00588--Summary of the Essay OLD CHINA by Charles Lamb [Essays of Elia]

Summary of the Essay OLD CHINA by Charles Lamb

Charles Lamb had a sentimental attachment to old china-cups, plates, jars and the like which are generally known as china-ware.  Whenever he visited a great house, he used to enquire first about the china-closet and then about the picture-gallery.  He did not remember when this love was planted in him. 

The pictures on old-china tea-cups are drawn without any sense of perspective.  The eye helps us in making up the sense of distance.  The figures may be up in the air but a speck of blue under their feet represents the earth.  The men on these cups and jars have women’s faces and the women have more womanish expressions. 

One of the cups has the picture of a young and courtly Mandarin, handing tea to a lady from a salver.  Between the two is a distance of only two miles.  On another side there is the same lady or another.  On tea-cups things similar are things identical.  She is stepping into a little fairy boat.  There is a river beside a garden.  At a distance are houses, trees, pagodas, country dances, a cow and a rabbit.  Lamb was pointing out these to his sister over a cup of tea.  This sister is represented as his cousin Bridget in the essays.   She was caught in the memory of their past.  So she started a long lecture.  She wanted Elia not to forget the past.
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Bridget wished for a return of the good old times when they were not quite so rich.  She did not want to be poor, nor did she like to be rich.  She wanted to get back to that state when they were neither rich nor poor, and in that state they were much happier.  Now if they buy something it has no other value except that of the money spent on it.  In the old days every purchase was a triumph.  Before they purchased anything, they used to argue about it and about their expenses for two or three days.  All the arguments for and against were duly considered, and then they would think about an item of expenditure where they could save something.  Thus they were inconvenienced by the money spent on the object purchased, and this raised the value of the purchase.

Lamb used to wear the same brown suit which used to change on him even after it was in rags.  This he did because they wanted to purchase the folio edition of the plays of Beanment and Fletcher.  For weeks they looked at the volume before they could decide whether to purchase it, and then at ten o’ clock of a Saturday night they ran to the shop and paid for it.  But now he wears neat black clothes because he has become rich and finical; and he goes about purchasing any book or any print he likes. 

In the past they would walk to Enfield and Potter’s Bar, and Waltham on a holiday.  They would go there with their meagre lunch and enter in a decent inn.  There they were lucky having an honest hostess like the one described by Izaak Walton in his The Complete Angler.  Formerly, they used to sit in the pit to witness the dramatic performances.  They squeezed out their shillings to sit in the one shilling gallery.  There Elia felt many a time that he ought not to have brought Bridget who was grateful to him for having brought her there.  When the curtain was drawn up, it did not matter where one sat.  So Elia used to say that “the Gallery was the best place of all for enjoying a play socially”.  The spectators in the Gallery were illiterate ones who never read the plays and who therefore were highly attentive to the play.  Bridget received the best attention there because there was chivalry still left, but now Elia cannot see a play from the Gallery.  So Bridget says that his sight disappeared with his poverty.
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In the past, they used to eat strawberries; at that time they did not become quite common.  Now they cannot have such a treat.  Elia may now say that it is better to have a clean balance-sheet at the end of the year.  But there was a different pleasure in the past.  On the night of the 31^st December, they used to argue accounting for the excess in the expenditure.  At last they pocketed up their loss and welcomed the New Year.  Now there is not such accounting, and there are “no flattering promises about the new year doing better for them”.

As long as Bridget was in a rhetorical vein speaking thus, Elia kept quiet.  At last he told her that they must put up with the excess.  He said that they must be thankful for their early struggles.  Because of the past suffering, they were drawn together.  “We must ride, where we formerly walked; live better, and lie softer.”

.

                                                        END

00587--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-48

Mulla Nasrudin's young wife, recently returned from her honeymoon, was complaining to her friend about her husband's drinking habits.

"If you knew he drank, why did you marry him?" her friend asked.

"I DID NOT KNOW HE DRANK," said Nasrudin's wife, "UNTIL ONE NIGHT HE CAME HOME SOBER."

00586--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-47

After the bride's first dinner, she asked her husband, Mulla Nasrudin, "Now, dear, what will I get if I cook a dinner like that for you everyday?"

"MY LIFE INSURANCE," said Nasrudin.

00585--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-46

Mulla Nasrudin, who was really unaccustomed to public speaking, arose in confusion after dinner and muttered hesitatingly:

"M-m-my f-f-friends, when I came here tonight only God and myself knew what I was about to say to you AND NOW ONLY GOD KNOWS!"

00584--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-45

"Darling," said the young woman,"I could die for your sake."

"YOU ARE ALWAYS PROMISING THAT," said Mulla Nasrudin, "BUT YOU NEVER DO IT."

00583--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-44

The young lady became angry with her boyfriend, Mulla Nasrudin, and said, "You are a perfect dope!"

"DON'T TRY FLATTERY," said Nasrudin. "NONE OF US IS PERFECT!"

00582--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-43

Mulla Nasrudin sat fishing in a bucket of water.

A visitor, wishing to be friendly, asked, "How many have you caught?"

"YOU ARE THE NINTH," said Nasrudin.

00581--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-42

A girlfriend at a cocktail party said to Mulla Nasrudin, "I keep hearing you use the word 'idiot;' I hope you are not referring to me."

"DON'T BE SO CONCEITED," said the Mulla. "AS IF THERE WERE NO OTHER IDIOTS IN THE WORLD!"

00580--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-41

Mulla Nasrudin was talking to a friend about his recently broken romance. "Do you mean," asked the friend, "that at her request, you gave up drinking, and smoking, and gambling, and dancing, and playing pool?"

"Yes, just because she insisted," said the Mulla.

"Then why didn't you marry her?" the fellow asked.

"WELL, AFTER ALL THAT REFORMING," said Nasrudin, "I DECIDED I COULD DO BETTER."

00579--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-40

Mulla Nasrudin's mother, worrying about her son's safety, said to him:

"Didn't I say you should not let that girl come over to your room last night? You know how things like that worry me."

"But I didn't invite her to my room," said Nasrudin. "I went over to her room. NOW YOU CAN LET HER MOTHER DO THE WORRYING."

00578--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-39

Mulla Nasrudin had been calling on his girlfriend for over a year. One evening the girl's father stopped him as he was leaving and asked, "Look here, young man, you have been seeing my daughter for a year now, and I would like to know whether your intentions are honorable or dishonorable?"

Nasrudin's face lit up. "DO YOU MEAN TO SAY, SIR," he said, "THAT I HAVE A CHOICE?"

00577--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-38

The young lady's hopes had been high for two years while Mulla Nasrudin remained silent on the question of marriage. Then one evening he said to her, "I had a most unusual dream last night. I dreamed that I asked to marry you. I wonder what that means."

"THAT MEANS," said his girlfriend, "THAT YOU HAVE MORE SENSE ASLEEP THAN YOU HAVE AWAKE."

00576--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-37

Mulla Nasrudin's family was upset because the girl he was planning to marry was an atheist.

"We'll not have you marrying an atheist," his mother said.

"What can I do? I love her," the young Nasrudin said.

"Well," said his mother, "if she loves you, she will do anything you ask. You should talk religion to her.n If you are persistent, you can win her over."

Several weeks went by, then one morning at breakfast the young Mulla seemed absolutely brokenhearted.

"What's the matter?" his mother asked. "I thought you were making such good progress in your talks about religion to your young girlfriend."

"THAT'S THE TROUBLE," said Nasrudin. I OVER DID IT. LAST NIGHT SHE TOLD ME SHE WAS SO CONVINCED THAT SHE IS GOING TO STUDY TO BE A NUN."

00575--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-36

A rich farmer had been trying desperately to marry off his daughters. One day he met Mulla Nasrudin.

"I have several daughters," the farmer told the Mulla. "I would like to see them comfortably fixed. And I will say this, they won't go to their husbands without a little bit in the bank, either. The youngest one is twenty-three and she will take Rupees 25,000 with her. The next one is thirty-two, and she will take Rupees 50,000 with her. Another is forty-three and she will take Rupees 75,000 with her."

"That's interesting," said Nasrudin. "I was just wondering if you have one about fifty years old."

00574--Vocabulary test-3

Match column A with B

A	B
1. pristine	a. acquire
2. procrastinate	b. fertile
3. procure	c. pen name
4. profundity	d. nearness
5. profusion	e. unspoiled
6. prolific	f. subdue
7. protagonist	g. predicament
8. provocative	h. main character
9. proximity	i. postpone
10. pseudonym	j. abundance
11. quandary	k. stimulating
12. quell	l. depth
13. querulous	m. pursuit
14. quest	n. teasing
15. quizzical	o. complaining

1. e

2. i

3. a

4. l

5. j

6. b

7. h

8. k

9. d

10. c

11. g

12. f

13. o

14. m

15. n

00573--A note [Summary] on Epithalamion by Edmund Spenser.

A short note [Summary] on Epithalamion by Edmund Spenser.

According to Mutter Epithalamion is one of the greatest formal lyrics in English.  Legouis praises it as a great ode without a rival.  It exceeds in richness and splendour all compositions of the same kind.  It is the most gorgeous jewel in the treasure-house of the Renaissance.  J.W. Mackail assigns to it the first place not only among spenser’s lyrics but also among all English odes.  It celebrates the marriage of Spenser with Elizabeth Boyle. 
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The ode adopts the Italian Canzone.  It has twenty three stanzas of usually seventeen lines which are of unequal length and intricate rhyme pattern, each stanza ending in a fourteen syllable line which forms a varied refrain.  The last seven lines are tornata, an envoi, that expresses the poet’s desire to offer the poem as a gift in lieu of the ornaments that have not reached her because of some accident.  It bears the influence of Sappho, Theocritus’s Epithalamium of Helen, Catallus’s The Wedding of Manlius and Vinia and the epithalamia of the French Pleiade, Ronsard and Du Bellay.  Its novelty lies in the narrator being the poet who is also the bridegroom. 

The poem unfolds a canvas where mythological and Christian elements, literary reminiscence and natural description  blend harmoniously to intensify the expression of the poet’s personal emotions.  It radiates an aura of a pageant about it.  Its chief features are the invocation of the Muse, the procession, feasting, the decoration of the bride, the praise of her beauty, the bride’s arrival at the church, the marriage ceremony, the preparation of the bridal chamber and prayer for their fruitful union. 

Spenser’s Platonic conception that the outward beauty is a reflection of the inner virtue and purity, manifests itself in the description of the bride who is adorn’d with beauty’s grace and virtue’s store.  The beauty of her body like a palace fair leads the mind with many a stately stair to honour’s seat, to the seat of perfect virtue.  Spenser’s celebration of ideal beauty, and the Petrarchan deification of the  lady are conventional.  Though the poem is personal, it universalies the experience of love.  The narration of events covering one day, from morning to midnight imposes on the poem a unity in respect of the subject-matter and of its emotional content.  As Mutter observes, the wealth of imagery is allied to the often remarked musical quality of the poem to produce a total effect of strength and controlled luxuriance which earns for it Coleridge’s praise of truly sublime. 

00572--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-35

Mulla Nasrudin was telling a friend his future through palmistry. He said, "You will be poor and unhappy and miserable until you are sixty."

"Then what?" asked the man hopefully.

"By that time," said Nasrudin, "you will be used to it."

00571--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-34

Mulla Nasrudin went to see his lawyer about a divorce.

"What grounds do you think you have for a divorce?" the lawyer asked.

"It is my wife's manners," said the Mulla. "She has such bad table manners that she is disgracing the whole family."

"That's bad," the lawyer said. "How long have you been married?"

"Nine years," said the Mulla.

"If you have been able to put up with her table manners for nine years, I can't understand why you want a divorce now," the lawyer said.

"Well," said Nasrudin, "I did not know it before. I just bought a book on etiquette this morning."

00570--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-33

"This is a lesson in logic," said the old professor in the teahouse. "If the show starts at nine and dinner is at six, and my son has the measles, and my brother drives a Cadillac, how old am I?"

"You are eighty-four," replied Mulla Nasrudin promptly.

"Right," said the professor. "Now tell the rest of the fellows here how you arrived at the correct answer."

"It is easy," said Nasrudin. "I have got an uncle who is forty-two, and he is only half nuts. You must be eighty-four."

00569--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-32

Mulla Nasrudin climbed into a barber's chair and asked, "Where is  the barber who used to work on the next chair?"

"Oh, that was a sad case," the barber said. "He became so nervous and despondent over poor business, that one day when a customer said he did not want a massage, he went out of his mind and cut the customer's throat with a razor. He is now in the state mental hospital. By the way, would you like a massage, sir?"

"Absolutely!" said Mulla Nasrudin.

00568--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-31

Mulla Nasrudin was getting ready to apply to a local department store for a job. A friend told him that it was the policy of the store to hire nobody but Catholic Christians, and that if he wanted a job there he would have to lie about being a Catholic Christian.

Nasrudin applied for the job, and the personnel man asked him the usual questions. Then he said to the Mulla, "To what church do you belong?"

"I am a Catholic," said Nasrudin, "and all my family are Catholics. In fact, my father is a priest and my mother is a nun, sir."

00567--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-30

One day Mulla Nasrudin visited a large department store to buy his wife some nylon hose. Inadvertently he got caught in the mad rush of a counter where a bargain sale was going on. He soon found himself being pushed and stepped on by frantic women. He stood it as long as he could, then with head lowered and elbows out, he plowed through the crowd.

"You there!" said a woman. "Can't you act like a gentleman?''

"Not anymore," said Nasrudin. "I have been acting like a gentleman for an hour. From now on I am acting like a lady."

00565--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-29

MULLA NASRUDIN constantly irritated his friends with his eternal optimism. No matter how bad the situation, he would always say, "It could have been worse." To cure him of this annoying habit his friends decided to invent a situation so completely black, so dreadful that even Nasrudin could find no hope in it.

Approaching him at the club bar one day, one of them said, "Mulla, did you hear what happened to George? He went home last night, found his wife in bed with another man, shot them both, then turned the gun on himself."

"Terrible," said the Mulla, "but it could have been worse."

"How in the hell," asked his dumbfounded friend, "could it 

possibly have been worse?"

"Well," said Nasrudin, "if it had happened the day before, I would be dead now."

00564--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-28

The Judge looked very severe. "Mulla," he said, "your wife says you hit her over the head with a baseball bat and threw her down a flight of stairs. What have you got to say for yourself?"

Mulla Nasrudin rubbed the side of his nose with his hand, and meditated. Finally he said, "Your Honor, I guess there are three sides to this case: my wife's story, my story, and the truth."

00563--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-27

Mulla Nasrudin's face lit up as he recognized the man who was walking ahead of him down the subway stairs. He slapped the man so heartily on the back that the man nearly collapsed, and cried, "Goldberg, I hardly recognized you! Why, you have gained thirty pounds since I saw you last. And you have had your nose fixed, and I swear you are about two feet taller."

The man looked at him angrily. "I beg your pardon," he said in icy tones, "but I do not happen to be Goldberg."

"Aha!" said Mulla Nasrudin, "so you have even changed your name?"

00562--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-26

Mulla Nasrudin got a job in a bank. The cashier tossed him a 

packet of one-rupee notes and said, "Check them to make sure there are one hundred."

The Mulla started counting. Finally he got up to fifty-six, fifty-seven, fifty-eight, then he threw the packet in the drawer.

"If it is right this far," remarked Nasrudin to the man next to him, 

"it is probably right all the way."

00561--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-25

Doctor Abrams was called to Mulla Nasrudin's shop where the  Mulla was Iying unconscious. Doctor

Abrams worked on him for a long time and finally revived him.

"How did you happen to drink that stuff, Nasrudin?" he asked the Mulla. "Didn't you see the label on the bottle? It said 'poison'."                  

Nasrudin said, "Yes Doctor, but I didn't believe it."

Doctor Abrams asked, "Why not?"

Nasrudin said, "Because whenever I believe someone, I am 

deceived."

00560--Mulla Nasrudin Stories--24

Mulla Nasrudin sidled up to a guest at one of his daughter's social evenings. He had heard him addressed as doctor, and now he said, diffidently, "Doctor, may I ask a question?"

"Certainly," he said.

"Lately," said Mulla Nasrudin, "I have been having a funny pain right here under the heart..."

The guest interrupted uncomfortably and said, "I am terribly sorry, Mulla, but the truth is I am a Doctor of Philosophy."

"Oh," said Nasrudin, "I'm sorry." He turned away, but then, overcome with curiosity, he turned back. "Just one more question, doctor. Tell me, what kind of disease is philosophy?"

00559--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-23

Mulla Nasrudin and his two friends were talking about their resemblances.

The first friend said, "My face resembles that of Winston Churchill. I have often been mistaken for him."

The second said, "In my case, people think I am President Nixon and ask me for my autograph."

Mulla said, "That's nothing. Well, in my case, I have been mistaken for God Himself."

The first and second asked together, "How?"

Mulla Nasrudin said, "Well, when I was convicted and sent to jail for the fourth time, on seeing me the jailer exclaimed, 'Oh God, you have come again!' "

00558--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-22

Mulla Nasrudin went to his psychiatrist once and said, "Doctor, I wonder if you can split my personality for me?"

"Why? Why would you want to do that?" asked the doctor, surprised.

"Because," said the Mulla, "I am so lonesome."

00557--Mulla Nasrudin Stories-21

Mulla Nasrudin was in love with a woman.

"Look darling," he said to her, "here is a diamond engagement ring 

for you."

"Oh, it is beautiful!" she claimed "But honey, the diamond has a flaw in it."

"You should not notice that," said the Mulla. "Why, you are in love and you know what they say -- 'love is blind'."

"Blind, yes," she said, "but not stone blind."

00556--Mulla Nasruddin Stories-20

A guest had come to Mulla Nasruddin's house.

Mulla Nasruddin was giving him food. 

The guest was saying, "Now it is enough -- I have taken five PURIS, now no more."

Nasruddin said, "Five? You have taken eleven, but who is 

counting?"