Chapter 3

"For one thing," I replied confidently, "the taxes would be graduated in the ordinary way in accordance with means. The slightest flicker of a conscience in Park Lane would be more heavily mulcted than the most blameless life in Bermondsey. But the main point is that under my system taxation would become the measure of a man's moral worth, and people who did not pay taxes would be simply out of it. All the plums would go the highly-taxed men. Their tax receipts would be certificates of character, and the more they earned the more the Treasury would be able to get out of them. So far from dodging taxation, people would scramble to pay it."

"But how," asked Hilda, "would you make the tax receipt a trustworthy testimonial? Your rich man with one virtue would have a better receipt than your poor one with ten."

"The virtues taxed would be shown on the receipt," I replied. "Besides, poor and virtuous men would, as I have suggested, get an abatement on their virtue taxes, and the amount of the abatement would be shown on the receipt. So it could easily be seen what proportion a man was paying on his wealth and what on his virtues."

"Look here," said Peter, aroused at last, "do you convey that the tobacco duty would be paid by people who didn't smoke?"

"It would amount to that," I answered, "assuming that abstention from tobacco were counted a virtue."

"There may be something in it after all," said Peter.

* * * * *

* * * * *

NEW RHYMES FOR OLD CHILDREN.

THE CHAMELEON.

The chameleon changes his colour; He can look like a tree or a wall; He is timid and shy and he hates to be seen, So he simply sits down in the grass and goes green, And pretends he is nothing at all.

I wish I could change my complexion To purple or orange or red; I wish I could look like the arm of a chair So nobody ever would know I was there When they wanted to put me to bed.

I wish I could be a chameleon And look like a lily or rose; I'd lie on the apples and peaches and pears, But not on Aunt Margaret's yellowy chairs-- I should have to be careful of those.

The chameleon's life is confusing; He is used to adventure and pain; But if ever he sat on Aunt Maggie's cretonne And found what a curious colour he'd gone, I don't think he'd do it again.

A.P.H.

* * * * *

THAT TEA INTERVAL.

Before the last ball of 1920 is bowled and the last wicket in a first-class match falls (as will most probably happen at the Oval this very afternoon, September 15th), I should like to let the Gods of the Game know how I propose to spend the following winter in their interests, so that when the season of 1921 is with us the happiness of the cricket spectator may be even greater than it has been in the one now expiring.

I am going to devote the time to invention. With every grain of intellect and ingenuity that I can scrape together I am going to devise a means of humanising the tea interval.

Once upon a time I was so rash as to ridicule this interruption. I drew attention to the fact that the ancient heroes of the game had been able to dispense with it. ALFRED MYNN needed no Asiatic stimulant between lunch and the close of play. Even such whole-hearted moderns as HORNBY and SHREWSBURY and GRACE managed to do well without the support of Hyson or Bohea. For more than a century cricket and tea were strangers and cricket did not suffer. And so on. But the attacks were futile: the tea interval became an institution; and nothing now, one realises, can ever occur to separate the gallant fellows from their cups and saucers.

That being accepted, the problem is how to make the interval at once less harmful to the match and more tolerable to the lover of cricket; and it is on this problem that I have been working and intend to work through the arid football months. What has to be done is (_a_) to get the interval abbreviated; and (_b_) to keep the players on the field. It is the length of it and the empty pitch that are so depressing to the spectator, and it is the return to the pavilion that is so detrimental to the rhythm of the game. Neither of the batsmen ever wants the interruption, and I have often noticed a reluctance in certain members of the fielding side. As for the watchers, they never fail to groan.

Still, as I have said, it is now recognised that the craving for tea is as much a part of the present-day game as the six-ball over, and the time has passed for censuring it. But something can be done to regulate it; and I have based my efforts towards a solution on the argument that, if a cricketer is not called in from the game to read his telegram, but (as we have all seen so often) the telegram is taken out to him, surely the precious fluid that he so passionately desiderates can be taken out to him too. At present, therefore, all my thoughts are turned upon the construction of some kind of wheeled waggon, such as is in use at a well-known restaurant in the Strand, on which fifteen cups (two for the umpires) and an urn and sugar and milk can be conveyed, with the concomitant bread-and-butter, or shrimps or meringues, or whatever is eaten with the tea, on a lower shelf. This could be pushed on to the ground at 4.15 and pushed back again at 4.20 without any serious injury to the match. That is my idea at the moment; but I am a poor mechanic and should be glad if some properly qualified person--someone with a HEATH ROBINSON mind--would take the work over.

E.V.L.

* * * * *

IN THE MOVEMENT.

How I came to be able to understand the language of trees is a secret. But I do understand it. It is my peculiar privilege to overhear all kinds of whispered conversation--green speech in green shades--as I take my rest underneath the boughs on a country walk. Some day I shall set down fully the result of these leaves-droppings, but at the moment I want to tell only of what I heard some blackberry bushes saying last week.

"From what I hear," said the first bush, "the cost of everything's going up by leaps and bounds."

"How is that?" asked one of its neighbours.

"It's due, I understand," the first bush replied, "partly to scarcity of labour and partly to profiteering."

"I don't see why we shouldn't participate," said another bush. "Here we are, covered with fruit, and it's all just as free as ever it was. That's absurd, after a big war. The duty of a war is to make things dearer and remove freedom."

"Of course," said the others.

"'Your blackberries will cost you more'--that should be our motto," said the first bush. "We must be up to date."

* * * * *

A few days later, after one of our infrequent post-bellum gleams of sunshine, I met the Lady of the White House and all her nice children returning from a day's blackberrying. They showed me their baskets with a proper pride, and I was suitably enthusiastic and complimentary.

"But do look at our poor hands and arms and our torn frocks!" said the lady. "We've picked blackberries here year after year, but we've never been so badly scratched before. It's extraordinary. I can't account for it."

I could, though.

* * * * *

THE MOON-SELLER.

A man came by at night with moons to sell; "Moons old and new," he cried; I hurried when I heard him call for me; He set his basket on the wall for me That I might see inside And watch the little moons curl up and hide.

Each one he touched rang softly like a bell; He pointed out to me Great harvest moons with russet light in them, Pale moons to gleam where snows grow white in them, Red moons for victory, And steadfast moons for men in ships at sea.

The man who came with many moons to sell Opened his basket wide; Showed me the filmy crescent moons in it, And the piled discs (like silver spoons) in it That push and pull the tide, And small sweet honey-moons to give a bride.

"This moon," he said, "you will remember well; Its price is wealth untold;" Took a camp-moon he vowed he stole for me And softly wrapped to keep it whole for me. I heaped his feet with gold; He changed, and said the moon might not be sold.

Then I was angry that with moons to sell He thought he had the right To keep that one. Those who were lent to us Had written the brief notes they sent to us When it shone out at night. I caught it to my heart and held it tight.

* * * * *

"Twenty Students Require clean, respectable Board-Residence; would not object to Share Bed."--_Provincial Paper._

They should have lived in the days of Og, the King of Basan; his bedstead _was_ a bedstead.

* * * * *

"Calcutta.

During the past few weeks several parties of Afghan merchants and traders have settled up their affairs and come into India. In order to avoid being questioned by British poets in the Khyber, they have entered this country by way of the Sissobi pass."--_Indian Paper._

Some of our poets are notoriously curious, and we are hardly surprised to learn that the Afghans could not "abide their question."

* * * * *

* * * * *

THE LANGUAGE DIFFICULTY.

"The jolly part about an island where there are no towns and no railways," said Willoughby, "is that you have thrills of excitement as to where you will sleep next night or eat your next meal. Now when we land at Lochrie Bay to-morrow it will be nearly lunch-time; but shall we get lunch?"

"I can answer that," replied MacFadden, whose grandfather was a Scotsman, and who was once in Edinburgh for a week; "the map shows it is only five miles to Waterfoot, and there's sure to be an hotel there. Those little Scots inns are all right."

"Yes," chimed in Sylvia, "and very likely there'll be nothing to eat when we get there. I am thinking of you three men, of course," she added hastily; "we girls don't want much."

"As for me," said Willoughby, looking at Sylvia, whom he has adored dumbly for years, "very little satisfies me. I'm like the fellow who said, 'a crust of bread, a bottle of wine and you.' You know the chap, MacFadden."

"Isn't it wonderful how he remembers his OMAR?" remarked Mac enthusiastically.

"I don't know much poetry," said Willoughby, whose tastes are sporting rather than literary, "but I always liked that bit."

"But lunch," I interposed, "is the pressing question. There's sure to be an hotel at Waterfoot, as you say. Send a telegram there, asking for lunch for six. If there's no hotel, no reply and no lunch. If there is we get our reply and our lunch. Willoughby can wire, because he learned all about telegraphs in the army."

Within two hours came the reply. I opened it.

"Will supply luncheon for six, 1.15 to-day."

"Can you remember what your wire said, Willoughby?" I asked mildly.

"Rather. 'Can you provide luncheon for six at 1.15.--Willoughby.'"

"Exactly. Can't you see, you silly ass, how you've muffed it? Read this." Willoughby read, while Sylvia and Molly looked over and giggled.

"Hang it all! I suppose I ought to have said to-morrow," he sighed. "Here, Thompson, you and Hilda, as the married couple of the party, ought to deal with these beastly emergencies."

"Not I," I replied. "You've got us in the muddle, now get us out. Wire and say it's for to-morrow."

"And then," said my practical wife, "we shall get to-day's hot lunch cold to-morrow, and a rapacious Scotch-woman will charge us for it twice over."

"I wish you would say 'Scots,' not 'Scotch,'" complained MacFadden.

"Sorry, Kiltie," rejoined Hilda; "and perhaps one of you two will deal with the Scots woman."

"Leave her to me and none of you interfere," answered MacFadden. "Willoughby is no good at a job that needs tact. He's not half as lovable as I am either. Is he, Molly? We'll send the wire at once. Come on."

Next day the steamer dropped us into the ferry-boat off Lochrie Bay, and our bicycles, more frightened than hurt, but much shaken, were hurled in after us. After five miles on a primitive road we arrived at the hotel very late.

MacFadden, assuring us that if we only kept quiet he would see us through in spite of any Scots innkeeper, led the way.

The landlady, a dour woman, appeared.

"Good morning, Madam," began Mac politely.

"Will you be Mr. Willoughby?" she replied.

"No," said Mac truthfully, assuming a puzzled expression.

"Weel, then," resumed the lady, addressing Sylvia, who happened to be close behind, "will you be Mrs. Willoughby?"

Molly sniggered; Sylvia reddened and answered hastily, "No, I won't!" at which Willoughby sighed audibly.

"What I wanted to ask you was whether perhaps you could be so kind as to give us a bit of bread and cheese or something," said Mac ingratiatingly. "Of course one doesn't expect a proper lunch in these places without ordering it beforehand."

"And those that order beforehand dinna come," she replied with some asperity. "A pairty of six ordered for yesterday then they telegraphs to say they mean to-day, and now they're no here and the time lang gone by. I thocht ye were the pairty at first."

"What a shame!" murmured MacFadden sympathetically.

"Ay, if they had turned up they should hae had their lunch, and paid for it too," said the good lady grimly. "Twa days they should hae paid for. But if ye like ye can eat their lunch for them; it's cauld but guid."

So we ate heartily, paid reasonably and went away on good terms with ourselves and the lady.

Walking up the steep hill from the hotel I was just behind Willoughby and Sylvia. He was pushing the two bicycles and explaining something elaborately.

"Awfully sorry about that silly woman, Sylvia," he said, "but it's only their rotten way of talking English. You see, when she says, '_Will_ you be Mrs. Willoughby?' she really means, '_Are_ you?' It's not the same as when an Englishman says it. If I said, 'Will you be Mrs. Willoughby?' that would be different; it would mean--"

"Yes," interrupted Sylvia rather breathlessly, "that, Tommy dear, would be plain English, to which I could give a plain answer. I should say--"

We had reached the brow of the hill. I mounted my bicycle and hurried on.

* * * * *

* * * * *

"1,000 EGGS IN ONE WHISKER."

_Daily Paper._

A much worse case than that of LEAR'S old man with a beard, who said it was just as he feared.

* * * * *

"For all we know, Helen of Troy's best friends might have said, 'Helen has style and knows how to make the most of her good points; but, honest, now, do you think she should have got the apple?'"

_Evening Paper._

Certainly not. That's why Paris gave it to Aphrodite.

* * * * *

* * * * *

OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.

(_By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned Clerks._)

Really I think that _Rhoda Drake_ (MURRAY) must be the most preposterously startling story that I have read for this age. It makes you feel as if you had had a squib exploded under your chair at a temperance meeting. After beginning placidly about persons who live in South Kensington (and are so dull that the author has to fill up with minute descriptions of their drawing-rooms), somewhere towards three-quarters through its decorous course it plunges you head over ears into such tearing melodrama as is comparable only to Episode 42 of "The Adventures of the Blinking Eye" at a provincial cinema. I am left asking myself in bewilderment whether Mr. C.H. DUDLEY WARD, D.S.O., M.C., can have been serious in the affair. As I say, practically all the early characters are of little or no account, including _Rhoda_ herself. Indeed, nobody looks like mattering at all, and the whole tale has, to be frank, taken on a somewhat soporific aspect, when lo! there enters a lady with a Russian name, no back to her gown and green face-powder. If I said of this paragon that she made the story bounce I should still do less than justice to her amazing personality. Really, she was a herald of revolution, whose remarkable method was to invite anyone important and obstructive to her house and make them discontented. It was the work of half-an-hour. Whether the process was hypnotic, or whether she actually put pepper in the ice-pudding, I could not clearly make out. But the dreadful fact remained that, let your patriotism be ever so firm, you had but to accept one of green-powder's little dinners and next morning you were as like as not to hurl a stone into 10, Downing Street. As for the end--! But no, I will stop short of it.

* * * * *

Frankly, what pleased me most about _Affinities_ (HODDER AND STOUGHTON) was its attractive get-up; pleasant, cherry-pie-coloured boards, swathed in a very daintily-drawn pictorial wrapper, the whole, as cataloguers say, forming an ideal birthday present for a young lady, especially one at all apt to discover, however harmlessly, the affinities that give these five tales their title. As for the stories themselves, really all that need be said is to congratulate Mrs. MARY ROBERTS RINEHART on the ingenuity with which she can tell what seems an obvious intrigue yet keep a surprise in reserve. I suppose it is because they come to us from America that certain of the episodes turn upon incidents in the Suffrage struggle, tale-fodder that our own militant novelists have long happily discarded. Of the others I think I myself would award the palm to one called "The Family Friend," a genially cynical little comedy of encouraged courtship, of which the end seems to be visible from the beginning, but isn't. Altogether, what I might call a Canute; in other words a book for the deck-chair, not too absorbing to endanger your shoes, however close you read it to the advancing wave.

* * * * *

I think I should best describe the characteristic quality of _Four Blind Mice_ (LANE) as geniality. The scene of it is Burmah--astonishing, when you consider the host of novels about the rest of India, that so few should employ this equally picturesque setting--and it is quickly apparent that what Mr. C.C. LOWIS doesn't know at first hand about Rangoon is not likely to be missed. The tale itself is a good-humoured little comedy of European and native intrigue, showing how one section of the populace strove as usual to ease the white man's burden by flirtation and gossip, and the other to get the best for themselves by unlimited roguery and chicane. The whole thing culminates in a trial scene which is at once a delightful entertainment and (I should suppose) a shrewdly observed study of the course of Anglo-Burmese justice. I think I would have chosen that Mr. LOWIS should base his fun on something a little less grim than the murder and mutilation of a European, or at least Eurasian, lady, even though the very slight part in the action played by _Mrs. Rodrigues_, when alive, could hardly be called sympathetic. Still we were all so good-humoured over her taking-off that for a long time I cherished a rather dream-like faith in her reappearance to prove that this attitude had been justified. Not that Mr. LOWIS has not every right to retort that he is writing comedy rather than farce; certainly he has made his four blind mice to run in highly diverting fashion, very entertaining to those of us who see how they run; and as they at least save their tails triumphantly it would perhaps be ungenerous to complain about one that doesn't.

* * * * *

* * * * *

_The Story of the Fourth Army in the Battles of the Hundred Days_ (HODDER AND STOUGHTON) is printed on pages the size of a copy of _Punch_, and with its accompanying case of maps it costs eighteen-pence to go through the post. It boasts a hundred full-page photographs, also sketches, charts, maps, panoramas and diagrams _ad lib._, a foreword by General Lord RAWLINSON and ten appendices; so really it seems that the much-abused word "sumptuous" may for once be fairly applied. The author, Major-General Sir A. MONTGOMERY, who himself helped to "stage" the battles he writes about, has built up a record which is in some sense unique, for I think it is possible from this book to trace precisely where any unit of the Fourth Army was placed, and what doing, at any given hour during the whole of the victory march from Amiens to the Belgian frontier. Apart from anything else it is pleasant to have a book that deals only with the days of victory; but it must be admitted that, to gain a completeness of detail so entirely satisfactory to those most nearly concerned, the writer has had to sacrifice something of human interest, for many of his pages are little more than a bare chronicle of names and places. Undoubtedly his book should be read with great deliberation, constant reference to the maps and a lively recollection of personal experiences on the spot; but the civilian reader may still be content to skim the text and save himself for the photographs. These, mostly taken from the air and of exquisite technical quality, form an amazing series, in themselves worth the heavy price. And who minds heavy prices when the proceeds are pledged to the service of wounded officers?

* * * * *

"Rather an anti-climax," I thought when I opened _The Happy Foreigner_ (HEINEMANN) and found that it purported to tell the experiences of an English _chauffeuse_ in France after the Armistice; but I know now that, in any place where ENID BAGNOLD happened to be, there would not be any anti-climax about. In a style so daring and vivid that it could only have been born, I suppose, of fast driving, the authoress describes a romantic affair with a young French officer; but her real theme is the suffering of France bowed down under the intolerable burden of so many strangers, both enemies and friends. The rich and well-fed Americans who will not trouble to understand, the grotesque Chinamen and Annamites, the starving Russians liberated from the Germans, flash by, with the ruins of villages, the tangle of wire and litter of derelict guns; and even the romance, intensely felt though it is, must be fleeting, like the rest of the nightmare, because the Frenchman's eyes are set on the future and the rebuilding of his fortunes. This book is not "about the War," but all the same it is one of the best books about the War that I have read.

* * * * *