Chapter 2

Just then James came in and announced dinner. James is all our staff; but her other name is Keziah, so we had no choice.

As we sat down I took a small box out of my pocket.

"Give this to your mistress, please," I said to James.

"O-o-o. How ripping of you, Gerald! So you did remember, after all."

"As soon as I got to the station this morning," I said, "I remembered that our wedding-day was to-day."

Margaret lifted her eyebrows at me. "To-day?"

"Yes. You are a little behind--or in front of--the times, I'm afraid. The twenty-fifth was a Tuesday last year, but it's trying Wednesday for a change now. Many Happy Returns of the Day, dear."

We both laughed.

"Now let's look at our presents," said Margaret happily.

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DORA AT THE PLAY.

["You cannot buy a cigarette, or an ice, or a box of chocolates in a theatre after eight o'clock--by order of D.O.R.A."--_Advt. passim._]

Attentive swain, whose lady has commanded you to be at her Disposal as an escort on a visit to the theatre, I give you precious doctrine that is certainly worth sticking to, At least as long as Dora is alive on earth and kicking too.

If you would keep your fair companion satisfied and cheery, some Provision must be made to fill the intervals so wearisome, For many a gallant fellow has discovered with a shock o' late That after 8 P.M. it's still a crime to sell a chocolate.

Though you may haunt the bar till ten and confidently mutter "Scotch," _She_ may not even clamour for a humble slab of butterscotch, And should the heat suggest an ice--may I be rolled out flat if I Distort the truth--it's courting gaol that harmless wish to gratify.

As for yourself, if you should yearn for blest tobacco's medium In those long waits between the Acts to while away the tedium, And find you're out of cigarettes, remember that to sell any A minute past the fatal hour is counted as a felony.

Unless the pair of you affect the life ascetic, you'll Be well advised to carry in a hamper or a reticule A goodly store of provender, both smokeable and eatable, For Dora's in the saddle yet and seemingly unseatable.

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BROODY.

"Will the Imperial Government hen proceed to a new conquest of Southern Ireland?"--_Daily Paper._

No, we expect it will be left sitting.

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"HIDDEN MUMMIES.

The Museum authorities are receiving numerous inquiries when the mummies will be on view, particularly for school children."--_Daily Paper._

We hope that the N.S.P.C.C. will see to it that all mummies are allowed to return to their families without further delay.

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GOLF NOTES.

(_With acknowledgments to Mr. A.C.M. Croome._)

APPROACHING.

TAYLOR--or was it JAMES BRAID?--begins one of his classic and illuminating chapters with the quotation "_Ex pede Herculem_," nor can even we of the Oxford and Cambridge Golfing Society venture to differ from so eminent an authority or grudge him so apt a phrase. _Verb. sap._ and, let me add, _sat_. To those, few perhaps in actual reckoning (though I, wearing of right the wine-dark vesture--were there half Blues in HOMER'S time?--cannot compete with JOHN LOW _et hoc genus omne_, Cantabs confessed, in the prestidigitation of numerals and weird signs of values)--to those, then, few, but of many parts appreciative, who followed a certain foursome at Addington last week, my premiss should be intrinsically incontrovertible. Partner, whom I had "made" with a drive well and truly apportioned--_ex carne ictum_--partner, after much self-searching and mental recursion to the maxims of TOM MORRIS and LA ROUCHEFOUCAULD, took his ball on the--_O horribile dictu_ (or shall I say _horresco referens_?)--well, to be meticulously exact, partner shanked it. And it is just here that those who have also enjoyed a University education will pick up--even as partner failed to do--what I, who write, am driving at.

Remembering how dear old W.G.--in those halcyon days when Gloucester was worthy of the cheese whereof she is now so chary a producer--used to score with that heavy cut between point and cover, I too, greatly daring, cut it and laid it (the ball, not the cheese) dead. _De mortuis_ ... For assuredly it _was_ good.

The one adornment of this episode should have been a quotation from ARISTOPHANES. It is not, however, given to all men always to remember. _Non cuivis_, in fact.

OF IMPACT.

It was at the ensuing consumption of Bohea, or of its substitute as provided by a paternal Government, that one of the party, with the rashness of a _d'Artagnan_, reverted to the question of weight of clubs. ABE MITCHELL'S driver, of course, gave him a handle; but himself he, unaided, gave away. For it is not to be boasted by every man that he has been blessed with an _Alma Mater_, and that consequently logic is to him even as hair and teeth--save only that these twain be not false. For, said this unhappy wight, increase the weight and the corollary is length increased.

Then arose a certain justly eminent author, whose list of tales is equalled only by the tale of his handicap, and demonstrably discounted weight without pace.

It was then agreed that a test _ad hominem_ should be applied, and that the result of such test should determine the individuality of him who should settle with our Ganymede. Partner and I pushed--_gemitu et fremitu_--a bulky sideboard against a paper ball. The inertia of the object was barely overcome.

Then the man of letters flicked it across the room with finger and thumb. And the original theorist became the poorer by the commercial estimate of four teas and jam.

PUTTING.

It has been said elsewhere, yet may not therefore be wholly lacking in elemental veracity, that putting is the devil. Systems more numerous than dactyls and spondees in Classic verse, patent putters outnumbered only by howlers in Oxford responsions, bear witness to this graceless statement. Quite lately in these columns have I confessed--_pulvere cineribusque_-- that our side had twice failed at the inconsiderable distance of two yards, even after discarding the small thirty-two. But that further confession will be forthcoming is now wildly and preposterously problematical. For I have discovered the true exorcism for demoniac influence in putting. It is this: First catch your putter. Put the whole length of the shaft up your sleeve. Then--but I must retain something for next Saturday's notes, and, besides, I fancy the secretary of the Club where I am inditing these words has his frugal eye on the consumption of the note-paper. But what I have written I have written. _Litera scripta manet._

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* * * * *

THE COALITION OF 1950.

"Aren't you being rather badly hit by the price of tobacco?" I asked Charles, whose pipe is a kind of extra limb to him.

"I have just been composing the plot of a novel," he replied with apparent irrelevance. "It begins something like this:--

"'Slowly and softly the violet dusk set in. The beautiful young Première stood at the window of her yellow-and-black boudoir, gazing a little wistfully at the almost deserted pavements of Downing Street. A white pigeon perched--'"

"They aren't white," I said; "they're a sort of purply pinky grey."

"All right," said Charles, unmoved, "only it rather spoils the sentence. 'A sort of purply pinky grey pigeon perched pompously--'"

"Never mind the pigeon," I said, "tell me what was the trouble with the B.Y.P."

"A change in the leadership of the Opposition. The old leaderess had just retired and her place had been taken by a new one, a man this time, young and handsome as Apollo, who had thrown up the Chair of Cinematography at the London University to plunge on to a political platform."

"What was the programme," I inquired, "of this--er--furniture-remover?"

"He was a reactionary," said Charles. "The Première's party had won a not too sweeping victory at the polls on prohibition (not of alcohol, of course--that had been done long ago--but of tobacco)."

"How on earth did she do it?"

"National economy, mostly," answered Charles. "She had the wives' vote solid, and they carried the more docile of the husbands with them. She had to throw out bribes to the unmarried electorate of both sexes, of course, bribes which she had since been attempting to pay. Powder and chocolates had been made cheaper. There was the Endowment of Cinemas Act of 1948, and the Subsidized Football Bill of '49. But all these extravagances had largely ruined the effect of the abolition of tobacco. At the beginning of that year she had been obliged to cancel the State holiday on Mondays--"

"Why Mondays?" I inquired.

"Everyone feels beastly on Monday."

"But I don't see why they should feel any better on Tuesday."

"It was twenty-four hours nearer Saturday," he replied, "and Saturday was also a State holiday. Labour, of course, was infuriated, and unrest was every day becoming more apparent. The by-elections were going against the Première. And now this new handsome young hero had arisen not only to crystallise the support of his own sex, but capture the hearts of all the female electorate under twenty."

"Twenty!" I gasped.

"Everyone over fifteen had the franchise," said Charles calmly. "Now mark you, the programme of the Opposition was very cunning. They only proposed to reintroduce cigar and cigarette smoking. Edward Oburn, the young leader, being a film actor, naturally smoked nothing but exquisite Havanas. In this he had the support of the wealthier employers, but the enormous army of cigarette-suckers, male and female, was with him.

"But I don't see how he proposed to cut down expenses," I objected.

"He was going to tax the printing of all words over two syllables in length," replied Charles. "The Press of those days was not affected by the proposal, but a considerable revenue was expected from scientific books, high-brow novels and Socialistic publications. Well, the Première, as I say, was a prey to sad reflections, when suddenly the chur-chur of a taxi--"

"Aren't you thinking of night-jars?" I said.

"Possibly I am," he admitted; "it may have been a chug-chug. Anyway, it threw a wide arc of light into the gloom and stopped at the door of No. 10. A few moments later the door of the boudoir was flung open and the Chancellor of the Exchequer was announced."

"What did _she_ want?"

"She was a he this time, and had come to announce the inevitable--the very thing that the Première was thinking about and fearing. 'We must have the Bachelor Tax,'" he said.

"Now, the Bachelor Tax had been tried some twenty years before, but had failed, partly owing to the number of passive resisters who had had to be forcibly fed, and partly owing to the number of men who had shown substantial proof of recurrent rejections. How were they to bring in a reasonable and satisfactory Bill? After a long consultation, lasting several hours beyond midnight--"

"Did the taxi go on chugging?" I asked.

"Shut up. They decided eventually that if a bachelor made a written proposal and was rejected he was entitled to have his case tried before a jury of women, who should decide whether it was a reasonable offer and one that should normally have been accepted. If they found that it was, he was to be exempt from further efforts. The Bill was accordingly drafted, and carried easily, and the sequel no doubt you have guessed. On the day after it became law the beautiful young Première received a neatly-typed offer of marriage from Edward Oburn. They met; there was a scene of the utmost beauty and pathos; they became engaged, and the Coalition Government of the middle of 1950 began."

"How long did it go on?" I inquired.

"Until the day of revolution," said Charles pleasantly, refilling his foul old briar--"the great day when Fleet Street ran with blood and the pipe-smokers put up barricades in the Strand, and Piccadilly became a reeking shambles. Have you got a match?"

EVOE.

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* * * * *

"The chauffeur, who sprang into the vehicle as it started off, was injured when it collided with a lamppost. Both were removed to hospital.--_Daily Paper._

It is hoped that when the lamp-post has recovered it may throw some light on the accident.

* * * * *

"'In a few more fleeting years'

The ---- will still be Earning Money for its owner when other cars have caused their owners to become but a memory."--_Provincial Paper._

The advertiser ought not, we think, to have suppressed the names of these murderous machines.

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* * * * *

ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.

_Monday, March 1st._--Calendar note (extracted from _The Wee Free Almanack_): "Asquith comes in like a lion."

Everybody wanted to see the victor of Paisley make his _rentrée_. The Peers' Gallery was so crowded with his former colleagues that Lord ROTHERMERE had scarcely room for the big stick which typifies his present attitude towards the Government. Poor Lord BEAVERBROOK was quite in the background; but I am told that on historic occasions he always prefers, with characteristic modesty, to be behind the scenes.

As the hero of the hour walked up the floor, escorted by Sir DONALD MACLEAN and Mr. THORNE, his supporters did their best to give him a rousing welcome. But they were too few to produce much effect, and a moment or two later, when Mr. LLOYD GEORGE left the Treasury Bench to greet his old chief behind the SPEAKER'S Chair, they were compelled to hear the young bloods of the Coalition "give a louder roar."

Finding the traditional seat of the Leader of the Opposition still in the occupation of Mr. ADAMSON, Mr. ASQUITH bestowed himself between the Labour Leader and Mr. NEIL MACLEAN, with whom he entered into conversation. If he was endeavouring to expound for his benefit the moral of Paisley I am afraid he had but a poor success, for in the ensuing debate on food-control the Member for Govan shocked Liberal hearers by declaring that "the Manchester School is dead and there is no going back to it." In opposing the continuance of D.O.R.A. Captain ELLIOT was again in good form. His best _mot_, "With the Cabinet a thing is always either _sub judice_ or _chose jugée_," will take a good deal of beating as a summary of the Ministerial method of answering Questions.

I understand that Mr. MALLABY-DEELEY disclaims being the customer to whom the Disposals Board sold 577,000 suits of Government clothing. He makes a point of never being over-dressed.

A suggestion that in view of the difficulty of filling diplomatic vacancies the Government should appoint suitable women to some of these posts was declined by the PRIME MINISTER on the ground that it was not practicable at present. I doubt if he would have had the hardihood to make this avowal but that Lady ASTOR had been ousted from her usual seat by Mr. PEMBERTON BILLING.

_Tuesday, March 2nd._--Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY might be described as a pacificist who conducts a persistent offensive. He accused the WAR MINISTER of having made a false statement about Conscription in America, and later on made an allusion to General DENIKIN which Mr. CHURCHILL, to the satisfaction of the House, which does not exactly love the Central Hullaballoonist, described as "a singularly ill-conditioned sneer."

Lord WINTERTON, once the "baby" of the House, is still one of its most popular figures. Members were quite interested as he proceeded to explain, with an engaging blush, that a "hard case" which he had brought to the notice of the WAR MINISTER was his own, and sorry when the SPEAKER brought the narrative to a sudden stop by observing, "This is not the moment for autobiography."

The FIRST COMMISSIONER OF WORKS was roundly abused for having spent £3,250 on tapestry for Hampton Court Palace. But when it turned out that the panel in question was the long-missing number of a set belonging to Cardinal WOLSEY, and that its recovery was largely due to the enterprise and munificence of the right hon. gentleman himself, the House agreed that his completion of "Seven Deadly Sins" was a venial offence.

Other Estimates evoked more healthy criticism. Sir FREDERICK BANBURY was eloquent upon what he called a "hotel for gardeners" at Kew. Mr. HOGGE was for rooting up the Royal Botanical Gardens, since they were hardly ever visited by Scotsmen, and Captain STANLEY WILSON inveighed against the extravagance with which the British delegates were housed in Paris. Sir ALFRED MOND admitted that they "did themselves very well," but pleaded that they could hardly be expected to go to Montmartre--at least not collectively--and pointed out that some of the criticisms should be addressed to other Departments. He was not responsible, for example, for "clothes of typists."

_Wednesday, March 3rd._--Among the things that they do better in France, according to Lord SUDELEY, is the popularisation of picture-galleries and museums. He instanced the pictures on French match-boxes. But were they always confined to reproductions of Louvre masterpieces? My recollection is that at one time they took a wider range and were distinctly more striking than the matches.

One was reminded of PRAED'S lines--

"Hume, no doubt, will be taking the sense Of the House on a question of thirteen-pence"--

when the Government very nearly came to grief to-night over a question of five pounds for the Inland Revenue offices in Manchester. In vain Mr. BALDWIN pointed out the desirability of giving proper accommodation to the gentlemen who pick our pockets in the interest of the State. The House was still obstinate, until Mr. BONAR LAW declared that the Government would resign if they did not get their "fiver." As he undertook, however, not to spend it without further leave, the vote at last went through.

_Thursday, March 4th._--Lord BUCKMASTER'S scheme for preventing the bankruptcy of the State is to make everybody invest a portion of his capital in Government securities and to withhold the interest until such time as the State should find it convenient to pay. This, he explained to his own satisfaction, was quite different from that dangerous expedient, a levy on capital. Lord PEEL took a more cheerful view of the situation, and indicated that it was quite unnecessary for noble lords to get the wind up, since the Government would have no difficulty in raising it.

Even the most rigid economists will not cavil at the latest addition to our financial burdens. The PENSIONS MINISTER announced an addition of close on two millions a year to the annual charge. The increase is chiefly for a much-needed improvement in the allowances made to disabled officers, who have hitherto been but scurvily treated.

Mr. HIGHAM objected to receiving an answer about the telephones from Mr. PIKE PEASE. He demanded a reply from the PRIME MINISTER, not from a representative of the department impugned. The SPEAKER, however, pointed out that there were limits to the PREMIER'S responsibilities: "He does not run the whole show." After this descent into the vernacular I half-expected that Mr. LOWTHER would dam the stream of Supplementaries that followed with, "Oh, ring off!" but he contented himself with calling the next Question.

The debate on the Third Reading of the War Emergency Laws (Continuance) Bill was chiefly devoted to Ireland. Captain WEDGWOOD BENN, after spending a whole week in that country, is convinced that all the trouble is due to the Government's reliance upon D.O.R.A., and declared that the only people who were not in gaol were the murderers. That would mean that there are some four million assassins in Ireland; which I feel sure is an exaggeration. The two hundred thousand mentioned by the CHIEF SECRETARY would seem to be ample for any country save Russia.

Scarcely was this gloomy episode over than the House was called upon to pass a Supplementary Estimate of £860 for "Peace Celebrations in Ireland." As £500 of this sum was for flags and decorations, which, in Mr. BALDWIN'S phrase, "remain for future use," the Irish outlook may, after all, be not quite so black as it is painted.

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A BUY ELECTION.

[The excellent precedent set by Mr. MALLABY-DEELEY in supplying needed goods at cheap rates may prove a little awkward if adopted by Parliamentary Candidates, as shown in the following anticipatory report.]

Quiet confidence reigned in the ranks of the Muddleboro Labour Party. The action of their Candidate, Mr. Dulham, in arranging for a co-operative milk supply at sixpence per quart, was supposed to have won the hearts of all householders. They had no fear of Mr. Coddem, the representative of the great BOTTOMLEY party. It was true that Mr. Coddem had taken over a local brewery and was supplying beer at threepence per pint. But the Labour stalwarts argued that, in the first place, this would lose him the women's and temperance vote, and, in the second place, the electors would drink the brewery dry in double-quick time. All those who failed to get cheap beer would revenge themselves on the Candidate who had failed to keep his promise.

The Wee Free cause was nearly hopeless. Their candidate, Mr. Guff, had made a desperate bid for popularity by offering, in conjunction with _The Daily News_, cocoa at reduced rates. But the Labour Candidate had put the pointed question, "Who made cocoa dear in the first place?" and Mr. Guff had evaded the question.

When Mr. Stilts, the National Party Candidate, promised the public cheaper honours--urging that, if he were returned, it would be unnecessary to subscribe to party funds to get a title--the voters were quite unmoved. Perhaps they knew that they could get the O.B.E. for nothing, anyhow, and had no higher ambitions.