The Journal of a Disappointed Man Part 39

I can't make out what has come over folk recently: the wit, wisdom and irony on the old tombstones have given place to maudlin sentiment and pious Bible references. Then on the anniversary of the death the custom among poorer cla.s.ses is to publish such pathetic doggerel as the following--cuttings I have taken from time to time from the local newspaper in-:

"Her wish:

"'Farewell dear brother, Mother, sisters, My life was pa.s.sed in love for thee.

Mourn not for me nor sorrow take But love my husband for my sake Until the call comes home to thee, Live thou in peace and harmony.'"

Again:

"A day of remembrance sad to recall But still in my heart he is loved best of all No matter how I think of him--his name I oft recall; There is nothing left to answer me but his photo on the wall."

Or:

"One year has pa.s.sed since that sad day, When one we loved was called away.

G.o.d took her home; it was His will, Forget her?--No, we never will."

These piteous screeds fill me with loving-kindness and with contempt alternately in a pendulum-like rhythm. What is the truth about them? Is the grief of these people as mean and ridiculous as their rhymes? Or is it a pitiful inarticulateness? Or is it merely vulgar advertis.e.m.e.nt of their sorrow? Or does it signify a pa.s.sionate intention never to forget?--or a fear of forgetting, the rhymes being used as a fillip to the memory? Or--most miserable of all--is it just a custom, and one follow'ed in order to appear respectable in others' eyes? Are they poor souls? or contemptible fools?

_September_ 14.

There is a ridiculous c.o.c.ker spaniel at the house where we are staying.

He must have had a love affair and been jilted, or else he's a sort of village idiot. The landlady says he's not so silly as he looks--but he looks very silly: he languishes sentimentally, and when we laugh at him he looks "hurt." To-day we took him up on the Down and it seemed to brighten him up. Really, he is sane enough, with plenty of commonsense and good manners. But he is kept at home in the garden so much, lolling about all day, that as E---- said, having nothing to do, he falls in love.

The _Sat.u.r.day Review_ writes: The effect of the "Brides and the Bath"

Case on people with any trace of _nice feeling_ is perhaps not particularly mischievous, tho' the thing is repulsive and hateful to them.... To gloat over the details of repulsive horrors, simply _from motives of curiosity_--this is bad and degrading.

What a lot of repulsive things the nice refined people who read the _Sat.u.r.day Review_ must find in the world just now. For example the War.

"Simply from motives of curiosity." Why certainly, no other than these, concerning one of the most remarkable murders in the annals of crime.

And murders anyhow are d.a.m.ned interesting--which the _Sat.u.r.day Review_ isn't.

_Chipples_

I was surprised to discover the other day that when I talked of Chipples no one understood what I meant! It proves to be a dialect word familiar to all residents in Devons.h.i.+re and designating spring onions. Anyway you won't find it in Murray's Dictionary; yet etymologically it is an extremely interesting word and a thoroughly good word with a splendid pedigree. To wit:

Italian: Cipollo.

Spanish: Cebolla.

French: Ciboule.

Latin: Caepulla, dim. of caepa (_cf_. cive, civot).

Now how did this pretty little alien manage to settle down among simple Devon folk? What has been the relation between Italy and--say Appledore, or Plymouth?[1]

_October_ 6.

In London once more, living at her flat and using her furniture.

_The Chalcidoidea_

The Chalcidoidea are minute winged insects that parasitise other insects, and in the _Memoirs of the Queensland Museum_ (Vol. I., 1912) you shall find an enormous catalogue of them by a person named Girault who writes the following dedication:

"I respectfully dedicate this little portion of work to science, common sense or true knowledge. I am convinced that human welfare is so dependent upon science that civilisation would not endure without it, and that what is meant by progress would be impossible. Also I am convinced that the great majority of mankind are too ignorant, that education is too archaic and impractical as looked at from the standpoint of intrinsic knowledge. There is too little known of the essential unity of the Universe and of things included, for instance, man himself. Opinions and prejudices rule in the place of what is true...."

Part II. is dedicated to:

"The genius of mankind, especially to that form of it expressed in monistic philosophy, whose conceived perception is the highest attainment reached by man."

I can only echo Whistler's remark one day as he stood before an execrably bad drawing "G.o.d bless my soul"--uttered slowly and thoughtfully and then repeated.

The beauty of it is that the Editor adds a serious footnote, dissociating himself, and a Scarabee to whom I shewed the Work, read it with a clouded brow and then said: "I think it rather out of place in a paper of this sort." (Tableau.)

_October_ 12.

Down with influenza.

_October_ 13.

A Zeppelin raid last night. I am down with a temperature, but our little household remained quite calm, thank G.o.d. We heard guns going off, and I had a fit of trembling as I lay in bed. Many dead of heart failure owing to the excitement.

_October_ 14.

Still in bed. No raid last night. There were two raids on Wednesday, one at 9.30, and another at midnight. The first time the caretaker of the flats came up very alarmed to say "Zeppelins about," so we put out the lights. Then at midnight when everyone else was asleep I heard a big voice shout up from the street: "Lights out there. They're about again."

Lay still in bed and waited. Distant gunfire.

_October_ 17.

Bad heart attack.

_October_ 18.

Heart intermits. Every three or four minutes. M---- said that I ought to be getting used to it by now! Phew!! Very nervy and pusillanimous.

Taking strychnine in strong doses. I hope dear E---- does not catch the 'flu. She swallows quinine with large hopes.

_October_ 19.

Staying at R----. Had a ghastly journey down, changing trains twice at Clapham Junction and at Croydon, heart intermitting all the time in every position. Poor E---- with me. To-day surprised to find myself still alive.

_October_ 20.

Better to-day. After much persuasion, I have got E---- to let the flat so that we can get away into the country outside the Zeppelin zone.

_October_ 24.

Back in London again. Am better, bolstered up with a.r.s.enic and strychnine. Too nervously excited to do any work.

_October_ 25.

The letting of our flat is now in the hands of an agent, and E----, poor dear, is quite resigned to abandoning all her precious wallpapers, etc.