by Ruskin Bond
No, he must express his regrets for his intolerable unkindness. At last, at last, the chance he had not dared to hope for had been granted him. True that Chasuble had not thrown himself before a train or tossed off a flask of strychnine. But what if he bore with him to the grave a crushed, a broken heart?
"Pigs" … a curious theme…
Wimpole pushed his way through the door and across a vestibule. He heard a voice, assured and resonant. The chairman had obviously not finished his introductory remarks. Wimpole pushed open another door. It squeaked frightfully. A hundred large faces turned towards him, large as a harvest moon and red as an apple—ninety-eight in the hall, two upon the platform. A hundred pairs of eyes concentrated upon Wimpole. A wild instinct of flight seized him. All these healthy faces, these breeches and gaiters and leggings and side-whiskers … There was one empty chair in the middle of the room. The chairman pointed at it with a peremptory gesture. It must have been the lecturer he had interrupted, not the chairman. The chairman sat in the centre of the table before a bell and a flask. The lecturer held a bundle of notes in his hands and resumed his interrupted flow.
He roared, he bellowed, like the bull of Bashan. Not because he was angry with anything or anybody, but because that was his natural mode of utterance. He was a genial gentleman and hearty. He must have stood six foot and one or two inches in his stockinged feet. But he looked smaller because of the enormous bulk of his shoulders. He had huge red hands. His knees were like the nobbly ends of lopped branches on the trunk of an oak.
There was an especial species of pig, one gathered, that had won Mr. Eustace Chasuble's affections. It was entitled the "Large Black Pig".
He recommended its virtues to his audience. His audience shook their heads in slow and weighty approbation, and tapped with their gnarled sticks on the ground. "No breed," proclaimed Mr. Chasuble, "could achieve such popularity without genuine merit, in the production both of pork and bacon: in the production of those cuts known as 'Medium', 'Fat', or 'Lean Sizeable'…"
Slowly a sweat of terror gathered upon Wimpole's brow. He tried to rise from his chair. The chair grated on the floor. He stumbled over somebody's stick. A hundred pairs of eyes concentrated upon him once more. The chairman touched the bell. Wimpole relapsed upon his chair. His heart tolled a muffled dirge within him. Mr. Chasuble returned to the Large Black Pig.
"The great weight to which the Large Black Pig was bred formerly has now given way to greater quality, and at an early age it yields a long, deep-sided carcass of 160 lb. to 190 lb. dead weight, light in the shoulder, jowl, and offal…"
"They can't stop me," thought Wimpole, "slinking away when it's all over. God help me!"
But the lecture drew to an end and questions followed, and votes of thanks followed those, and the farmers ambled out of the hall. But little Wimpole still sat upon his chair like one hypnotised, his pale grey eyes staring from his head.
"Now's your chance to escape!" said Wimpole to himself. But his limbs would not obey him. A palsy, a terror had descended upon him. He was aware that Eustace Chasuble came striding like a tree over to him. Chasuble opened his mouth and spoke.
"If it's some more advice about the Large Black Pig you're wanting, sir…"
Then suddenly Wimpole found words, or words found Wimpole. He must now and for ever deliver himself from this phantom, even though the phantom had taken to itself so strange and terrible a shape.
"Your book of poems," he cried, "called Gangrene and Lilies. It was me. I wrote the review. My name's Wimpole! Sir, I assure you…"
"You!" exclaimed the other. "So you're Wimpole!"
Wimpole saw his vast arm shoot through the air towards him like Jove's thunderbolt. He ducked. He found his tiny fingers crushed in a gigantic hand.
"I've been wanting to meet you for years, Mr. Wimpole!" the vast voice boomed. "The only critic who took any notice of my book. Thank you, Mr. Wimpole, thank you! I can't say how grateful I am! Come round to the Pig and Whistle and let me try and tell you! No? Mr. Wimpole, no! I'll take no refusals!"
Mr. Wimpole blinked.
My Failed Omelettes—and Other Disasters
BY RUSKIN BOND
In nearly fifty years of writing for a living, I have never succeeded in writing a best-seller. And now I know why. I can't cook.
Had I been able to do so, I could have turned out a few of those sumptuous looking cookery books that brighten up the bookstore windows before being snapped up by folk who can't cook either.
As it is, if I were forced to write a cook book, it would probably be called Fifty Different Ways of Boiling An Egg, and other disasters.
I used to think that boiling an egg would be a simple undertaking. But when I came to live at 7,000 ft in the Himalayan foothills, I found that just getting the water to boil was something of an achievement. I don't know if it's the altitude or the density of the water, but it just won't come to the boil in time for breakfast. As a result my eggs are only half-boiled. "Never mind," I tell everyone; "half-boiled eggs are more nutritious than full-boiled eggs."
"Why boil them at all?" askes my five-year old grandson, Gautam, who is my Mr. Dick, always offering good advice. "Raw eggs are probably healthier."
"Just you wait and see," I told him. "I'll make you a cheese omelette you'll never forget." And I did. It was a bit messy, as I was over-generous with the tomatoes, but I thought it tasted rather good. Gautam, however, pushed his plate away, saying, "You forgot to put in the egg."
101 Failed Omelettes might well be the title of my best-seller.
I love watching other people cook—a habit that I acquired at a young age, when I would watch my Granny at work in the kitchen, turning out delicious curries, koftas and custards. I would try helping her, but she soon put a stop to my feeble contributions. On one occasion she asked me to add a cup of spices to a large curry dish she was preparing, and absent-mindedly I added a cup of sugar. The result—a very sweet curry! Another invention of mine.
I was better at remembering Granny's kitchen proverbs. Here are some of them:
There is skill in all things, even in making porridge.'
'Dry bread at home is better then curried prawns abroad.'
'Eating and drinking should not keep men from thinking.'
'Better a small fish than an empty dish.'
And her favourite maxim, with which she reprimanded me whenever I showed signs of gluttony: 'Don't let your tongue cut your throat.'
And as for making porridge, it's certainly no simple matter. I made one or two attempts, but it always came out lumpy.
"What's this?" asked Gautam suspiciously, when I offered him some.
"Porridge!" I said enthusiastically. "It's eaten by those brave Scottish Highlanders who were always fighting the English!"
"And did they win?" he asked.
"Well—er—not usually. But they were outnumbered!"
He looked doubtfully at the porridge. "Some other time," he said.
So why not take the advice of Thoreau and try to simplify life? Simplify, simplify! Or simply sandwiches…
These shouldn't be too difficult, I decided. After all, they are basically bread and butter. But have you tried cutting bread into thin slices? Don't. It's highly dangerous. If you're a pianist, you could be putting your career at great risk.
You must get your bread ready sliced. Butter it generously. Now add your fillings. Cheese, tomato, lettuce, cucumber, whatever. Gosh, I was really going places! Slap another slice of buttered bread over this mouth-watering assemblage. Now cut in two. Result: Everything spills out at the sides and on to the table-cloth.
"Now look what you've gone and done," says Gautam, in his best Oliver Hardy manner.
"Never mind," I tell him. "Practice makes perfect!"
And one of these days you're going to find Bond's Book of Better Sandwiches up there on the best-seller lists.
Song for a Beetle in a Goldfish Bowl
BY RUSKIN BOND
A beetle fell into the gold
fish bowl,
Hey-ho!
The beetle began to struggle and roll,
Ho-hum!
The window was open, the moon shone bright,
The crickets were singing with all their might,
But a blundering beetle had muddled his flight
And here he was now, in a watery plight,
Having given the goldfish a terrible fright,
Ho-hum, hey-ho!
The beetle swam left, the beetle swam right,
Hum-ho!
Along came myself—I said, "Lord, what a sight!
That poor old beetle will drown tonight.
Ho-hum.
A beetle is just an insect, I hear,
But what if I fell in a vat full of beer?
I'd be brewed to light lager if no one came near—
(It happened I'm told, to a man in Tangier)—
Ho-hum, ho-hum."
With my finger and thumb
The beetle I seized,
The goldfish looked pleased,
The window was open, the moon shone bright,
I thrust the beetle far out in the night,
And he bumbled away in a staggering flight,
Ho-hum, hey-ho,
Good night!
The Inn and the Dog
BY JEROME K. JEROME
A thing that vexes much the high-class Anglo-Saxon soul is the earthly instinct prompting the German to fix a restaurant at the goal of every excursion. On mountain summit, in fairy glen, on lonely pass, by waterfall or winding stream, stands ever the busy Wirtschaft. How can one rhapsodize over a view when surrounded by beer-stained tables? How lose one's self in historical reverie amid the odour of roast veal and spinach?
One day, on elevating thoughts intent, we climbed through tangled woods.
'And at the top', said Harris, bitterly, as we paused to breathe a space and pull our belts a hole tighter, 'there will be a gaudy restaurant, where people will be guzzling beefsteaks and plum tarts and drinking white wine.'
'Do you think so?' said George.
'Sure to be,' answered Harris; 'you know their way. Not one grove will they consent to dedicate to solitude and contemplation; not one height will they leave to the lover of nature unpolluted by the gross and the material.'
'I calculate', I remarked, 'that we shall be there a little before one o'clock, provided we don't dawdle.'
'The "mittagstisch" will be just ready,' groaned Harris, 'with possibly some of those little blue trout they catch about here. In Germany one never seems able to get away from food and drink. It is maddening!'
We pushed on, and in the beauty of the walk forgot our indignation. My estimate proved to be correct.
At a quarter to one, said Harris, who was leading:
'Here we are; I can see the summit.'
'Any sign of that restaurant?' said George.
'I don't notice it,' replied Harris; 'but it's there, you may be sure; confound it!'
Five minutes later we stood on the top. We looked north, south, east and west; then we looked at one another.
'Grand view, isn't it?' said Harris.
'Magnificent,' I agreed.
'Superb,' remarked George.
'They have had the good sense for once,' said Harris, 'to put that restaurant out of sight.'
'They do seem to have hidden it,' said George.
'One doesn't mind the thing so much when it is not forced under one's nose,' said Harris.
'Of course, in its place', I observed, 'a restaurant is right enough.'
'I should like to know where they have put it,' said George.
'Suppose we look for it?' said Harris, with inspiration.
It seemed a good idea. I felt curious myself. We agreed to explore in different directions, returning to the summit to report progress. In half an hour we stood together once again. There was no need for words. The face of one and all of us announced plainly that at last we had discovered a recess of German nature untarnished by the sordid suggestion of food or drink.
'I should never have believed it possible,' said Harris; 'would you?'
'I should say,' I replied, 'that this is the only square quarter of a mile in the entire Fatherland unprovided with one.'
'And we three strangers have struck it', said George, 'without an effort.'
'True,' I observed. 'By pure good fortune we are now enabled to feast our finer senses undisturbed by appeal to our lower nature. Observe the light upon those distant peaks; is it not ravishing?'
'Talking of nature,' said George, 'which should you say was the nearest way down?'
'The road to the left', I replied, after consulting the guide book, 'takes us to Sonnensteig—where, by the by, I observe the "Goldener Adler" is well spoken of—in about two hours. The road to the right, though somewhat longer, commands more extensive prospects.'
'One prospect', said Harris, 'is very much like another prospect; don't you think so?'
'Personally', George, 'I am going by the lefthand road.'
And Harris and I went after him.
But we were not to get down so soon as we anticipated. Storms come quickly in these regions, and before we had walked for a quarter of an hour it became a question of seeking shelter or living for the rest of the day in soaked clothes. We decided on the former alternative, and selected a tree that, under ordinary circumstances, should have been ample protection. But a Black Forest thunderstorm is not an ordinary circumstance. We consoled ourselves at first by telling each other that at such a rate it could not last long. Next, we endeavoured to comfort ourselves with the reflection that if it did we should soon be too wet to fear getting wetter.
'As it turned out,' said Harris, 'I should have been almost glad if there had been a restaurant up here.'
'I see no advantage in being both wet and hungry,' said George. 'I should give it another five minutes, then I am going on.'
'These mountain solitudes', I remarked, 'are very attractive in fine weather. On a rainy day, especially if you happen to be past the age when—'
At this point there hailed us a voice, proceeding from a stout gentleman, who stood some fifty feet away from us under a big umbrella.
'Won't you come inside?' asked the stout gentleman.
'Inside where?' I called back. I thought at first he was one of those fools that will try to be funny when there is nothing to be funny about.
'Inside the restaurant,' he answered.
We left our shelter and made for him. We wished for further information about this thing.
'I did call you from the window,' said the stout gentleman, as we drew near to him, 'but I suppose you did not hear me. This storm may last for another hour; you will get so wet.'
He was a kindly old gentleman; he seemed quite anxious about us.
I said: 'It is very kind of you to have come out. We are not lunatics. We have not been standing under that tree for the last half-hour knowing all the time there was a restaurant, hidden by the trees, within twenty yards of us. We had no idea we were anywhere near a restaurant.'
'I thought maybe you hadn't,' said the old gentleman; 'that is why I came.'
It appeared that all the people in the inn had been watching us from the windows, also wondering why we stood there looking miserable. If it had not been for this nice old gentleman the fools would have remained watching us, I suppose, for the rest of the afternoon. The landlord excused himself by saying he thought we looked like English. It is no figure of speech. On the Continent they do sincerely believe that every Englishman is mad. They are as convinced of it as is every English peasant that Frenchmen live on frogs. Even when one makes a direct personal effort to disabuse them of the impression one is not always successful.
It was a comfortable little restaurant, where they cooked well, while the Tischwein was really most passable. We stopped there for a couple of hours, and dried ourselves and fed ourselves, and talked about the view; and just before we left an incident occurred that shows how much more stirring in this wo
rld are the influences of evil compared with those of good.
A traveller entered. He seemed a careworn man. He carried a brick in his hand, tied to a piece of rope. He entered nervously and hurriedly, closed the door carefully behind him, saw to it that it was fastened, peered out of the window long and earnestly, and then, with a sigh of relief, laid his brick upon the bench beside him and called for food and drink.
There was something mysterious about the whole affair. One wondered what he was going to do with the brick, why he had closed the door so carefully, why he had looked so anxiously from the window; but his aspect was too wretched to invite conversation, and we forebore, therefore, to ask him questions. As he ate and drank he grew more cheerful, sighed less often. Later he stretched his legs, lit an evil-smelling cigar, and puffed in calm contentment.
Then it happened. It happened too suddenly for any detailed explanation of the thing to be possible. I recollect a Frāulein entering the room from the kitchen with a pan in her hand. I saw her cross to the outer door. The next moment the whole room was in an uproar. One was reminded of those pantomime transformation scenes where, from among floating clouds, slow music, waving flowers, and reclining fairies, one is suddenly transported into the midst of shouting policemen tumbling over yelling babies, swells fighting pantaloons, sausages and harlequins, buttered slides and clowns. As the Frāulein of the pan touched the door it flew open, as though all the spirits of sin had been pressed against it, waiting. Two pigs and a chicken rushed into the room; a cat that had been sleeping on a beer barrel spluttered into fiery life. The Frāulein threw her pan into the air and lay down on the floor. The gentleman with the brick sprang to his feet, upsetting the table before him with everything upon it.
One looked to see the cause of the disaster; one discovered it at once in the person of a mongrel terrier with pointed ears and a squirrel's tail. The landlord rushed out from another door, and attempted to kick him out of the room. Instead, he kicked one of the pigs, the fatter of the two. It was a vigorous, well-planted kick, and the pig got the whole of it, none of it was wasted. One felt sorry for the poor animal; but no amount of sorrow anyone else might feel for him could compare with the sorrow he felt for himself. He stopped running about; he sat down in the middle of the room, and appealed to the solar system generally to observe the unjust thing that had come upon him. They must have heard this complaint in the valleys round about, and have wondered what upheaval of nature was taking place among the hills.