JILTED.

Stratford Evening Post, Issue 15, 8 October 1929, Page 4

JILTED.

I once saw a (luck trying to walk , on a frozen pond, ao,d 1 have often debated with myself as to whether that is the most comical sight in the world. But I think, now, that the erratic deportment of the duck cannot be compared, for genuine humour, with the behaviour of rvhat I may call the “Just Jilted.” (The male of the species, that is—for the female in similar circumstances retains a queer sense of dignity to, a misfortune that is usually far less trivial for her than it is for the male). jt is, of course, no joke for the victim when handed his hat. In 1582 one Thomas Watson, who had evidently taken a nasty toss, wrote; I Love is a sour delight, a sugred grief, A living death, an ever-dying life, A breach of Reason’s Law. . . . And I have t\o doubt his friends screamed with merriment at the pale green Thomas as he sat, surrounded by returned presents, pouring out vitriolic verses by the quillful. But every unsuccessful swain does not, like Thomas, rush into pentameters. Some, for instance, make a habit of rushing into the night: it always looks well. Others rush into Big Game. Thus: Bertie; I thin,k we should make and ideal pair, darling. Darling: Well, think again. Bertie: Very well. I shall go and shoot springbok and Forget. Of course, the quarry can be selected according t.o choice. A friend of mine told me that the only cure for hi s (frequently) broken heart was the systematic slaughter of gerenuk (or Waller’s gazelle), j For those with less bizarre tastes a few lions would probably meet the case. Indeed, the comparative rarity of the Kto.g of Beasts is attributed mainly to tiffs. It will be noted that there is a * distinct element of self-conscious-ness in the antics of these “broken men.” Horrified to find, three ■.weeks after the “blow,” that their appetite is returning and that they can once more laugh at comic, strips, they attempt to prolong the dramatic pitch when they have tn.o longer any . genuine emotion to support it; with '.the result that, imagining themselves pale, heroic figures Of (he calibre of Henry I. after the wreck of the White Ship, they merely succeed in striking us a s rather funnier than Charlie Chaplin,