Hang it all! They have blocked the street and are laying it with
asphalte; just in May, as usual. From early morning the quiet of my
rooms is disturbed by the noise of the work, when I go out I scramble
over heaps of rubbish, past smoking cauldrons of pitch, and when I
come home at night my cab drops me nearly a quarter of a mile away.
Moreover, one neighbouring house is being painted, and the other is
being rebuilt. I fly from falling dust and brickbats, only to run
against ladders and paint-pots. It is awful. And now my Aunt JANE is
coming up from Bath, and has invited herself to tea at my chambers.
Her rheumatism prevents her from walking more than a yard or two, she
cannot bear any noise, and the smell of paint makes her ill. She
is very rich, and could leave all she has to the poor. Accurately
speaking, that class includes me, but in my aunt's opinion it does
not. She is very suspicious, and, if I made excuses and invited her
to tea anywhere else, she would feel convinced that I was hiding some
guilty secret in my dull, quiet, respectable rooms. She is very prim,
and the mere suggestion of such a thing would alienate her from me for
ever. Why on earth can't she stop in Bath? And I shall have to go with
her to May meetings! It is impossible; I must fly. But where? She
has a horror and suspicion of all foreign nations, except perhaps the
steady, industrious Swiss. Good idea--Switzerland. But what reason can
I give for rushing off just now? Someone must send me. I have it. She
knows I try to write a little, so I will say my editor requires me to
go at once to Geneva to write a series of articles in the Jardin Alpin
d'Acclimatation on Alpine botany. Botany, how respectable! Geneva,
how sedate! Makes one think at once of CALVIN and Geneva bands. These
sound rather frivolous, something like German bands, but they are not
really so, only, I believe, a sort of clerical cravat. Then I will
start off to Paris, the direct way to Geneva.
Perhaps I shall never reach Geneva. Paris will do well enough. No
streets there taken up in the Spring. No painting on the clean stone
houses. No rebuilding on the Boulevards. No aunt of mine anywhere
near. I shall escape all my troubles. I shall be able to smoke my
cigarette lazily in the pleasant courtyard of the Grand Hôtel, and try
to imagine that I see some of the people in _Trilby_--_Little Billee_,
or _Taffy_, or the _Laird_--amongst the animated, cosmopolitan crowd.
And the stately giant in the gilt chain will solemnly arrange the
newspapers in all languages, and will supply me with note-paper. I
must be careful not to write to my aunt a long description of the
Jardin Alpin d'Acclimatation de Geneve on paper stamped "Grand Hôtel,
Paris." And the attentive JOSEPH, with those long grey whiskers,
sacred to the elderly French waiter and the elderly French lawyer,
will exclaim, "_V'là, M'sieu!_" in all those varied tones which make
the two syllables mean "Yessir!" "Coming, Sir!" "Here is your coffee,
Sir!" "In a minute, Sir!" and so many things besides. And I shall be
able to watch, assembled from all parts of the world, some younger
and prettier faces than my Aunt JANE'S. That settles it. A regretful
letter to my aunt. And to-morrow _en route!_
* * * * *
CHANGE OF SPELLING?--Our dramatic friend known to the public through
_Mr. Punch_ as ENRY HAUTHOR JONES appears to have recently altered the
spelling of his name. He has left the JONES and the HENRY alone, but
in the _Times_ of Friday he appears as "HENRY ARTH_E_R JONES," "U" out
of it; and what was "E" doing there?
* * * * *
PRESENTATION TO THE REV. GUINNESS ROGERS.--Last week this worthy
minister was presented by his Congregationalists with an address and a
cheque for a thousand guineas, Mr. GLADSTONE, ex-minister, being among
the subscribers. In future the _bénéficiaire_ will be remembered as
the "Reverend Thousand GUINNESS ROGERS."
* * * * *
MUSIC NOTE (_after hearing Mr. J. M. Coward's performance on the
Orchestral Harmonium_).--It would be high praise to say of any
organist that "he attacks his instrument in a Cowardly manner."
* * * * *
"VERY APPROPRIATE."--Last Wednesday the Right Hon. A. W. _PEEL_ became
a "_Skinner_."
* * * * *