Let Us Keep the Tavern

When, in an ancient legend, Hiram the master-builder, was slain by the treacherous craftsmen, the supreme word—or secret—of masonry perished with him. Consequently the temple that Hiram was building, though almost finished, could never be finished absolutely, and the Lost Word has not yet been recovered. It will be found, perhaps, on the day on which the missing letters of the Great Name are restored; and then, as the Kabbalists truly say, there shall be compassions on every side.

In the meantime, as I have understood, the Masons do as best they can with a substituted word. It is not the true word, nor does it pretend to be the true word. It is a makeshift, the best obtainable under present conditions, and, no doubt, it has done as well as could be expected.

As a matter of fact, this mystery of the substituted word goes through the whole of life. There are people in the arts who do not possess genius, but managed to turn out highly respectable and interesting tales and pictures by dint of hard work and careful cultivation of their talents. So in war, so in games. There is the ban soldier, the ban cricketer. These are rare, but a man by taking pains can no doubt make himself a safe and solid soldier, or a safe and solid cricketer. And if one cannot get the best—the real thing—it is, no doubt, wise to put up with the second best. There is a great deal to be said for substitutes.

This is true even of such minor matter as lunch. I have the ideal lunch in my mind: a sardine or two, a few radishes, a little bread and butter. Then an omelette fines herbes, a small fish, exquisitely fried, fresh from the Loire, a cutlet and fried potatoes, a slice or two of paté de lièvre, a plate of those fragrant tous les mois strawberries with sugar and cream in a bit of gruyère.

We will drink with this simple but agreeable meal a bottle of Barsac, and afterwards we will have our coffee and fine champagne in the garden court of the Pheasant at Tours, sitting amidst flowers by the fountain, under the shade of the broad-leafed plane tree.

This is my Lost Word in the article of luncheon; but what an admirable substitute may be found for it. If a man can discover an old English inn, and in it a hunk of bread, a good cheese, and a pint of honest ale, he may boast truly that he has lunched very well. Provided, of course, in the first place, that the inn or Tavern does not call itself “Ye Olde Red Loin” or “Ye Olde” anything else: “Ye,” it has been observed by the judicious, has a tendency to make the beer too weak and the cheese too strong. But if the tavern be genuine and the food and drink be genuine, then I say that he who lunches thus lunches well.

But it will be remarked that here there is no pretense of make-believe in the substituted word. Bread and cheese and beer do not pretend that they are omelettes, cutlets, or white wine. They stand up boldly as good things in their way, without subterfuge or concealment. It is the curse of too many substitutes that they are full of false pretenses.

Look at the people called Vegetarians. I think I could eat with them—now and then—if they would only be honest. If the Vegetarian would only say: “I can give you a bowl of lentil soup, guaranteed velvety, smooth, guileless of all gritty offenses against the palate, and then some first-rate floury potatoes, grown in dry, warm soil, mashed up with salt, black pepper, and real butter, and a fine bit of Stilton to finish up with”: then, I say, I would keep his fast with him.

But your vegetarian has the profoundest distrust in the attractive power of vegetables. He begins to lie with the soup. He calls it “Vegetable Hare Soup.” He equivocates as he passes his sickly “Mock Galatine of Chicken.”

He is ridiculous with his “Nut Cutlets,” shameless with his “Fruitarian Roast Turkey.” His whole bill of fare is like a tale told by an idiot to an idiot: it is a vainer delusion than the Barmecide’s feast. Here, in short, we have the vicious make-shift, the corrupted rather than the substituted word; as we have it again in those horrible products, unfermented wine and non-alcoholic—or “Control”—beer.

And this brings me to an announcement that I saw in The Times a few days ago. The Lord Mayor of London—may the Saints send him a better occupation—is to preside at a conference to be held in the course of the autumn on the subject of “The Provision of Alternatives to the Liquor Tavern.” In other words the misguided persons concerned in the conferences are going to try to find a substitute for the tavern; for one of the most ancient and honorable institutions in the whole estate of man.

Some would say that Church and State synthesize humanity in a condition of well-being. I would rather say Church and Tavern. There is a great deal to be said against even the good State; there is nothing to be said against the good tavern.

Not that I deny that it is possible to find a tolerable substitute for the tavern; but the method is difficult. You must take first of all a burning sun, a fiery sky, a land of rock and sand and thirsty desolation. Then by the stony road, with its thorns and thistles, bring your caravan of travelers parched with the fires of the air and the earth. Finally, make a well of cold, bubbling water to thrill up shining through the ardent rock. Then it will be said: de torrente in via bibet: ergo exultabit caput—he shall drink of the brook by the way: therefore shall he lift up his head. That is the only substitute for the tavern.

But these conferencing people—of “14 Christian denominations,” by the way—I know what they want. They want a large dreary room, very high, with walls distempered in bilious green, and furniture in pale pitchpine. They want tablecloths covered with stale mustard stains. They want shelves full of “Pops Ale,” “Cork-ho, “Vinto,” “Pipso,” and other flagitious and offensive beverages. They want to dispense coffee of such forlorn and shabby nastiness that a French beggar would spit it out of his mouth: and Conscientious Cocoa—"Pacifist” Brand.

*Originally published in the Evening News: August 22, 1917. Reprinted in Dreamt in Fire: The Dreadful Ecstasy of Arthur Machen (Darkly Bright Press, 2021) Pages 192-194. Available for purchase at Eighth Day Books.