Chapter L

SUPPOSED ORIGIN OF UNDERGROUND TACTICS.]

* * * * *

TWO "STEIN"-WAY GRANDS.

BY A PHILISTINE.

EINSTEIN and EPSTEIN were wonderful men,
Bringing new miracles into our ken.
EINSTEIN upset the Newtonian rule;
EPSTEIN demolished the Pheidian School.
EINSTEIN gave fits to the Royal Society;
EPSTEIN delighted in loud notoriety.
EINSTEIN made parallels meet in infinity;
EPSTEIN remodelled the form of Divinity.
Nature exhausted, I hopefully sing,
Can't have more Steins of this sort in her sling.

* * * * *

* * * * *

"Disputing Sergt. Alvan C. York's claim as the world war's greatest
hero, Sergt. Mike Donaldson of New York has challenged the Tennessean
to a debate on who is the greatest war hero."--_New Haven
Journal-Courier (U.S.A.)_

Without waiting for the result of this unique contest Mr. Punch has no hesitation in saying that between them these warriors are responsible for the mightiest "blow" of the War.

* * * * *

* * * * *

FROM THE DANCE WORLD.

(_By our Ballet Expert._)

_The Daily Graphic_ announces that Mr. ARNOLD BENNETT has "fallen a willing victim to the latest fashionable dances," and is having lessons in them "in the privacy of his Hanover Square home." A thousand entrancing possibilities are opened up by this bald announcement. We are content to supplement it by a few authentic details.

Mr. BENNETT, who does nothing by halves, has mapped out a programme which will occupy his energies for at least two years. First comes the period of pupilship, which will last for six months. Then a year on the stage; then six months devoted to the composition of three novels and three plays, each with a Terpsichorean motive. Already, while engaged on his daily exercises, Mr. BENNETT has found time to revise the titles of some of his earlier works in keeping with his present aims, and two of these have now been appropriately rechristened _Anna Pavlova of the Five Towns_ and _Helen of the High Kick_.

In the actual technique of his adopted art Mr. BENNETT has already shown extraordinary progress. The other day, while a wedding party was just about to leave St. George's, Hanover Square, Mr. BENNETT, who happened to be passing by, took a flying caracole clean over the Rolls-Royce which contained the happy pair. Those who witnessed the feat say that it eclipsed NIJINSKY in his most elastic mood. But Mr. BENNETT is not satisfied, and declined an invitation to appear at the Devonshire House Ball last week on the ground that his achievement does not yet square with his ambition. Moreover he has decided not to dance in public under his real name, but is not yet quite certain whether to choose the artistic pseudonym of Ben Netsky or Cinquecittà--probably the latter.

Above all he is firmly resolved to preserve in his dancing the sympathetic and humanistic tone of his presentation of life in his books. It will be a message of hope. He is determined by his gestural artistry and resilient thistle-downiness to "sanction and fortify the natural human passion for believing that life can somehow, behind all the miseries and the mysteries, mean something profoundly worth while." To render justice to his mental and physical agility is beyond our powers.

We have been driven to culling this memorable sentence from the latest and most preternaturally precious of his American admirers.

It is only fair to say that as a dancing fictionist Mr. BENNETT will not be allowed to have it entirely his own way. Rumours are already afloat of the appearance on the boards of Messrs. CHESTERTON and BELLOC, under the impressive aliases of Campoborgo and Bellocchio, "the Terrible Tarantulators." This may be only a wild surmise. There is however strong _a priori_ evidence in support of the statements that Mr. MASEFIELD is taking lessons in the Fox Trot at Boar's Hill, and that Lord Northsquith is bringing back with him from Morocco a powerful troupe of Dancing Dervishes, with the intention of installing them ultimately in Downing Street.

* * * * *

OUR LITERARY LEGISLATORS.

"AN IMPERIAL POLICY.

(By Mr. ALFRED BIGLAND, M.P.)

May I commence my argument by a well-known quotation from Shakespeare,
'He knows not England who only England knows'?"--_Liverpool Paper_.

* * * * *

"SITUATIONS OPEN.

(COLONIAL, INDIAN AND FOREIGN.)

IRELAND.--Invoice Clerk required by leading firm of Wholesale Druggists
in Ireland."--_Trade Paper._

Dominion Home Rule casts its shadow before.

* * * * *

"The decree of the Archbishop of Canterbury for the creation of a
separate Providence of Wales was read."--_Scotch Paper._

What's wrong with Mr. LLOYD GEORGE?

* * * * *

VOICE FROM AUDIENCE: "IT'S A TRICK!"

PERFORMER: "OF COURSE IT'S A TRICK! THE POINT IS THAT IT HASN'T BEEN DONE FOR YEARS AND YEARS--AND I'LL TROUBLE YOU TO APPLAUD IT."]

* * * * *

ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.

_Monday, April 12th._--Neither Ministers nor ordinary Members showed any marked eagerness to resume their Parliamentary labours. Little green oases were to be seen in every part of the House, and on the Treasury Bench even Under-Secretaries (who often have to maintain a precarious perch on one another's knees) had room to spread themselves.

The Underground Railway may, like Nature, be careless of the individual, but it is extremely careful of the typewriter, and insists on making a special charge for this instrument, officially regarded as a bicycle. But as Sir ERIC GEDDES announced that this extortion, "though legal," was in his opinion "neither just nor expedient," we may hope that it will shortly be abandoned. The Ministry of Transport at last seems likely to justify its existence.

MR. MILLS OF DARTFORD.]

Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY was annoyed to find that there has been no change during the recess in the regulations relating to passports, and that they are still not issued to Soviet Russia. The tone of the Minister's reply rather suggested that the Government might be disposed to make an exception in favour of the hon. and gallant Member.

_Tuesday, April 13th._--After the official announcement that the Slough depot had been sold, and the chorus of satisfaction in the Press that the Government had disposed of its white elephant at a profit, Mr. HOGGE was disappointed to learn that, though the heads of agreement were being discussed, no contract had yet been signed. He was indeed rather surprised that the Government should think of parting at all with what the LEADER OF THE HOUSE had assured them was going to be "a dripping roast for the taxpayer." Mr. LAW smilingly disclaimed the coinage of this appetising phrase.

Mr. MILLS, the new Member for Dartford, is credited with being "very hot stuff" (a cadet, I am told, of the _Moulin Rouge_ family), but he looked much too trim and spruce for a real revolutionary as he walked up, amid the plaudits of his Labour colleagues, to take the oath and his seat. In fact Mr. GREENWOOD, the new Coalition-Unionist Member for Stockport, who followed him, has much more the air of an _homme du peuple_. As for Mr. FILDES, his Coalition-Liberal colleague, I don't wonder that Stockport favoured a candidate whose genial countenance so strongly resembles that of Mr. Punch.

MR. FILDES OF STOCKPORT.]

The debate on the Civil Service Estimates furnished Mr. HOPKINS with an opportunity of delivering an appeal, doubtless cogent but mainly inaudible, for the restoration of the exchange value of the pound sterling. Mr. A.M. SAMUEL, on the other hand, was more audible than orthodox. At least it rather shocked me to be told that we were getting too much for the pound before the War. Mr. BALDWIN, for the Government, made a speech so full of sound commonsense that Sir FREDERICK BANBURY hoped he would send a special copy of it to San Remo for the edification of the PRIME MINISTER.

The rest of the evening was mainly taken up with the case of the Irish hunger-strikers. Mr. BONAR LAW was at first very stiff in his attitude, pointing out quite reasonably that if the Government found it necessary to intern people suspected of crime it was absurd to let them out again because they threatened to commit suicide. Several Members, English as well as Irish, thought that there was a case for differentiating between convicted prisoners and those who were merely under suspicion, and on the adjournment the Irish Attorney-General a little relieved the prevailing gloom by a hint that some modification of the prison-rules might be made on these lines.

_Wednesday, April 14th._--The MINISTER OF HEALTH announced with some pride that under the Housing Acts passed last year no fewer than 1,346 dwellings had actually been completed, and twelve thousand more were in various stages of construction. But he showed no enthusiasm for the suggestion that be should extend the benefits of the Acts to others besides the "working classes," and flatly declined to attempt a definition of that ambiguous term. It is believed, however, that recent experience has convinced him that builders in general and bricklayers in particular cannot properly be so described.

Mr. RENDALL'S attempt to get the House to pledge itself in advance to the full policy of Lord BUCKMASTER'S Divorce Bill was defeated. The main opposition came from Mr. RONALD MCNEILL, who sits for Canterbury and spoke with cathedral solemnity. Mr. MUNRO supported the Resolution, on the ground that Englishwomen ought not to be refused the advantages enjoyed by their Scotch sisters. Marriage in Scotland appears to resemble Glasgow--there are great facilities for getting away from it. But Lady ASTOR, hailing from a land where they are even greater, displayed no desire to jump to conclusions, and asked for an interval of five or ten years to make up her mind.

DR. MACNAMARA EFFECTS A LABOUR EXCHANGE.]

If the cheers that greeted Mr. MACPHERSON were meant to console him for his "Irishman's rise" in slipping down from the Chief Secretaryship to the Ministry of Pensions, they were assuredly superfluous. The supposed victim was obviously delighted to be rid of the responsibility for a policy which seems to grow more tangled every day. Only on Tuesday Mr. BONAR LAW was assuring the House that the Mountjoy hunger-strikers must be left to commit suicide if they chose; the Government could not release men suspected of grave crimes. This afternoon he announced that sixty-six of them had in fact been liberated on parole.

The new Minister of Labour (late of the Admiralty) came on board again, looking none the worse for his strenuous exertions at Camberwell. He had a hearty welcome from all quarters of the House, which would hardly know itself without its "Dr. MAC."

It is one thing to gain a seat in the House, but quite another thing to keep it, as Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS has just discovered. Returning from a prolonged tour in foreign parts he found that his favourite corner-seat had been annexed by another Member. Determined to reclaim it, he visited the House at 8 A.M. and inserted his card; but on coming back to the House for prayers found that the usurper had substituted her own. Mr. T.P. O'CONNOR, with old-world chivalry, considered that the only lady-Member should be allowed to sit where she pleased; but the SPEAKER upheld the principle "first come, first served."

On a Vote of twenty-seven millions for the expenses of the Ministry of Munitions Mr. HOPE told a flattering tale. The Department might be spending a lot of money, but it was making a great deal more; and he anticipated that the Disposals Board would hand over to the Exchequer this year something like a hundred millions, if not more. The Slough Depôt, he maintained, had been run at a profit and sold at a profit. The Ministry might have made some mistakes, but it represented a prodigious national effort, of which the historian would speak with amazement and praise.

Unimpressed by this panegyric Sir DONALD MACLEAN intimated that he came to bury the Ministry and not to praise it. In his view its administration had been grossly extravagant. He demanded the full details of the Slough transaction and suggested that the Vote should be withdrawn until they were forthcoming. To this proposal Mr. HOPE, with more humility than I should have expected after the optimism of his earlier speech, ultimately agreed.

* * * * *

_Farmer._ "NO GOOD, SIR? WHAT'S WRONG WI' 'EM?"

_Our Animal Artist._ "THEY'VE GOT NO EXPRESSION."]

* * * * *

THE LAND OF LOGIC.

Let me tell you about my Nationalist friend, Gabal Osman Effendi.

The circumstances of his brother's death, which were as follows, drove him into politics and made him a fervent advocate of "Egypt for the Egyptians."

His brother was in a very humble way and lived in a little mud village. There he had a friend, yet poorer than himself, who only attained to prosperity when a plague fell on the village. The sanitary authorities put a cordon around it to prevent the spread of the plague, and hired this man among others to throw disinfectants and things into any drains that happened to exist. Thus Osman Effendi's brother's friend became a Government servant.

Now Osman Effendi's brother had a sore leg. When he heard of his friend's new work he thought he saw a way to avoid any doctor's fees. So he went to him and said, "I hear that you are now a doctor." His friend, proud but truthful, said he was perhaps hardly that, but he was certainly put to administer drugs. Osman's brother pointed out that his leg was sore and suggested that it should be healed. The other looked doubtful, then produced a lump of his disinfectant. "This," said he, "is a powerful drug and, who knows? it may cure your leg." It was a friendly act; but Osman's brother swallowed the lump and shortly afterwards died.

Osman Effendi at once brought an action for damages against the Government, on the ground that its servant had caused the death of his brother (whom, as a matter of fact, he himself had largely supported). The case was heard by a Court on which sat two Egyptian judges and one English, and the decision went against Osman. This convinced him of the injustice of the English.

The Assize Court of Appeal, which visited the district and heard Osman Effendi's appeal against the first verdict, consisted of three Egyptian judges. It is true that the English judge who should have gone on Assize had fallen ill, and there was no other to take his place. But Osman Effendi saw in this too the malevolent hand of the English, who nourished a grudge against him. "How," he said, "can I obtain justice if there is no Englishman on the Court?"

From that moment he has become an ultra-Nationalist, and has, I believe, been seen in the streets of Cairo shouting with the best of them the latest "English" catchword of "Long Live Egypt! Long Die MILNER!"

He is, you see, an educated man.

* * * * *

* * * * *

CONSOLIDATING THE EMPIRE.

"In honour of the visit to Napier of the Prince of Wales the roof of
the Borough Council offices is to be given a coat of paint."--_New
Zealand Paper._

* * * * *

"PERSONAL.

ARTHUR.--You idiot.--Irene."--_Times._

Very "personal," we should say.

* * * * *

"Sir Auckland and Lady Geddes left London last Saturday for the Untied
States."--_Irish Paper._

It is only fair to add that they have not chosen this country for the sake of its easy Divorce Laws.

* * * * *

"Major. Christopher Lowther (CUCumberland, North) moved a new clause."
--_Provincial Paper._

It was somewhere in this neighbourhood, we believe, that WORDSWORTH discovered his "winsome marrow."

* * * * *

"Though to-day is Primrose Day...."--_Daily Mirror, April 12th._

At the risk of being thought behind the times, we ourselves deferred our celebration until April 19th as usual.

* * * * *

* * * * *

AT THE PLAY.

"BIRDS OF A FEATHER."

It is nearly always a good thing for the author of a play to know what he is after, and if he can get his audience to follow him so much the better. It is quite possible that Mr. ESMOND had an idea in his head when he wrote _Birds of a Feather_, but if so he never let me get at it. Up to the very end I had no conception of what he was trying to illustrate, unless it was the trite theory that we are the creatures of our environment.

That, at any rate, was how _Constance_ (of "the House of _Ussher_") explained her vagaries, though I couldn't see why. The daughter of a very rich Jew, whose Christian wife had run away from him, she was brought up in great comfort, which included the love of a peer's son, her father's secretary. It is true that her stern parent would not hear of their union; but that has no doubt happened to young heiresses before now without turning them into criminals. With _Constance_ however it seems to have been different. She had gathered from what she knew of her father's career that there must be easy ways of making money if you are not too scrupulous, so she forged his name for a thousand pounds with speculative intent. It was open to the old man to regard this as an act of filial piety, since it was an attempt, however crude, to follow the parental tradition; but apparently forgery had not been one of his foibles and he threatened her with the law unless she gave up the idea of marrying the secretary, now dismissed from his service.

Meanwhile she has been carrying on a secret intrigue with that gentleman (she must have got this from her "Christian" mother), and when her father comes to know of it he suddenly exhibits an unsuspected gift of sentimentality ("My baby Con! my baby Con!" he sobs), and, in terror lest his ewe-lamb's name should be tainted by the breath of scandal, he offers his late secretary a heavy sum of money to make an honest woman of her. It sounds a little inconsistent, but of course there may have been a nice differentiation in the old rogue's mind between a moral and a criminal offence, in favour of the latter.

As for _Constance_ I have seldom met a less seizable character. If she was the result of environment there was no visible sign to show how it infected her. We simply had to take Mr. ESMOND'S word for it. To me the ménage seemed to be of the most respectable. But, of course, you can always attribute anything to your surroundings. One environment is vicious and so drives you to vice; another is virtuous with the same effect. _Constance_ might condemn hers, but it never had a chance with a girl like that.

For myself it was not her viciousness that worried me, it was her vulgarity; and of this she seemed quite unconscious. Her speech abounded in second-rate colloquialisms. Was it her environment that taught her to say dreadful things like "Put that in your pipe and smoke it"? The cheap fun that she got out of a girl-friend who had made it a rule to pray for her was the kind of thing you would be sorry to find in a common boarding-school. And are gentlefolk in the habit of asking a man, as _Constance_ did, how it was that he ever came to get engaged to such a woman as the one of his choice? In Bayswater it simply isn't done.

At the end of the First Act, after many trivialities and the waste of precious time over a description of certain characters that were presently to appear and endorse it, there was a sudden diversion. The professional card of a private detective was discovered in an arm-chair. No one seemed to know how it got there, and, as the curtain chose this moment to fall, we were left in a state of palpitation, wondering how we were to get through the interval with our curiosity unappeased. Ultimately it turned out that the detective was to be employed by _Miss Ussher_ (aunt) to verify her suspicions with regard to the morals of _Constance_. But I shall never get you to believe me when I say that the subject was not so much as touched again till the final Act.

I have spoken of the incongruous stuff of which old _Jacob Ussher's_ heart was constructed. That strange organ was hard enough to make him give his daughter away to his secretary in the matter of the forgery; but when it came to a question of the exposure of her relations with her lover this same heart was found to be of the consistency of putty.

I hope I shall not seem guilty of _Constance's_ indiscretion if I politely wonder how it was that so astute a judge as Miss MARIE LÖHR accepted this play. Actor-managers, of course, have been known to produce indifferent work for the sake of a good acting part for themselves. If that was her motive I think she must have imagined a fine subtlety in a character which was difficult only because it was loosely conceived. If she failed to make it plausible it was not for want of very adroit handling.

In _Jacob Ussher_ Mr. ESMOND gave himself a most congenial part, in which he easily surpassed his achievement as author. Mr. TOZER as a slum-parson was extremely probable with his quiet sincerity. But our chief consolation came from Miss RACHEL DE SOLLA as the maiden aunt, a reactionary type of the most confirmed stolidity, with a weakness for diamonds and indigestion. Miss MARIE LÖHR had many clever things to say, but it didn't matter what Miss DE SOLLA said; her manner was irresistible.

I must doubt, however, whether the excellent work of the actors will carry the play to success. Even its title is obscure. The only thing I know about "birds of a feather" is that they are supposed to "flock together"; and I have always been given to understand that the adage alludes to the mutual attraction of similar types. Nobody ever told me that it was meant to indicate that the sins of the father bird are liable to be reproduced in his chicken,

ANNA PAVLOVA.

She hasn't changed at all. Many Russian dancers have come and gone since last she was with us, but there is still none like her, none. Her perfect technique remains the least of her graces. The secret of her charm lies deeper, in the power to interpret and convey emotions in the language of her art. To watch her feet alone is to hear the shuddering sigh of her Dying Swan, but her whole body is alert to translate every nuance of her theme.

She can draw beauty even from an anticlimax. Again and again in _Snowflakes_, when her partner withdrew the support of his hand, she poised for a moment, and, when the poise had to cease, covered her descent with the most fascinating gestures of head and arms.

I liked her least (if one may talk of her like that) as the gipsy-girl in _Amarilla_; not that she failed in dramatic intensity but that jealous passion seems alien to her temperament as we have learned to know it. I think, however, that my judgment was tainted by her wig, which greatly distressed me.

In M. VOLININE she has a very accomplished partner. His solo as a _Pierrot_, danced to a familiar air of DVORÁK'S, was the most delightful of "_divertissements_." Her other dancers, Russian and English, make up a really excellent company. The _presto furioso_ of the wild gipsy dance in _Amarilla_, to the exciting music of GLOZOUNOW and DRIGO, was a brilliant _tour de force_.

My only complaint (apart from _Amarilla's_ wig) is that the programme's explanation of the motive of _Snowflakes_ was beyond me. "A little girl," it says, "receives as a present a nut-cracker in the form of a doll. The doll is in reality a Prince who has been transformed by a bad fairy, but by an act of devotion to the little girl he is restored to life. He then leads his little friend and other children to the Kingdom of Pine-trees where the Christmas-tree was born." It is true that the music was from TSCHAIKOWSKI'S "Casse-Noisettes," and that the snow-scene was suggestive of Christmas-time; but there was no sign of a "nut-cracker in the form of a doll," or, if there was, I can't think how it escaped me, for I was watching with all my eyes.

O.S.

* * * * *

_Schoolboy_ (_after long pause_). "I SAY--ER--CAN YOU MOVE YOUR EARS?"]

* * * * *

"Chaplain-Master Wanted on May 13th for one term to Teach Latin and
History in Upper School, coloris paribus a cricketer would be most
acceptable."--_Provincial Paper._

"_Coloris paribus_" suggests faintly that the authorities hope to get a double-blue; but it looks as if he would have to spend most of the term in teaching Latin.

* * * * *

BIRD CALLS.