Outlook from Meikles
RHODES in his baggy trousers is on his plinth, and in Meikles Hotel, Salisbury, are the children of his genius. Noise is the first and overwhelming factor that hits you as you enter the enormous lounge. Secondly, that there is nowhere to sit. Boys (sometimes called waiters) wander aim- lessly about, and if you are staying in the hotel you can sign for your drink. And while you sip it, having found a chair, you can examine a fair cross-section of Rhodesian life. The women offer far less variation than the men, so, except for the lady who plays the 'cello in the orchestra, I will take them as read. I was told by an oculist, fresh from home, that they, the women, hate the place and the men like it, but we won't go into that now. Let us take a look at the men. The variety is infinite, and this, I gather, is a new phenomenon. An elderly lady behind the counter in the chemist's, who came out first- class with me, tells me that Salisbury is not what it was, and I see what she means.
I should hazard a guess, as a start, that the only test of aristo- cracy recognised out here is length of permanent residence. The definition is broad, but I doubt if one of more practical utility could be found. The squire-type, a newcomer, also to be seen in Meikles looking rather uncomfortable, the man who talks about "our sort" and" one of us," who has connections at home, and talks, or does not talk, about them, who owns bloodstock and rides on them about his large estates, is in a strong position, and is a worthy and valuable element in the life of the community in general, but I doubt if a Tracey or a Gilchrist would set any particular store by him. Then there is the settler pure and simple. He is distinguished, more often than not, by a bush-shirt and a very lean and deeply tanned countenance. A few such run to an excess of brawn, but not many. It is this type that will lean back in their chairs absorbed in the strains of "Roses of Picardy." They live on their farms and come into town for various purposes, none of them frivolous.
But not all are the country folk. The lady in the chemist's is right. Salisbury has changed. Here in Meiklest there are men in natty tropical suits, and men with searching, wistful faces. There are some beautiful underdogs, and not a few Blimps. As Salisbury grows, as Southern Rhodesia fills up, as farming becomes food-production, as the country's merits as a nursery for the old become known, the ancillary services make their appearance, an urban lot. They cling to London more closely than the settlers. They are the agricultural machinery and fertiliser gentry, thill consulting engineers, the brokers, bankers and agents, and, of course, the lawyers. The settlers are not, as a class, in touch with London, and they mistrust Whitehall. It is the inverse instinct of their attachment to the flag and the monarchy. The settler is not, by and large, based on his home- land. He goes there on leave, and his wife gets her clothes there, or the ideas for them, and draws on the West End for her tittle-tattle and cultural tit-bits, that is unless she is aggressively tough and trek-minded. But the business-man has London and Whitehall right at his back, and would be helpless without them. His comings and goings, as likely as not, are swift and frequent.
Let us now consider the men in the shops. You will meet them too in Meikles. The hairdresser who cut my hair and washed it, charging me what I had paid in Bond Street before I sailed, had two black boys in attendance on him. They handed him the instruments of his trade, towels, etc. Surely this is a bad thing, not for the black boys, but for the white man. The example I have offered may not be a good or a fair one, but it seems to me that the general principle that a pure-blooded white man will deign to cut my hair and wash it with his own fair hands, and yet, even in the hairdresser's, must not give way a single point, must, at all costs, keep theory hard at work in practice, is unsound, and will lead, in God's good time, to the placing of the Englishman in a false position, from which he will not extricate himself without damage and even danger to our cause. It is, say what you like, ranging white against black to an unnecessary degree. Example is the best teacher. Manual labour is not a dishonourable pursuit. The hairdresser cannot plead that he is teaching his black boys to cut hair. He, mani- festly, is not. He is perching himself upon a little throne, sup- ported by black boys, an unnecessary proceeding.
If the lady with the 'cello ever sees these lines 1 hope she will forgive me. There is nothing personal in my remarks. And if I say, as I do, that the sardonic grin of hate and contempt on her face when she plays "Roses of Picardy" will remain with me in deep sympathy always will she try to understand ?
Roses of Picardy" was composed in 1917, and brought balm or acute misery to many aching hearts. But" Roses of Picardy" in 1917 was not half so sad, so deeply, utter pathetic, as the strains of the melody today, played morning after morning, night after night, by the Meikles string orchestra. And this is not the orchestra's fault, nor the fault of the management. The Rhodesians in Meikles like "Roses of Picardy"; they enjoy it. If they didn't it wouldn't be played. The Rhodesian is nothing if not forceful. But his forcefulness has not yet been used to influence the course and development, the refinements, modulations and adjustments, of artist.c and critical presentation.
A sing-song is all very well in its place, but I am talking very seriously about the arts and culture, and suggesting, very diffidently, that the Rhodesian should now do a great deal more to cultivate the acute arts, really cultivate them, inducing a real taste and power of discrimination. His apathy is encouraging the second-rate, and it will overwhelm him if he is not careful. The criterion is not whether one likes or understands a thing, but whether that thing is not necessary to round-off life, especially family life; whether, to quicken life, the Rhodesians, or those they choose to employ for the purpose, should not go probing into the future and into the flanks of other contemporary cultures, music included. Rhodesia, I argue, should step out with more impetuous strides in these directions. What is antiquated may be cheaper, but is it, in the long run, worth it I take it the Rhodesian is here to stay. If he is not, then a major African problem is solved.
The last thing I am suggesting is that vigour should be lost or impaired. There is no need for that. I am not offering a hint that men on the farms should be distracted by cultural lectures and practice on the harpsichord, or by amateur theatricals. But Salisbury has got out of hand. She is no longer a mere farming centre, the capital of a farming community, club-land for bands of light-hearted young men. Her physical stature is outgrow- ing her cultural equipment, her critical faculty in regions other than broad streets, big business and commercial enterprise. She is, alas, growing up. If the balance is not soon corrected, if she does not soon assume the crowning diadem, she is lost indeed. She will become in time the symbol of all that is ugly and overpowering, retaining only her brute strength.
I am all for the supremacy of the white man. But his skin is not his warrant of commission. He must be schooled and trained and polished if he wishes to rule. No community that was not half-frightened, and wholly lacking in poise, would have booed, as a Salisbury audience booed, when, in the film Where no Vultures Fly, a mild, bespectacled negro politician was thrown momentarily on the screen. Outrageous as the idea may sound, I am constrained to believe that "Roses of Picardy" is partly to blame. More cohesion in respect of those qualities which we call civilisation, which I would like to call civilisation, —an ability, amongst other things, to reject the obvious and repetitive, to establish a keener intellectual consciousness, will give complete national coherence. The hairdresser, with other fancies in his head, may even get through his job without bothering about black boys. And the black boys, without doubt, will follow his example.
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