Posted by Pam Adams on March 13, 2006 at 18:40:47 from 134.71.192.172 user PamAdams.
In Reply to: Re: water systems - Re: Beckfoot posted by John Nichols on March 11, 2006 at 18:39:13:
The desire to bathe in 'real water' wasn't limited to the S A & D's.
From Stalky & Co.
"The Reverend John went out to bathe off the Pebble Ridge, girt with a fair linen towel whose red fringe signalled from half a mile away.
There lurked on summer afternoons, round the fives-court or the gym, certain watchful outcasts who had exhausted their weekly ration of three baths, and who were too well known to Cory the bathman to outface him by swearing that they hadn’t. These came in like sycophantic pups at walk, and when the Reverend John climbed the Pebble Ridge, more than a dozen of them were at his heels, with never a towel among them. One could only bathe off the Ridge with a House Master, but by custom, a dozen details above a certain age, no matter whence recruited, made a ‘House’ for bathing, if any kindly Master chose so to regard them. Beetle led the low, growing reminder: ‘House! House, sir? We’ve got a House now, Padre.’
‘Let it be law as it is desired,’ boomed the Reverend John. On which word they broke forward, hirpling over the unstable pebbles and stripping as they ran, till, when they touched the sands, they were as naked as God had made them, and as happy as He intended them to be." (The Propagation of Knowledge)
"‘If you say a word about cold tubs and brisk walks,’ drawled M‘Turk, ‘I’ll kill you, Infant. I’ve got a liver, too. ’Member when we used to think it a treat to turn out of our beds on a Sunday morning—thermometer fifty-seven degrees if it was summer—and bathe off the Pebbleridge? Ugh!’ " (Slaves of the Lamp, Part II)
pam