A Damsel in Distress

The following notes attempt to explain cultural, historical and literary allusions in Wodehouse's text, to identify his sources, and to cross-reference similar references in the rest of the canon (as yet, links to other books may not work).

A Damsel in Distress was originally annotated for the Yahoo! discussion group, Blandings, by Mark Hodson (aka The Efficient Baxter). I have added a great many new entries, modified some of Mark's comments (largely on the basis of material newly available online), and have re-cast the entirety in my own style, but credit goes to Mark for his original efforts, even while I bear the blame for errors of fact or interpretation.

A Damsel in Distress was published in the US by George H Doran, New York, in October 1919 and in the UK by Herbert Jenkins, London, two weeks later. There are a few minor differences between the two editions.

These annotations relate to the UK version. Page references are to the 2003 Everyman edition.

Chapter 1 (pp 7 - 22)

Belpher Castle, in the county of Hampshire (p 7)

There is a village named Belpher (or Belper) in Derbyshire, but no obvious link between that and Wodehouse's choice of name.

The names of two other Wodehouse castles—Dreever Castle in A Gentleman of Leisure and Beevor Castle in Spring Fever—echo the names of well-known real-life castles: Belvoir (pronounced 'Beaver') in Leicestershire and Hever (pronounced 'Heaver') in Kent (the county in which Beevor Castle is placed); it is possible that the name Belpher may have been similarly inspired.

Norman Murphy (In Search of Blandings) identifies the village of Belpher with Emsworth, a village on the Hampshire coast just east of Havant where Wodehouse lived for varying periods between 1903 and 1914; Belpher Castle he identifies with Stansted House, a stately home about two miles north of Emsworth which features in The Little Nugget as 'Sanstead House'.

Earls of Marshmoreton (p 7)

The similarity between Marshmoreton and Moreton-in-Marsh, a market town in Gloucestershire, is probably not coincidental. Moreton-in-Marsh lies less than 15 miles from Cheltenham, where Wodehouse's parents lived from 1902.

jack-rabbit (p 7)

Jack-rabbits are not rabbits, but hares, of the genus Lepus. They are most active at night, spending much of the day-time lying in a flattened spot of grass or other vegetation; if startled, they run at a speed that few animals can match. Hares occur throughout much of Africa, Asia, Europe and North America, but the name "jack rabbit" is usually applied only to some of the North American species.

picture-palaces (p 7)

A (rather old-fashioned) term for cinema.

twenty-first birthday (p 7)

At the time when A Damsel in Distress was written, twenty-one was, in the United Kingdom, the legal age of majority, the age at which one acquires the full legal rights of an adult. Under the Family Law Reform Act 1969, the age of majority in England and Wales was lowered to 18 years with effect from 1 January 1970.

Lord Belpher . . . Lady Patricia Maud Marsh . . . Lady Caroline Byng (p 7)

The plethora of titles may be confusing. If, as is often the case, an English peer holds more than one title, his eldest son is customarily styled using one of the subsidiary titles; within the Wodehouse canon, the best-known example is Clarence, 9th Earl of Emsworth, whose elder son, George, is styled Viscount Bosham. In the present case, the Earl of Marshmoreton's son, Percy, is styled using the courtesy title of Lord Belpher; his daughter, Maud, takes the honorific prefix 'Lady', hence is known as Lady Maud Marsh, Marsh being the family name; his sister, who, as a daughter of the 6th Earl, would have been styled Lady Caroline Marsh before her marriage, retains the honorific prefix with her married name.

The use of 'Lord' or 'Lady' by the Earl's close relatives is solely a matter of courtesy and social usage; those so styled are regarded, in law, as commoners. Only the Earl has the legal status of a peer.

chatelaine (p 8)

A woman who has charge of a large house (from French châtelaine, the feminine form of châtelain, a castellan, or govenor of a castle).

Keggs the butler (p 8)

There are several butlers named Keggs, or Coggs, in Wodehouse's stories. Others Keggses are the Keith's butler in 'The Good Angel' (The Man Upstairs) and (presumably the same Keith/Keggs pairing) in 'Love Me, Love My Dog' (a short story published in Strand Magazine in August 1910); John Bannister's butler in The Coming of Bill; and Augustus Keggs, now retired but formerly in the employment of Lord Uffenham (see Money in the Bank, Something Fishy and Ice in the Bedroom). Coggs is Lord Ickenham's butler in Uncle Fred in the Springtime and Uncle Dynamite.

The Keggs of 'A Good Angel' may be the same individual as Keggs in A Damsel in Distress: as David Jasen points out, both engage in organising matrimonial sweepstakes.

the voice of calumny (p 8)

This personification occurs frequently in 18th and 19th century literature, as, for example, in Walter Scott's Kenilworth (ch 11), Mary Wollstonecraft's Maria (ch 17), Fanny Burney's Cecilia (bk 8, ch 1) and Charles Dickens's The Pickwick Papers (ch 39), as well as in several theological works.

Farmers' and Merchants' Bank (p 8)

The Farmers and Merchants Bank (now absorbed into the Bank of America) was the first bank to be incorporated in Los Angeles, California, and it played a major role in the early economic development of the city. While there are many unrelated banks of the same name in towns and cities across the US, no bank of this name seems to have existed in England.

Oddfellows' Hall (p 8)

The Oddfellows is one of the largest and oldest friendly societies currently operating in the UK. Evolving from the mediaeval Trade Guilds, the Oddfellows began in the City of London in the late 17th and early 18th centuries and established local groups across England and Wales. In 1810 the Manchester Unity of Oddfellows was formed by a number of local groups joining together. As the idea caught on, more and more groups started up around the country, generally meeting in pubs and church halls and now many Branches own their own meeting place or Oddfellows hall.

The Oddfellows website

Although the Oddfellows have several branches in the Portsmouth and Southampton area, there is no record of a Lodge in Emsworth.

The origin of the name Oddfellows is uncertain. One suggestion is that in the mediaeval period the "Odd Fellows" were associations of "fellows" (journeymen) from an odd assortment of trades, as distinct from the socially more prestigious craftsmen's guilds, which were associations of master craftsmen from a single trade.

inductive reasoning (p 8)

"Yes, gentlemen," said he, "it is the most famous pearl now existing in the world, and it has been my good fortune, by a connected chain of inductive reasoning, to trace it from the Prince of Colonna's bedroom at the Dacre Hotel, where it was lost, to the interior of this, the last of the six busts of Napoleon which were manufactured by Gelder & Co, of Stepney."

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, 'The Adventure of the Six Napoleons', from The Return of Sherlock Holmes

Inductive reasoning is the process of drawing inferences from specific observations. For example, from previous experience that a guard dog does not usually bark at its owner and the fact that a particular guard dog did not bark during the night-time, one can reason inductively to the inference that the burglar may have been the dog's owner. As Wodehouse clearly demonstrates, inductive reasoning yields inferences that are not necessarily true: another example of a false inference, based on countless observations of wild swans in Europe, is that all swans are white; it is immediately refuted by the sight of an Australian black swan.

Inductive reasoning is often contrasted with deductive reasoning, which derives a necessarily-true conclusion from previously known facts or premises; thus, if I am human and all humans are mortal, it necessarily follows, deductively, that I am mortal. (The premise that all humans are mortal is an inductive inference; the premise that I am human is occasionally questioned!)

whale-oil solution (p 9)

Spraying with whale-oil solution, more precisely with a solution of whale-oil soap, used to be a recognised method for the control of insect pests on roses:

The Aphis (Aphis rosae), or Green Fly, is well known by all who have grown roses. . . Much the best destructive agent to use against them is tobacco smoke. . . Whale-oil soap, dissolved in water, is also a useful remedy.

Henry Brooks Ellwanger, The rose; a treatise on the cultivation, history, family characteristics, pp 88-9 (1906)

The first leaves have scarcely appeared ere they are beset by the thrip or rose-hopper, almost immediately succeeded by the green fly, leaf-roller, rose-chafer and rose-slug. Were the sparrow of any earthly use, he would not leave these to hellebore, whale-oil soap, and Paris green.

George Herman Ellwanger, The garden's story, p 188 (1891)

Athenæum Club (p 9)

The Athenæum Club was founded in 1824. While most of London's gentlemen's clubs at that period attracted mainly those of independent wealth and status, the Athenæum Club aimed additionally to attract men "of distinguished eminence in Science, Literature, or the Arts, or for Public Service". It used to number among its members so many bishops and other clerics that it was long regarded as a clergymen's club; continuing this tradition, the late Cardinal Basil Hume was a member.

The club's first chairman was the distinguished scientist Sir Humphrey Davy; the first secretary was a scientist who achieved even greater distinction, Michael Faraday. Other members have included Sir Walter Scott, Charles Darwin, Charles Dickens, Cecil Rhodes, Walter de la Mare, Thackeray, Winston Churchill, Benjamin Disraeli, and Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington. Rudyard Kipling is just one of over 50 members of the club who have been awarded the Nobel Prize, including at least one in each category of the prize.

The Athenæum Club occupies a handsome neoclassical building on the corner of Pall Mall and Waterloo Place.

Hybrid teas (p 9)

Hybrid teas are a group of rose cultivars, produced by crossing two other types, the Tea and the Hybrid Perpetual. The first hybrid teas were raised from the late 1860s. They are highly regarded for their colour and fragrance. The large flowers are usually borne singly on a long stem, which makes them particularly suitable as cut flowers.

Most hybrid teas are hardy plants and can withstand a relatively cold winter, but they do require protection from severe cold and this, together with a lack of resistance to disease, makes them difficult to grow in the home garden.

Temple Flower Show (p 9)

The Temple Flower Show, then called the Great Spring Show, was an exhibition of the Royal Horticultural Society, held annually in the gardens of the Inner Temple in London from 1888 to 1911. In 1912, the show was cancelled to make way for the Royal International Horticultural Exhibition, which was held in the grounds of the Royal Hospital at Chelsea; when the Great Spring Show resumed, in 1913, it was held at Chelsea, where it remains today and is now known as the RHS Chelsea Flower Show.

rose-slugs, rose-beetles . . . (p 9-10)

Rose-slug is the name given to the larvae of certain sawflies which cause damage to rose bushes by eating away the fleshy part of the leaves, leaving only the veins and stalk untouched. Sawflies are the most primitive members of the insect order Hymenoptera, and are distantly related to bees and wasps. Over 400 species of sawfly have been recorded in Britain. Many feed on a specific type of plant, from which they derive their common name, such as Gooseberry sawfly, Pine sawfly, etc; those which show a partiality for roses include the Rose-slug sawfly, Endelomyia aethiops, and the Bristly rose slug, Cladius difformis.

Rose-beetle is another name for the rose chafer, Cetonia aurata, a member of the family Scarabaeidae and thus a relative of the dung beetles. The adult rose chafer is a bright metallic-green and measures 14-20 mm in length; it feeds mainly on the petals of roses and other plants. The larvae live in decaying plant material such as compost, peat and rotten wood; unlike the larvae of many other chafers, which do considerable economic damage to cereal crops and grassland, the larvae of the rose chafer do not feed on plant roots.

The rose-hopper, or rose leafhopper (Edwardsiana rosae, is a small yellowish-white insect, about four millimetres long, with transparent wings. While its behaviour is as Wodehouse describes it, there is some terminological confusion because the rose leafhopper is not a thrips and, indeed, belongs to a different insect order, the Hemiptera, or 'true bugs'. According to H B Ellwanger (see above), a solution of whale-oil soap is an effective remedy for rose leafhoppers.

Thrips are tiny, slender insects with fringed wings; they comprise the order Thysanoptera (from the Greek thysanos—fringe + pteron—wing). Unlike the rose leafhopper, thrips are tiny black insects and are usually to be found deep within the flower head, rather than under the leaves. The word thrips is both singular and plural; thrip is erroneous.

Attila the Hun (p 10)

Attila was born c 406 AD. In 434, he became ruler of the Huns, jointly with his brother Bleda until the latter's death, c 445, thereafter sole ruler until his own death in 453. During his reign, Attila forged an empire that extended over much of Europe, from Germany and the Netherlands to the Ural river, and from the Danube to Poland and Estonia. In 451, Attila invaded Gaul, reaching Orleans before being repulsed by a coalition of Romans, Visigoths and Franks; the two armies met at a place usually assumed to be near Châlons-en-Champagne, where they fought the Battle of Chalons. Though the Visigoth king was killed during the battle, it was Attila who was forced to retreat. After an indecisive invasion of Italy in 452, Attila retreated across the Danube. He died the following year, in circumstances that are still debated. Following his death, his three sons fought over his legacy, the Huns became disunited, and within a year Attila's empire had dissolved.

In western culture, Attila is a byword for barbarism and cruelty, though many historians now believe that this is partly due to a confusion with other so-called 'barbarians' and that Attila, and the Huns in general, were far more civilised than they are usually depicted. In the Germanic epics, Attila appears as Etzel in the Nibelungenlied and as Atli in the Volsunga Saga and the Poetic Edda.

Genghis Khan (p 10)

Temüjin, known to history as Genghis Khan, was born c 1162 AD. He rose to become the undisputed leader of the Mongols and established the basis of the Mongol Empire. Temüjin took the name Genghis Khan in 1206 when, having succeeded, by a combination of war and diplomacy, in uniting all the tribes of the Mongolian plains, he was acknowledged by a council of Mongol chiefs as their 'khan', or leader. Having united the Mongols, Genghis Khan set about conquering their neighbours, and by the time he died, in 1227, the Mongol empire extended from the Caspian Sea in the west to the Sea of Japan in the east; Mongol armies had also raided as far west as the Crimea. Under Genghis Khan's successors, the Mongol Empire was expanded to encompass the whole of China, Burma and the Korean peninsula, southern Russia from the Sea of Okhotsk to modern-day Belarus and Ukraine, Turkey, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Tibet.

Like Attila, but with more justification, Genghis Khan has a reputation for savage cruelty. Though he usually offered his enemies relatively fair terms if they would submit without a fight, he and his successors were ruthless in exterminating those who resisted; cities, such as Samarkand, that opposed the Mongols were devastated and their inhabitants slaughtered. Accurate numbers for those killed by the Mongols during the 13th and 14th centuries cannot be established, but estimates range as high as tens of millions.

horny-handed toiler (p 10)

The phrase "horny-handed toiler" appears in a pamphlet written, in 1865, by a Boston-based unionist, Ira Seward, as part of a campaign for reduced working hours. In modified form, as "horny-handed sons of toil", it appears in the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, attributed to Denis Kearney, an Irish-born political activist, in a speech he made at San Francisco around 1878. The spoonerism "tons of soil" is frequently, though without any evidence, attributed to William Spooner himself, while the (probably apocryphal) newspaper headline "Sons of toil buried under tons of soil", as relating to a mining accident, is also frequently quoted, again without adequate citation.

They say absence makes the heart grow fonder. (p 11)

The first to say so may have been the Latin poet Sextus Aurelius Propertius (c 50-15 BC):

semper in absentis felicior aestus amantis
(absence always increases lovers' passion)

Elegies, Book 2, XXXIII

The phrase was popularised by the English poet and songwriter Thomas Haynes Bayly (1797-1839) in his poem "Isle of Beauty". The poem was part of the collection "Songs to Rosa", which, with a melody by Charles Chapland Whitmore and musical arrangement by Thomas A Rawlings, was published in 1826:

When the waves are round me breaking,
As I pace the deck alone,
And my eye in vain is seeking
Some green leaf to rest upon,
What would I not give to wander,
Where my old companions dwell . . .
Absence makes the heart grow fonder;
Isle of Beauty "fare thee well"!

The song was sufficiently popular that it is mentioned in a letter dated 20 October 1831, written by Elizabeth Cleghorn Stevenson (Mrs Gaskell) to her friend Harriet Carr.

dashed affair (p 12)

In less permissive times, "damned", used as an oath, was usually printed as "d–––d", from which arose the practice of substituting the descriptive "dashed" in its place.

incubus (p 13)

Latin: nightmare. Hence, an oppressive person or thing.

stops at Belpher if signalled. (p 15)

Emsworth is served by the London (Victoria) to Portsmouth line, the coastal stretch of which also doubles as part of the Portsmouth to Brighton line. Nowadays, the service from Portsmouth to London Victoria makes a scheduled stop at Emsworth, from where the fastest journey takes approximately 2 hours, but at a time when express services made unscheduled stops on request, it is not improbable that Emsworth could have been a request stop. The journey time can be reduced by about 10 minutes by going one station west, to Havant, and joining the Portsmouth to London (Waterloo) express.

Social Progress League at Lewisham (p 15)

Possibly from his time at Dulwich, Wodehouse would have known Lewisham, a suburb in South London just 2-3 miles to the east, as a largely working-class area and thus just the sort of place where a social reform movement might hope to be effective. Whether a real Social Progress League existed (in England: there was one in New Zealand) has not been established, but as a generic name it could cover a wide range of activities: Lady Caroline's attitudes would tend to rule out socialism, women's suffrage or anything else that might alter the existing social order; the temperance movement, welfare for 'fallen women', and similar worthy causes would seem more likely to attract her energies.

correct stance for his approach-shots (p 15)

At the time he was writing A Damsel in Distress, Wodehouse was living at Great Neck, Long Island, near the Sound View Golf Course, which became the setting for many of his golf stories. Although he had already written a few stories with a golfing background ('A Woman is Only a Woman' was published just a few months before A Damsel in Distress), this is the first of his novels to make extensive use of the comic possibilities of golfing jargon such as "correct stance" and "approach shots".

troubled spirit (p 15)

But they my troubled spirit rule,
For they controll'd me when a boy;
They bring me sorrow touch'd with joy,
The merry merry bells of Yule.

Alfred, Lord Tennyson, 'In Memoriam', stanza XXVIII

soul in torment (p 15)

And there in the middle of it was the man himself, his face twisted like a lost soul in torment, and his great brindled beard stuck upwards in his agony.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, 'The Adventure of Black Peter', from The Return of Sherlock Holmes

the mater (p 16)

Latin: mother. As with 'pater' (Latin: father), it became a popular expression in the slang of mid- to late-19th century public schoolboys; the earliest instance cited in the OED is from a book of reminiscences, Eton School Days, of 1864.

Simon Legree (p 16)

See Money in the Bank.

all the world was sunshine (p 16)

This phrase occurs in Jack London's short story 'The Faith of Men' (Macmillan, New York, 1904) and in a few works by other writers in the period 1910-19.

Prestwick (p 17)

Prestwick Golf Club is on the Ayrshire coast, about a half-hour's drive south-west of Glasgow. The club was founded in 1851 and from then until 1864 the Keeper of the Green was the legendary 'Old' Tom Morris. In 1860, Prestwick was the venue for the first Open Championship, which was played there each year until 1870, since when the venue has rotated among a small number of links courses. Prestwick was the venue in 1914, when Harry Vardon won the last Open before war brought the annual event to a temporary halt. Tam Duggan and Alec Fraser may be real people, but it is more probable that they are generic Scots names; there is no record of anyone of either name having won a tournament of any note, at Prestwick or any other venue, in the years preceding the writing of A Damsel in Distress.

Morning Post (p 17)

See Summer Moonshine.

absolute pash (p 17)

"pash" = passion, infatuation.

blue-eyed boy (p 18)

Favoured (figuratively). The earliest use of the phrase noted in the OED is in chapter 19 of The Coming of Bill, which was published just a few months before A Damsel in Distress:

If ever there was a blue-eyed boy, you will be it, once he hears about this.

everywhere the uncle went (p 21)

Mary had a little lamb,
its fleece was white as snow.
And everywhere that Mary went,
the lamb was sure to go.

From a nursery rhyme published in May 1830 by Sarah Josepha Hale (1788-1879)

Thomas Edison recited, and successfuly played back, the first stanza of this poem to test his invention of the phonograph in 1877.

Belgrave Square (p 22)

Belgrave Square was laid out in the 1820s on land owned by the Earl of Grosvenor (now the Duke of Westminster) and took its name from the village of Belgrave on the Grosvenor family estate in Cheshire. The houses surrounding the square are said to among the grandest ever built in London and were, from their construction until World War II, the homes of leading members of the British aristocracy and, latterly, of exceedingly wealthy individuals and some foreign embassies; after the War, most of the private residences were converted into offices.

No 11a Belgrave Square does not exist; no 11, situated close to the eastern corner of the square, houses the Embassy of Portugal.

Chapter 2 (pp 23 - 35)

Little Gooch Street (p 23)

Probably not 'Gooch', but 'Goodge'. Little Goodge Street (since renamed as Goodge Place, though it was Little Goodge Street until at least 1915) is a narrow street off Goodge Street, immediately east of The Middlesex Hospital. It is a few minutes' walk from Shaftesbury Avenue, and just about qualifies as "round the corner" (though it is, in fact, round two or three corners!); it is also south-facing and sheltered. The children playing in the street would not, however, be visible to someone standing at the entrance to the Regal Theatre.

Lucretia Borgia (p 23)

Lucrezia Borgia (1480-1519) was the bastard daughter of Rodrigo Borgia (later Pope Alexander VI) and sister of the notorious despot Cesare Borgia. Whether the stories about her are true or not, history has given her a reputation as one whose cocktails had such a deadly kick that guests rarely had time for a second.

Shaftesbury Avenue (p 23)

Constructed between 1877 and 1886 to improve communications across London's busy West End, and named after the 7th Earl of Shaftesbury, a prominent social reformer, Shaftesbury Avenue soon acquired a reputation as the heart of London's theatreland. By the time the New Princes Theatre (see below) opened, in 1911, it was the seventh theatre to have been erected on the thoroughfare; six of them are still active today.

Regal Theatre (p 23)

Norman Murphy identifies the Regal with Princes Theatre (originally New Princes Theatre, now the Shaftesbury), which is situated toward the northern end of Shaftesbury Avenue, at the junction with High Holborn. The Regal and Mac, the guardian of its stage door, also appear in Summer Lightning (1929) and Bachelors Anonymous (1973).

George Bevan (p 24)

George Bevan shares the same initials as Wodehouse's life-long friend, Guy Bolton, his collaborator in many theatrical enterprises (though Bolton was a writer, not a composer). Norman Murphy believes that George Bevan, George Benham (a playwright in Indiscretions of Archie) and George Caffyn (also a playwright, in 'Jeeves and the Chump Cyril') were all based on, and are a compliment to, Bolton.

a labour of Hercules (p 24)

Hercules is the latinised name of the greatest of mythical Greek heroes, Herakles. According to the myths, Herakles killed his wife and children in a fit of passion and, as penance, was required to undertake a series of ten tasks (later increased to twelve, because he had assistance for two of them). Because of the difficult nature of the twelve tasks, a 'labour of Hercules' has come to signify a particularly arduous undertaking.

dried over a barrel (p 24)

Before modern methods of resuscitation were developed, one method of treating a victim of drowning was to lay the victim over a barrel, which was then rolled back and forth in the hope that this would dislodge water from the lungs.

Say, I rode for an hour in a 'rickshaw at Nagoya to see the most beautiful girl in Japan and when we got to the teahouse they trotted out a little shrimp that looked as if she'd been dried over a barrel—you know, stood bent all the time, as if she was getting ready to jump.

George Ade, The Slim Princess, ch 5 (1907)

By their united strength they pulled Silver up the bank so that his limp head hung downward. Then they began to work over him exactly as if he had been a drowned man, except that they did not, of course, roll him over a barrel.

B M Bower, The Flying U's Last Stand, ch 3 (1915)

Jermyn Street (p 25)

Jermyn Street runs parallel to, and immediately to the south of, Piccadilly, not far from Shaftesbury Avenue. It is famous for the number of high-quality shirtmakers who have premises there. Past residents of the street include the Duke of Marlborough, Sir Isaac Newton and Prince Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, later Emperor Napoléon III of France, who lived in an hotel on Jermyn Street, under the alias of Count d'Arenberg, after his escape from imprisonment.

The Morning Leader (p 25)

The Morning Leader was founded in 1892. It ceased publication in 1912, after being amalgamated into The Daily News, a newspaper whose first editor, in 1846, had been Charles Dickens. In 1930, The Daily News was itself absorbed into The Daily Chronicle, which thereafter appeared as The News Chronicle until 1960, when it ceased publication.

better four-fifths (p 27)

Wife. The more usual expression is "better half".

festive hams (p 27)

A 'ham' (shortened from US slang 'ham-fatter') is a poor actor. The OED cites its first occurrence in 1882; a later citation is from Wodehouse's Laughing Gas. More literally, a 'festive ham' is a meat dish that is served on festive occasions.

In this instance, Wodehouse seems to be combining the two usages to imply that the actors ('hams', here used jocularly) dined well.

Little Eva (p 27)

Little Eva—full name Evangeline St Clare—is a character in Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin. Aged between 5 and 6 years, she is rescued from drowning by Uncle Tom, who is on his way to be sold at a slave auction. Eva persuades her father, Augustine St Clare, to buy Tom and he becomes coachman to the St Clare family.

Her form was the perfection of childish beauty, without its usual chubbiness and squareness of outline. There was about it an undulating and aerial grace, such as one might dream of for some mythic and allegorical being. . . She was always in motion, always with a half smile on her rosy mouth, flying hither and thither, with an undulating and cloud-like tread, singing to herself as she moved as in a happy dream.

Harriet Beecher Stowe, Uncle Tom's Cabin, ch 14 (1852)

Hicks Corners (p 28)

Wodehouse several times uses the name Hicks Corners to suggest a small rural town:

"Say, I got married since I saw you last."

"You did, did you?" I said. "Then what are you doing, may I ask, dancing on Broadway like a gay bachelor? I suppose you have left your wife at Hicks' Corners, singing 'Where is my wandering boy tonight'?"

'At Geisenheimer's', from The Man With Two Left Feet

"Well, she comes from the Middle West, and seems to be trying to be twice as Bohemian as the rest of the girls down in Greenwich Village. She wears her hair bobbed and goes about in a kimono. She's probably read magazine stories about Greenwich Village, and has modelled herself on them. It's so silly, when you can see Hicks Corners sticking out of her all the time."

Indiscretions of Archie, ch 23

There is a real Hicks Corners in Illinois, USA. The name seems to derive from a combination of hick—an ignorant rustic—and Hickscorner, a 16th century word for a scoffer (from the eponymous libertine character who scoffs at religion in the morality play of that name, written some time between 1497 and 1512).

Bide a Wee Home (p 28)

The Bide-A-Wee Home Association was established in 1903 by Mrs Flora D'Auby Jenkins Kibbe to provide care and shelter for stray and unwanted animals. The first shelter was in Manhatten; two others were opened later, both on Long Island, at Wantagh and Westhampton. Barrie Phelps notes that in 1966 the Wodehouses donated US$20,000 to the Bide-A-Wee Association to build the 'PG Wodehouse Shelter' for stray animals at Westhampton and that six of their pets are buried there.

Covent Garden (p 28)

Covent Garden, situated just north of Strand, in central London, was the site of London's principal fruit and vegetable market from the 1600s until 1974, when it moved to a new site at Nine Elms, south of the river Thames.

Spenser Gray (p 29)

The name is possibly coined from the poets Edmund Spenser (1552-99, author of The Faerie Queen) and Thomas Gray (1716-71, famous for his Elegy written in a country churchyard). The first husband of Bertie Wooster's Aunt Agatha was named Spenser Gregson.

this gink (p 29)

The OED defines 'gink' as US slang meaning "a fellow, a man" and notes that it is frequently used pejoratively (as it is here). The earliest citation in the OED is from the Saturday Evening Post in October 1910; the second citation is this instance.

Mr Arbuckle . . . Fatty (p 29)

Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle (1887-1933) was a famously overweight comic actor in the era of silent films. He was a star of the Keystone Cops films, gave Buster Keaton his first screen opportunity (in the short film The Butcher Boy), and mentored the young Charles Chaplin.

In 1921, two years after the publication of A Damsel in Distress, Arbuckle was falsely accused of rape and manslaughter; after two mistrials, he was eventually acquitted—and received a written apology from the jury—but by then his career and reputation had been destroyed. He died of a heart attack just hours after signing a contract with Warner Brothers to make a feature-length film that would have been his first since the scandal broke 12 years earlier.

What ho, within there (p 29)

Compare:

"Ha?" Mr Sturge drew back in dark surprise. "'Tis the language of delirium. He raves. What ho, without there!" he called aloud.

Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch, The Mayor of Troy, ch 14 (1906)

Halting beneath this outer gate, the youth winded the horn which hung at his side in mimicry of the custom of the times.

"What ho, without there!" challenged the old man entering grimly into the spirit of the play.

Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Outlaw of Torn, ch 4 (1927)

I stopped singing and opened the door an inch.

"What ho without there!"

"Lady Malvern wishes to see you, sir," said Jeeves.

'Jeeves and the Unbidden Guest', from My Man Jeeves (1919)

mash notes (p 29)

Love letters.

To "mash" someone is defined by the OED as "to fascinate or excite sentimental admiration in (one of the opposite sex)". The OED cites Barrère & Leland, A Dictionary of Slang, Jargon & Cant (1897):

"About the year 1860 mash was a word found only in theatrical parlance in the United States. When an actress . . . smiled at . . . a friend in the audience, she was said to mash him."

Farmer & Henley, Slang and Its Analogues, vol 4 (1896), quotes Barrère & Leland at greater length:

"It occurred to the writer [C G Leland] that it must have been derived from the gypsy mash (masher-ava) to allure, to entice . . . Mr Paluez, a well-known impresario, said . . . he could confirm [the suggestion] for the term had originated with the C—— family, who were all actors and actresses, of Romany stock, who spoke gypsy familiarly among themselves."

blarzy (p 30)

blasé—bored through over-familiarity (French)

Tin Pan Alley (p 31)

"Tin Pan Alley" was originally the name given to a block in Manhatten, New York, on West 28th Street between Broadway and Sixth Avenue, where, from the mid-1880s, there developed a high concentration of music publishers. The name was subsequently extended to any area within a major city that has a high concentration of music publishers and musical instrument stores, such as Denmark Street, near Covent Garden, London, which has been known since the 1920s as "Britain's Tin Pan Alley". Later still, "Tin Pan Alley" came to be used as a colloquial term for the world of music composing and publishing, and for popular music generally (usually—as in this instance—with a slightly derogatory reference to the commercial and unadventurous nature of the music).

The origin of the phrase is uncertain: the OED cites the use, in 1885, of "tin-panning" to refer to "a great uproar being caused by the beating of old trays, kettles, etc" and it is often suggested that "Tin Pan Alley" referred to the cacophony produced by many musical instruments playing different tunes in a small area. The first use of the phrase cited in the OED is in the October 1908 issue of Hampton's Broadway Magazine; by 1926, the OED cites a statement that "as a matter of fact, Tin Pan Alley exists now only as a tradition".

become one of the Mendelssohn's March Daughters (p 31)

Get married.

The reference is to the "Wedding March" composed by Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy (1809-47) as part of his incidental music for Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, Op 61 (1843). Together with the "Bridal Chorus" from Act 3 of Richard Wagner's opera Lohengrin, WWV 75 (1850), it has traditionally been one of the most popular pieces of wedding music, the Wagner usually being played as a processional, heralding the arrival of the bride at the church, and the Mendelssohn being played as a recessional, as the newly-wed couple depart.

meet at Philippi (p 31)

Brutus:
There is a tide in the affairs of men
which taken at the flood leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
is bound in shallows and in miseries.
On such a full sea are we now afloat,
and we must take the current when it serves,
or lose our ventures.
Cassius:
Then, with your will, go on;
We'll along ourselves and meet them at Philippi.

Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, Act IV, sc 3 (1599 ?)

The plain to the west of the Greek city of Philippi was the scene, in 42 BC, of the final battle of the Roman civil war, fought between Julius Caesar's heirs, Marcus Antonius and Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus, and his assassins, Marcus Junius Brutus and Gaius Cassius Longinus. Brutus and Cassius were defeated and committed suicide; Octavian went on to become the ruler of Italy and, after defeating Antony at the battle of Actium, in 32 BC, became de facto emperor, though he never used the title.

poor geek (p 31)

'Geek' is here being used to mean a simpleton or dupe. The use of 'geek' to describe "an unsociable person obsessively devoted to a particular pursuit" (OED) or "a person who is extremely devoted to and knowledgeable about computers or related technology" (OED) came much later.

stenographer (p 32)

Originally, a shorthand writer (from Greek stenos—narrow + graphos—written), later also a shorthand typist, and sometimes, more loosely, any sort of secretary.

interpolated numbers (p 32)

In the musical theatre, an interpolated number is a song, most often written by someone other than the main composer of a show, that is added between the numbers of the original work. Before he achieved success as a lyricist, Wodehouse frequently did work of this nature. Ironically, what is probably his best-known song, "Bill", only became popular as an interpolated number. Originally written for the 1918 production of Oh, Lady! Lady, the last of the five musicals by the trio of Wodehouse, Guy Bolton and Jerome Kern that were staged at the Princess Theatre, New York, it was dropped from the show and not used until 1927, when it found a home in Showboat, a work for which the book and lyrics were written by Oscar Hammerstein to music by Kern.

write it on your cuff (p 32)

This refers to the fashion, common among 'white-collar' workers of the time, for wearing shirts with detachable, disposable cuffs and collars made out of paper or celluloid. Such cuffs were a convenient place to jot down notes, a practice which gave rise to the phrase "off the cuff" (as also "white-collar").

acquired a liver (p 32)

George has, of course, always had a liver; here he is using 'liver' in its sense of 'liver-complaint':

He suffered from ague for the first time since boyhood, and later came liver.

Archibald Forbes, Chinese Gordon, ch 3 (1884)

In and Out Club (p 33)

This is not, as one might think, one of Wodehouse's fictional clubs; rather, it is the nickname of the Naval & Military Club, a gentlemen's club that was founded in 1862. The name derives from the signs that were prominently displayed on the entrance and exit gates of the Club's original home at 94 Piccadilly; although the Club moved, in 1999, to premises in St James Square that have only one gate, the tradition is maintained by 'In' and 'Out' signs on either side of the entrance.

Chapter 3 (pp 36 - 44)

the work of a moment (p 36)

"It is all very strange. So suddenly to be gone! It seems but the work of a moment. . ."

Jane Austen, Sense and Sensibility, ch 15 (1811)

It is now but the work of a moment to lift the saucepan of peas from the fire, strain them through a colander, pass them thence into a net or bag, rinse them in cold water and then spread the whole appetising mass on a platter and carry it on a fireshovel to the dining-room.

Stephen Leacock, Further Foolishness, ch 7 (1916)

The charging of his enemy was but the work of a moment.

Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote, Part 1, Book 1, ch 8
quoted in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed (1919)

As is clear, this phrase is not original to Wodehouse, but it was one that he made his own:

I had often wondered how those Johnnies in books did it—I mean the fellows with whom it was the work of a moment to do about a dozen things that ought to have taken them about ten minutes. But, as a matter of fact, it was the work of a moment with me to chuck away my cigarette, swear a bit, leap about ten yards, dive into a bush that stood near the library window, and stand there with my ears flapping.

'Jeeves Takes Charge'

To tiptoe backwards, holding his breath, was with Montrose Mulliner the work of a moment.

'Monkey Business'

. . . and to pour into a glass an inch or so of the raw spirit and shoosh some soda-water on top of it was with me the work of a moment.

Right Ho, Jeeves, ch 10

There was a sheet lying on the bed . . . and to snatch this up and envelop Spode in it was with me the work of a moment.

The Code of the Woosters, ch 7

The phrase is also found in The Clicking of Cuthbert, Indiscretions of Archie, Thank You, Jeeves, and The Inimitable Jeeves, among others.

eyes from which the scales had fallen (p 37)

And Ananias went his way, and entered into the house; and putting his hands on him said, Brother Saul, the Lord, even Jesus, that appeared unto thee in the way as thou camest, hath sent me, that thou mightest receive thy sight, and be filled with the Holy Ghost.

And immediately there fell from his eyes as it had been scales: and he received sight forthwith, and arose, and was baptized.

Acts ix, 17-18

the days of the Tudors (p 37)

The days of the Tudors lasted from 1485 to 1603. The Tudor dynasty began when Henry Tudor, Earl of Richmond, became King Henry VII of England after defeating the last Plantagenet king, Richard III, at the Battle of Bosworth in August 1485. The dynasty came to an end with the death of Henry's granddaughter, Elizabeth I, who left no direct heir and was succeeded (as James I of England) by King James VI of Scotland, son of Elizabeth's cousin, Mary Stuart (Mary, Queen of Scots).

touched in the wind (p 38)

"Touched in the wind" describes a horse whose breathing is disordered, usually as the result of an ailment rather than by over-exertion.

Lawrenceville and Harvard (p 38)

Lawrenceville is one of the oldest and most elite prep schools in the US. It was originally founded in 1810 as the Maidenhead Academy and went through several changes of name before its current name, "The Lawrenceville School", was adopted during its refounding in 1883. The school is located in Lawrence, New Jersey, just a few miles from Princeton. Lawrenceville featured in several novels written by one of its alumni, Owen Johnson (class of 1895); one of the novels, The Varmint was made into a motion picture in 1950. The novelist and playwright Thornton Wilder taught French at the school in the 1920s (he received his MA in French from nearby Princeton in 1926).

Harvard University is a private university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is one of the eight institutions (Princeton and Yale are others) that collectively comprise the Ivy League. Founded in 1636, Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States; it adopted the name Harvard College in 1639 in recognition of its first major donor, clergyman John Harvard.

theatrical managers (p 38)

That Wodehouse probably intends no compliment to New York theatrical managers can be judged from the following comments (from Bring on the Girls) on three prominent New York impresarios:

"Tell me about Erlanger. . . . What's he like? . . ."
"He's rather like a toad."

Colonel Savage . . . walked with a slight limp, having probably in the course of his career been bitten in the leg by some indignant author.

They found Ray [Comstock] seated at his desk with a bottle of whisky beside him for purposes of reference.

Vere de Vere (p 38)

Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
Of me you shall not win renown:
You thought to break a country heart
For pastime, ere you went to town.
At me you smiled, but unbeguiled
I saw the snare, and I retired;
The daughter of a hundred earls,
You are not one to be desired.

. . . .

Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
When thus he met his mother's view,
She had the passion of her kind,
She spake some certain truths of you.
Indeed I heard one bitter word
That scarce is fit for you to hear;
Her manners had not that repose
Which stamps the caste of Vere de Vere.

Alfred, Lord Tennyson, 'Lady Clara Vere de Vere', from The Lady of Shalott, and Other Poems (1842)

Time was not of the essence (p 38)

"Time is of the essence" is an expression commonly used in contract law. Unless it is expressly agreed by the parties or implied by the nature of the contract, the time allowed for performance of a contract is not of the essence and the contracting parties are allowed a reasonable amount of time in which to fulfil their obligations. If it is important that performance of the contract take place as quickly as possible, it is usual to insert a clause stating that "time is of the essence". Alternatively, if one party to a contract has failed to perform its obligations, the other party can issue a notice making time of the essence and, if non-performance continues, will become entitled to terminate the contract and sue for damages.

the two Bohemians (p 39)

It is unlikely that the pair are, in fact, natives of Bohemia. More probably, Wodehouse is stretching the term beyond its colloquial usage as a description of "one who either cuts himself off, or is by his habits cut off, from society for which he is otherwise fitted; especially an artist, literary man, or actor, who leads a free, vagabond, or irregular life, not being particular as to the society he frequents, and despising conventionalities generally" (OED).

too few goes of gin (p 40)

"The score!" he burst out. "Three goes o' rum! Why, shiver my timbers if I hadn't forgotten my score."

Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island, Part II, ch viii (1883)

I have tickled the captain too; I have made him dance to some tune; he must have pledged his half pay to keep open house for you, and now, like the other half-pays in London, he must live on plates of beef and goes of gin for the next seven years.

William Cobbett, addressing the electors of Preston, Lancashire, after unsuccessfully standing as a candidate in the general election of June 1826 (quoted in The Life of William Cobbett, Esq, 1835)

a tray of collar-studs (p 41)

Detachable shirt collars (see above) were held in place by two collar-studs.

the many-headed (p 41)

First Citizen:
And to make us no better thought of, a little help
will serve; for once we stood up about the corn, he
himself stuck not to call us the many-headed multitude.
Third Citizen:
We have been called so of many; not that our heads
are some brown, some black, some auburn, some bald,
but that our wits are so diversely coloured:

Shakespeare, The Tragedy of Coriolanus, Act II, sc 3 (1608/9 ?)

Shakespeare was not the first to refer to a mob as the "many-headed multitude", as the following commentary on his Julius Caesar shows:

The many-headed multitude were drawne
By Brutus speech, that Caesar was ambitious,
When eloquent Mark Antonie had showne
His vertues, who but Brutus shell was vicious?
Mans memorie, with new, forgets the old,
One tale is good, untill another's told.

John Weever, The Mirror of Martyrs, s 4 (1601)

"You can't do that sort of thing, you know." (p 42)

This passage mirrors very closely the exchange between Psmith and Spiller in chap 33 of Mike [chap 4 of Mike and Psmith], when the latter objects to the usurpation of his study:

"You can't go about the place bagging studies."

"But we do", said Psmith. "In this life, Comrade Spiller, we must be prepared for every emergency. We must distinguish between the unusual and the impossible. It is unusual for people to go about the place bagging studies, so you have rashly ordered your life on the assumption that it is impossible. Error! Ah, Spiller, Spiller, let this be a lesson to you."

"Look here, I tell you what it—"

"[. . .] The advice I give to every young man starting life is: 'Never confuse the unusual and the impossible.' Take the present case. If you had only realised the possibility of somebody some day collaring your study, you might have thought out dozens of sound schemes for dealing with the matter. As it is, you are unprepared. The thing comes on you as a surprise. The cry goes round: 'Spiller has been taken unawares. He cannot cope with the situation.'"

berserk frame of mind (p 43)

The Beserks (or Beserkers) were Norse warriors who fought in an uncontrollable rage; the mechanism by which the warriors induced such a rage is unclear. In 1015, Eiríkr Hákonarson, the ruler of Norway, outlawed Beserkers, and by the 1100s organised Berserker warbands had disappeared.

Today, the term 'beserk' (usually uncapitalised) is used to refer to any person who acts in a wild rage or in an uncontrolled and irrational manner.

technical battery (p 43)

Battery is a common law offence (though subject to the jurisdiction of the criminal court) and consists in the unlawful touching of another person.

Common assault is a crime and occurs when one person causes another to apprehend or fear that force is about to be used to cause some degree of personal contact and possible injury.

Technical battery is a term used in US jurisprudence to describe cases of unlawful touching that stop short of actual physical harm—for example, the provision of medical treatment, no matter how well-intentioned, without the consent of the patient has been ruled to constitute 'technical battery'.

Under English law, George's threat to "bust you one on the jaw" is a common assault in so far as he has raised in the stout young man an apprehension of immediate personal violence. And should he, in the course of removing the young man's silk hat, inflict even the most minor injury, he could be charged with the offence of battery. If he were to carry out his threat and break the young man's jaw, he could be charged with the crime of assault occasioning actual bodily harm, which carries a maximum sentence of five years' imprisonment.

Under s 42 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861, charges of common assault or battery could be heard by two magistrates (acting without a jury) and, if found guilty, the offender could be fined a maximum of £200 or imprisoned in the common gaol for up to two months.

S 39 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 essentially retained this status by defining common assault and battery as 'summary offences', which means that they can be dealt with summarily, without the need for an indictment and with no right to trial by jury. It also raised the maximum penalties on conviction to £5000 fine or six months' imprisonment.

Achilles heel (p 43)

See The Clicking of Cuthbert.

popped up into the infield (p 44)

In baseball, the infield is an area that includes the square formed by the bases and extending out to a distance of 95 feet from the centre of the pitcher's mound. In certain clearly-defined situations, a ball that is popped up into the infield is subject to what is known as the Infield Fly Rule, whereby if, in the umpire's judgment, the ball is catchable by an infielder with ordinary effort, the batter is out regardless of whether the ball is actually caught in flight.

Chapter 4 (pp 45 - 54)

Carlton (p 48)

The Carlton Hotel, once one of London's smartest hotels, was situated at the corner of Pall Mall and Haymarket. The hotel was damaged by bombing during World War 2 and in the mid-1950s the site was acquired by the New Zealand Government, the old building was demolished, and a new tower block, the first to be built in central London after the war, was erected to house the offices of the New Zealand High Commission.

Although it seems that there is no evidence to support the claim, a blue plaque on the present building commemorates a pastry cook who, it is said, worked at the hotel in 1913; the cook was named Ho Chi Minh and is better known as the first president of modern Vietnam.

the manners of a ring-tailed chimpanzee (p 48)

We can only guess at the manners of the ring-tailed chimpanzee, as no such animal has yet been seen. Nor is a sighting at all imminent, as neither of the two known species of chimpanzee—the Common Chimpanzee, Pan troglodytes, and the Bonobo, or "Pygmy Chimpanzee", Pan paniscus—possesses a tail!

Perhaps George has in mind the Ring-tailed Lemur, Lemur catta, which, although a primate, is only distantly related to the "great apes" (which include Man and the chimpanzees).

a Lothario (p 52)

In Nicholas Rowe's play The Fair Penitent (1703), Lothario, a handsome but unprincipled young nobleman, seduces and betrays Calista, the intended spouse of his enemy, Altamont. The play was so popular that the name Lothario has subsequently come to denote the type of a libertine or rake.

the Holy Grail sliding athwart a sunbeam (p 53)

And then the king and all estates went home unto Camelot, and so went to evensong to the great minster, and so after upon that to supper, and every knight sat in his own place as they were toforehand. Then anon they heard cracking and crying of thunder, that them thought the place should all to-drive. In the midst of this blast entered a sunbeam more clearer by seven times than ever they saw day, and all they were alighted of the grace of the Holy Ghost. Then began every knight to behold other, and either saw other, by their seeming, fairer than ever they saw afore. Not for then there was no knight might speak one word a great while, and so they looked every man on other as they had been dumb. Then there entered into the hall the Holy Grail covered with white samite, but there was none might see it, nor who bare it. And there was all the hall fulfilled with good odours, and every knight had such meats and drinks as he best loved in this world. And when the Holy Grail had been borne through the hall, then the holy vessel departed suddenly, that they wist not where it became: then had they all breath to speak.

Sir Thomas Malory (ed Caxton), Le morte d'Arthur, Book 2, ch 7 (1470)

. . . for a brief space things were mixed and chaotic and Arthurian. The silvery sound of the luncheon-bell restored an instant peace, even in the teeth of clenched antagonisms like ours. The Holy Grail itself, "sliding athwart a sunbeam", never so effectually stilled a riot of warring passions into sweet and quiet accord.

Kenneth Grahame, "Snowbound", from The Golden Age (1895)

C-division (p 53)

London's Metropolitan Police Force was established in 1829, and originally consisted of 17 divisions, designated alphabetically. Over time, further divisions were added, before the alphabetic designations were finally abolished in the 1990s. The Metropolitan Police is now organised geographically into 33 Borough Operational Command Units, one dedicated to Heathrow Airport and the rest aligned with the boundaries of the 32 London borough councils.

"C" Division, headquartered, until 1939, at Little Vine Street, Piccadilly, and thereafter at Savile Row Police Station, traditionally covered the areas of Mayfair and Soho.

the Olympian brow. . . thunderbolts. (p 53)

In Roman mythology, Jove, or Jupiter, was the leader of the gods, the ruler of Mount Olympus, the god of the sky and thunder, and the patron deity of the Roman state. He was often depicted hurling thunderbolts.

Mount Olympus is the highest mountain in Greece and in Greek mythology was the home of the Twelve Olympians, the principal gods of the Greek pantheon, hence 'Olympian' became a synonym for 'god-like'.

Wodehouse is facetiously endowing the police constable with the awe-inspiring majesty of a god.

fell from him like a garment (p 54)

While there does not seem to be a specific source for this phrase, variants on it are quite common:

They whispered one another, 'He is dying.'

And he said, 'I am. My age is falling from me like a garment . . .'

Charles Dickens, "A Child's Dream of a Star", Household Words I, 25 (6 April 1850)

For a moment, perhaps, I could not clearly understand how I came there. My terror had fallen from me like a garment.

H G Wells, The War of the Worlds, chap 7 (1898)

His indifference fell from him like a garment.

Edith Wharton, The Valley of Decision, Book IV, ch 11 (1901)

The rough hardihood of the ring fell from him like a garment:

George Bernard Shaw, Cashel Byron's Profession, ch 14 (1886)

It was then . . . that fear dropped from her like a garment

Bret Harte, 'High-Water Mark', from The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales (1870)

Wodehouse himself employed the phrase in a number of different ways, eg:

Nutty's fatigue fell from him like a garment.

Uneasy Money, ch 8

See also Money in the Bank and below (p 195).

Vine Street Police Station (p 54)

Vine Street lies just off Regent Street, close to Piccadilly Circus. The police station, formerly the headquarters of "C" Division, is no longer in use.

As an historical footnote, one of the (not necessarily better) men who had made the journey to Vine Street police station was the Marquess of Queensberry, who was taken there in March 1895 to be charged with criminal libel against Oscar Wilde, thus precipitating the series of trials that eventually led to Wilde's imprisonment.

See also Money in the Bank.

Chapter 5 (pp 55 - 61)

Everything was emphatically for the best (p 55)

See Something Fresh. See also below

Booth Tarkington (p 55)

Newton Booth Tarkington (1869-1946) was an American novelist and dramatist. He is best remembered for his novel The Magnificent Ambersons (1918), which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1919 and was filmed by Orson Welles in 1941. The reference here is to his novel Seventeen, published in 1917.

During the last five years . . . (p 56)

Ignoring the fact that Wodehouse had been married since September 1914, this passage reads like autobiography, even to the reference to one of his well-known habits—gliding swiftly away from awkward social encounters.

trinitrotoluol (p 57)

Trinitrotoluol, or trinitrotoluene (TNT), is a chemical reagent and explosive. It is one of the most commonly-used military and commercial explosives, not least because it is insensitive to shocks and friction, is comparatively stable, neither absorbs nor dissolves in water, and can be melted and poured at temperatures well below those at which it will spontaneously detonate. First produced in 1863, it was originally used as a dye and, because it is so difficult to detonate, its explosive qualities were not immediately recognised.

The amount of energy released in an explosion of a unit quantity (eg kiloton or megaton) of TNT is frequently used to quantify the energy released in large explosions, such as nuclear weapon tests and asteroid impacts.

troubadour of the Middle Ages (p 57)

Troubadours were composers and performers of lyric poetry during the High Middle Ages (1100-1350). The troubador tradition began in the Occitan-speaking region of southern and south-western France, from where it spread to Spain and Italy. The art of the troubadors declined during the early 14th century and died out around the time of the Black Death (1348), which killed an estimated 30-60% of the population of Europe.

The troubadors were professional entertainers, some of whom wandered from court to court. More typically, a troubador would gain the patronage of a wealthy noble and would become part of the noble's household, staying in the one place as long as the patronage continued. While many troubador songs dealt with themes such as chivalry and courtly love, many were also comic or satirical, and a troubador who sang of unrequited love was not necessarily any more troubled in love than a modern-day pop singer.

in a cuppy lie (p 57)

See The Clicking of Cuthbert.

"Ships that pass in the night!" (p 58)

Ships that pass in the night and speak each other in passing;
Only a signal shown and a distant voice in the darkness;
So on the ocean of life we pass and speak one another,
Only a look and a voice; then darkness again and a silence.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Tales of a Wayside Inn, Part III, 'The Theologian's Tale: Elizabeth', iv (1863)

Piccadilly Grill-room (p 59)

The Piccadilly Hotel, on Piccadilly Circus, was built in 1905-08 on the site of the former St James's Hall. The hotel's grill-room became a very popular eating-place, especially in the evening, when a small orchestra entertained the diners, its performances often being broadcast live on radio. The hotel is now known as Le Méridien Piccadilly.

Evening News (p 59)

The Evening News was launched in London in July 1881. In 1960 it absorbed the Star, which had been published since 1888. The Evening News ceased publication in 1980 after merging with the Evening Standard; the latter, originally known simply as the Standard, has been published continuously since 1827.

that admirable slop (p 60)

"Slop" here means "policeman"; it is an example of 'back slang', where a word is written backwards and a new word coined from the result, in this case "ecilop" or "esclop", hence "slop" — another example is "yobbo", or "yob", which originated as back-slang for "boy".

See also The Code of the Woosters.

Burke's Peerage (p 61)

Burke's Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage is a guide to the titled families of Great Britain and Ireland. It was first published in 1826 by a British genealogist, John Burke, under the title Burke's Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Peerage and Baronetage of the United Kingdom. It was revised annually between 1840 and 1940, except for a hiatus from 1917 to 1923, but subsequent revisions were infrequent(there were none between 1970 and 1999); the last print edition was published in 2003, since when further revisions are being made available only online.

When "A Damsel in Distress" was written, Burke's Peerage was still recognised as a major authority on genealogical matters. In recent years that status has been eroded somewhat by a rash of publications, some of very inferior quality, bearing the name "Burke's", though unconnected with Burke's Peerage.

Chapter 6 (pp 62 - 79)

Boots (p 62)

Slang: "An appellation given to the youngest officer in a regiment, junior member of a club, etc (OED).

Not so dusty (p 62)

In the 17th century, one meaning of 'dusty' was "mean, worthless, vile" (OED), a usage that has survived only in this slang expression, meaning "not so bad".

Bow Street Police Court (p 63)

More correctly, Bow Street Magistrates' Court.

Bow Street is in central London, close to Covent Garden. It has been home to a magistrates' court since c 1739, when Colonel Thomas de Veil sat as a magistrate in his home at No 4. In 1747, the novelist Henry Fielding was appointed a Justice of the Peace (ie magistrate) and held court in the same house. A purpose-built magistrates' court was opened in Bow Street in 1881 and continued in operation until 2006.

As well as dealing with summary offences (such as Lord Belpher's), Bow Street Magistrates' Court was, for much of its history, the office of the Senior District Judge (Magistrates' Courts) and, as such, was the venue for the preliminary hearings of many famous cases that were eventually transferred, on indictment, to the Central Criminal Court ("Old Bailey"). Among those who passed through the Bow Street court are: Roger Casement and William Joyce ("Lord Haw-Haw"), both subsequently executed for treason; Dr Crippen, who was hanged for murder; the suffragette sisters, Emmeline and Christabel Pankhurst; and Oscar Wilde.

the raspberry (p 64)

A 'raspberry' is a derisive sound made by keeping the lips closed and forcing air over the tongue; it derives from rhyming slang ("raspberry tart" = fart) and has been dated to 1875 by Eric Partridge (A Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English). The US equivalent is the 'Bronx cheer' (which Wodehouse uses in Hot Water).

According to the OED, this example in A Damsel in Distress is the first recorded use of 'raspberry' in a figurative sense, to signify 'a refusal; a reprimand, disapproval; dismissal'; the second citation is also from Wodehouse:

He would seem . . . to have blown in one morning at seven-forty-five . . . He was given the respectful raspberry by Jeeves, and told to try again about three hours later . . .

The Inimitable Jeeves, ch 9, 'A Letter of Introduction'

blot on the family escutcheon (p 64)

In heraldry, an escutcheon is a shield, or an emblem in the shape of a shield, bearing a coat of arms. Figuratively, to "blot one's escutcheon" is to stain one's reputation.

See also Sam the Sudden.

filled his cup of pleasure (p 64)

They, too, added their quota to my cup of pleasure by being distinctly frigid.

Not George Washington, ch 26

"His Nibs" (p 65)

Nibs (or Nabs), subst (colloquial) — Self: His Nibs = the person referred to; Your Nibs = yourself; My Nibs = myself.

Farmer & Henley, Slang and Its Analogues, Past and Present, vol 5 (1902)

According to the OED, "now chiefly: the person in authority, as an employer, superior, etc. (frequently used ironically or with the implication that the person referred to has an excessive sense of his or her own importance) . . . usually with possessive adjective as a mock title, as his nibs, her nibs, etc".

a Socialist (p 65)

In 1919, when A Damsel in Distress was published, English politics was still dominated by the Liberal and Conservative parties and Socialists were viewed by many as revolutionaries who, left to themselves, would bring upon the country the sort of turmoil still, at that time, being experienced in revolutionary Russia.

intellectually he considered him negligible (p 65)

Shades of Jeeves and Wooster!

"You will find Mr Wooster", he was saying to the substitute chappie, "an exceedingly pleasant and amiable young gentleman, but not intelligent. By no means intelligent. Mentally he is negligible—quite negligible."

The Inimitable Jeeves, ch 5

I am not saying that in the course of our long association I have always found myself able to view Jeeves with approval. . . he has been known to allude to me as "mentally negligible".

Right Ho, Jeeves, ch 22

"Oh, yes, he thinks a lot of you. I remember his very words. 'Mr Wooster, miss', he said, 'is, perhaps, mentally somewhat negligible, but he has a heart of gold.'

Thank You Jeeves, ch 7

The cross marks the spot (p 67)

The notion that "X marks the spot" can be traced to the fictional map in Robert Louis Stevenson's novel Treasure Island (1883) on which an X marks the location of the pirates' buried treasure.

walked between with gyves upon his wrists (p 67)

That very night while gentle sleep
The urchin's eyelids kissed,
Two stern-faced men set out from Lynn,
Through the cold and heavy mist;
And Eugene Aram walked between,
With gyves upon his wrist.

Thomas Hood, "The Dream of Eugene Aram" (1829)

Other works that allude to this poem include Cocktail Time (ch 11), Uncle Fred in the Springtime (ch 14), Carry On, Jeeves ('Jeeves Takes Charge'), Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves (ch 1), and Uncle Dynamite (ch 14).

beak (p 67)

A magistrate or justice of the peace.

"I suppose you don't know what a beak is, my flash com-pan-i-on."

Oliver mildly replied, that he had always heard a bird's mouth described by the term in question.

"My eyes, how green!" exclaimed the young gentleman. "Why, a beak's a madgst'rate; . . ."

Charles Dickens, The Adventures of Oliver Twist, ch 8 (1837-9)

National Sporting Club (p 67)

See Something Fresh.

Oysters garrulous and tombs chatty (p 67)

Wodehouse is inverting two common English similes, "silent as an oyster" and "silent as a tomb".

"Lo, Ben Adhem's name led all the rest." (p 69)

Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase!)
Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace,
And saw, within the moonlight in his room,
Making it rich, and like a lily in bloom,
An angel writing in a book of gold:—

Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold,
And to the presence in the room he said,
'What writest thou?' The vision raised its head,
And with a look made of all sweet accord,
Answered, 'The names of those who love the Lord'

'And is mine one?' said Abou. 'Nay not so'
Replied the angel. Abou spoke more low,
But cheerily still; and said, 'I pray thee, then'
Write me as one who loves his fellow men'

The angel wrote, and vanished. The next night
It came again with a great wakening light,
And showed the names whom love of God had blest,
And lo! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest.

James Leigh Hunt, "Abou Ben Adhem" (1835)

See also The Code of the Woosters.

entertain the County (p 69)

The "county" is a shorthand way of referring to those families of the nobility or gentry with an ancestral home or estate in the county and who are on terms of social familiarity with Lord Marshmoreton.

See also Summer Moonshine.

like a frenzied Hottentot (p 70)

The Khoikhoi or 'Hottentots' (the latter is now regarded as an offensive epithet) were a pastoral people, closely related to the San (or 'Bushmen'), who occupied much of the Cape region of southern Africa from about the 5th century AD. Ships sailing to the Dutch East Indies were attracted to the Cape by the prospect of provisioning their vessels from the Khoi cattle herds, and this led to the establishment of a permanent white presence at what is now Capetown from 1652 onward. Over the next few hundred years, wars and disease slowly destroyed the social cohesion of the Khoikhoi. Those Khoi who did not flee the Cape colony mostly became farm workers for the white settlers; their descendants are found among that part of the population which, under Apartheid, was classified as 'Cape coloured'.

Hottentots were probably no more frenzied than other people; indeed, they were possibly far less frenzied than many people who now call London their home!

Burlington Arcade (p 71)

Burlington Arcade is a covered shopping gallery that runs from the north side of Piccadilly as far as Burlington Gardens. It was built in 1819 to the order of Lord George Cavendish, younger brother of the 5th Duke of Devonshire, who had inherited the adjacent Burlington House (now home to the Royal Academy); the Arcade occupies what was formerly the side garden of the house.

nothing in Percy's life so became him (p 71)

Nothing in his life
Became him like the leaving it: he died
As one that had been studied in his death,
To throw away the dearest thing he owed,
As 'twere a careless trifle.

Shakespeare, Macbeth, Act I, sc 4 (1603-6 ?)

You wear flannel next your skin (p 71)

Flannel is a warm fabric, usually made from loosely-spun yarn, traditionally of carded wool. The wearing of flannel cloth next to the skin was often recommended as a means of avoiding colds, pleurisy, and other ailments. In 1803, for example, Meriwether Lewis, one of the leaders of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, was advised to wear flannel next to the skin during the expedition; a few years earlier, Admiral Sir John Jervis, Earl of St Vincent, had ordered British seaman to do likewise, to avoid chills.

Aunt Rachel charged him to remember his principles of religion, to take care of his health, to beware of Scotch mists, which, she had heard, would wet an Englishman through and through, never to go out at night without his great-coat, and, above all, to wear flannel next to his skin.

Sir Walter Scott, Waverley, ch 25 (1814)

Not everyone shared this view:

I'd rather have my head cut off than wear flannel next the skin.

Virginia Woolf, The Voyage Out, ch 3 (1915)

insolent jacks in office (p 73)

A 'jack in office' is a petty official who abuses his position by behaving imperiously.

As the noble Lord well knows, I am instinctively sympathetic to what he says. I have spent all my life complaining about the abuse of authority—of Jacks-in-office, as they may be called. The fact that I am now a Jack-in-office myself has not stopped my objecting to the practice.

Lord McIntosh of Haringey, speaking in a debate in the House of Lords, 22 July 2002

"Go out of the passage, sir."

"You're a Jack-in-office, sir."

"A what?" ejaculates he of the boots.

"A Jack-in-office, sir, and a very insolent fellow", reiterates the stranger, now completely in a passion.

Charles Dickens, Sketches by Boz, ch 18 (1836)

Apollo (p 73)

In Greek and Roman mythology, Apollo was the god of medicine and healing and one of the Olympian deities. He was usually depicted by artists as a handsome beardless youth and his name came to epitomise the ideal of male beauty.

the royal and ancient game (p 74)

ie golf (from its association with the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews.

the Lie Direct (p 75)

Jaques:
Can you nominate in order now the degrees of the lie?
Touchstone:
O sir, we quarrel in print, by the book;
As you have books for good manners:
I will name you the degrees.
The first, the Retort Courteous;
The second, the Quip Modest;
The third, the Reply Churlish;
The fourth, the Reproof Valiant;
The fifth, the Countercheque Quarrelsome;
The sixth, the Lie with Circumstance;
The seventh, the Lie Direct.
All these you may avoid but the Lie Direct;
And you may avoid that too, with an If.

Shakespeare, As You Like It, Act V, sc 4 (1599 ?)

technical assault (p 76)

See note on battery above.

Stone walls do not a prison make nor iron bars a cage (p 78)

Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage;
Minds innocent and quiet take
That for an hermitage;
If I have freedom in my love,
And in my soul am free,
Angels alone that soar above,
Enjoy such liberty.

Richard Lovelace (1618-59), "To Althea, from Prison"

love laughs at locksmiths (p 79)

But it must end, she felt. If she saw that magic lure in his eyes there would be no holding back for her. Love laughs at locksmiths. She would make the great sacrifice.

James Joyce, Ulysses, 'Nausicaa'

As well as being an old proverb, Love Laughs at Locksmiths is the title of a musical farce in two acts by George Colman the younger (1762-1836), with music by Michael Kelly (1762-1826). It was first performed at the Haymarket Theatre, London, on 25 July 1803. One of the songs from Act 2, "Unfortunate Miss Bailey", is alluded to by Charles Dickens in chapter 9 of The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit (1843-4):

At the period of which we write, he was generally known among the gentlemen as Bailey Junior, a name bestowed upon him in contradistinction, perhaps, to Old Bailey, and possibly as involving the recollection of an unfortunate lady of the same name, who perished by her own hand early in life, and has been immortalized in a ballad.

Chapter 7 (pp 80 - 89)

it pays to advertise (p 80)

It Pays to Advertise is a farce by Roi Cooper Megrue (1883-1927) and Walter C Hackett (c 1876-1944). It opened in New York in 1914 and ran for 399 performances. It was filmed as a silent movie in 1919 with Megrue and Hackett as scriptwriters, and was re-made in 1931, with a cast that included Carole Lombard and Louise Brooks.

In context here, it describes a strong-smelling cheese.

an annoyed cinnamon bear (p 81)

Unlike the ring-tailed chimpanzee, the cinnamon bear does exist. Named for the colour of its coat, which is cinnamon yellow, it is a subspecies (cinnamomum) of the American Black Bear, Ursus americanus. It is a resident of the Rocky Mountains, its range extending from eastern Washington and Oregon through Idaho to western Montana and Wyoming and northeastern Utah. Black Bears tend to avoid contact with humans, but—like the Grizzly Bear, Ursus arctos—will attack if cornered or threatened. And, unlike the Grizzly Bear—which hardly ever attacks except in self-defence—Black Bears do, on rare occasions, make unprovoked predatory attacks on humans.

New York Public Library (p 81)

The Main Branch (more properly, the Humanities and Social Sciences Library) of the New York Public Library occupies two blocks on Fifth Avenue, Manhatten, between 40th and 42nd Streets. It was opened in 1911. The building was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1956.

South of England oyster trade (p 81)

It is clear from the ensuing description of its geography and history that 'Belpher' is the village of Emsworth, where Wodehouse lived for several years in the early 1900s; the though the collapse of the Emsworth oyster industry owed more to over-exploitation, disease and predation, than to a minor typhoid scare.

Long Island (p 81)

Wodehouse had a summer residence on Long Island from 1914, and was living at Great Neck, Long Island, in 1918. When he returned to the USA in 1945, he again took up residence on Long Island and lived there for the rest of his life.

the Savoy (p 81)

The Savoy Hotel is one of London's most prestigious hotels. It was built by Richard D'Oyly Carte, the owner of the nearby Savoy Theatre, and opened in 1889; its first manager was César Ritz, who later established the renowned hotel that bears his name. Claude Monet and James Whistler both stayed at the Savoy and painted the view of the River Thames from their rooms.

The hotel and theatre take their name from the Savoy Palace, which once stood on the site. The palace was built in 1246 by Peter, Count of Savoy, uncle of King Henry III's queen, Eleanor of Provence. It later became the home of John of Gaunt, Richard II's uncle. During the king's minority, John of Gaunt was the major power behind the throne and was blamed for the introduction of the poll tax that triggered the Peasants' Revolt of 1381; the rioting peasants took their revenge by totally demolishing the palace and destroying its contents.

For the Carlton, see above

Romano's (p 81)

Romano's restaurant was situated at 399-400 Strand. It was opened in the 1840s by Alfonso Nicolino Romano ("the Roman", d 1901). He had been a headwaiter at the Café Royal and invested his savings in a little shop and bar that he called the Café Vaudeville. The establishment achieved popularity thanks in part to the efforts of John Corlett, the editor of The Sporting Times (better known as "The Pink 'Un"), who promoted it in his paper. It became a favourite resort of the members of the Pelican Club, one of whom, George Edwardes, took over the Gaiety Theatre in 1885. Edwardes increased the popularity of his theatre by introducing a chorus (the 'Gaiety Girls') of the prettiest girls he could find, and enhanced the popularity of Romano's by arranging for his girls to dine there at half-price: young men flocked to the restaurant, which became one of the most popular centres of London's night-life in the 1890s and early 1900s.

Romano's survived the 1914-18 war, but the society that had made it famous did not. It continued to thrive, however, until the Second World War, when it was damaged by bombing. In 1956, the old building was demolished and replaced by an office block.

". . . I've engaged a table at Romano's. That's more in my line. Get your coat, and let's be going."

'Ahead of Schedule', from The Man Upstairs

On the fifth night, when the place was fairly packed and looked for all the world like Oddy's or Romano's, . . .

'The Making of Mac's', from The Man with Two Left Feet

For Galahad in his day had been a notable lad about town. A beau sabreur of Romano's. A Pink 'Un. A Pelican.

Summer Lightning, ch 1

"Wilfrid Slingsby. . .", explained Pilbeam. Sort of man you're always seeing at Romano's and that sort of place."

Bill the Conqueror, ch 8

"How are you, Pyke? Good Lord, this certainly puts the clock back. The last time I saw you must have been that night at Romano's, when Plug Basham started throwing bread and got a little over-excited, and one thing led to another and in about two minutes there you were on the floor, laid out cold by a dashed great side of beef and all the undertakers present making bids for the body. I can see your face now", said the Hon Galahad, chuckling.

Heavy Weather, ch 7

The glory . . . Ichabod (p 82)

And she named the child Ichabod, saying, The glory is departed from Israel:

1 Samuel 4:21

In Hebrew, ichabod (a closer transliteration is iy-kabowd) means "no glory" (or "inglorious"). As a sentence it can be understood as meaning "the glory has gone".

one kissed by a goddess in a dream (p 83)

This probably alludes to the story of Endymion in Greek mythology:

Endymion was a beautiful youth who fed his flock on Mount Latmos. One calm, clear night Diana, the moon, looked down and saw him sleeping. The cold heart of the virgin goddess was warmed by his surpassing beauty, and she came down to him, kissed him, and watched over him while he slept.

Thomas Bulfinch (1796-1867), Bulfinch's Mythology: Age of Fable, ch 26 (1880)

On such a tranquil night as this,
She woke Endymion with a kiss,
When, sleeping in the grove,
He dreamed not of her love.

Like Dian's kiss, unasked, unsought,
Love gives itself, but is not bought;
Nor voice, nor sound betrays
Its deep, impassioned gaze.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, "Endymion" (1842)

Bulfinch dedicated the 1880 edition of his Mythology to Longfellow.

Henceforth his life is saddened; as one kissed by a goddess in a dream, he goes thereafter, as one might say, in a sort of love-sickness.

Kenneth Grahame, "Of Smoking", from Pagan Papers (1893)

walked on air (p 83)

He had won a kiss and a confession, and he was transfigured and raised to a place among the lesser gods. He walked on air as he went home. He did a hop-step of happiness.

Ellis Parker Butler, 'Romance', in Saturday Evening Post, 10 May 1919

. . . all fear left him from that moment, replaced, it seemed, by a mild and exquisite surprise. His footsteps made no sound, he walked on air;

Algernon Blackwood, 'The Other Wing', from Day and Night Stories (1917)

Owen's heart gave a jump. For a moment he walked on air.

'Pots o' Money', from The Man Upstairs

sophomore from Yale (p 83)

A second-year student at Yale University, in New Haven, Connecticut. Yale was founded in 1701 and is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the US. Like Harvard, with which it has an intense academic and sporting rivalry, Yale is a member of the Ivy League.

Bedouin's Love Song (p 83)

"Bedouin Song" is a poem by the American writer and poet, Bayard Taylor (1825-78). As "Bedouin [or Bedouin's] Love-song" it has been set to music by several composers, among them (according to the Library of Congress) Dudley Buck (1881), Ciro Pinsuti (1883) and Charles Whitney Coombs (1883). In 1907, the Australian bass-baritone Peter Dawson was filmed singing Pinsuti's version.

In 1916, the American pulp magazine All-Story Weekly published a short story by Harold Titus (1888-1967) which was inspired by Taylor's poem. Its title, "On a Stallion Shod with Fire", derived from the second line of the poem. The story was adapted in 1920 for a silent movie entitled "Shod with Fire".

From the desert I come to thee
On my Arab shod with fire.
And the winds are left behind
In the speed of my desire.
Under thy window I stand
And the midnight hears my cry
I love thee! I love but thee!
With a love that shall not die!
With a love that shall not die!

Bayard Taylor, "Bedouin Song" (1853)

Poor Butterfly (p 83)

"Poor Butterfly" was a popular song of 1916, composed by Raymond Hubbell with lyrics by John L Golden. It featured in the musical revue, "The Big Show", which opened at the Hippodrome Theatre, New York, in August 1916 and ran for 425 performances.

There's a story told of a little Japanese
sitting demurely 'neath the cherry-blossom trees
Miss Butterfly her name
A sweet little innocent child was she
Till a fine young American from the sea
To her garden came.
They met 'neath the cherry-blossoms every day
and he taught her how to love in the 'Merican way
To love with her soul! 'twas easy to learn
The he sailed away with a promise to return.

Those who recognise this as the plot of Giacomo Puccini's opera, Madame Butterfly (1904), will not be surprised to learn that her lover won't return! The opera had been turned into a film, directed by Sidney Olcott and starring Mary Pickford, in 1915, the year before "The Big Show".

on the map (p 83)

The OED cites this example as an illustration of figurative usage: the meaning here is that one is in a position to act, unlike George, who faces numerous obstacles.

Moses on Pisgah (p 84)

Mount Pisgah (identified with Mount Nebo, a prominent peak in the Abarim Range, east of the Dead Sea) is where Jehovah sent Moses to view the Promised Land, and where he died.

And the Lord said unto Moses, get thee up into this mount Abarim, and see the land which I have given unto the children of Israel.

And when thou hast seen it, thou also shalt be gathered unto thy people, as Aaron thy brother was gathered.

Numbers, xxvii, 12-13

And Moses went up from the plains of Moab unto the mountain of Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, that is over against Jericho. And the Lord shewed him all the land of Gilead, unto Dan

And the Lord said unto him, This is the land which I swore unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob, saying, I will give it unto thy seed: I have caused thee to see it with thine eyes, but thou shalt not go over thither.

Deuteronomy, xxxiv, 1 & 4

See also Sam the Sudden and Summer Moonshine. There are further references in Ukridge ('Ukridge's Accident Syndicate'), The Man Upstairs ('Ruth in Exile'), Jill the Reckless (ch 10), The Adventures of Sally (ch 2), The Little Warrior (ch 10), and Uncle Fred in the Springtime (ch 19).

marauders of old . . . top of this very hill (p 85)

On the contrary, the marauders of old must have been cheered to see the castle nestling in a valley, surrounded by trees, rather than commanding the heights of a windswept hill, a position which would have made it far easier to defend.

furnished cottage (p 86)

Wodehouse had himself rented a cottage at Emsworth soon after his first visit (see Something Fresh).

dispute about a right-of-way (p 86)

In England & Wales, a public right-of-way (PRoW) is a highway over which the public has a right of passage. Many PRoWs are footpaths, open only to walkers; others, known as bridleways, can also be used by horse-riders and pedal-cyclists; a further category, usually referred to as byways, is also open to motor traffic, though in practice this is often restricted to motor-cycles and off-road vehicles.

PRoWs can arise in a number of ways. The clearest is where a landowner has expressly dedicated a public right of way over his land. Alternatively, a PRoW may be presumed to exist if it has been used as a right-of-way for a time beyond anyone's memory, or deemed to exist if it has been in use for 20 years or more. As there may be disagreement about the facts in these last two cases, disputes between landowners and bodies representing public interest groups are not uncommon.

a sort of Nero (p 86)

See The Clicking of Cuthbert.

the ghila monster of Arizona (p 86)

The Gila monster, Heloderma suspectum, is one of only two species of venomous lizard. It is a large lizard, its length sometimes exceeding 50 cm. The Gila is found in the Mojave, Sonoran and Chihuahuan deserts, and its range extends beyond Arizona into parts of Utah, Nevada, California, and New Mexico, as well as into Mexico, but the core of its range is the Sonoran desert of Arizona.

Gila Monsters spend much of their time under rocks, in the burrows of other animals, or in holes that they dig for themselves. They hunt, often at night, using their keen senses of smell and hearing to locate small rodents, juvenile birds, insects, carrion, and the eggs of birds and reptiles: an adult can consume enough in three or four meals to satisfy its entire annual energy requirement. The Gila monster injects venom into its victim through grooves in the teeth of its lower jaw; the venom is not usually fatal to humans, but it can bite quickly and holds on tenaciously, causing an unpleasant wound.

antimacassars (p 87)

Macassar oil is a vegetable oil, obtained from the seeds of the Ceylon oak, Schleichera oleosa.

In the early 19th century, a London merchant named Rowland advertised a gentlemen's hair preparation that he claimed was based on sweet oils imported from Makassar, a seaport on the island of Celebes (now Sulawesi, a province of modern Indonesia). Rowland's product became popular among the nobility—Lord Byron mentioned it in his poem Don Juan in 1819—and started a fashion for oiled hair that continued throughout Victorian and Edwardian times.

Because the oil tended to transfer itself to the backs of chairs and sofas, housewives were forced to use removable, washable cloths to protect the fabric coverings of their furniture. From around 1850, these covers—at first made of stiff white crochet-work, but later of soft, coloured materials, such as embroidered wools or silks—started to be known as antimacassars.

By the early 20th century, antimacassars had become associated with the out-moded fashions of the Victorian era and their popularity waned; they survive today mainly in the form of the detachable piece of fabric that can be found on the headrests of the seats in many passenger aircraft.

statuette of the Infant Samuel (p 87)

See The Clicking of Cuthbert.

It is unusual for a statuette of the Infant Samuel to survive an encounter with a Wodehouse character!

vanished . . . like the Cheshire cat (p 89)

The Cheshire Cat appears (and disappears) in chapter 6 of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865).

"You'll see me there", said the Cat, and vanished.

. . . While she was still looking at the place where it had been, it suddenly appeared again.

. . . "I thought it would", said the Cat, and vanished again.

The Cheshire cat also appears (or disappears) in Money in the Bank, Cocktail Time (ch 1), The Little Nugget (ch 12), and Uncle Dynamite (ch 11).

Chapter 8 (pp 90 - 98)

open to the general public (p 90)

As long ago as the 18th century, it was not unusual for respectable visitors to a country house whose owner was absent to be shown around by the housekeeper or butler—Elizabeth Bennet's visit to Mr Darcy's house at Pemberley (Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice) is a well-known example. But while we can be sure that the servants would be rewarded for their courtesy, this was a far cry from the modern practice of opening one's country house as an organised venture. The first to do so may have been Horace Walpole, who, embarassed by the flood of people wanting to see his house, "Strawberry Hill", at Twickenham, wrote guides to the house and published a list of opening times and rules for visitors to follow; he is reputed to have retreated to a "cottage in the woods" when visitors were expected, a habit that would no doubt have earned Wodehouse's approval! In a letter to George Montagu (3 September 1763), he wrote:

My house is full of people and has been so from the instant I breakfasted, and more are coming—in short I keep an inn: the sign "The Gothic Castle". Since my gallery was finished I have not been in it a quarter of an hour together; my whole time is passed in giving tickets for seeing it and hiding myself while it is seen.

half a crown (p 91)

Prior to 1970, a year before Britain adopted a decimalised currency, one of the coins in circulation was the half-crown, which was worth two shillings and sixpence, or one-eighth of a pound: there was also a crown coin, worth five shillings, but it was minted in far smaller numbers than the half-crown and was struck chiefly in commemorative issues. Until 1919, the half-crown was a silver coin; between 1919 and 1946, the silver content was reduced to 50%, the balance being cupro-nickel; from 1946, the coin was entirely cupro-nickel.

mistook him for one of the gardeners (p 91)

In being mistaken for a gardener, Lord Marshmoreton is following a notable tradition:

And when she had thus said, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus.

Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou? She, supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away.

John, xx, 14-15

Sir Peter Lely (p 91)

Sir Peter Lely (1618-80) was a painter of Dutch origin. He arrived in London in the early 1640s and soon established himself as the successor to Anthony Van Dyck as the most fashionable portrait artist in England, a reputation that he maintained until his death, despite the turmoil of the Civil War and the Restoration: he worked in turn for Charles I, Oliver Cromwell, Richard Cromwell, and Charles II, but his talent ensured that he did not suffer as one regime replaced another.

Lely was born Pieter van der Faes to Dutch parents in Soest in Westphalia, where his father was an officer serving in the armed forces of the Elector of Brandenburg. He is reputed to have adopted the surname "Lely" (occasionally spelled Lilly) from a heraldic lily on the gable of the house where his father was born in The Hague.

on the level (p 92)

See Something Fresh.

fire when ready, Gridley (p 93)

Capt Charles Vernon Gridley USN commanded the USS Olympia, the flagship of Commodore George Dewey, at the Battle of Manila Bay in the Spanish-American War (1 May 1898). As the US squadron sailed into the Bay, Gridley was at his station in the Olympia's armored conning tower, from w