Chapter V

"All is not plane sailing yet for the German in search of
foreign markets."--_Evening Paper._

But wait till their flying bagmen get to work.

* * * * *

* * * * *

PRACTICAL ZOOLOGY.

There is nothing which distinguishes your true Briton so much as the systematic study of the ways of wild animals, and there is no kind of instruction which an English child so eagerly accepts.

"The addax or Nubian antelope," how frequently one may hear a father say to his small son in the schoolroom, "has horns very similar to those of the Indian antelope, but is a larger animal." "Yes, father," responds the boy brightly, "it has a tuft of long hair on the forehead and large broad hoofs, adapted for treading on fine and loose sands."

But it is easier perhaps to make these nice points in natural history in the comparative calm of the home than in the more frenzied atmosphere that reigns in the Zoological Gardens themselves. It is for that reason that I have put together the few notes which follow, hoping that they may assist the reader to adopt a definite system in dealing with this great national institution and educate the young mind on a reasoned and scientific plan.

Take the order of visiting the cages first. I do not complain of your natural wish to begin with the giraffe, because it has such an absurdly long neck and may possibly mistake Pamela's straw-hat for a bunch of hay and try to eat it, and because you will be able to see the hippopotamus on the way. As a matter of fact you will find that the giraffe is not standing near the bars at all, but close to its stable, where it is mincing and bridling exactly like a lady in a Victorian novel, and as for the hippopotamus you cannot see the pretty pink part of him because he is giving his famous imitation of a submarine. But never mind that. Your difficulty now will be, "What shall we do next?" and in order to assist you I have constructed a logical order for visiting the various cages. Here it is:--

1. The lions, because you can hear them already roaring most
horribly fiercely.

2. The sea-lions, because they are saying "Ock, ock."

3. The lions, because the tiger may be roaring too this time.

4. The Elephant House. No, Pamela, I don't know why he is
swaying about like that.

5. The lions, because Tony did not really see the black
panther, which was asleep in one corner of its cage.

6. The Monkey House. I suppose we _must_.

7. The lions, to wait there till they are fed.

The only trouble about this order is that you may not have much time to visit the Mappin Terraces, and it is of course very important that you should go there because of the bears. The bears by rights should be fed on umbrellas, because they suck the stick and the ribs of the frame for all the world as if they were pieces of asparagus, and tear the silk part very carefully into tiny little shreds. But umbrellas are very expensive just now and the keeper does not think they are very good for the bears either. It is better to give them oranges, but oranges are expensive too, so you must make quite certain that you do not waste them on the grizzlies which are not on the Mappin Terraces at all. It is no use giving an orange to a grizzly bear, because it goes down with one quick motion, like the red into the right-hand top pocket. But if you give it to one of the Himalayan bears he opens it and scoops out all the inside and guzzles it up and then sits down and licks his paws exactly like a Christian, and while he is doing that the other Himalayan bear comes up and is so annoyed at not having an orange too that he lies down and groans with rage and flaps himself with his paws. So you have to get another orange.

Another thing that you have missed all this time and ought to see if possible is the Antelope House, where the telephone is. I don't know why the antelopes want a telephone more than all the other animals, but they do. Of course if they knew how bad the telephone is they would realise that with their long legs they could get there and back again in much quicker time than it takes to get a call through.

And then there are the Small Birds. It is not known to everybody, least of all, I think, to poets, that the nightingale sings best of all in a cage in broad daylight and amongst a lot of other birds, all twittering away like anything. We should like to take Mr. ROBERT BRIDGES to the Small Birds' House. We should like to take Mr. ROBERT SMILLIE there too, and introduce him to the bird just underneath the nightingale, which is called the Talking Mynah.

But you are not very much interested in coal or poetry, and will probably like the Sugar Birds best, for, if there is anything more delightful than being a bird, especially a tiny little bird, blue or green underneath, it must be living on sugar and having grapes stuck in the bars of your cage.

The snakes of course are slimy sort of creatures and their house is a long way off, and, though we fully agree with you that the monkeys were just like real persons, we think we really ought to be starting home now.

No, there is no time to see the lions again....

EVOE.

* * * * *

PROFITEER. "'ECONOMY'? NEVER HEARD THE NAME. LOOKS AS IF HE MIGHT SPOIL MY BOOK, THOUGH."]

* * * * *

"GOOD LORD! THAT FELLOW'S ACTUALLY HAD HIS OVERALLS _PATCHED_!"

"DARNED LITTLE FOP."]

* * * * *

THE CAP THAT FITS.

"Gerald, dear," said my wife the other evening, "I wish you'd write and order some more notepaper; we've hardly any left."

"All right, Margaret. What sort do you want? The last lot was beastly--too thick to make into spills and not large enough for drawing up the fire."

"Well, here's a list of the different kinds they have in stock at Jones and Robinson's."

I took it from her and glanced through it. "What do you say to 'Cream Laid,' Margaret? I like the sound of that. It will make me feel so nice and cool in the hot weather to think of the rows of fresh-faced country girls, in their spotless white overalls, pouring the cream delicately over the paper. I wonder how they get it to stop exactly at the edge?"

"It wants a very cool head and steady hand, I expect," said Margaret; "they'd all be picked cream-layers, of course. But how would you like 'thick hand-made paper with deckle edges'? What are deckle edges, I wonder; and how is paper hand-made?"

"Rather like treading grapes, I fancy, only that's done by foot. I mean they smash up the pulp with a very heavy pestle in a huge----"

"Mortar!" cried Margaret triumphantly.

"Yes; but am I telling this story or are you? Well, and then they put it through a mangle----"

"Wurzel," said Margaret.

"Wrong--just a mangle, and roll it out flat, after which they deckle the edges."

"But how do they do that, Gerald?"

"Oh, they just call in the edge-deckler and say, 'See to 't that yon edges be deckled ere set o' sun,' and he sees to 't. His is a most important post, I believe."

Margaret came and sat on a tuffet by my chair.

"Sorry about wurzel," she said. "Now tell me all about machine-made paper, there's a dear. It will be so nice to be able to explain all this to Nat when he's older."

"Paper-making by machinery, my dear," I said graciously, "is a most complicated process. I won't puzzle you with all the details, but roughly the idea is to pulp up the--er--rags and so on in a huge sort of--er--bowl, and then to roll it out thin in the rolling-out machine."

Margaret thought this over. "It sounds just the same as the hand-made," she said.

"Oh, _no_," I said quickly; "it's all done by _machinery_, you see. Pistons and rollers and--er--mechanical edge-decklers and so on."

"And what does 'Linen Wove' mean?"

"They employ people to thread the paper with linen threads, my dear. A very delicate performance; that's why Linen Wove is so expensive. Azure Wove is, of course, done with blue flaxen threads. Silurian Bond is made by a fellowship of geologists, and for Chelsea Bank they have a factory on the bank of the Thames at Cheyne Walk. That's all I need tell you, though I know a lot more."

"I never realised before how awfully interesting paper-making could be," said Margaret gratefully. "Write and order me a good supply of Chelsea Cream Wove, will you, dear? Oh, and some other kind for yourself, to write your stories on. Don't forget."

"Very well; Chelsea Cream Wove for you. And what shall I have?"

Margaret's mouth twitched a little.

"Foolscap, I think, dear," she said.

* * * * *

* * * * *

ANALGESIA.

(_With Mr. Punch's best wishes for the speedy recovery of the French PRESIDENT._)

["President Deschanel ... was compelled to take several
analgesia cachets. (Analgesia is a condition in which there is
incapacity of feeling pain)."]--_Evening Paper._

When, haply through excess of cake,
In childhood's days of fun and frolic,
I suffered from that local ache
Known to the Faculty as colic;

Or if across the foam I fared
And was (invariably) sea-sick,
How much distress had I been spared
Just by a simple analgesic.

In the Headmaster's awesome den,
His cane poised o'er me palely bending,
A lozenge deftly swallowed then
Had eased the smart of its descending.

Thus might I have indulged in "rags,"
Immune from every sore corrective,
Nor need I then have stuffed my bags
With notebooks, often ineffective.

Henceforth, in any sort of fuss--
Life's little incidental dramas,
As when one boards a motor-bus
Or leaps from trains in one's pyjamas--

I'll take a tabloid. DESCHANEL!
So much to me your agile feat meant;
_L'exemple presidentiel_
Lends quite a _cachet_ to the treatment.

* * * * *

"59 ACCIDENTS IN 5 YEARS.

PROPOSED ROAD WIDENING TO INCLUDE CEMETERY CORNER."

_Evening Paper._

The only alternative would appear to be to enlarge the cemetery.

* * * * *

"THAT IT WAS WORTH IT, SIR, EVEN IF IT DO MEAN THE LOSS OF MY PENSION."]

* * * * *

AN ERROR OF JUDGMENT AT EPSOM.

I am not attending the Derby this year. Nor was it my original intention to go last year, but since my beneficent employers, unasked, offered me a day off, Selina insisted we ought to go. It was a national institution, a sight everyone should see once in a lifetime, and so forth. I protested it was an extravagance; that to be married was really more than we could afford, let alone race-meetings. But Selina was firm. She would pay, if necessary, out of the house-keeping money. Besides it need cost nothing. We might win enough money to cover our expenses.

Thus the idea of betting was introduced. Gambling in all forms is against my principles; and how I came to give in on the point I scarcely know. From the way Selina argued one might have supposed that a bet on the Derby was a prudent investment, something in the nature of a life-insurance which no careful husband would neglect to make. So I yielded, merely stipulating that our stake was not to exceed one pound: and this amount fortunately satisfied Selina's conception of recklessness.

So upon the appointed day we found ourselves at the famous Heath, or is it the Downs? The selection of a horse to bear our fortunes to victory was not made without anxious debate, since Selina's choice was based upon the colour scheme of the jockey's coats, and mine on the romantic associations of the animals' names. In the end we compromised on a horse called Grand Parade.

Next, equally momentous, we selected a bookmaker who was to oblige us by opposing our fancy at the most advantageous rate. I was in favour of picking a man whose abundance of chin and paunch would, should he default, prevent his attaining more than four miles an hour on the flat. I had already discovered one that answered this description. He was soliciting clients in a voice that made one think a vulture might be rending his liver. Selina, who pretends to read character from faces, declared his eyes were too close together for those of an honest man. She had singled out a more suitable individual, and she indicated to me a slender gentlemanly man dressed in a grey frock-coat with a tall hat of the same colour just pathetically beginning to grow shabby. He also invited custom, but in a refined, almost confidential tone which, in comparison with the braying of his rival, resembled the cooing of a dove. His features, which to me denoted weakness of character, Selina asserted to be those of an honourable man struggling with adversity. It was to support an ailing wife, she felt sure, that he toiled at his uncongenial vocation. I should have liked to explain, though I knew it was useless, that our object in dealing with him was not to contribute to the support of his wife; that our success, indeed, might mean that the unhappy lady would be deprived for many a week to come of those little delicacies that are essential to the comfort of an invalid.

Against my better judgment I gave in and our little stake was deposited in his hands. I almost felt inclined to apologize for its smallness, but his courtesy in accepting it rendered excuses unnecessary. Nevertheless I should have preferred, when taking up a position to view the race, to have chosen a spot from which we could at the same time have kept an eye on his gentlemanly tall hat. Selina however poohpoohed the idea. We therefore walked some little distance to a point on the hill whence, some ten minutes later, we had the satisfaction of seeing Grand Parade gallop home a winner.

In the moment of triumph I had almost forgotten my apprehensions as to our bookmaker. Selina however had not, for, as we caught sight of his elegant grey-clad figure on our return, she could not resist exclaiming, "See how wrong your suspicions were."

The crowd, set loose after the tension of the race, impeded our progress, so that by the time we reached him he was alone. Apparently he had paid off all the other winners, and we were the last claimants to arrive.

"Ah, I was waiting for you," he said in his easy well-bred fashion. "You will think it very strange, perhaps, but for the moment I am unable to pay you. Most absurd. My losses have been rather more than I calculated, and I have unfortunately disbursed all my available cash. You need be under no apprehension, however; if you will kindly give me your address you shall have a cheque by the first post to-morrow."

I tried to recall what one did to welshers. I seemed to remember that one raised a hue-and-cry, that one tarred and feathered them, and rode them on a rail to a pond. I am, however, constitutionally timid about making my voice heard in public, and I was as short of tar and feathers as he was of ready cash. I had therefore no alternative but to draw out my pocket-case and present him with a card.

"Ah, thanks," he said, and with a neat little silver pencil he scribbled on the back a hieroglyph of some sort, doubtless to jog his memory. Then he wished me good-day with many apologies and, politely taking off his hat to Selina, sauntered leisurely in the direction of the railway-station.

I confess that this _contretemps_ somewhat dashed my spirits. Nor was my chagrin lessened by observing, during the remainder of the afternoon, my corpulent friend, notwithstanding the closeness of his eyes to each other, paying off regularly, at the end of each race, a host of customers with the greatest good grace, enlivened by coarse jocularities. I followed the rest of the sport with little zest, and my cup of enjoyment was not filled to overflowing when, possessing first-class return tickets, we had to stand, Selina as well as myself, in a crowded third-class smoker.

Selina however preserved both her spirits and her confidence. Bookmakers, she had heard, were, as a class, most honourable. Their losses could not be recovered by law, but they regarded them as debts of honour. There were exceptions, of course, but the gentleman in grey was not one of them. Something told her so. I should see that she was right.

At breakfast next morning we scanned our post for a letter in an unfamiliar handwriting. There was none.

"It was really rather early to expect one," said Selina.

On the following morning, however, amongst others there lay a letter in a strange writing, addressed moreover in precisely the same style as the description of me on my visiting card.

"What did I tell you?" said Selina.

"Well?" she asked, as I tore open the envelope and read the letter.

"This must be some mistake," I said. "It is a demand from the railway for a first-class fare from Epsom to London. They state that I was detected travelling without a ticket. Ridiculous. I shall pay no attention to it."

In the evening, however, as I started home from the City, I thought better. It would save trouble if I looked in at London Bridge.

"You have come to pay?" said the chief clerk, as I showed him the note.

"Indeed I have not," said I. "On the contrary the Company should refund me the difference between first and third-class fare."

"Do you deny, then, that you travelled back from Epsom without a ticket?"

"Indeed I do."

"You will not deny, perhaps, that this is the card you handed the inspector with a promise to pay?"

I took the proffered card. I could not deny it, for the card was mine. I turned it over. There, faintly legible on the back in pencil, was the hieroglyph that the bookie had scrawled on it.

I explained to the clerk. I also explained to Selina when I got home. She, however, sticks to her original contention. She was not deceived. Fundamentally the man was honest. Only the expenses of his wife's long illness had caused him to deviate from the path of probity.

* * * * *

METHODIC MADNESS.

(_By our Medical Correspondent._)

The newspapers have recently devoted a certain amount of space to the American millionaire who, while confined in a psychopathic ward of a private lunatic asylum, by his clever financial manipulations added in the course of six weeks five hundred thousand pounds to a fortune "conservatively estimated at three million pounds." In spite of this achievement the misguided millionaire pleaded earnestly for his release. But the verdict of the New York Sheriffs' Court was adverse. The expert "alienists" admitted that he possessed an extraordinary memory and undoubted genius, but held that he was none the less insane. Accordingly he is to remain in the psychopathic ward to which he was consigned "at the request of his aged mother." A simple sum in addition establishes the fact that, if the patient maintains his present average, he will considerably more than double his fortune in a year. Yet none of the newspaper commentators have realised the tremendous possibilities underlying this achievement.

We are threatened with national insolvency, and here is an infallible remedy ready to hand. Lord FISHER'S panacea for our discontents was to "sack the lot"--to dismiss all our rulers and administrators. But he had only a glimmering of the truth. Our cry should rather be, "Lock up the lot." Experience has taught us that if complete latitude is given to eccentrics and incompetents, if, in the words of Professor SODDY, F.R.S., the destinies of the country are entrusted to people of archaic mental outlook, the result is bound to be disastrous and chaotic. But if you treat them as lunatics, there is a strong presumption of their mending their ways and proving valuable factors in the economic reconstruction of the Empire and the world.

Grave evils call for drastic treatment, and in view of the hectic condition of the Stock Exchange and the "vicious circle" round which industrialism is now unhappily revolving I cannot but think that the temporary seclusion of the Ministry in a psychopathic ward might be fraught with economic consequences of the utmost importance. Even if they were only able to reduce our indebtedness at the same rate as that attained by the American millionaire, their combined efforts would represent a magnificent total.

Perhaps it would be wiser to proceed tentatively and not commit ourselves for more than six weeks to start with. It is just conceivable that the treatment might stimulate extravagance instead of economy. Financial thrombosis is not unknown as one of the obscurer forms of megalomania. Still, as I have said, the experiment is worth making.

In other spheres of activity the results achieved are most encouraging. For example, an extremely _outre_ Cubist who was recently consigned to a psychopathic ward at the instigation of his grandmother, developed a remarkable talent for painting in the manner of MARCUS STONE; while a neo-Georgian composer under similar treatment has produced a series of _etudes_ indistinguishable from the pianoforte music of STERNDALE BENNETT, though he had previously far outstripped the most unbridled and exacerbated aberrations of SCRIABINE in his latest phase.

* * * * *

Commercial Candour.

"YE OLDE TEA HOUSE

(Opposite the Church).

HOME-MADE CAKES. ANTIQUES."

_Local Paper._

* * * * *

"TO BE SURE.

'Why do you call that performing poodle Sidius?'

'He's a dog star, ain't he now?'"

_Canadian Paper._

Still we don't see it.

* * * * *

"CAN WE SUPPLY YOU WITH A CAR, SIR? CERTAINLY.

THIS IS OUR 1920 TOURING MODEL--PROVISIONAL, OF COURSE.

BY THE WAY, THE BODY, YOU SEE, IS ONLY A PROVISIONAL ONE.

THE ENGINE DESIGN IS PURELY PROVISIONAL, YOU'LL UNDERSTAND--

AND THE HORSEPOWER IS PROVISIONALLY FIXED AT 12-78.

DELIVERY IS IN EIGHTEEN MONTHS--QUITE PROVISIONAL, THAT IS--

AND THE PRICE WE PUT PROVISIONALLY AT L1,200.

WE SHALL REQUIRE, OF COURSE, A DEPOSIT OF L600 BEFORE WE CAN PROVISIONALLY ACCEPT THE ORDER.