suspect
him….

II.

Naturally the hotel
is very much excited.
It is the most thrilling
event since the
mixed foursomes. Nothing
else has been discussed
since breakfast.
Ten people had beds
and about ten people
are suspected. The
really extraordinary
thing is that numbers
of people seem to suspect
me! That is the
worst of being a professional
humourist;
everything is put down to you. When I
was accompanying Mrs. F. to-day she
suddenly stopped fiddling and said hotly
that someone had been tampering with
her violin. I know she suspected me.
Fortunately, however, I have a very
good answer to this apple-pie bed
charge. Eric says that his bed must
have been done after dinner, and I was
to be seen at the dance in the lounge
all the evening. I have an alibi.

Besides I had a bed myself; surely
they don’t believe that even a professional
humourist could be so bursting
with humour as to make himself an
apple-pie bed and not make one for his
brother-in-law in the same room! It
would be too much like overtime.

But they say that only shows my
cleverness….

III.

Then there is the question of the
Barkers. Most of the victims were
young people, who could not possibly
mind. But the Barkers had two, and
the Barkers are a respected middle-aged
couple, and nobody could possibly
make them apple-pie beds who did not
know them very well. That shows you
it can’t have been me—I—me—that
shows you I couldn’t have done it. I
have only spoken to them once.

They say Mr. Barker was rather
annoyed. He has rheumatism and
went to bed early. Mrs. Barker discovered
about her bed before she got
in, but she didn’t let on. She put out
the candle and allowed her lord to get
into his apple-pie in the dark. I think
I shall like her.

They couldn’t find the matches. I
believe he was quite angry….

IV.

I suspect Denys and Joan. They
are engaged, and people in that state
are capable of anything. Neither of
them had one, and they were seen slipping
upstairs during the dance. They
say they went out on the balcony—a
pretty story….

V.

I suspect the Barkers. You know,
that story about Mrs. B. letting Mr.
B. get into his without warning him
was pretty thin. Can you imagine an
English wife doing a thing of that kind?
If you can it ought to be a ground for
divorce under the new Bill. But you
can’t.

Then all that stuff about the rheumatism—clever
but unconvincing. Mr.
Barker stayed in his room all the next
morning when the awkward questions
were being asked. Not well; oh, no!
But he was down for lunch and conducting
for a glee-party in the drawing-room
afterwards, as perky and active
as a professional. Besides, the really
unanswerable problem is, who could
have dared to make the Barkers’ apple-pie
beds? And the answer is, nobody—except
the Barkers.

And there must have been a lady in
it, it was so neatly done. Everybody
says no man could have done it. So
that shows you it couldn’t have been
me—I—myself….

VI.

I suspect Mr. Winthrop. Mr. Winthrop
is fifty-three. He has been in
the hotel since this time last year, and
he makes accurate forecasts of the
weather. My experience is that a man
who makes accurate forecasts of the
weather may get up to any devilry.
And he protests too much. He keeps
coming up to me and making long
speeches to prove that he didn’t do it.
But I never said he
did. Somebody else
started that rumour,
but of course he thinks
that I did. That comes
of being a professional
humourist.

But I do believe he
did it. You see he is
fifty-three and doesn’t
dance, so he had the
whole evening to do it
in.

To-night we are going
to have a Court
of Inquiry….

VII.

We have had the
inquiry. I was judge.
I started with Denys
and Joan in the dock,
as I thought we must
have somebody there
and it would look
better if it was somebody
in the family. The first witness
was Mrs. Barker. Her evidence was
so unsatisfactory that I had to have
her put in the dock too. So was Mr.
Barker’s. I was sorry to put him in
the dock, as he still had rheumatics.
But he had to go.

So did Mr. Winthrop. I had no
qualms about him. For a man of his
age to do a thing like that seems to me
really deplorable. And the barefaced
evasiveness of his evidence! He simply
could not account for his movements
during the evening at all. When I
asked him what he had been doing at
9.21, and where, he actually said he
didn’t know.

Rather curious—very few people can
account for their movements, or anyone
else’s. In most criminal trials the witnesses
remember to a minute, years
after the event, exactly what time they
went upstairs and when they passed
the prisoner in the lounge, but nobody
[pg 269]
seems to remember anything in this
affair. No doubt it will come in time.

The trial was very realistic. I was
able to make one or two excellent judicial
jokes. Right at the beginning I
said to the prosecuting counsel, “What
is an apple-pie bed?” and when he had
explained I said with a meaning look,
“You mean that the bed was not in
apple-pie order?” Ha, ha! Everybody
laughed heartily….

VIII.

In my address to the jury of matrons
I was able to show pretty clearly that
the crime was the work of a gang. I
proved that Denys and Joan must have
done the bulk of the dirty work, under
the tactical direction of the Barkers,
who did the rest; while in the background
was the sinister figure of Mr.
Winthrop, the strategical genius, the
lurking Macchiavelli of the gang.

The jury were not long in considering
their verdict. They said: “We find,
your Lordship, that you did it yourself,
with some lady or ladies unknown.”

That comes of being a professional
humourist….

IX.

I ignored the verdict. I addressed
the prisoners very severely and sentenced
them to do the Chasm hole from
6.0 a.m. to 6.0 p.m. every day for a
week, to take out cards and play out
every stroke. “You, Winthrop,” I
said, “with your gentlemanly cunning,
your subtle pretensions of righteousness—”
But there is no space for
that….

X.

As a matter of fact the jury were
quite right. In company with a lady
who shall be nameless I did do it. At
least, at one time I thought I did. Only
we have proved so often that somebody
else did it, we have shown so conclusively
that we can’t have done it, that we find
ourselves wondering if we really did.

Perhaps we didn’t.

If we did we apologise to all concerned—except,
of course, to Mr. Winthrop.
I suspect him.

A.P.H.

THE END OF THE SEASON.

Sympathetic Friend. “Well, you’ve laid her up nicely for the winter, anyhow.”

MIXED METEOROLOGICAL MAXIMS.

(By a Student of Psychology.)

Commercial Importunity.

“Services! Dozens other cars available,
£1,500 to £50. Call and insult us.”—Motor Journal.

More Visions of the Unseen.

“The roads are peculiarly situated, and are
dangerous not only because they are main
cross roads, but also on account of the hidden
view they afford of each other.”—Local Paper.

Teacher. “And what does ff mean?”
    
Pupil (after mature deliberation). “Fump-Fump.“

THE DEVOTED LOVER.

[“Loiterers will be treated as trespassers.”—Notice on Tube Station.]

THE PRINCE COMES HOME.

PAMELA’S ALPHABET.

Scene.—A Domestic Interior.

Pamela’s father, in one armchair, is making a praiseworthy
effort to absorb an article in a review on “The Future of
British Finance.” In another armchair Pamela’s mother
is doing some sort of mending. Pamela herself, stretched
upon the hearthrug, is reading aloud interesting extracts
from a picture-book.

Pamela (in a cheerful sing-song). A for Donkey; B for
Dicky.

Her Father. What sort of dicky?

Pamela (examining the illustration more closely). All
ugly black, bissect for his blue mouf.

Her Mother (instructively). Not blue; yellow. And it’s
a beak, not a mouth.

Pamela. I calls it a mouf. He’s eating wiv it. (With
increasing disfavour) A poor little worm he’s eating.
Don’t like him; he’s crool. (She turns the page hurriedly
and continues) C for Pussy; D for Mick.

[This is the name of the family mongrel. That the
picture represents an absolutely thoroughbred collie
matters nothing to Pamela. She spends some time in
admiring Mick, then rapidly sweeps over certain illustrations
that fail to attract.

Pamela (stopping at the sight of a web-footed fowl, triumphantly).
G for Quack-quack.

Her Father. Oh, come, Pamela, that’s not a quack-quack;
that’s a goose. It makes quite a different noise.

[Anticipating an immediate demand for a goose’s noise
he clears his throat nervously.

Pamela (with authority). This one isn’t making any noise.
It’s jus’ thinking. (Her father accepts the correction and
swallows again.) H for Gee-gee. Stupid gee-gee.

Her Father. Why stupid?

Pamela. ‘Acos its tail looks silly.

Her Father (glancing at the tail, which bears some resemblance
to an osprey’s feather). You’re right; it does.

Her Mother. I wonder whether it’s wrong to let children
get accustomed to bad drawings?

Her Father. Pamela doesn’t get accustomed—she criticises.
If it weren’t for a silly tail here, a stupid face there,
her critical faculty might lie for ever dormant.

Pamela (having turned over four or five pages with one
grasp of the hand, as if determined to suppress the unsatisfactory
horse). R for Bunny.

Her Mother. No, dear, Rabbit. R for Rabbit. B for Bunny.

Pamela (gently). No; B is for Dicky. The ugly dicky wiv
the blue mouf.

Her Father (rashly). The blackbird.

Pamela (conscious of superior knowledge). That isn’t its
name. That’s what it looks like, all black; but its name
is Dicky. B for Dicky.

Her Father. Well, have it your own way. What does
S stand for?

Pamela (turning to the likeness of an elderly quadruped,
with great assurance). Baa-lamb!

Her Father. Sometimes we call baa-lambs sheep.

Pamela. I don’t.

Her Father. You will when you grow older.

Pamela. I won’t be any older, not for ever so long. Not
till next birfday. (Pushing her book away and assuming an
air of extreme infancy) Tired of reading. Want a piggy-back,
please!

Her Father (firmly taking up his review again). Not just
now. I’m busy with a picture-book.

[A reproachful silence falls upon the room.

Pamela (presently, in a mournful chant). A for Don-key.
B for Dicky—

The Scene closes.

MORE OUTLINES OF HISTORY.

Sailor. “We have just seen some orange-peel and banana-skins floating on the starboard, Sir.”

Columbus. “Was there any chewing-gum?”

Sailor. “No, Sir.”

Columbus. “Then it must be the West Indies we’re coming to,
and I’d hoped it was going to be America.”

FLOWERS’ NAMES.

Crow’s-Foot.

“Have you ever been up in an aeroplane, Grandpa?”
    
“No, my boy—not yet.”

HONOURS EASY.

I.

Not very long ago the following
advertisements appeared in the same
column of The Southshire Daily Gazette:

“Lost, a pure black Pekinese dog, wearing a
silver badge marked ‘Cherub.’ Handsome
reward offered. F.B., Grand Hotel, Brightbourne.”

“Found, a black Pekinese, wearing a silver
badge marked ‘Cherub.’ No reward required.
The Limes, Cheviot Road, Brightbourne.”

II.

On the same morning the paper was
opened and scanned almost simultaneously
by Mrs. Frederick Bathurst in
the sitting-room which she and her
husband occupied at the Grand Hotel,
and by Mr. Hartley Friend in the
morning-room at “The Limes.”

“Oh, Fred,” exclaimed Mrs. Bathurst,
“Cherub has been found. He’s all
safe at a house called ‘The Limes,’ in
Cheviot Road. Isn’t that splendid?”

“Very good news,” said her husband.
“I told you not to worry.”

“It’s a direct answer to prayer,”
said Mrs. Bathurst. “But—”

“But what?” her husband inquired.

“But I do wish you had taken my
advice not to offer any reward. You
might so easily have left it open.
People aren’t so mercenary as all that.
It stands to reason that anyone staying
at an hotel like this and bringing a
dog with them—always an expensive
thing to do—and valuing it enough to
advertise its loss, would behave properly
when the time came.”

“I don’t know,” Mr. Bathurst replied.
“Does anything stand to reason? The
ordinary dog-thief, holding up an animal
to ransom, might be deterred from returning
it if no mention of money was
made. You remember we decided on
that.”

“Oh, no, I don’t think so. You
merely had your way again, that was
all. I was always against offering a
reward. And the word ‘handsome’ too.
In any case I never agreed to that.
You put that in later. Another thing,”
Mrs. Bathurst continued, “I knew it
in some curious way—in my bones, as
they say—that the fineness of Cherub’s
nature, its innocence, its radiant friendliness,
would overcome any sordidness
in the person who found him, poor darling,
all lost and unhappy. No one
who has been much with that simple
sweet character could fail to be the
better for it.”

Mr. Bathurst coughed.

“That is so?” his wife persisted.

“Well,” said Mr. Bathurst, after
helping himself to another egg, “let us
hope so, at any rate.”

“It’s gone beyond mere hope,” said
his wife triumphantly. “Listen to
this;” and she read out the sentence
from the second advertisement, “‘No
reward required.’ There,” she added,
“isn’t that proof? I’ll go round to
Cheviot Road directly after breakfast
and say how grateful we are, and bring
the darling back.”

III.

Meanwhile at “The Limes” Mr.
Hartley Friend was pacing the room
with impatient steps.

“I do wish you would try to be less
impulsive,” he was saying to his wife.
“Anything in the nature of business
you would be so much wiser to leave
to me.”

“What is it now?” Mrs. Friend asked
with perfect placidity.

“This dog,” said her husband, “that
fastened itself on you in this deplorable
way—whatever possessed you to rush
into print about it?”

“Of course I rushed, as you say.
Think of the feelings of the poor woman
[pg 274]
who has lost her pet. It was the only
kind thing to do.”

“‘Poor woman’ indeed! I assure
you she’s nothing of the sort. One
would think you were a millionaire to
be ladling out benefactions like this.
‘No reward required.’ Fancy not even
asking for the price of the advertisement
to be refunded!”

“But that would have been so
squalid.”

“‘Squalid!’ I’ve no patience with
you. Justice isn’t squalor. It’s—it’s
justice. As for your ‘poor woman,’
listen to this.” And he read out the
Bathurst advertisement with terrible
emphasis on the words “Handsome
reward offered.” “Do you hear that—’handsome’?”

“Yes, I hear,” said his wife amiably;
“but that isn’t my idea of making
money.”

“I hope you don’t suppose it’s mine,”
said her husband. “But there is such
a thing as common sense. Why on
earth the accident of this little brute
following us home should run us into
the expense of an advertisement and a
certain amount of food and drink I’m
hanged if I can see.”

“Well, dear,” said his wife with the
same amiability, “if you can’t see it I
can’t make you.”

IV.

A few minutes later the arrival of “a
lady who’s come for the Peek” was
announced.

“No,” said Mr. Friend as his wife
rose, “leave it to me. I’ll deal with
it. The situation is very delicate.”

“How can I thank you enough,” began
Mrs. Bathurst, “for being so kind
and generous about our little angel?
My husband and I agreed that nothing
more charmingly considerate can ever
have been done.”

At this point Mrs. Friend followed
her husband into the room, and Mrs.
Bathurst renewed her expressions of
gratitude.

“But at any rate,” she added to her,
“you will permit me to defray the cost
of the advertisement? I could not allow
you to be at that expense.”

Before Mrs. Friend could speak her
husband intervened. “No, madam,”
he said, “I couldn’t think of it. Please
don’t let the mention of money vulgarize
a little friendly act like this. We
are only too glad to have been the
means of reuniting you and your pet.”

E.V.L.

Lady with Pram (who has been pointing out to newcomer the beauties of the neighbourhood,
where a strike is threatened). “That’s one of the ‘Ot ‘Eads.”

“Rufford Abbey is, of course, a wonderful
old place, and all the front, from gable to
gable, is genuine tenth-century, built in 1139.”—Sunday Times.

It looks as if the ca’ canny idea was
not so new as we thought it.

AT THE PLAY.

“Every Woman’s Privilege.”

When Dahlia refused the hand of a
wealthy middle-aged nut, with faultless
knickerbockers and a gift for lucubrated
epigrams, preferring to throw in
her lot (platonically) with a young and
penniless social reformer, we took no
notice of those who feared a scandal
(“scandals are not what they were,” as
she said), nor of the girl’s assertion
that she had no use for the alleged
romance of marriage. We were confident
that the little god whose image,
with bow and arrow, stood in the garden
of Dahlia’s ancestral home, would put
things right for us in the end. Yet we
were not greatly annoyed when he made
a mess of his business and married her
to the wrong man; for in the meantime
such strange things had been
allowed to occur and the right man
had proved such a disappointment that
we didn’t much care what happened to
anybody.

It was the rejected lover, Mortimer
Jerrold, who conceived two bright ideas
for conquering her independence of
mind, apparently for the benefit of his
rival. First he contrived to get Harold
Glaive, the young socialist, selected as a
candidate for Parliament, hoping (if I
read the gentleman’s motive rightly)
that his probable failure would touch
the place where her heart should have
been. This scheme did not go very
well, for he was chosen to contest the
seat held by Dahlia’s own father (which
caused a lot of trouble), and in the
result beat him.

Meanwhile Jerrold had had an alternative
[pg 275]
brain-wave. He thought that
if he pinched the latchkey of Dahlia’s
Bloomsbury flat, broke in at night, and
made a show of assaulting her modesty
he could prove to her that she was only
a poor weak woman after all. Nothing,
you would say, could well have been more
stupid. Yet, according to Mr. Hastings
Turner’s showing (and who were we
to challenge his authority?) it came off.
We were, in fact, asked to believe that
a girl who had protested her freedom
from all sense of sex was suddenly made
conscious of it by the violence of a man
whose advances, when decently conducted,
had left her cold; and from that
moment developed an inclination to
marry him. An assault by a tramp or
an apache would apparently have served
almost as well for the purpose. If this
is “Every Woman’s Privilege” it is
fortunate that so few of them get the
chance of exercising it.

Miss Marie Löhr herself came very
well out of a play that can hardly add
to the author’s reputation. Her personality
lent itself to a part which
demanded a blend of feminine charm
with a boyish contempt for romance.
And she had a few good things to say.
It was not Mr. Hallard’s fault if he
failed to win our perfect sympathy for
a hero whom the heroine addressed as
“Spats.” As for Mr. Basil Rathbone,
who played the part of Harold Glaive,
I cannot imagine why he took it on.
Apart from his timorous declaration of
love, conveyed on a typewriter, there
was no colour in it, and nothing whatever
to show why his passion petered out.
I think that the author, in his surprise at
the success of Harold’s rival, must have
forgotten all about it. Mr. Herbert
Ross was excellent as Dahlia’s father,
a pleasantly futile baronet under the
thumb of a sour-tongued managing
female, an old-fashioned part in which
Miss Helen Rous has nothing to learn.
Miss Vane Featherston, as the lady
who finally absorbed the baronet, did
her little gratuitous piece all right.

I cannot get myself to believe that
all these intelligent actors are under
any illusion as to the merits of the
comedy. With the best wishes in the
world for the success of Miss Marie
Löhr’s enterprises, I am bound to regard
it as yet another instance of a play
where the attractions of the leading
part have a little deranged the judgment
of the actor-manager.

O.S.

“The Crossing.”

Richard Petafor (Mr. Hubert Harben), the
apostle of Materialism and Physical Exercise,
trying to convert Antony Grimshaw (Mr. Herbert
Marshall), the believer in Mysticism
and Armchairs.

Mr. Algernon Blackwood and Mr.
Bertram Forsyth (assisted by Mr.
Donald Calthrop) present to us in
The Crossing a certain Mr. Anthony
Grimshaw, a princely egotist of the
poetic-idealist type who gets up on the
hearth-rug and says to his family, “I
am a humanitarian before everything,”
and things like that, and then wonders
why his wife is estranged from him.
He has a daughter, Nixie, who is not old
enough to know how bad all this is, and
together they hear the wind singing
glees without words (or in Volapuk,
but anyway not intelligible to us poor
normals), a thing Mr. Algernon Blackwood
has been doing or pretending to
do for years without once taking me in.

Anthony is run over and (as we say)
dies. After an extraordinarily tiresome
conversation in the morning-room with
his friend and his son and his mother
(who are also what people call dead) it
dawns upon him that something odd
has happened to himself also. His wife
and two children, after his (so-called)
death, become blissfully happy and set
to work to finish his book, that being,
as they think, his wish. Well, I wonder.
At any rate in death (as we say)
he was not divided—from his egotisms.

One knows well enough, alas, how
the temptation to spiritual drug-taking
has grown as the result of the accumulated
sorrows of these past years, but
it is not well that such a treatment
of the eternal question should be taken
seriously. Is this sort of thing really
better than the harp-and-cloud theory?
It is not. One looked in vain for any
trace of real vision, any true sense of the
height and depth of the problem.

Mr. Marshall struggled quite manfully
with the part of Anthony, and of
course he had his moments. I hope
so good a player is not developing the
“actor’s pause,” of which I detected
signs. Miss Irene Rooke had nothing
in particular to do and did it very well.
Mr. Hubert Harben as the impenitent
profiteer from Lancashire, Anthony’s
brother-in-law, was better suited than
I have seen him for some time, and
provided the very necessary relief. The
precocious children infuriated me, but
that is purely temperamental. The
actors who played the parts of those who
had “crossed” were wrapped in such
an atmosphere of gloom, to the strains
of such meretricious music that (on the
evidence) I can only advise people to
defer their crossing as long as possible;
a thing they will doubtless do, even if
they have a friendlier feeling to the new
religion than I can command…. I
am afraid I proved a bad sailor.

T.

THE DREAM OF BLISS.

TWO STUDIES IN MUSICAL
CRITICISM.

(With grateful acknowledgments to “The
Times” and “The Morning Post.”)

I.

We had quite a hectic time at the
Philharmonic—I nearly wrote the
Phillemonade—concert last night, what
with two Czechs, Dabçik and Ploffskin,
slabs of Wagner, and Carl Walbrook’s
Humorous Variations, “The Quangle
Wangle,” conducted by Carl himself.
If the honest truth be told, we sat down
to the Variations with no more pleasurable
anticipation than one sits down with
in the dentist’s chair, preparatory to the
application of gags, electric drills and
other instruments of odontological torture.
(Strange, by the way, that no
modernist has translated the horrors
of the modern Tusculum into terms of
sound and fury!) But we were most
agreeably surprised to find ourselves
following every one of the forty-nine
Variations with breathless interest. Mr.
Walbrook is indeed a case of the deformed
transformed. We found hardly
a trace of the poluphloisboisterous pomposity
with which he used to camouflage
his dearth of ideas. His main
theme is shapely and sinuous, and its
treatment in most of the Variations
titillated us voluptuously. But, since
it is the function of the critic to criticise,
let us justify our rôle by noting that the
scoring throughout tends to glutinousness,
like that of the pre-war Carlsbad
plum; further, that a solo on the muted
viola against an accompaniment of sixteen
sarrusophones is only effective if
the sarrusophones are prepared to roar
like sucking-doves, which, as Lear
would have said, “they seldom if ever
do.” Still, on the whole the Variations
arrided us vastly.

It was a curious but exhilarating
experience to hear the Bohemians, the
playboys of Central Europe, interpreted
in the roast-beef-and-plum-pudding
style of the Philharmonic at its beefiest
and plummiest. Dabçik survived the
treatment fairly well, but poor Ploffskin
was simply stodged under. But they
were in the same boat with Richard
the Elder, whose Venusberg music was
given with all the orgiastic exuberance
of a Temperance Band at a Sunday-School
Treat, recalling the sarcastic
jape of old Hans Richter during the
rehearsal of the same work: “You play
it like teetotalers—which you are
not.” Yet the orchestra were lavish
of violent sonority where it was not
required; the well-meaning but unfortunate
Mr. Orlo Jimson, who essayed
the “Smithy Songs” from Siegfried,
being submerged in a very Niagara of
noise. Wagner’s scoring no doubt is
“a bit thick,” but then he devised a
special “spelunk” (as Bacon says) for
his orchestra to lurk in, and there is
no cavernous accommodation at the
Queen’s Hall.

II.

Though fashion considers September
as an unpropitious time for the production
of novelties, the scheme arranged
for the patrons of the Philharmonic Concert
last night, under the direction of
Sir Henry Peacham, was successful in
bringing together an audience of eminently
respectable dimensions. The
occasion served for the launching under
favourable circumstances of what constituted
the chief landmark of the programme—a
set of orchestral variations
with the quaint title of “The Quangle
Wangle,” from the prolific pen of
Mr. Carl Walbrook. It is satisfactory
to be able to record the gratifying fact
that this work met with cordial acceptance.
In the interests of serious art,
the borrowing of a title from one of the
works of a writer so addicted to levity
as Edward Lear may perhaps be deprecated,
but there can be no doubt of the
ingenuity and sprightliness with which
Mr. Walbrook has addressed himself
to, and accomplished, his task. If we
cannot discover in his composition the
manifestation of any pronounced individuality
or high artistic uplift, it none
the less commands the respect due to
the exhibition of a vigorous mentality
combined with a notable mastery of
orchestral resource and mellifluous
modulation. At the conclusion of the
performance Mr. Walbrook was constrained
to make the transit from the
artistes’ room to the platform no fewer
than three times before the applausive
zeal of the audience could be allayed.

The remainder of the scheme was
copious and well-contrived. Pleasurable
evidence of the friendly interest
shown in the fortunes of the Czecho-Slovakian
Republic was forthcoming
in the performance of two works by
composers of that interesting race—Messrs.
Dabçik and Ploffskin—of
which it may suffice to say that the
temperamental peculiarities of the
Bohemian genius were elicited with
conspicuous brilliancy under the inspiring
direction of Sir Henry Peacham. In
a vocal item from Siegfried, Mr. Orlo
Jimson evinced a sympathetic appreciation
of the emotional needs of the situation
which augurs favourably for his
further progress, and the powerful
support furnished him by the orchestra
was an important factor in the enjoyment
of his praiseworthy efforts. An
almost too vivacious rendering of the
Venusberg music brought the scheme to
a strepitous conclusion. It may, however,
be submitted that so realistic an
interpretation of the Pagan revelries
depicted by the composer is hardly in
accordance with the best traditions of
the British musical public.

Fussy Old Party (who likes to make sure).
“Are you certain you go to Tunbridge Wells?”

Driver (to Conductor). “‘Ere, Bill, we are careless. Someone must have pinched the name-boards when we weren’t looking.”

“There is no such thing as infallibility in
rerum naturæ.”—Provincial Paper.

Nor, apparently, in journalistic Latin.

“Reward.—Bedroom taken Tuesday, 27th,
between Holborn and Woburn-place. A basket
and umbrella left.”—Daily Paper.

We compliment the victim of this theft
on his courtesy in calling the thieves’
attention to their oversight.

Exhausted War Profiteer. “Deer forests for the ‘idle rich’ be blowed! The ‘new poor’ can ‘ave ’em for me.”

OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.

(By Mr. Punch’s Staff of Learned Clerks.)

The long-promised Herbert Beerbohm Tree (Hutchinson),
than which I have expected no book with more impatience,
turns out to be a volume full of lively interest, though
rather an experiment in snap-shot portraiture from various
angles than a full-dress biography. Mr. Max Beerbohm
has arranged the book, himself contributing a short memoir
of his brother, which, together with what Lady Tree aptly
calls her Reverie, fills some two-thirds of it with the more
intimate view of the subject, the rest being supplied by the
outside appreciations of friends and colleagues. If I were
to sum up my impression of the resulting picture it would
be in the word “happiness.” Not without reason did the
Trees name a daughter Felicity. Here was a life spent
in precisely the kind of success that held most delight for
the victor—honour, love, obedience, troops of friends; all
that Macbeth missed his exponent enjoyed in flowing measure.
Perhaps Tree was never a great actor, because he
found existence too “full of a number of things”; if so he
was something considerably jollier, the enthusiastic, often
inspired amateur, approaching each new part with the zest
of a brief but brilliant enthusiasm. I suppose no popular
favourite ever had his name associated with more good
stories and wit, original and vicarious. Despite some entertaining
extracts from his commonplace book I doubt if this
side of him is quite worthily represented; at least nothing
here quoted beats Lady Tree’s own mot for a mendacious
newspaper poster—Canard à la Press. Possibly we are still
to look for a more official volume of reference; meantime the
present memoir gives a vastly readable sketch of one whose
passing left a void perhaps unexpectedly hard to fill.

In the prefatory chapter of Our Women (Cassell)
Mr. Arnold Bennett coyly disclaims any intention of
tackling his theme on strictly scientific principles. The
warning is perhaps hardly necessary, since, apart from the
duty which the author owes to his public as a novelist
rather than a philosopher, the title alone should be a sufficient
guide. One would hardly expect a serious zoologist, for
instance, in attempting to deal with the domesticated fauna,
to entitle his work Our Dumb Friends. The book is divided
in the main between adjuration and prophecy. As a result
of their emancipation from economic slavery, Mr. Bennett
expects women—women, that is to say, of the “top class,”
as he calls it—to adopt more and more the rôle of professional
wage-earners; but at the same time he insists
that they do not as yet take themselves seriously enough
as professional housekeepers. How the two functions are
to be combined it is a little difficult to see, but apparently
women are to retain a profession as a stand-by in case they
fail to marry or to remain married. At the same time
Mr. Bennett takes it for granted that woman will never
relinquish her position as a charmer of man, or even the
use of cosmetics and expensive lingerie. Speaking neither
as a novelist nor as a philosopher, I cannot help feeling
that Mr. Bennett is too apt to consider the things he
particularly likes about women to be eternal, and those
that he does not like so much to be susceptible of alteration
and improvement. Anyhow, it looks as if Our Men were
going to have rather a thin time.

Miss Beatrice Harraden calls her latest story Spring
Shall Plant (Hodder and Stoughton). She might equally
well have called it The Successes of a Naughty Child.
Certainly it is chiefly concerned with the many triumphant
[pg 279]
insubordinations of Patuffa (whom I suspect of having
been encouraged by her too challenging name) both at home
and at the various schools from which she either ran away
or was returned with thanks. This is all mildly attractive
if only from the vivacity of its telling; but I confess to
having felt a mild wonder whether a child’s book had not
got on to my table by error—when the grown-ups suddenly
began to carry on in a way that placed all such doubts at
rest. There was, for example, a Russian lady, godmother
of Patuffa, who escaped from somewhere and established
herself, with others of her kind, in an attic in Coptic Street.
My welcome for this interesting fugitive was to some extent
shaken by a realisation that she was (so to speak) a refugee
from the other side and, in a sense, a spiritual ancestress
of Bolshevism. Miss Harraden would however object,
and justly, that the clean-purposed conspirators of the
earlier revolution had little in common with the unsavoury
individuals who at present obscure the Russian dawn.
Soon after this, Patuffa’s papa begins to go quite dreadfully
off the rails, even to
the extent of wishing
to elope with her
governess and eventually
losing all his
money and shooting
himself. There was
also a famous violinist—well,
you can see
already that Patuffa’s
vernal experiences
were on generous lines.
It is to the credit of
all concerned that she
and her story retain
an appreciable charm
under adverse conditions.

Nothing, one would
imagine, could promise
much more restful
reading than a
book that concerns
itself with such things
as christening robes
for caterpillars, the
dyeing blue of white chickens and searches among Californian
lilies and pine-trees for the soul of a hog unseasonably defunct.
But, since this most uncharitable age refuses to
believe anything just because it is told it should, the peaceful
pages of The Diary of Opal Whiteley (Putnam) are unfortunately
fussed over with a controversy that no one who
reads them can quite escape. Miss Whiteley’s diary is presented
with every circumstance of solemn asseveration as the
unaided work of a child of seven, only now pieced together
by the writer after quite a number of years. If you care
to throw yourself into the argument you will certainly find
heaps of reasons for thinking unkind thinks, as the writer
would say, of the truth of this claim, particularly in the
completeness with which every incident is carried through
various stages to its literary finish; but, if you will be ruled
by me, you will try to forget anything but the book itself,
with its quite charming pictures of many animals and one
little girl, their understanding friend. The quaint idiom
in which the diary is supposed to have been written (or, of
course, was written) adds to the delight of a rather uncommon
feeling for nature at its simplest, while the scrapes for which
the small heroine receives (or, you may say, is alleged to
receive) well-deserved punishment preserve the book from
ever dropping into mere mawkishness. A great pity, I
think, that it was not published rather as based on childish
memories than as the actual printed script of a prodigy.

Moon Mountains (Hurst and Blackett) is a story which
with the best will in the world I found it impossible to regard
wholly seriously. The greater part of the scene is laid in
Darkest Africa, where the father of the hero, Peter (my hope
that the Peter habit had blown over appears to have been
premature), disappears at an early stage. The subsequent
course of events reminds me of the words of the musical-comedy
poet, popular in my youth, who wrote, “It were
better for you rather not to try and find your father, than
to find him”—well, certainly better than to find him as
Peter found his. Perhaps it would not be unfair to suppose
that Miss Margaret Peterson had at this point her eye
already firmly fixed upon her big situation. Certainly the
course of Peter is rather impatiently and spasmodically
sketched till the moment when matters are sufficiently advanced
to ship him
also to Africa, in
company with an
elderly hunter of butterflies
named Mellis.
Their adventures form
the bulk of the tale
(filled out with some
chat about elephants,
and a sufficiency of
love-making on the
part of Peter), and I
suppose I need hardly
tell you how one of
them, poor Mellis, is
immediately captured
and brought before
the terrible white king
of the hidden lands,
nor how this same
monarch, a really
dreadfully unpleasant
person, turns out to
be—Precisely. So
there the tale is; little
more incredible than,
I dare say, most of
its kind; and if you have no rooted objection to characters
all of whom behave like persons who know they are in a
book there is no reason why you should not find it at
least passably entertaining.

Mr. F. Brett Young’s manner of presenting The Tragic
Bride (Secker) is not free from affectation, and this is the
more irritating because his literary style is in itself admirably
unpretentious. But having recorded this complaint
I gladly go on to declare that his tale of Gabrielle Hewish
has both charm and distinction. I protest my belief in
Gabrielle both in her Irish and English homes, but my
protest would have been superfluous if Mr. Brett Young
had not almost super-taxed my powers of belief. So also
with Arthur Payne; he is a fascinating lad, and the battle
between his mother and Gabrielle for possession of him was
a royal struggle, fought without gloves yet very fairly.
All the same I caught myself doubting once or twice
whether any boy could at the same time be so human
and so inhuman. It is to Mr. Brett Young’s credit that
these doubts do not interfere with one’s enjoyment of his
book, and the reason is that he is first and last and all the
time an artist.

New Clerk. “Beg pardon, Sir, but there’s a gentleman outside who says
that you’ve robbed him of all he had.“

Turf Accountant. “Well, what’s his name? Ask him to give you his
name. How am I to distinguish him if he doesn’t send his name in?“