H. H. M.
August, 1911
There are good things which we want to share with the world and goodthings which we want to keep to ourselves. The secret of our favouriterestaurant, to take a case, is guarded jealously from all but a fewintimates; the secret, to take a contrary case, of our infallibleremedy for seasickness is thrust upon every traveller we meet, even ifhe be no more than a casual acquaintance about to cross the Serpentine.So with our books. There are dearly loved books of which we babble to aneighbour at dinner, insisting that she shall share our delight inthem; and there are books, equally dear to us, of which we say nothing,fearing lest the praise of others should cheapen the glory of ourdiscovery. The books of "Saki" were, for me at least, in the secondclass.
It was in the WESTMINSTER GAZETTE that I discovered him (I like toremember now) almost as soon as he was discoverable. Let us spare amoment, and a tear, for those golden days in the early nineteenhundreds, when there were five leisurely papers of an evening in whichthe free-lance might graduate, and he could speak of his Alma Mater,whether the GLOBE or the PALL MALL, with as much pride as, he neverdoubted, the GLOBE or the PALL MALL would speak one day of him. Myselfbut lately down from ST. JAMES', I was not too proud to take someslight but pitying interest in men of other colleges. The unusual nameof a freshman up at WESTMINSTER attracted my attention; I read what hehad to say; and it was only by reciting rapidly with closed eyes thenames of our own famous alumni, beginning confidently with Barrie andending, now very doubtfully, with myself, that I was able to preservemy equanimity. Later one heard that this undergraduate from overseashad gone up at an age more advanced than customary; and just asCambridge men have been known to complain of the maturity of OxfordRhodes scholars, so one felt that this WESTMINSTER free-lance in thethirties was no fit competitor for the youth of other colleges.Indeed, it could not compete.
Well, I discovered him, but only to the few, the favoured, did I speakof him. It may have been my uncertainty (which still persists) whetherhe called himself Sayki, Sahki or Sakki which made me thus ungenerousof his name, or it may have been the feeling that the others were notworthy of him; but how refreshing it was when some intellectuallyblown-up stranger said "Do you ever read Saki?" to reply, with the samepronunciation and even greater condescension: "Saki! He has been myfavourite author for years!"
A strange exotic creature, this Saki, to us many others who were tryingto do it too. For we were so domestic, he so terrifyinglycosmopolitan. While we were being funny, as planned, with collar-studsand hot-water bottles, he was being much funnier with werwolves andtigers. Our little dialogues were between John and Mary; his, and howmuch better, between Bertie van Tahn and the Baroness. Even the mostcasual intruder into one of his sketches, as it might be our Tomkins,had to be called