Shandygaff: A number of most agreeable Inquirendoes upon Life & Letters, interspersed with Short Stories & Skits, the whole most Diverting to the ReaderMorley, Christopher
General
Shandygaff: A number of most agreeable Inquirendoes upon Life & Letters, interspersed with Short Stories & Skits, the whole most Diverting to the Reader
Morley, Christopher
Essays; Short stories
"Yes," says Titania, "but there was a block at 42nd Street. I'm _so_
sorry, Grump."
"Eye-polishers" is our term for the Fifth Avenue busses, because riding
on them makes Titania's eyes so bright. More widely, the word connotes
anything that produces that desirable result, such as bunches of
violets, lavender peddlers, tea at Mary Elizabeth's, spring millinery,
or finding sixpence in her shoe. This last is a rite suggested by the
old song:
And though maids sweep their hearths no less
Than they were wont to do,
Yet who doth now for cleanliness
Find sixpence in her shoe?
A bright dune does very well as a sixpenny piece.
We always lunch at Moretti's on Saturday: it is the recognized beginning
of an adventure. The Moretti lunch has advanced from a quarter to thirty
cents, I am sorry to say, but this is readily compensated by the Grump
buying Sweet Caporals instead of something Turkish. A packet of
cigarettes is another curtain-raiser for an adventure. On other days
publishers' readers smoke pipes, but on Saturdays cigarettes are
possible.
"Antipasto?"
"No, thanks."
"Minestrone or consommé?"
"Two minestrone, two prime ribs, ice cream and coffee. Red wine,
please." That is the formula. We have eaten the "old reliable Moretti
lunch" so often that the routine has become a ritual. Oh, excellent
savor of the Moretti basement! Compounded of warmth, a pungent pourri of
smells, and the jangle of thick china, how diverting it is! The
franc-tireur in charge of the wine-bin watches us complaisantly from his
counter where he sits flanked by flasks of Hoboken chianti and a case of
brittle cigars.
How good Moretti's _minestrone_ tastes to the unsophisticated tongue.
What though it be only an azoic extract of intense potato, dimly tinct
with sargasso and macaroni--it has a pleasing warmth and bulk. Is it not
the prelude to an Adventure?
Well, where shall we go to-day? No two explorers dickering over azimuth
and dead reckoning could discuss latitude and longitude more earnestly
than Titania and I argue our possible courses. Generally, however, she
leaves it to me to chart the journey. That gives me the pride of
conductor and her the pleasure of being surprised.
According to our Mercator's projection (which, duly wrapped in a
waterproof envelope, we always carry on our adventures) there was a
little known region lying nor' nor'west of Blackwell's Island and
plotted on the map as East River Park. I had heard of this as a
picturesque and old-fashioned territory, comparatively free from
footpads and lying near such places as Astoria and Hell Gate. We laid a
romantic course due east along 35th Street, Titania humming a little
snatch from an English music-hall song that once amused us:
"My old man's a fireman
Now what do you think of that?
He wears goblimey breeches
And a little goblimey hat."
She always quotes this to me when (she says) I wear my hat too far on
the back of my head.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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