Patum Peperium

Oh, The Humanity...

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American Incognitum

Irish Elk

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"It wasn't the Hindenburg or the Titanic. It was the Hindenburg crashing into the Titanic."

That's how Michael Graham describes Martha Coakley's "absolute disaster of a campaign." . I suppose it's poor sportsmanship to put the boot in after the fact, but I have to say, when I saw the pictures of the Coakley supporters in mourning, I thought of Mrs P., whose motto, after Alice Roosevelt, is, "If you don't have anything nice to say, come sit next to me."

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Oh, the crocodile tears were flowing. Say, Jawn, what did the bartender say when the horse walked into the bar?

The returns looked bad from the start. The taste of their beer to Emily's List members was as ashes in their mouths.

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Woe to the Progressive School Headmistresses for Coakley.

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And among the Episcopal Divinity School Priestesses for Coakley there was much gnashing of teeth.

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Well, the people had spoken. Think the Dems got the message?

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A Toast To St. Tammany

American Incognitum
Irish Elk

Celebrate today's feast day of the patron saint of early America with an intoxicating concoction:

The Tammany Cocktail

Mixmaster Old Dominion Tory 

offers this recipe:

1 jigger Mount Gay Rum

1 jigger Dark Rum (e.g., Black Seal)

1 T Fresh Lemon Juice

1 T Fresh Lime Juice

Dash of sweet vermouth

1. Fill cocktail shaker with ice

2. Add ingredients. 

Shake vigorously and 

pour into a chilled cocktail glass. 

Stir with a walrus tusk.

3. Variation -- Top with Ginger Beer 

I do believe I have my walrus tusk lying around somewhere. Cheers!

Song For St. Tammany's Day

Of Andrew, of Patrick, of David, and George, 

      What mighty achievements we hear! 

While no one relates great Tammany's feats, 

Although more heroic by far, my brave boys, 

      Although more heroic by far. 

These heroes fought only as fancy inspired, 

        As by their own stories we find; 

Whilst Tammany, he fought only to free 

From cruel oppression mankind, my brave boys, 

        From cruel oppression mankind. 

When our country was young and our numbers were few 

        To our fathers his friendship was shown, 

(For he e'er would oppose whom he took for his foes,) 

And he made our misfortunes his own, my brave boys, 

        And he made our misfortunes his own. 

At length, growing old and quite worn out with years, 

        As history doth truly proclaim, 

His wigwam was fired, he nobly expired, 

And flew to the skies in a flame, my brave boys, 

        And flew to the skies in a flame.

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Martyr Fun Time

American Incognitum
Irish Elk

Mrs P used to scratch her head to come up with ideas for the school pageant.

No more! Not since she discovered:

Saints and clergy play clothes for kids!

That's right, all you need are some Necco Wafers to celebrate a pretend Pontifical High Mass in the backyard.

The little fellow above is a good old-fashioned Jesuit, yet to be scalped. Just add Hurons!

With the two-for-the-price-of-one special on papal garments, go ahead and stage a Good Pope-Antipope battle between BXVI and the Rev. Pulvermacher.

And of course, no one expects the Spanish Inquisition!

Coming soon:

New saints for '08, including St Lucy, with accessory eyeballs, and Christina the Astonishing, with Levitation Action (TM).

* Parental supervision recommended on Joan of Arc. (Matches not included)

The Great Christmas Book Series, Cont'd (Irish Elk)

The Great Christmas Book Series
Irish Elk

Nothing says Christmas like a good cautionary tale for children. Here are a few that would be jolly under the tree, starting with two with a Christmas twist.

The Story of Little Kettle-head, or The Story of Little Degchie-head: An Awful Warning to Bad Babas, is by Helen Bannerman, author of Little Black Sambo. It's about a little colonial girl in India named Mary who, ignoring her mother's warnings, plays with fire and burns off her head. She resorts to wearing a cooking pot for a head, which makes her very sad. Old Father Christmas takes pity on her, and leaves her a pretty doll's head with golden hair. Mary glues it on, and lives happily after after. Now, debate still continues in some quarters over the appropriateness of Little Black Sambo, but if there were ever any debate over Little Kettle-head, apparently it was settled long ago, because this is a book you won't readily find on the shelf of your local children's library (more's the pity). You can find copies, but they are rare.

In "The Story of the Inky Boys," part of the classic Struwwelpeter collection by Heinrich Hoffmann, Caspar, Edward and William taunt a black-a-moor, singing, "Oh, Blacky, you're as black as ink!" Saint Nicholas, disapproving of the boys' rudeness, dips them all in an inkwell until they, too, are black as can be.

The whole of Struwwelpeter is great fun. One old-time favorite of mine from the collection is "The Story of Little Suck-a-Thumb," about little Conrad, who learns a hard lesson from the scissorman. Other representative entries include "The Story of Johnny Look-in-the-Air," "The Story of Augustus Who Would Not Have Any Soup," and "The Story of Fidgety Philip." In all, the youthful protagonists, persistent in folly, come to regrettable ends. The English translation is available via Alibris.

This list, of course, would not be complete with some Belloc. Cautionary Tales for Children contains the stories of "Jim, Who Ran Away from his Nurse and Was Eaten by a Lion," and "Matilda, Who Told Lies and Was Burned to Death." An edition illustrated by Edward Gorey is available.

To close, a little more Belloc, in the spirit of the season:

"Lines For A Christmas Card"
By Hilaire Belloc

May all my enemies go to hell,
Noel, Noel, Noel, Noel

May all yours, too! Merry Christmas!
MCNS

You can read more from Irish Elk at his own blog

Ghost Stories

American Incognitum

Irish Elk

A house ghost in a powdered wig is as revered a tradition as Indian pudding at the old inns and taverns in this history-laden corner of New England.

For a Halloween piece for the newspaper some years back, I visited several places said to be haunted. Here are some of the stories I was told.

In Groton, the Stagecoach Inn and Tavern dates to 1678. Its guests over the years have included Paul Revere, presidents Ulysses S. Grant, Grover Cleveland, and William H. Taft, and, if you believe the stories, a full complement of ghosts.

"Many people have seen many things," said owner George Pergantis. "The lights go off. A waitress said she heard her name called over and over. I'm from the old country - I don't believe these things."

Porterhouse Blue

American Incognitum
Irish Elk

When PBS aired the miniseries version of Tom Sharpe's Porterhouse Blue in 1991, Montreal Gazette reviewer Mike Boone wrote:

The funniest lines in prime time tonight are delivered in Latin. This is a television first.

At approximately 9:20 p.m., an elderly university professor will open huge oak doors, declaim "Quisnam nos appelat?" and viewers will fall off their couches in hysterics.

Indeed, this four-part satire of English university life, recently released on DVD, is quite funny. Imagine Oxbridge dons from the Vanity Fair Spy prints come to life, and chasing gas-filled prophylactics across the grounds of Andrew Cusack's alma mater.

From the Wellington Post comes this synopsis:

Set at Cambridge University, Porterhouse Blue centres around fictional Porterhouse College, where genially eccentric fellows are the proud guardians of six centuries of tradition in which oar-pulling prowess and gourmet over-indulgence have taken prowess over academic achievement. Its rich and cholesterol-laden excesses have become a way of life, where eating and drinking have become a decadent art form. Porterhouse is also the domain of the irascible head porter, Skullion (David Jason). His family have occupied menial positions there since the Elizabethan era ("the first!"), and like generations of Skullions before him, he has spent 45 years in proprietorial subservience to fellows and students alike. Indeed, it may be whispered that many an intellectually impoverished old Porterhusian has risen to public prominence from the launch pad of a successful degree engineered by Skullion.

When the master of the college succumbs to a Porterhouse Blue – a stroke brought on by over-indulgence, he dies without naming a successor, leaving the Government to make the new appointment.

In comes Sir Godber Evans (Ian Richardson), failed politician and old Porterhusian, who brings with him the formidable and zealous progressive lobbyist Lady Mary. As the new master, he chooses the occasion of the annual great feast - complete with whole, roasted, feathered swans stuffed with widgeon - to announce a major break with 600 years of tradition.

The real-life master of Pembroke College, Cambridge, where Sharpe was an undergraduate, took a dim view of the show when it originally aired on British television in June 1987, the Times' Charles Oulton wrote:

Lord Adrian, who is also vice-chancellor of the university, said: "We do a great deal of important research here and wish we would get a bit more credit for that."

Adrian is worried what the public perception of Cambridge will be. Porterhouse Blue does the opposite for Cambridge of what Brideshead Revisited did for Oxford; the dreaming spires of Waugh's creation become instead, for Sharpe, a battle-ground for snobs, dunces and bores.

In real-life Cambridge last week, the university was at its most romantic, with gilded youths throwing off their exam gowns and heading for the river and the May balls. But for viewers of Porterhouse Blue, the only romance attached to the place was the obsession of one graduate for his "bedder" and the chaplain's sexual fantasies about the check-out girls at Woolies.

This has, naturally, been highly popular with the undergraduates themselves…

The high-table feast with the swans stuffed with widgeons is colorfully described in an excerpt from the novel itself at Google Books.

Certainly Porterhouse Blue's humor is not for everyone. You will not like it if, for example, you are someone who finds even Wodehouse a near occasion of sin. And the spectacle of Mrs Biggs is indeed alarming, to say the least.

But on the positive side, those vehement in opposition to contraception will have fresh ammunition as to its life-threatening nature. And the chaplain with the bull-horn for confession and a feel for the female form in classical sculpture appears to have been founding muse of the ACB for A, the Anglo-Catholic Boys for Art, and would fit right in at Sir Basil's. Meantime, I have been humming the title song, "Dives in Omnia," all week.

This is an opportune occasion to toast the memory of the late Ian Richardson, who plays the reform-minded master with the Hillary Clinton-like wife, Sir Godber Evans. The Baltimore Sun's Mary Carole McCauley writes:

In one telling moment, the new master, played by Ian Richardson, is presented with a roast swan for inspection.

As Richardson looks down his long, beak-like nose, we see him wondering which of the two is really being served up for consumption on a platter.

Richardson, who passed away in February, was a wonderful actor, famed for his portrayal of Francis Urquhart in "House of Cards" (and for asking for the Grey Poupon in commercials). RIP.

Mr. Elk Goes To Washington

American Incognitum
Irish Elk

Healy Hall drainspout

The happy news that a favorite DC-area blogger plans to swim the Tiber set me thinking of the attractions of Catholicism and of Catholic Washington, in particular.

The capital city, of course, is site of the "Little Rome" around the Byzantine-style National Basilica, and of the historic cathedral where JFK was eulogized, St. Matthew's, (Latin Mass, Novus Ordo, with Schola Cantorum, Gregorian Scholars, and organ, 10 a.m., Sundays).

To me, though, Catholic Washington is, first and foremost, Georgetown.

You can see the steps where they filmed The Exorcist, a cinematic reminder that --Dan'l Webster to the contrary -- if you want to wrestle Old Nick, you need a Jesuit.

Then there is my favorite college building, Healy Hall, wreathed in legend.

According to one tale, a young Jesuit student accidentally opened the Gates of the Underworld when reading forbidden chants in a book about exorcism.

Again -- if you want to pull a Tom Riddle, it helps to be a Jesuit.

The Healy Hall clocktower has its own lore.

A tradition at Georgetown involves students stealing the clock hands from the tower and mailing them to the Vatican, where they are supposed to be simply stamped 'return to sender' and returned to the university.

Cordelia Flyte would approve.

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A hearty thank you to mine hosts for the invitation to join the party here at Patum Peperium. This is most witty and erudite company and I can only hope to hold up my end of the conversation. My column's title, "American Incognitum," inspired by the Mastodonic whatsit of the Jefferson administration, continues a palaeontological theme in my blogging nomenclature. It also evokes the pseudonymous veil behind which we clack on our keyboards, whence I hope to contribute items of interest to PP's cabinet of curiosities.

Cheers!
Irish Elk