THE ROAD AND THE GAME
By BERNARD DARWIN
i'LL warrant," said the old woman of the opium den (in JL Edwin Drood) to John Jasper, "I'll warrant you made t1',.! journey in many ways, when you made it so often." "No," he answered, "always in one way."
"And always took the same pleasure in harping on it?" she asked. "Did you never get tired of it, and try to call up something else for a change?"
I am of the villainous Jasper's opinion. New journeys are very well, but I like best to make an old one and always in one way. In fact, I have been calling it up and harping on it lately with the very same pleasure as before. So, I trust, has my fellow-traveller, for we like our festivals immutable. We have made it a good many times now, and what was once merely a journey to a friendly house has become a game rich in tradition and ritual, with rules having a certain elasticity but well recognised nevertheless by both parries. On one point there is no elasticity at all. We always travel on exactly the same road. When somebody actually suggested that we should go by Tenbury instead of Leominster we exclaimed as one man, "But that's impossible. We could not have luncheon on Bromyard Common." A glass of ale which must be "the genuine stunning" at Broadway, a sandwich luncheon not only on Bromyard Common but on a particular piece of grass by the roadside—these are the simplest and most fundamental rules of the game, but they do not really touch the heart and purport of it. The game is to remember the name of every single village, and, if possible, every single public house in the course of 230 miles. It is played on the whole with a fine team spirit in that neither player deliber- ately keeps any knowledge to himself. " At the same time if he can get in first with Docldow or Knightwick, if he can point out, quite in a friendly way, that his comrade made a little slip about the first turning to Martley, or committed the gross error of confusing the two New Inns, why then he does not regard himself as being selfish or unsportsmanlike. The principle of playing for the side can be carried too far.
One result of playing this agreeable game is that we nearly always say the same thing at the same place throughout the drive. They are not, I suppose, essentially interesting things, but since there is nobody to be bored that does not matter. Let me illustrate our appalling dullness by a few—only a very few--examples. The starting place of our journey is not far from Windsor, but it is a convention that the real game does not begin till Oxford is passed, and indeed on one occa- sion, regrettably as I think, we went by a new way to Oxford. True there are some pleasant places before that—Henley and Huntercombe and Nuneham, with its Harcourt Arms—and when we are on the top of the hill, with Bensington and Dor- chester before us, we may casually remark that it was on that very spot on one historic journey that the rain stopped ; but that is, as it were, but a trial ball. The first ball of the match is seriously bowled when we have twisted our way through Headington and Cowley and come to a certain roundabout where there is a signpost "To Woodstock." We then simultaneously and brilliantly observe that now we are really on the way.
Shortly afterwards, on seeing a certain stone wall, we say that we are beginning to get into the Cotswolds. At Chip- ping Norton we dare each other to remember the name of a certain factory on the far side of the town (there is the same sort of competition just outside Leominster) and dis- cuss whether the next inn is the Horse and Groom or the Fox and Hounds. A little further on we cry aloud to one another quite unnecessarily "To Blockley," "To Blockky " as that pleasant village calls and calls in our ears with a series of particularly flamboyant signposts. Between Pershore and Worcester we always miss the name of a tiny hamlet and then always say how very odd it is that we do miss it. As we approach Bromyard we have an argument "well tried through many a varying year" whether a particular wall is red or grey. We are not nearly in Wales yet, but if by this time the reader is not convinced of our supreme tiresomeness I despair of making the matter clear to him.
Let me say honourably and at once that my fellow- traveller is a better player than I am. He has had advantages first in that he is the driver and so corners and landmarks impress themselves on his mind and secondly in that he has made the journey much more often. Still I am making no excuses ; he is a fine player and were he to be blindfolded and then have the bandage suddenly removed from his eyes he would, I am convinced, at once remark "In about three hundred yards we shall be coming to Cottage Teas.'" All I can say for myself is that I think I get a little better every time and that I feel as if I could now play certain stretches of the road, so to speak, with my eyes shut.
Given interest and enjoyment and the fun of looking forward, hedges and trees do take on wonderfully friendly and familiar shapes, and a hundred miles of country are easier to remember than a mile of suburbs. Admittedly the signs of public houses are not what they were. The road would be still more entrancing and memorable if there were more red and blue and green lions to be encountered in the heraldic flesh instead of mere names. Still we must be grateful for the glittering splendours of the Royal Sun and the Sandys Arms, and, as for names, it is surely hard to beat the Aleppo Merchant who greets us when we are nearing our last lap.
Even though one does improve slowly, so that with each journey one's handicap gets a little lower, it is disappointing to find that there are, if they may so be termed, recurring pockets in the mind. Each of us has certain places that he remembers and the other forgets and our respective brilliancies and failures seem to have become almost constant. We are like two batsmen, each with his favourite strokes and each also with his weaknesses to particular types of bowl- ing. For instance it was I.—and it is one of my few claims to distinction in the game—who first discovered, as we sped past, the way to Little Brampton, and I always know where it is, whereas my companion almost pretends to deny its existence. I am not bad too, if I may modestly say so, at Ashton, which is heralded by the cottage with its agreeable topiary ; I pride myself on the turning to Stoke Prior.
On the other hand there is a village in Shropshire called— there I have forgotten its name again and can only say that it begins with L. My partner, on whom I bestow, in passing, a jealous malediction, can reel it off pat. How I have toiled and moiled at that name and invented a perfect memoria technica for it, which has now vanished. It is, I think, some- where near Aston-on-Clun, where stands the fascinating village tree adorned with flags, and hang it all I I can summon up the church and the very house bearing the name on its hideous yellow label, but what is the name?
0 memory! that which I gave thee To guard in thy garner yestreen- Little deeming thou e'er could'st behave thee Thus basely—hath gone from thee clean!
I am almost tempted, though I will not yield, to the un- speakable meanness of looking it up privily on the map before we start. However there are still several days left and it may come back.
* * It is now possible to add a postscript. After a good night's rest that name came back, not in a flash, but slowly, almost syllable by syllable. "Now that you've got it" as the drill-sergeant says " See that you keep it."
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