But these would not be my motives if the editor of The Children's Encyclopaedia took me for a walk and allowed me to ask him questions. The fact that light travels at so many hundred thousand miles an hour does not interest me; I should accept the information and then ask him my next question, "How did they find out?" That is always the intriguing part of the business. Who first realized that light was not instantaneous? What put him up to it? How did he measure its velocity? The fact (to take another case) that a cricket chirps by rubbing his knees together does not interest me; I want to know why he chirps. Is it involuntary, or is it done with the idea of pleasing? Why does a bird sing? The editor is prepared to tell me why a parrot is able to talk, but that is a much less intriguing matter. Why does a bird sing? I do not want an explanation of a thrush's song or a nightingale's, but why does a silly bird go on saying "chiff-chaff" all day long? Is it, for instance, happiness or hiccups?

Possibly these things are explained in some other volume than the one which fell to me. Possibly they are inexplicable. We can dogmatize about a star a billion miles away, but we cannot say with certainty how an idea came to a man or a song to a bird. Indeed, I think, perhaps, it would have been wiser of me to have left the chiff-chaff out of it altogether. I have an uneasy feeling that all last year the chiff-chaff was asking himself why I wrote every day. Was it involuntary, he wondered, or was it done with the idea of pleasing?



A Man of Property



Yes, a gardener's life is a disappointing one. When it was announced that we were just too late for everything this year, I decided to buy some ready-made gardens and keep them about the house, until such time as Nature was ready to co-operate. So now I have three gardens. This enables me to wear that superior look (which is so annoying for you) when you talk about your one little garden in front of me. Then you get off in disgust and shoot yourself, and they bury you in what you proudly called your herbaceous border, and people wonder next year why the delphiniums are so luxuriant—but you are not there to tell them.

Yes, I have three gardens. You come upon the first one as you are shown up the staircase to the drawing-room. It is outside the staircase window. This is the daffodil garden—3 ft. 8 ins. by 9 ins. The vulgar speak of it as a window-box; that is how one knows that they are vulgar. The maid has her instructions; we are not at home when next they call.

Sometimes I sit on the stairs and count the daffodils in my garden. There are seventy-eight of them; seventy-eight or seventy-nine—I cannot say for certain, because they will keep nodding their heads, so that sometimes one may escape me, or perhaps I may count another one twice over. The wall round the daffodil garden is bright blue—I painted it myself, and still carry patterns of it about with me—and the result of all these yellow heads on their long green necks waving above the blue walls of my garden is that we are always making excuses to each other for going up and down stairs, and the bell in the drawing-room is never rung.

But I have a fault to find with my daffodils. They turn their backs on us. It is natural, I suppose, that they do not care to look in at the window to see what we are doing, preferring the blue sky and the sun, and all that they can catch of March and April, but the end of it is that we see too little of their faces; for even if they are trained in youth with a disposition towards the window, yet as soon as they begin to come to their full glory they swing round towards the south and hide their beauty from us. But the House Opposite sees them, and brings his visitors, you may be sure, to his window to look at them. Indeed, I should not be surprised if he boasted of it as "his garden" and were even now writing in a book about it.

My second garden is circular—18 ins. in diameter, and, of course, more than that all the way round. I can see it now as I write—or, more accurately, if I stop writing for a moment—for it is just outside the library window. The vulgar call it a tub—they would; actually it is the Tulip Garden. At least, the man says so. For the tulips have not bourgeoned yet. No, I am wrong. (That is the worst of using these difficult words.) They have bourgeoned, but they have not blossomed. Their heads are well above ground, they have swelled into buds, but the buds have not broken. So, for all I know, they may yet be sun-flowers. However, the man says they will be tulips; he was paid for tulips; and he assures me that he has had experience in these matters. For myself, I should never dare to speak with so much authority. It is not our birth but our upbringing which makes us what we are, and these tulips have had, during their short lives above ground, a fatherly care and a watchfulness neither greater nor less than were bestowed upon the daffodils. That they sprang from different bulbs seems to me a small matter in comparison with this. However, the man says that they will be tulips. Presumably yellow ones.

One's gardens get smaller and smaller. My third is only 11 ins. by 9 ins. The vulgar call it a Japanese garden—indeed, I don't see what else they could call it. East is East and West is West and never the twain shall meet, but this does not prevent my Japanese garden from sitting on an old English refectory table in the dining-room. A Japanese garden needs very careful management. I have three native gardeners working at it day and night. At least they maintain the attitudes of men hard at work, but they don't seem to do much; perhaps they are afraid of throwing one another out of employment. The head gardener spends his time pointing to the largest cactus, and saying (I suppose in Japanese), "Look at my cactus!" The other two appear to be washing his Sunday shirt for him, instead of pruning or potting out, which is what I pay them for. However, the whole scene is one of great activity, for in the ornamental water in the middle of the garden two fishermen are hard at it, hoping to land something for my breakfast. So far they have not had a bite.

My Japanese garden has this advantage over the others, that it is independent of the seasons. The daffodils will bow their heads and droop away. The tulips—well, let us be sure that they are tulips first; but, if the man is correct, they too will wither. But the green hedgehog which friends tell me is a cactus will just go on and on. It must have some source of self-nourishment, for it can derive little from the sand whereon it rests. Perhaps, like most of us, it thrives on appreciation, and the gardener, who points to it so proudly day and night, is rightly employed after all. He knows that if once he dropped his hand, or looked the other way, the cactus would give it up disheartened.

It is fortunate for you that I am writing this week, and not later, for I have now ordered three more gardens, circular ones, to sit outside the library. There is talk also of a couple of evergreen woods for the front of the house. With six gardens, two woods, and an ornamental lake I shall be unbearable. In all the gardens of England people will be shooting themselves in disgust, and the herbaceous borders will flourish as never before. But that is for the future. To-day I write only of my three gardens. I would write of them at greater length but that my daffodil garden is sending out an irresistible call. I go to sit on the staircase.



An Ordnance Map



Spring calls to us to be up and about. It shouts to us to stand bareheaded upon hills and look down upon little woods and tiny red cottages, and away up to where the pines stand straight into the sky. Let the road, thin and white, wander on alone; we shall meet it again, and it shall lead us if it will to some comfortable inn; but now we are for the footpath and the stile—we are to stand in the fields and listen to the skylark.

Must you stay and work in London? But you will have ten minutes to spare. Look, I have an ordnance map—let us take our walk upon that.

We will start, if you please, at Buckley Cross. That is the best of walking on the map; you may start where you like, and there are no trains to catch. Our road goes north through the village—shall we stop a moment to buy an apple or two? Apples go well in the open air; we shall sit upon a gate presently and eat them before we light our pipes and join the road again. A pound, if you will—and now with bulging pockets for the north.

Over Buckley Common. You see by the dotted lines that it is an unfenced road, as, indeed, it should be over gorse and heather. A mile of it, and then it branches into two. Let us take this lane on the left; the way seems more wooded to the west.

By now we should be passing Buckley Grove. Perhaps it is for sale. If so, we might stop for a minute or two and buy it. We can work out how many acres it is, because it is about three-quarters of an inch each way, and if we could only remember how many acres went to a square mile—well, anyhow, it is a good-sized place. But three miles from a station, you say? Ah yes, but look at that little mark there just round the corner. Do you know what that stands for? A wind pump. How jolly to have one at your very door. "Shall we go and look at the wind pump?" you would say casually to your guests.

Let us leave the road. Do you see those dots going off to the right? That is a footpath. I have an idea that that will take us to the skylark. They do not mark skylarks on the map—I cannot say why—but something tells me that about a mile farther on, where the dots begin to bend.... Ah, do you hear? Up and up and up he goes into the blue, fainter and fainter falls the music. He calls to us to follow him to the clean morning of the world, whose magic light has shone for us in our dreams so long, yet ever eluded us waking. Bathed in that light, Youth is not so young as we, nor Beauty more beautiful; in that light Happiness is ours at last, for Endeavour shall have its perfect fulfilment, a fulfilment without regret....

Yes, let us have an apple.

Our path seems to end suddenly here. We shall have to go through this farm. All the dogs barking, all the fowls cluttering, all the lambs galloping—what a jolly, friendly commotion we've made! But we can get into the road again this way. Indeed, we must get into the road soon because it is hungry work out in the air, and two inches to the north-west is written a word full of meaning—the most purposeful word that can be written upon a map. "Inn," So now for a steady climb. We have dropped down to "200" by the farmhouse, and the inn is marked "500." But it is only two miles—well, barely that. Come along.

What shall we have? Ought it not to be bread and cheese and beer? But if you will excuse me, I would rather not have beer. I know that it sounds well to ask for it—as far as that goes, I will ask for it willingly—but I have never been able to drink it in any comfort. I think I shall have a gin and ginger. That also sounds well. More important still, it drinks well; in fact, the only thing which I don't like about it is the gin. "Oh, good morning. We want some bread and cheese, please, and one pint of beer, and a gin and ginger. And—er—you might leave out the gin." Yes, of course, I could have asked straight off for a plain ginger beer, but that sounds so very mild. My way I use the word "gin" twice. Let us be dashing on this brave day.

After lunch a pipe, while we consider where to go next.

It is anywhere you like, you know. To the north there is Greymoor Wood, and we pass a windmill; and to the east there is the little village of Colesford which has a church without a steeple; and to the west we go quite near another wind pump; and to the south—well, we should have to cross the line pretty soon. That brings us into touch with civilization; we do not want that just yet. So the north again let it be....

This is Greymoor Wood. Yes; there is a footpath marked right through it, but footpaths are hard to see beneath such a carpet of dead leaves. I dare say we shall lose ourselves. One false step and we are off the line of dots. There you are, there's a dot missing. We have lost the track. Now we must get out as best we can.

Do you know the way of telling the north by the sun? You turn the hour hand of your watch to the sun, and half-way between that and the XII is the south. Or else you turn the XII to the sun and take half-way between that and the hour hand. Anyhow you do find the south eventually after one or two experiments, and having discovered the south it is easy enough to locate the north. With your permission then we will push due north through Greymoor Wood.

We are through and on the road, but it is getting late. I et us hurry on. It would be tempting to wander down to that stream and follow its banks for a little; it would be pleasant to turn into that "unmetalled, unfenced" road—ah, doesn't one know those roads?—and let it carry us to the village of Milden, rich in both telegraph office and steeple. There is also, no more than two miles from where we stand, a contour of 600 ft.—shall we make for the view at the top of that? But no, perhaps you are right. We had best be getting home now. It is growing chilly; the sun has gone in; if we lost ourselves again, we could never find the north. Let us make for the nearest station. Widdington, isn't it? Three miles away....

There! Now we're home again. And must you really get on with your work? Well, but it has been a jolly day, hasn't it?



The Lord Mayor



There is a story of a boy who was asked to name ten animals which inhabit the polar regions. After a little thought he answered, "Six penguins and four seals." In the same way I suspect that, if you were asked to give the names of any three Lord Mayors of London, you would say, "Dick Whittington, and—er—Dick Whittington, and of course—er—Dick Whittington," knowing that he held that high office three times, and being quite unable to think of anybody else. This is where I have the advantage of you. In my youth there was a joke which went like this: "Why does the Lord Mayor like pepper? Because without his K.N., he'd be ill." I have an unfortunate habit of remembering even the worst joke, and so I can tell you, all these years after, that there was once a Lord Mayor called Knill. It is because I know the names of four Lord Mayors that I can write with such authority upon the subject.

To be a successful Lord Mayor demands years of training. Fortunately, the aspiring apprentice has time for preparation. From the moment when he is first elected a member of the Worshipful Company of Linendrapers he can see it coming. He can say with confidence that in 1944—or '43, if old Sir Joshua has his stroke next year, as seems probable—he will become the first citizen of London; which gives him twenty-four years in which to acquire the manner. It would be more interesting if this were not so; it would be more interesting to you and me if there were something of a struggle each year for the Lord Mayorality, so that we could put our money on our respective fancies. If, towards the end of October, we could read the Haberdashers' nominee had been for a stripped gallop on Hackney Downs and had pulled up sweating badly; if the Mayor could send a late wire from Aldgate to tell us that the candidate from the Drysalters' stable was refusing his turtle soup; if we could all try our luck at spotting the winner for November 9, then it is possible that the name of the new Lord Mayor might be as familiar in our mouths as that of this year's Derby favourite. As it is, there is no excitement at all about the business. We are told casually in a corner of the paper that Sir Tuttlebury Tupkins is to be the next Lord Mayor, and we gather that it was inevitable. The name conveys nothing to us, the face is the habitual face. He duly becomes Lord Mayor and loses his identity. We can still only think of Dick Whittington.

One cannot help wondering if it is worth it. He has his crowded year of glorious life, but it is a year without a name. He is never himself, he is just the Lord Mayor. He meets all the great people of the day, soldiers, sailors, statesmen, even artists, but they would never recognize him again. He cannot say that he knows them, even though he has given them the freedom of the City or a jewelled sword. He can do nothing to make his year of office memorable; nothing that is, which his predecessor did not do before, or his successor will not do again. If he raises a Mansion House Fund for the survivors of a flood, his predecessor had an earthquake, and his successor is safe for a famine. And nobody will remember whether it was in this year or in Sir Joshua Potts' that the record was beaten.

For this one year of anonymous greatness the aspiring Lord Mayor has to sacrifice his whole personality. He is to be the first citizen of London, but he must be very careful that London has never heard of him before. He has to live the life of a hermit, resolute neither to know nor to be known. For a year he shakes hands mechanically, but in the years before and the years afterwards, nobody, I imagine, has ever smacked him on the back. Indeed, it is doubtful if anybody has even seen him, so remote is his life from ours. He was dedicated to this from birth, or anyhow from the moment when he was first elected a member of the Worshipful Company of Linendrapers, and he has been preparing that wooden expression ever since.

It is because he has had to spend so many years out of the world that a City Remembrancer is provided for him. The City Remembrancer stands at his elbow when he receives his guests and tells him who they are. Without this aid, how should he know? Perhaps it is Mr. Thomas Hardy who is arriving. "Mr. Thomas Hardy," says the gentleman with the voice, and the Lord Mayor holds out his hand.

"I am very glad," he says, "to welcome such a very well-known—h'm—such a distinguished—er——"

"Writer," says the City Remembrancer behind the hack of his hand.

"Such a distinguished writer. The author of so many famous biog——"

"Novels," breathes the City Remembrancer, gazing up at the ceiling.

"So many famous novels," continues the Lord Mayor quite undisturbed, for he is used to it by this time. "The author of East Lynne——"

The City Remembrancer coughs and walks across to the other side of the Lord Mayor, murmuring Tess of the D'Urbervilles to the back of the Mayoral head as he goes. The Lord Mayor then repeats that he is delighted to welcome the author of Death and the Door-bells to the City, and holds out his hand to Mr. John Sargent.

"The painter," says the City Remembrancer, his lips, from long practice, hardly moving.

In the sanctity of the home that evening, while removing his chains of office, the Lord Mayor (we may suppose) tells his sleepy wife what an interesting day he has had, and how Mr. Thomas Sargent, the famous statesman, and Mr. John Hardy, the sculptor, both came to lunch.

And all the time the year is creeping on. Another day gone. Another day nearer to that fatal November 8.... And here, inevitably, is November 8, and by to-morrow he will be that most pathetic of all living creatures, an ex-Lord Mayor of London. Where do they live, the ex-Lord Mayors? They must have a colony of their own somewhere, a Garden City in which they can live together as equals. Probably they have some arrangement by which they take it in turns to be reminiscent; Sir Tuttlebury Tupkins has "and Wednesdays" on his card, and Sir Joshua Potts receives on "3rd Mondays"; and the other Lord Mayors gather round and listen, nodding their heads. On their birthdays they give each other gold caskets, and every November 10 they march in a body to the station to welcome the new arrival. Poor fellow, the tears are streaming down his cheeks, and his paunch is shaken with sobs, but there is a hot bowl of turtle soup waiting for him at Lady Tupkins' house, The Mansion Cottage, and he will soon feel more comfortable. He has been allotted the "4th Fridays," and it is hoped that by Christmas he will have settled down quite happily at Ichabod Lodge.



The Holiday Problem



The time for a summer holiday is May, June. July, August, and September—with, perhaps a fortnight in October if the weather holds up. But it is difficult to cram all this into the few short weeks allowed to most of us. We are faced accordingly with the business of singling out one month from the others—a business invidious enough to a lover of the country, but still more so to one who loves London as well. The question for him is not only which month is most wonderful by the sea, but also which month is most tolerable out of town.

I would wash my hands of London in May and come back brown from cricket and golf and sailing in September with willingness. Alas I it is impossible. But if I pick out July as the month for the open-air life, I begin immediately to think of the superiority of July over June as a month to spend in London. Not but what June is a delightful month in town, and May and August for that matter. In May, for instance——

Let us go into this question. May, of course, is hopeless for a holiday. One must be near one's tailor in May to see about one's summer clothes. Choosing a flannel suit in May is one of the moments of one's life—only equalled by certain other great moments at the hosier's and hatter's. "Ne'er cast a clout till May be out" says a particularly idiotic saw, but as you have already disregarded it by casting your fur coat, you may as well go through with the business now. Socks; I ask you to think of summer socks. Have you ordered your half-hose yet? No. Then how can you go away for your holiday?

Again, taxicabs pull down their shutters in May, and you are able to see and be seen as you drive through London. Never forget when you drive in a taxi that you own the car absolutely as long as the clock is ticking; that you are a motorist, a fit member for the Royal Automobile Club; that the driver is your chauffeur to obey your orders; and, best of all, that, May being here, you can put your feet upon the seat opposite in the sight of everybody. Will you miss the glory? In June and July it will have lost something. Pay your five shillings in May and expand, live; pay your five pounds if you like and drive all down the Cromwell Road. Don't bury yourself in Devonshire.

The long light evenings of June in London! The dances, the dinners in the warm nights of June! The window-boxes in the squares, the pretty people in the parks; are we going to leave them? There is so much going on. We may not be in it, but we must be in London to feel that we are helping. They also serve who only stand and stare. Besides—I put it to you—strawberries are ripe in June. You will never get enough in Cumberland or wherever you are. Not good ones; not the shilling-a-seed kind.

Is it wise to go away in July? What about the Varsity match and Gentlemen v. Players? You must be at Lord's for those. Yes; July is the month for Lord's. Drive there, I beg you, in a hansom, if indeed there is still one left. A taxi by all means in May or when you are in a hurry, but a day at Lord's must be taken deliberately. Drive there at your leisure; breathe deeply. Do not he afraid of taking your seat before play begins—you can buy a Sportsman on the ground and read how Vallingwick nearly beat Upper Finchley. It is all part of the great game, and if you are to enjoy your day truly, then you must go with this feeling in the back of your mind—that you ought really to be working. That is the right condiment for a cricket match.

Yes; we must be near St. John's Wood in July, but what about August? Everybody, you say, goes away in August; but is not that rather a reason for staying? I don't bother to point out that the country will be crowded, only that London will be so pleasantly empty. In August and September you can wander about in your oldest clothes and nobody will mind. You can get a seat for any play without difficulty—indeed, without paying, if you know the way. It is a rare time for seeing the old churches of the City or for exploring the South Kensington Museum. London is not London in August and September; it is a jolly old town that you have never seen before. You can dine at the Savoy in your shirt sleeves—well, nearly. I mean, that gives you the idea. And, best of all, your friends will all be enjoying themselves in the country, and they will ask you down for week-ends. Robinson, who is having a cricket week for his schoolboy sons, and Smith, who has hired a yacht, will be glad to see you from Friday to Tuesday. If you had gone to Switzerland for the month, you couldn't have accepted their kind invitations. "How I wish," you would have said as you paid the extra centimes on their letters, "how I wish I had taken my holiday in June." On the other hand, in June——

Well, you see how difficult it is for you. Of course, I don't really mind what you do. For myself I have almost decided to have a week in each month. The advantage of this is that I shall go away four times instead of once. There is no joy in the world to equal that of strolling after a London porter who is looking for an empty smoker in which to put your golf clubs. To do it four times, each time with the knowledge of a week's holiday ahead, is almost more than man deserves. True that by this means I shall also come back four times instead of once, but to a lover of London that is no great matter. Indeed, I like it so.

And another advantage is that I can take five weeks in this way while deluding my conscience into thinking that I am only taking four. A holiday taken in a lump is taken and over. Taken in weeks, with odd days at each end of the weeks, it always leaves a margin for error. I shall take care that the error is on the right side. And if anybody grumbles, "Why, you're always going away," I shall answer with dignity, "Confound it! I'm always coming back."



The Burlington Arcade



It is the fashion, I understand, to be late for dinner, but punctual for lunch. What the perfect gentleman does when he accepts an invitation to breakfast I do not know. Possibly he has to be early. But for lunch the guests should arrive at the very stroke of the appointed hour, even though it leads to a certain congestion on the mat.

My engagement was for one-thirty, and for a little while my reputation seemed to be in jeopardy. Two circumstances contributed to this. The first one was the ever-present difficulty in these busy days of synchronizing an arrival. A prudent man allows himself time for being pushed off the first half-dozen omnibuses and trusts to surging up with the seventh wave. I was so unlucky as to cleave my way on to the first 'bus of all, with the result that when I descended from it I was a good ten minutes early. Well, that was bad enough. But, just as I was approaching the door, I realized that my calculations had been made for a one o'clock lunch. It was now ten to one; I had forty minutes in hand.

It is very difficult to know what to do with forty minutes in the middle of Piccadilly, particularly when it is raining. Until a year ago I had had a club there, and I had actually resigned from it (how little one foresees the future!) on the plea that I never had occasion to use it. I felt that I would cheerfully have paid the subscription for the rest of my life in order to have had the loan of its roof at that moment. My new club—like the National Gallery and the British Museum, those refuges for the wet Londoner—was too far away. The Academy had not yet opened.

And then a sudden inspiration drew me into the Burlington Arcade. They say that the churches of London are ill-attended nowadays, but at least St. James, Piccadilly, can have no cause for complaint, for I suppose that the merchants of the Arcade, and all those dependent on them, repair thither twice weekly to pray for wet weather. The Burlington Arcade is indeed a beautiful place on a wet day. One can move leisurely from window to window, passing from silk pyjamas to bead necklaces and from bead necklaces back to silk pyjamas again; one can look for a break in the weather from either the north or the south; and at the south end there is a clock conveniently placed for those who have a watch waiting its turn at the repairer's and a luncheon engagement in forty minutes.

For a long time I hesitated between a bead necklace and a pair of pyjamas. A few coloured stones on a chain were introduced to the umbrella-less onlooker as "The Latest Fashion," followed by the announcement, superfluous in the circumstances, that it was "Very Stylish." It came as a shock to read further that one could be in the fashion for so little a sum as six shillings. There were other necklaces at the same price but of entirely different design, which were equally "Stylish," and of a fashion no less up to date. In this the merchant seemed to me to have made a mistake; for the whole glory of wearing "The Latest Fashion" is the realization that the other woman has just missed it by a bead or two. A fashion must be exclusive. St. James, Piccadilly, is all very well, but one has also to consider how to draw the umbrella-less within after one has got their noses to the shop window.

I passed on to the pyjamas, which seemed to be mostly in regimental colours. This war came upon us too suddenly, so that most of us rushed into the army without a proper consideration of essentials. I doubt if anyone who enlisted in the early days stopped to ask himself whether the regimental colours would suit him. It will be different in the next war. If anybody joins the infantry at all (which is doubtful), he will at least join a regiment whose pyjamas may be worn with self-respect in the happy peace days.

There are objections to turning up to lunch (however warmly invited) with a pair of pyjamas under the arm. It looks as though you might stay too long. I moved on to another row of bead necklaces. They offered themselves for two shillings, and all that the owner could find to say for them was that they were "Quite New." If he meant that nobody had ever worn such a necklace before, he was probably right, but I feel that he could have done better for them than this, and that, "As supplied to the Queen of Denmark," or something of the sort, would have justified an increase to two and threepence.

By this time nearly everybody was lunching except myself, and my clock said one twenty-five. If I were to arrive with that exact punctuality upon which I so credit myself, I must buy my bead necklace upon some other day. I said good-bye to the Burlington Arcade, and stepped out of it with the air of a man who has done a successful morning's shopping. A clock in the hall was striking one-thirty as I entered. Then I remembered. It was Tuesday's lunch which was to be at one-thirty. To-day's was at one o'clock... However, I had discovered the Burlington Arcade.



State Lotteries



The popular argument against the State Lottery is an assertion that it will encourage the gambling spirit. The popular argument in favour of the State Lottery is an assertion that it is hypocritical to say that it will encourage the gambling spirit, because the gambling spirit is already amongst us. Having listened to a good deal of this sort of argument on both sides, I thought it would be well to look up the word "gamble" in my dictionary. I found it next to "gamboge," and I can now tell you all about it.

To gamble, says my dictionary, is "to play for money in games of skill or chance," and it adds the information that the word is derived from the Anglo-Saxon gamen, which means "a game". Now, to me this definition is particularly interesting, because it justifies all that I have been thinking about the gambling spirit in connexion with Premium Bonds. I am against Premium Bonds, but not for the popular reason. I am against them because (as it seems to me) there is so very little of the gamble about them. And now that I have looked up "gamble" in the dictionary, I see that I was right. The "chance" element in a state lottery is obvious enough, but the "game" element is entirely absent. It is nothing so harmless and so human as the gambling spirit which Premium Bonds would encourage.

We play for money in games of skill or chance—bridge, for instance. But it isn't only of the money we are thinking. We get pleasure out of the game. Probably we prefer it to a game of greater chance, such as vingt-et-un. But even at vingt-et-un or baccarat there is something more than chance which is taking a hand in the game; not skill, perhaps, but at least personality. If you are only throwing dice, you are engaged in a personal struggle with another man, and you are directing the struggle to this extent, that you can call the value of the stakes, and decide whether to go on or to stop. And is there any man who, having made a fortune at Monte Carlo, will admit that he owes it entirely to chance? Will he not rather attribute it to his wonderful system, or if not to that, at any rate to his wonderful nerve, his perseverance, or his recklessness?

The "game" element, then, comes into all these forms of gambling, and still more strongly does it pervade that most common form of gambling, betting on horses. I do not suggest that the street-corner boy who puts a shilling both ways on Bronchitis knows anything whatever about horses, but at least he thinks he does; and if he wins five shillings on that happy afternoon when Bronchitis proves himself to be the 2.30 winner, his pleasure will not be solely in the money. The thought that he is such a skilful follower of form, that he has something of the national eye for a horse, will give him as much pleasure as can be extracted from the five shillings itself.

This, then, is the gambling spirit. It has its dangers, certainly, hut it is not entirely an evil spirit. It is possible that the State should not encourage it, but it is not called upon to exorcise it with bell, and book, and candle. I am not sure that I should favour a State gamble, but my arguments against it would be much the same as my arguments against State cricket or the solemn official endowment and recognition of any other jolly game. However, I need not trouble you with those arguments now, for nothing so harmless as a State gamble has ever been suggested. Instead, we have from time to time a State lottery offered to us, and that is a very different proposition.

For in a State lottery—with daily prizes of L50,000—the game (or gambling) element does not exist. Buy your L100 bond, as a thousand placards will urge you to do, and you simply take part in a cold-blooded attempt to acquire money without working for it. You can take no personal interest whatever in the manner of acquiring it. Somebody turns a handle, and perhaps your number comes out. More probably it doesn't. If it doesn't, you can call yourself a fool for having thrown away your savings; if it does—well, you have got the money. May you be happy with it! But you have considerably less on which to congratulate yourself than had the street-corner boy who backed Bronchitis. He had an eye for a horse. Probably you hadn't even an eye for a row of figures.

Moreover, the State would be giving its official approval to the unearned fortune. In these days, when the worker is asking for a week of so many less hours and so many more shillings, the State would answer: "I can show you a better way than that. What do you say to no work at all, and L20 a week for it?" At a time when the one cry is "Production!" the State adds (behind its hand), "Buy a Premium Bond, and let the other man produce for you." After all these years in which we have been slowly progressing towards the idea of a more equitable distribution of wealth, the Government would show us the really equitable way; it would collect the savings of the many, and re-distribute them among the few. Instead of a million ten-pound citizens, we should have a thousand ten-thousand-pounders and 999,000 with nothing. That would be the official way of making the country happy and contented. But, in fact, our social and political controversies are not kept alive by such arguments as these, nor by the answers which can legitimately be made to such arguments. The case of the average man in favour of State lotteries is, quite simply, that he does not like Dr. Clifford. The case of the average man against State lotteries is equally simple; he cannot bear to be on the same side as Mr. Bottomley.



The Record Lie



I have just seen it quoted again. Yes, it appears solemnly in print, even now, at the end of the greatest war in history. Si vis pacem, para bellum. And the writer goes on to say that the League of Nations is all very well, but unfortunately we are "not angels." Dear, dear!

Being separated for the moment from my book of quotations, I cannot say who was the Roman thinker who first gave this brilliant paradox to the world, but I imagine him a fat, easy-going gentleman, who occasionally threw off good things after dinner. He never thought very much of Si vis pacem, para bellum; it was not one of his best; but it seemed to please some of his political friends, one of whom asked if he might use it in his next speech in the Senate. Our fat gentleman said: "Certainly, if you like," and added, with unusual frankness: "I don't quite know what it means." But the other did not think that that would matter very much. So he quoted it, and it had a considerable vogue... and by and by they returned to the place from which they had come, leaving behind them the record of the ages, the lie which has caused more suffering than anything the Devil could have invented for himself. Two thousand years from now people will still be quoting it, and killing each other on the strength of it. Or perhaps I am wrong. Perhaps two thousand years from now, if the English language is sufficiently dead by then, the world will have some casual paradox of Bernard Shaw's or Oscar Wilde's on its lips, passing it reverently from mouth to mouth as if it were Holy Writ, and dropping bombs on Mars to show that they know what it means. For a quotation is a handy thing to have about, saving one the trouble of thinking for oneself, always a laborious business.

Si vis pacem, para bellum. Yes, it sounds well. It has a conclusive ring about it, particularly if the speaker stops there for a moment and drinks a glass of water. "If you want peace, prepare for war," is not quite so convincing; that might have been his own idea, evolved while running after a motor-bus in the morning; we should not be so ready to accept it as Gospel. But Si vis pacem——! It is almost blasphemous to doubt it.

Suppose for a moment that it is true. Well, but this certainly is true: Si vis bellum, para bellum. So it follows that preparation for war means nothing; it does not necessarily mean that you want war, it does not necessarily mean that you want peace; it is an action which is as likely to have been inspired by an evil motive as by a good motive. When a gentleman with a van calls for your furniture you have means of ascertaining whether he is the furniture-remover whom you ordered or the burglar whom you didn't order, but there is no way of discovering which of two Latin tags is inspiring a nation's armaments. Si vis pacem, para bellum—it is a delightful excuse. Germany was using it up to the last moment.

However, I can produce a third tag in the same language, which is worth consideration. Si vis amare bellum, para bellum—said by Quintus Balbus the Younger five minutes before he was called a pro-Carthaginian. There seems to be something in it. I have been told by women that it is great fun putting on a new frock, but I understand that they like going out in it afterwards. After years in the schools a painter does want to show the public what he has learnt. Soldiers who have given their lives to preparing for war may be different; they may be quite content to play about at manoeuvres and answer examination papers. I learnt my golf (such as it is) by driving into a net. Perhaps, if I had had the soldier's temperament, I should still be driving into a net quite happily. On the other hand, soldiers may be just like other people, and having prepared for a thing may want to do it.

No; it is a pity, but Universal Peace will hardly come as the result of universal preparedness for war, as these dear people seem to hope. It will only come as the result of a universal feeling that war is the most babyish and laughably idiotic thing that this poor world has evolved. Our writer says sadly that there is no hope of doing without armies—we are not angels. It is not a question of "not being angels," it is a question of not being childish lunatics. Possibly there is no hope of this either, but I think we might make an effort.

For opinions do spread, if one holds them firmly oneself and is not afraid of confessing them. A si-vis-pacem gentleman said to me once, with a sneer: "How are you going to do it? Speeches and pamphlets?" Well, that was how Christianity got about, even though Paul's letters did not appear in a daily paper with a circulation of a million and a telegraphic service to every part of the world.

But perhaps Christianity is an unfortunate example to give in an argument about war; one begins to ask oneself if Christianity has spread as much as one thought. There are dear people, of course, to whom it has been revealed in the night that God is really much more interested in nations than in persons; it is not your soul or my soul that He is concerned about, but the British Empire's. Germany He dislikes (although the Germans were under a silly misapprehension about this once), and though the Japanese do not worship Him, yet they are such active little fellows, not to say Allies of England, that they too are under His special protection. And when He deprecated lying and stealing and murder and bearing false witness, and all those things, He meant that if they were done in a really wholesale way—by nations, not by individuals—then it did not matter; for He can forgive a nation anything, having so much more interest in it. All of which may be true, but it is not Christianity.

However, as our writer says, "we are not angels," and apparently he thinks that it would be rather wicked of us to try to be. Perhaps he is right.



Wedding Bells



Champagne is often pleasant at lunch, it is always delightful at dinner, and it is an absolute necessity, if one is to talk freely about oneself afterwards, at a dance supper. But champagne for tea is horrible. Perhaps this is why a wedding always finds me melancholy next morning. "She has married the wrong man," I say to myself. "I wonder if it is too late to tell her."

The trouble of answering the invitation and of thinking of something to give more original than a toast rack should, one feels, have its compensations. From each wedding that I attend I expect an afternoon's enjoyment in return for my egg stand. For one thing I have my best clothes on. Few people have seen me in them (and these few won't believe it), so that from the very beginning the day has a certain freshness. It is not an ordinary day. It starts with this advantage, that in my best clothes I am not difficult to please. The world smiles upon me.

Once I am in church, however, my calm begins to leave me. As time wears on, and the organist invents more and more tunes, I tremble lest the bride has forgotten the day. The choir is waiting for her; the bridegroom is waiting for her. I—I also—wait. What if she has changed her mind at the last minute? But no. The organist has sailed into his set piece; the choir advances; follows the bride looking so lonely that I long to comfort her and remind her of my egg stand; and, last of all, the pretty bridesmaids. The clergyman begins his drone.

You would think that, reassured by the presence of the bride, I could be happy now. But there is still much to bother me. The bridegroom is showing signs of having forgotten his part, the bride can't get her glove off, one of the bridesmaids is treading on my hat. Worse than all this, there is a painful want of unanimity among the congregation as to when we stand up and when we sit down. Sometimes I am alone and sitting when everybody else is standing, and that is easy to bear; but sometimes I find myself standing when everybody else is sitting, and that is very hard.

They have gone to the vestry. The choir sings an anthem to while away the kissing-time, and, right or wrong, I am sitting down, comforting my poor hat. There was a time when I, too, used to go into the vestry; when I was something of an authority on weddings, and would attend weekly in some minor official capacity. Any odd jobs that were going seemed to devolve on me. If somebody was wanted suddenly to sign the register, or kiss the bride's mother, or wind up the going-away car, it used to be taken for granted that I was the man to do it. I wore a white flower in my button-hole to show that I was available. I served, I may say, in an entirely honorary capacity, except in so far as I was expected to give the happy pair a slightly larger present than the others. One day I happened to suggest to an intending groom that he had other friends more ornamental, and therefore more suitable for this sort of work, than I; to which he replied that they were all married, and that etiquette demanded a bachelor for the business. Of course, as soon as I heard this I got married too.

Here they come. "Doesn't she look sweet?" We hurry after them and rush for the carriages. I am only a friend of the bridegroom's; perhaps I had better walk.

It must be very easy to be a guest at a wedding reception, where each of the two clans takes it for granted that all the extraordinary strangers belong to the other clan. Indeed, nobody with one good suit, and a stomach for champagne and sandwiches, need starve in London. He or she can wander safely in wherever a red carpet beckons. I suppose I must put in an appearance at this reception, but if I happen to pass another piece of carpet on the way to the house, and the people going in seem more attractive than our lot, I shall be tempted to join them.

This is, perhaps, the worst part of the ceremony, this three hundred yards or so from the hymn-sheets to the champagne. All London is now gazing at my old top-hat. When the war went on and on and on, and it seemed as though it were going on for ever, I looked back on peace much as those old retired warriors at the end of last century looked back on their happy Crimean days; and in the same spirit as that in which they hung their swords over the baronial fireplace, I decided to suspend my old top-hat above the mantel-piece in the drawing-room. In the years to come I would take my grandchildren on my knee and tell them stories of the old days when grandfather was a civilian, of desperate charges by church-wardens and organists, and warm receptions; and sometimes I would hold the old top-hat reverently in my hands, and a sudden gleam would come into my eyes, so that those watching me would say to each other, "He is thinking of that tea-fight at Rutland Gate in 1912." So I pictured the future for my top-hat, never dreaming that in 1920 it would take the air again.

For I went into the war in order to make the world safe for democracy, which I understood to mean (and was distinctly informed so by the press) a world safe for those of us who prefer soft hats with a dent in the middle. "The war," said the press, "has killed the top-hat." Apparently it failed to do this, as it failed to do so many of the things which we hoped from it. So the old veteran of 1912 dares the sunlight again. We are arrived, and I am greeted warmly by the bride's parents. I look at the mother closely so that I shall know her again when I come to say good-bye, and give her a smile which tells her that I was determined to come down to this wedding although I had a good deal of work to do. I linger with the idea of pursuing this point, for I want them to know that they nearly missed me, but I am pushed on by the crowd behind me. The bride and bridegroom salute me cordially but show no desire for intimate gossip. A horrible feeling goes through me that my absence would not have been commented upon by them at any inordinate length. It would not have spoilt the honeymoon, for instance.

I move on and look at the presents. The presents are numerous and costly. Having discovered my own I stand a little way back and listen to the opinions of my neighbours upon it. On the whole the reception is favourable. The detective, I am horrified to discover, is on the other side of the room, apparently callous as to the fate of my egg stand. I cannot help feeling that if he knew his business he would be standing where I am standing now; or else there should be two detectives. It is a question now whether it is safe for me to leave my post and search for food... Now he is coming round; I can trust it to him.

On my way to the refreshments I have met an old friend. I like to meet my friends at weddings, but I wish I had not met this one. She has sowed the seeds of disquiet in my mind by telling me that it is not etiquette to begin to eat until the bride has cut the cake. I answer, "Then why doesn't somebody tell the bride to cut the cake?" but the bride, it seems, is busy. I wish now that I had not met my friend. Who but a woman would know the etiquette of these things, and who but a woman would bother about it?

The bride is cutting the cake. The bridegroom has lent her his sword, or his fountain-pen, whatever is the emblem of his trade—he is a stockbroker—and as she cuts, we buzz round her, hoping for one of the marzipan pieces. I wish to leave now, before I am sorry, but my friend tells me that it is not etiquette to leave until the bride and bridegroom have gone. Besides, I must drink the bride's health. I drink her health; hers, not mine.

Time rolls on. I was wrong to have had champagne. It doesn't suit me at tea. However, for the moment life is bright enough. I have looked at the presents and my own is still there. And I have been given a bagful of confetti. The weary weeks one lives through without a handful of anything to throw at anybody. How good to be young again. I take up a strong position in the hall.

They come... Got him—got him! Now a long shot—got him! I feel slightly better, and begin the search for my hostess....

I have shaken hands with all the bride's aunts and all the bridegroom's aunts, and in fact all the aunts of everybody here. Each one seems to me more like my hostess than the last. "Good-bye!" Fool—of course—there she is. "Good-Bye!"

My hat and I take the air again. A pleasant afternoon; and yet to-morrow morning I shall see things more clearly, and I shall know that the bridegroom has married the wrong girl. But it will be too late then to save him.



Public Opinion



At the beginning of the last strike the papers announced that Public Opinion was firmly opposed to dictation by a minority. Towards the end of the strike the papers said that Public Opinion was strongly in favour of a settlement which would leave neither side with a sense of defeat. I do not complain of either of these statements, but I have been wondering, as I have often wondered before, how a leader-writer discovers what the Public Opinion is.

When one reads about Public Opinion in the press (and one reads a good deal about it one way and another), it is a little difficult to realize, particularly if the printer has used capital letters, that this much-advertised Public Opinion is simply You and Me and the Others. Now, since it is impossible for any man to get at the opinions of all of us, it is necessary that he should content himself with a sample half-dozen or so. But from where does he get his sample? Possibly from his own club, limited perhaps to men of his own political opinions; almost certainly from his own class. Public Opinion in this case is simply what he thinks. Even if he takes the opinion of strangers—the waiter who serves him at lunch, the tobacconist, the policeman at the corner—the opinion may be one specially prepared for his personal consumption, one inspired by tact, boredom, or even a sense of humour. If, for instance, the process were to be reversed, and my tobacconist were to ask me what I thought of the strike, I should grunt and go out of his shop; but he would be wrong to attribute "a dour grimness" to the nation in consequence.

Nor is the investigator likely to be more correct if he judges Public Opinion from the evidence of his eyes rather than his ears. Thus one reporter noticed on the faces of his companions in the omnibus "a look of stern determination to see this thing through." If they were all really looking like that, it must have been an impressive sight. But it is at least possible that this distinctive look was one of stern determination to get a more comfortable seat on the 'bus which took them home again.

It must be very easy (and would certainly be extremely interesting) to go about forming Public Opinion, I should like to initiate an L.F.P.O., or League for Forming Public Opinion, and not only for forming it, but for putting it, when formed, into direct action. Such a League, even if limited to two hundred members, could by its concerted action exercise a very remarkable effect. Suppose we decided to attack profiteering. We should choose our shop—a hosier's, let us say. Beginning on Monday morning, a member of the League would go in and ask to be shown some ties. Having spent some time in looking through the stock and selecting a couple, he would ask the price. "Oh, but that's ridiculous," he would say. "I couldn't think of paying that. If I can't get them cheaper somewhere else, I'll do without them altogether." The shopman shrugs his shoulders and puts his ties back again. Perhaps he tells himself contemptuously that he doesn't cater for that sort of customer. The customer goes out, and half an hour later the second member of the League arrives. This one asks for collars. He is equally indignant at the price, and is equally determined not to wear a collar at all rather than submit to such extortion. Half an hour later the third member comes in. He wants socks.... The fourth member wants ties again... The fifth wants gloves....

Now this is going on, not only all through the day, but all through the week, and for another week after that. Can you not imagine that, after a fortnight of it, the haberdasher begins to feel that "Public Opinion is strongly aroused against profiteering in the hosiery trade"? Is it not possible that the loss of two hundred customers in a fortnight would make him wonder whether a lower price might not bring him in a greater profit? I think it is possible. I do not think he could withstand a Public Opinion so well organized and so relentlessly concentrated.

But such a League would have enormous power in many ways. If you were to write to the editor of a paper complaining that So-and-So's contributions (mine, if you like) were beneath contempt, the editor would not be seriously concerned about it. Possibly he had a letter the day before saying that So-and-So was beyond all other writers delightful. But if twenty members of the League wrote every week for ten weeks in succession, from two hundred different addresses, saying that So-and-So's articles were beneath contempt, the editor would be more than human if he did not tell himself that So-and-So had fallen off a little and was obviously losing his hold on the popular imagination. In a little while he would decide that it would be wiser to make a change....

Of course, the League would not attack a writer or any other public man from sheer wilfulness, but it would probably have no difficulty in bringing down over-praised mediocrity to its proper level or in giving a helping hand to unrecognized talent. But unless its president were a man of unerring judgment and remarkable restraint, its sense of power would probably be too much for it, and it would lose its head altogether. Looking round for a suitable president, I can think of nobody but myself. And I am too busy just now.



The Honour of Your Country



We were resting after the first battle of the Somme. Naturally all the talk in the Mess was of after-the-war. Ours was the H.Q. Mess, and I was the only subaltern; the youngest of us was well over thirty. With a gravity befitting our years and (except for myself) our rank, we discussed not only restaurants and revues, but also Reconstruction.

The Colonel's idea of Reconstruction included a large army of conscripts. He did not call them conscripts. The fact that he had chosen to be a soldier himself, out of all the professions open to him, made it difficult for him to understand why a million others should not do the same without compulsion. At any rate, we must have the men. The one thing the war had taught us was that we must have a real Continental army.

I asked why. "Theirs not to reason why" on parade, but in the H.Q. Mess on active service the Colonel is a fellow human being. So I asked him why we wanted a large army after the war.

For the moment he was at a loss. Of course, he might have said "Germany," had it not been decided already that there would be no Germany after the war. He did not like to say "France," seeing that we were even then enjoying the hospitality of the most delightful French villages. So, after a little hesitation, he said "Spain."

At least he put it like this:—

"Of course, we must have an army, a large army."

"But why?" I said again.

"How else can you—can you defend the honour of your country?"

"The Navy."

"The Navy! Pooh! The Navy isn't a weapon of attack; it's a weapon of defence."

"But you said 'defend'."

"Attack," put in the Major oracularly, "is the best defence."

"Exactly."

I hinted at the possibilities of blockade. The Colonel was scornful. "Sitting down under an insult for months and months," he called it, until you starved the enemy into surrender. He wanted something much more picturesque, more immediately effective than that. (Something, presumably, more like the Somme.)

"But give me an example," I said, "of what you mean by 'insults' and 'honour'."

Whereupon he gave me this extraordinary example of the need for a large army.

"Well, supposing," he said, "that fifty English women in Madrid were suddenly murdered, what would you do?"

I thought for a moment, and then said that I should probably decide not to take my wife to Madrid until things had settled down a bit.

"I'm supposing that you're Prime Minister," said the Colonel, a little annoyed. "What is England going to do?"

"Ah!... Well, one might do nothing. After all, what is one to do? One can't restore them to life."

The Colonel, the Major, even the Adjutant, expressed his contempt for such a cowardly policy. So I tried again.

"Well," I said, "I might decide to murder fifty Spanish women in London, just to even things up."

The Adjutant laughed. But the Colonel was taking it too seriously for that.

"Do you mean it?" he asked.

"Well, what would you do, sir?"

"Land an army in Spain," he said promptly, "and show them what it meant to treat English women like that."

"I see. They would resist of course?"

"No doubt."

"Yes. But equally without doubt we should win in the end?"

"Certainly."

"And so re-establish England's honour."

"Quite so."

"I see. Well, sir, I really think my way is the better. To avenge the fifty murdered English women, you are going to kill (say) 100,000 Spaniards who have had no connexion with the murders, and 50,000 Englishmen who are even less concerned. Indirectly also you will cause the death of hundreds of guiltless Spanish women and children, besides destroying the happiness of thousands of English wives and mothers. Surely my way—of murdering only fifty innocents—is just as effective and much more humane."

"That's nonsense," said the Colonel shortly.

"And the other is war."

We were silent for a little, and then the Colonel poured himself out a whisky.

"All the same," he said, as he went back to his seat, "you haven't answered my question."

"What was that, sir?"

"What you would do in the case I mentioned. Seriously."

"Oh! Well, I stick to my first answer. I would do nothing—except, of course, ask for an explanation and an apology. If you can apologize for that sort of thing."

"And if they were refused?"

"Have no more official relations with Spain."

"That's all you would do?"

"Yes."

"And you think that that is consistent with the honour of a great nation like England?"

"Perfectly."

"Oh! Well, I don't."

An indignant silence followed.

"May I ask you a question now, sir?" I said at last.

"Well?"

"Suppose this time England begins. Suppose we murder all the Spanish women in London first. What are you going to do—as Spanish Premier?"

"Er—I don't quite——"

"Are you going to order the Spanish Fleet to sail for the mouth of the Thames, and hurl itself upon the British fleet?"

"Of course not, She has no fleet."

"Then do you agree with the—er Spanish Colonel, who goes about saying that Spain's honour will never be safe until she has a fleet as big as England's?"

"That's ridiculous. They couldn't possibly."

"Then what could Spain do in the circumstances?"

"Well, she—er—she could—er—protest."

"And would that be consistent with the honour of a small nation like Spain?"

"In the circumstances," said the Colonel unwillingly, "er—yes."

"So that what it comes to is this. Honour only demands that you should attack the other man if you are much bigger than he is. When a man insults my wife, I look him carefully over; if he is a stone heavier than I, then I satisfy my honour by a mild protest. But if he only has one leg, and is three stone lighter, honour demands that I should jump on him."

"We're talking of nations," said the Colonel gruffly, "not of men, It's a question of prestige."

"Which would be increased by a victory over Spain?"

The Major began to get nervous. After all, I was only a subaltern. He tried to cool the atmosphere a little.

"I don't know why poor old Spain should be dragged into it like this," he said, with a laugh. "I had a very jolly time in Madrid years ago."

"O, I only gave Spain as an example," said the Colonel casually.

"It might just as well have been Switzerland?" I suggested.

There was silence for a little.

"Talking of Switzerland——" I said, as I knocked out my pipe.

"Oh, go on," said the Colonel, with a good-humoured shrug. "I've brought this on myself."

"Well, sir, what I was wondering was—What would happen to the honour of England if fifty English women were murdered at Interlaken?"

The Colonel was silent.

"However large an army we had——" I went on.

The Colonel struck a match.

"It's a funny thing, honour," I said. "And prestige."

The Colonel pulled at his pipe.

"Just fancy," I murmured, "the Swiss can do what they like to British subjects in Switzerland, and we can't get at them. Yet England's honour does not suffer, the world is no worse a place to live in, and one can spend quite a safe holiday at Interlaken."

"I remember being there in '94," began the Major hastily....



A Village Celebration



Although our village is a very small one, we had fifteen men serving in the Forces before the war was over. Fortunately, as the Vicar well said, "we were wonderfully blessed in that none of us was called upon to make the great sacrifice." Indeed, with the exception of Charlie Rudd, of the Army Service Corps, who was called upon to be kicked by a horse, the village did not even suffer any casualties. Our rejoicings at the conclusion of Peace were whole-hearted.

Naturally, when we met to discuss the best way in which to give expression to our joy, our first thoughts were with our returned heroes. Miss Travers, who plays the organ with considerable expression on Sundays, suggested that a drinking fountain erected on the village green would be a pleasing memorial of their valour, if suitably inscribed. For instance, it might say, "In gratitude to our brave defenders who leaped to answer their country's call," followed by their names. Embury, the cobbler, who is always a wet blanket on these occasions, asked if "leaping" was the exact word for a young fellow who got into khaki in 1918, and then only in answer to his country's police. The meeting was more lively after this, and Mr. Bates, of Hill Farm, had to be personally assured by the Vicar that for his part he quite understood how it was that young Robert Bates had been unable to leave the farm before, and he was sure that our good friend Embury meant nothing personal by his, if he might say so, perhaps somewhat untimely observation. He would suggest himself that some such phrase as "who gallantly answered" would be more in keeping with Miss Travers' beautiful idea. He would venture to put it to the meeting that the inscription should be amended in this sense.

Mr. Clayton, the grocer and draper, interrupted to say that they were getting on too fast. Supposing they agreed upon a drinking fountain, who was going to do it? Was it going to be done in the village, or were they going to get sculptors and architects and such-like people from London? And if so The Vicar caught the eye of Miss Travers, and signalled to her to proceed; whereupon she explained that, as she had already told the Vicar in private, her nephew was studying art in London, and she was sure he would be only too glad to get Augustus James or one of those Academy artists to think of something really beautiful.

At this moment Embury said that he would like to ask two questions. First question—In what order were the names of our gallant defenders to be inscribed? The Vicar said that, speaking entirely without preparation and on the spur of the moment, he would imagine that an alphabetical order would be the most satisfactory. There was a general "Hear, hear," led by the Squire, who thus made his first contribution to the debate. "That's what I thought," said Embury. "Well, then, second question—What's coming out of the fountain?" The Vicar, a little surprised, said that presumably, my dear Embury, the fountain would give forth water. "Ah!" said Embury with great significance, and sat down.

Our village is a little slow at getting on to things; "leaping" is not the exact word for our movements at any time, either of brain or body. It is not surprising, therefore, that even Bates failed to realize for a moment that his son's name was to have precedence on a water-fountain. But when once he realized it, he refused to be pacified by the cobbler's explanation that he had only said "Ah!" Let those who had anything to say, he observed, speak out openly, and then we should know where we were. Embury's answer, that one could generally guess where some people were, and not be far wrong, was drowned in the ecclesiastical applause which greeted the rising of the Squire.

The Squire said that he—er—hadn't—er—intended—er—to say anything. But he thought—er—if he might—er—intervene—to—er—say something on the matter of—er—a matter which—er—well, they all knew what it was—in short—er—money. Because until they knew how they—er—stood, it was obvious that—it was obvious—quite obvious—well it was a question of how they stood. Whereupon he sat down.

The Vicar said that as had often happened before, the sound common-sense of Sir John had saved them from undue rashness and precipitancy. They were getting on a little too fast. Their valued friend Miss Travers had made what he was not ashamed to call a suggestion both rare and beautiful, but alas! in these prosaic modern days the sordid question of pounds, shillings and pence could not be wholly disregarded. How much money would they have?

Everybody looked at Sir John. There was an awkward silence, in which the Squire joined....

Amid pushings and whisperings from his corner of the room, Charlie Rudd said that he would just like to say a few words for the boys, if all were willing. The Vicar said that certainly, certainly he might, my dear Rudd. So Charlie said that he would just like to say that with all respect to Miss Travers, who was a real lady, and many was the packet of fags he'd had from her out there, and all the other boys could say the same, and if some of them joined up sooner than others, well perhaps they did, but they all tried to do their bit, just like those who stayed at home, and they'd thrashed Jerry, and glad of it, fountains or no fountains, and pleased to be back again and see them all, just the same as ever, Mr. Bates and Mr. Embury and all of them, which was all he wanted to say, and the other boys would say the same, hoping no offence was meant, and that was all he wanted to say.

When the applause had died down, Mr. Clayton said that, in his opinion, as he had said before, they were getting on too fast. Did they want a fountain, that was the question. Who wanted it? The Vicar replied that it would be a beautiful memento for their children of the stirring times through which their country had passed. Embury asked if Mr. Bates' child wanted a memento of——"This is a general question, my dear Embury," said the Vicar.

There rose slowly to his feet the landlord of the Dog and Duck. Celebrations, he said. We were celebrating this here peace. Now, as man to man, what did celebrations mean? He asked any of them. What did it mean? Celebrations meant celebrating, and celebrating meant sitting down hearty-like, sitting down like Englishmen and—and celebrating. First, find how much money they'd got, same as Sir John said; that was right and proper. Then if so be as they wanted to leave the rest to him, well he'd be proud to do his best for them. They knew him. Do fair by him and he'd do fair by them. Soon as he knew how much money they'd got, and how many were going to sit down, then he could get to work. That was all he'd got to say about celebrations.

The enthusiasm was tremendous. Rut the Vicar looked anxious, and whispered to the Squire. The Squire shrugged his shoulders and murmured something, and the Vicar rose. They would be all glad to hear, he said, glad but not surprised, that with his customary generosity the Squire had decided to throw open his own beautiful gardens and pleasure-grounds to them on Peace Day and to take upon his own shoulders the burden of entertaining them. He would suggest that they now give Sir John three hearty cheers. This was done, and the proceedings closed.



A Train of Thought



On the same day I saw two unsettling announcements in the papers. The first said simply, underneath a suitable photograph, that the ski-ing season was now in full swing in Switzerland; the second explained elaborately why it cost more to go from London to the Riviera and back than from the Riviera to London and back. Both announcements unsettled me considerably. They would upset anybody for whom the umbrella season in London was just opening, and who was wondering what was the cost of a return ticket to Manchester.

At first I amused myself with trying to decide whether I should prefer it to be the Riviera or Switzerland this Christmas. Switzerland won; not because it is more invigorating, but because I had just discovered a woollen helmet and a pair of ski-ing boots, relics of an earlier visit. I am thus equipped for Switzerland already, whereas for the Riviera I should want several new suits. One of the chief beauties of Switzerland (other than the mountains) is that it is so uncritical of the visitor's wardrobe. So long as he has a black coat for the evenings, it demands nothing more. In the day-time he may fall about in whatever he pleases. Indeed, it is almost an economy to go there now and work off some of one's moth-collecting khaki on it. The socks which are impossible with our civilian clothes could renew their youth as the middle pair of three, inside a pair of ski-ing boots.

Yet to whichever I went this year, Switzerland or the Riviera, I think it would be money wasted. I am one of those obvious people who detest an uncomfortable railway journey, and the journey this year will certainly be uncomfortable. But I am something more than this; I am one of those uncommon people who enjoy a comfortable railway journey. I mean that I enjoy it as an entertainment in itself, not only as a relief from the hair-shirts of previous journeys. I would much sooner go by wagonlit from Calais to Monte Carlo in twenty hours, than by magic carpet in twenty seconds. I am even looking forward to my journey to Manchester, supposing that there is no great rush for the place on my chosen day. The scenery as one approaches Manchester may not be beautiful, but I shall be quite happy in my corner facing the engine.

Nowhere can I think so happily as in a train. I am not inspired; nothing so uncomfortable as that. I am never seized with a sudden idea for a masterpiece, nor form a sudden plan for some new enterprise. My thoughts are just pleasantly reflective. I think of all the good deeds I have done, and (when these give out) of all the good deeds I am going to do. I look out of the window and say lazily to myself, "How jolly to live there"; and a little farther on, "How jolly not to live there." I see a cow, and I wonder what it is like to be a cow, and I wonder whether the cow wonders what it is to be like me; and perhaps, by this time, we have passed on to a sheep, and I wonder if it is more fun being a sheep. My mind wanders on in a way which would annoy Pelman a good deal, but it wanders on quite happily, and the "clankety-clank" of the train adds a very soothing accompaniment. So soothing, indeed, that at any moment I can close my eyes and pass into a pleasant state of sleep.

But this entertainment which my train provides for me is doubly entertaining if it be but the overture to greater delights. If some magic property which the train possesses—whether it be the motion or the clankety-clank—makes me happy even when I am only thinking about a cow, is it any wonder that I am happy in thinking about the delightful new life to which I am travelling? We are going to the Riviera, but I have had no time as yet in which to meditate properly upon that delightful fact. I have been too busy saving up for it, doing work in advance for it, buying cloth for it. Between London and Dover I have been worrying, perhaps, about the crossing; between Dover and Calais my worries have come to a head; but when I step into the train at Calais, then at last I can give myself up with a whole mind to the contemplation of the happy future. So long as the train does not stop, so long as nobody goes in or out of my carriage, I care not how many hours the journey takes. I have enough happy thoughts to fill them.

All this, as I said, is not at all Pelman's idea of success in life; one should be counting cows instead of thinking of them; although presumably a train journey would seem in any case a waste of time to The Man Who Succeeds. But to those of us to whom it is no more a waste of time than any other pleasant form of entertainment, the train-service to which we have had to submit lately has been doubly distressing. The bliss of travelling from London to Manchester was torn from us and we were given purgatory instead. Things are a little better now in England; if one chooses the right day one can still come sometimes upon the old happiness. But not yet on the Continent. In the happy days before the war the journey out was almost the best part of Switzerland on the Riviera. I must wait until those days come back again.



Melodrama



The most characteristic thing about a melodrama is that it always begins at 7.30. The idea, no doubt, is that one is more in the mood for this sort of entertainment after a high tea than after a late dinner. Plain living leads to plain thinking, and a solid foundation of eggs and potted meat leaves no room for appreciation of the finer shades of conduct; Right is obviously Right, and Wrong is Wrong. Or it may be also that the management wishes to allow us time for recovery afterwards from the emotions of the evening; the play ends at 10.30, so that we can build up the ravaged tissues again with a hearty supper. But whatever the reason for the early start, the result is the same. We arrive at 7.45 to find that we alone of the whole audience have been left out of the secret as to why Lord Algernon is to be pushed off the pier.

For melodrama, unlike the more fashionable comedy, gets to grips at once. It is well understood by every dramatist that a late-dining audience needs several minutes of dialogue before it recovers from its bewilderment at finding itself in a theatre at all. Even the expedient of printing the names of the characters on the programme in the order in which they appear, and of letting them address each other frankly by name as soon as they come on the stage, fails to dispel the mists. The stalls still wear that vague, flustered look, as if they had expected a concert or a prize-fight and have just remembered that the concert, of course, is to-morrow. For this reason a wise dramatist keeps back his story until the brain of the more expensive seats begins to clear, and he is careful not to waste his jokes on the first five pages of his dialogue.

But melodrama plays to cheap seats, and the purchaser of the cheap seat has come there to have his money's worth. Directly the curtain goes up he is ready to collaborate. It is perfectly safe for the Villain to come on at once and reveal his dastardly plans; the audience is alert for his confidences.

"Curse that young cub, Dick Vereker, what ill-fortune has sent him across my path? Already he has established himself in the affections of Lady Alicia, and if she consents to wed him my plans are foiled. Fortunately she does not know as yet that, by the will of her late Uncle Gregory, the ironmaster, two million pounds are settled upon the man who wins her hand. With two million pounds I could pay back my betting losses and prevent myself from being turned out of the Constitutional Club. And now to put the marked ace of spades in young Vereker's coat-tail pocket. Ha!"

No doubt the audience is the more ready to assimilate this because it knew it was coming. As soon as the Villain steps on to the stage he is obviously the Villain; one does not need to peer at one's programme and murmur, "Who is this, dear?" It is known beforehand that the Hero will be falsely accused, and that not until the last act will he and his true love come together again. All that we are waiting to be told is whether it is to be a marked card, a forged cheque, or a bloodstain this time; and (if, as is probable, the Heroine is forced into a marriage with the Villain) whether the Villain's first wife, whom he had deserted, will turn up during the ceremony or immediately afterwards. For the whole charm of a melodrama is that it is in essentials just like every other melodrama that has gone before. The author may indulge his own fancies to the extent of calling the Villain Jasper or Eustace, of letting the Hero be ruined on the battle-field or the Stock Exchange, but we are keeping an eye on him to see that he plays no tricks with our national drama. It is our play as well as his, and we have laid down the rules for it. Let the author stick to them.

It is strange how unconvincing the Hero is to his fellows on the stage, and how very convincing to us. That ringing voice, those gleaming eyes—how is it that none of his companions seems able to recognize Innocence when it is shining forth so obviously? "I feel that I never want to see your face again," says the Heroine, when the diamond necklace is found in his hat-box, and we feel that she has never really seen it at all yet. "Good Heavens, madam," we long to cry, "have you never been to a melodrama that you can be so deceived? Look again! Is it not the face of the Falsely Accused?" But probably she has not been to a melodrama. She moves in the best society, and the thought of a high tea at 6.30 would appal her.

But let me confess that we in the audience are carried away sometimes by that ringing voice, those gleaming eyes. He has us, this Hero, in the hollow of his hand (to borrow a phrase from the Villain). When the limelight is playing round his brow, and he stands in the centre of the stage with clenched fists, oh! then he has us. "What! Betray my aged mother for filthy gold!" he cries, looking at us scornfully as if it was our suggestion. "Never, while yet breath remains in my body!" What a cheer we give him then; a cheer which seems to imply that, having often betrayed our own mothers for half a crown or so, we are able to realize the heroic nature of his abstention on this occasion. For in the presence of the Hero we lose our sense of values. If he were to scorn an offer to sell his father for vivisectional purposes, we should applaud enthusiastically his altruism.

But it is only the Hero who wins our cheers, only the Villain who wins our hisses. The minor characters are necessary, but we are not greatly interested in them. The Villain must have a confederate to whom he can reveal his wicked thoughts when he is tired of soliloquizing; the Hero must have friends who can tell each other all those things which a modest man cannot say for himself; there must be characters of lower birth, competent to relieve the tension by sitting down on their hats or pulling chairs from beneath their acquaintances. We could not do without them, but we do not give them our hearts. Even the Heroine leaves us calm. However beautiful she be, she is not more than the Hero deserves. It is the Hero whom we have come out to see, and it is painful to reflect that in a little while he will he struggling to get on the 'bus for Walham Green, and be pushed off again just like the rest of us.



A Lost Masterpiece



The short essay on "The Improbability of the Infinite" which I was planning for you yesterday will now never be written. Last night my brain was crammed with lofty thoughts on the subject—and for that matter, on every other subject. My mind was never so fertile. Ten thousand words on any theme from Tin-tacks to Tomatoes would have been easy to me. That was last night. This morning I have only one word in my brain, and I cannot get rid of it. The word is "Teralbay."

Teralbay is not a word which one uses much in ordinary life. Rearrange the letters, however, and it becomes such a word. A friend—no, I can call him a friend no longer—a person gave me this collection of letters as I was going to bed and challenged me to make a proper word of it. He added that Lord Melbourne—this, he alleged, is a well-known historical fact—Lord Melbourne had given this word to Queen Victoria once, and it had kept her awake the whole night. After this, one could not be so disloyal as to solve it at once. For two hours or so, therefore, I merely toyed with it. Whenever I seemed to be getting warm I hurriedly thought of something else. This quixotic loyalty has been the undoing of me; my chances of a solution have slipped by, and I am beginning to fear that they will never return. While this is the case, the only word I can write about is Teralbay.

Teralbay—what does it make? There are two ways of solving a problem of this sort. The first is to waggle your eyes and see what you get. If you do this, words like "alterably" and "laboratory" emerge, which a little thought shows you to be wrong. You may then waggle your eyes again, look at it upside down or sideways, or stalk it carefully from the southwest and plunge upon it suddenly when it is not ready for you. In this way it may be surprised into giving up its secret. But if you find that it cannot be captured by strategy or assault, then there is only one way of taking it. It must be starved into surrender. This will take a long time, but victory is certain.

There are eight letters in Teralbay and two of them are the same, so that there must be 181,440 ways of writing the letters out. This may not be obvious to you at once; you may have thought that it was only 181,439; but you may take my word for it that I am right. (Wait a moment while I work it out again.... Yes, that's it.) Well, now suppose that you put down a new order of letters—such as "raytable"—every six seconds, which is very easy going, and suppose that you can spare an hour a day for it; then by the 303rd day—a year hence, if you rest on Sundays—you are bound to have reached a solution.

But perhaps this is not playing the game. This, I am sure, is not what Queen Victoria did. And now I think of it, history does not tell us what she did do, beyond that she passed a sleepless night. (And that she still liked Melbourne afterwards—which is surprising.) Did she ever guess it? Or did Lord Melbourne have to tell her in the morning, and did she say, "Why, of course!" I expect so. Or did Lord Melbourne say, "I'm awfully sorry, madam, but I find I put a 'y' in too many?" But no—history could not have remained silent over such a tragedy as that. Besides, she went on liking him.

When I die "Teralbay" will be written on my heart. While I live it shall be my telegraphic address. I shall patent a breakfast food called "Teralbay"; I shall say "Teralbay!" when I miss a 2-ft. putt; the Teralbay carnation will catch your eye at the Temple show. I shall write anonymous letters over the name. "Fly at once; all is discovered—Teralbay." Yes, that would look rather well.

I wish I knew more about Lord Melbourne. What sort of words did he think of? The thing couldn't he "aeroplane" or "telephone" or "googly," because these weren't invented in his time. That gives us three words less. Nor, probably, would it be anything to eat; a Prime Minister would hardly discuss such subjects with his Sovereign. I have no doubt that after hours of immense labour you will triumphantly suggest "rateably." I suggested that myself, but it is wrong. There is no such word in the dictionary. The same objection applies to "bat-early"—it ought to mean something, but it doesn't.

So I hand the word over to you. Please do not send the solution to me, for by the time you read this I shall either have found it out or else I shall be in a nursing home. In either case it will be of no use to me. Send it to the Postmaster-General or one of the Geddeses or Mary Pickford. You will want to get it off your mind.

As for myself I shall write to my fr——, to the person who first said "Teralbay" to me, and ask him to make something of "sabet" and "donureb." When he has worked out the corrections—which, in case he gets the wrong ones, I may tell him here are "beast" and "bounder"—I shall search the dictionary for some long word like "intellectual." I shall alter the order of the letters and throw in a couple of "g's" and a "k". And then I shall tell them to keep a spare bed for him in my nursing home.

Well, I have got "Teralbay" a little off my mind. I feel better able now to think of other things. Indeed, I might almost begin my famous essay on "The Improbability of the Infinite." It would be a pity for the country to lose such a masterpiece—she has had quite enough trouble already what with one thing and another. For my view of the Infinite is this: that although beyond the Finite, or, as one might say, the Commensurate, there may or may not be a——

Just a moment. I think I have it now. T—R—A——No....



A Hint for Next Christmas



There has been some talk lately of the standardization of golf balls, but a more urgent reform is the standardization of Christmas presents. It is no good putting this matter off; let us take it in hand now, so that we shall be in time for next Christmas.

My crusade is on behalf of those who spend their Christmas away from home. Last year I returned (with great difficulty) from such an adventure and I am more convinced than ever that Christmas presents should conform to a certain standard of size. My own little offerings were thoughtfully chosen. A match-box, a lace handkerchief or two, a cigarette-holder, a pencil and note-book, Gems from Wilcox, and so on; such gifts not only bring pleasure (let us hope) to the recipient, but take up a negligible amount of room in one's bag, and add hardly anything to the weight of it. Of course, if your fellow-visitor says to you, "How sweet of you to give me such a darling little handkerchief—it's just what I wanted—how ever did you think of it?" you do not reply, "Well, it was a choice between that and a hundredweight of coal, and I'll give you two guesses why I chose the handkerchief." No; you smile modestly and say, "As soon as I saw it, I felt somehow that it was yours"; after which you are almost in a position to ask your host casually where he keeps the mistletoe.

But it is almost a certainty that the presents you receive will not have been chosen with such care. Probably the young son of the house has been going in for carpentry lately, and in return for your tie-pin he gives you a wardrobe of his own manufacture. You thank him heartily, you praise its figure, but all the time you are wishing that it had chosen some other occasion. Your host gives you a statuette or a large engraving; somebody else turns up with a large brass candle-stick. It is all very gratifying, but you have got to get back to London somehow, and, thankful though you are not to have received the boar-hound or parrot-in-cage which seemed at one time to be threatening, you cannot help wishing that the limits of size for a Christmas present had been decreed by some authority who was familiar with the look of your dressing-case.

Obviously, too, there should be a standard value for a certain type of Christmas present. One may give what one will to one's own family or particular friends; that is all right. But in a Christmas house-party there is a pleasant interchange of parcels, of which the string and the brown paper and the kindly thought are the really important ingredients, and the gift inside is nothing more than an excuse for these things. It is embarrassing for you if Jones has apologized for his brown paper with a hundred cigars, and you have only excused yourself with twenty-five cigarettes; perhaps still more embarrassing if it is you who have lost so heavily on the exchange. An understanding that the contents were to be worth five shillings exactly would avoid this embarassment.

And now I am reminded of the ingenuity of a friend of mine, William by name, who arrived at a large country house for Christmas without any present in his bag. He had expected neither to give nor to receive anything, but to his horror he discovered on the 24th that everybody was preparing a Christmas present for him, and that it was taken for granted that he would require a little privacy and brown paper on Christmas Eve for the purpose of addressing his own offerings to others. He had wild thoughts of telegraphing to London for something to be sent down, and spoke to other members of the house-party in order to discover what sort of presents would be suitable.

"What are you giving our host P" he asked one of them.

"Mary and I are giving him a book," said John, referring to his wife.

William then approached the youngest son of the house, and discovered that he and his next brother Dick were sharing in this, that, and the other. When he had heard this, William retired to his room and thought profoundly. He was the first down to breakfast on Christmas morning. All the places at the table were piled high with presents. He looked at John's place. The top parcel said, "To John and Mary from Charles." William took out his fountain-pen and added a couple of words to the inscription. It then read, "To John and Mary from Charles and William," and in William's opinion looked just as effective as before. He moved on to the next place. "To Angela from Father," said the top parcel. "And William," wrote William. At his hostess' place he hesitated for a moment. The first present there was for "Darling Mother, from her loving children." It did not seem that an "and William" was quite suitable. But his hostess was not to be deprived of William's kindly thought; twenty seconds later the handkerchiefs "from John and Mary and William" expressed all the nice things which he was feeling for her. He passed on to the next place....

It is, of course, impossible to thank every donor of a joint gift; one simply thanks the first person whose eye one happens to catch. Sometimes William's eye was caught, sometimes not. But he was spared all embarrassment; and I can recommend his solution of the problem with perfect confidence to those who may be in a similar predicament next Christmas.

There is a minor sort of Christmas present about which also a few words must be said; I refer to the Christmas card.

The Christmas card habit is a very pleasant one, but it, too, needs to be disciplined. I doubt if many people understand its proper function. This is partly the result of our bringing up; as children we were allowed (quite rightly) to run wild in the Christmas card shop, with one of two results. Either we still run wild, or else the reaction has set in and we avoid the Christmas card shop altogether. We convey our printed wishes for a happy Christmas to everybody or to nobody. This is a mistake. In our middle-age we should discriminate.

The child does not need to discriminate. It has two shillings in the hand and about twenty-four relations. Even in my time two shillings did not go far among twenty-four people. But though presents were out of the question, one could get twenty-four really beautiful Christmas cards for the money, and if some of them were ha'penny ones, then one could afford real snow on a threepenny one for the most important uncle, meaning by "most important," perhaps (but I have forgotten now), the one most likely to be generous in return. Of the fun of choosing those twenty-four cards I need not now speak, nor of the best method of seeing to it that somebody else paid for the necessary twenty-four stamps. But certainly one took more trouble in suiting the tastes of those who were to receive the cards than the richest and most leisured grown-up would take in selecting a diamond necklace for his wife's stocking or motor-cars for his sons-in-law. It was not only a question of snow, but also of the words in which the old, old wish was expressed. If the aunt who was known to be fond of poetry did not get something suitable from Eliza Cook, one might regard her Christmas as ruined. How could one grudge the trouble necessary to make her Christmas really happy for her? One might even explore the fourpenny box.