Wednesday, December 22, 2010
Temple of doom
Yesterday I thought it time to balance all the visits to churches with a visit to the very grand Freemasons' Hall in Great Queen Street. Not having bothered to check beforehand, I found that one could creep around some of the building without joining a tour. Amazed to find that the Hall contained a shop selling souvenirs and other masonic materiel, that its grand rooms were available for hire to the profane and that there were women among the workforce. There were also a dozen or more rather sombre lodge rooms (one of which at least seemed to include the sort of wire cages for togs that you had in the changing rooms at my secondary school), a drawing room, a library and a museum. The drawing room was a second division version of the sort of club room that you get in films. Not all red leather, dark panelling and flunkies but tendencies in that direction. Second division appearance completed by the presence of a coffee machine in the corner; the sort of thing that you get in the better class of workplace. Sadly, the grand rooms were only open to tours and the bad weather meant that the only tour of the day was some hours off. Decided that waiting in the neighbouring pub for this sort of time was not showing proper respect.
Prior to that, the first interesting item of the day had been the discovery that at least one inhabitant of Belgrave Place had invested in the same sort of fake Christmas tree from Homebase as our good selves. This I know as its remnants were littering the street.
Unable to gain entry to what looked to be rather a splendid 19th century church, St Pauls of Knightsbridge, as it was actually being used. The posh looking lady guarding the door seemed quite ready to believe that I was late for whatever was going on, but that did not seem quite the thing.
I was then amused by the spectacle of a lady police officer on a rather large and frisky horse near Green Park, with a saddle cloth advertising some outfit called Child Exploitation and Online Protection, possibly part of the Child Abuse Investigation Command, this last presumably under the command of a commander. Not at all clear what horses had to do with all this.
Then close by, I happened to get up close to one of the many war memorials which have sprouted in London's public places over recent years. This one a composition of inclined black girders, of various heights, up to about eight feet. Rather to my surprise it was rather effective close too, having looked a bit odd from a distance. A memorial to the New Zealand war dead of the two world wars. So my take, is that the memorial is sound but that its planting is not. They should have given more thought and more space to that part of the operation - something made more difficult by the number of memorials which were prior facts on the ground around. For me, a familiar problem with outdoor sculpture: how to plant the thing? A trick that not many manage to my satisfaction.
By Waterloo station was treated to the sight of a loaded six yard concrete lorry - one of those with a rotating drum - proceeding very cautiously towards, if not to, the site of the shard. The driver appeared to have had a recent close encounter with some ice and was taking no chances - despite the fact that the ice was more or less no more. At least not there. I learned later in the day that it has never been the custom, certainly not in the south of England, to put chains on lorry wheels. Neither concrete lorries nor municipal dust carts - despite the fact that one ex-driver of one of these last remembers getting into a pickle in one on ice near Hove. Must ask the Finn of our acquaintance with haulage connections what goes there.
After more vicissitudes of the same sort, found my way to the Tooting branch of Wetherspoon's library where as good luck would have it I chanced on a book called 'The Bird of Dawning' by John Masefield whom I had thought to be a poet but who was also, it turns out, a sort of English Conrad, with sea time in sailing ships, presumably more or less at the end of the era of big sailing ships. Good read, gripping even as it closes. Clippers are portrayed as the race horses of the sea. Their proper purpose might have been to move tea or wool about, but half the point was to race the things. To drive a beautiful and beautifully turned out ship as fast as it would go. Well past the point of prudence. Crack on all sail and go for the winning post. Take a chance on great chunks of spar and rigging getting carried away. On the ship simply diving down into a big wave. With the suggestion that a fair proportion - say half - of the masters of crack clippers were themselves cracked. To the peril of their ship, their crew and themselves. In defence of the masters, it seems that the crews - usually rather mixed bags - were fully up for racing.
Reminded along the way of an important professional skill in those days: you have to be able to work out where you are with the aid of a clock, a sextant, navigational tables, pencil and paper. A skill that Scott took to the pole and back. Could not have been much fun when you were cold, hungry and sick and your legs were slowly turning to blocks of ice.
The book was a rip roaring success, according to Mr. G., at the time of its publication around 1930. Entirely fitting, given my current fascination with the chap, that its title should be taken from towards the end of the first scene of Hamlet, from a speech by Marcellus.
# posted by Jim @ 8:30 AM 
