Free On Nothing and Kindred Subjects by Hilaire Belloc Page A

Ar!
That was young Cobbler's joke in times gone by.
    BALD ( politely ): Ever see young Cobbler now, Mr. Mowle?
    CAP ( with importance ): Why yes, Mr. Binder; I met him at the
Thersites' Lodge down Brixham way—only the other day. Wonderful
brilliant he was … well, there … ( his tone changes ) he
was sitting next to me—( thoughtfully )—as, might be here—( putting
Harmsworth's paper down to represent Young Cobbler )—and here like,
would be Lord Haltingtowres.
    BALD ( his manner suddenly becoming very serious ): He's a
fine man, he is! One of those men I respect.
    CAP ( with still greater seriousness ): You may say that, Mr.
Binder. No respecter of persons—talks to me or you or any of them
just the same.
    BALD ( vaguely ): Yes, they're a fine lot! ( Suddenly )
So's Charlie Beresford!
    CAP ( with more enthusiasm than he had yet shown ): I say ditto
to that, Mr. Binder! ( Thinking for a few moments of the
characteristics of Lord Charles Beresford. ) It's pluck—that's
what it is—regular British pluck ( Grimly ) That's the kind of
man—no favouritism.
    BALD: Ar! it's a case of "Well done, Condor!"
    CAP: Ar! you're right there, Mr. Binder.
    BALD ( suddenly pulling a large flask out of his pocket and
speaking very rapidly ): Well, here's yours, Mr. Mowle. ( He
drinks out of it a quantity of neat whisky, and having drunk it rubs
the top of his flask with his sleeve and hands it over politely to )
CAP.
    Cap ( having drunk a lot of neat whisky also, rubbed his sleeve
over it, screwed on the little top and giving that long gasp which
the occasion demands ): Yes, you're right there—"Well done.
Condor."
    At this point the train began to go slowly, and just as it stopped
at the station I heard Cap begin again, asking Bald on what occasion
and for what services Lord Charles Beresford had been given his
title.
    Full of the marvels of this conversation I got out, went into the
waiting-room and wrote it all down. I think I have it accurately
word for word.
    But there happened to me what always happens after all literary
effort; the enthusiasm vanished, the common day was before me. I
went out to do my work in the place and to meet quite ordinary
people and to forget, perhaps, (so strong is Time) the fantastic
beings in the train. In a word, to quote Mr. Binyon's admirable
lines:
      "The world whose wrong
   Mocks holy beauty and our desire returned."

ON THE RETURN OF THE DEAD
    The reason the Dead do not return nowadays is the boredom of it.
    In the old time they would come casually, as suited them, without
fuss and thinly, as it were, which is their nature; but when such
visits were doubted even by those who received them and when new and
false names were given them the Dead did not find it worth while. It
was always a trouble; they did it really more for our sakes than for
theirs and they would be recognised or stay where they were.
    I am not certain that they might not have changed with the times and
come frankly and positively, as some urged them to do, had it not
been for Rabelais' failure towards the end of the Boer war. Rabelais
(it will be remembered) appeared in London at the very beginning of
the season in 1902. Everybody knows one part of the story or
another, but if I put down the gist of it here I shall be of
service, for very few people have got it quite right all through,
and yet that story alone can explain why one cannot get the dead to
come back at all now even in the old doubtful way they did in the
'80's and early '90's of the last century.
    There is a place in heaven where a group of writers have put up a
colonnade on a little hill looking south over the plains. There are
thrones there with the names of the owners on them. It is a sort of
Club.
    Rabelais was quarrelling with some fool who had missed fire with a
medium and was saying that the modern world wanted positive
unmistakable appearances: he said he ought to know, because he had
begun the modern world. Lucian said it would fail just as much