Punch, July 18, 1917 by Various
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Various >> Punch, July 18, 1917
"My dear Francesca, how can you venture to fly in the face of all
experience--"
"Men's experience," she said; "it doesn't count. You've often said
that smoking-room stories are the dullest in the world."
"How you do dart about," I said, "from subject to subject. Just now
you were in a polling-booth and now you're in a smoking-room."
"And heartily ashamed to be found there--stale tobacco and staler
stories. Why have a smoking-room at all when everybody's grandmother
has her own cigarette case and her own special brand of cigarettes?"
"We ought rather," I said, "to have two smoking-rooms to every house,
one for me and the likes of me and the other for the grandmothers."
"Segregating the sexes again! Surely if we have mixed bathing we may
have mixed smoking."
"And mixed voting," I said.
"That is no real concession. We have wrung it from you because of the
force and reasonableness of our case."
"Say rather the force and Christabelness of your case."
"Anyhow, we've got it."
"And now that you've got it you don't really care for it."
"We do, we do."
"You don't. It's not one of the important subjects you and your
friends talk about after you've quite definitely got up to go and said
good-bye to one another."
"What," said Francesca, "does this man mean?"
"He means," I said, "those delightful and lingering committee
meetings, when you have nearly separated and suddenly remember all the
subjects you have forgotten."
"Now," she said, "you are really funny."
"I'm a man and can only do my best."
"That's the pity of it; but now you've got the women to help you."
"So I have. Well, _au revoir_ in the polling-booth."
"Anyhow, _à bas_ the smoking-room."
R.C.L.
* * * * *
[Illustration: WAR ECONOMY.
_Aunt Liz_. "WHERE YER GOIN', TINY?" _Tiny_. "PICTURES."
_Aunt Liz_. "GOT YER MONEY?" _Tiny_. "NO."
_Aunt Liz_. "WHAT YER GOIN' TO DO, THEN?" _Tiny_. "SHOVE IN."
_Aunt Liz_. "ALL RIGHT. MIND YER DON'T GET RUNNED OVER."]
* * * * *
"Hot pennies and halfpennies were thrown from the windows
at a West Hartlepool wedding party. One fell down the
back of a schoolboy, burning him, and has been awarded
£5 damages."--_Eastern Dally Press_.
And did the poor boy get nothing?
* * * * *
"The Lower House of the Convocation of Canterbury has a very full
agenda. Reports of the respective Joint Committees on the Royal
Letters of Business, Purity of Life and the Revision of the
Dictionary ... will be taken into consideration; and, afterwards,
several motions on a variety of topics will be brought forward.
One of these begs the War Office to provide some means of
protecting, when necessary, ladies of education working in
munition factories 'from the profane language and swearing of
the officials under whom they work.'"--_Church Courier_.
The dictionary certainly needs revising if this sort of language
appears in it.
* * * * *
"After doing a few rounds of the field a wha he 'naives' call a
errific speed, he calf leaped a high wall inoa nohehr field, and,
followed by a number of men, made sraigh for he cliffs. Fearing
nohing, he animal jumped from the cliff."--_Daily Dispatch_.
It is conjectured that the unfortunate animal was missing its "t."
* * * * *
"Wanted Plain Dressmaker, who goes out daily, for altering and
re-making."--_Irish Paper_.
After a few days of this process she may hope to be a plain dressmaker
no longer.
* * * * *
[Illustration: _Mistress_ (_to under-gardener, who has been up to be
examined for the Army_). "I SUPPOSE, JOHN, YOU TOLD THEM YOU WOULD
NOT BE EIGHTEEN UNTIL THE END OF THE MONTH?"
_John_. "NO USE, MUM. YOU ONLY GETS CHEEK UP THERE IF YOU SAYS
ANYTHING."]
* * * * *
OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.
(_BY MR. PUNCH'S STAFF OF LEARNED CLERKS._)
_The Candid Courtship_ (LANE) is a story full of good talk; by which I
do not at all mean brilliant epigram and verbal fireworks, but direct
and genuine conversation, just so far manipulated by the author that
it advances the business in hand without becoming artificial. I must
add, however, that Miss MADGE MEARS occasionally displays the defects
of her qualities, to the extent of sacrificing syntax to ease, even
in passages of pure narrative, with results that might offend the
precisionist. But after all it is what she has to say that matters
most; and the story of _The Candid Courtship_ will hold you amused
and curious to the end. I will not spoil it by re-telling, save to
indicate that (as the title implies) it is about a suitor who, in
proposing to the girl of his choice, confessed to her that he had a
past. Not a very lurid past, but quite bad enough for the G.O.H.C.,
who happened to entertain strong views on sex-equality. So, as vulgar
persons say, the fat was in the fire--more especially when the lady
of the past turned up again, not past at all, but very pleasantly
intriguing with another, and that other own brother to the girl
herself. A pretty complication, and leading up to an admirable scene
of tragi-comedy over a double elopement and a pursuit, which you must
certainly read. Do not, however, be led to think that the story is at
all farcically treated; Miss MEARS is far too serious an artist to
neglect the graver aspects of her theme. Briefly, an excellently human
and stimulating novel, whose only drawback is that recent events have
caused the suffrage atmosphere in which it is sat to taste somewhat
stale.
* * * * *
Between anarchy and anarchy the history of unhappy Mexico is
spanned for the space of a generation by the colossal figure of the
soldier-president, _Diaz_ (CONSTABLE). Mr. DAVID HANNAY, writing with
exquisite literary workmanship in the series of biographies entitled
collectively _Makers of the Nineteenth Century_, presents this
typically "strong" man as neither hero nor villain, but as a human
being with human limitations, even more as a Mexican with the
characteristics of a Mexican. Amongst a populace hopelessly divided by
race, untrained in self-government and cursed with a natural twist for
lawlessness only equalled by its hatred of work, _Diaz_ stands for a
tyranny certainly, but for a unified orderly tyranny, preferable, one
might think, to a myriad petty outlawries. If little of the country's
wealth found its way beyond the narrowest of circles during his long
control, and if certain Indian tribes were shamefully enslaved--a fact
which is neither denied nor condoned--still railways and harbours
did get themselves built and the dictator himself lived a life of
uncorrupt simplicity. He has been blamed for failure to establish
enduringly the civilisation that Europe thought bad been attained, but
on this the author's verdict is an unhesitating acquittal. Only a god
could have done better, he thinks, and, in a series of illuminating
analyses of the material to be moulded he shows how anything more than
a superficial improvement was humanly impossible. Until that day of
absorption in the United States which Mr. HANNAY considers fortunately
inevitable, Mexico has no chance, he maintains, of even a moderately
good government except under a firm dictatorship; and so he renders no
small homage to the man who, all his failures notwithstanding, did for
a time lift his country from the anarchy to which in his old age it
reverted. Sober reading in all conscience, but for the manner of the
writing one can have nothing but joyous praise.
* * * * *
His own modesty must preclude Mr. Punch from indicating those chapters
in _Soldier Men_ (LANE) that appear to him the most worthy of praise.
But of course, if you specially want to know, a glance at the
preliminary acknowledgments ... Anyhow, parental prejudice apart,
these studies of military life, mostly on the Egyptian Front, form a
sufficiently entertaining and interesting volume. In this war of many
fronts and facets, literature seems a little to have deserted the
desert; it is therefore good that a writer so well equipped as "YEO"
should tell us a little of what our soldiers there are doing for the
cause, the special variety of beastliness that they are enduring (to
read the chapter called "Plagues of Egypt" is enough to make one seek
out an English wasp and embrace it with tears of affection), and the
courage and humour that support them in their task. Something more
than this, too; the wholly illogical and baffling humanity that--one
likes to think--helps to differentiate the British fighting man, and
must surely cause certain European people such bewildered qualms, if
they ever hear of it. Read, for example, that grim and moving story
of the Corporal who thought shooting was too good for Bedouin rebels,
and what he actually did to a family of them who interrupted these
reflections. But I forgot; this is one of the chapters that I was not
going to mention.
* * * * *
Miss MARGARET PETERSON's _Fate and the Watcher_ (HURST AND BLACKETT)
was already reminding me strongly of _The Broken Road_ when I found
that one of her characters had been struck by this same idea: "Lady
Daring was not easy in mind, remembering the look in Prince Channa's
eyes the evening of the ball. She had a vague memory of a novel by
Mason that she had once read which dealt more or less with the same
situation." This naïve admission must be my excuse for making odious
comparisons between the two books and saying that Mr. MASON'S novel,
which also treats of a native prince's love for an English girl, is
on bigger and broader lines. In _Fate and the Watcher_ the heroine
and the cause of all the trouble is a waif taken literally from the
gutter. She develops into a most unscrupulous minx, and, although we
are led to suppose that her defects of character were largely due to
her origin, I am prepared to allot to _Sir Henry_ and _Lady Daring_,
who adopted her, their fair share in the blame. A girl of the sweet
type, endowed liberally with virtues, is produced as an antidote to
the minx, but is no match for her. The present is not perhaps the most
happily chosen time for a novel with such a theme, but I can at least
say that Miss PETERSON is an expert in her subject and is never at a
loss for incident. And _Ruth_ (if that will console you) pays full
price for her sins.
* * * * *
Mr. HERBERT VIVIAN is the complete partisan. He will believe always
the worst of an enemy, the best of a friend--a credulous loyal fellow.
And in _Italy at War_ (DENT) he sets out to tell us a good deal that
is interesting about the fine feats of our Italian Allies, especially
of those Titanic gymnasts, the heaven-scaling Alpini. It is fair to
warn the reader that it is a rather desultory scrap-book of the type
the War has made common; fair also to add that some of the chapters
least connected with the War are exceedingly interesting, as that
about the elaborate sport of pigeon-netting at Cava dei Terreni. What
I like least about our ready author is his fatuous little jokes, such
as "Noli remained a sovereign republic for centuries ... had her own
bishopric (hence the phrase '_Noli episcopari_')"; or, "Briand came to
Rome the other day with much _brio_." And inconsequences like this:
"One of Disraeli's heroes discovered two nations: the rich and the
poor. In a similar spirit General February may be said to command two
distinct armies." All the same, an interesting book.
* * * * *
I am no pacificist, but I am bound to admit that the moment seems
distinctly ripe for a cessation in one minor War product, namely the
trench-book. Perhaps some form of armistice might be arranged, to
last, say, six months; at the end of which time (should the War last
so long) the changed conditions of campaigning on German soil might
at least give our impressionists a chance of originality. I have been
inspired to these comments by a perusal of _Mud and Khaki_ (SIMPKIN),
in which Mr. VERNON BARTLETT has reprinted from _The Daily Mail_ and
elsewhere a number of vigorous and realistic studies of life on the
Western Front. Perhaps, as a whole, the collection is a little more
grim than most; but there are not wanting touches of light comedy, in,
for example, the comments of an admirable philosopher named _"Pongo"
Simpson_. For the rest the book is precisely what you can gather from
its title. In his preface the author tells us that his object in
writing it has partly been to correct a lack of appreciation among
stay-at-homes of the hardships and heroism of their defenders. But
does there really breathe a man with soul so dead as to belittle these
to-day? I should be ashamed to think so. Still, do not suppose that I
regret that Mr. BARTLETT should have been goaded by whatever motive
into print. Far from it, for he is clearly a writer of gifts. But I
suggest that he should next time exhibit them to us in some (dare I
say?) less trenchant guise.
* * * * *
[Illustration: _Returned Soldier_. "WELL, JOHN, I DON'T SEE MUCH
CHANGE IN THE OLD PLACE SINCE I WENT AWAY."
_Old Villager_. "OH, WE AIN'T SUCH STICK-IN-THE-MUDS AS YOU MAKE OUT,
MY LAD. W'Y AIN'T YOU NOTICED THAT OLD MRS. HUBBLE 'AS GOT A NEW PAIR
O' SPECS?"]
* * * * *
"CHRISTENING LUCK.
While going down the Canongate one day last year, I was presented
with a parcel by a lady carrying a baby, which contained bread
and cheese, cakes, and a threepenny piece."--_Scots Paper_.
Thrifty little beggar!