If of course you have done this vaingloriously embarrassing thing out of desperation for a little current turf recognition, then be sure to have a high powered binoculars and be the first to know when your horse drops hopelessly behind. And make your way quickly from the stands. Your programme raised to the side of your face will allow you to pass unrecognized by other race goers of your acquaintance. The safest place to seclude is often the parking area where on the floor or seat of your motor you can he low under rugs.
Should your horse have shamed you in the last race and you are unable to slip away unnoticed in the exodus, the gentlemen’s crapper may be your best hideout till such time as the course clears. By bringing with you an enthralling thriller to read you will also be able to skulk long enough to avoid those owner winners who tarry in champagne celebration. But beware, horse racing being what it is, there may always be some nosy bastard hanging over the transom trying to get a look at you sitting in your sins, or to see the tears streaming down your face. It is advised to stay away from any major horse sale for at least six months and allow nothing sartorially to hint of your racing colours.
But if before the race, your jockey takes the diabolical liberty in the green elegance of the mounting enclosure to cast an aspersion upon your entry, and as you are aware of your horse’s sensitive nature to know when folk profess little faith, it is permissible to remonstrate to his cavil.
‘Why the derby.’
By pausing with your riposte till you have laid a firm tap of your shooting stick upon his knee cap.
‘Please keep your lightweight opinions to yourself and out of hearing of my horse who clearly finds you gravely distressing to listen to and will have you to thank if he runs last.’
Polo
Whamming this willow root about, watched by admiring parasoled ladies, is an invigorating way to spend an afternoon. Make sure that your ponies are at all times well watered and fed and kept in the absolute peak of condition. It is extremely bad form if during play, any of your mounts drops dead beneath you. Unless of course you have just scored three goals in succession.
Never flaunt your high rated handicap. Nor on the ground of play, swing your mallet in such a fashion that it could wrap around your opponent’s neck and clean wipe him right out of his saddle. Side swiping is acceptable but charging your pony broadside onto an opposing player easily leads to disputes. And while dismounted during pony changes rigidly control your temper as it is never done to be part of a punch up along the sideline.
The expense of this sport will throw you into the company of hale outspoken, hard drinking but eminently socially acceptable chaps. But do beware of impostors who frequently are to be encountered unhorsed and unashamedly wheedling invitations to the intimate but dazzlingly splendid dinners held by the partakers of this ancient game. Such mountebank adventurers and chancers are often recognized by their proclivity for too obvious tailoring, ornamented shirtings and shoe buckles. Never hesitate to accost these bogus straight off, even though they pretend to dance attendance upon you between chukkars by making themselves useful proffering sweat towels or holding reins while you mount. If you can start a fight with one of these Joe Superficials, so much the better, someone of course will always hold you back but the gesture is sufficient to publically register your fatal disapproval.
Recreational Amusements
Depending upon your physique many happy pastimes can be indulged which not only keep you chipper but make you admired and envied among your weaker and more decrepit friends. For increasing lung capacity and broadening the shoulders, water polo has few equals although this aqueous contest is constantly interrupted throughout by referee’s blasts of whistle occasioned by constant fouls, which if you are a real tiger might frustrate you.
However, for those able bodied but of weakling appearance, one of the easiest ways of giving a sporting image is to be frequently seen with an armful of tennis rackets to which you refer as bats. Armed with these and with your sword arm in a sling you can even show up at a fencing tournament and make a virile impression upon the splendid looking curvaceous ladies who are usually thick in attendance. And whose acquaintance can be made by inquiring as to who was just penalized for corps à corps.
To indulge your devilish, sadistic and brutal tendencies there is nothing quite like croquet on a sunny afternoon outdoors. This simple lawn amusement will cause much disagreeable rancour especially from players who like to keep strictly to the rules and proceed about their officious little ways. And one can gratify the disgustingly pleasant delight in banging their ball a mile out of bounds.
After which you might want to rush indoors to some ping pong, otherwise called ‘pingers’ and by some ‘pongers’. The really big guns at this game make it impossible for just average players not to be blasted off the table. But don’t whatever you do resort to shuttlecock whose participants display a most disagreeable self importance and will often let doors slam in your face. As an antidote to such types, squash will put you amongst fellows who shoot straight from the shoulder. And except for an odd chap with an unhealthy amount of unreleased rage, which may require you to be well practised at ducking, it is a healthy activity.
Should your frond like physical condition restrict you to seated table sport, remember that chequers is a good game with which to make the unpractised look stupid if you know a few basic stratagems. Chess, however, is a friendship breaker but does keep the mind agile. And although this pastime can make momentary giants out of quite ordinary folk who can succeed in little else in life, it also produces people who with an overinflated opinion of themselves as players have been known to upset playing boards, punch opponents and attack onlookers.
Gaming
This dissipation should only be undertaken in the evening and requires the company of a beautiful woman in whose adoring smiles you can bask as you collar in vast amounts of winnings. If you want to appear at your best, chemin de fer and baccarat should be chosen. Sit poised, head held up. Do not slump in your seat or give any impression of sneakiness. Gather up your winnings without smiling. Nor does it do to leave a casino laughing your head off after breaking the bank as it can give the impression to all the crowd watching that you are a rank amateur who has never won anything before.
In divesting yourself of huge sums in prolonged losing streaks which you can ill afford, it is time for you to be, above all other things, urbane. Show not a trickle of saliva from the corners of your mouth, or when you are really skint, let your jaw drop in utter humiliation and defeat and walk cowering away from the tables. The loneliness after losing is something which can disembowel the soul and never at such times have firearms near at hand.
Greed being a most intractable desire, gambling for gain demands vast reserves of self control, and so while standing at the slot machine waiting impatiently for it to dump jackpot coins on you and while sporting the incomparably stupid look that has overcome your face, it is not done to try to cheat this machine by the use of devices or tricky little shenanigans to thwart the honest performance of its mechanism. Especially is it bad form to pull the machine over and as it lies floored and helpless on its side to then rain kicks into its glass and metal areas.
Those who oversee gambling enjoy a very nervous occupation. And if their constant facial tics, jerks and spasms put you off your game, don’t hesitate to request such chaps to stand a little outside your range of sight. But be careful of giving offence to these habitués of this profession for they go nearly out of their minds at the merest slight and instead of just a tiny distracting convulsion or two in the background they may end up shaking and quivering all over the place.
When high rollers hit town watch out. They displace small time gamblers even to getting their bookings in hotels. Stand clear of these big spenders at the tables. For it is here that they reign as kings. At craps they are ebullient, and real regular guys. And throw the bones with suitably accompanying words.
‘Come on baby, buy daddy a new pair of transplant ball
s.’
You might if you feel particularly robust of the moment, suggest.
‘And you need them pop.’
At the Arena
In frequenting contests where blood and gore is likely to splash the spectators, do contain your enthusiasm. There is nothing more disenchanting than seeing a lust thirsty onlooker at a dog or cock fight wildly gesticulating and sweating or indeed adding to the stench by nervously breaking wind during these battles to the death. Therefore do not eat odoriferous methane makers such as sauerkraut, garlic, hot dogs, peanuts or beans prior to or during attendance.
To lend an air of daring to your appearance, always carry prominently upon your person up to date appurtenances which identify you as an aficionado but do not overdo it so that you look like an itinerant snake oil peddler. Be aware of the proper way of showing your pleasure and displeasure. It never does to be singled out in a refined crowd for having committed a faux pas, such as letting go with a loud squeal in the hear a pin drop silence of a prolonged cliff hanging rally during a championship tennis match. But if you really make it a good old fashioned scream, your outburst will help relieve everyone’s tension and they along with the players will be grateful. You may even be applauded but don’t count on it.
At major boxing contests there is much to be recommended in being seen arriving ringside just before the main bout and trading mock uppercuts with former heavyweight champions and backslapping promotors. But never climb up through the ropes and jump uninvited into the ring to shake the gloves of the pugilists who in their pre fight tension will usually pleasantly accommodate even though they don’t know you from Adam. A further boorishness is to wipe your feet in the rosin of a neutral corner and then raise your arms hopefully for cheers from the crowd. These antics, however, will instil caution in your neighbouring onlooker, who at prize fights, is usually itching himself to get into fisticuffs.
At the bullfight, to increase one’s enjoyment as a spectator, it helps to know the intimate workings of the corrida de toros. And this is best done by taking a little private practice yourself. Rehearsals can be had free of charge walking the streets pretending matador status with quick sidesteps and a little cape work with your top coat trembled provocatively at the more rapidly oncoming pedestrians. Some of whom will immediately catch on and in a suitable crouched position will erect their arms and hands in a pair of horns for you. When this makes you utterly fleet of foot you can try your moments of truth on passing cars, even to skilfully crossing a speedy many laned highway with a series of passes. And if a motorist has sufficient nerve to stop and get out and accost you for being a risk to other road users, you may by further inciting him with verbal abuse, be given the opportunity of improving your agility by having to dodge a few fists. Following which you should then be fully capable of jumping the barrier of a bull ring to distract a totally out of control bull who has grievously gored the matador. But on no account await toro’s charge recibiendo.
The Season
Wherever these rage, involving as they do, regattas, steeplechases, boulevards, festivals and spas, take in as many as you can since it is always congenial in a suitable setting to let people know you are alive, and if not smiling, at least kicking. The pageantry occasioned by the sunshine on ladies’ large hats and bare backs plus the throngs of toilet watered people flowing to and fro without boor or lout anywhere, can inspire one to feel that all the world reposes rich, nicely mannered and safe from harm. And quietly inviting you to pursue a deserved longevity.
Be the day mud deep inclement, the spirit still can soar provided you have your boots and umbrella. And to give yourself a sense of belonging, if you don’t belong, it is an advantage to sport the garb appropriate to the day and to make sure your binocular case is not plastic. If it is, get rid of it as soon as possible. Even though folk may look mesmerized by who’s winning, they have a naughty habit of allowing one eye to tabulate the quality and origin of your various accessories with the wholesale purpose of relegating you good and proper to your social station with as much prejudice as their eyeballs can encompass. And this can make you feel unseasonably rotten.
Reunions
Seeing all those passé clapped out dead beat faces from yesteryear can sometimes make you think you’re on a roller coaster to the grave. And if you’ve really made it big, these get togethers of the old gang can become tight lipped occasions of resentment. It is rare that bygone comraderies can do anything but tempt you to drink more than you should or make you utterly teetotal with distaste.
But if you have suffered failure and defeat and have mustered the courage to crawl out of your little niche where you’ve been hibernating over the years cooking with your lonesome skillet while hearing of the marvellous things your long past peers have been doing, here is your chance to make up for it. Straight off get laughingly stinking drunk. You’ll make the assembly a happy one by letting everyone refer to you as look at that poor son of a bitch. Especially if you choose to wear only the old school insignia upon your nudity while stomping your war dance hullabaloo and singing the old school song. It will of course be your farewell reunion.
On Safari
In order to get entirely away from it all for a stretch during the year and between the de rigueur international dates, this kind of outing does the trick. Rakish informality should be the key note. Without of course looking like something a big cat dragged in. Make sure to have all your guns overhauled at the hands of a good gunsmith and pack the proper quality khaki and the essential pith helmet. Indeed take several of the latter which will, while you wait en route on piers and train platforms, give you the admired air of the long practised professional jungle explorer.
The sharing of hardship and lust while on safari brings either a deepening enrichment of friendship or a life long detestation. The latter often occurring when a member of the expedition party keeps borrowing your wife or other custom made crested utensils and equipment. But even though sorely pressed you should not forgo observing civil behaviour. And following the day’s kill and photographing of trophies, in which it is extremely bad form to smile, always appear showered and spruced in fresh bush regalia at your host’s tent for dinner. This prevents what is commonly known in the jungle as going native. Which is only permissible when you are captured by a hostile tribe.
During inter tent itinerary keep a weather eye out for the sudden appearance of revenge seeking man eating beasts. Nothing is more galling or makes you all look more like a bunch of amateurs than when someone gets bitten or mauled just as everyone is convening for pre dinner drinks. In the case of dangerous snakes be aware of these at all times. It is quite an unsettling experience to be confronted in the middle of one’s personal toiletries with a death dealing serpent, particularly while crouching to defecate, when it could be curtains for you to move the merest muscle. While asleep special precautions should be taken against the constricting reptiles as these can wrap right around you and while you may dream it is a loved one, it can quickly be too late to find it is not.
If you have a tendency towards cowardice in the face of savage rampaging wild beasts make this known early to the guide or your host. There is nothing more inglorious than when, with your safari colleagues enjoying a leisured moment as an unarmed party of spectators, you have been appointed and are expected to divert a charging herd of marauding elephants or water buffalos with a single well aimed shot and instead you drop your gun, turn tail and beat it. It also makes your appearance absolutely painfully unhappy at the evening drink before dinner. That is if any of the other members of the stampeded assemblage escaped.
Having attended one of the better educational institutions it is possible you will come upon an old dark complexioned school chum who has now taken up his hereditary position out in the bush. Observe protocol and remember most jungle chiefs and potentates dine black tie at a high table, bush or no bush. They are usually seated before a large gathering of their own people who perform erotic dances and other gyrating entertainments
to the rapid beating of torn toms. Never clap to demonstrate your appreciation but it is polite on these dusty occasions to look up from your plate and smile whenever the rhythm of the drums noticeably changes. Nor be overfamiliar with His Royal Highness as you had been accustomed during undergraduate years. An inadvertent gesture lacking proper respect could get you a spear from one of his loyal subjects without warning. Especially upon your refusal to accept some nice morsel he has selected for you from the chorus line to wrestle the night away with in your tent. Otherwise behave as you would back home at an ordinary banquet.
Upon a Gent Marrying a Lady for Her Money
This really is a hot one and a subject which regrettably must be treated at some length. As more wily guys than you think do it. But getting the spondulics in this manner is an ancient well tried method requiring aptitudes which, if applied elsewhere, might even make you richer.
Make absolutely sure that the lady has the assets you think she has, then woo her assiduously until the knot is tied. You will get all kinds of impedimenta especially from other guys who have tried or are trying the same thing. But your most embarrassing moment will come when you are confronted by your future wife’s advisers, guardians and trustees who will insist you sign a forfeiture of any future ownership or benefit. This ordeal can only be made easier for you should your pedigree be quite superior to that of your wife’s. But should it be inferior, good lord, it’s terrible what they make you go through. And no matter how much you express in heartrending tones the simple sentiment.