The most interesting column in any paper (always excepting those
which I write myself) is that entitled "The World's Press,"
wherein one may observe the world as it appears to a press of
which one has for the most part never heard. It is in this column
that I have just made the acquaintance of The Shoe Manufacturers'
Monthly, the journal to which the elect turn eagerly upon each
new moon. (Its one-time rival, The Footwear Fortnightly, has, I
am told, quite lost its following.) The bon mot of the current
number of The S.M.M. is a note to the effect that Kaffirs have a
special fondness for boots which make a noise. I quote this
simply as an excuse for referring to the old problem of the
squeaky boots and the squeaky collar; the problem, in fact, of
the unfairness of things.
The majors and clubmen who assist their country with columns of
advice on clothes have often tried to explain why a collar
squeaks, but have never done so to the satisfaction of any man of
intelligence. They say that the collar is too large or too small,
too dirty or too clean. They say that if you have your collars
made for you (like a gentleman) you will be all right, but that
if you buy the cheap, ready-made article, what can you expect?
They say that a little soap on the outside of the shirt, or a
little something on the inside of something else, that this,
that, and the other will abate the nuisance. They are quite
wrong.
The simple truth, and everybody knows it really, is that collars
squeak for some people and not for others. A squeaky collar round
the neck of a man is a comment, not upon the collar, but upon the
man. That man is unlucky. Things are against him. Nature may have
done all for him that she could, have given him a handsome
outside and a noble inside, but the world of inanimate objects is
against him.
We all know the man whom children or dogs love instinctively. It
is a rare gift to be able to inspire this affection. The Fates
have been kind to him. But to inspire the affection of inanimate
things is something greater. The man to whom a collar or a window
sash takes instinctively is a man who may truly be said to have
luck on his side. Consider him for a moment. His collar never
squeaks; his clothes take a delight in fitting him. At a dinner-
party he walks as by instinct straight to his seat, what time you
and I are dragging our partners round and round the table in
search of our cards. The windows of taxicabs open to him easily.
When he travels by train his luggage works its way to the front
of the van and is the first to jump out at Paddington. String
hastens to undo itself when he approaches; he is the only man who
can make a decent impression with sealing-wax. If he is asked by
the hostess in a crowded drawing-room to ring the bell, that bell
comes out from behind the sofa where it hid from us and places
itself in a convenient spot before his eyes. Asparagus stiffens
itself at sight of him, macaroni winds itself round his fork.
You will observe that I am not describing just the ordinary lucky
man. He may lose thousands on the Stock Exchange; he may be
jilted; whenever he goes to the Oval to see Hobbs, Hobbs may be
out first ball; he may invariably get mixed up in railway
accidents. That is a kind of ill-luck which one can bear, not
indeed without grumbling, but without rancour. The man who is
unlucky to experience these things at least has the consolation
of other people's sympathy; but the man who is the butt of
inanimate things has no one's sympathy. We may be on a motor bus
which overturns and nobody will say that it is our fault, but if
our collar deliberately and maliciously squeaks, everybody will
say that we ought to buy better collars; if our dinner cards hide
from us, or the string of our parcel works itself into knots, we
are called clumsy; our asparagus and macaroni give us a
reputation for bad manners; our luggage gets us a name for
dilatoriness.
I think we, we others, have a right to complain. However lucky we
may be in other ways, if we have not this luck of inanimate
things we have a right to complain. It is pleasant, I admit, to
win £500 on the Stock Exchange by a stroke of sheer good fortune,
but even in the blue of this there is a cloud, for the next £500
that we win by a stroke of shrewd business will certainly be put
down to luck. Luck is given the credit of all our successes, but
the other man is given the credit of all his luck. That is why we
have a right to complain.
I do not know why things should conspire against a man. Perhaps
there is some justice in it. It is possible--nay, probable--that
the man whom things love is hated by animals and children--even
by his fellow-men. Certainly he is hated by me. Indeed, the more
I think of him, the more I see that he is not a nice man in any
way. The gods have neglected him; he has no good qualities. He is
a worm. No wonder, then, that this small compensation is doled
out to him--the gift of getting on with inanimate things. This
gives him (with the unthinking) a certain reputation for
readiness and dexterity. If ever you meet a man with such a
reputation, you will know what he really is.
Circumstances connected with the hour at which I rose this
morning ordained that I should write this article in a dressing-
gown. I shall now put on a collar. I hope it will squeak.