Diary
Disappointment bordering on dismay gripped my household with the arrival of last week's issue of Country Life. In place of the full-page engagement photograph which traditionally separates the advertisements from the articles, was a colour frontispiece of a 17th-century lapis lazuli table cabinet with a Charles II giltwood stand from Belton House, Leicestershire. The Belton cabinet was, to be sure, extremely handsome; its propor- tions could even be said to eclipse those of the engaged girls. But it was a melancholy innovation. The Country Life girls are one of the great enigmas of modern life. Not only have I never met one, but I have never heard of one nor spoken to anyone who has. And yet, week after week, year in and Year out, they smile out of the magazine, freshly engaged to an appropriate young man, with every appearance of happiness. This has always seemed a reason for en- couragement. To those of us doomed to live in London, surrounded by fickle career- minded girls and closet drug addicts, it is comforting to know that a reservoir of wholesome potential fiancees still exists, if only we knew where to find them. The truth of course, they live in a very small area indeed, presumably within easy driving distance of Country Life's engagement photographer Rosalind Mann; the catch- ment zone is central Surrey, bounded roughly by Haslemere, Woking, Camberley and Purley. None of the girls is selected, so far as I can see, on any criterion beyond this accident of geography; certainly Country Life does not stoop to seeking out 'socially smart' candidates. When this week's issue of the magazine arrived, excitement knew no bounds. Reinstated to her rightful place was a bride-to-be of extraordinary health and demureness, wearing a frilly white silk blouse and a string of pearls. This was Miss Lucy Tudway Quilter, who is to be married Dr Christopher Daniel of Welland House, Purley, Surrey. I understand that the Belton cabinet was a 'once off' experi- ment, to tie in with the Grosvenor antiques fair, and any distress caused by the passing
of the engagement photograph was a false alarm.
Staying with friends in Hampshire earlier this month I came across a game that was new to me, also requiring a copy of Country Y Life. This involves two or more Players, and is designed to instruct com- petitors in the disparate disciplines of ar- chitecture, geography and decisiveness. Starting at the beginning of the property advertisements in the front of the magazine, the pages are turned quite briskly and in order, pausing for only three seconds on each house. When somebody sees a pro- perty they like the look of, they must
it on impulse. Once you have made your choice, you cannot change your mind, even if it turns out to be suitable only for 'in- stitutional' use, and is close to Gatwick air- port. If, however, you are too cautious to plump for anything, you quickly arrive at the more modest, suburban homes at the back of the property section. The winner is the player with the largest house. In the event of a draw, classical beats gothic.
The first issue of a new magazine appeared last week; not, I hasten to say, a magazine liable to attract many subscriptions from Spectator readers, but nevertheless indicative of a new, low trend in the media. Young Royals is a monthly journal devoted exclusively to the activities of those members of the royal family aged under 25. In other words there will be nothing whatever about the Queen, the Queen Mother, Princess Margaret, Prince Charles or even Princess Michael of Kent, but plenty about the Princess of-Wales, the two Armstrong-Joneses, sundry Windsors and their respective escorts. The first number, for instance, includes an exciting 'exclusive' photograph of Lady Helen Windsor travelling by tube, a routine round-up of Prince Andrew's girlfriends and an article about the head porter of Prince Edward's college, Jesus, at Cam- bridge. In recent months there has been an extraordinary amount of space devoted to the 'young royals', by no means all of it confined to the more lurid tabloids. None of the articles has been very interesting, probably because their subjects are still too young to have done anything much. Quite how a magazine intends to fill up its pages, month after month, with stories on such a nebulous topic I cannot imagine. All jour- nalism is to some extent repetitive, but there can surely be no fate to match that of 'news editor' of Young Royals.
Fmends living in Ladbroke Grove and Earls Court have been complaining that incidents of spitting on the pavements by Moslem neighbours have reached an unbelievable level. Earlier this week I was taken on a tour of inspection, and can con- firm that the noise of throat-clearing and hawking along Westbourne Grove almost drowns the roar of traffic. We are, of course, at the beginning of the fourth week of Ramadan, the Islamic month of fasting which will culminate at the weekend with the festival of Eid al-Fitr. Until then, no devout Moslem may allow food or drink to pass his lips from dawn to sunset, or even — in the more orthodox sects — swallow his own spittle. What is interesting is the 'Dry? Anything but!' number of Arabs prepared to toe the Koran line over here. The tabloid papers ran several photographs of sheiks drinking champagne at Ascot, yet the rank and file will go without water through a heatwave, even to the extent of spitting on the sidewalks of South Kensington. This is par- ticularly impressive when you consider that most Moslems are only in London on short- stay visas, either as students or on holiday, and will soon be returning to their own dry countries. For non-Moslems, the month of Ramadan is a good moment to visit Islamic restaurants. For the rest of the year the Arab cafes along Westbourne Grove are in- variably full, and the large number of unac- companied men sitting inside gives them a menacing air. During Ramadan, however, the restaurants are empty until nine o'clock at night, and their staffs pleased to serve you. (They remain open all day in order to service their charcoal barbecues.) The only offputting note is the periodic spitting which emanates from the kitchen. I do not know where the law now stands on spitting in the street. Several years ago there used to be a sign in the King's Road saying 'Spitting is an offence punishable by a fine of up to £10'. Now the notice has disappeared.
Possibly spitting by Moslems is permitted under the same theocratic byelaw as excuses Sikhs on mopeds from wearing crash helmets.
Idid not attend Ascot last week but monitored proceedings with unusual in- terest on television. The coverage of women's fashions, over which such a fuss is made, is always amusing, not least because the genuinely smart women are inside the Enclosure where cameras may not follow. Consequently we are urged to admire the most ugly outfits, often printed to look like tiger skin. The only opportunity television viewers have to view the Enclosure set is when they parade through to the paddock, where I think I detected less flamboyance in their appearance than at previous Ascots. This was to be expected. Last year, in what must have been the sternest broadside in her long career, racegoers were given a ticking off by Mrs Betty Kenward (`Jennifer' in Harpers & Queen) that must have rung in their ears for months. It was also, I submit, one of the finest paragraphs of general cen- sure published this decade: 'The standard of dress among some of those present, even in the Royal Ascot Enclosure, left a lot to be desired. There were men with suits and shirts that fitted nowhere, with which they wore ill-shaped hats, often too big for them, and on top of hair that was disgustingly long. Many of the women,
young and old, looked unkempt and un- tidy, and sometimes ridiculous. Many seem- ed to expect their hats to stay on in the wind, I suppose by willpower or suction, as so few of them had hat pins. Most of those I noticed letting the scene down so badly were English, not overseas visitors.'
Nicholas Coleridge
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