WHAT MRS. WILKINS THOUGHT ABOUT IT.
LAST year, travelling on the Underground Railway, I met a man; he was oneof the saddest-looking men I had seen for years. I used to know him wellin the old days when we were journalists together. I asked him, in asympathetic tone, how things were going with him. I expected hisresponse would be a flood of tears, and that in the end I should have tofork out a fiver. To my astonishment, his answer was that things weregoing exceedingly well with him. I did not want to say to him bluntly:
“Then what has happened to you to make you look like a mute at atemperance funeral?” I said:
“And how are all at home?”
I thought that if the trouble lay there he would take the opportunity.It brightened him somewhat, the necessity of replying to the question.It appeared that his wife was in the best of health.
“You remember her,” he continued with a smile; “wonderful spirits, alwayscheerful, nothing seems to put her out, not even—”
He ended the sentence abruptly with a sigh.
His mother-in-law, I learned from further talk with him, had died since Ihad last met him, and had left them a comfortable addition to theirincome. His eldest daughter was engaged to be married.
“It is entirely a love match,” he explained, “and he is such a dear, goodfellow, that I should not have made any objection even had he been poor.But, of course, as it is, I am naturally all the more content.”
His eldest boy, having won the Mottle Scholarship, was going up toCambridge in the Autumn. His own health, he told me, had greatlyimproved; and a novel he had written in his leisure time promised to beone of the successes of the season. Then it was that I spoke plainly.
“If I am opening a wound too painful to be touched,” I said, “tell me.If, on the contrary, it is an ordinary sort of trouble upon which thesympathy of a fellow worker may fall as balm, let me hear it.”
“So far as I am concerned,” he replied, “I should be glad to tell you.Speaking about it does me good, and may lead—so I am always in hopes—toan idea. But, for your own sake, if you take my advice, you will notpress me.”
“How can it affect me?” I asked, “it is nothing to do with me, is it?”
“It need have nothing to do with you,” he answered, “if you are sensibleenough to keep out of it. If I tell you: from this time onward it willbe your trouble also. Anyhow, that is what has happened in four otherseparate cases. If you like to be the fifth and complete the half dozenof us, you are welcome. But remember I have warned you.”
“What has it done to the other five?” I demanded.
“It has changed them from cheerful, companionable persons into gloomyone-idead bores,” he told me. “They think of but one thing, they talk ofbut one thing, they dream of but one thing. Instead of getting over it,as time goes on, it takes possession of them more and more. There aremen, of course, who would be unaffected by it—who could shake it off. Iwarn you in particular against it, because, in spite of all that is said,I am convinced you have a sense of humour; and that being so, it will layhold of you. It will plague you night and day. You see what it has madeof me! Three months ago a lady interviewer described me as of a sunnytemperament. If you know your own business you will get out at the nextstation.”
I wish now I had followed his advice. As it was, I allowed my curiosityto take possession of me, and begged him to explain. And he did so.
“It was just about Christmas time,” he said. “We were discussing theDrury Lane Pantomime—some three or four of us—in the smoking room of theDevonshire Club, and young Gold said he thought it would prove a mistake,the introduction of a subject like the Fiscal question into the story ofHumpty Dumpty. The two things, so far as he could see, had nothing to dowith one another. He added that he entertained a real regard for Mr. DanLeno, whom he had once met on a steamboat, but that there were othertopics upon which he would prefer to seek that gentleman’s guidance.Nettleship, on the other hand, declared that he had no sympathy with theargument that artists should never intrude upon public affairs. Theactor was a fellow citizen with the rest of us. He said that, whetherone agreed with their conclusions or not, one must admit that the nationowed a debt of gratitude to Mrs. Brown Potter and to Miss Olga Nethersolefor giving to it the benefit of their convictions. He had talked to bothladies in private on the subject and was convinced they knew as muchabout it as did most people.
“Burnside, who was one of the party, contended that if sides were to betaken, a pantomime should surely advocate the Free-Food Cause, seeing itwas a form of entertainment supposed to appeal primarily to the tastes ofthe Little Englander. Then I came into the discussion.
“‘The Fiscal question,’ I said, ‘is on everybody’s tongue. Such beingthe case, it is fit and proper it should be referred to in our annualpantomime, which has come to be regarded as a review of the year’sdoings. But it should not have been dealt with from the politicalstandpoint. The proper attitude to have assumed towards it was that ofinnocent raillery, free from all trace of partisanship.’
“Old Johnson had strolled up and was standing behind us.
“‘The very thing I have been trying to get hold of for weeks,’ he said—‘abright, amusing _resumé_ of the whole problem that should give offence toneither side. You know our paper,’ he continued; ‘we steer clear ofpolitics, but, at the same time, try to be up-to-date; it is not alwayseasy. The treatment of the subject, on the lines you suggest, is justwhat we require. I do wish you would write me something.’
“He is a good old sort, Johnson; it seemed an easy thing. I said Iwould. Since that time I have been thinking how to do it. As a matterof fact, I have not thought of much else. Maybe you can suggestsomething.”
I was feeling in a good working mood the next morning.
“Pilson,” said I to myself, “shall have the benefit of this. He does notneed anything boisterously funny. A few playfully witty remarks on thesubject will be the ideal.”
I lit a pipe and sat down to think. At half-past twelve, having to writesome letters before going out to lunch, I dismissed the Fiscal questionfrom my mind.
But not for long. It worried me all the afternoon. I thought, maybe,something would come to me in the evening. I wasted all that evening,and I wasted all the following morning. Everything has its amusing side,I told myself. One turns out comic stories about funerals, aboutweddings. Hardly a misfortune that can happen to mankind but hasproduced its comic literature. An American friend of mine once took acontract from the Editor of an Insurance Journal to write four humorousstories; one was to deal with an earthquake, the second with a cyclone,the third with a flood, and the fourth with a thunderstorm. And moreamusing stories I have never read. What is the matter with the Fiscalquestion?
I myself have written lightly on Bime-metallism. Home Rule we used to bemerry over in the eighties. I remember one delightful evening at theCodgers’ Hall. It would have been more delightful still, but for araw-boned Irishman, who rose towards eleven o’clock and requested to beinformed if any other speaker was wishful to make any more jokes on thesubject of Ould Ireland; because, if so, the raw-boned gentleman wasprepared to save time by waiting and dealing with them altogether. Butif not, then—so the raw-boned gentleman announced—his intention was to gofor the last speaker and the last speaker but two at once and withoutfurther warning.
No other humourist rising, the raw-boned gentleman proceeded to make goodhis threat, with the result that the fun degenerated somewhat. Even onthe Boer War we used to whisper jokes to one another in quiet places. Inthis Fiscal question there must be fun. Where is it?
For days I thought of little else. My laundress—as we call them in theTemple—noticed my trouble.
“Mrs. Wilkins,” I confessed, “I am trying to think of somethinginnocently amusing to say on the Fiscal question.”
“I’ve ’eard about it,” she said, “but I don’t ’ave much time to read thepapers. They want to make us pay mo
re for our food, don’t they?”
“For some of it,” I explained. “But, then, we shall pay less for otherthings, so that really we shan’t be paying more at all.”
“There don’t seem much in it, either way,” was Mrs. Wilkins’ opinion.
“Just so,” I agreed, “that is the advantage of the system. It will costnobody anything, and will result in everybody being better off.”
“The pity is,” said Mrs. Wilkins “that pity nobody ever thought of itbefore.”
“The whole trouble hitherto,” I explained, “has been the foreigner.”
“Ah,” said Mrs. Wilkins, “I never ’eard much good of ’em, though they dosay the Almighty ’as a use for almost everything.”
“These foreigners,” I continued, “these Germans and Americans, they dumpthings on us, you know.”
“What’s that?” demanded Mrs. Wilkins.
“What’s dump? Well, it’s dumping, you know. You take things, and youdump them down.”
“But what things? ’Ow do they do it?” asked Mrs. Wilkins.
“Why, all sorts of things: pig iron, bacon, door-mats—everything. Theybring them over here—in ships, you understand—and then, if you please,just dump them down upon our shores.”
“You don’t mean surely to tell me that they just throw them out and leavethem there?” queried Mrs. Wilkins.
“Of course not,” I replied; “when I say they dump these things upon ourshores, that is a figure of speech. What I mean is they sell them tous.”
“But why do we buy them if we don’t want them?” asked Mrs. Wilkins;“we’re not bound to buy them, are we?”
“It is their artfulness,” I explained, “these Germans and Americans, andthe others; they are all just as bad as one another—they insist onselling us these things at less price than they cost to make.”
“It seems a bit silly of them, don’t it?” thought Mrs. Wilkins. “Isuppose being foreigners, poor things, they ain’t naturally got muchsense.”
“It does seem silly of them, if you look at it that way,” I admitted,“but what we have got to consider is, the injury it is doing us.”
“Don’t see ’ow it can do us much ’arm,” argued Mrs. Wilkins; “seems a bitof luck so far as we are concerned. There’s a few more things they’d bewelcome to dump round my way.”
“I don’t seem to be putting this thing quite in the right light to you,Mrs. Wilkins,” I confessed. “It is a long argument, and you might not beable to follow it; but you must take it as a fact now generally admittedthat the cheaper you buy things the sooner your money goes. By allowingthe foreigner to sell us all these things at about half the cost price,he is getting richer every day, and we are getting poorer. Unless we, asa country, insist on paying at least twenty per cent. more for everythingwe want, it is calculated that in a very few years England won’t have apenny left.”
“Sounds a bit topsy turvy,” suggested Mrs. Wilkins.
“It may sound so,” I answered, “but I fear there can be no doubt of it.The Board of Trade Returns would seem to prove it conclusively.”
“Well, God be praised, we’ve found it out in time,” ejaculated Mrs.Wilkins piously.
“It is a matter of congratulation,” I agreed; “the difficulty is that agood many other people say that far from being ruined, we are doing verywell indeed, and are growing richer every year.”
“But ’ow can they say that,” argued Mrs. Wilkins, “when, as you tell me,those Trade Returns prove just the opposite?”
“Well, they say the same, Mrs. Wilkins, that the Board of Trade Returnsprove just the opposite.”
“Well, they can’t both be right,” said Mrs. Wilkins.
“You would be surprised, Mrs. Wilkins,” I said, “how many things can beproved from Board of Trade Returns!”
But I have not yet thought of that article for Pilson.
Idle Ideas in 1905 Page 18
