On Something (Dodo Press) (9 page)

Some years ago it was required of every statesman that he should, for at
least so many times in any one year, extravagantly praise the virtues
of these foreign merchants, and particularly allude to their intensely
unforeign character; but this custom has recently fallen into abeyance,
and silence upon the subject is the most that is demanded.

A further social habit of this people which we should find very strange
and which I for my part think unaccountable is their habit of judging the
excellence of a literary production, not by the sense or even the sound of
it, but by the ink in which it is printed and the paper upon which it is
impressed. And this applies not only to their letters but also to their
foreign information, and on this account they should (one would imagine)
obtain but a very distorted view of the world. For if a good printer
prints with excellent ink at five shillings a pound, and with beautiful
clear type upon the best linen paper, the statement that the British
Islands are uninhabited, while another in bad ink and upon flimsy paper
and with worn type affirms that they contain over forty million souls, the
first impression and not the second would be conveyed to the Monomotapan,
mind. As a fact, however, they are not misinformed, for this singular
frailty of theirs (as I conceive it to be) is moderated by one very wise
countervailing mental habit of theirs, which is to believe whatever they
hear asserted more than twenty-six times, so that even if the assertion be
conveyed to them in bad print and upon poor paper, they will believe it if
they read it over and over again to the required limits of reiterations.

No people in the world are fonder of animals than this genial race, but
here again curious limits to their affection are to be discovered, for
while they will tear to pieces some abandoned wretch who beats a llama
with a hazel twig for its correction, they will see nothing remarkable in
the tearing to pieces of an alpaca goat by dogs specially trained in that
exercise.

Generally speaking, the larger an animal is, the warmer is the affection
borne it by these people. Fleas and lice are crushed without pity,
blackbeetles with more hesitation, small birds are spared entirely, and
so on upwards until for calves they have a special legislation to protect
and cherish them. At the other end of the scale, microbes are pitilessly
exterminated.

Divorce is not common in Monomotapa. But such divorces as take place are
very rightly treated differently, according to the wealth of the persons
involved. Above a certain scale of wealth divorce is only granted after a
lengthy trial in a court of justice; but with the poor it is established
by the decree of a magistrate who usually, shortly after pronouncing his
sentence, finds an occasion to imprison the innocent party. Moreover, the
poor can be divorced in this manner, if any magistrate feels inclined to
exercise his power, while for the divorce of the rich set conditions are
laid down.

I should add that the Monomotapans have no religion; but the tolerance of
their Constitution is nowhere better shown than in this particular, for
though they themselves regard religion as ridiculous, they will permit
its exercise within the State, and even occasionally give high office and
emoluments to those who practise it.

We have, indeed, much to learn in this matter of religion from the race
whose habits I have discovered and here describe. Nothing, perhaps, has
done more to warp our own story than the hide-bound prejudice that a
doctrine could not be both false and true at the same time, and the
unreasoning certitude, inherited from the bad old days of clerical
tyranny, that a thing either was or was not.

No such narrowness troubles the Monomotapan. He will prefer—and very
wisely prefer—an opinion that renders him comfortable to one that in any
way interferes with his appetites; and if two such opinions contradict
each other, he will not fall into a silly casuistry which would attempt to
reconcile them: he will quietly accept both, and serve the Higher Purpose
with a contented mind.

It is on this account that I have said that the Monomotapans regard
religion as ridiculous. For true religion, indeed (as they phrase it),
they have the highest reverence; and true religion consists in following
the inclinations of an honest man, that is, oneself; but "religion in the
sense of fixed doctrine," as one of their priests explained to me, "is
abhorrent to our free commonwealth." Thus such hair-splitting questions as
whether God really exists or no, whether it be wrong to kill or to steal,
whether we owe any duties to the State, and, if so, what duties, are
treated by the honest Monomotapans with the contempt they deserve: they
abandon such speculation for the worthy task of enjoying, each man, what
his fortune permits him to enjoy.

But, as I have said above, they do not persecute the small minority living
in their midst who cling with the tenacity of all starved minds to their
fixed ideas; and if a man who professes certitude upon doctrinal matters
is useful in other ways, they are very far from refusing his services to
the State. I have known more than one, for instance, of this old-fashioned
and bigoted lot who, when he offered a sum of money in order to be
admitted to the Senate of Monomotapa, found it accepted as readily and
cheerfully as though it had been offered by one of the broadest principles
and most liberal mind.

Let no one be surprised that I have spoken of their priests, for though
the Monomotapans regard religion with due contempt, it does not follow
that they will take away the livelihood of a very honest class of people
who in an older and barbaric state of affairs were employed to maintain
the structure of what was then a public worship. The priesthood,
therefore, is very justly and properly retained by the Monomotapans,
subject only to a few simple duties and to a sacred intonation of voice
very distressing to those not accustomed to it. If I am asked in what
occupation they are employed, I answer, the wealthier of them in such
sports and futilities as attract the wealthy, and the less wealthy in such
futilities and sports as the less wealthy customarily enjoy. Nor is it a
rigid law among them that the sons of priests should be priests, but only
the custom—so far, at least, as I have been able to discover.

My dear Ormond,

Nothing was further from my thoughts. I had imagined you knew me well
enough—and, for the matter of that, all your mother's family—to judge
me better. Believe me, no conception of blaming your profession entered
my mind for a moment. Whether there be such a thing as "property" in the
abstract I should leave it to metaphysicians to decide: in practical
affairs everything must be judged in its own surroundings.

It was not upon any musty theological whimsy that I wrote; the definition
of stealing or "theft"—I care not by what name you call it—is not for
practical men to discuss. Nor was I concerned with the ethical discussion
of burglary (to give the matter its old legal and technical title); it was
lack of judgment, sudden actions due to nothing but impulse, and what I
think I may call "the speculative side" of a burglar's life.

You have not, as yet, any great responsibilities. No one is dependent upon
you—you have but yourself to provide for; but you must remember that such
responsibilities will arrive in their natural course, and that if you form
habits of rashness or obstinacy now they will cling to you through life.
We are all looking forward to a certain event when Anne is free again; in
plain English, my boy, we know your loyal heart, and we shall bless the
union; but I should feel easier in my mind if I saw you settled into one
definite branch of the profession before you undertook the nurture of a
family.

Adventure tempts you because you are brave, and something of a poet in
you leads you to unusual scenes of action. Well, Youth has a right to its
dreams, but beware of letting a dangerous Quixotism spoil your splendid
chances.

Take, for example, your breaking into Mr. Cowl's house. You may say Mr.
Cowl was not a journalist, but only a reviewer; the distinction is very
thin, but let it pass. You know and I know that the houses of
none
in any way connected with the daily Press should ever be approached. It is
plain common sense. The journalist comes home at all hours of the night.
His servant (if he keeps one) is often up before he is abed. Do you think
to enter such houses unobserved?

Again, in one capacity or another, the journalist is dealing with our
profession all day long. Some he serves and knows as masters; others he is
employed in denouncing at about forty-two shillings the 1600 words; others
again it is his business to interview and to pacify or cajole in the
lobbies of the House—do you think he would not know what you were if he
found you in the kitchen with a dark lantern?

There is another peril—I mean that of alienating friends. Mr. Cowl is an
Imperialist—of a very unemphatic type: he wears (as you will say) gold
spectacles, and has a nervous cough, but he
is
an Imperialist. I
never said that it was
wrong
or even
foolish
to alienate
such a man. I said that a great and powerful section of opinion thought it
a breach of honour in one of Ours to do it. Do not run away with the first
impression my words convey. Believe me, I weigh them all.

There has been so much misunderstanding that I hardly know what to choose.
Take those watches. I did not say that watches were "a mere distraction."
You have put the words into my mouth. What I said was that watches,
especially watches at a Tariff Reform meeting, were not worth the risk.
Of course a hatful of watches, such as your Uncle Robert would bring home
from fires, or better still, such a load as your poor cousin Charles
obtained upon Empire Day last year, has value. But how many gold watches
are there, off the platform, at a Tariff Reform meeting? And what possible
chance have you of getting
on
the platform? Now church and purses,
that is another thing, but your mid-Devon adventure was simple folly.

Who is Lord Darrell? I never heard of him! For Heaven's sake don't get
caught by a title. Do you know any of the servants? His butler or his
secretary? The fellow who catalogues the library is useful. Do recollect
that lots of the ornaments in those Mayfair houses are fastened to the
wall. That is where your dear father failed over the large Chinese jar in
Park Street…. Your mother would never forgive me if you were to get into
another of your boyish scrapes.

There is another little matter, my dear Ormond, which I wish you to lay
to heart very seriously. Now do take an old man's advice and do not get
up upon your Quixotic hobby-horse the moment you sniff what it is—for I
suppose you have guessed it already. Yes, it is what you feared: I want to
urge you to follow your mother's ardent wish and add commission business
to your other work. I know very well that young men must dream their
dreams, but the world is what it is, and after all there is nothing so
very dreadful in the commission side of our profession. You do not come
into direct relation with the collectors of curios and church ornaments:
there is always an agent to break the crudeness of the connexion. And
it is a certain and profitable source of income with none of the risks
attached to it that the older branches of the profession unfortunately
show. Moreover, it affords excellent opportunities for foreign travel,
and gives one a special position very difficult to define, but easily
appreciable among one's colleagues.

George Burton made to my knowledge three thousand pounds last year in a
short season; he got this very large commission without the necessity of
breaking into a single public-house; he earned it entirely upon objects
taken out of churches upon the Continent, and in only three cases had he
to pick a pocket. It would have hurt him very much with his knowledge and
tastes to have had to break a stained-glass window.

Do consider this, my dear Ormond, for your mother's sake. Don't think for
a moment that I am advising you to take up any of those forms of work
which we both agree in despising, and which are quite unworthy of your
traditions, as for instance stealing pictures on commission out of the
houses of dealers and then turning detective to recover them again. It is
much too easy work for a man of your talents, much too ill-paid, and much
too dangerous. It is all very well for the picture dealer to leave the
door open, but what if the policeman is not in the know? No, you will
always find me on your side in your steady refusal to have anything to do
with this kind of business.

Ormond, my dear lad, bear me no ill-will. It is true of every profession,
of the Bar and of the City, of homicide, medicine, the Services, even
Politics—everything, that success only comes slowly, and that the
experience of older men is the key to it.

Tomorrow is Ascension Day, and I am at leisure. Come and dine with me at
the Colonial Club at eight for eight-fifteen. I will show you a
magnificent littla tanagra I picked up yesterday, and we will talk about
the new prospectus.

God bless you! (Dress.)

Your affectionate Uncle

A privileged body slips so easily into regarding its privileges as common
rights that I fear the plea which the SIMIAN LEAGUE repeats in this
pamphlet will still sound strange in the ears of many, though the work of
the League has been increasingly successful and has reached yearly a wider
circle of the educated public since its foundation by Lady Wayne in 1902.
We desire to place before our fellow-citizens the claims of Monkeys, and
we hope once more that nothing we say may seem extreme or violent, for we
know full well what poor weapons violence and passion are in the debate of
a practical political matter.