From The Spectator, 21 November 1914: The papers of Tuesday and Wednesday contained two exceptionally interesting despatches from an eyewitness at Sir John French’s headquarters. These descriptive narratives have improved remarkably in value since the beginning of the war—a fact which does not seem to be in the least appreciated by some newspapers. The despatch
‘Is this one of those Christmas ad spectaculars?’
‘Samaritan here — yeah, thanks, I’m good.’
‘Are we there yet?’
‘We must have got the date wrong. This isn’t the teddy bears’ picnic.’
‘We’ll have the tear’n’share gazelle.’
‘He’s just not developing.’
‘That’s the trouble with these muscle cars… cost a fortune to run.’
‘I’m sorry to hear about your domestic problems, Hartley, but I can’t allow you to take it home.’
‘Teddy’s lactose-intolerant. Do you have any imaginary soya milk?’
‘Sorry, do you mind if we change the subject? I’m uncomfortable not talking about immigration.’
‘That’s Mummy and Daddy and Daddy’s bit on the side.’
‘Dear God, is there ever any good news?’
‘Of course, the Victorians would have covered up the legs.’
Let’s subsidise weddings Sir: Fraser Nelson (‘Marrying money’, 15 November) points out that marriages tend to last longer than cohabitations and that this is a good thing. But there is only one obvious difference between being married and merely cohabitating. If you are married you’ve been through a marriage ceremony and if you’re not you haven’t.
Yeah, Bob, they know The answer to the rhetorical question posed by the Band Aid single, ‘Do they know it’s Christmas?’, is broadly yes. Christmas Day is a public holiday everywhere in Africa except Mauritania, Western Sahara, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya and Somalia, although countries have widely differing customs associated with the event. — In
