My Maugham Collection Concordance Library: The Gentleman in the Parlour

Non-Fiction > The Gentleman in the Parlour >

But I had idled long enough and so, bright and early one morning, I set out with my caravan from Keng Tung. I was accompanied by an official of the Sawbwa's court who was to escort me to the frontier of the Sawbwa's dominions. He was a corpulent gentleman and he rode a very small and scraggy pony. For the first day I rode through the plain with rice-fields on either side of the road and then plunged once more into the hills. I had finished now with the P.W.D. bungalows, but the Sawbwa had been good enough to order houses to be built for me on the way and messengers had been sent on to the various villages with the necessary instructions. I felt very grand to have a house built for me to spend a single night in and the first one I lodged at filled me with delight. It was like a toy. It would hardly have kept out the wet if it rained or the wind if it blew, but in fine weather it was a place for young lovers to live in rather than a middle-aged writer. It was very neat and clean, for the bamboos of which it was made had been cut that morning, and it had the pleasant, fresh smell of growing things. It was all green, walls, floor and roof. It consisted of two rooms and a broad verandah. The walls and the floor, raised about three feet from the ground, were of split bamboos. The supporting pillars and the beams were of whole bamboos, and the roof was neatly thatched with rice straw. The floor was resilient so that, accustomed to an unyielding surface underfoot, I had at first a feeling of some insecurity and walked gingerly; but there was a network of solid bamboos under it and it was really as strong as could be desired. Within a few feet was a rushing mountain stream (I had crossed it half-a-dozen times during the day either by a ford or a rickety bridge) and its banks were thickly grown with trees. In front was a little open space where cattle grazed and the view was shut in by a green hill. It was an enchanting spot.

One day, a letter sent on ahead to arrange accommodation having been received but that morning, on arriving at the end of the stage I found the villagers, gathered from a village some miles off, for this was in the middle of the jungle, still busy with the construction of my house. It was of course very curious to watch the speed and deftness with which with their rude knives they cut and split the bamboos in order to make the floor, the ingenuity with which they fitted the rafters and the neatness with which they thatched the roof; but it did not interest me. I was tired and hungry, I wanted a cook-house so that my dinner could be prepared, and I wanted a place for my bed so that I could lie down and rest. I lost my temper and my commonsense. I sent for the Sawbwa's official and abused him roundly for his slackness. I vowed I would send him back to his mater and threatened him with every sort of punishment my angry imagination could devise. I would not listen to his excuses. I stamped and raved. Now no one had ever troubled in my life before to treat me with such consideration and though I have travelled much in out-of-the-way parts of the world I have had to shift for myself and lodge at haphazard wherever I could find a lodging. I have slept quite happily for seven days in an open rowing-boat and in South Sea islands shared a native hut open to the wind and rain with a family of Kanakas. No one had even thought of building a house for me, and in the middle of the jungle besides, and it was an attention to which I had no right. The moral is that even the most sensible person can very easily get above himself: grant him certain privileges and before you know where you are he will claim them as his inalienable right; lend him a little authority and he will play the tyrant. Give a fool a uniform and sew a tab or two on his tunic and he thinks that his word is law.

But when my house was finished, a green house in a green glade with the torrent plashing noisily between its green banks, and I had eaten, I laughed at myself. At Keng Tung I had bought some rum off a Ghurka when I discovered that my supply of gin was running low and feared that I would have to finish my journey on tea and coffee; it was good rum, home-made, but I did not like it; so to mark the sincere contrition I felt for having behaved with so little sense I sent the Sawbwa's official two bottles.

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The Gentleman in the Parlour – XXII