Part 4 (1/2)

AUTUMN

- xxxIX -

Sunday: My annual duel with ht word, for it suggests a contest of lightning-like thrust and parry, and-- a slow but hideously powerful and destructive coh to warthe furnace, keeping all air froh 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 ht There is a tank in my furnace into which I pour water every day, and the superstition is that water les with the hot air and produces a balremlins drink this water, and the mice in my cellar commit the Happy Despatch in it, and the air fro 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 e and dirty supply of ash In twenty years, I suppose, furnaces like the one which I now harbour in ly 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 flourfroh to put oing 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 hts 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, ht that I should like to be a tyrant, but it costs ly fit of the season today When I opened its front door thisfor the usual health inspection, I noticed that it had a bad breath and a nasty, coated back-draft However, it took its food without , however, it had dyspepsia, and the usual cures did no good at all So for the first ti its appetite from time to time with tiny shovelfuls of coke, a dainty which itin the cellar that I hardly notice it any ht socket; the present one is too diht 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 rakethe Augean stables, and soon gave it up It would be easier to climb the trees in Septeround, 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 a 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 nu at concerts and theatres could be eli 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 theeneration it would cease If, instead of glaring at coughers, we turned our heads away fro 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 hers would think twice If the word ”cough” were to become a Forbidden Word, and if children were to have their h would cease to be a popular indulgence Coughing would beco that rude little boys did, amid snickers of their cousting and indecent personal noise, and its knell is rung

Friday: A friend as interested in my observations on fae Santayana's Persons And Places: ”On one of the ht, or dreaded, that he ht be on his deathbed, he felt a sudden desire for so up his asseveration that he was dying; and as his deafness prevented hi 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 noble Last Words, coard for both worlds, but as the elder Santayana did not die on this occasion, they are not Last Words in the true senseVery irritating Last Words would be, ”I forgive you all,” which would leave one's relatives in a condition of baffled and angry stupefactionCharles 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 circu-Off in Croivably

Saturday: More furnace martyrdoly 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 te, and went out for a couple of hours When I carees FSet to work to bring theashes 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 mass of molten ht 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 destroyto an irate father whose little boy had recently joined the teent 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 storeatly, and after the teent had plied thee to taste not, touch not, nor yet s their membershi+p in the Wee Wowsers' Total Abstinence FraternityWhat annoyed this man was that this particular Wee Wowser had come home armed with the sword of the spirit, and had lectured hiather that the Wee Woas told that what looked like soul-saving to him looked much like infant impudence to his father, and his membershi+p in the Wee Wowsers terminated at that instant

Monday: A friend of mine lost confidence in hie can carefully in the luggage co-case on the curb to await the Offal Officer I assured his like that for years, and attributed it to abstraction of the kind froenius suffer

Tuesday: My brother Fairchild paid me one of his infrequent visits today, and asked to watch while I stoked oted Back-to-Fronter, while I am a determined Middler That is to say, Fairchild stokes his furnace by raking the live coal fro his new coal in the resulting trough, whereas I make a bed of coals with the poker, and put ht up a Back-to-Fronter, but I changed to Middleis which Back-to-Fronters have for Middlers is comparable to that which Roman Catholics cherish for adherents of the Greek Orthodox ChurchHowever, while Fairchild stood by I stoked the furnace in hten and his temples throb In a low voice, he asked ood fire that way? I said that I did, and to spare him embarrassment, I leaned toward the fire-door at thatpoker 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 screarip on the cellar floorWe parted fairly good friends, butupsets it

Wednesday: Attended a concert this evening, and enjoyed the h for a few le band which wasIt is characteristic of the musical life of the city in which I live that every concert runs foul of this bugle band at sole bands, wide as h ht drulers and I have walked les blared their simple-le well; indeed, I venture the opinion that buglers are born, and not roup frolers in my school band were drawn; they had wind and spit in plenty, but no genius for the instruot out of the band and achieved the post of Corporal in Charge of the Medically Unfit; this was the peak of le band noithout thinking of it, and as the singers fought against the band tonight Fond Meht 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 chewedto be unconscious that anyone could see or hear us; but it was ireat rubber-wheeled monsters, with ca intently at us; fro for a peanut; then, quite suddenly, they would retreat, as though they had been frightened The ga was not to look directly at the monsters, which would have randmother, who could induce squirrels to take nuts fro in the other direction; I tried it, and the cameras ca theue, but I knew that this would frighten theood For television one must be less an actor than a wild-life expert

Friday: For a brief drive in the country today; was as 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, atte 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 Tos ant to commit the Happy Despatch will present themselves before a Govern 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 class)

Saturday: It was so waro out; it thinks it went out of its own accord, but I know better; I starved it, and it expiredBought 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, e Marchbanks Towers for its long winter's nap I a 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 haveit Otherwise no squirrel is better prepared for winter than I; I aood 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 schees

- XLI -

Sunday: To a christening this afternoon, a cereht 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 pal of the child, of course, is ainst an invasion of his propertyI understand that in most churches a first-aid box is kept in the vestry for the use of parsons who have suffered da; I have seen men of God horribly clawed by infants who possessed extraordinary resistance to GraceSometimes 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 theain a women behind the bars treat nificance; to the 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 e to throw me out Banks hate suicides on the preht saw a piece written by Sir Arthur Pinero and produced with coe in 1922, and later served up by Hollywood as sohably untrue one that Love Conquers All) ht 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 inal A pilot who has been injured and disfigured in the war liness, and in the throes of the Tender Passion they are transformed, and seem beautiful to one another; but they do not seeic, 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 ortheir corsets creak more than was considered decent

Wednesday: Saw soarette stubs were doused before they threw theiven that one carelessly thrown overnht my furnace for me soarette stub Tonight I laboured fiftyout my furnace (which had passed quietly away at 8:30 a in its ; then I put a few carefully lighted matches inside and awaited results There were none Rehted 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 hueon today; the symptoms of this illness are a sense of failure, self-conteue; there is no cure for it; application to the bottle ests ideas of suicide; while the fit lasts all seeeon should be left alone, though if they can be persuaded to lie doith a pillow under the knees, it helpsIt was during a fit of the hueon, on a Sunday afternoon in London, that De Quincey , to allay the pains of toothache He never coe of 75, coked to the gills quite a lot of the ti is relative, I suppose, but I wish that the law, or a Chamber of Commerce, or somebody, would define the word ”lifetiht a suit which was made of a cloth which I was assured would not -- could not -- wear out; the tailor jabbed pencils through it to show ood care, and the sleeves and cuffs are undeniably worn through; the lifetio I was sold a Harris tweed suit, which I was assured would last h in just over three years And I have never had a pen with a lifetiuarantee which lasted five years Yet the days of our years are three-score years and ten

Saturday: Long discussion this evening with a man ants to revise our systes, he says, lived in their shi+ps and loved them, and when they died their bodies were laid out in their shi+ps and sent off to sea Ours, he points out, is an automobile civilization, and if we had any real respect for the dead, ould sit them at the wheel of the car in which they spent so much of life, and which they loved so dearly, and ould then allow thea special funeral speedway and eventually over a cliff There is a poetic sweep about this notion which appeals to ly For non-drivers like , but perhaps an arrangement could be ly let into the heels ofsoar 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 s 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 heweakly to his child wife, and tearfully addressing histo a ht -- a hs 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 attitude, he said, was coreat physicians of the past, but was out of favour with the nosis by machine as much as possible, and prefer not to see the patient if they can possibly e with a piece of him Too many doctors are deeply interested in disease, but don't care ood sense to h 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,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, s it will be before they can send out a girl for their hourly cup of coffee At hos of Bayviehere grass 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 wretches who run about the don area are all visitors fro 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 solected branch of art which I have made peculiarly ular eyes and nose, and a gash of a mouth: mine has a noble 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 puht is harsh and lacking in mystery

Thursday and All Hallow's Eve: Hallowe'en, and a fine windy night There was a ring at host, about three feet high, confronted me ”Who are you?” I deht ”I'm Charles,” whispered the spirit, and whisked e into the folds of its ectoplashost of Charles had disappeared, I heard a groan, and went outside just in ti ripped , horrible curse irandmother, as a witch They will not feel the full effect of this curse for a week or so, but then parts of thearded as undesirable even in the circles of society in which they nowon ith soap, too, mostly confined to such comments as ”Ha ha” and ”Boo” The world is so constituted that people who feel like writing on s 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 s

Friday and All Hallowmas: The folk-spirit in poetry is not dead Today I heard so O' Sixpence, the last verse of which runs: Thecame 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

Saturday: People s in the oddest ways I heard today about a h the manufacture of ”slumber slippers” -- soft little slippers like ballet shoes which are placed on the feet of corpses All God's chillun got special shoesAnd a h the cultivation and sale of sunflower seeds, for the chewing trade It seereat numbers of New Canadians fro out the husks and eating the tiny, oily kernel, which tastes like a nutI 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-reas a bell when the occupant has eaten enough, for fat women on diets? The possibilities are infinite

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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 co flies I admit few equals and no superiors I prefer a swatter with a rubber flapper to the ordinary wire affair; the wire ame, but the rubber slaps it into oblivion and leaves the carcass un or table useIt is not generally realized that when a fly rises fro position, it jumps backward; it is necessary to allow for this ju I have also noticed that ah 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 sith 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 handsoold 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 coold and ivory, and one of the appearance ore a purple cloak of ious ostrich plurandees, perhaps a govern men in ordinary khaki and blue did not salute them, but seemed indeed to look upon them with ill-concealed amusement; I saw one airman point them out to his dinner partner hat I can only describe as a contuestureI eous 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 pass a beverage room in the course of my duties, and at least every second day an habitue of the place pursuesvoice how badly he needs twenty-five cents I have given him money several times, chiefly from a fear that he will fall dead atto 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 econo 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 ood fairies clustered round race, freedoifts, 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 e a fuse I do not glory in oes wrong with et a man in to mend it -- no small task in these days -- and I know that he despiseslittle job and takes away five dollars of ood at odd jobs are blessed above co flies and shi+ning shoes, but otherwise I am a nuisance in the house If I were ever shi+pwrecked on a desert island with several thousand feet of lumber, a complete set of carpenter's tools and 100 cases of assorted foods, I should die in a week of exposure and starvation

Thursday: Read a piece in a ed everybody to retire earlier, and live longer But we can't all retire at 45 or 50; we ether Many people, of course, compro as they can, but they retireas 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,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 assistance could be devised for people who have ceased to think? A few ready-ht surely be distributed? The proble them into the skull

Friday: Received a telephone call from a friend of mine, anted to knoho 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 nobleton, who in 1596 described his invention, which he was certain would ue, and what did the world do? It condemned him as a reat benefactor of mankind is known to about one person in 5,000, whereas the inventor of the zip-fastener was given an LLD by the University of Uppsala What a world!

Saturday: Undertook to bathe a small child and put it to bed, in the absence of itspursuit 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 frolicsoan to throater on , in order to meet this situation on fair ternified When at last I had landed un to dry it, the unforeseen proble 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 -