The Diary of Samuel Marchbanks Part 4

AUTUMN.

- x.x.xIX -.

Sunday: My annual duel with my furnace has begun. Perhaps "duel" is not the right word, for it suggests a contest of lightning-like thrust and parry, and my fight with the furnace is much more like medieval jousting -- a slow but hideously powerful and destructive combat. At present my aim is to keep a fire low enough to warm my house without dehydrating me and all my possessions; this I do by throttling the furnace, keeping all air from it, and treating it with ostentatious contempt, as though I did not care whether it went out or not. It retorts by belching its hot breath all through the house, cracking the surface of the furniture, and making the floors groan and pop in the night. There is a tank in my furnace into which I pour water every day, and the superst.i.tion is that water mingles with the hot air and produces a balmy climate all through my house. But in actual fact gremlins drink this water, and the mice in my cellar commit the Happy Despatch in it, and the air from the furnace is like the parching simoom of the East Indies. Frankly I hate furnaces, and would far rather have a big Quebec heater, upon which I could spit when I was disgusted with it. Spit on a furnace, and it doesn't even hiss.

Monday: Whenever I win a bout with my furnace, it always retorts by producing a particularly large and dirty supply of ash. In twenty years, I suppose, furnaces like the one which I now harbour in my cellar will be antiques, and we shall look back laughingly at the era of the bi-weekly ash collection. But at present it is a stern reality. The ashes have to be taken out of the entrails of the furnace, sifted by hand, and then conveyed in tubs and buckets to the street. After I have done this, I look as though I had been working in a flour mill, and smell as though I had been travelling from Montreal to Toronto in a smoking car. It is enough to put me in a bad temper for a whole evening. . . Some day I am going to have a house heated by the rays of the sun in the most modern manner. Or perhaps I shall enjoy the luxury of a furnace man, and while he struggles and fights with the furnace, I shall sit upstairs dressed like Mr. Capitalistic Interests in a socialist cartoon, laughing and drinking cherry bounce, and shouting "More heat, more heat!" in a tyrannous voice. I have always thought that I should like to be a tyrant, but it costs money.

Tuesday: My furnace had its first ugly fit of the season today. When I opened its front door this morning for the usual health inspection, I noticed that it had a bad breath and a nasty, coated back-draft. However, it took its food without much complaint and I thought no more about it. By this evening, however, it had dyspepsia, and the usual cures did no good at all. So for the first time in the Furnace Season I sat up with it, coaxing its appet.i.te from time to time with tiny shovelfuls of c.o.ke, a dainty which it much enjoys. I have grown so used to sitting in the cellar that I hardly notice it any more. But I must put a stronger globe in the light socket; the present one is too dim for pleasant reading. And I might knock up a bookshelf over the preserve cupboard to hold a few appropriate favourites such as Orpheus In Hades, The Light That Failed, The Sacred Flame, The Stoker, and, of course, Man vs. Machine.

Wednesday: This afternoon I tried to rake my lawn clear of leaves, but felt like Hercules cleaning the Augean stables, and soon gave it up. It would be easier to climb the trees in September and pick the leaves than to sc.r.a.pe them up from the ground, and I think that I shall do so next year. "What are you doing in that tree, Mr. Marchbanks?" the neighbours will cry, their suspicions aroused. "I am harvesting my leaves," I shall reply, with pardonable superiority. After that, of course, everyone will take it up.

Thursday: To a concert this evening where a large number of gifted coughers were in splendid form. Coughing at concerts and theatres could be eliminated, of course, by making coughing an inexcusable indecency. The body is capable of a variety of offensive noises, some of which are permitted by public opinion, while others are forbidden and 99 people out of a hundred would rather burst than be guilty of them. Put coughing in that category and in a generation it would cease. If, instead of glaring at coughers, we turned our heads away from them, blushing for their shameful lack of self-control, they would soon stop their noise. If, when a cough burst out in company, we all spoke a little louder and more distinctly, as though to drown the shameful sound, coughers would think twice. If the word "cough" were to become a Forbidden Word, and if children were to have their mouths washed out with soap when they used it, the cough would cease to be a popular indulgence. Coughing would become a thing that rude little boys did, amid snickers of their companions, to annoy the teacher. Stamp the cough as a disgusting and indecent personal noise, and its knell is rung.

Friday: A friend who was interested in my observations on famous Last Words draws my attention to this pa.s.sage in George Santayana's Persons And Places: "On one of the many occasions when he (Santayana's father) thought, or dreaded, that he might be on his deathbed, he felt a sudden desire for some boiled chicken, without in the least giving up his a.s.severation that he was dying; and as his deafness prevented him from properly modulating his voice, he cried out with a shout that resounded through the whole house: 'La Uncion y la gallina!' ... which is to say 'Extreme Unction and a Chicken'." Undoubtedly these are n.o.ble Last Words, combining as they do a prudent regard for both worlds, but as the elder Santayana did not die on this occasion, they are not Last Words in the true sense. . . Very irritating Last Words would be, "I forgive you all," which would leave one's relatives in a condition of baffled and angry stupefaction. . . Charles I had a brilliant inspiration when, on the scaffold, he turned to the attendant bishop and said, "Remember, Juxon." Since then hundreds of people have puzzled their brains as to what it was that Juxon was to remember. If it was an adjuration (very natural under the circ.u.mstances) to put Dog-Off in Cromwell's soup, it is obvious that Juxon forgot, unforgivably.

Sat.u.r.day: More furnace martyrdom; cold today, and the fire which I have nursed so lovingly was inadequate. I have kept it low, yet not dangerously low, and it refused to burn up when the need arose. So, in an unwise fit of temper, I gave it a severe poking, and went out for a couple of hours. When I came home again the thermometer was just at 90 degrees F. . . Set to work to bring the monster under control, opening all checks and even shovelling ashes through the fire door to quench the flames. I was afraid that the furnace would be consumed by its own heat, and suddenly subside in a ma.s.s of molten metal. ... I have deceived myself about my furnace; I thought that I had the upper hand of it, and that its proud spirit was broken. But no! The Old Nick is as active in its iron bosom as ever. Some day I shall destroy that furnace or it will destroy me.

- XL -.

Sunday: Was talking to an irate father whose little boy had recently joined the temperance movement. It appears that an agent of the temperance interests (it is known that they have all kinds of money at their command, because they are heavily subsidized by the soft drink cartel) had attracted a number of children into a church hall after school and had shown them movies of the inside of a drunkard's stomach in Technicolor; this impressed the tots greatly, and after the temperance agent had plied them with chocolate milk, they all signed a pledge to taste not, touch not, nor yet smell of the cork, and received certificates establishing their membership in the Wee Wowsers' Total Abstinence Fraternity. . . What annoyed this man was that this particular Wee Wowser had come home armed with the sword of the spirit, and had lectured him on the evils of beer; I gather that the Wee Wowser was told that what looked like soul-saving to him looked much like infant impudence to his father, and his membership in the Wee Wowsers terminated at that instant.

Monday: A friend of mine lost confidence in himself today because he discovered that he had put the garbage can carefully in the luggage compartment of his car, and had stood his wife's dressing-case on the curb to await the Offal Officer. I a.s.sured him that I had been doing things like that for years, and attributed it to abstraction of the kind from which all men of genius suffer.

Tuesday: My brother Fairchild paid me one of his infrequent visits today, and asked to watch while I stoked my furnace. This was unfortunate, for Fairchild is a bigoted Back-to-Fronter, while I am a determined Middler. That is to say, Fairchild stokes his furnace by raking the live coal from the back to the front, and putting his new coal in the resulting trough, whereas I make a bed of coals with the poker, and put my new coal in a heap in the middle. I was brought up a Back-to-Fronter, but I changed to Middleism when I married my furnace. The feeling which Back-to-Fronters have for Middlers is comparable to that which Roman Catholics cherish for adherents of the Greek Orthodox Church. . . However, while Fairchild stood by I stoked the furnace in my usual way, and I noticed his jaw tighten and his temples throb. In a low voice, he asked me whether I expected to make a good fire that way? I said that I did, and to spare him embarra.s.sment, I leaned toward the fire-door at that moment. I think it was the big poker he used when he struck, but luckily I caught the blow on my shoulder, and was able to push his head in an ash-bucket while I screamed for help. When the police came we were locked in a deathgrip on the cellar floor. . . We parted fairly good friends, but my furnace went out in the night. The slightest thing upsets it.

Wednesday: Attended a concert this evening, and enjoyed the music greatly, though for a few minutes it was in compet.i.tion with a bugle band which was marching past the building. It is characteristic of the musical life of the city in which I live that every concert runs foul of this bugle band at some point in its program. I cannot say that I care for bugle bands, wide as my musical sympathies are. When a boy I played in one, though my instrument was the Side Drum; there were eight drummers, and sixteen buglers and I have walked many miles rattling my drum, while the bugles blared their simple-minded tunes in my ears. It is no small feat to play a bugle well; indeed, I venture the opinion that buglers are born, and not made. Not many of them had been born in the particular group from which the buglers in my school band were drawn; they had wind and spit in plenty, but no genius for the instrument. At the earliest opportunity I got out of the band and achieved the post of Corporal in Charge of the Medically Unfit; this was the peak of my career as a cadet. I never hear a bugle band now without thinking of it, and as the singers fought against the band tonight Fond Memory brought the light of other days around me.

Thursday: Made my debut in television, and enjoyed it. It is a kind of elaborate puss-in-the-corner, played with three cameras. With four other people I sat at a table and chewed many a delicious rag, pretending to be unconscious that anyone could see or hear us; but it was impossible not to notice that three great rubber-wheeled monsters, with cameras for heads, prowled about in the shadows, peering intently at us; from time to time they came very close, like shy elephants hoping for a peanut; then, quite suddenly, they would retreat, as though they had been frightened. The game for those of us who were talking was not to look directly at the monsters, which would have made them nervous. I was reminded of the technique of my grandmother, who could induce squirrels to take nuts from her hand by pretending that she was looking at something in the other direction; I tried it, and the cameras came quite near. It was all I could do to refrain from facing them suddenly and sticking out my tongue, but I knew that this would frighten them away for good. For television one must be less an actor than a wild-life expert.

Friday: For a brief drive in the country today; was amazed by the number of farm dogs who seem anxious to quit this life and join their ancestors in whatever future existence a discerning Providence has provided for dogs. They rush at every car, attempting to hurl themselves under the wheels, and when they fail (which they do quite often, being slow and stupid) they bite at the tires, hoping to cause a puncture. In the World of Tomorrow dogs who want to commit the Happy Despatch will present themselves before a Government Board, explain their reasons for wishing to die, and if successful, will receive a cyanide bone, coated with synthetic beef gravy. The expense of this service will, of course, be borne by the taxpayers. Dogs who fail to make a case for themselves will receive the Order of Mother Hubbard (first cla.s.s).

Sat.u.r.day: It was so warm today that I let my furnace go out; it thinks it went out of its own accord, but I know better; I starved it, and it expired. . . Bought a new rake, and seized the opportunity to sharpen my penknife, free, on the various stones in the hardware store. Then set about tasks of raking leaves, emptying flowerpots, cutting back bushes, and preparing Marchbanks Towers for its long winter's nap. I am still waiting for my winter wood, which is apparently marooned in a swamp somewhere and cannot be reached; it will arrive simultaneously with the first snow, I predict, and I will have my usual jolly weekend piling it. Otherwise no squirrel is better prepared for winter than I; I am looking for a cidermill in good condition, and will buy it if I can find it, though I understand that apples are going to be very scarce this year; but I have a scheme of my own for making cider out of oranges.

- XLI -.

Sunday: To a christening this afternoon, a ceremony in which I always take a large measure of innocent delight. At best it is a race between the parson and the infant, both gathering steam and momentum as the moment of immersion approaches; if the parson is still audible above the outraged screams of the child after this point, I award the victor's palm to him. The shrieking of the child, of course, is merely the Old Adam protesting against an invasion of his property. . . I understand that in most churches a first-aid box is kept in the vestry for the use of parsons who have suffered damage during a christening; I have seen men of G.o.d horribly clawed by infants who possessed extraordinary resistance to Grace. . . Sometimes I have doubted the efficacy of the baptismal rite; so many children seem to be in full possession of the Old Adam, or, more accurately, the Old Nick is in full possession of them.

Monday: To the bank this afternoon, and was once again amazed by the nonchalance with which the young women behind the bars treat my balance. To me it is a matter of the most profound significance; to them it is a mere sum in addition and subtraction. Without being in the least aware of it, they can drive their cruel pens deep into my heart. That is, they are not aware of it unless I sink upon the floor with a despairing cry and attempt to disembowel myself with my penknife; then they call the a.s.sistant manage to throw me out. Banks hate suicides on the premises -- looks bad.

Tuesday: On the Late Movie tonight saw a piece written by Sir Arthur Pinero and produced with complete and humiliating failure on the stage in 1922, and later served up by Hollywood as something new and dainty. Its theme (which is the old and laughably untrue one that Love Conquers All) might have been handled acceptably by Barrie, but Pinero, who had all the delicate appreciation of human nature that one expects in police court lawyers and auctioneers, made a mess of it, and Hollywood had piled its own mess on top of the original. A pilot who has been injured and disfigured in the war marries a girl of remarkable ugliness, and in the throes of the Tender Pa.s.sion they are transformed, and seem beautiful to one another; but they do not seem beautiful to anyone else, and this is supposed to be tragic, though it appears entirely normal and explicable to me. Pinero was no hand at such confectionery; he was happier with plushy Edwardian trollops such as Paula Tanqueray and the notorious Mrs. Ebbsmith, who could sin, repent and have hysterics without disturbing their elaborate hair-dos or making their corsets creak more than was considered decent.

Wednesday: Saw some posters today, adjuring hunters to make sure that their cigarette stubs were doused before they threw them away; the solemn a.s.surance was given that one carelessly thrown match might start a forest fire. I wish that the government officials who dream up these posters would come and light my furnace for me some time with one of their carelessly thrown matches, or a cigarette stub. Tonight I laboured fifty minutes cleaning out my furnace (which had pa.s.sed quietly away at 8:30 a.m.) and putting paper and kindling in its maw, preparatory to re-lighting; then I put a few carefully lighted matches inside and awaited results. There were none. Remembering the posters, I threw a lighted match carelessly into the fire-door; it went out at once. Next I tried a cigarette stub; it went out too. So at last I made a torch of twisted paper, and that worked. I can only conclude that it is easier to start a forest fire than it is to light my furnace.

Thursday: Suffered an acute attack of the humdudgeon today; the symptoms of this illness are a sense of failure, self-contempt and mental fatigue; there is no cure for it; application to the bottle merely brings on a crying-jag; a walk in the park suggests ideas of suicide; while the fit lasts all seems dross; sufferers from the humdudgeon should be left alone, though if they can be persuaded to lie down, with a pillow under the knees, it helps. . . It was during a fit of the humdudgeon, on a Sunday afternoon in London, that De Quincey made his first experiment at opium-eating, to allay the pains of toothache. He never completely abandoned the habit, and lived to the ripe old age of 75, c.o.ked to the gills quite a lot of the time.

Friday: Everything is relative, I suppose, but I wish that the law, or a Chamber of Commerce, or somebody, would define the word "lifetime" as it is used by merchants. Fourteen months ago I bought a suit which was made of a cloth which I was a.s.sured would not -- could not -- wear out; the tailor jabbed pencils through it to show me how tough the fabric was. I have given it good care, and the sleeves and cuffs are undeniably worn through; the lifetime fabric is just ordinary shoddy. A few years ago I was sold a Harris tweed suit, which I was a.s.sured would last my lifetime; I wore both elbows through in just over three years. And I have never had a pen with a lifetime guarantee which lasted five years. Yet the days of our years are three-score years and ten.

Sat.u.r.day: Long discussion this evening with a man who wants to revise our system of funerals and burial. The Vikings, he says, lived in their ships and loved them, and when they died their bodies were laid out in their ships and sent off to sea. Ours, he points out, is an automobile civilization, and if we had any real respect for the dead, we would sit them at the wheel of the car in which they spent so much of life, and which they loved so dearly, and we would then allow the machine to dash along a special funeral speedway and eventually over a cliff. There is a poetic sweep about this notion which appeals to me strongly. For non-drivers like myself, of course, the plan might prove somewhat humiliating, but perhaps an arrangement could be made to whisk me into oblivion on castors, cunningly let into the heels of my burial boots.

- XLII -.

Sunday: Was reading some of the letters of Edgar Allen Poe today, and they confirmed me in my belief that a man's private correspondence should never be published. He does not write his letters with a horde of snoopy strangers in mind, and he says things which he would never say for publication. Poe was a great literary artist, and we have all the poems and stories which he wanted the public to see; why publish letters in which he makes a fool of himself, drooling weakly to his child wife, and tearfully addressing his mother-in-law as "Dearest Muddy"?

Monday: Was talking to a most unusual physician tonight -- a man who scorns vitamins and laughs uproariously at talk of allergies. Medicine, he said, was an art and not a science, and could only be usefully practised after deep study of human nature and of each individual patient. This att.i.tude, he said, was commonplace among the great physicians of the past, but was out of favour with the modern school of pill-peddlers, who like to do their diagnosis by machine as much as possible, and prefer not to see the patient if they can possibly manage with a piece of him. Too many doctors are deeply interested in disease, but don't care much for people, he said. . . This all sounded like good sense to me, though I put in a word or two for the overworked physicians, whose patients always expect a bottle of medicine, and love to be treated for any disease under the sun, but hate to be accused of Original Sin, which is what is wrong with most of them.

Tuesday: To Toronto on some business, and found it noisier and dirtier than ever. Of course, visitors see Toronto at its worst. I had to fly around the business section, meeting this one here, and phoning that one there, and my impression was all of tiresome noise, stench and rush. But native Torontonians rarely encounter this; they sit in their luxurious offices, with their feet on desks, smoking big cigars and wondering how long it will be before they can send out a girl for their hourly cup of coffee. At home their wives and children live in the pastoral surroundings of Bayview, where gra.s.s grows in the streets, in Forest Hill, where the wild maztoth looms luxuriantly all the year round, or in Lawrence Park, where cows and sheep graze peacefully on the lawns. The calm, white, expressionless face of a real Torontonian is never creased with care, and his collar is never soiled with s.m.u.ts from the chimneys. Those frantic, feverish, sweating wretches who run about the downtown area are all visitors from the country, rushing madly to do a week's business in a few hours.

Wednesday: This afternoon bent to the task of carving a pumpkin face as a Hallowe'en surprise for some children I know; this is a neglected branch of art which I have made peculiarly my own. I scorn the mediocre pumpkin face with triangular eyes and nose, and a gash of a mouth: mine has a n.o.ble nose, a mouth full of teeth, eyes which search your soul when the pumpkin is illuminated, and a leer which sums up the whole spirit of Hallowe'en. The only proper way to illuminate a pumpkin head is with the stub of a candle; electric light is harsh and lacking in mystery.

Thursday and All Hallow's Eve: Hallowe'en, and a fine windy night. There was a ring at my door, and when I opened it a frightful ghost, about three feet high, confronted me. "Who are you?" I demanded in a voice which trembled with fright. "I'm Charles," whispered the spirit, and whisked my proffered orange into the folds of its ectoplasm. . . Not long after the ghost of Charles had disappeared, I heard a groan, and went outside just in time to see a gang of hooligans running up the street, having ripped my gate off its hinges. I cursed them with a slow, lingering, horrible curse imparted to me by my grandmother, who was a witch. They will not feel the full effect of this curse for a week or so, but then parts of them will begin to turn black, and drop off, and they will be regarded as undesirable even in the circles of society in which they now move. . . There was a good deal of writing on windows with soap, too, mostly confined to such comments as "Ha ha" and "Boo." The world is so const.i.tuted that people who feel like writing on windows can never think of anything funny to write, while those who can think of funny things have too much brains to want to write them on windows.

Friday and All Hallowmas: The folk-spirit in poetry is not dead. Today I heard some children singing Sing a Song O' Sixpence, the last verse of which runs: The maid was in the garden Lining out the clothes; Along came a blackbird And snapped off her nose.

But to this a youthful poet in the group had added a delightful sequel: She went to the doctor To get a wooden nose, And when she came home, She couldn't blow her nose.

I hope to see this addition incorporated in the next edition of Mother Goose.

Sat.u.r.day: People make their livings in the oddest ways. I heard today about a man who has become wealthy through the manufacture of "slumber slippers" -- soft little slippers like ballet shoes which are placed on the feet of corpses. All G.o.d's chillun got special shoes. . . And a man in Winnipeg has become well-off through the cultivation and sale of sunflower seeds, for the chewing trade. It seems that great numbers of New Canadians from Middle Europe like to chew sunflower seeds, spitting out the husks and eating the tiny, oily kernel, which tastes like a nut. . . I should like to get into one of these queer trades, and make my fortune: I wonder how luminous false teeth would be, so that lovers could smile at one another in the dark? Or pipecleaners with blunted ends, so that they could safely be used as ear-reamers? Or a pair of stays that rings a bell when the occupant has eaten enough, for fat women on diets? The possibilities are infinite.

- XLIII -.

Sunday: For years I have been known to a large circle of sports enthusiasts as the Nimrod of the Fly-Swatter; I take no interest in other blood-sports, but when it comes to swatting flies I admit few equals and no superiors. I prefer a swatter with a rubber flapper to the ordinary wire affair; the wire mashes the game, but the rubber slaps it into oblivion and leaves the carca.s.s unmutilated, and suitable for stuffing or table use. . . It is not generally realized that when a fly rises from a standing position, it jumps backward; it is necessary to allow for this jump when swatting. I have also noticed that amateurs, particularly women, swat at flies as though they were driving spikes; this causes a noticeable breeze, and the fly is warned. The way to swat a fly is this: grip the swatter firmly but not tensely, hold it six inches over the quarry, and then swat with a decisive but not vindictive motion. If the fly escapes, do not pursue it with yells and wild swipes of the swatter; wait until it lights again, and swat like a gentleman and a sportsman. With my rubber swatter, I can often stun a fly while it is in the air, but you had better not try this; only an Annie Oakley like myself has the finesse for such refinements.

Monday: Business called me to Toronto, where I found the lobby of the Royal York thronged with men in handsome blue uniforms which were richly ornamented with gold lace, gold rope and gold insignia; many of them wore impressive medals and ribbons, and I heard one of them address another as "General." All of them carried swords, the scabbards of which appeared to be composed of gold and ivory, and one of them was accompanied by a lady of dominating appearance who wore a purple cloak of military cut, and a hat with a prodigious ostrich plume in it. I a.s.sumed that they must be foreign grandees, perhaps a government-in-exile, until I noticed that fighting men in ordinary khaki and blue did not salute them, but seemed indeed to look upon them with ill-concealed amus.e.m.e.nt; I saw one airman point them out to his dinner partner with what I can only describe as a contumelious gesture. . . I made discreet enquiries, and learned that the gorgeous creatures were attending a convention of a fraternal order -- the Ancient and Honourable Order of Poltergeists, I believe. There is a corroboree of some sort at the Royal York every week.

Tuesday: Every day I pa.s.s a beverage room in the course of my duties, and at least every second day an habitue of the place pursues me for a hundred yards or so, telling me in a low, compelling voice how badly he needs twenty-five cents. I have given him money several times, chiefly from a fear that he will fall dead at my feet if I refuse, but I am beginning to be indifferent to his fate. What is more, an uncharitable suspicion dawns in my mind that he uses my money to buy beer. Now if he spends all his daily income, which is my twenty-five cents, on drink, he is obviously an improvident oaf and the despair of economists, and the next time he appears trembling and muttering at my side I shall tell him so. If he were a true Canadian he would spend five cents of my quarter on food and drink, he would save five cents, and he would pay the other fifteen for Income Tax and the Baby Bonus. That is what I have to do. Why should he live a life of pleasure, spending his whole income on drink, when I have to slave and pinch to keep him and several thousand civil servants in luxury? This is the sort of social injustice which makes communists of white-collar workers like me.

Wednesday: When I was born good fairies cl.u.s.tered round my cradle, showering me with wit, beauty, grace, freedom from dandruff, natural piety and other great gifts, but the Wicked Fairy Carabosse (who had not been invited to the party) crept to my side and screamed, "Let him be cursed with Inability To Do Little Jobs Around The House," and so it has always been. I cannot drive a nail straight, or mend an electric iron, or make a door stop sticking, or change a fuse. I do not glory in my inefficiency; I suffer under it. Whenever anything goes wrong with my household arrangements, I have to get a man in to mend it -- no small task in these days -- and I know that he despises me as he does the fiddling little job and takes away five dollars of my money. People who are good at odd jobs are blessed above common mortals; I have some trifling skill in swatting flies and shining shoes, but otherwise I am a nuisance in the house. If I were ever shipwrecked on a desert island with several thousand feet of lumber, a complete set of carpenter's tools and 100 cases of a.s.sorted foods, I should die in a week of exposure and starvation.

Thursday: Read a piece in a magazine by a man who urged everybody to retire earlier, and live longer. But we can't all retire at 45 or 50; we must get money to keep body and soul together. Many people, of course, compromise in this matter: they continue to work physically as long as they can, but they retire mentally at a very early age (sometimes as young as 14) and live on their small intellectual capital for the rest of their lives. Sometimes their last forty years or so is spent in extreme mental poverty, but they don't seem to mind; they have lots of mental leisure, and when the breeze blows in their left ear it soon whistles out their right, as fresh as ever, making a pleasant, hollow sound the while which issues from their mouths in the form of conversation. I am surprised that this sort of early retirement does not attract more attention from the Department of Health and Welfare. Surely some a.s.sistance could be devised for people who have ceased to think? A few ready-made opinions, of a size to fit any head, might surely be distributed? The problem is to find a way of introducing them into the skull.

Friday: Received a telephone call from a friend of mine, who wanted to know who invented the water-closet; he has had one in his house for years, but has only recently become curious about it. The answer is that it was first devised by the Elizabethan n.o.bleman, Sir John Harington, who in 1596 described his invention, which he was certain would mitigate the plague, and what did the world do? It condemned him as a man whose mind dwelt on filth. Thus the very name of this great benefactor of mankind is known to about one person in 5,000, whereas the inventor of the zip-fastener was given an LL.D. by the University of Uppsala. What a world!

Sat.u.r.day: Undertook to bathe a small child and put it to bed, in the absence of its mother; this is not a fitting pursuit for a man whose temperament is philosophical and whose habits are sedentary. Several times I underestimated the elusiveness of a small creature covered from head to foot in soapsuds, and almost fell into the tub myself. The child took this for frolicsomeness on my part, and began to throw water on me; I toyed with the idea of stripping, in order to meet this situation on fair terms, but rejected the plan as undignified. When at last I had landed my fish and begun to dry it, the unforeseen problem of ticklishness obtruded itself, and then hair-brushing created a great hullabaloo. When at last it was in bed, and had had all the drinks of water and Kleenex it demanded, I was a nervous and physical wreck.

- XLIV -.

Sunday: To the zoo this afternoon, just to see how the animals liked the cold weather. The bear looked restless and banged his cage resoundingly from time to time; the rac.o.o.n and the skunk had retired for the winter; the foxes looked as though the cement floor gave them cold feet. But the ducks were very hearty, and nipped at the toes of my boots in a spirited manner; a duck nipping at one's boot is a good joke, but a duck nipping at one's nether regions when one is in a bathing suit is something entirely different. The pheasants were moulting -- a process which is chronic with them, though the Ringneck c.o.c.k was in his finest plumage and a glorious sight. Two owls had been added to the collection, and were resenting it; I know of no animal which has a capacity for dignified outrage equal to that of an owl.

Monday: A correspondence school has written to me, inviting me to take a course in writing; this is a type of criticism which I resent. "You do not have to be a genius to become a successful writer," they say, in what is meant to be a rea.s.suring manner. Then they go on to urge me to look in my own neighbourhood for subjects. "Dig below the surface of your home town," they say; frankly I am afraid that this method would not win me "a big income and interesting friends," as they promise, but merely a pack of lawsuits. . . People who have taken the course write eagerly, "Last week I hit The Country Gentleman; this week I hit Mademoiselle; next week I hope to hit the American Mother!" Frankly I don't think this course would suit me; I don't want to hit any of those people, though I might toss a pie at the American Mother, just for fun. . . But I like the promise the people make that they will teach me how to create tense moments, and how to play on the heartstrings; I have never been any good at either of those things. And I particularly like their offer to teach me how to be funny; any school which can make a man funny by correspondence must possess a secret which has been hidden from the rest of mankind for some thousands of generations. It would be nice to be unfailingly, perpetually, remorselessly funny, day in and day out, year in and year out until somebody murdered you, now wouldn't it?

Tuesday: Walked home this evening in the dusk, and pa.s.sed a surprising number of couples of High School age conversing in low, tense voices as they leaned over bicycles or huddled under trees. Poets insist that Spring is the time of mating, but personal observation convinces me that the austere, bright nights of late Autumn are equally favourable to romance. The interesting thing about these lovers' conversations are the pauses. The lad asks some question which (to my ears, at least) has no amorous significance, and the girl then casts down her eyes, fingers her Latin Grammar in an agitated manner, and after a breathless interval (during which I try to keep on walking without getting out of earshot) replies. "Oh, I guess so," or "Oh, I just as leave," causing her swain to breathe hard and gulp. . . Why doesn't he throw himself on the ground, saying, "You are my Soul, my Better Self, be mine or I stab myself with this pair of protractors"; then she could reply, "Nay, press me not, I am Another's." In that way they could really have some romantic fun and store up things to tell their grandchildren. No style, no breadth, that's the trouble with the modern High School set.

Wednesday: An unseasonable warm spell forces me to reverse my tactics with my furnace; instead of begging the thing to give me a little heat, I am now imploring it to relax its efforts. Perverse as always, it huffs and puffs and frizzles me with its breath. . . However, I have got a load of wood, with not more than a fair amount of soft stuff, punk and limbs in it, and I shall conduct Marchbanks' Annual Wood Bee on Sat.u.r.day. Hard cider and doughnuts will be served to all helpers.

Thursday: Was talking to a woman who has just had a baby, and who pa.s.sed her period of recovery in a public ward in a Great Canadian City. There were nine other women in the room with her, and she said that they talked all the time -- mostly about names for babies and the peculiar behaviour of their husbands. When these husbands came visiting one piece of dialogue was invariable: HUSBAND: "Do you want anything to read?"

WIFE: (patting her bedside table) "No, no; I have MY BOOK.

. . . My informant was burned up with curiosity to know what these books were which were spoken of in such a portentous manner; she was able to discover that in all nine cases the "book" was a magazine of true love stories, or of confessions. This is an interesting sidelight on Canadian reading habits. Furthermore, she said that she never saw one of her nine companions open her "book" upon any occasion. . . My informant read several books during her recovery, to the amazement and ill-concealed indignation of her room-mates. It was their opinion that too much reading was a sign of being stuck-up, and furthermore liable to harm the baby's eyes -- by sympathetic magic, I suppose.

Friday: My brother Fairchild is my guest today, and as there is always something of an unusual nature going on in Fairchild's vicinity, I kept a close watch on him, and soon surprised him in the act of shaving himself with a little electric machine which he kept in a leather case. It was, he said, a razor, and not a miniature sheep-shearer, as I thought; held close to the face, it chewed the whiskers off with tiny teeth; he pa.s.sed it over the rugosities of his countenance with a great air of virtuosity, and I must admit that the little machine seemed to work. I asked him if it did not excite his face too much to have electricity applied to it? Was there no tendency for the skin to loosen and hang in folds? He denied this with more heat than was really necessary, for my question was purely academic. Later I crept off to the bathroom and cut myself with a razor I have used for years; I have a fear of new-fangled contrivances. Fairchild is the daring member of the family.

Sat.u.r.day: This afternoon hove wood into my cellar and piled it; the heaving was a wild, brutal ecstasy, but the piling was a weary penance. It was necessary for me to grab up as much wood as I could hold, and scuttle under the rafters and furnace-pipes in a crouching position, rather as an ape rushes through the forest with a stolen bunch of bananas. After an hour or two of this my back began to hurt, and my philosophy took a violent turn toward pessimism. It was at this time also that my woodpile began to slip and slide, and drop on my feet. After some very delicate engineering, I got it to stay in place, and decided not to tempt fate by putting any more on it, so I retired to an upstairs room and settled down with a book and a foaming gla.s.s of burdock blood-bitters. . . During the night a mouse tramped rather heavily on the cellar floor, and I heard a thunderous roll as my woodpile sank into ruin.

- XLV -.

Sunday: Woke with an aching head and a vile taste in my mouth -- the consequence of piling wood yesterday; the pursuit of pleasure always leaves me in splendid condition (a fact which puzzles and irritates the Moral Element among my friends) but hard work gives me the most intolerable hangovers. Obviously Nature is evolving a new type of man, geared for a life of pleasure, and I am the first model. . . But on the principle of "a hair of the dog" I went out and heaved and piled the rest of my wood, having reconstructed the woodpile which fell down yesterday. By the time I was finished, I was on the verge of physical and mental breakdown. Though thousands of people indulge themselves in it regularly, and even develop a taste for it, there is no doubt in my mind (and that of scientists whom I employ to prove it) that Work is a dangerous and destructive drug, and should be called by its right name, which is Fatigue.

Monday: Attended a concert in a collegiate auditorium tonight, and sat in the front row in order to have room for my legs; in the ordinary concert-hall seat (designed by and for dwarfs) I have to sit side-saddle, while numbness seizes first one haunch and then the other. But being in the front row I had a fine view of the empty orchestra pit, and during a rowdy rendition of Chopin's Scherzo in B Minor a tiny mouse crept from under the piano in the pit and began to dance, lightly, elegantly and charmingly. When the music twiddled, the mouse twiddled; when the music bounced, the mouse bounced; there was no arabesque of sound which the mouse was not able to trans.m.u.te into an arabesque of movement. When it was all over I applauded the mouse vigorously, a.s.suming that it was a protege of the Board of Education. I learned later, however, that the concert committee had been put out by the fact that the mouse got in, somehow, without a ticket. . . Why are school mice always so fat and sleek? Is it because they have access to unlimited floor-oil?

Tuesday: There is a special grubby joylessness about life these days which oppresses the spirit. As I look out of my window there is not a green leaf or a flowering plant to be seen; dust blows everywhere; a woman pa.s.ses, and pulling at her arm is a little boy dressed in a snow suit, in which he is hot and fretful; a man with a paunch stalks by, looking as though all his meals in the last fifteen years had soured his stomach; a girl goes by wearing an elaborate hairdo, a pea-jacket and a pair of short slacks, from which her dirty legs emerge; she is pigeon-toed, but she holds her head proudly; an elderly woman in an ill-chosen hat waits for a bus; she breathes through her mouth and stares at the pa.s.sers-by. Is there any hope in these people? Could immortal souls inhabit such frames without showing some spark through the eyes, or in a smile? November is a month to breed pessimists.

Wednesday: Was discussing wart-cures with a physician this evening. He says that in his experience the best one is this: rub the wart with a slice of bacon, then go outdoors on a night when the moon is full, throw the bacon over your left shoulder and then, as the bacon rots, the wart will vanish. "But what if a cat eats the bacon?" I asked; "The wart will vanish that much sooner," said he. . . Naturally this led to talk of magic, and a lady present spoke of an old woman known to her grandmother, whose custom it was (when her luck was bad) to bind her churn with willow-withes, and beat it with a stick; then whoever it was that was wishing her ill would come to the door and beg forgiveness. This was in Canada, about 1850-60. Our pioneer ancestors had a lot of simple fun that we miss.

Thursday: Life, for a man of my temperament, is an endless procession of vexing domestic problems. Shall I have my storm-windows put on, or not? At present the weather is warmer than it was most of last May, and it is only by the most rigorous repression of my furnace that I keep my house livable. But I know that Winter will come upon me like a thief in the night, blowing its raw breath through every c.h.i.n.k, ruffling the carpets on the floors and whipping the pictures off the walls. G.o.d pity all the poor souls on a night like that! And then I shall not be able to get anyone to creep up a ladder in the icy blast, bearing 15 square feet of gla.s.s in his arms. Shall I do it now or shall I wait a little longer? My indecision will be the ruin of me, I know it. But oh, the heat of storm windows in warm weather! I will. . . I won't. . . I will.. . . I WON'T. Come then, Boreas, and be d.a.m.ned! It is better to tarry than to burn.

Friday: Waiting for a bus today, I listened to the conversation of two women who were waiting also; they were exchanging symptoms. Such tales of nervous breakdown, bad dreams, uncontrollable crying, pains in the legs, bladder weakness and general debility I have never heard: although they stood side by side they shouted as though they were conversing in a hurricane, and as their symptoms grew worse and worse, their voices grew louder and shriller. They talked so loudly that I had no need of my formidable powers of eavesdropping. To my unskilled eye they looked healthy, though unwholesome and glum. . . Most people like to be ill, and ask nothing more than a chance to rehea.r.s.e their ailments. In some dark corner of their minds (I use the word loosely) there lurks the notion that if they ever admit that they feel quite well the G.o.ds will at once punish them with some direful malady.

Sat.u.r.day: Rain all day. What can a man do on a rainy day which is also his half-holiday? I am never at a loss for an answer to that question. Immediately after lunch, I went to bed, and bade farewell to the world for a few hours. The telephone rang. "It can't be anyone of any consequence," I thought: "every sane man is in bed this afternoon." After a while the ringing ceased. . . Later there was a knock at the door. "n.o.body is up to any good this afternoon," I said to myself; "that is doubtless someone wanting to sell me a ticket on a sanctified raffle, or a dozen repulsive Christmas cards, or a copy of the Christmas War Whoop, or a pillow stuffed with pine needles. -- A pox upon them." The knocker went away. . . "If everybody spent one half-day in bed," I reflected, "there would be no need of a United Nations Organization; world peace would come as a matter of course, the divorce rate would be cut in two, and even grim-visaged labour leaders would become creatures of light and spirit." At this point Oblivion claimed me.

- XLVI -.

Sunday: Was looking through a book today which had a good deal to say about prayer as a mental exercise. Prayer it said, was not a formal thing, and could be indulged in anywhere; pray on the bus, while eating your dinner, or while taking a bath, it said; it was particularly scornful of the notion that prayer should be done on the knees; much better to say one's prayers lying in bed. . . Now this may be all right as mental exercise, but it entirely neglects the function of prayer as physical exercise. Most people, if they don't kneel to pray, never kneel at all, and kneeling is good for you. The Moslems understand the value of prayer as exercise, and several times a day they prostrate themselves with their heads toward Mecca; I once knew a Moslem who said that this kept the most sedentary of his sect in good physical trim. The Chinese, before the revolution, made a great point of the kotow, in which you kneel gracefully and touch your forehead to the ground when in the presence of your superiors, or in temples; this kept them admirably supple and healthy, and when the revolution put an end to the kotow the Chinese went straight to the bad. The present decline of Christianity may be traced to this habit of praying in bed, which is bad for the Christian liver.

Monday: A doctor tells me that he has observed a number of cases of poultry diseases among middle-aged women in the last few weeks; apparently the women are regular attendants at Bingo games, where they absent-mindedly consume large quant.i.ties of the corn which is used for counters; then they go home and drink several cups of tea, and the trouble begins. Sometimes he says, it is simple distension of the crop, and can be cured by purchasing a set of celluloid Bingo counters, but often the disease has gone too far for anything but severe measures. He mentioned one patient of his (whom he referred to as a White Wyandotte type) whose wattles had turned greyish and whose eyes had filmed over simply from a prolonged surfeit of Bingo corn. Another woman he mentioned (a table Plymouth Rock) showed every symptom of pip, and waddled about his office uttering pitiful squawks and occasionally falling over on her side. Still another was far gone in fowl-convulsions, and he did not think she would last for the Christmas trade. . . I tried to cheer him up by pointing out the st.u.r.dy character which the Scots built on a diet of oats; he said that he was afraid that Bingo corn would turn Canada into a nation of sick hens.

Tuesday: The Russians are acclaiming Robbie Burns as a genius -- a sort of primeval, pre-Marx Communist. This proves only that the Russians are not reading Burns's works complete. His dislike of aristocracy pleases them, no doubt, but his hatred of orthodoxy and bureaucracy cannot go down very well. Probably the Russian editions of his works are carefully expurgated, and such verses as The De'il's Awa Wi' The Exciseman are omitted. . . My advice to the Russians is that they should give thanks that Burns is dead, and not alive in Russia today. He would be a great bother to the commissars of literature and popular thought.

Wednesday: Was introduced to an elderly lady today who offered me two fingers to shake; they were cold, damp and blue, like uncooked sausages. Her conduct in this matter did not please me greatly, for I would much have preferred to have no hand at all, rather than half a hand. It was the custom in the last century to give a few fingers -- three, two, or in extreme cases, one -- to people whom one regarded as socal inferiors, or in some way undesirable. I only know one man who still does it, and as he does it to everybody I a.s.sume that he has a high regard for himself. The story is told that the late Arthur Balfour once offered a man one finger to shake, and the man vindictively shook it to such a degree that Balfour was unable to write for a week. Moderation in the handshake is highly desirable; neither the blacksmith grip, which crushes the hand into the semblance of hamburger, nor the chilly extension of two or three fingers. I think handshaking is overdone, in any case; why do we not compliment our friends by shaking hands with ourselves, like Chinamen, or boxers who have won a match?

Thursday: Was talking to a woman today who kept giving out strange squeaks and groans, as though she had mice in her corsage; I soon diagnosed her trouble; her corsets were creaking, and whenever she moved the stresses and strains of her underpinning were audible. This reminded me of one of my earliest business ventures, when I patented and attempted to sell Marchbanks' Patent Stay Oil, a scented unguent which was rubbed well into the corsets before putting them on. It rendered the stays supple, without weakening their repressive powers. I was unlucky in the time I chose to market my invention; it was just when rubber corsets were coming into fashion, and the heavier corset of canvas, steel, whalebone and leather thongs was falling into disuse. But there are still a few women who need my Stay Oil, and I am thinking of getting one of the big cosmetic houses to try it on the public again.

Friday: Was talking to a young woman today who informed me that she had no soul. I think she hoped to shock me by this declaration, but it was old stuff to me. The world is full of bright young things and cynical old things who think they have no souls. They appear to regard the soul as a part of their personalities upon which the Christian Church has established squatters' rights, and they very properly resent such intrusion. As to defining the soul, they never attempt it, though I gather that they regard it as a sort of vapour floating about the heart -- not unlike gas on the stomach. For a belief in the soul, and the deity of which the soul is a reflection, they subst.i.tute belief in such chimaeras as Progress, General Education, Single Tax, cold baths, colonic irrigation, free love, women's rights, vegetarianism, the Century of the Common Man, the infallibility of TV commentators, social security, and their laughable congeners and equivalents. As a result, their souls become anaemic and debilitated, and their faces have the unlit look of vacant houses.

Sat.u.r.day: Pa.s.sed the day very agreeably laughing, patting myself on the back and drinking toasts to myself. The reason for my satisfaction was that I was comfortably at home, and not in Toronto watching the Santa Claus Parade. As I grow older, and the Christmas Frenzy begins earlier and earlier, my relish for Christmas dwindles. The spirit of love and friendship which should fill us all at Christmas is very dear to me, but it has to struggle against gifts which I don't want, vulgarized Christmas carols, hysterical appeals from the Post Office for mercy, ill-considered entertainments from which the real spirit of Christmas is painfully absent, and a commercial bombardment which sets my nerves jingling. Santa Claus, now utterly divorced from the St. Nicholas of legend, is a crazed old slob, hounding me to buy things I don't like, and give them to people who don't like them either. So on this balmy Indian Summer day, I worked in my garden, made firm but not excessive demands upon my cellar, and laughed and sang the hours away, precisely as though Santa, the patron of the Chamber of Commerce, were not making triumphal entry into the Ontario Babylon.

- XLVII -.

Sunday: Impossible to postpone any longer the tidying of some attic closets so faced the task with a heavy heart. Under the debris of the years discovered an astonishing quant.i.ty of old wallpaper. I have never seen an attic yet which did not contain a lot of old wallpaper, and this makes me wonder why it is that a paperhanger doesn't feel safe unless he has a lot more material than he really needs. I learned how to calculate the amount of paper needed for a room when I was at school: you multiply the square footage of the walls by the cubic contents of the floor and ceiling combined, and double it; you then allow half the total for openings such as windows and doors; then you allow the other half for matching the pattern; then you double the whole thing again to give a margin for error, and then you order the paper. Result: every attic contains enough extra wallpaper to print a complete Sunday edition of the New York Times.

Monday: Peeped nervously from behind my lace curtains today to see if the Offal Officer would really take away all the a.s.sorted junk which I banished from my attic yesterday; he did, and he even wore some of it as he drove down the street. . . Christmas draws near, with its desperate challenge to every man to buy presents for people whose taste he does not know, or who have no discernible taste of any kind. I buy a few Christmas cards as a beginning, knowing full well that they will not be enough for my needs. The Christmas spirit has not yet taken possession of me.

Tuesday: In the course of a conversation about drinks this evening, a man told me that I am wrong in supposing that no joy goes into the making of Ontario wines. Vintage time in the Niagara Peninsula, he says, is a season of Bacchic revel and riot; the merry Niagara farmers and their plump, rosy-cheeked wives roll up their blue jeans and tread out the grapes in an elaborate ritual dance, singing this song the while: Io, Father Bacchus, Io, Io!

And hurrah for the Chairman of the L.C.B.O.!

Merrily we sing As we dance in a ring, Banishing our troubles With gulps of gas and bubbles!

Io, Father Bacchus, Io, Io!

And hurrah for the Chairman of the L.C.B.O.!

When night falls, they all drape exquisite garlands of flowers about the priapic statues of the Chairman of the Liquor Control Board of Ontario which stand in every vineyard, and then depart into the woods in pairs. It is very dangerous to follow them.

Wednesday: A year ago today I was in a motor accident -- not a large one, but big enough to make me nervous of cars even yet. Without wishing to do so I still press hard on the dashboard of any car I am riding in, mumble warnings to the driver under my breath, and cringe and scrunch whenever another car comes within spitting distance. For peace of mind I should really ride with my back to the engine, and sometimes I do, but on a long drive I get tired of kneeling on the back seat, and besides it gives people in other cars a wrong impression.

Thursday: To Toronto, the Ontario Babylon, on business. Pa.s.sed hastily through Toyland and saw children being introduced to Santa Claus. Two or three hara.s.sed men were busy shooing the tots away from S. C. down a ramp; they all wanted to turn around and barge back into the crowd whence they had come, disarranging the queue. This is an instinct deep in the childish heart. What does Omar Khayyam say? -- Myself when young did eagerly frequent A Santa Claus to Toyland yearly sent -- Then turned, and vainly tried to b.u.t.t my way Outward by the same path as in I went.

Saw also a toy train big enough to pull children and a few adults. Would fain have had a ride on it, but I had no child with me, and feared that I might excite remark and even rebuke if I tried to pa.s.s myself off as a nursery-school type. The train had an excellent whistle which sent me, just as the Beatles send the bobby-sockers. Whoo! it went, mellowly and invitingly: Whoo! Whoo!

Friday: Toronto is already in the toils of Christmas, and from several windows the hollow Ho Ho! of a mechanical Santa Claus may be heard. Children watch these creatures with hard calculating eyes, wondering if the old man is really crazy, or only pretending to be, like Hamlet. . . Everywhere I went Christmas preparations were going on, but they all seemed to be of a secular nature. Gnomes, elves, giants and Disney oddities abounded, and there were a few angels, but even they had been Disneyized, and made cute, rather than spiritual. A Man from Mars would never know that Christmas was a religious festival from what he sees here. Is it the final triumph of Protestantism that it has pushed the sacred origin of Christmas so far into the background that most people are able to ignore it?

Sat.u.r.day: Dashed out this morning to get some more Christmas cards; I am not what could be called a greeting-card type, but at Christmas I bow to the general custom. Saw a great many which inspired me with nausea, being depictions of jolly doggies hanging up their stockings, or pretty p.u.s.s.ies doing the same thing; several cards were in what is called "the semi-sacred manner," showing the Holy Family with figures and postures strongly recalling the kewpies who used to appear in the advertis.e.m.e.nts of a famous tomato soup. St. Nicholas, too, appeared on many cards as a frowsy old drunk in a red ski suit, fingering his bulbous nose. In short, everything possible had been done to rob Christmas of its beauty, dignity and significance. It was not in this spirit that d.i.c.kens wrote A Christmas Carol, and it is not in this spirit that I, personally, shall celebrate Christmas. I can stand almost anything except vulgar infantilism, and against that I shall war as long as there is breath in my body.

- XLVIII -.

Sunday: Lay abed this morning, reading dispersedly in several favourite books, and much comforted by my hot water bottle. When I was younger nothing would have persuaded me to confess that I used such an article, but one of the joys of increasing age is that one loses much of one's shame. My hot water bottle is a saucy red job, with a delightfully smooth skin. I call it Abis.h.a.g the Shunammite, and every Sunday School child will know why; infidels may find out by consulting the First Book of Kings, chapter one, verses one to four. A December Sunday morning would be unbearable without Abis.h.a.g. Louis XIV, I once read, possessed 413 splendid beds, but I doubt if he got any more pleasure from them than I from my one humble but convenient couch. The only vexation that can a.s.sail me here is that the covers may be tucked in at the bottom in such a way that they do not reach my chin at the top. But a few spirited kicks soon correct that, and I am in my Earthly Paradise with A the S.

Monday: This Christmas shopping leads a man into the most alarming situations. Decided today to get a bottle of toilet water for my Great-Aunt Lettice, and sought out a shop which had a big display of unguents, balms, lotions, electuaries and the like. Asked for a bottle of scent, and a young woman with more curves than the Burma Road brought out two or three, and poured drops from them on her wrist and arm. Then to my horror she invited me to sniff them! I did so, tentatively. She rippled her muscles like a wrestler. "Young woman, have you any idea where this may lead?" I cried, but she smiled in an oblique manner and said that it was impossible to tell anything about perfume if it were not applied to flesh. I blushed to such a degree that I scorched a handkerchief in my hip pocket. . . At last, after what seemed ages, she sold me a bottle of something at four dollars a quarter ounce, which I fear Aunt Lettice will have to wear in the privacy of her own chamber, for if she ventured into a drawing room with it on she would immediately become the object of embarra.s.sing attentions, and might have to make a run for shelter. I really wanted some lavender water, but this stuff is called Tres Ooomph, and is guaranteed to rouse the dead.

Tuesday: Addressed Christmas cards tonight. There was a time when I used to hunt for the most suitable card for everyone on my list. I chose cards covered with lambs and reindeer for children, snow-scenes for friends who were wintering in Florida, High Church cards for friends of a ritualistic tendency, Low Church cards for evangelicals, Thick Church cards for those whose religion impressed me as a bit thick, cards with coaches and jolly drunken Englishmen on them for my jolly drunken American friends, and so forth. It was a lot of work, and I gave it up long ago. Now I buy my cards in large inexpensive bundles, and send them out in whatever order they happen to come. . . Like everybody else I am sending cards this year to people who sent me cards last year, but whom I forgot last year, and who will not send me cards this year. This desperate game goes on for decades, and there seems to be no way or stopping it. . . On several cards I put messages such as, "Why don't you write?" or "Am writing soon," which is a lie. I have no intention of writing them, but in an excess of Christmas spirit I pretend that serious illness, or the press of affairs, is the only thing which keeps me from sending them a long letter every week.

Wednesday: Was driving with a motorist today who nearly ran down several pedestrians who persisted in crossing streets against the traffic lights; he thought they did it on purpose, and I really think they were trying to commit suicide; some had a hopeless O-G.o.d-let-me-die look on their faces, while others wore the slack grin of idiocy. It seems to me that when people dearly want to die, motorists should be encouraged to a.s.sist them. . . This evening read in Nellie McClung's autobiography that a properly licensed dog has the same right to use the street as a citizen. I am glad that citizens do not exercise their rights as freely as dogs do, however. . . Not long ago a clergyman said to me, apropos a scruffy dog he had with him, "Wouldn't it be a wonderful world if there were nothing but dogs? No wars, no racial discrimination, all friends." Was so stunned by this idea that I said "Yes, indeed" before I knew what I was about. Hurried home and washed my mouth out with soap.

Thursday: Had a long talk with an insurance man today, and was fascinated by the skill with which he avoided talking about my death. This was a game we played between us. We never admitted for a moment that I was mortal, and would some day be one with Napoleon, Homer and Strangler Lewis. Instead we tried imagining what the world would be like if I, purely as a joke, withdrew from it and lolled for a time on a big pink cloud. When it was impossible to avoid the nasty matter completely, he would say: "Now just supposing for a moment that you are Out of The Picture, Mr. Marchbanks. . ." and then we would both smile, as though such a supposition