Three months later the editor of the _New York Monthly Journal_
received a letter from Craighouse. Adjusting his glasses, he settled
comfortably into his chair and read it.
"MY DEAR PATRON,--I hope you have not been disappointed at my lack
of articles, but, to be candid, I have not struck the proper mental
balance yet.
"England is delightful; England is absurd. I was on a bus
yesterday, and the conductress gave the signal to go ahead by
hammering the side with the fare-box. It fascinated me.
Incidentally, the girls have wonderful complexions over here, but
they do not dress as cleverly as ours. I know you will say it is
war-time, but nothing is powerful enough to interfere with anything
so fundamental as a woman's clothes." ("A bit labored, but quite
good," muttered the editor.)
"The country, as you know, is like a garden, with all a garden's
charm and limitations. I don't feel yet that I can take a deep
breath. There are woods; but the trees seem to huddle together for
want of space, and one always feels that just the other side of the
woods there is a town or a village. England is lovely, but I feel
the lack of immensity. To me, the whole effect is that the country
is complete; there is nothing more to do. Everything that can be
built has been built." ("And well built, too," muttered Mr.
Townsend.) "In fact, I don't see what there is over here to employ
to the full the brains, the nerves, and the imagination of a
full-blooded _homo_. Again I return to the garden simile. Is
the task of maintenance big enough for the splendid specimens of
manhood that England rears?
"I feel that there is something wrong with the public-school
system. Not that it is inefficient, but rather that it is too
thorough in its results. Judging superficially, of course, it seems
that the public school ignores the fact that every one is born an
individual, and proceeds to produce a type. To use a vulgarism, it
is a high-class scholastic sausage-machine. It takes in variegated
ingredients, and turns out uniformity of product. It instructs the
youth of the land in the manly virtues of past ages, but appears to
ignore the creative instinct. Public-school men are the Greek
chorus of England's national drama; they seldom provide either the
dramatist or the principal actors.
"My biggest disappointment has been the English stage. I know our
'playsmiths' are futile enough, but we would never endure in New
York what is put on at many first-class London theaters. At a time
when her grandsons from the four corners of the world are paying,
in most cases, their first visit to the Old Country, England offers
them the spectacle of a once classic stage given over to inanity
and vulgarity. Of course, there are two or three producers who
still maintain a commendable standard of art, but in the majority
of first-class London theaters one finds a coarseness of innuendo,
an utter lack of refinement, and an almost total elimination of
humor. In their musical shows the producers still go in for the
type of comedian known on Broadway as 'hard-boiled'--the kind that
carries his own jests in a valise, and whose _pièce de résistance_
is the word 'damn,' which seldom fails to convulse the audience. If
I may coin a phrase, I would say the aim of some London producers
is 'to be vulgar without being funny.'" ("I wonder if that is
original," observed the editor.)
"I like the restraint of the better English newspapers, and there
are still five or six monthly journals that demand a high standard
of writing from their contributors. Some of the popular English
magazines, however, publish stories that would hardly pass muster
as a blushing schoolgirl's first attempt at authorship. I remember
my mother used to say to me, 'Out of nothing, nothing comes.' She
had obviously never seen one of these fiction magazines.
"Judging by the advertisements in these publications and in the
society illustrated papers, I would say that manufacturing women's
underwear, or 'undies,' as they are coyly called, is the greatest
commercial industry here. The advertisements state that an officer
can send a lady a complete set of these garments with his
regimental crest on them. I am still trying to gauge the mental
attitude of an officer who would do so.
"The political situation puzzles me. Lloyd George looks like a
mighty big man, but he has to spend most of his time dodging
snipers from behind. Nero fiddled while Rome was burning, but a
certain section of the House of Commons goes in for absolute
symphonies while Britain is locked in the death-grip with Germany.
But she's a dear old country, and her people are as brave and
cheery as in the days when she was Merrie England, and not England
of Many Sorrows.
"To hear her people talk, you would think that the Canadians and
the Australians had done all the fighting, and that the United
States was the savior of the world; but I know there's hardly a
home in England or Scotland that hasn't lost a son--and often the
last son too. And when the old families send their boys, it's right
into the trenches, not back on the lines of communication.
"There--you can see why I have not written before. Incoherency
alone is hardly sufficient. I haven't seriously sorted my
impressions as yet. As you would say, the chaos has not yet become
cosmos.
"By-the-by, the British Navy mothered us from the coast of Ireland
like an eagle with her young.
"Every one is most cordial, and invitations are showered on us from
every quarter. I'm going to-morrow to visit the Earl of
Lummersdale, who seems to want to entertain a real, live American.
As I have six days' leave, I'm going to let him. They tell me he
comes of a very old family, so look out for an article on the
aristocracy.
"This letter is rambling most aimlessly. I suppose you are bored to
tears. Just a minute, till I read over what I have written....
Yes--I might add in my comments on the English theater that a chap
named Beecham is doing opera in English, and it's pretty nearly the
finest opera I have ever heard. Then, of course, Barrie produces a
play every now and then, just to show that he hasn't lost his
genius of tenderness and whimsical charm.
"Perhaps my visit to the Earl of Lummersdale will crystallize some
of my vagrant impressions. Good-by, dear patron.--Faithfully yours,
"LAWRENCE CRAIGHOUSE (Lt.),
"c/o American Officers' Club, London.
"P.S.--We're working like beavers getting things ready for the
American Army which is coming. It looks slow, but when Uncle Sam's
men are ready, Fritz is going to enjoy a real avalanche. This, I
promise you.
"L. C."