Molesworth

by Geoffrey Willans

  FOOPBALL

  Foopball is a tuough game but it is a pity you canot win by hacking everbode. You hav to be nippy. You hav also to be agile cuning alert skeming courageous and imbecile. But there are a few of us who are only imbeciles cheers cheers cheers and just do wot we can to pla our humble part in that well-oiled foopballing machine which is the st custards eleven i.e. thro mud cakes at fotherington-tomas, encourage skool dog to trip referee and diskuss influence of t. s. eliot on 20th century drama with a few progresive-thinking players of like interests. Another thing we do to cheet the long hours of boredom of the foopball field on a winters afternoon is to diskuss composition of all-time world eleven

  i think a few of those would hold their own in any company and there mite even be a revolution in foopball methods.

  MATCHES

  st custards was agog with excitement on the day of the match with their grate rivals, porridge court. And then came the bio which spread consternation through the skool making faces in maths classes glumer even than ushual. Hary mugwort, the briliant centre forward, had been put into deten by sigismund the mad maths master for saing BANG whenever a perpendicular was droped. He must miss the match and who would take his place? nigel molesworth was quietly tuoughing up the junior ticks when the footer captain tapped him on the shoulder. ‘You are in the team, molesworth,’ he sa. ‘Gratters.’

  ‘OO gosh wot me. Where will i pla eh?’

  ‘Centre forward.’

  molesworth then fanted and was revived by the larffter of the junior ticks.

  ‘oo ha-ha-ha-ha look at baby molesworth who couldn’t kick a flea ect. He thinks he is going to be the hero of the match but we kno beter. Much beter. We kno the match is as good as lost Hahahaha.’

  * * *

  Hurra! a mighty cheer broke as porridge court scored their eighth gole. With only 5 minits to go the match looked safe for this unsemely colection of huge louts and bulies.

  ‘Come on st custards,’ sa the footer captain cheerfuly. ‘Only 8 goles down. We can do it. Pla up and pla the game.’

  ‘8 goles?’ sa molesworth. ‘Gosh.’

  So far he had not touched the ball except to tap it off from the centre. He had been the weak link in the chain. Now he determined to pla his natural game. Instead of a tap he kicked off with a tremendous boot at the gole. The ball stuned the fuleback and went into the gole. One to st custard’s. Porridge court kicked off only for molesworth to gane posession and do it agane. He scored from all quarters of the field – 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and, in the last seconds, a mighty crash from a gole kick drove the ball into the porridge court net to win the match. Hurra! The exultant spektators dashed across the field to chair their hero into the pav. . . . . .

  Poor saps, i supose you believed all that. You lapped it up, eh, like all those skoolboy stories. But life is not like that. It is not like wot dickens and all those write either.

  A REEL MATCH

  I am sory to sa it but in reel life foopball matches are a bit diferent. First the porridge court team arive they all look like giants tuough tuough but with blue knees. They hav a keen master with them who sa ‘Warm up knees bend got your coshes. Each of you get into your man and maim him. Here are your gloves golekeeper the lead is inside.’

  He then go off to the touchline to cheer and exhort. The rest of st custard’s then arive saing yar boo sucks while masters lash them with knouts. They are then herded at pistol point and made to sing st custard’s cheer

  Boom-walla boom walla

  Geese walla geese walla

  st custard’s hooray!

  At this moment gold-plated rolls royce arive with visiting headmaster. Headmasters greet each other.

  Well how are you hoggwart eh wot eh.1 We hav not a bad team won all our last six matches quite promising.2 Of course we are up to 99 boys can’t get another bed in the place.3 And of course royalty is a great responsibility for all.4 But we are building up quite a little shall we sa kno-how 5 in that direction ha-ha.

  REEL THORTS OF ST CUSTARD’S HEADMASTER

  1. Older and fatter bad colour.

  2. Buys his players wot was the transfer fee.

  3. Curses curses.

  4. Wait till they ask for the porn ticket on the crown jewels.

  5. Kno-how? treble fees and toothpaste extra.

  Peep! the shrill whistle go (keats) the match begin. Headmasters charge up and down the touchline belowing at the tops of their voices.

  COME ON PORRIDGE COURT LETS HAV A GOLE. PILE INTO YOUR MEN. MARK THEM. CROSBY-KERSHAW-PARKINSON (Hon. The A.P.R.)

  Thring creeps round the other way

  MARK YOUR MAN. FOUL! SEND HIM OFF! WILL MILORD KINDLY GET HIS FAT HEAD TO THE BALL? IF YOUR HIGHNESS WILL PERMIT ME AFFAIRS OF STATE ARE NOT MORE IMPORTANT THAN CRASHING THE LEATHER INTO THE RETICULE. NO SWEET PRINCE NOT YOUR OWN RETICULE YOU SEE WOT YOU HAV DONE. ON AGANE PORRIDGE COURT ECT.

  It is a funy thing tho your side always gets beaten whichever skool you are at. That is like life i supose, fotherington-tomas skips about when he is golie ‘Hullo trees Hullo birds.’ ect. He luv only bountiful nature and perhaps he is right.

  SHOOTING

  This sounds more fun than it aktualy is. They lend you a gun it is true but you are not alowed to shoot anything you realy want to chiz i.e. masters, the matron, robins, etc. chiz. You could hav wizard fun if you pretend they were red indians chiz but you hav to aim at a weedy target. You mite get a bird of fotherington-tomas by mistake like this but there is not much chance. Besides, they always tell you not to point a gun. If you do not point it wot use is a gun i would like to kno?

  SWIMING

  Agane the iron hand of authority prevent us from geting the best out of swiming which would otherwise be full of belyflopers, duckings atomic splashes and the shouts and cries of those who perish. Listed we are suspended like a spider chiz on the end of a pole and told to strike out. Most boys in this position do not strike out but suck in which do not help, if i had my way i would be a frogman and look super in a ruber suit and webbed feet but pop sa it is rather xpensive. Anyway peason tell me i look like a frogman without suit or feet chiz chiz so i stooge off to punkture fotherington-tomas ickle pritty water wings.

  CONKERS

  Conkers is an old-fashioned game which hav been played by generations of british boys. You kno what hapens you pick up a huge horse chestnut which look absolutely super like a derby winner and put some string through it. Then you chalenge grabber or gilibrand who hav a conkerer of 20. You say weedy things like

  Obbly obbly onker

  My first conker

  Hay ho hay nonny no ect.

  Honour your oponent and turn round on the points of your toes. After that you whirl your conker round and hurl it at the dangling target hem-hem. Successful conkers are always shriveled and weedy. Wot hapens is that your conker either shaters into a milion pieces or flies through the nearest window crash crash tinkle tinkle. (‘i shall make you pay from your poket-money, molesworth, not becos i need the money but becos you must face the consequences of your actions.’)

  What is needed in conkers is a new scientific approach. We are too conservative. As new elizabethans we must adventure with science i.e. select a new conker bombard it with uranium 238 (element 92) folow it with a beam of nitrogen atoms fired from a 60 inch cyclotron. If it stands this all the neutrons will hav gummed together in a nucleus. If it do not, turn the cyclotron on molesworth 2 or fotherington-tomas and see wot it do to them. If they disintegrate in less than 2.3 minits the thanks of mankind should be yours but you may be ahead of your time chiz.

  SNAKES AND LADERS

  If you hav a quiet half hour with one of your dear companions like peason or gillibrand what is nicer than a game of snakes and laders? Aktualy quite a number of things are nicer like a film of marylyn monroe a quiet cig or a plateful of roste turkey but you do not get these things at skool chiz so it have to be snakes and laders.

  How to Play. Face oponent and lay all gats and coshes on the hall t
able. Setle the stakes at 5 bob a corner. Inspect dice. Turn round and tuough up junior ticks for looking. Start cheerfuly go up laders cheers cheers go down snakes. Dice fly and are lost in w.p.b. Stare at snakes and observe resemblance to certain of your contemporaries hem-hem. Go down snake and start agane. Now not so cheerful. Oponent come down. More cheerful. This go on until you are 997 years old and dying of old age. You could take up chess instead but you may find the game too fast.

  THE GYMNASIUM

  Wot makes a boy healthy and splendid with giant and rip-ling muscles? Wot makes his torso remarkable eh? The answer is not the red ink skull and crossbones on his chest or the tatoo marks i luv maysie on his biceps. The effect is obtained by his WORK in the GYM.

  As in other departments of skool life SUKSESS do not always come easily. In fact the grate gymnasiums of Britain are littered with boys who hav broken their legs, brused their branes (if any) grazed their shins and sufered horibly. You can always tell where the gym is becos all the vultures hover over it and each time the springboard go PLUNK they strane their ears and their mouths water. THAT boy was safely over the horse (and the gym sergeant too) but sooner or later one will make a slip. He will fall out of the line tallest on the right shortest on the left and be deserted to his fate.

  The Horse

  Every gymnasium hav a horse for the tiny tots to jump over. At one end is a springboard and there is also a scrufy old thing lying on the floor at the other. This is not the gym sergeant who hav had too much BEER it is the MAT and if you landed on the gym sergeant instead you would soon kno the diference and learn some interesting WORDS.

  The BOY BEATIFUL who is determined to be good at gym rev. up like mad zoom away bounce on the springbord and sale litely over the horse. Sometimes however he make a bish. When that hapen he bounce on the springbord rise verticaly in the air and strike his head on the roof. When you come to think of it there is no reason why this should not hapen more often than it do.

  The Bar

  No not that kind of bar clot altho anebode would need a stiff tot before he can do 3 circles with no hands. Aktualy the whole thing is simply pappy. You sit erect on the bar bak holow arms stiff eyes fixed in glassy stare and whole face contorted with fear. After about 3 hours trying to pluck up courage this position becomes a bit uncomfortable. Besides the mob ten miles below get a bit restless. They sa Yar Boo Sucks and cowardy cowardy custard and other weedy things. You then decide to go. Then you change your mind the whole affair is too ghastly.

  Position 2. Thro the arms upwards and bakwards swing with the bar in the crook of your knobbly knees. Round round round out and down. All you need really is Confidence. You must not believe for a moment that it is posible that you can go round round round down and OUT. Just give a good swing to start with and all will be well. If it isn’t you won’t kno anything about it aneway.

  Position 3. The final position. Rigid, unconscious, chin in, hands stretched to sides, nose and toes in air. (Too much movement may damage the stretcher.)

  The Rings

  The rings are the most dangerous of all and only a really tuough and brave BOY BEATIFUL can show off with them. There are two rings and they hang down on two ropes at least they do unless some skoolboy who luv pranks hav severed them with his jackknife. Wot you hav to do is to swing on the rings in some very funy positions. You can be chest out or chest in or arms xtended. But there is only one rule i can give e.g. HOLD ON. If you let go you fly out of the window. And then where will you be poor thing? In the rubish bin along with the skool brekfast poo gosh which is most unsavoury.

  Another exercise with the rings is to swing on them by yore feet upside down. This is super. At least it would be if fotherington-tomas do not come along.

  ‘Look at me fotherington-tomas,’ you sa as you zoom by. ‘Look at me no hands.’

  ‘i am looking,’ he sa. ‘Wot are you doing?’

  ‘Boddy swinging ARMS XTENDED, feet in the rings bakwards and forwards bending with deep rhymical breething.’

  ‘So that is the noise i hear?’

  ‘In and O-U-T. In and O-U-T.’

  (fotherington-tomas scratch his head.)

  ‘But molesworth wot is the point of it?’ he sa. ‘Wot hav you ganed when it is all over? Do it make you beter than other boys? Wot does it prove in the long run? ect. ect.’ . . . . . .

  These are very dificult questions to answer when swinging by the feet upside down. As you ponder you strike head sharply on the ground.

  ‘You see?’ sa fotherington-tomas and stroll away. He is a gurly.

  7

  HOW TO BE TOPP

  IN FRENCH

  Whenever anyone mention fr. all the eleves sa oo gosh ugh french weedy ect but it is no use saing what’s the use of it as you do with latin. The masters sa fr. is a living langwage and swank about they think they hav got the beter of us chiz. It is not much use repling O.K. bruther SO WHAT when fr. masters sa fr. is living it is beter to be keen cheerful and enthusiastick

  e.g. The Francais, sir, are certainly vital and ebullient. or

  The Francais realy understand the art of LIFE don’t you agree, monsieur?

  Monsieur may not be fuled by this but it may lead to something. In fact it may lead to him teling you about his last holiday in Dieppe tho i would hav thought the less said about what he did there the beter. This may tempt a tiny eleve to get caried away and GO TOO FAR e.g. were there any mademoiselles hem-hem there, monsieur?

  No master like his name coupled with a GURL at least not by a garcon they are not pray to mortal passions. Next moment the whole class is back with Armand and M. Dubois and the other weeds in the fr. book. (leson 3 etre to be ect.)

  ALL ABOUT ARMAND

  Everyone kno that Armand is a wet becos he wear that striped shirt and sissy straw hat. In Lesson 6A Armand has just entered into the salle a manger from the jardin. He enter it not to pinch something to eat but to give Mama the jolies fleurs which he hav picked. Papa is pleased. Papa is not woried as he joly well ort to be at this base conduct. Papa is highly delited.

  ‘Thou art a good boy, Armand,’ he sa, ‘this afternoon i will take thee to the zoo.’

  Ahha you think Papa is not so dumb as he look he will thro Armand to the lions.

  ‘Are there any animals in the zoo?’ ask Armand.

  ‘Oh but yes,’ sa Papa without loosing his temper at this feeble question.

  ‘Houpla houpla i am so hapy.’

  Perhaps the lions are not bad enough perhaps it will hav to be the loups. The loups could indubitably do a good job on Armand. Is it with these thoughts that Papa go hand in hand with his little son? They pay ten sous. They pass through the turnstile. They enter into the zoological garden. They look around themselves.

  ‘How big the elephants are,’ observe Armand at length.

  ‘Yes and also the giraffes.’

  ‘The monkeys are amusings.’

  ‘O yes en effet and there is a fox.’

  ‘Foxes are naughties.’

  You wonder if it was noel coward who wrote the dialog it is so nervously brilliant my dear how long can it be before Papa do Armand. But it is not to be. They pass the loups and the lions but o hapen chiz xcept that Papa observe that the sky is blue altho it is sometimes grey. They go out of the turnstile and return home.

  ‘Next week we will go a la campagne,’ sa Papa.

  Now you can see what hav been going on. The zoo and the bord de la mer are too crowded. Get Armand by himself in a meadow and it is money for jam unless aunt beatrice goes along. Then Papa can do them both or they can watch the bees flit from flower to flower. It is up to him.

  ‘How big the elephants are,’ observe Armand

  A STRATAGEM HEM-HEM

  Altho fr. masters canot keep order they stick grimly to their task nothing seme to discourage them. It is a good wheeze then if you have a real Fr. boy in the class. Then you sa innocently

  What is it like in France, sir?

  France is quite exquisit molesworth the fine
old wines of Burgundy the splendid food the gay wines of Champagne the cafes the railway stations the mice which love cheese and the trees which are pretty.

  Gosh sir really sir then it is just like the piktures in the fr. book?

  France molesworth do not hav beetles drawn all over it. Get on with your ex. boy.

  This is the time when you stick your compass into the real Fr. boy who jaber like a bren gun

  maymsieuestcequejaituailaspaparat ect. for 5 minits. Then there is silence you could here a piece of buble gum drop and fr master larff uneasily

  Come again le crapaud he sa come again.

  well you kno what it is once a fr. boy start you canot stop them becos they hav so much on their mind.

  i only venture to remark he sa that recevoir is a verb which is the invention of the english especially in the imperfect subjunc which the grate poet beaujolais rarely if ever used in his verses assur yourself of my distinguished sentiments ect.

  ‘Cor!’

  if i may have the pleasur of continuing i would sa deuxfrancsilserontbonmieuxmeileur ect.

  ‘EH?’

  etparcequequand and so it go on the trouble is that once a fr. boy start you canot stop him in fact you feel sory for the fr. master in a sort of way chiz. But fr. masters kno how to cope they unroll a huge pikture of a farmyard and point out a turkey.

  ‘What is the fr. for that, molesworth he sa.

  well i mean to sa the only one i kno on that picture is the little baby who is uterly wet he is stroking a sheep. No wonder the sheep look disgusted. Anyway no boy could admit that so my lips are sealed. Dinde dolt or dindon sa the fr. master back on the home ground after loosing away.