There are numberless people who are, doubtless, of much interest and
charm--in their proper context. That context we feel, however, is not our
society. We have no objection to their carrying on the business of human
beings, so long as they allow us an uninterrupted trading of, say, a
hundred miles. Within that charmed and charming circle they should not set
foot, and we are quite willing in addition, for them, to gird themselves
about with the circumference of another thousand. It is not that they are
disagreeable or stupid, or in any way obviously objectionable. Bores are
more frequently clever than dull, and the only all-round definition of a
bore is--The Person We Don't Want. Few people are bores at all times and
places, and indeed one might venture on the charitable axiom: that when
people bore us we are pretty sure to be boring them at the same time. The
bore, to attempt a further definition, is simply a fellow human being out
of his element. It is said by travellers from distant lands that fishes
will not live out of water. It is a no less familiar fact that certain
dull metals need to be placed in oxygen to show off their brilliant parts.
So is it with the bore: set him in the oxygen of his native admiration,
and he will scintillate like a human St. Catherine wheel, though in your
society he was not even a Chinese cracker. Every man needs his own stage
and his own audience.
'Hath not love
Made for all these their sweet particular air
To shine in, their own beams and names to bear,
Their ways to wander and their wards to keep,
Till story and song and glory and all things sleep.'
Mr. Swinburne asked the question of lovers, but perhaps it is none the
less applicable to the bore or irrelevant person. Yet a third definition
of the latter here suggests itself. To be born for each other is,
obviously, to be lovers. Well, not to be born for each other is to be
bores. In future, let us not speak unkindly of the tame bore, let us
say--'We were not born for each other.'
Relations do not, perhaps, invariably suggest the first line of
'Endymion'; indeed, they are, one fears, but infrequently celebrated in
song. But the same word in the singular, how beautiful it is! Relation! In
that little word is the whole secret of life. To get oneself placed in
perfect harmony of relation with the world around us, to have nothing in
our lives that we wouldn't buy, to possess nothing that is not sensitive
to us, ready to ring a fairy chime of association at our slightest touch:
no irrelevant book, picture, acquaintance, or activity--ah me! you may
well say it is an ideal. Yes, it is what men have meant by El Dorado, The
Promised Land, and all such shy haunts of the Beatific Vision. Probably
the quest of the Philosopher's Stone is not more wild. Yet men still seek
that precious substitute for Midas. Brave spirits! Unconquerable
idealists! Salt of the earth!
But if it be admitted that the quest of the Perfect Relation (in two
senses) is hopeless, yet there is no reason why we should not approach as
near to it as we can.
We can at least begin by barring the irrelevant person--in other words,
choosing our own acquaintance. Of course, we have no entire free-will in
so important a matter. Free-will is like the proverbial policeman, never
there when most wanted. There are two classes of more or less irrelevant
persons that cannot be entirely avoided: our blood-relations, and our
business-relations--both often so pathetically distinct from our
heart-relations and our brain-relations. Well, our business-relations need
not trouble us over much. They are not, as the vermin-killer advertisement
has it, 'pests of the household.' They come out only during business
hours. The curse of the blood-relation, however, is that he infests your
leisure moments; and you must notice the pathos of that verbal
distinction: man measures his toil by 'hours' (office-hours), his leisure
by 'moments!'
But let not the reader mistake me for a Nero. The claims of a certain
degree of blood-relationship I not only admit, but welcome as a sacred
joy. Their experience is unhappy for whom the bonds of parentage, of
sisterhood and brotherhood, will not always have a sort of involuntary
religion. If a man should not exactly be tied to his mother's
apron-string, he should all his life remain tied to her by that other
mysterious cord which no knife can sever. Uncles and aunts may, under
certain circumstances, be regarded as sacred, and meet for occasional
burnt-offerings; but beyond them I hold that the knot of
blood-relationship may be regarded as Gordian, and ruthlessly cut. Cousins
have no claims. Indeed, the scale of the legacy duties, like few
legalities, follows the natural law. The further removed, the greater tax
should our blood-relations pay for our love, or our legacy; but the
heart-relation, the brain-relation ('the stranger in blood'), he alone
should go untaxed altogether! Alas, the Inland Revenue Commissioners would
charge him more than any, which shows that their above-mentioned touch of
nature was but a fluke, after all.
It is impossible to classify the multitude of remaining irrelevancies,
who, were one to permit them, would fall upon our leisure like locusts;
but possibly 'friends of the family,' 'friends from the country,' and
'casuals' would include the most able-bodied. Sentiment apart, old
schoolfellows should, if possible, be avoided; and no one who merely knew
us when we were babies (really a very limited elementary acquaintance) and
has mistaken us ever since should be admitted within the gates--though we
might introduce him to our own baby as the nearest match. The child is not
father to the man. It was a merely verbal paradox, which shows
Wordsworth's ignorance of humanity. Let me especially warn the reader,
particularly the newly-married reader, against the type of friend from the
country who, so soon as they learn you have set up house in London,
suddenly discovers an interest in your fortunes which, like certain
rivers, has run underground further than you can remember. They write and
tell you that they are thinking of coming to town, and would like to spend
a few days with you. They leave their London address vague. It has the
look of a blank which you are expected to fill up. You shrewdly surmise
that, so to say, they meditate paying a visit to Euston, and spending a
fortnight with you on the way. But if you are wise and subtle and strong,
you cut this acquaintance ruthlessly, as you lop a branch. Such are the
dead wood of your life. Cut it away and cast it into the oven of oblivion.
Don't fear to hurt it. These people care as little for you, as you for
them. All they want is board and lodging, and if you give in to them, you
may be an amateur hotel-keeper all your days.
Another 'word to the newly-married.' Be not over-solicitous of
wedding-presents. They carry a terrible rate of interest. A silver
toast-rack will never leave you a Bank Holiday secure, and a breakfast
service means at least a fortnight's 'change' to one or more irrelevant
persons twice a year. They have been known to stay a month on the strength
of an egg-boiler. So, be warned, I pray you. Wedding-presents are but a
form of loan, which you are expected to pay back, with compound interest
at 50 per cent., in 'hospitality,' 'entertainment,' and your still more
precious time. For the givers of wedding-presents there is no more
profitable form of investment. But you, be wise, and buy your own.
There is a peculiar joy in snubbing irrelevant would-be country visitors.
It is the sweetest exercise of the will. Especially, too, if they are
conceited persons who made sure of invitation. It adds a yet deeper thrill
to the pleasure if you are able to invite some other friends near at hand,
of humbler mind and greater interest, whose (maybe) shy charms are not
flauntingly revealed. 'Fancy So-and-So being invited! I shouldn't have
thought they had anything in common.' How sweet is the imagination of that
wounded whisper. It makes you feel like a (German) prince. You have the
power of making happy and (even better in some cases) unhappy, at least,
as Carlyle would say, 'to the extent of sixpence.'
You have tasted the sweets of choosing your own friends, and snubbing the
others. You have gone so far towards the attainment of the harmonious
environment, the Perfect Relation. Your friends shall be as carefully
selected, shall mean as much to you as your books and flowers and
pictures; and your leisure shall be a priest's garden, in which none but
the chosen may walk.
Yet, in spite of my little burst of Neroics, I am far from advising a
cruel treatment of the Irrelevant Person. Let us not forget what we said
at the beginning, that he is probably an interesting person in the wrong
place. He has taken the wrong turning--into your company. Do unto him as
you would he might do unto you. Direct him aright--that is to say, out of
it! Remember, we are all bores in certain uncongenial social climates: all
stars in our own particular milky way. So, remember, don't be cruel--as a
rule--to the Irrelevant Person; but just smile your best at him, and
whisper: 'We were not born for each other.'