Spectator New Writing Prizewinner 1971
prefer present ease whatever the future cost, cry, "Throw them a sop!" Little do the simpletons realize that a beggar, whose appetite is whetted by a crust, is merely encouraged to demand the whole loaf! The voices of the timid have been swelled by the bluster of the arabs' newfound champion, that Great Bear of a fellow who, having dispossessed his master of his estates, has set himself up as Man of the People, a second Titus Oates — though he, in no way, neglects to enjoy the privileges of his inheritance. Being a greedy and unscrupulous rogue, with a voracious appetite, he has set his eyes on the properties of others and contrives to foment the mischiefs of the arabs that, in the ensuing disorders, he may lay his hands upon the spoils. It is a matter of the deepest regret, too, ma'am, that your Uncle, with the amiable eccentricity of age, has become preoccupied in constant forays into the Chinese garden of his neighbour from which(he swears) a plague of green-fly and other aphids has been ravaging his fruit-trees and rose-bushes. So engrossed has he become in reciprocating, with compound interest, the despoliation that I fear he has little energy to spare for other ventures. "Buy them off," he shouts, and plunges back into his raids, laying about him with a profligate enthusiasm which confounds his friends no less than his foes. If then, ma'am, you would rid yourself once and for all of the pestilence, both reason and necessity point to the same conclusion. You must n act aloe, as you have so admirably acted in the past, with that cunning and audacity which has been the envy and astonishment of mankind. As you have proved, nil mortalibus ardui est. The answer, too, I humbly submit, is at hand in that remarkable disquisition recently published by your grandfather, the distinguished general whose intellect at an age when most have dwindled into senility retains all its pristine clarity. Therein he elaborates at length on the inestimable advantages of the fire-bolt in a confined battleground, and I am apprised that you have taken his lessons to heart. You hesitate, I know, only because of that deep-ingrained humanity of yours and the fear that the conflagration which would swallow the arab hovels might prove uncontainable and spead to your own properties. Even the ash, it is said, could, in an unfavourable wind, be so dispersed as to fall on your crops and blight them irremediably. In this matter, ma'am, I hope I may crave your indulgence to venture a modest pro posal. You will, of course, be cognisant that, in the proximity of the arabic settlement, there is a prodigiously large water-tank whose contents, when full, are sufficient to douse the fire of Prometheus himself. Were this to be primed with gunpowder and exploded consequent upon the hail of fire-bolts falling on the encampment, it would have the happy effect of drowning such of the rats as escaped the flames, while at the same time extinguishing them before they could envelop your woodland and consume your household and effects. The simplicity of this scheme, with the added beauty of utilising man's primal weapons, fire and water, in the pursuance of justice, will be adequate, I trust, ma'am, to recommend itself to you. You will not, I surmise, have to look far for a pretext to launch the enterprise. The drunken rantings of these tinks, with their threats of cutting your children's throats as they lie a-bed of nights, will sufficiently justify your action in the eyes of civilized men as no more than legitimate self-defence. And the elimination of that suppurating sore, which is at once a hazard to civic health and a reproach to the conscience, will be welcomed (after sundry rumblings) by the majority, who wish nothing better than to slumber on in uninterrupted torpor and sloth.
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