A Chair on the Boulevard Part 1

A Chair on The Boulevard.

by Leonard Merrick.

INTRODUCTION

These disjointed thoughts about one of Leonard Merrick's most articulate books must begin with a personal confession.

For many years I walked about this earth avoiding the works of Leonard Merrick, as other men might have avoided an onion. This insane aversion was created in my mind chiefly by admirers of what is called the "cheerful" note in fiction. Such people are completely agreed in p.r.o.nouncing Mr. Merrick to be a pessimistic writer. I hate pessimistic writers.

Years ago, when I was of an age when the mind responds acutely to exterior impressions, some well-meaning uncle, or other fool, gave me a pessimistic book to read. This was a work of fiction which the British Public had hailed as a masterpiece of humour. It represented, with an utter fury of pessimism, the spiritual inadequacies of--but why go into details.

Now, I have to confess that for a long time I did Mr. Merrick the extraordinary injustice of believing him to be the author of that popular masterpiece.

The mistake, though intellectually unpardonable, may perhaps be condoned on other grounds. By virtue of that process of thought which we call the "a.s.sociation of ideas," I naturally connected Mr. Merrick with this work of super-pessimism; my friends being so confirmed in their belief that he was a super-pessimist.

But by virtue of a fortunate accident, I at last got the truth about Mr. Merrick. This event arose from the action of a right-minded butcher, who, having exhausted his stock of _The Pigeon-Fancier's Gazette_, sent me my weekly supply of dog-bones wrapped about with Leonard Merrick.

These dog-bones happened to reach my house at a moment when no other kind of literary nutriment was to be had. Having nothing better to read I read the dog-bone wrappers. Thus, by dog-bones, was I brought to Merrick: the most jolly, amusing, and optimistic of all spiritual friends.

The book to which these utterances are prefixed is to my mind one of the few _really_ amusing books which have been published in England during my lifetime. But, then, I think that all of Mr.

Merrick's books are amusing: even his "earnest" books, such as _The Actor-Manager, When Love Flies out o' the Window_, or _The Position of Peggy Harper_.

It is, of course, true that such novels as these are unlikely to be found congenial by those persons who derive entertainment from fiction like my uncle's present. On the other hand, there are people in the world with a capacity for being amused by psychological inquiry. To such people I would say: "Don't miss Merrick." The extraordinary cheerfulness of Mr. Merrick's philosophy is a fact which will impress itself upon all folk who are able to take a really cheerful view of life.

All of Mr. Merrick's sermons--I do not hesitate to call his novels "sermons," because no decent novel can be anything else--all his sermons, I say, point to this conclusion: that people who go out deliberately to look for happiness, to kick for it, and fight for it, or who try to buy it with money, will miss happiness; this being a state of heart--a mere outgrowth, more often to be found by a careless and self-forgetful vagrant than by the deliberate and self-conscious seeker. A cheerful doctrine this. Not only cheerful, but self-evidently true. How right it is, and how cheerful it is, to think that while philosophers and clergymen strut about this world looking out, and smelling out, for its prime experiences, more careless and less celebrated men are continually finding such things, without effort, without care, in irregular and unconsecrated places.

In novel after novel, Mr. Merrick has preached the same good-humoured, cheerful doctrine: the doctrine of anti-fat. He asks us to believe--he _makes_ us believe--that a man (or woman) is not merely virtuous, but merely sane, who exchanges the fats of fulfilment for the little lean pleasures of honourable hope and high endeavour. Oh wise, oh witty Mr. Merrick!

Mr. Merrick has not, to my knowledge, written one novel in which his hero is represented as having achieved complacency. Mr. Merrick's heroes all undergo the very human experience of "hitting a snag." They are none of them represented as _enjoying_ this experience; but none of them whimper and none of them "rat."

If anybody could prove to me that Mr. Merrick had ever invented a hero who submitted tamely to tame success, to fat prosperity; or who had stepped, were it ever so lightly, into the dirty mora.s.s of accepted comfort, then would I cheerfully admit to anybody that Leonard Merrick is a Pessimistic Writer. But until this proof be forthcoming, I stick to my opinion: I stick to the conviction that Mr. Merrick is the gayest, cheer fullest, and most courageous of living humorists.

This opinion is a general opinion, applicable to Mr. Merrick's general work. This morning, however, I am asked to narrow my field of view: to contemplate not so much Mr. Merrick at large as Mr. Merrick in particular: to look at Mr. Merrick in his relationship to this one particular book: _A Chair on the Boulevard_.

Now, if I say, as I have said, that Mr. Merrick is cheerful in his capacity of solemn novelist, what am I to say of Mr. Merrick in his lighter aspect, that of a writer of _feuilletons?_ Addressing myself to an imaginary audience of Magazine Enthusiasts, I ask them to tell me whether, judged even by comparison with their favourite fiction, some of the stories to be found in this volume are not exquisitely amusing?

The first story in the book--that which Mr. Merrick calls "The Tragedy of a Comic Song"--is in my view the funniest story of this century: but I don't ask or expect the Magazine Enthusiast to share this view or to endorse that judgment. "The Tragedy of a Comic Song" is essentially one of those productions in which the reader is expected to collaborate. The author has deliberately contrived certain voids of narrative; and his reader is expected to populate these anecdotal wastes. This is asking more than it is fair to ask of a Magazine Enthusiast. No genuine Magazine reader cares for the elusive or allusive style in fiction. "The Tragedy of a Comic Song" won't do for Bouverie Street, however well and completely it may do for me.

But there are other stories in this book. There is that screaming farce called "The Suicides in the Rue Sombre." Now, then, you Magazine zealots, speak up and tell me truly: is there anything too difficult for you in this? If so, the psychology of what is called "public taste"

becomes a subject not suited to public discussion.

The foregoing remarks and considerations apply equally to such stories as "The Dress Clothes of M. Pomponnet" and "Tricotrin Entertains."

There are other stories which delight me, as, for example, "Little- Flower-of-the-Wood": but this jerks us back again to the essential Mr.

Merrick: he who demands collaboration.

There are, again, other stories, and yet others; but to write down all their t.i.tles here would be merely to transcribe the index page of the book. Neither the reader nor I can afford to waste our time like that.

I have said nothing about the technical qualities of Mr. Merrick's work. I don't intend to do so. It has long been a conceit of mine to believe that professional vendors of letterpress should reserve their mutual discussions of technique for technical occasions, such as those when men of like mind and occupation sit at table, with a bottle between them.

I am convinced that Mr. Merrick is a very great and gifted man, deeply skilled in his profession. I can bring forth arguments and proofs to support this conviction; but I fail utterly to see why I should do so.

To people who have a sense of that which is sincere and fresh in fiction, these facts will be apparent. To them my arguments and ill.u.s.trations would be profitless. As for those honest persons to whom the excellencies of Merrick are not apparent, I can only think that nothing which I or any other man could say would render them obvious.

"Happiness is in ourselves," as the Vicar remarked to the donkey who was pulling the lawn-mower.

Good luck, Leonard Merrick, and good cheer! I shout my greeting to you across the ripples of that inky lake which is our common fishery.

A. NEIL LYONS.

A CHAIR ON THE BOULEVARD

THE TRAGEDY OF A COMIC SONG

I like to monopolise a table in a restaurant, unless a friend is with me, so I resented the young man's presence. Besides, he had a melancholy face. If it hadn't been for the piano-organ, I don't suppose I should have spoken to him. As the organ that was afflicting Lisle Street began to volley a comic song of a day that was dead, he started.

"That tune!" he murmured in French. If I did not deceive myself, tears sprang to his eyes.

I was curious. Certainly, on both sides of the Channel, we had long ago had more than enough of the tune--no self-respecting organ-grinder rattled it now. That the young Frenchman should wince at the tune I understood. But that he should weep!

I smiled sympathetically. "We suffered from it over here as well," I remarked.

"I did not know," he said, in English that reproved my French, "it was sung in London also--'Partant pour le Moulin'?"

"Under another name," I told him, "it was an epidemic."

Clearly, the organ had stirred distressing memories in him, for though we fell to chatting, I could see that he neither talked nor dined with any relish. As luck would have it, too, the instrument of torture resumed its repertoire well within hearing, and when "Partant pour le Moulin" was reached again, he clasped his head.

"You find it so painful?" I inquired.

"Painful?" he exclaimed. "Monsieur, it is my 'istory, that comic tune!

It is to me romance, tragedy, ruin. Will you hear? Wait! I shall range my ideas. Listen:"

It is Paris, at Montmartre--we are before the door of a laundress. A girl approaches. Her gaze is troubled, she frowns a little. What ails her? I shall tell you: the laundress has refused to deliver her washing until her bill is paid. And the girl cannot pay it--not till Sat.u.r.day-- and she has need of things to put on. It is a moment of anxiety.

She opens the door. Some minutes pa.s.s. The girl reappears, holding under her arm a little parcel. Good! she has triumphed. In coming out she sees a young man, pale, abstracted, who stands before the shop. He does not attempt to enter. He stands motionless, regarding the window with an air forlorn.

"Ah," she says to herself, "here is another customer who cannot pay his bill!"

But wait a little. After 'alf an hour what happens? She sees the young man again! This time he stands before a modest restaurant. Does he go in? No, again no! He regards the window sorrowfully. He sighs. The dejection of his att.i.tude would melt a stone.

"Poor boy," she thought; "he cannot pay for a dinner either!"

The affair is not finished. How the summer day is beautiful--she will do some footing! Figure yourself that once more she perceives the young man. Now it is before the mont-de-piete, the p.a.w.nbroker's. She watches him attentively. Here, at least, he will enter, she does not doubt. She is wrong. It is the same thing--he regards, he laments, he turns away!

"Oh, mon Dieu," she said. "Nothing remains to him to p.a.w.n even!"