The Table Talk of Samuel Marchbanks (17 page)

O
N TWELFTH NIGHT
my host offered me a drink of Drambuie; plainly marked on the bottle was a statement that this was the drink favoured above all others by Prince Charles Edward. It seems to me that this throws a light on the history of the 1745 rebellion which historians
have unaccountably neglected. If Bonnie Prince Charlie was in the habit of drinking Drambuie freely he was in no state to lead armies, though it is obvious why he so grossly overestimated the size of his forces. That look of being delightfully fried which he wears in all his portraits is explained, too.

I
SAW AN AMATEUR
production of
The Barrets of Wimpole Street
last week; the audience had come to admire the actors (who were high school boys and girls) but were much taken by the goings-on of the spaniel who played the role of Flush. Dogs and babies are impossible creatures on the stage; they have only to gurgle or scratch a flea and the careful art of the human actors is set at naught. Somebody should write a play in which a dog has to do something difficult, and meet stern criticism. In Victorian England there was a popular version of
Hamlet
in which the Prince was accompanied at all times by a huge dog (a Great Dane, of course); in the Play Scene it was the dog’s duty to leap at the throat of King Claudius. Often the dog-actor missed his cue, or wagged his tail at the gallery, or licked Claudius affectionately; such dog-hams were given short shrift by the critics of the day and many a dog-actor disgraced himself by snarling over the footlights at the critic’s row, with bared teeth. This is only just; if a dog appears on the stage, it should be expected to do something difficult, and not loll about, stealing scenes from hard-working humans.

C
ONSIDERING THE AMOUNT
of time and ingenuity which is devoted to making it hard for a man to get a drink in this country, I think it strange that nothing is done
to keep people from digging their graves with their teeth. I have just finished two volumes of historical studies by Dr. C. H. MacLaurin, the celebrated diagnostician, in which he shows that a surprising number of the most eminent people in history have died of diseases which began in their habit of overeating. Drink is a spectacular vice, but comparatively few people have any inclination to drink to excess. But the quiet, day-to-day cramming, guzzling, stuffing, bolting and gormandizing which goes on is thoroughly alarming, when we consider its effect on the nation’s health. And everywhere we permit signs and advertising positively encouraging people to eat; little children are plied with cake and pie; the old are urged to eat “to keep their strength up” when in reality food will only sclerose their poor old arteries and blow the fuses in their shaky nervous systems. Frankly, I think that a move should be set on foot to limit the retail outlets for food, or perhaps bring it under government monopoly, making it too expensive for people to get much of it.

B
Y A COMPLEX SYSTEM
of my own I cushion myself against the shocks of daily life, but today I was forced to face the fact that I must have a new winter overcoat, and a few discreet enquiries made it clear to me that prices have been going up, and that clothes cost more now than they did. I grudge money spent on clothes. I like to give away any spare money I have to worthy charities, such as the Fund for Brewery Executives in Reduced Circumstances, and the like. But from time to time it is absolutely necessary for me to replenish my wardrobe, and then there is always a disquieting struggle between my need and my ingrained penuriousness.
I cannot bear to spend money on anything except pleasure, and I do not consider the buying of new clothes as a pleasure. If I could have a red overcoat with a fur collar, that might be fun, but to face the dreary choice between grey and blue again at my time of life, and to have to fork out several month’s income in payment is more than I can bear. Still, I suppose that by a painful process of screwing up my resolution, I shall come to it.

I
HAD A LONG
conversation with a man who comes from Lincolnshire this afternoon; he says that the peasants in his native shire have a pretty simile to describe a baby which has just awakened; they say it looks “like a louse peerin’ out o’ an ash heap.” It is such flights of untutored poesy as this which inspired Wordsworth.

I
WENT TO THE
movies last night. I always buy a stall, or loge, as I am by nature a snobbish fellow, and also because those seats give me more room for my legs. But the people who get to the loges before me all seem to bring provisions for a week, and attach themselves to their seats with cobbler’s wax and glue, so that I usually spend the first half of any film sitting in a cheaper seat, poised to pounce if any loge-squatter should be called out by the demands of nature or the death of a near relative. Tonight I sat next to a couple of spirited girls who were not content to follow the story on the screen; they acted it, as well. When the heroine bridled, they bridled; when the hero hit the villain on the jaw, they cut the air with desperate haymakers. When there was kissing on the screen, they squeaked with their lips and wriggled in their seats. It was fascinating but unnerving,
this audience participation; I was never sure that they might not involve me in the game in some embarrassing way. But at last a slide was flashed on the screen: “Whole West End of the City Wiped Out By Tornado—Hundreds Killed.” One man rose and departed reluctantly from the loges, and I vaulted into his seat, beating an old lady by a nose.

B
EFORE DINNER
I joined in a great discussion about the forthcoming rise in the price of bread, and I heard several men planning to have their wives make bread at home. I know this will not last long, for home bread-making, though not difficult, is a nuisance. Home bread is greatly superior to the purchased article, but it has to be made two or three times a week, and the average housewife would rather pay more for the customary ration of half-cooked dough than be bothered with it. Many men are speaking nostalgically of breads which their mothers used to bake—fancy confections with odd names, like Old Hoe Handle Bread, Barnyard Pandowdy, Corncob Bumblepuppy, and the like. They tell me that they always ate these luscious breads with baked beans. It is odd how all men develop the notion, as they grow older, that their mothers were wonderful cooks. I have yet to meet the man who will admit that his mother was a kitchen assassin, and nearly poisoned him. Yet there must be some bad cooks who are also mothers.

I
WENT TO CALL
on some people today and stumbled into a children’s party—a type of entertainment which I usually study to avoid. No sooner was I in the door than a young woman of about six pushed an apple core into my hand, saying “Here!” in a peremptory tone. I immediately
assumed the guise of Marchbanks the Child-Lover and grinned at her forgivingly; I tossed the apple behind a sofa. Not long afterward I was called upon to umpire a game of Pin the Donkey’s Tail, and barely escaped with my life, but not before a small girl showed me her doll. It was one of those dolls which can be fed water from a feeding-bottle at one end, and shortly afterwards rejects the water through a sort of brass drain in its bottom. I am not easily embarrassed, but this doll made me blush; its lack of reticence was appalling. Live babies have drenched me, and I have borne with good humour, but this awful effigy of a baby with its hideous painted smile! … “Don’t you think your dolly would like a rest?” I asked hopefully. “NO!” said the moppet, with iron decision, and began to ply it with water again. Whatever served the office of kidneys in the doll gave a gurgle, and I hurried away. Why not a doll which burps? Babies burp, and a doll with a bellows and a squeaker in it, which could belch like a sailor or an Indian chief, would sell like hotcakes.

After refreshments the party grew rough; one lad kept jumping off the top of the piano, landing in a sitting posture on the keyboard; he did this a number of times—leaving no tone unsterned, in fact. As soon as was decently possible, I left; children were beginning to go upstairs to be sick, and I was willing to leave them in abler hands.

I
WAS FACED TODAY
with the necessity to decorate Marchbanks Towers against the coming Christmas, and passed many hours perched on a shaky ladder twisting paper streamers (which immediately untwisted), getting sharp pieces of tinsel under my nails, and arranging elaborate festoons which, as soon as I looked at them from the
floor, proved to be miserable in conception and lopsided in execution. I also knocked down a good deal of plaster and made dirty marks on the wallpaper. The effect, when I was finished, was that of a cheap dancehall decorated by a drunken sailor. However, I had a great artistic success with the younger members of my family, who think my efforts greatly superior to Michelangelo’s decorations of the Sistine Chapel. This disposed me to be friendly toward them, and we ate a great deal of candy, which caused them no inconvenience, but makes me feel pensive even at this moment… No, no more chocolate mousse, thank you.

I
WAS A JUDGE
at a county fair today: I was invited to give my opinion on the turnips and the cats. There were only three turnips exhibited and as all of them came from the farm of the son of the man who was my colleague in judging, we awarded him the prize with beautiful unanimity. There was only one entry in the cat-show; it belonged to the other judge’s daughter, so we gave her the First, Second and Third Prizes, as well as the silver cup. I then strolled around the fair, with a large purple ribbon with “Judge” printed on it in gold adorning my bosom. It was an “Open Sesame” to all the treasures of the fair. I rode free on the merry-go-round, the ferris wheel and the Dodge ’Em. I then judged the whole of the midway, poking the Fat Lady with a stick to see if she was genuinely fat or merely padded, patting the midgets, and accepting the gift of a cigar from the Turkey-Faced Man. Oh, it is a beautiful thing to be a Judge, to be honoured wherever one goes, to get things for nothing! If all life could be passed as a Judge at a fair, what a glad, sweet song it would be!

I
HAD TO APPEAR
today before a large audience of women. I sat on a platform, without any table in front of me, for more than an hour, while other people talked and the women stared at me mercilessly. I discovered that my socks were falling down and that my ankles looked like the legs of a Jacobean table. Problem: to pull up the socks, drawing attention to my plight and perhaps scandalizing the females with a lubricious peep of male leg, or to ignore the matter, pretending to be above such trifles? I tried to compromise (always a mistake) by plucking gently at my socks through my trouser legs. This merely hitched my trousers higher, giving the effect of knee breeches. Then I tried to squirm in my seat in such a way that my trouser legs would descend to their proper level. The effect was that of a dog with worms. I contemplated rushing off the stage to adjust my dress, but thought this might be misunderstood. Misery. The other men on the stage had perfectly fitting socks, and they regarded me with contempt. It is these small miseries, falling short of tragedy, which make life bitter. Afterward I shook hands with many women. Their hands were all clean and dry,—more than can be said for any audience of men I have ever met.

I
WENT ON MY
first hunt last week with a group of friends; they were Old Hands, and I was what they call a Greenfoot or a Tenderhorn, so I kept quiet and tried to learn woodlore. We motored fifty miles, then crowded our eight selves, 400 pounds of equipment, four dogs and two Indians into a rather small boat, bringing the gunwales down almost to the water-line. We journeyed
by water for a considerable distance and then debarked after sundown. Then we carried the junk a further five miles in the dark—at least, it was supposed to be five miles, but as none of the Old Hands knew the way and there was no road or path, it was more like eight. At last we found the camp and the guide, who had prepared a supper of salt pork and fried potatoes two hours earlier; it had congealed curiously, but we ate it. Then the Old Hands “turned in.” Being a mere tenderhorn, I simply went to bed.

Next day it was raining cats and dogs, and the Old Hands complained that their feet hurt; my feet hurt too but being a mere Greenfoot I was ashamed to say so. We breakfasted on salt pork and fried potatoes. We decided that it was useless to try to hunt in the rain; it kills the scent, or depresses the dogs or gives the Old Hands colds, or something. The Old Hands did not seem to be feeling very woodsy, and talked about the merits of different kinds of cars all day. Dinner and supper were of salt pork and fried potatoes. One Old Hand produced a package of bicarbonate of soda, and we all had a snort. We went to bed early. The bunks were boards with marsh-grass strewn lightly over them, and I dreamed of Hell.