sort--though to say so sounds absurd, for one would imagine that
gluttony should be proper to Inns. And so it is, when it is your true
gluttony of old, the gluttony of our fathers made famous in English
letters by the song which begins:
I am not a glutton
But I do like pie.
But evil gluttony, which may also be called the gluttony of devils,
is another matter. It flies to liquor as to a drug; it is ashamed of
itself; it swallows a glass behind a screen and hides. There is no
companionship with it. It is an abomination, and this abomination has
the power to destroy a Christian Inn and to substitute for it, first a
gin-palace, and then, in reaction against that, the very horrible house
where they sell only tea and coffee and bubbly waters that bite and
sting both in the mouth and in the stomach. These places are hotbeds of
despair, and suicides have passed their last hours on earth consuming
slops therein alone.
Thus, again, a sad enemy of Inns is luxury. The rich will have their
special habitations in a town so cut off from ordinary human beings
that no Inn may be built in their neighbourhood. In which connection I
greatly praise that little colony of the rich which is settled on the
western side of Berkeley Square, in Lansdowne House, and all around
the eastern parts of Charles Street, for they have permitted to be
established in their midst the "Running Footman," and this will count
in the scale when their detestable vices are weighed upon the Day of
Judgment, upon which day, you must know, vices are not put into the
scale gently and carefully so as to give you fair measure, but are
banged down with enormous force by strong and maleficent demons.
Then, again, a very subtle enemy of Inns is poverty, when it is pushed
to inhuman limits, and you will note especially in the dreadful
great towns of the North, more than one ancient house which was
once honourable and where Mr. Pickwick might very well have stayed,
now turned ramshackle and dilapidated and abandoned, slattern,
draggle-tail, a blotch, until the yet beastlier reformers come and pull
it down to make an open space wherein the stunted children may play.
Thus, again, you will have the pulling down of an Inn and the setting
up of an Hotel built of iron and mud, or ferro-concrete. This is
murder.
Let me not be misunderstood. Many an honest Inn calls itself an hotel.
I have no quarrel with that, nor has any traveller I think. It is a
title. Some few blighted and accursed hotels call themselves "Inns"--a
foul snobbism, a nasty trick of words pretending to create realities.
No, it is when the thing is really done, not when the name is changed
that murder calls out to God for vengeance.
I knew an Inn in South England, when I was a boy, that stood on
the fringe of a larch wood, upon a great high road. Here when the
springtime came and I went off to see the world I used to meet with
carters and with travelling men, also keepers and men who bred horses
and sold them, and sometimes with sailors padding the hoof between port
and port. These men would tell me a thousand things. The larch trees
were pleasant in their new colour; the woods alive with birds and the
great high road was, in those days, deserted: for high bicycles were
very rare, low bicycles were not invented, the rich went by train
in those days; only carts and caravans and men with horses used the
leisurely surface of the way.
Now that good Inn has gone. I was in it some five years ago, marvelling
that it had changed so little, though motor things and money-changers
went howling by in a stream and though there were now no poachers
or gipsies or forestmen to speak to, when a too smart young man
came in with two assistants and they began measuring, calculating,
two-foot-ruling and jotting. This was the plot. Next came the deed. For
in another year, when the Spring burst and I passed by, what should I
see in the place of my Inn, my Inn of youth, my Inn of memories, my Inn
of trees, but a damnable stack of iron with men fitting a thin shell
of bricks to it like a skin. Next year the monster was alive and made.
The old name (call it the Jolly) was flaunting on a vulgar signboard
swing in cast-iron tracing to imitate forged work. The shell of bricks
was cast with sham white as for half-timber work. The sham-white was
patterned with sham timbers of baltic deal, stained dark, with pins of
wood stuck in: like Cheshire, not like home. Wrong lattice insulted
the windows--and inside there were three bars. At the door stood an
Evil Spirit, and within every room upstairs and down other devils, his
servants, resided.
It is no light thing that such things should be done and that we cannot
prevent them.
From the towns all Inns have been driven: from the villages most. No
conscious efforts, no Bond Street nastiness of false conservation,
will save the beloved roofs. Change your hearts or you will lose your
Inns and you will deserve to have lost them. But when you have lost
your Inns drown your empty selves, for you will have lost the last of
England.
VIII
ON ROWS
THE HON. MEMBER: _Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker! Is the Hon. Member
in order in calling me an insolent swine?_
(_See Hansard passim_)
A distinguished literary man has composed and perhaps will shortly
publish a valuable poem the refrain of which is "I like the sound of
broken glass."
This concrete instance admirably illustrates one of the most profound
of human appetites: indeed, an appetite which, to the male half of
humanity, is more than an appetite and is, rather, a necessity: the
appetite for rows.
It has been remarked by authorities so distant and distinct, yet each
so commanding, as Aristotle and Confucius, that words lose their
meanings in the decline of a State.
Absolutely purposeless phrases go the rounds, are mechanically
repeated; sometimes there is an attempt by the less lively citizens
to _act_ upon such phrases when Society is diseased! And so to-day
you have the suburban fool who denounces the row. Sometimes he calls
it ungentlemanly--that is, unsuitable to the wealthy male. If he says
_that_ he simply cannot know what he is talking about.
If there is one class in the community which has made more rows than
another it is the young male of the wealthier classes, from Alcibiades
to my Lord Tit-up. When men are well fed, good-natured, fairly innocent
(as are our youth) then rows are their meat and drink. Nay, the younger
males of the gentry have such a craving and necessity for a row that
they may be observed at the universities of this country making rows
continually without any sort of object or goal attached to such rows.
Sometimes he does not call it ungentlemanly, but points out that a row
is of no effect, by which he means that there is no money in it. That
is true, neither is there money in drinking, or breathing, or sleeping,
but they are all very necessary things. Sometimes the row is denounced
by the suburban gentleman as unchristian; but that is because he knows
nothing about human history or the Faith, and plasters the phrase down
as a label without consideration. The whole history of Christendom is
one great row. From time to time the Christians would leap up and swarm
like bees, making the most hideous noise and pouring out by millions to
whang in their Christianity for as long as it could be borne upon the
vile persons of the infidel. More commonly the Christians would vent
their happy rage one against the other.
The row is better fun when it is played according to rule: it sounds
paradoxical, and your superficial man might conceive that the essence
of a row was anarchy. If he did he would be quite wrong; a row being
a male thing at once demands all sorts of rules and complications.
Otherwise it would be no fun. Take, for instance, the oldest and most
solid of our national rows--the House of Commons row. Everybody knows
how it is done and everybody surely knows that very special rules are
observed. For instance, there is the word "traitor." That is in order.
It was decided long ago, when Mr. Joseph Chamberlain, of Birmingham,
called Mr. Dillon a traitor. But I have heard with my own ears the word
"party-hack" ruled out. It is not allowed.
By a very interesting decision of the Chair, pointing is ruled out
also. If a member of the House suddenly thrusts out his arm with a long
forefinger at the end of it and directs this instrument towards some
other member, the Chair has decided the gesture to be out of order. It
is, as another member of the Chamberlain family has said, "No class."
Throwing things is absolutely barred. Nor may you now imitate the noise
of animals in the chamber itself. This last is a recent decision, or
rather it is an example of an old practice falling into desuetude.
The last time a characteristic animal cry was heard in the House of
Commons was when a very distinguished lawyer, later Lord Chief Justice
of England, gave an excellent rendering of a cock-crow behind the
Speaker's chair during a difference of opinion upon the matter of Home
Rule--but this was more than twenty years ago.
It is a curious thing that Englishmen no longer sing during their rows.
The fine song about the House of Lords which had a curse in it and was
sung some months ago by two drunken men in Pall Mall to the lasting
pleasure of the clubs, would come in very well at this juncture; or
that other old political song now forgotten, the chorus of which is (if
my memory serves me), "Bow wow wow!"
No one has seized the appetite for a row more fully than the ladies
who demand the suffrage. The "disgraceful scenes" and "unwomanly
conduct" which we have all heard officially denounced, were certainly
odd, proceeding as they did from great groups of middle-class women
as unsuited to exercises of this sort as a cow would be to following
hounds, but there is no doubt that the men enjoyed it hugely. It had
all the fun of a good football scrimmage about it, except when they
scratched. And to their honour be it said they did not stab with those
murderous long pins about which the Americans make so many jokes.
Before leaving this fascinating subject of rows, we will draw up
for the warning of the reader a list of those to whom rows are
abhorrent. Luckily they are few. Money-lenders dislike rows; political
wire-pullers dislike rows; very tired men recovering from fevers must
be put in the same category, and, finally, oddly enough, newspaper
proprietors.
Why on earth this last little band--there are not a couple of dozen
of them that count in the country--should have such a feature in
common, Heaven only knows, but they most undoubtedly have; and they
compel their unfortunate employees to write on the subject of rows
most amazing and incomprehensible nonsense. There is no accounting for
tastes!
IX
THE PLEASANT PLACE
A gentleman of my acquaintance came to me the other day for
sympathy.... But first I must describe him:--
He is a man of careful, not neat, dress: I would call it sober rather
than neat. He is always clean-shaven and his scanty hair is kept
short-cut. He is occupied in letters; he is, to put it bluntly, a
litteratoor; none the less he is possessed of scholarship and is a
minor authority upon English pottery.
He is a very good writer of verse; he is not exactly a poet, but still,
his verse is remarkable. Two of his pieces have been publicly praised
by political peers and at least half a dozen of them have been praised
in private by the ladies of that world. He is a man fifty-four years of
age, and, if I may say so without betraying him, a little disappointed.
He came to me, I say, for sympathy. I was sitting in my study watching
the pouring rain falling upon the already soaked and drenched and
drowned clay lands of my county. The leafless trees (which are in
our part of a low but thick sort) were standing against a dead grey
sky with a sort of ghost of movement in it, when he came in, opened
his umbrella carefully so that it might not drip, and left it in the
stone-floored passage--which is, to be accurate, six hundred years
old--kicked off his galoshes and begged my hospitality; also (let me
say it for the third time) my sympathy.
He said he had suffered greatly and that he desired to tell me the
whole tale. I was very willing, and his tale was this:
It seems that my friend (according to his account) found himself
recently in a country of a very delightful character.
This country lay up and heavenly upon a sort of table-land. One went up
a road which led continually higher and higher through the ravines of
the mountains, until, passing through a natural gate of rock, one saw
before one a wide plain bounded upon the further side by the highest
crests of the range. Through this upland plain ran a broad and noble
river whose reaches he could see in glimpses for miles, and upon the
further bank of it in a direction opposite that which the gate of rock
regarded, was a very delightful city.
The walls of this city were old in their texture, venerable and
majestic in their lines. Within their circumference could be discerned
sacred buildings of a similar antiquity, but also modern and convenient
houses of a kind which my friend had not come across before, but which
were evidently suited to the genial, sunlit climate, as also to the
habits of leisured men. Their roofs were flat, covered in places by
awnings, in other places by tiled verandas, and these roofs were often
disposed in the form of little gardens.
Trees were numerous in the city and showed their tops above the lower
buildings, while the lines of their foliage indicated the direction of
the streets.
My friend was passing down the road which led to this plain--and as it
descended it took on an ampler and more majestic character--when he
came upon a traveller who appeared to be walking in the direction of
the town.
This traveller asked him courteously in the English tongue whether he
were bound for the city. My friend was constrained to reply that he
could not pretend to any definite plan, but certainly the prospect all
round him was so pleasant and the aspect of the town so inviting, that
he would rather visit the capital of this delightful land at once than
linger in its outskirts.
"Come with me, then," said the Traveller, "and if I may make so bold
upon so short an acquaintance, accept my hospitality. I have a good
house upon the wall of the town and my rank among the citizens of it is
that of a merchant;--I am glad to say a prosperous one."
He spoke without affectation and with so much kindness, that my friend
was ravished to discover such a companion, and they proceeded in
leisurely company over the few miles that separated them from their
goal.
The road was now paved in every part with small square slabs, quite
smooth and apparently constructed of some sort of marble. Upon either
side there ran canalised in the shining stone a little stream of
perfectly clear water. From time to time they would pass a lovely
shrine or statue which the country people had adorned with garlands. As
they approached the city they discovered a noble bridge in the manner,
my friend believed, of the Italian Renaissance, with strong elliptical
arches and built, like all the rest of the way, of marble, while the
balustrade upon either side of it was so disposed in short symmetrical
columns as to be particularly grateful to the eye. Over this bridge
there went to and fro a great concourse of people, all smiling, eager,
happy and busy, largely acquainted, apparently, each with the others,
nodding, exchanging news, and in a word forming a most blessed company.
As they entered the city my friend's companion, who had talked of many
things upon their way and had seemed to unite the most perfect courtesy
and modesty with the widest knowledge, asked him whether there was any
food or drink to which he was particularly attached.
"For," said he, "I make a point whenever I entertain a guest--and
that," he put in with a laugh, "is, I am glad to say, a thing that
happens frequently--I make a point, I say, of asking him what he really
prefers. It makes such a difference!"
My friend began his reply with those conventional phrases to which we
are all accustomed, "That he would be only too happy to take whatever
was set before him," "That the prospect of his hospitality was a
sufficient guarantee of his satisfaction," and so forth: but his host
would take no denial.
"No, no!" said he. "Do please say just what you prefer! It is so
easy to arrange--if you only knew!... Come, I know the place better
than you," he added, smiling again; "you have no conception of
its resources. Pray tell me quite simply before we leave this
street"--for they were now in a street of sumptuous and well-appointed
shops--"exactly what shall be commissioned."
Moved by I know not what freedom of expression, and expansive in a
degree which he had never yet known, my friend smiled back and said:
"Well, to tell you the truth, some such meal as this would appeal
to me: First two dozen green-bearded oysters of the Arcachon kind,
opened upon the _deep_ shell with all their juices preserved, and each
exquisitely cleaned. These set upon pounded ice and served in that
sort of dish which is contrived for _each_ oyster to repose in its own
little recess with a sort of side arrangement for the reception of the
empty shells."
His host nodded gravely, as one who takes in all that is said to him.
"Next," said my friend, in an enthusiastic manner, "real and good
Russian caviar, cold but not frozen, and so touched with lemon--only
just so touched--as to be perfect. With this I think a little of
the wine called Barsac should be drunk, and that cooled to about
thirty-eight degrees--(Fahrenheit). After this a True Bouillon, and by
a True Bouillon," said my friend with earnestness, "I mean a Bouillon
that has long simmered in the pot and has been properly skimmed, and
has been seasoned not only with the customary herbs but also with a
suspicion of carrot and of onion, and a mere breath of tarragon."
"Right!" said his host. "Right!" nodding with real appreciation.
"And next," said my friend, halting in the street to continue his list,
"I think there should be eggs."
"Right," said his host once more approvingly; "and shall we say----"
"No," interrupted my friend eagerly, "let me speak. Eggs _sur-le-plat_,
frizzled to the exact degree."
"Just what I was about to suggest," answered his delighted entertainer,
"and black pepper, I hope, ground large upon them in fresh granules
from a proper wooden mill."
"Yes! Yes!" said my friend, now lyric, "and with _sea_ salt in large
crystals."
On saying which both of them fell into a sort of ecstasy which my
friend broke by adding:
"Something quite light to follow ... preferably a sugar-cured Ham
braised in white wine. Then, I think, spinach, not with the ham but
after it; and that spinach cooked perfectly dry. We will conclude with
some of the cheese called Brie. And for wine during all these latter
courses we will drink the wine of Chinon: Chinon Grillé. What they
call," he added slyly, "the _Fausse maigre_; for it is a wine thin at
sight but full in the drinking of it."
"Good! Excellent!" said his host, clapping his hands together once with
a gesture of finality. "And then after the lot you shall have coffee."
"Yes, coffee roasted during the meal and ground immediately before its
concoction. And for liqueur...."
My friend was suddenly taken with a little doubt. "I dare not ask,"
said he, "for the liqueur called Aquebus? Once only did I taste it. A
monk gave it me on Christmas Eve four years ago and I think it is not
known!"
"Oh, ask for it by all means!" said his host. "Why, we know it and love
it in this place as though it were a member of the family!"
My friend could hardly believe his ears on hearing such things, and
said nothing of cigars. But to his astonishment his host, putting his
left hand on my friend's shoulder, looked him full in the face and said:
"And now shall _I_ tell you about cigars?"
"I confess they were in my mind," said my friend.
"Why then," said his host with an expression of profound happiness,
"there is a cigar in this town which is full of flavour, black in
colour, which does not bite the tongue, and which none the less
satisfies whatever tobacco does satisfy in man. When you smoke it you
really dream."
"Why," said my friend humbly, "very well then, let us mention these
cigars as the completion of our little feast."
"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.