Postscript • • •
BEING a Celt myself—my maternal grandfather was a rabbi in Cardiff— I am always sorry to see the Welsh making asses of themselves, which they are continuing to do over the Shell Guide to Mid- Wales.
This latest volume in the admirable and ele- gant series edited jointly by John Betjeman and John Piper is an affectionate and perceptive account by David Verey (himself of Welsh de- scent) of the scenery and architecture of the three enchanting and little-known counties of Brecon, Radnor and Montgomery, of which he says such things as 'unforgettable'; 'wild and beautiful'; 'includes some of the most beautiful mountain country in the British Isles'; and 'of its scenery it is impossible to speak without excite- ment.'
You would think that this would more than satisfy—would even please—the proudest Welsh patriot and the most grasping Welsh innkeeper, but not so. There have been angry meetings of at least three town or rural district 'councils, and now of the Welsh Tourist and Holidays Board, because Mr. Verey said of Llandrindod Wells that its 'pressed Ruabon-red-brick buildings are of peculiar hideousness,' and that 'round every corner one expects to find the sea; but there is no sea, only rain'; that Builth is 'a busy, but rather ugly little town'; and that in the centre of Rhayader 'is a hideous clock turret.'
All of which, God knows, is true, but does not diminish the charm of the mid-Welsh scenery or of the old manor houses and other small country towns that Mr. Verey lovingly describes. And I, fot one, would take his word about those a good deal less readily if he tried to tell me that Builth is a pretty place or that in Llandrindod Wells it never rained.
As it is, his guide book makes me want to re- visit mid-Wales, whereas the humourless self- righteousness of the embattled rural district coun- cillors makes me think again. To say nothing of the even bigger asses in those parts who are said to be boycotting Shell petrol.
Not that I'm really surprised. I toured those parts a few years ago to write about the lovely lost little village of Dolanog, which was in danger of being flooded to provide a reservoir for Liver- pool. I was lyrical in my Sunday Times article about its peaceful charm and, in describing its remoteness, quoted (quite correctly) a young man in the public library of Newtown, the nearest size- able town, of whom I had asked the way, as having said, `Dolanog? That's the devil of a place to get to.' Forthwith, a letter to my editor from the County librarian : no member of his staff would use 'such coarse and insulting language' as 'the devil of a place,' and as the village re- ferred to was served once a fortnight by a mobile library van, it could hardly be described as 'of difficult accessibility.'
Well, a nation the librarians of which prefer the phrase 'of difficult accessibility' to 'devil of a place to get to' will undoubtedly regard the Rhayader clock tower as a couple of cuts above the Taj Mahal by moonlight. But I don't like its attempt at the censorship of guide books by rural district council any more than I approved of the Soviet censor who, when I wrote a piece about the charm of the Russian countryside in winter— the snow, the frozen lakes, the silver birches, the little wooden villages and the sledges drawn by shaggy ponies—cut out the word 'shaggy.'
As this column is world-famous for its wine notes from all over, here is a tale from darkest Hampstead, where a reader asked at an off-licence whether the Australian 'sherry' was anything like as good as the South African.
'Good Lord, no,' said the man behind the counter. 'Australian sherry's terrible stuff, not s patch on South African. Mind you, the South Africans have had a lot more experience of wine. growing. Their vineyards were established by the Hottentots.'
As this was said with a scholarly seriousness, my correspondent decided that this was a slip of the tongue for 'Huguenots' (who did, indeed, establish the Cape wine industry). But he was a shade more perplexed when the shopkeeper went on to say, with equal seriousness, that, 'Mind yOU, even the Australian sherry's a good deal better than that fornicated Cyprus wine.'
'Fermented'? 'Fortified'? Or an attempt to import new vigour into the vocabulary of wine- manship?
Books on wine are becoming almost as plenti- ful as cookery books (which I wish publishers wouldn't call 'cook books)—and most of them almost as dispensable. But The Wines of Bordeaux (Deutsch, 15s.)—a translation of the immensely detailed work published in France in 1955 by Professor Roger, editor of Revue du Vin de France—went on to my reference shelf immediately. (Let me not conceal from my readers that the secret of specialised journalism is to have the right books within easy reach.) Sure enough, Roger soon came in handy, when I wanted to check whether Château Guiraud, a dessert wine I had enjoyed after a recent dinner party, was a Sauternes or a Barsac. It turned out to be a first growth of Sauternes, and to have recovered after a fairly recent, but undated, period of mediocrity. It is a beautifully fragrant wine—very sweet, but nothing like so luscious as its more famous neighbour, Yquem. I see that J. Lyons, at their Hop Exchange cellars, have the admirable 1953 at 13s.—further support for my contention that, compared with the legendary Yquem, the other great sweet wines of Bordeaux are under-valued.
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