Delphi Complete Works of Stephen Leacock, page 669
As to English, the very best English, I imagine it sounds to foreigners just, ‘Wah, wah, wah, oh, weally?’ Gaelic is like a hiccough in the nose, and for all I know there may be something wrong even with the sound of English-Canadian as used at the University of Toronto.
But still more odd, to me, is the effect when foreigners try to use one another’s languages, in phrases and quotations, and always twist their own ideas into it.
Take the case of English and French. English people always imagine that they are talking excellent French when they speak of ‘the bon ton,’ or say that they are ‘si, si, fatigués,’ or when they call a cabman a cochon.
Similarly, French people think themselves terrifically English when they talk of ‘le high-life,’ and ‘le five-o’clock,’ and when they offer one another ‘un shake hands.’ They really have the idea that an Englishman drapes himself in a ‘smoking’ — the last word in aristocratic ease. When they want ‘bacon and eggs’ they call for ‘un baking,’ supposed to be the English idiom for the combination. In the same way an Englishman in Paris tries in vain to get a glass of ‘sherry,’ calling ‘chérie’ in a mincing voice — and doesn’t get it. At best the waiter brings him cherry brandy. The French for ‘sherry’ is ‘Herreth,’ but only the forty members of the French Academy know this. It is the French pronunciation of Spanish ‘Xeres’ and if you remember that the Spanish X is as aspirate guttural as the French H only a breathing, you realize that you had better drink something else.
But French people are at their best when they tackle English titles and talk of ‘Sir Smith’ and ‘Sir Jones’ and ‘Milord Neville’ and ‘Milord Laird Macduff,’ and ‘Mister the Earl.’
This mixture of idiom is not altogether displeasing; and it was only natural that in the year of the Coronation and the Paris Exposition it should serve to cement the alliance of the two great nations.
It was with this in mind that I put together for the Paris stage the little play which follows. Need I say that it was an overwhelming success? No, I don’t think I need to.
The Two Milords
or
The Blow of Thunder
An Internationally Air-Conditioned Play, for the
Coronation-Exposition Theatres of 1937
Piece in One Scene
Personages of the Piece, in the Order of Their
Apparition
Milord Sir Ross: Ancient Remnant of old High Scotch, sufficiently aged. He will never see again the quarantine, in effect, one would say well the sixantine. But he guards always the high and erect tail of the Scottish race. Sir Ross has adventured himself on the high Finance of the French Purse at Paris.
Jean: Chamber valet, type known.
Milord the Baron Alphonse de Citrouille: French financier, associated of Sir Ross. He is young and high, with the maintenance rather of a man of affairs than of a stump of the old French aristocracy.
Miladi Madame la Comtesse Fifine Ross: The French wife of Sir Ross. She is young, very spiritual and very jolly, and very degaged in her allure.
The scene passes itself at Paris, in the apartment of Sir Ross, apartment sufficiently chic, one would say even coquette. One divines in its decoration the hand of a Frenchwoman.
At the lift of the curtain, Sir Ross discovers himself elongated on a long chair. He is carrying a smoking, with a black pants. He has a journal in his hand, his eyes plonged in the list of the actions of the Purse of the Morning.
He sounds. Jean appears. ‘Mister sounded?’ ‘Yes, make me mount the journal of this evening.’ ‘Mister, it is not yet arrived.’ ‘Very well; the moment it arrives make it mount the whole suite.’ ‘Perfect, mister.’
Jean makes a false start and then re-enters to announce: ‘Milord the Baron de Citrouille!’
The Baron de Citrouille advances himself in the chamber; Sir Ross, to receive him, dresses himself on his sitting-part.
The Baron, in giving him a cordial shake-hands: No, no, do not put yourself on end. I pray you, rest there.
The Baron goes to place himself on end near the chimney. He is not in tenure of evening, but wears a complete of bureau, to know, a jacket, an open chemise, with a grey pants.
Both milords carry an air of anxiety, above all Sir Ross.
Sir Ross (Taking the word first): You come from the city?
The Baron: From the Purse itself.
Sir Ross: And our affairs, our actions?
The Baron: One cannot more bad — all our actions sink!
Sir Ross (With an effort): An instant! I forget my duties: you must be fatigued. You will drink something. Let me make you mount a bottle of whiskey-scotch. (He sounds.)
The Baron: My faith, you are very amiable. But let it be a half bottle: I am very little drinker.
Sir Ross (To Jean, who appears): Make seek a half bottle of whiskey-scotch, and mount it here.
Jean: Yes, mister.
Sir Ross: Mount it yourself and with it mount the evening journal.
Jean (Hoisting his shoulders): Still always not here, mister. (He sorts.)
Sir Ross (Essaying a calm): And if the actions always fall?
The Baron (Passing to a gridiron and taking on it a cigarette, which he lights. He speaks of a tone measured, calculated.): Then there is nothing more to do, we are at dry of money.
Sir Ross: Then it is the ruin!
The Baron (Coldly): For you!
Sir Ross (Lifting himself from his sitting-part and erecting himself to the height of his high tail): For me! How for you? For you, too, Citrouille!
The Baron is about to take the word when Jean re-enters, carrying a plateau with a glass and a half bottle of whiskey-scotch. He reverses it and places it before the Baron.
Sir Ross: The journal, the journal of this evening?
Jean (A little impatiented): Mister, still not here. But Madame la Comtesse has re-entered from her walk in her automobile, and is mounted at her boudoir.
Sir Ross: Pray her to descend; that she does not wait; make her know that it is important.
Jean: Yes, mister. (He inclines himself and sorts.)
Sir Ross (Remitting himself on his sitting-part and resuming the entertainment): But you! Ruin for you also, Mister the Baron. For both of us — as associates — is it not?
The Baron (Raising the glass and coldly drinking the half bottle of whiskey-scotch): For you alone!
Sir Ross: But you?
The Baron: I did not sign!
Sir Ross: But your honour! Mister the Baron, your honour as a Citrouille!
The Baron (Hoisting): I mock myself not badly of it! In the affairs, there is not of it! Listen, Sir Ross —
He goes to plant himself direct in face of Sir Ross, who holds himself seated always on his sitting-part. Listen.
At that moment Jean announces: Madame la Comtesse!
Fifine precipitates herself into the room — then arrests herself — in appearance surprised, confused, almost ball-turned, to find both the two men there.
The Baron de Citrouille remains on end; he gives no sign; he does not look at Fifine, nor Fifine at him.
Sir Ross speaks: Ah, you have come at once. It is very amiable on your part. I have to talk — but first let me present Mister the Baron of Citrouille. You know him well of name, is it not? La Comtesse Fifine Ross, my wife.
The two incline themselves.
Madame la Comtesse (Finding her voice): How do you carry yourself, Mister de Citrouille?
De Citrouille: How go you, madame?
One sees that they seem to avoid themselves of their eyes. One divines something of intrigue, of hidden. But Sir Ross does not see nothing. He lifts himself suddenly from his sitting-part and cries himself: Rest, rest with my wife. I myself will descend: this scoundrel of a John is hiding something. (He elongates himself in a hurry.)
Fifine (Pushing a profound breath of relief): Ah. I expected to find you alone — only you — (She precipitates herself towards him.) Ah, Alphonse! My cherished!
They rush towards one another. The Baron passes his arm to her around the tail and poses his lips on to hers. They murmur words of love: Ah, my cherished! My cabbage! My cauliflower! My toad!
Fifine (At last enforcing herself to quit his extraint): That marches?
The Baron: That marches! That marches marvellously! I have not told him yet. I was just going to. Everything has succeeded for us to a marvel. It was all over to-day. And what he does not know, not suspect even, for him not dishonour alone — it is the prison. Ah! (He lights a cigarette with cold blood.) He will not trouble us no more!
Fifine: Explain to me, a little, my cabbage. I have not yet even clearly understood. We other women, it is not for us, the Purse. How did you combine it, my petty toad? (She passes to him the fingers in the hairs.) Tell me how.
The Baron: Of the simplest fashion! As our actions lowered I made him sign hypothèques of margin, you comprehend, to sustain them — hypothequès which he had not the right to allocate, let it be then even for amortization —
Fifine (Closing to him the mouth with her jolly palm): Oh, la, la, la! leave all that. I do not comprehend a word. But I know what it means to us. Oh, my God! What happiness! (She throws herself in his arms.)
One hears voices below — a tumult — a blow of revolver.
Jean (Entering, all exsuffled): Madame! Monsieur!
Both: What is it what it is?
Jean: Madame! Monsieur! It is the Police!
The Baron: The Police!
Jean: Yes, the Police! She is here! She came to take Milord Sir Ross.
The Baron (With a calm): And then what?
Jean: Sir Ross asked for a moment — to seek papers — and then, there below — in the dining-room — he made his brain jump!
De Citrouille: He made his brain jump! He burnt his brain!
Jean: With a blow of revolver.
De Citrouille: He is dead?
Jean: Oui, monsieur, he is dead. (Jean melts into tears and sorts.)
Lady Fifine: Ah, mon chou! Viens, donc! Viens, mon crapaud!
Curtain
IX. MY NEWSPAPER AND HOW I READ IT
A PRESS CLUB Talk with Apologies
I get my newspaper in the dark of early morning, just before daylight. I rise, like a farm hand, before the sun (the sun’s too slow for me), and at that hour I am working, over a dish of tea, in my study. So just before it’s light I hear the click of the letter-box downstairs, or, if it’s really cold, the crunch of the newspaper man’s feet in the snow.
I go down in my dressing-gown and flick on the hall light and pick up the paper, and that is the way all the world’s news has come to me, now these more than thirty years.
I take a first look at the paper, standing there, just to make sure that nothing big has happened, nothing that I’d have to read right away. No, it’s all right, nothing happened. Two hundred thousand Chinese drowned in the floods of the Hoo-poo river — that’s all right — I don’t even know the river. And the President of Paraguay shot — I hadn’t even known his name, Senor Something. But nothing big has happened, like the King of England abdicating or the Duke of Kent having another baby.
So with that I take the paper upstairs to have a real look at it, over a fresh cup of tea in the arm-chair beside my study table, before I go on with my work.
The first thing I look for is to see what the United States Supreme Court has thrown out now. In our Canadian newspaper, the United States Supreme Court always throws things out from the top left-hand corner. It’s quickest. Yes, there it is sure enough— ‘QQA Thrown out by Supreme Court.’ . . . ‘By a vote of . . .’ Exactly. . . . ‘Judges A and B dissenting . . .’ That’s it, they always do. ‘. . . declares Constitution endangered.’ Fine! It always is. . . . ‘President tells the newspapers’ — of course he does.
Now that’s going to make good reading. But I never like to spoil a thing by a hurried first reading. That needs thought, a thing like the QQA. There will be some really nice constitutional points involved; for all I know, that act may be ultra vires or even vicious. So I always keep the QQA stuff to read carefully and properly later on — and I never do; that’s why I still don’t know why they threw out the APA and YMCA and the OGPU, and all those acts that the Supreme Court has chucked out in the last three years.
Never mind, let’s have a glance, just a running glance, at the foreign news — I mean as we get it in our Canadian papers. Let me see: ‘Stanley Baldwin defies Mussolini’ — that’s the stuff! ‘Stanley Baldwin warns Germany’ — that’s right. They need it. ‘Stanley Baldwin rebukes France.’ Yes, be a little gentle with them, Stanley. ‘Soviet must change its tone,’ says Baldwin. That’s fine! Good stuff!
Now let’s see what follows. ‘Mussolini defies Baldwin.’ He does, does he? The Italian pup! How can he expect a great, peaceful people like the English to stand for that sort of thing? Ha! and here’s the answer in the same column. ‘Chancellor of Exchequer says Britain will spend Ten Billion Sterling on Peaceful Preparation.’ You realize, Mussolini, the crushing power of our national wealth! ‘Will Borrow Money in United States.’ Precisely; we don’t even need to spend our own; they’ll give it to us.
And then, I admit, I turn the pages over quite suddenly to see what price the Jellaboo Mine is quoted at. I’d been wanting to all the time, but I didn’t like to. What is the Jellaboo Mine? It’s the one I have shares in just now. I bought at 20 cents. Where is it? It is on the last page of the financial section, under the heading Over the Counter Mines. Oh! you mean, where is the Mine? I’ve no idea. Near Flin Flon? It may be. Or close to the Hollinger? Very likely. I shouldn’t be surprised if it’s right in between the two of them. All I care about is that I bought it at 20 cents.
Listen. I don’t want to teach anybody to speculate. For young people, especially, speculation spells ruin. Even people with absolutely nothing may lose everything they have. But I will say this, let the moral consequences be what they may. I know nothing that can brighten up a dull life quicker than to take what you can afford to lose, afford to throw away, and put it in a ‘penny’ mine. That’s the only way to play poker, the only way to do many things in life. On that basis nations could raise huge sums in lotteries and give the people at large nothing but fun. If only we were wise enough! Life for all but the fortunate few, under modern conditions, has become so cheerless in its prospect, all seen before it happens, a march down a long avenue of daily work, the hours foreseen, the little break of leisure far ahead, on either side the hedge-line of limited means, and down all the long line no golden fairy, no sudden oncoming of adventure or fortune, no opening of an Aladdin’s Cave in the hedgerow. — That’s why nations go to war, why men quit their wives, and bandits hold up bankers! All that the Jellaboo Mine can banish; it may be the Door of the Cave. Think of it, 20 cents! A lot of our Canadian mines began at 20 cents and went from that to God knows what! Think of it.
I bought the Jellaboo at 20 cents and yesterday it had got up to 25 — at least the paper said 25 asked; no one seemed to dare to bid. . . .
After the Jellaboo Mine, I always leave the rest of the news to read much later on, at breakfast, with the paper propped up against the coffee-pot. That’s how I read all the fragmentary stuff, the really human items. Most of this human stuff seems to come to us from the United States. There’s more of it there. You know what I mean: ‘Bandits carry away safe from National Bank.’— ‘Chicago professor claims Man is an Ape.’— ‘Iowa boy weighs 600 pounds.’ —
You can take that stuff in by the column with your marmalade; there is no strain in it. The only thing that worries me about the human news is that there’s so much of it that never seems to get finished. You never know what happened about it in the end. Either the paper doesn’t say, or else you forget to look, I don’t know which. For example, that man, Three-Fingered Jack, who was to have been extradited from Florida for killing the girl in Montana by hitting her with a saxophone — did that all die out? Or, most typical of all, that Great Australian Cricket Match — how did it end? Our papers have a way of suddenly boosting a Great Australian Cricket Match — not a real one, apparently, but what they call a test one — and then letting it drop. The Australians go to bat and make 720 runs: then the English, all England, go to bat, and they bat and bat all day — and make ever so many runs, but some of them get out — and they bat and bat — mind you, all England, it says. The thing fills half a column with stuff about how they kept on batting leg-breaks, and slow googlies, batted and batted, and then the paper forgets to go on with it — or I do — and I never know how it ended. In thirty years I have never heard the end of a cricket match.
I must now stop, and go downstairs, and, yes, this time, I will — I’ll take a look right away at the Jellaboo Mine. Perhaps she’s away up, eh?
X. WHY I AM LEAVING MY FARM. I CAN’T LIVE UP TO IT
(A LUNCH CLUB Talk that was designed to stop the Back to the Land Movement. It killed it dead.)
My! But these farmers are wonderful fellows — I mean the words they use and the education they must have! I never realized it till just recently when I retired from being a professor and came to settle down on my little place that I call a farm.
I hadn’t had anything to do with a farm since I lived on one as a little boy, more than fifty years ago. I am amazed at the change! I’m not sufficiently educated for it. I’ll have to go back to the city.
I mean like this — a few days ago I bought a bottle of poison to use against garden bugs, and it had on the label, ‘The antidote to this poison is any alkali emetic followed by an emollient febrifuge’! Just think of it! Imagine a farmer’s wife calling downstairs: ‘William! Baby has been eating shoeblacking! Throw me up an alkali emetic and follow it with an emollient febrifuge!’ And the farmer would probably call back: ‘All right! And you’d better handle baby very carefully. Lift him up with callipers!’
