Book: Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, January 14, 1920
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Various >> Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, January 14, 1920
When he arrived at the other end the night was calm and the sky
star-spangled. The walk out exhilarated him; his exasperation was over.
He ran lightly down the leaf-strewn steps of the old garden and looked in
at the window. Mary was seated at the fire. She looked pensive, pretty
and a little sad. He whistled and she smiled up. "Hooray!" she said, "I'd
nearly given you up." She slipped round and had the door open before he
could get out his key and drew him in. She helped him off with his coat
and scanned his face with even more than her usual intentness and
interest. But she didn't ask him why he was late and he didn't tell her.
He thought that could wait.
Their extemporised supper was a great success, and they sat before the wood
fire far into the night.
"What was up this morning?" he finally asked. "You weren't quite yourself,
were you?"
"This morning?" she questioned, puzzled. "Oh, I remember. I woke with a
splitting headache. Did you notice it? You nice old thing!"
* * * * *
[Illustration: _Musician_ (_having bumped lady with 'cello_). "OH, I _AM_
SO SORRY."
_Lady._ "DON'T MENTION IT. I'M PASSIONATELY FOND OF MUSIC."]
* * * * *
AT THE PLAY.
"MR. PIM PASSES BY."
"The year's at the spring
And day's at the morn...
God's in His heaven--
All's right with the world!"
When _Pippa_ "passed," singing songs like that and preoccupied with the
splendid fact of her one day's holiday, she unconsciously brought about a
change for the better in the heart or conscience of all who overheard her.
It was not so with the passing of _Mr. Pim_. Prior to his intrusion, there
had been nothing to disturb the well-ordered existence of _Geo. Marden,
Esq., J.P.,_ and his wife (late Mrs. Tellworthy), except that they did not
see eye to eye on the small question of his niece's early engagement to a
young artist and on the still smaller question of futuristic curtains. Then
came _Mr. Garraway Pim_, a doddering old gentleman, with a thin falsetto
voice and a loosish memory, but otherwise harmless. He arrives with an
introduction from Australia and casually lets fall a tale of a
fellow-passenger with the unusual name of Tellworthy, from which--and
other incidental evidence--_Mrs. Marden_ gathers that her first husband
(an ex-convict) is still alive. Having dropped this thunderbolt he drifts
off, leaving tragedy in his wake. End of Act I.
_Marden_, highly conscientious, takes the orthodox view that his lawless
marriage must be nullified. His wife, though horrified at the resurrection
of her impossible first husband, permits herself to recognise the
humorously ironic side of things. _Mr. Pim_, fortunately located in the
immediate neighbourhood, is sent for that he may throw further light on the
painful subject of Tellworthy's revival. He now reports--what he had
vaguely imagined himself to have mentioned in the first instance--that
Tellworthy had met his death at Marseilles through swallowing a
herring-bone. The Second Act closes with a burst of jubilant hysterics on
the part of _Mrs. Marden_.
But the situation is only partially relieved. True, the old husband is dead
all right, but the _Mardens'_ marriage is still bigamous; they have been
living all this time in what would be regarded in the eyes of Heaven (and,
still worse, the county of Bucks) as sin. However, a trifling formality at
a registry-office can rectify this and nobody need be any the wiser. This
at least is _Marden's_ attitude, always free from any suspicion of
complexity. But his wife (if that is the word for her), being of a more
subtle nature, determines to make profit out of the situation. She points
out to him that she is at present the widow Tellworthy and that she must be
wooed all over again, and can only be won on her own terms. These include a
recognition of the niece's engagement (has not the young artist an equal
right with _Marden_ to a speedy marriage with the woman of his choice?) and
a concession to her taste in futuristic curtains.
[Illustration: A DROPPER OF UNCONSIDERED TRIFLES.
_Mr. Pim._ Mr. DION BOUCICAULT.
_Mrs Marden._ Miss IRENE VANBRUGH.]
At this juncture _Mr. Pim_ drifts in again to correct an error of memory.
The name of the gentleman who succumbed to the herring-bone was not
Tellworthy (he must have got that name into his head through hearing it
mentioned as that of _Mrs. Marden's_ first husband). It was really
Polwhistle--either Henry or Ernest Polwhistle; he was not quite sure which.
Everything is thus restored to the _status quo ante_, except that _Marden_,
in a spasm of generous reaction, feels himself morally bound to abide by
the new conditions that his wife had laid down.
_Mr. Pim_ only passes by once more to announce his settled conviction that
_Polwhistle's_ Christian name was Ernest and not Henry.
It will be seen that the play is original in design; but it is also a true
play of character revealed by circumstance. Further--and this is very
rare--it owes nothing to the adventitious aid of the costumier. For the
author's observation of the unities is extended to include the matter of
dress; he allows his people one costume each and no more.
Miss IRENE VANBRUGH played as if every one of her words had been made
expressly for her, as, no doubt, they were. I have never seen her so
perfect in detail, in the poise of her head, in her least gesture and
intonation, in her swift changes of mood; never so quietly mistress of the
_finesse_ of her art.
As _Marden_, Mr. BEN WEBSTER was a little restless in a part for which he
was not constitutionally suited, but played with the greatest courage and
sincerity. Mr. DION BOUCICAULT'S study of _Mr. Pim_ was extraordinarily
effective; and the way in which he made the attenuated pipings of this
futile old gentleman carry like the notes of a bell was in itself a
remarkable feat.
These three were given great chances, full of colour. But in the part of
_Brian Strange_, the boy-lover, by its nature relatively colourless, Mr.
LESLIE HOWARD was hardly less good. He never made anything like a mistake
of manner. I wish I could say the same of his flapper. But Miss COHAN
asserted her good spirits a little too boisterously for the picture.
I hope I shall not be suspected of partiality towards one of Mr. Punch's
young men if I say that this is the best of the good things that Mr. MILNE
has given us. As in his unacted play, _The Lucky One_, he gives evidence of
a desire, not unfrequent in humourists, to be taken seriously. But he knows
by now that brilliant dialogue is what is expected of him, and he thinks,
too modestly, that he cannot afford to dispense with it for long at a time.
The result is that, after stringing us up to face a tragic situation, he is
tempted to let us down with light-hearted cynicisms. He would hate me to
suggest that Mr. BERNARD SHAW has infected him, but perhaps he wouldn't
mind my hinting at the influence of Sir JAMES BARRIE. Certainly his
_Mardens_ remind me of the _Darlings_ in _Peter Pan_. Just as there we were
invited alternately to weep for the bereaved mother's sorrow and roar over
the bereaved father's buffooneries, so here, though not so disastrously,
our hearts are torn between sympathy for the husband's real troubles and
amusement at the wife's flippant attitude towards the common tragedy.
I will not deny the sneaking pleasure which this flippancy gave me at the
time, but in the light of calmer reflection I feel that Mr. MILNE would
really have pleased himself better if he could have found the courage to
keep the play on a serious note all through the interval between _Mr.
Pim's_ first and second revelations. Apart from the higher question of
sincerity he would have gained something, in an artistic sense, by getting
a stronger contrast out of the change of situation that followed the
announcement of Tellworthy's demise.
In the First Act we seemed to have a little too much of the young couple,
but this insistence was perhaps justified by the important part which their
affairs subsequently played (along with the _leit-motif_ of the futuristic
curtains) in the readjustment of the relations between husband and wife.
If I have any flaw to find in a really charming play, I think it was a
mistake for _Mrs. Marden_ to let _Mr. Pim_ into the secret of her past. As
with the sweet influences of _Pippa_, so with the devastating havoc wrought
by the inexactitudes of _Mr. Pim_, I think he should have been left
unconscious of the effect of his passing.
For the rest,
Mr. MILNE'S at his best--
All's right with the play!
O.S.
* * * * *
[Illustration: IT WAS UNFORTUNATE THAT BROWN HAD NOT FINISHED HIS
MASTERPIECE, "THE SURRENDER OF THE GARRISON," BY THE TIME THE WAR CAME TO
AN END.]
[Illustration: HOWEVER, IT NEEDED VERY LITTLE ALTERATION TO MAKE IT
SALEABLE.]
* * * * *
EUPHONIOUS ALIENS.
(_A successful chamber concert has been given by three players, styling
themselves "The Modern Trio," and named as under._)
You may search through all Europe from Nenagh to Nish
For such a delightfully-named coalish
As that of MANNUCCI and MELZAK and KRISH.
In MELZAK we note the Slavonic ambish;
MANNUCCI suggests an Italian dish,
And there's an exotic allurement in KRISH.
Their combined _cantilena's_ as soothing as squish;
'Twould have banished the madness of SAUL, son of KISH,
Had he listened to MELZAK, MANNUCCI and KRISH.
Their music, I gather, is wholly delish,
But their names are the thing that I specially wish
To applaud in MANNUCCI and MELZAK and KRISH.
* * * * *
THE STRUGGLE FOR LIFE.
"FOR SALE.--Entire household, $200 cash."--_American Paper_.
* * * * *
ANOTHER CRISIS.
Whether it is due to war-weariness or not the fact remains that the British
public view with apparent apathy the new crises which arise day by day to
threaten their happiness and maybe to change the whole course of their
life.
Only a few mornings ago we read in _The Daily Chronicle_ the following
momentous statement made by that newspaper's golf correspondent: "I'm told
that the thirty-one pennyweight ball is doomed." Doomed! Yet, so far as
could be observed in the demeanour of the pleasure-seekers in the Strand on
the afternoon of that same day, things might have been exactly as they were
the day before.
We learn that the sub-committee investigating this matter of the thirty-one
pennyweight ball have consulted both the manufacturers and the
professionals. A ray of hope is given by the statement, made on good
authority, that "the manufacturers have adopted a very reasonable
attitude." The country should be grateful for this. But, on the other hand,
"the professionals want full freedom in the selection of balls."
To foster a false optimism at this juncture would be criminal, and it may
as well be admitted at once that negotiations are proceeding with
difficulty. As we go to press we learn that a protracted meeting, lasting
from 2 P.M. until after midnight, has been held. The leader of the
manufacturers, on emerging from the conference hall, was seen to look pale
and exhausted. Pushing his way through the pressmen and photographers he
said, "Boys, for the moment we are bunkered; we must employ the niblick.
No, that is all I can tell you;" and he walked quickly away with his hand
to his brow and muttering words seldom heard off the course.
Equally grave, the organising secretary of the professionals was even less
communicative, for he spoke in his native tongue, and the Scotsman among
the reporters who undertook to translate his remarks was unfortunately
unable to make himself understood.
The PRIME MINISTER'S Private Secretary has issued to the Press a statement
that Mr. LLOYD GEORGE is keeping in close touch with Walton Heath and the
progress of events, but that at present no useful purpose would be served
by Government interference.
_The Daily Chronicle_ correspondent also announces that representatives of
American golf are to visit St. Andrews in the Spring to discuss the
question. We trust their visit may not be too late. If the problem is one
that can be solved by dollars no doubt they will come well-equipped for
enforcing American opinion on the British public. We can only hope that
international relationships will not be strained by their deliberations;
let there be a spirit of toleration and a recognition of the rights of
small nations, and all may yet be well.
* * * * *
WHY THE SPARROW LIVES IN THE TOWN.
In noisy towns, where traffic roars and rushes
And where the grimy streets are dark and narrow,
You never see the robins and the thrushes,
Nor hear their songs. Only the City sparrow
Chirps bravely and as cheerily as they,
Although his home is very far away.
He chirps of lanes, of far-off country places
(This is the sparrows' story that I'm telling);
Long, long ago they lived in sweet wide spaces;
Their homes were in the hedges, gay, green-smelling;
The people, though, came citywards to dwell;
"Then we," the sparrows said, "must go as well.
"Yes, we're the birds to go, for all our brothers
Would lose their songs in cities dark and crowdy;
Their hearts would break; but we're not like the others,
We cannot sing, our coats are drab and dowdy;
But we can chirp and chirp and chirp again;
The people shan't forget a country lane."
And so they came, and in all city-weathers
They chirped a note of cheer to exiles weary;
And _still_ the sparrows chirp, for their brown feathers
Hide now, as then, brave kindly hearts and cheery,
Of lanes they've never seen nor lived among,
Of country lanes they sing, the same old song.
* * * * *
"SIR ALBERT'S ELEVATION.--'Up, Stanley, up!'--_Shakespeare_ (amended)."
--_Sunday Pictorial._
Great SCOTT (WALTER)!
* * * * *
"Very attractive was the interior of the ---- Hall, when the Misses
---- entertained a large number of their friends at an enjoyable dance.
Everything was 'conteur de pose.'"--_Australian Paper._
It is very clear they weren't jazzing.
* * * * *
[Illustration: THE POST-WAR SPORTSMAN MAKES THE ACQUAINTANCE OF THE
HUNTSMAN.]
* * * * *
OUR BOOKING-OFFICE.
(_By Mr. Punch's Staff of Learned Clerks._)
_The Romance of Madame Tussaud's_ (ODHAMS) strikes one, in these days of
universal reminiscence, almost as a _libre a faire_, certainly as a volume
that finds its welcome waiting for it. I suppose there are few unhappy
beings for whom the very name of that gifted lady does not revive something
of the nursery magic that is never quite forgotten. All of which means that
Mr. JOHN T. TUSSAUD, who has written, vivaciously and with obvious
pleasure, this history of the famous show, is (I hope) assured beforehand
of his sales. It is a fat record, taking the story from the earliest wax
profiles made by Dr. CURTIUS for the Parisian aristocracy in the days
before the Revolution; through the Terror, when his niece (afterwards
Madame TUSSAUD) was employed to model notable heads from the basket of the
guillotine, which was itself subsequently to figure amongst the attractions
of her collection, and finally bringing the enterprising artist and her
models to England and Baker Street, whence a comparatively recent move
established them (the foundress in effigy only) in their present palace. I
was especially interested to trace the evidence of close attention paid to
the show by Mr. Punch, and in particular to learn that the title Chamber of
Horrors was first invented by that observer; though the author falls into
an obvious chronological inexactitude in ascribing to these pages a cartoon
by CRUIKSHANK published "in November of Waterloo year." I have no space for
the many queer stories, chiefly of encounters between the quick and the
wax, with which the book abounds, nor for more than mention of its
admirable photographs, of which I should have liked many more. Altogether
it gives an unusual sidelight on the history of two Capitals; and
incidentally, if the reading of it puts others in the same resolve as
myself, an extra turn-stile will be needed in the Marylebone Road.
* * * * *
Mr. HARRY TIGHE is something of a problem to me. With the best will in the
world to appreciate what looked like unusual promise I can only regard him
at present as one who is neglecting the good gifts of heaven in the pursuit
apparently of some Jack-o'-lanthorn idea of popularity. No doubt you recall
his first novel, _The Sheep Path_, a sincere and well-observed study of
feminine temperament. This was followed by one that (though it had its
friends) marked, to my thinking, a lamentable fall from grace. He has now
published a third, _Day Dawn_ (WESTALL). Here, though popularity of a kind
may be its reward, the work is still woefully beneath what should be Mr.
TIGHE'S level. Certainly not one of the demands of the circulating
libraries is unfulfilled. We have a fair-haired heroine (victim to
cocaine), a dark and villainous foreigner, a dashing hero, a middle-aged
woman who adores him despite the presence of her husband, himself called
throughout _Baron Brinthall_, a style surely more common in pantomimic
circles than in the drawing-rooms of Mayfair; and the incidents embrace
both murder and suicide. Moreover there is "plenty of conversation," and
the intrigue moves sufficiently quickly (if jerkily) to keep one curious
about the next page. But having very willingly admitted so much I return to
my contention, that for Mr. TIGHE to neglect his sensitive and delicate art
for the antics of these tawdry dolls is to betray both himself and the
craft of which he may still become a distinguished exponent.
* * * * *
From the official who is interested in officialdom to the Infantry officer
who is interested in tactics, from the mechanical expert who can appreciate
the technical details of diagrams to the child who revels in faultless
photographs of hair-raising monsters ("I may read it, mother, mayn't I,
when I've unstickied my fingers?" was the way I heard it put), everybody, I
think, will find plenty to attract him in Sir ALBERT STERN'S finely
illustrated _Tanks 1914-1918_ (HODDER AND STOUGHTON). Tanks were born at
Lincoln, and rightly so, for did not OLIVER CROMWELL'S Ironsides mostly
come from this region?--and the main theme of this book is to show how much
more formidable an obstacle they found in the files and registries of
Whitehall than in the trenches and wire-entanglements of Flanders and
France. Parents they had and sponsors innumerable. Practical soldiers and
engineers were enthusiastic about them, and the Bosch quaked in his
trenches or ran; but even so late as the autumn of 1917, after General FOCH
(as he was then) had said, "You must make quantities and quantities; we
must fight mechanically," one stout little company of obscurantists bravely
defied the creed of Juggernaut until the irresistible logic of its
successes in the field crushed them remorselessly under the "creeping
grip." And that company, of course, according to Sir ALBERT STERN, was the
British War Office.
* * * * *
Let me commend to you _The Mask_ (METHUEN) as a craftsmanlike essay in
imaginative realism; ruthlessly candid and self-revealing, but free from
that tiresome obsession of the ultra-realists that everything that has ever
happened is equally important in retrospect. The narrator, _Vanya
Gombarov_, a Russian Jew, discourses reflectively and detachedly, as it
were from behind a mask, to an English artist friend about his early
childhood in his own land and the dismal adventures of the _Gombarov_
family in that underworld of exploited and miserable aliens which is one of
the root social problems of America. Very poignantly Mr. JOHN COURNOS makes
you understand the import of the phrase so constantly on the lips of such
victims of their own credulous hopes of El Dorado--"Woe to COLUMBUS!" The
portrait of _Vanya's_ stepfather, brilliant, magnanimous, pursued by an
AEschylean malignity of destiny, fills much of the foreground and is a quite
masterly piece of work. One cannot be wrong in assuming this to be
essential autobiography; there is a passionate conviction as of things
intimately seen and dreadfully suffered. Such material might well have
tempted to a mere piling of squalor upon squalor. A fine discretion has
given a noble dignity to a record through which shines the unquenchable
human spirit. One passage, full of affectionate discernment about London,
will cause a flicker of just pride in everyone who is authentic Cockney,
whether by birth or adoption. A big book of its kind, I dare assert.
* * * * *
_Star of India_ (CASSELL) is what Mrs. ALICE PERRIN calls her latest novel,
a title so good that I can only wonder why (or perhaps whether) it has not
been used before. Inside also I found excellent entertainment. One supposes
the author to have been confronted with two main problems with regard to
her plot--how to make sufficiently plausible the marriage between a flapper
(if you will forgive the odious word) of seventeen and a middle-ageing
Anglo-Indian; and, secondly, how to impart any touch of novelty to the
inevitable catastrophe that must attend this union. The first she has
managed by a very cunning suggestion of the mingled jealousy, curiosity and
boredom that drove _Stella_ into the arms of her elderly suitor; the second
by a variety of devices, to indicate which would be to give away the whole
intrigue--one, I may say, whose climax is not nearly so visible from afar
as that of most triangle tales. One point only I will reveal: Mrs. PERRIN
has had the courage, while vindicating her own common-sense judgment upon
such folk, to introduce a second girl, daughter and pupil of one of the
spoon-fed idealists who would govern India with the platitudes of
ignorance, and not only to make her sympathetic, but to convince me of her
attractions, which (especially just now) was not easy work. Decidedly a
first-rate yarn.
* * * * *
We may, I think, take it that the love-story in _The Gunroom_ (BLACK) is
fiction pure and naively simple, but that the experiences of _John
Lynwood_, the hero, in the Navy are given as the actual experiences of Mr.
C.L. MORGAN, the author. Let me then at once say that his revelations of
the bullying of junior by senior midshipmen go back to a period before the
War. These "shakings," we are asked to believe, were due partly to custom
and partly to boredom caused by lack of leave. If Mr. MORGAN is correct
both in his facts and surmises it is satisfactory to think that the War
must have obliterated the boredom which provoked such excesses, and one
need not be a fanatical opponent of physical punishment to hope that such
forms of tyranny will never again be tolerated as a matter of custom. I am
obliged to conclude that these incidents in _Lynwood's_ career are
absolutely true, for certainly nothing less than absolute truth could
excuse their appearance in print; but at the same time I must confess that
any attack upon our Navy is apt with me to act as an irritant. The more
reason that I should honestly admit Mr. MORGAN'S merits and say that he
writes with a nice sense of style, and that his book does not derive its
only interest from its revelations.
* * * * *
[Illustration: OUR LAUNDRIES: THE COLLAR-FINISHER.]
* * * * *
HUNTING EXTRAORDINARY.
"GOOD SPORT WITH THE HOLDERNESS.
"A stout ox led the field into Bilton village."--_Provincial Paper._
* * * * *
RECHAUFFES FOR CANNIBALS.
"A company, numbering over 80, sat down to dinner, the host and hostess
(Mr. and Mrs. ----) proving, as usual, a first-class menu."--_Local
Paper._