Part 4

"Little _feast_, indeed!" said his host, "why it is but a most humble meal. Anyhow, I am glad to have had from you a proper schedule of your pleasures of the table. In time to come when we know each other better, we will arrange other large and really satisfactory meals; but this will do very well for our initiatory lunch as it were." And he laughed merrily.

"But have I not given you great trouble?" said my friend.

"How little you will easily perceive," said his companion, "for in this town we have but to order and all is at once promptly and intelligently done." With that he turned into a small office where a commissary at once took down his order. "And now," said he emerging, "let us be home."

They went together down the turnings of a couple of broad streets lined with great private palaces and public temples until they came to a garden which had no boundaries to it but which was open, and apparently the property of the city. But the people who wandered here were at once so few, so discreet and so courteous, my friend could not discover whether they were (as their salutes seemed to indicate) the dependents of his host, or merely acquaintances who recognized him upon their way.

This garden, as they proceeded, became more private and more domestic; it led by narrowing paths through high, diversified trees, until, beyond the screen of a great beech hedge, he saw the house ... and it was all that a house should be!

Its clear, well set stone walls were in such perfect harmony with the climate and with the sky, its roof garden from which a child was greeting them upon their approach, so unexpected and so suitable, its arched open gallery was of so august a sort, and yet the domestic ornaments of its colonnade so familiar, that nothing could be conceived more appropriate for the residence of man.

The mere passage into this Home out of the warm morning daylight into the inner domestic cool, was a benediction, and in the courtyard which they thus entered a lazy fountain leaped and babbled to itself in a manner that filled the heart with ease.

"I do not know," said his host in a gentle whisper as they crossed the courtyard, "whether it is your custom to bathe before the morning meal or in the middle of the afternoon?"

"Why, sir," said my friend, "if I may tell the whole truth, I have no custom in the matter; but perhaps the middle of the afternoon would suit me best."

"By all means," said his host in a satisfied tone. "And I think you have chosen wisely, for the meal you have ordered will very shortly be prepared. But, for your refreshment at least, one of my friends shall put you in order, cool your hands and forehead, see to your face and hair, put comfortable sandals upon your feet and give you a change of raiment."

All of this was done. My friend's host did well to call the servant who attended upon his guest a "friend," for there was in this man's manner no trace of servility or of dependence, and yet an eager willingness for service coupled with a perfect reticence which was admirable to behold and feel.

When my friend had been thus refreshed he was conducted to a most exceptional little room. Four pictures were set in the walls of it, mosaics, they seemed--but he did not examine their medium closely. The room itself in its perfect lightness and harmony, with its view out through a large round arch upon the countryside beyond the walls (the old turrets of which made a framework for the view), exactly prepared him for the meal that was prepared.

While the oysters (delightful things!) were entering upon their tray and were being put upon the table, the host, taking my friend aside with an exquisite gesture of courteous privacy, led him through the window-arch on to a balcony without, and said, as they gazed upon the wall and the plain and the mountains beyond (and what a sight they were!):

"There is one thing, my dear sir, that I should like to say to you before you eat ... it is rather a delicate matter.... You will not mind my being perfectly frank?"

"Speak on, speak on," said my friend, who by this time would have confided any interests whatsoever into the hands of such a host.

"Well," said that host, continuing a little carefully, "it is this: as you can see we are very careful in this city to make men as happy as may be. We are happy ourselves, and we love to confer happiness upon others, strangers and travellers who honour us with their presence. But we find--I am very sorry to say we find ... that is, we find from time to time that their _complete_ happiness, no matter with what we may provide them, is dashed by certain forms of anxiety, the chief of which is anxiety with regard to their future receipts of money."

My friend started.

"Nay," said his host hastily, "do not misunderstand me. I do not mean that preoccupations of business are alone so alarming. What I mean is that sometimes, yes, and I may say often (horrible as it seems to us!), our guests are in an active preoccupation about the petty business of finance. Some few have debts, it seems, in the wretched society from which they come, and of which, frankly, I know nothing. Others, though not indebted, feel insecure about the future. Others though wealthy are oppressed by their responsibilities. Now," he continued firmly, "I must tell you once and for all that we have a custom here upon which we take no denial: _no denial whatsoever_. Every man who enters this city, who _honours_ us by entering this city, is made free of _that_ sort of nonsense, thank God!" And as he said this, my friend's host breathed a great sigh of relief. "It would be intolerable to us to think," he continued, "that our welcome and dear companions were suffering from such a tawdry thing as money-worry in our presence. So the matter is plainly this: whether you like it or whether you do not, the sum of £10,000 is already set down to your credit in the public bank of the city; whether you use it or not is your business; if you do not it is our custom to melt down an equivalent sum of gold and to cast it into the depths of the river, for we have of this metal an unfailing supply, and I confess we do not find it easy to understand the exaggerated value which other men place upon it."

"I do not know that I shall have occasion to use so magnificent a custom," said my friend with an extraordinary relief in his heart, "but I certainly thank you very kindly for its intention, and I shall not hesitate to use any sum that may be necessary for my continuing the great happiness which this city appears to afford."

"You have spoken well," said his host, seizing both his hands, "and your frankness compels me to another confession: We have at our disposal a means of discovering exactly how any one of our guests may stand: the responsibilities of the rich, the indebtedness of the embarrassed, the anxiety of those whose future may be precarious. May I tell you without discourtesy, that your own case is known to me and to two trustees, who are public officials--absolutely reliable--and whom, for that matter, you will not meet."

My friend must have looked incredulous, but his host continued firmly: "It is so, we have settled your whole matter, I am glad to say, on terms that settle all your liabilities and leave a further £50,000 to your credit in the public bank. But the size of the sum is in this city really of no importance. You may demand whatever you will, and enjoy, I hope, a complete security during your habitation here. And that habitation, both the Town Council and the National Government, beg you, through me, to extend to the whole of your life."

* * * * *

"Imagine," said my friend, "how I felt.... The oysters were now upon the table, and before them, ready for consumption, the caviar. The Barsac in its original bottle, cooled (need I say!) to exactly thirty-eight degrees, stood ready...."

At this point he stopped and gazed into the fire.

"But, my dear fellow," said I, "if you are coming to me for sympathy and simply succeed in making me hungry and cross...."

"No," said my friend with a sob, "you don't understand!" And he continued to gaze at the fire.

"Well, go _on_," said I angrily.

"There isn't any _on_," he said; "I woke!"

We both looked into the fire together for perhaps three minutes before I spoke and said:

"Will you have some wine?"

"No thank you," he answered sadly, "not _that_ wine." Then he got up uneasily and moved for his umbrella and his galoshes, and the passage and the door. I thought he muttered, "You might have helped me."

"How could I help you?" I said savagely.

"Well," he sighed, "I thought you could ... it was a bitter disappointment. Good night!" And he went out again into the rain and over the clay.

X

ON OMENS

Only the other day there was printed in a newspaper (what a lot of things they print in newspapers!) five lines which read thus:

"Calcutta, Thursday.

"An hour before the Viceroy left Calcutta on Wednesday for the last time lightning struck the flag over Government House, tearing it to shreds. This is considered to be an omen by the natives."

The Devil they did! A superstitious chap, your native, and we have outgrown such things. But it is really astonishing when you come to think of it how absurdly credulous the human race has been for thousands of years about omens, and still is--everywhere except here. And by the way, what a curious thing it is that only in one country, and only in one little tiny circle of it should this terrible vice have been eradicated from the human mind! If one were capable of paradox one would say that the blessing conferred upon us few enlightened people in England was providential; but that would be worse superstition than the other. There seems to be a tangle somewhere. Anyhow, there it is: people have gone on by the million and for centuries and centuries believing in omens. It is an illusion. It is due to a frame of mind. That which the enlightened person easily discovers to be a coincidence, the Native, that is, the person living in a place, thinks to be in some way due to a Superior Power. It is a way Natives have. Nothing warps the mind like being a Native.

The Reform Bill passed in 1832 and destroyed not only the Pot-Wallopers, but also the ancient Constitution of the country. From that time onwards we have been free. When the thing was thoroughly settled (and the old Poor Law was being got rid of into the bargain), the old House of Lords, and the old House of Commons, they caught fire, "and they did get burnt down to the ground." Those are the very words of an old man who saw it happen and who told me about it. The misfortune was due to the old tallies of the Exchequer catching fire, and this silly old man, who saw it happen (he was a child of six at the time), has always thought it was an Omen. It has been explained to him, not only by good, kind ladies who go and visit him and see that he gets no money or beer, but also from the Pulpit of St. Margaret's Church, Westminster (where he regularly attends Divine Service by kind permission of the Middle Class, and in the vain hope of cadging alms), that there is no such thing as Providence, and that if he lets his mind dwell on Omens he will end by believing in God. But the old man is much too old to receive a new idea, so he goes on believing that the burning of old St. Stephen's was an Omen.

Not so the commercial traveller, who told me in an hotel the other day the story of the market-woman of Devizes, to exemplify the gross superstitions of our fathers.

It seems that the market-woman, sometime when George III was King, had taken change of a sovereign on market-day, from a purchaser, when there were no witnesses, and then, in the presence of witnesses, demanded the change again. The man most solemnly affirmed that he had paid her, to which she replied: "If I have taken your money may God strike me dead." The moment these words were out of the market-woman's lips, an enormous great jagged, forked, fiery dart of lightning, three miles long, leapt out of a distant cloud, and shrivelled her up. "Whereupon," ended the commercial traveller, "the people of Devizes _in those days_ were so superstitious that they thought it was a judgment, they did! And they put up a plate in commemoration. Such foolishness!" It is sad to think of the people of Devizes and their darkness of understanding when George III was King. But, upon the other hand, it is a joy to think of the fresh, clear minds of the people of Devizes to-day. For though, every Sunday morning, about half an hour after Church time, every single man and woman who had shirked Church, Chapel, Mosque or Synagogue, each according to his or her creed should fall down dead of no apparent illness, and though upon the forehead of each one so taken, the survivors returning from their services, meetings or what-not, should find clearly written in a vivid blue the Letters of Doom. None the less the people of Devizes would, it is to be hoped, retain their mental balance, and distinguish between a coincidence (which is the only true explanation of such things) and fond imaginings of supernatural possibilities.

There is an old story and a good one to teach us how to fight against any weakness of the sort, which is this. Two old gentlemen who had never met before were in a first-class railway carriage of a train that does not stop until it gets to Bristol. They were talking about ghosts. One of them was a parson, the other was a layman. The layman said he did not believe in ghosts. The parson was very much annoyed, tried to convince him, and at last said, "After all, you'd have to believe in one if you saw one."

"No, I shouldn't," said the layman sturdily. "I should know it was an illusion."

Then the old parson got very angry indeed, and said in a voice shaking with self-restraint:

"Well, you've got to believe in ghosts now, for I am one!" Whereat he immediately vanished into the air.

The old layman, finding himself well rid of a bad business, shook himself together, wrapped his rug round his knees, and began to read his paper, for he knew very well that it was an illusion.

Of the same sturdy sense was Isaac Newton, when a lady came to him who had heard he was an astrologer, and asked him where she had dropped her purse, somewhere between Shooter's Hill and London Bridge. She would not believe that the Baronet (or knight, I forget which) could be ignorant of such things, and she came about fourteen times. So to be rid of her Newton, on the occasion of her last visit, put on an old flowered dressing-gown, and made himself a conical paper hat, and put on great blue goggles, and drew a circle on the floor, and said "Abracadabra!" "The front of Greenwich Hospital, the third great window from the southern end. On the grass just beneath it I see a short devil crouched upon a purse of gold." Off went the female, and sure enough under that window she found her purse. Whereat, instead of hearing the explanation (there was none) she thought it was an Omen.

Remember this parable. It is enormously illuminating.

XI

THE BOOK

This is written to dissuade all rich men from queering the pitch of us poor litteratoors, who have to write or starve. It is about a Mr. Foley: a Mr. Charles Foley, a banker and the son of a banker, who in middle life, that is at forty, saw no more use in coming to his office every day, but began to lead the life of a man of leisure. Next, being exceedingly rich he was prompted, of course, to write a book. The thing that prompted him to write a book was a thought, an idea. It took him suddenly as ideas will, one Saturday evening as he was walking home from his Club. It was a fine night and the idea seemed to come upon him out of the sky. This was the idea: that men produce such and such art in architecture and society and so forth, on account of the kind of climate they live in. Such a thought had never come to him before and very probably to no other man. It was simple like a seed--and yet, as he turned it over, what enormous possibilities.

He lay awake half the night examining it. It spread out like a great tree and explained every human thing on earth; at least if to climate one added one or two other things, such as height above the sea and consequent rarity of the air and so forth--but perhaps all these could be included in climate.

Hitherto every one had imagined that nations and civilisations had each their temperament and tendency or genius, but those words were only ways of saying that one did not know what it was. _He_ knew: Charles Foley did. He had caught the inspiration suddenly as it passed. He slept the few last hours of the night in a profound repose, and next day he was at it. He was writing that book.

He was a business-man--luckily for him. He did not speak of the great task until it was done. He was in no need of money--luckily for him. He could afford to wait until the last pages had satisfied him. Life had taught him that one could do nothing in business unless one had something in one's hands. He would come to the publisher with something in his hands, to wit, with this MSS. He had no doubt about the title. He would call it "MAN AND NATURE." The title had come to him in a sort of flash after the idea. Anyhow, that was the title, and he felt it to be a very part of his being.

He had fixed upon his publisher. He rang him up to make an appointment. The publisher received him with charming courtesy. It was the publisher himself who received him; not the manager, not the secretary, nor any one like that, but the real person, the one who had the overdraft at the Bank.

He treated Mr. Charles Foley so well that Mr. Foley tasted a new joy which was the joy of sincere praise received. He was in the liberal arts now. He had come into a second world. His mere wealth had never given him this. When the publisher had heard what Mr. Charles Foley had to say, he scratched the tip of his nose with his forefinger, and suggested that Mr. Foley should pay for the printing and the binding of the book, and that then the publisher should advertise it and sell it, and give Mr. Foley so much.

But Mr. Foley would have none of this. He was a business man and he could see through a brick wall as well as any one. So the publisher made this suggestion and that suggestion and talked all round about it. He was evidently keen to have the book. Mr. Foley could see that. At last the publisher made what Mr. Foley thought for the first time a sound business proposition, which was that he should publish the book in the ordinary way and then that he and Mr. Foley should share and share alike. If there was a loss they would divide it, but if there was a profit they would divide that. Mr. Foley was glad that he came to a sensible business decision at last, and closed with him. The date of publication also was agreed upon: it was to be the 15th of April. "In order," said the publisher, "that we may catch the London season." Mr. Charles Foley suggested August, but the publisher assured him that August was a rotten time for books.

Only the very next day Mr. Foley entered upon the responsibilities which are inseparable from the joys of an author. He received a letter from the publisher, saying that it seemed that another book had been written under the title "Man and Nature," that he dared not publish under that title lest the publishers of the other volume should apply for an injunction.

Mr. Foley suffered acutely. He left his breakfast half finished; ran into town in his motor, as agonized in every block of the traffic as though he had to catch a train; was kept waiting half an hour in the publisher's office because the principal had not yet arrived, and, when he did arrive, was persuaded that there was nothing to be done. The Courts wouldn't allow "Man and Nature," the publisher was sure of that. He kept on shaking his great big silly head until it got on Mr. Foley's nerves. But there was no way out of it, so Mr. Foley changed the title to "ART AND ENVIRONMENT"--it was the publisher's secretary who suggested this new title.

He got home to luncheon, to which he now remembered he had asked a friend--a man who played golf. Mr. Foley did not want to make a fool of himself, so he led up very cautiously at luncheon to his great question, which was this: "How does the title 'Art and Environment' sound?" He had a friend, he said, who wanted to know. On hearing this Mr. Foley's golfing friend gave a loud guffaw, and said it _sounded_ all right; so did the _Origin of Species_. It would come out about the same time, and then he spent three or four minutes trying to remember who the old johnny was who wrote it, but Mr. Foley was already at the telephone in the hall. He was not happy; he had rung up the publisher. The publisher was at luncheon. Mr. Foley damned the publisher. Could he speak to the manager? To the secretary? To one of the clerks? To the little dog? In his anger he was pleased to be facetious. He heard the manager's voice:

"Yes, is that Mr. Foley?"

"Yes, about that title."

"Oh, yes, I thought you'ld ring up. It's impossible, you know, it's been used before; and there's no doubt at all that the University printers would apply for an injunction."

"Well, I can't wait," shouted Mr. Foley into the receiver.

"You can't what?" said the manager. "I can't hear you, you are talking too loud."

"I can't wait," said Mr. Foley in a lower tone and strenuously. "Suggest something quick."

The manager could be heard thinking at the end of the live wire. At last he said, "Oh, anything." Mr. Foley used a horrible word and put back the receiver.

He went back to his golfing friend who was drinking some port steadily with cheese, and said: "Look here, that friend of mine I have just been telephoning to says he wants another title."

"What for?" said the golfing friend, his mouth full of cheese.

"Oh, for his book of course," said Mr. Foley sharply.

"Sorry, I thought it was politics," answered his friend, his mouth rather less full. Then a bright thought struck him.

"What's the book about?"

"Well, it's about art and ... climate, you know."

"Why, then," said the friend stolidly, "why not call it 'Art and Climate'?"

"That's a good idea," said Mr. Foley, stroking his chin.

He hurried indecently, turned the poor golfing friend out, hurried up to town in his motor in order to make them call the book "Art and Climate." When he got there he found the real publisher, who hummed and hawed and said: "All this changing of titles will be very expensive, you know." Mr. Foley could not help that, it had to be done, so the book was called "Art and Climate," and then it was printed, and seventy copies were sent out to the Press and it was reviewed by three papers.

One of the papers said:

"Mr. Charles Foley has written an interesting essay upon the effect of climate upon art, upon such conditions as will affect it whether adversely or the contrary. The point of view is an original one and gives food for thought."

Mr. Foley thought this notice quite too short and imperfect.

The second paper had a column about it, nearly all of which was made out of bits cut right out of the book, but without acknowledgment or in inverted commas. In between the bits cut out there were phrases like, "Are we however to believe that ..." and "Some in this connection would decide that...." But all the rest were bits cut out of his book.

The third review was in _The Times_, and in very small type between brackets. All it did was to give a list of the chapters and a sentence out of the preface.

Mr. Foley sold thirty copies of his book, gave away seventy-four and lent two. The publisher assured him that books like that did not have a large immediate sale as a novel did; they had a slow, steady sale.