Transportation – Part One – Trains

This week we begin an examination of modes of transportation by recalling four memorable rail journeys. At least your Quizmaster found these train trips memorable and hopes that you also will be able to identify the passengers and circumstances in the following trips.

1. "I beg your pardon," she said breathlessly. "Are you ____(A)____?"

"I am."

"My name is ___(B)___," said ___(B)___, wishing that she could have achieved a vocal delivery a little more impressive than that of a very young, startled mouse.

"Well, well, well!" said ____(A)____. "Quite a coincidence, Mr ___(C)___. (...) We were just talking about you, Miss ___(B)___. (....) I am losing a son and gaining a daughter, and you're the daughter, eh? (...) Well, you must come over here and tell me all about yourself. We will get rid of Mr ___(C)___. By the way, you did tell me you had not met Miss ___(B)___?"

"Definitely not. Certainly not. Far from it. Not at all."

"Don't speak in that tone of horrified loathing, Mr ___(C)___. I'm sure Miss ___(B)___ is a very nice girl, well worthy of your acquaintance. At any rate, you've met her now. Mr ___(C)___, Miss ___(B)___."

"How do you do?" said ___(C)___ stiffly.

"How do you do?" said ___(B)____ with aloofness.

2. You go through a door at the end on to a platform with a couple of chairs on it and there you sit and observe the countryside. (...) Well, as I say, on the second morning of the journey I was sitting on the observation platform, observing, when I was stunned by the door opening.

That's not quite right, of course, and when I fix and revise I must remember to polish up that sentence. Because I don't mean the thing got me on the head or anything like that. What stunned me was not the door opening, but what came through it. Viz, the loveliest girl I had ever seen in my life.

(Can you identify the narrator and the object he found well worth observing?)

3. He leaped in, accordingly, as the train began to move and ___(D)___, glancing up from his paper, jerked a thumb at the door.

"Get out, blast you!" he said. "Full up."

As the compartment was empty but for themselves, ___(E)___ made no move to comply with the request. (...) Instead he spoke cordially.

"____(D)____, I believe?"

"Go to hell," said ___(D)___.

"I fancy we are to be fellow-guests at (name of country house) this week-end." (...)

(...) "Oh?" said ___(D)___. "Well, since you're here, how about a little flutter? (...) Ever played Persian Monarchs?" he asked, shuffling.

4. ___(F)___ made his way along the swaying train to the smoking-car, which was almost empty. It had come upon him overwhelmingly that he needed tobacco. He was in the mood when a man must either smoke or give up altogether the struggle with Fate. He lit his pipe and looked out of the window at Long Island racing past him. It was only a blur to him.

He became aware that the conductor was standing beside him, saying something about a ticket. (...) "Lady back there told me to collect her fare from you," repeated the conductor. "Said you would pay."

____(F)___ blinked. Either there was some mistake or trouble had turned his brain. He pushed himself together with a supreme effort. (....)

"What does she look like?"

The conductor delved in his mind for adjectives. "Small," he said, collecting them slowly. "Brown eyes ---"

He desisted from his cataloguing at this point, for, with a loud exclamation, ___(F)___ had dashed away.

Two cars further back he dropped into the seat by ___(G)___ and was gurgling wordlessly.

Round 222 - 4 March 2005

Transportation – Part Two – Boats

This week we continue our exploration of modes of travel in Wodehouse with four examples of marine transportation. Once again we're looking for the identities of the passengers and their circumstances.

1. For the first few hours after leaving Cherbourg nothing could have been calmer and serener than the ocean. The vessel purred through waters that seemed to be trying to compete in blueness and blandness with those of the Mediterranean. People played deck tennis, shuffleboard became rampant, and the heartiest of meals were consumed by one and all. In short, 'Youth on the prow and Pleasure at the helm' only faintly expresses the conditions on board.

And then, quite suddenly on the second morning, just as the first shy deck stewards were beginning to steal out with cups of soup and the fluting cry of the shuffleboard addicts was making itself heard in the drowsy stillness, the skies turned from blue to grey, the horizon became dark with unwholesome-looking clouds and the wind, veering to the north, blew with a gradually increasing force till presently it was howling through the rigging with a shrill, melancholy wail and causing the [name of liner] to behave more like a Russian dancer than a respectable ship. ___(A)___, prone in his bunk and holding on to the woodwork, was able to count no fewer than five occasions when the vessel lowered Nijinsky's record for leaping in the air and twiddling the feet before descending.

2. The cavernous Customs sheds were congested with friends and relatives, and ___(B)___, heading for the gangplank, was only able to make progress by employing all the muscle and energy which Nature had bestowed upon him (...). However, after some minutes of silent endeavour, now driving his shoulder into the midriff of some obstructing male, now courteously lifting some stout female off her feet, he had succeeded in struggling to within a few yards of his goal, when suddenly a sharp pain shot through his right arm, and he spun round with a cry.

It seemed to ___(B)___ that he had been bitten, and this puzzled him, for New York crowds, though they may shove and jostle, rarely bite. He found himself face to face with an extraordinarily pretty girl.

(...)

"Oh, I'm so sorry!" she cried.

Well, of course, if she regretted her rash act ... After all, an impulsive girl might bite a man in the arm in the excitement of the moment and still have a sweet, womanly nature.

3. She was leaning against the rail of a yacht that lay at its moorings some forty yards away; and, as he beheld her, ___(C)___'s heart leaped like a young gherkin in the boiling-vat. In her face, it seemed to him, was concentrated all the beauty of all the ages. Confronted with this girl, Cleopatra would have looked like Nellie Wallace, and Helen of Troy might have been her plain sister. He was still gazing at her in a sort of trance, when the bell sounded for luncheon and he had to go below.

All through the meal, (...), ___(C)___ remained in a reverie. He was counting the minutes until he could get on deck and start goggling again. Judge, therefore, of his dismay when, on bounding up the companionway, he found that the other yacht had disappeared. He recalled now having heard a sort of harsh, grating noise towards the end of luncheon; but at the time he had merely thought it was his uncle eating celery. Too late he realised it must have been the raising of the anchor-chain.

4. (...) the next moment they were off across the bay, bowling along before a nippy breeze which, naturally, cheesed it abruptly as soon as it had landed them far enough away from shore to make things interesting for the unfortunate blighter who had to take to the oars.

This, of course, was poor old __(D)__. There was a man in charge of the boat, but he, though but a rough, untutored salt, had enough sense not to let himself in for a job like rowing this Noah's Ark home. __(D)__ did put it up to him tentatively, but the fellow said that he had to attend to the steering, and when __(D)__ said that he, __(D)__, knew how to steer, the fellow said that he, the fellow, could not entrust a valuable boat to an amateur. After which, he lit his pipe and lolled back in the stern sheets with rather the air of an ancient Roman banqueter making himself cosy among the cushions. And __(D)__, attaching himself to a couple of oars of about the size of those served out to galley-slaves in the old trireme days, started to put his back into it.

Round 223 - 12 March 2005

Transportation - Part Three - Automobiles

We continue to study the various methods available to Wodehouse characters to get from Point A to Point B this week with a series of examples of automobile travel.

1. In this world, as has been pointed out in various ways by a great many sages and philosophers, it is wiser for the man who shrinks from being disappointed not to look forward too keenly to moments that promise pleasure. ___(A)___, who had anticipated considerable enjoyment from his drive down to [name of country house], soon discovered, when the car had threaded its way through the London traffic and was out in the open country, that the conditions were not right for enjoyment. Miss ___(B)___ did not appear to share the modern girl's distaste for her home. She plainly wanted to get there as quickly as possible. It seemed to ____(A)___ that from the time they left High Barnet to the moment when, with a grinding of brakes, they drew up at the door of [name of country house] the two-seater had only touched Hertfordshire at odd spots.

Yet, as they alighted, ___(B)___ voiced a certain dissatisfaction with her work.

"Forty-three minutes," she said, frowning at her watch. "I can do better than that."

"Can you?" gulped ___(A)___. "Can you, indeed?"

2. I drove round to the stables and halted the car in the yard. As I got out, I looked at it somewhat intently. It was a good car, and appeared to be in excellent condition. But somehow I seemed to feel that something was going to go wrong with it – something serious – something that would not be able to be put right again for at least a couple of hours.

One gets these presentiments.

3. We were moving at a brisk clip into Clapham Common when the second of the incidents occurred which were to make this drive linger in the memory. Just as we came in sight of the Common, a fool of a girl loomed up right before our front wheels. She had been crossing the road, and now, after the manner of her species, she lost her head. She was a large, silly-looking girl, and she darted to and fro like a lunatic hen; and as ___(C)___ and I rose simultaneously from our seats, clutching each other in agony, she tripped over her feet and fell. But [the chauffeur], master of his craft, had the situation well in hand. He made an inspired swerve, and when we stopped a moment later, the girl was picking herself up, dusty, but still in one piece.

4. The story of ___(D)___'s great love begins at about six-forty-five on an evening in June in the Marylebone district of London. He had spent the day at Lord's cricket ground watching a cricket match, and driving away at the close of play had been held up in a traffic jam. And held up alongside his taxi was a car with a girl at the wheel. And he had just lit a cigarette and was thinking of this and that, when he heard her say:

"Cricket is not a game. It is a mere shallow excuse for walking in your sleep."

It was at this point that love wound its silken fetters about ___(D)___. He leaped like a jumping bean and the cigarette fell from his nerveless fingers. If a girl who talked like that was not his dream girl, he didn't know a dream girl when he heard one.

Round 224 - 22 March 2005

Transportation – Part Four – Planes and Things

After examining rail, sea and automobile travel in the last three weeks, we conclude this series with a miscellaneous grab-bag loosely titled "Planes and Things". Once again, we're looking for the identities of the travellers along with the source novels or stories.

1. "In my line of business you need constant cheering up. (...) Too much smiling to do. Very lowering to the spirits. I'm an air hostess. And not only lowering to the spirits; extremely wearing on the cheek muscles."

"Still, you must meet a lot of interesting people." (...)

"Oh, I do. (...) One sees the great world and, as you say, one meets a lot of interesting people." She laughed. Analyzing it, __(A)__ described it to himself as a silvery laugh. Rather like, he thought, for there was a touch of the poet in him, the sound ice makes in a jug of beer on a hot day in August. "I was thinking," she explained, "of an old man (...) who travelled with us a good deal and was always in a bad temper. (...) He never failed to snarl at me like a wounded puma for not coming quick enough. Finally I told him the trouble was that he always seemed to catch me when I wasn't in my spiked shoes and running shorts, and after that we got on fine."

2. (To avoid any possible confusion, in this question the person identified as "the damsel" in the second paragraph is also the __(B)__ who appears in the fourth paragraph.)

As they were speaking, a dim mass on the skyline began to take shape.

"Behold!" said the damsel. "My father's castle." And presently they were riding across the drawbridge and through the great gate, which shut behind them with a clang.

As they dismounted, a man came out through a door at the farther end of the courtyard.

"Father," said ___(B)___, "this is ___(C)___, who has come to –" it seemed to ___(C)___ that she hesitated for a moment.

"To tackle our dragon?" said the father. "Excellent. Come right in."

3. A man in an open cart on an English Spring night may continue to be in love, but love is not the emotion uppermost in his bosom. It shrinks within him and waits for better times.

For the cart was not a covered cart. It was open to the four winds of heaven, of which the one at present active proceeded from the bleak east. To this fact may be attributed ___(D)___'s swift recovery from the exalted mood into which ___(E)___'s smile had thrown him, his almost instant emergence from the trance. (...) Before the cart had travelled twenty yards he was a mere chunk of frozen misery.

(If you require a hint for this one your Quizmaster will be happy to supply on request an additional paragraph describing the cart's arrival at its destination.)

4. ___(F)___, meanwhile, who had been navigating in a sort of somnambulistic trance in the neighbourhood of the lift, now threw back the cage with a rattle.

"It's a shame to have woken you up," said ___(G)___ commiseratingly, stepping in.

___(F)___ did not reply, for the excellent reason that he had not been woken up. Constant practice enabled him to do this sort of work without breaking his slumber. His brain, if you could call it that, was working automatically. He had shut up the gate with a clang and was tugging sluggishly at the correct rope, so that the lift was going slowly up instead of retiring down into the basement, but he was not awake.

(...)

At the third floor ___(G)____ leaned forward and prodded ___(F)___ in the lower ribs. (...) ___(F)___ brought the machine to a halt: and it was at this point that he should have done the one thing connected with his professional activities which he did really well – the opening, to wit, of the iron cage. There are ways of doing this. ___(F)___'s was the right way. He was accustomed to do it with a flourish, and generally remarked "V'la!" in a modest but self-congratulatory voice as though he would have liked to see another man who could have put through a job like that. ___(F)___'s opinion was that he might not be much to look at, but that he could open a lift door.

(What went wrong to spoil __(F)__'s performance on this occasion?)

5. (...) he sprang to his feet, and the next moment he had shot into the ball-room with incredible velocity and was skidding along the polished floor on one ear.

Only then did he observe that during his slumbers some hidden hand had fastened roller-skates to his feet with stout straps. Simultaneously with this discovery came the sound of musical mirth on every side, and looking up he found himself the centre of merry, laughing faces. The merriest of these faces, and the one that laughed most, was ___(H)___.

It was a grim, moody ___(I)___ who, some five minutes later, after taking three more tosses in a manner which he distinctly heard ___(H)___ compare to the delivery of coal in sacks, withdrew on all fours to the kitchen, where a kindly waiter cut the straps with a knife.

Round 225 - 30 March 2005

A Whale of a Prince

As you may be aware, a marriage has been arranged in the highest circles of the United Kingdom, and will shortly take place in the not wholly un-Wodehousian setting of a registry office. At the occasion of the forthcoming nuptials, let us take a playful look at one of the lovebirds. With sincerest apologies for the awful pun in the title.

1. "Pretty girl be dashed! I’m not talking about her being a pretty girl. I’m talking of what anybody with half an eye ought to be able to see when he takes one look at her – that she’s all right. Just as her mother was all right. Her mother was the sweetest, straightest, squarest, honestest, jolliest thing that ever lived. And A___’s the same. Any man who marries A___ is in luck. Damn it all, the way you women have been going on about him, one would think young B___ was the Prince of Wales or something. Who is B___, dash it? My nephew. Well, look at me. Do you mean to assert that a fellow handicapped by an uncle like me isn’t jolly lucky to get any girl to marry him?"

Who is not the Prince of Wales?

2. The Ratcliff Highway is an interesting thoroughfare, but on a warm day it breeds thirst. After wandering about for an hour or so, therefore, I entered the Prince of Wales public-house, called for a pint of beer, drained it at a draught, reached in my pocket for coin, and found emptiness. I was in a position to add to my notes on the East End of London one to the effect that pocket-pickery flourishes there as a fine art.

"I’m awfully sorry," I said, smiling an apologetic smile and endeavouring to put a debonair winsomeness into my voice. "I find I’ve got no money."

It was at this point that the barman said "Ho!" and moved out into the open through a trick door in the counter.

"I think my pocket must have been picked," I said.

"Oh, do you?" said the barman.

He gave me the idea of being rather a soured man. Years of association with unscrupulous citizens who tried to get drinks for nothing had robbed him of that fine fresh young enthusiasm with which he had started out on his career of barmanship.

Who is the narrator and what happens next?

3. "You should have kicked him in the eye and made good your escape," said C___ firmly. "Surely, you were under no illusion that his patronage would make you popular in the home? D___ is one of those men who have only to express a liking for anybody to cause their wives to look on him as something out of the Underworld. D___ could not bring the Prince of Wales home to dinner and get away with it. And when he drags in and lays on the mat a specimen – I use the word in the kindliest spirit – like you, and does so, moreover, five minutes before the start of a formal dinner-party, thus upsetting the seating arrangements and leading to black thoughts in the kitchen, can you blame his wife for not fawning on you? And on top of that you pretend to be an artist."

"I am an artist," said E___, with a flicker of spirit. It was a subject on which he held strong views.

"The point is a debatable one. And, anyhow, you should have concealed it from F___. A woman of her type looks on artists as blots on the social scheme. I told you she judged her fellow creatures entirely by their balance at the bank."

Please identify the speakers.

4. "No, G___," I said, raising my hand, "argument is useless. Nobody has a greater respect than I have for your judgement in socks, in ties, and – I will go farther – in spats; but when it comes to evening shirts your nerve seems to fail you. You have no vision. You are prejudiced and reactionary. Hidebound is the word that suggests itself. It may interest you to learn that when I was at Le Touquet the Prince of Wales buzzed into the Casino one night with soft silk shirt complete."

"His Royal Highness, sir, may permit himself a certain licence which in your own case –"

"No, G___," I said firmly, "it’s no use. When we H___s are adamant, we are – well, adamant, if you know what I mean."

No bonus points for identifying G and H! But what happened to the silk shirts, as worn by HRH?

Round 226 - 7 April 2005

Buckingham Palace

From last week’s theme to Buckingham Palace is but a small step. Can you identify the speakers in the following excerpts?

1. "You know, you aren’t a bit like I expected you’d be."

"In what respect," inquired A___, "do I fall short of the ideal?"

"It isn’t so much falling short. It’s – oh, I don’t know ... Well, yes, if you want to know, I thought you’d be a tougher specimen altogether. I got the impression from your advertisement that you were down and out and ready for anything, and you look as if you were on your way to a garden-party at Buckingham Palace."

2. "Well, there’s only one thing to be done. I must go to this B___ [name of a country house] place and overcome those scruples. Can you give me a letter of introduction to your brother?"

"It won’t be necessary. He takes in paying guests."

"How very convenient. So I just ring the front door bell and walk in?"

"Exactly."

"Goodbye then, Mr C___. I won’t take up more of your valuable time."

"Always a pleasure to see you. Drop in again if you want to buy Buckingham Palace or anything like that."

3. "Who are these two men supposed to be?"

"I told you. A couple of Irishmen named Pat and Mike."

"Well, perhaps you can explain what their social position is, for it is frankly beyond me. Pat, for instance, appears to move in the very highest circles, for he describes himself as dining at Buckingham Palace, and yet his wife takes in lodgers."

"I see what you mean. Odd."

"Inexplicable. Is it credible that a man of his class would be invited to dinner at Buckingham Palace, especially as he is apparently completely without social savoir-faire? At this dinner-party to which he alludes he relates how the Queen asked him if he would like some mulligatawny and he, thinking that there was nothing else coming, had six helpings, with the result that, to quote his words, he spent the rest of the evening sitting in a corner full of soup."

4. "The trouble with Pekes is, they’re so shortsighted, they can’t see the human eye, so you can’t quell them with it."

"You could if you put your face right down close."

"If," said D___ thoughtfully.

E___ gasped. Already this afternoon she had had occasion to stare at this man. She now started again.

"Are you afraid of a dog?"

He gave a light laugh.

"Afraid of dogs? That would amuse the boys at Buckingham Palace, if they could hear it. They know what a dare-devil I was in the old days when I was Deputy Master of the Royal Buckhounds."

Extra credit: who had a dream about his Aunt dancing the Twist in a bikini bathing suit outside Buckingham Palace?

Round 227 - 15 April 2005

For Better for Worse

The two love-birds in whose honour the previous two quiz rounds were composed did not really get the wedding-day they must have had in mind when their engagement was announced. The Wodehouse canon contains several examples of weddings that did not quite go as planned. Who are the spouses in the following excerpts? In question 2, only the name of the groom is required.

1. "But, A___," he urged, "surely a girl’s wedding-day ought to be something for her to think of all her life – to recall with dreamily smiling lips as she knits the tiny garments or cooks the evening meal for the husband she adores. She ought to be able to look back and live again through the solemn hush in the church, savour once more the sweet scent of the lilies-of-the-valley, hear the rolling swell of the organ and the grave voice of the clergyman reading the service. What memories would you have if you carried out this plan that you suggest? One only – that of a smelly monkey. Have you reflected upon this, A___?"

2. It was a crowd such as may be seen any morning during the London mating-season outside any of the churches which nestle in the quiet squares between Hyde Park and the King’s Road, Chelsea.

It consisted of five women of cooklike aspect, four nursemaids, half a dozen men of the non-producing class who had torn themselves away for the moment from their normal task of propping up the wall of the Bunch of Grapes public-house on the corner, a costermonger with a barrow of vegetables, divers small boys, eleven dogs, and two or three purposeful-looking young fellows with cameras slung over their shoulders. It was plain that a wedding was in progress – and, arguing from the presence of the camera-men and the line of smart motor-cars along the kerb, a fairly fashionable wedding. What was not plain – to me – was why B___, sternest of bachelors, had desired to add himself to the spectators.

"What," I enquired, "is the thought behind this? Why are we interrupting our walk to attend the obsequies of some perfect stranger?"

3. Little remains to be told. C___ and D___ were married three months later at a fashionable West End church. All Society was there. The presents were both numerous and costly, and the bride looked charming. The service was conducted by the Very Reverend the Dean of E___.

It was in the vestry afterwards, as C___ looked at D___ and seemed to realise for the first time that all his troubles were over and that this lovely girl was indeed his, for better or worse, that a full sense of his happiness swept over the young man.

All through the ceremony he had been grave, as befitted a man at the most serious point of his career. But now, fizzing as if with some spiritual yeast, he clasped her in his arms and over her shoulder his face broke into a quick smile.

4. "Postponed?"

The man with the badge nodded solemnly. There was more wispering.

"Then it’s no use waiting?" said the woman.

"None," said the man with the badge.

Others had apparently received the same information. The church was beginning to empty itself. F___ added himself to the stream, and was presently outside in the square, where disappointed and perplexed cognoscenti gaped in amazement at this strange anti-climax. They had been to many weddings in their time, but they had never yet been to one where nobody got married.

5. The ceremony had nearly reached its conclusion. As the officiating clergyman, coming to the nub of the thing, addressed the young man in the cutaway coat and sponsebag trousers, there reigned throughout the sacred edifice a tense silence, such as prevails upon a racecourse just before the shout goes up, "They’re off!"

"Wilt thou," he said, " - hup - G___, take this - hup - H___ to be thy wedded wife?"

A sudden gleam came into the other’s horn-rimmed spectacled eyes.

"Say, listen," he began. "Lemme tell you what to - "

He stopped, a blush mantling his face.

"I will," he said.

Round 228 - 23 April 2005

Outstanding Ears

Here follows an official statement from your quizmaster. This week’s theme has absolutely and positively nothing to do with the three previous quiz rounds. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental. We are looking for the names of the chaps with the aeroplane ears.

1. He was still brooding on a problem which seemed to grow each moment more hopeless of solution, when he entered the smoking-room and found a group of fellows there, gathered about a kid in knickerbockers. And not only were they gathered about this kid – they were practically fawning on him.

This surprised A___. He knew that a chap has to have something outstanding about him to be fawned upon at the Drones, and nothing in this child’s appearance suggested that he was in any way exceptional. The only outstanding thing about him was his ears.

2. My manner was reserved. The memory of that lizard in my bed still lingered. I don’t know if you have ever leaped between the sheets, all ready for a spot of sleep, and received an unforeseen lizard up the left pyjama leg? It is an experience that puts its stamp on a man. And while, as I say, I had no legal proof that this young blighter had been the author of the outrage, I entertained suspicions that were tantamount to certainty. So now I not only spoke with a marked coldness but also gave him the fairly frosty eye.

It didn’t seem to jar him. He continued to regard me with that supercilious gaze which had got him so disliked among the right-minded. He was a smallish, freckled kid with aeroplane ears, and he had a way of looking at you as if you were something he had run into in the course of a slumming trip.

3. B___, the opposition candidate, seemed to run as generously to ears as his adversary did to nose, and the artist had not overlooked this feature. Indeed, except for a mean, narrow face with close-set eyes and a murderer’s mouth, B___ appeared to be all ears. They drooped and flapped about him like carpet-bags, and I averted my gaze, appalled.

4. "I had gone to see C___, and I tripped and fell in the sty. It was a little muddy."

From the very start of this conversation D___ had been blowing at his moustache at frequent intervals, but never with the vigour which this statement provoked. He sent it shooting up now as if his aim was to loosen it from its foundations. It has not been stated in this chronicle that he had large outstanding ears, rather like the handles of a Greek amphora. We mention them at this juncture because he was feeling that he could not believe them.

Extra credit: who got engaged to the wrong girl because the valet of a friend of his got married in spite of his (i.e. the valet’s) aeroplane ears?

Round 229 - 3 May 2005

Dogs

This week's quiz is dedicated to the terrestrial members of the family Canidae which constitute the genus Canis: Alsatians, beagles, collies, dachshunds, elkhounds, foxhounds, greyhounds, huskies, Irish setters, Jack Russells, kelpies, Labradors, mastiffs, Newfoundlands, otterhounds, Pekes, Queensland heelers, retrievers, Sealyhams, terriers, vizslas, whippets, Xoloizcuintli, Yorkshires – in short, dogs. Though the breeds of the dogs in this quiz can best be described as "Miscellaneous."

1. "I never saw such a mongrel in my life."

"Kind hearts are more than coronets," said A__. "The point at issue is not this dog's pedigree, which, I concede, is not all Burke and Debrett, but his physique." ...

The dog B__, during this conversation, had been roaming to and fro in the inquisitive manner customary with dogs who find themselves in strange territory. He had sniffed at trees. He had rolled on the turf. Now, returning to the centre of things, he observed for the first time that on the lap of the woman seated in the chair there lay a peculiar something.

What it was that B__ did not know. It appeared to be alive. A keen desire came upon him to solve this mystery. To keep the records straight, he advanced to the chair, thrust an inquiring nose against the object, and inhaled sharply.

The next moment, to his intense surprise, the thing had gone off like a bomb, had sprung to the ground, and was moving rapidly towards him.
B__ did not hesitate. ... He had never met a Pekingese before, and no one would have been more surprised than himself if he had been informed that this curious, fluffy thing was a dog. Himself he regarded it as an Act of God, and, thoroughly unnerved, he raced three times round the lawn and tried to climb a tree.

Name the dog, B, and his owner.

2. I opened the door, accordingly, and was immediately knocked base over apex by some solid body with a tongue like an ant-eater's. This tongue it proceeded to pass enthusiastically over my upper slopes and, the mists clearing away, I perceived that what I was tangled up with was a shaggy dog of mixed parentage. And standing beside us, looking down like a mother watching the gambols of her first-born, was C__'s sister D__.

"Isn't he a lamb?" she said. "Isn't he an absolute seraph?"

I was not able wholly to subscribe to this view. The animal appeared to have an agreeable disposition and to have taken an immediate fancy to me, but physically it was no beauty-prize winner. It looked like Boris Karloff made up for something.

Name this dog and his owner.

3. A vast shape was rising from the floor, revealing itself as an enormous dog. It finished rising, and having placed its chin upon the table, stood looking at him with dreamy eyes and a wrinkled forehead, like a shortsighted person trying to recall a face.

"Oh, yes," said E__, remembering. "So you got him?"

"Her."

"What is he – she?"

"Gawd knows," said F__ simply. ...

E__ leaned forward and pulled the animal's ears in friendly fashion. G__ simpered in a ladylike way, well pleased. "Would you say she was a bloodhound, F__?"

"I wouldn't say she was anything, not to swear to."

"A kind of canine cocktail," said E__. "The sort of thing a Cruft's Show judge dreams about when he has a nightmare."

Again, name the dog, G.

4. The only blot on this paradise which H__ had so far been able to discover was the infernal dog, I__. I__ was a mixture of Airedale, setter, bull terrier, and mastiff; and when in vocal mood, favoured the mastiff side of the family.

H__ peered out. There on the porch stood a girl in blue. She held in her arms a small fluffy white dog, and she was endeavouring to foil the upward movement toward this of the blackguard I__. I__'s mentality had been arrested some years before at the point where he imagined that everything in the world had been created for him to eat. He had even made a plucky attempt to devour the remains of the young Joseph prophesying before Pharaoh. And it was perfectly plain that he regarded the curious wriggling object in the girl's arms purely in the light of a snack to keep body and soul together till dinner-time.

Name both dogs.

5. J__ stopped, and the dog stopped. They stood there for a moment, drinking each other in.

"Ger-r-r!" said J__.

Now mind you, there was absolutely nothing about this dog to inspire alarm. Certainly it was on the large side and had rather a rolling eye; but I could see at a glance that it was just one of those friendly mongrels which your man of the world greets with a cheerful chirrup and prods in the ribs without a second thought. But J__ seemed ill at ease.

The dog came a step closer. I think he wanted to smell J__, though I could have told him, as a friend, that there was neither profit nor pleasure to be derived from such a course.

This dog's name is as unknown as its heritage, so name J and the narrator.

Round 230 - 11 May 2005

Cats

To quote one deep thinker at the Angler's Rest, "Cats are not dogs." Identify the following non-dogs or their associates.

1. "Cats! What about it? Are there any cats in the flat?"

"Only the three in your bedroom, sir."

"What!"

"Cats in his bedroom!" I heard A__ whisper in a kind of stricken way, and his eyes hit me amidships like a couple of bullets.

"What do you mean," I said, "only the three in my bedroom?"

"The black one, the tabby, and the small lemon-coloured animal, sir." ...

Just then the most frightful shindy started in the bedroom. It sounded as though all the cats in London, assisted by delegates from outlying suburbs, had got together to settle their differences once for all. A sort of augmented orchestra of cats.

"This noise is unendurable," yelled A__. "I cannot hear myself speak."

"I fancy, sir," said B__ respectfully, "that the animals may have become somewhat exhilarated as the result of having discovered the fish under C__'s bed."

Identify A, who is apparently not a cat person.

2. Gathering the table-cloth, he edged round with extraordinary stealth till he was in the cat's immediate rear, and dropped it over him just as he was tensing his muscles for another leap. Then, flinging himself on the mixture of cat and table-cloth, he wound them up into a single convenient parcel.

Exceedingly pleased with himself D__ felt at this point. It seemed to him that he had shown resource, intelligence, and an agility highly creditable in one who had not played Rugby football for years. A good deal of bitter criticism was filtering through the cloth, but he overlooked it. E__, he knew, when he came to think the thing over more calmly, would realise that he deserved all he was getting. He had always found E__ a fair-minded cat, when the cold sobriety of his judgment was not warped by the sight of canaries.

Name the cat (E) upon whom D is bestowing wrapped attention.

3. "I remember F__," said Exhibit B, looking at me in much the same way as the Bosher Street beak had looked at F__ before putting on the black cap. "Nasty little boy! He teased my cat. ... He chased my G__ all over the garden, shooting arrows at her from a bow."

At this moment a cat strolled out from under the sofa and made for me with its tail up. Cats always do take to me, which made it all the sadder that I should be saddled with F__'s criminal record. I stooped to tickle it under the ear, such being my invariable policy, and the Exhibit uttered a piercing cry.

"Stop him! Stop him!"

She leaped forward, moving uncommonly well for one of her years, and having scooped up the cat, stood eyeing me with bitter defiance, as if daring me to start anything.

Name the cat G and Exhibit B, who has just saved another cat from a horrible fate.

4. "Permit me," said H__, suave to the eyebrows.

And, bounding forward with the feeling that this was the stuff to give them, he barged right into a cat.

"Oh, sorry," he said, backing and bringing down his heel on another cat.

"I say, most frightfully sorry," he said.

And, tottering to a chair, he sank heavily onto a third cat.

Name this well-meaning foe of the feline species.

ExtraCredit: A ghastly thought rushed into X__'s mind. ...

"Y__! Speak! Tell me! Have the cats got at it?"

It was a fixed idea of X__, which no argument would have seduced him to abandon, that cats had the power to work some dreadful mischief on Z__ and were continually lying in wait for the opportunity to do so...

Who is X, and what does he fear the cats have got at? (Or, more properly, at what does he fear the cats have got?)