Maidenhead

Now, where would you like to go? He asked.

What part of the river do you like? How about Maidenhead? Oh, any part.

Don't ask me.

Anything you suggest is sure to be right.

You know far more about these things than I do.

But Maidenhead, isn't it just a little commonplace, a little noisy and crowded even now? By Jove, yes, you're quite right.

Madame Frabelle's perfectly right, Edith, you know.

Well, what about Shepperton? Shepperton.

What makes Manchester unique is its cultural identity, and the cultural evidence of that through the Shed and all the festivals and so on is what makes Manchester unique.

And Leeds are the same, and then towns are the same, whether it's Maidenhead or Luton or whatever.

Those towns... should be drawing out their cultural identity and then pushing that into their conversations with developers.

But there are

But even when the element of human nature has been fully allowed for, it remains a question whether the type or mind that a generation or two of free libraries will evolve is or is not the one that the world most desiderates and whether the spare reading and consequent fertile thinking necessitated by the old or gas-lamp style is not productive of sounder results the cloyed and congested mind resulting from the free run of these grocer's shops to omnivorous appetites and all young readers are omnivorous bids fair to produce a race of literary resurrection men result from which we may well pray to be spared of all forms of lettered effusiveness that which exploits the original work of others and professes to supply us with right opinions there an end is the least wanted and whether he take to literary expression by pen or only wag the tongue of him the grossest boy of letters is sure to prove a prodigious ball the free library if it be fulfilling the programme of its advocates is breeding such as he by scores but after all there is balm in gilead and much joy and consolation may be drawn from the sorrowful official reports by which it would appear that the patrons of these libraries are confining their reading with a charming unanimity exclusively to novels and indeed they cannot do better there is no more blessed thing on earth than a good novel not the least merit of which is that it induces a state of passive unconscious enjoyment and never frenzies the reader to go out and put the world right next to fairy tales the original world fiction our modern novels may be ranked as our most precious possessions and so it has come to pass that i shall now cheerfully pay my five shillings or ten shillings or whatever it may shortly be in the pound towards the free library Convinced at last that the money is not wasted in training exponents of the subjectivity of this writer and the objectivity of that Nor in developing fresh imitators of dead discredited styles But is righteously devoted to the support of wholesome honest unpretending novel reading End of cheap knowledge

Section 6 of Pagan Papers through shady throckmorton street and about the vale of cheapside the restless mercury is flitting with furtive eye and voice a little hoarse from bidding in the market further west down classic piccadilly moves the young apollo the lord of the unerring satin bow and nothing meaner than a frock-coat shall in these latter years float round his perfect limbs but remote in other haunts than these the rural pan is hiding and piping the low sweet strain that reaches only the ears of a chosen few and now that the year wearily turns and stretches herself before the perfect waking the god emboldened begins to blow a clearer note when the waking comes at last and summer is abroad these deities will abroad too each as his several attributes move him who is this that flieth up the reaches of the thames in steam-launch hired for the day mercury is out some dozen or fifteen strong the flower gemmed banks crumble and slide down under the wash of his rampant screw his wake is marked by a line of lobster claws gold-necked bottles and fragments of veal-pie resplendent and blazer he may even be seen to embrace the slim-waisted nymph haunter of green room shades in the full gaze of the shocked and scandalized sun apollo meantime reposeth passively beautiful on the lawn of the guards club at maidenhead here o apollo our haunts meet for thee a deity subjectively inclined he is neither objective nor it must be said for him at all objectionable like them of mercury meanwhile nor launches nor lawns tempt him that pursueth the rural pan in the hushed recesses of hurly backwater where the canoe may be paddled almost under the tumbling comb of the weir he is to be looked for there the god pipes with freest abandonment or under the great shadow of streetly hill annihilating all that's made to a green thought in a green shade or better yet pushing an explorer's prow up the remote untravelled thames till dorchester's stately roof broods over the quiet fields in solitudes such as these pan sits and dabbles and all the air is full of the music of his piping southwards again on the pleasant surrey downs there is shouting and jostling dust that is drouthy and language that is sultry thither comes the young apollo calmly confident as ever and he meeteth certain mercuries of the baser sort who do him obeisance call him captain and lord and then proceed to skin him from head to foot as thoroughly as the god himself laid marsyas in days of yore at a certain spring meeting in phrygia a good instance of time's revenges and yet apollo returns to town and swears he has had a grand day he does so every year out of hearing of all the clamour the rural pan may be found stretched on ranmore common loitering under abringer pines or prone by the secluded stream of the sinuous mole abounding in friendly greetings for his foster-brothers the dab-chick and water-rat for a holiday mercury loveth the pullman express and a short hour with a society paper anon brown boots on the pier and the pleasant combination of metropole and monopole apollo for his part will urge the horses of the sun and if he leaveth the society weekly to mercury yet he loveth well the magazine from which omphalos or hub of the universe he will direct his shining team even to the far hesperides of richmond or of windsor both iron road and level highway are shunned by the rural pan who chooses rather to foot it along the sheep track on the limitless downs or the thort leading footpath through copse and spinney not without pleasant

fellowship with feather and fur

nor does it follow from all this that the god is unsocial albeit shy of the company of his more showy brother deities he loveth the more unpretentious human kind especially them that are adscripti addicted to the kindly soil and to the working thereof perfect in no way only simple cheery sinners for he is only half a god after all and the red earth in him is strong when the pelting storm drives the wayfarers to the sheltering inn among the little group on bench and settle pan has been known to appear at times in homely guise of hedger and ditcher or weather-beaten shepherd from the downs strange lore and quaint fancy he will then impart in the musical wessex or mercian he has learned to speak so naturally though it may not be till many a mile away that you begin to suspect that you have unwittingly talked with him who chased the flying shrinks in argadie and turned the tide of fight at marathon yes to-day the iron horse has searched the country through east and west north and south bringing with it commercialism whose god is jerry and who studs the hills with stucco and garrets the streams with the girder bringing too into every nook and corner fashion and chatter the tailor-made gown and the eyeglass Happily, a great part is still spared.

Good spirits indeed.

But a quick thing, we're going to talk through a demolition of Maidenhead, let's call it that.

We're going to talk through the victory over Folkestone, two wins to talk about on the podcast.

Who would have thought that? We're going to go through some of the new faces, some of the outgoing faces, and there'll be old faces talking you through it the whole way.

speaking of old faces Simon what was your take on tonight's game let's start with Maidenhead so that's Maidenhead 0 Torquay United 4 all those goals coming in the second half what was your take of the game

You can't really complain when you've just watched the 4-0.

Obviously, it was heavily influenced by the two red cards for Maidenhead, both of which I think were fair.

The first one was a very rash challenge by the lad Raggett, one of our new players, Roberts.