AT THE PEN’S POINT

Southland Times, Issue 19395, 8 November 1924, Page 11 (Supplement)

AT THE PEN’S POINT

LABOUR AND LEISURE.

(By

“Zyx.”)

The argument had its origin in a remark by the Poet, a provocative fellow who was the envied of everyone in the club, not for the fame that was not his, but for the easy manner in which Life treated him. It was a bright summery day and appropos of nothing at all this rhymer remarked lazily that he often wondered why one’s hopes of the Christmas vacation were never fully realised. “It is a strange thihg to me,” he said, “that in spite of all our planning, we never achieve all that we hope to. I wonder why?”

From his comfortable chair, the Business Man broke the silence. “I should say,” he said with heavy implication, “that it is rather difficult for you to detect the difference between your working time and your holiday. Fortunately I am not in that predicament. There are few opportunities for relaxation in my year; even the Christmas period finds me with work to do while my staff is disporting itself in tennis flannels and bathing suits, but the few days I do get I am content to use in sheer idleness, to rest and thus prepare for the long round of tpil which is before me. I plan nothing for my holiday - except idleness and that I achieve.”

A gleam came into the Retired Farmer’s eye as he intervened, fastening the Business Man with an assertive glare. “I have never been impressed by your busy days,” he said. “From what I know of you, I can say that on those days you begin by devoting the best part of an hour to the morning paper, and usually to those columns which concern themselves with sport, after which you go casually through your private mail. Then you indulge in what you are pleased to call a conference with another busy business man, with whom you argue warmly about the doings of the All Blacks and the uncharitable utterances of their critics. A few stories with a touch of spice in them follow and then it is time for your luncheon, over which you spend not less than a couple of hours. In the afternoon you dictate a couple of letters which cannot be delegated to the office manager, and then it is time for you to discover what horses have won the principal races. Another conference, very similar to the morning one, and you are ready to telep,hone a friend to make up a foursome or a table at Auction or Mah Jong at the club. Your evenings, of course, are your own and so are your Saturday afternoons and your Sundays. Your life is one round of exacting toil of this kind.”

The Business Man might have retorted if the Junior Clerk preparing to take his father’s place had not stepped into the lists: the firm had no direct contact with the ruralities and so he spoke freely. “Before you annhilate the Tired Business Man,” he drawled in the Retired Farmer’s beard, “you should look to yourself, old thing. I have watched the tiller of the soil in the sweat of his brow and all that sort of thing, but usually my optics light on him as he caresses the top rail of a fence and weeps because the freights are not crashing to the depths, or he assures an equally laborious neighbour that his bus has jerked more miles out of a gallon of juice than the salesman guaranteed. I have surprised farmers dissipating their energies over a trout stream or a stock sale, but the only real work they do is when they dust up the benzine buggy for a visit to the mortgagee. I wouldn’t mind betting a dinged peanut that it’s hard for a farmer t-o tell whether or not he has retired.”

Before the Retired Farmer could crush him, the Headmaster had mingled in the fray. “Young man,” he began severely, “if you could spare enough time from tennis to give thought to the subject you would realise that your slangy utterance is in bad taste and shocking English. A Junior Clerk waiting to inherit a business is not in a position to discuss this subject because he has not basis of contrast. To appreciate the significance of Leisure it is necessary to have a personal knowledge of Labour and that, unfortunately, has been denied you. The only occasions offered you for anxiety are those which come when a pretty girl’s programme is filled with initials and when you have made two appointments for picture shows on the same night.” With an alacrity that cut off whatever remonstrance the Junior Clerk had concocted, the Politician took the stump: “Educationalists have the advantage of reputation,” he declaimed sonorously. “They are credited with being responsible for the future of the race. I have often persuaded my constituents to agree that the children of to-day are the men and women of tomorrow and that to the hands of the school teachers is given the glorious duty of training them for their destined places in the great army of the Democracy, but nothing I have said, and I retract nothing that is on record, can mitigate the immitigable fact that in the actual work of education the principals of school play an insignificant part. I might allude to the school committees on which so many electors give praiseworthy service or to the poorly paid assistant teachers, who can be numbered in thousands against the few tens of headmasters, but I will not burden you with these details. The headmasters spend some little time in their rooms, labour to them is unknown, and in these days of Democratic government it is essential . . . .”

At that moment, to the relief of everyone, the Lawyer took up the case. “It is not my intention to weary you with the weakness of the argument presented by my friend,” he said, “because you are all aware of the facts of a politician’s life, that is to say the brevity of sessions and the manner in which one speech may be used to supply the political oratory of a whole career. The inner facts may not be known to us, but they are not germaine to the point at issue, a contention for which I can quote you authorities if needs be. With your indulgence, however, I will pass to the crux of the case and direct your attention to the principal complainant: the Poet. He has been responsible for this confusion of Labour and Leisure, but I might ask him to answer me this: Does he himself know what it is to labour? Is it not a fact that idleness is the prime occupation of a poet?” The company was united at once; but the Poet was not abashed. “Of course, gentlemen,” he confessed, ‘T must agree, but then I have to idle so that I may study the world about me. When I am thoroughly idle I am busiest, because it is in those moments that I am absorbing the great facts of life for the making of my poems. I alone amongst you bring my Leisure and Labour to a commingling so that I may express that which is true through the medium of my artistic sensibilities and give to you that which is truer than Truth. When I am idle I am working and when I am not working I am not idle, and thus I can be honest about it.” To this there was no answer, because the Poet ambled out of the room with a grin, without anyone knowing quite what he meant. But he was a poet.