PART III--MARRIAGE

_September_ 12.

This evening we walked thro' the Churchyard reading tombstone inscriptions. What a lot of men have had wives!

I can't make out what has come over folk recently: the wit, wisdom and irony on the old tombstones have given place to maudlin sentiment and pious Bible references. Then on the anniversary of the death the custom among poorer classes is to publish such pathetic doggerel as the following--cuttings I have taken from time to time from the local newspaper in ----:

"Her wish:

"'Farewell dear brother, Mother, sisters, My life was passed in love for thee. Mourn not for me nor sorrow take But love my husband for my sake Until the call comes home to thee, Live thou in peace and harmony.'"

Again:

"A day of remembrance sad to recall But still in my heart he is loved best of all No matter how I think of him--his name I oft recall; There is nothing left to answer me but his photo on the wall."

Or:

"One year has passed since that sad day, When one we loved was called away. God took her home; it was His will, Forget her?--No, we never will."

These piteous screeds fill me with loving-kindness and with contempt alternately in a pendulum-like rhythm. What is the truth about them? Is the grief of these people as mean and ridiculous as their rhymes? Or is it a pitiful inarticulateness? Or is it merely vulgar advertisement of their sorrow? Or does it signify a passionate intention never to forget?--or a fear of forgetting, the rhymes being used as a fillip to the memory? Or--most miserable of all--is it just a custom, and one followed in order to appear respectable in others' eyes? Are they poor souls? or contemptible fools?

_September_ 14.

There is a ridiculous Cocker spaniel at the house where we are staying. He must have had a love affair and been jilted, or else he's a sort of village idiot. The landlady says he's not so silly as he looks--but he looks very silly: he languishes sentimentally, and when we laugh at him he looks "hurt." To-day we took him up on the Down and it seemed to brighten him up. Really, he is sane enough, with plenty of commonsense and good manners. But he is kept at home in the garden so much, lolling about all day, that as E---- said, having nothing to do, he falls in love.

The _Saturday Review_ writes: The effect of the "Brides and the Bath" Case on people with any trace of _nice feeling_ is perhaps not particularly mischievous, tho' the thing is repulsive and hateful to them.... To gloat over the details of repulsive horrors, simply _from motives of curiosity_--this is bad and degrading.

What a lot of repulsive things the nice refined people who read the _Saturday Review_ must find in the world just now. For example the War. "Simply from motives of curiosity." Why certainly, no other than these, concerning one of the most remarkable murders in the annals of crime. And murders anyhow are damned interesting--which the _Saturday Review_ isn't.

_Chipples_

I was surprised to discover the other day that when I talked of Chipples no one understood what I meant! It proves to be a dialect word familiar to all residents in Devonshire and designating spring onions. Anyway you won't find it in Murray's Dictionary; yet etymologically it is an extremely interesting word and a thoroughly good word with a splendid pedigree. To wit:

Italian: Cipollo.

Spanish: Cebolla.

French: Ciboule.

Latin: Cæpulla, dim. of cæpa (_cf_. cive, civot).

Now how did this pretty little alien manage to settle down among simple Devon folk? What has been the relation between Italy and--say Appledore, or Plymouth?[1]

_October_ 6.

In London once more, living at her flat and using her furniture.

_The Chalcidoidea_

The Chalcidoidea are minute winged insects that parasitise other insects, and in the _Memoirs of the Queensland Museum_ (Vol. I., 1912) you shall find an enormous catalogue of them by a person named Girault who writes the following dedication:

"I respectfully dedicate this little portion of work to science, common sense or true knowledge. I am convinced that human welfare is so dependent upon science that civilisation would not endure without it, and that what is meant by progress would be impossible. Also I am convinced that the great majority of mankind are too ignorant, that education is too archaic and impractical as looked at from the standpoint of intrinsic knowledge. There is too little known of the essential unity of the Universe and of things included, for instance, man himself. Opinions and prejudices rule in the place of what is true...."