Mr. Britling Sees It Through | Page 7

oak. All this electric-starter business and
this electric lighting outfit I have here, is perfectly hateful to the
English mind.... It isn't that we are simply backward in these things, we
are antagonistic. The British mind has never really tolerated electricity;
at least, not that sort of electricity that runs through wires. Too slippery
and glib for it. Associates it with Italians and fluency generally, with

Volta, Galvani, Marconi and so on. The proper British electricity is that
high-grade useless long-sparking stuff you get by turning round a glass
machine; stuff we used to call frictional electricity. Keep it in Leyden
jars.... At Claverings here they still refuse to have electric bells. There
was a row when the Solomonsons, who were tenants here for a time,
tried to put them in...."
Mr. Direck had followed this cascade of remarks with a patient smile
and a slowly nodding head. "What you say," he said, "forms a very
marked contrast indeed with the sort of thing that goes on in America.
This friend of mine I was speaking of, the one who is connected with
an automobile factory in Toledo--"
"Of course," Mr. Britling burst out again, "even conservatism isn't an
ultimate thing. After all, we and your enterprising friend at Toledo, are
very much the same blood. The conservatism, I mean, isn't racial. And
our earlier energy shows it isn't in the air or in the soil. England has
become unenterprising and sluggish because England has been so
prosperous and comfortable...."
"Exactly," said Mr. Direck. "My friend of whom I was telling you, was
a man named Robinson, which indicates pretty clearly that he was of
genuine English stock, and, if I may say so, quite of your build and
complexion; racially, I should say, he was, well--very much what you
are...."
Section 7
This rally of Mr. Direck's mind was suddenly interrupted.
Mr. Britling stood up, and putting both hands to the sides of his mouth,
shouted "Yi-ah! Aye-ya! Thea!" at unseen hearers.
After shouting again, several times, it became manifest that he had
attracted the attention of two willing but deliberate labouring men.
They emerged slowly, first as attentive heads, from the landscape. With
their assistance the car was restored to the road again. Mr. Direck
assisted manfully, and noted the respect that was given to Mr. Britling

and the shillings that fell to the men, with an intelligent detachment.
They touched their hats, they called Mr. Britling "Sir." They examined
the car distantly but kindly. "Ain't 'urt 'e, not a bit 'e ain't, not really,"
said one encouragingly. And indeed except for a slight crumpling of the
mud-guard and the detachment of the wire of one of the headlights the
automobile was uninjured. Mr. Britling resumed his seat; Mr. Direck
gravely and in silence got up beside him. They started with the usual
convulsion, as though something had pricked the vehicle unexpectedly
and shamefully behind. And from this point Mr. Britling, driving with
meticulous care, got home without further mishap, excepting only that
he scraped off some of the metal edge of his footboard against the
gate-post of his very agreeable garden.
His family welcomed his safe return, visitor and all, with undisguised
relief and admiration. A small boy appeared at the corner of the house,
and then disappeared hastily again. "Daddy's got back all right at last,"
they heard him shouting to unseen hearers.
Section 8
Mr. Direck, though he was a little incommoded by the suppression of
his story about Robinson--for when he had begun a thing he liked to
finish it--found Mr. Britling's household at once thoroughly British,
quite un-American and a little difficult to follow. It had a quality that at
first he could not define at all. Compared with anything he had ever
seen in his life before it struck him as being--he found the word at
last--sketchy. For instance, he was introduced to nobody except his
hostess, and she was indicated to him by a mere wave of Mr. Britling's
hand. "That's Edith," he said, and returned at once to his car to put it
away. Mrs. Britling was a tall, freckled woman with pretty bright
brown hair and preoccupied brown eyes. She welcomed him with a
handshake, and then a wonderful English parlourmaid--she at least was
according to expectations--took his grip-sack and guided him to his
room. "Lunch, sir," she said, "is outside," and closed the door and left
him to that and a towel-covered can of hot water.
It was a square-looking old red-brick house he had come to, very
handsome in a simple Georgian fashion, with a broad lawn before it

and great blue cedar trees, and a drive that came frankly up to the front
door and then went off with Mr. Britling and the car round to unknown
regions at