Payback Time

In 1997, at the fag-end of the seven-year fag-end that followed Margaret Thatcher's removal from power, the British Conservative Party was roused to its usual fever of moral indignation at the thought of abiding by an international treaty. Unfortunately, the greatest country in the world (the United Kingdom, for those who came in late) did not have American permission to use its independent nuclear deterrent on Beijing; so with much indignant spluttering about rights which the British had somehow neglected to grant the natives over the preceding ninety-eight and a half years, the Queen Gawblesser's very own procurator Ruritanicus had to hand over his little colony, and apparently the poor old thing has never quite got over the shock. It would be uncharitable in the extreme to suggest that Baron Patten of Barnes feels a sneaking envy of his former boss, a political vacuum now ludicrously sucked up by the media as some sort of elder statesman; though certainly in the present state of political rationality there seems little reason why a pair of eyes like cold poached eggs dipped in a weak solution of blackcurrant juice should not ooze as much charisma as any personal advantage of John Major's.

In any case, and doubtless from none but the noblest motives, Baron Patten of Barnes has been bleating about Hong Kong for the past quarter of a century, and the fact that the present pandemic originated among the Heathen Chinee has afforded him an unparalleled opportunity to go full Trumpster and insist on a full and intrusive examination. His Lordship wished to make clear from the outset that his problem was not with China or the Chinese people, but only with the Chinese government, which the Baron apparently believes should be bypassed, or possibly sent a gunboat or so, in order that Britain may attain a more meaningful and fulfilling relationship with the real China. His Lordship dislikes totalitarian régimes, which rely on secrecy and mendacity, quite unlike Her Majesty's Government or the Parliamentary Brexit Party. The dangerous and immoral Communist Party has tried to shut doctors up and does not appear to care about public health or international law, quite unlike Her Majesty's Government or the Parliamentary Brexit Party. The Heathen Chinee even appear to be prejudiced against both autonomous local government and inspections by foreign powers, which are famously among Her Majesty's Government's and the Parliamentary Brexit Party's two very favourite things. Still, his Lordship does not appear to have called out the Chinese government for its persecution of Muslims, so perhaps even the Chinese Communist Party has at least one redeeming feature.

Journal of the Plague Year

continued, by a Gentleman

To-day the Realm hath been bleſsed with the joyous Tidings of a new Heir to our Mother of Democracies, as the Prime Miniſter's favourite Filly as was ſome nine Moons gone, hath been delivered this Morning of his lateſt Baſtard. This Baſtard is diſtinguiſhable from all his other Baſtards by the unique pre-marital Condition of its Expungement, which moral Virtue maketh it immeaſurably ſuperior to the Broods upon Broods of merely extra-marital Baſtards which the Father of the Nation hath heretofore been accuſtomed to ſiring. Provided there is no Neceſsity to court the Sympathies of the Publick with a timely Bereavement, in the Manner of two recent Predeceſsors, the Iſsue being male can look forward to a moſt profitable Career as a Miniſter for Being Related to a Miniſter, after the nobleſt Traditions of adminiſtrative Britiſhneſs. Our dear Leader himſelf is almoſt entirely recovered from his recent Malady, and his Whore is unlikely to expire of the poſt-partum Megrims becauſe the Archbiſhop of Canterbury hath offered up a Prayer requeſting the Contrary: a moſt neceſsary Precaution as the Surgeon in attendance is notoriouſly partial to the Waſhing of Hands and ſundry other effete and diſguſting outlandiſh Affectations.

Lapidary Loophole

We are all well aware, because the more rampant members of the Parliamentary Brexit Party have mentioned it so often, that what is enshrined in British law is enshrined for all time. The ephemeral legal whimsies of Medes, Persians and other lesser breeds are worn to merited oblivion beside the marmoreal immutability of the humblest Westminster statute. This of course explains why the transition period for British independence cannot be extended by so much as a minute; it also explains how such temporary measures as daylight saving and income tax have persisted far beyond their original purpose, and why the nation's present lack of National Service and the death penalty is merely a temporary blip. All this being axiomatic and accepted without question by every true patriot, it will come as no surprise at all that Her Majesty's Government is seeking to change the law. A review of Prevent, the Blairite Muslim-baiting programme for turning inessential workers like teachers and nurses into informers for the hostile environment, is due this summer; Her Majesty's Government, which had to sack its favoured chair for being too gung-ho about not changing a thing, indulged in a four-month sulk before advertising for a successor and is now expressing concern at the possibility of a wasted chance to mark its own homework with due precision and rigour. The great British mind, unlike the mind of your beastly Euro-wog, is not so crude and self-interested as to be concentrated by a tight and looming deadline.

Well Spent

However assiduously it may protect the British taxpayer from the horrors of funding an undeserved standard of living, Her Majesty's Government is always prepared to splash out on the fallen, on the sensible grounds that if you rah-rah loudly enough about sacrifice people will forget who wielded the knife. Accordingly, the Minister for Profitable Healthcare, acting from a deep personal sense of duty, has pledged to pay £60,000 to the families of NHS workers who die from the coronavirus: an amount which, if multiplied by four, would almost qualify as chickenfeed. It remains to be seen whether the money, should it materialise at all, will be taken from cancer patients, battered wives or some other prune-worthy branch of the magic money tree. Still, in terms of British spirit the scheme may well pay for itself. Given that many of the sacrificed workers will also have been swarming migrant hordes, families who dare to apply will undoubtedly find their data being passed to the Home Office for a bit of environmental hostility.

Bad Theology

Text for today: Jonah 1 xi-xvi, 4 x-xi

Seeking to escape his unwanted appointment as a prophet and his unwelcome assignment to warn the city of Nineveh that God is about to obliterate it for unspecified sins, Jonah boards a ship to Tarshish, which is outside the Almighty's presence. Before the ship can escape His jurisdiction, God sends a great storm and those aboard cast lots to find out who is to blame. The lot falls on Jonah, who confesses that he is fleeing the presence of God, and he tells the crew to pick him up and throw him overboard.

Never one to keep things simple when complications can be introduced, God goes about threatening Nineveh by very indirect means. Rather than sending His warning through a resident of the city, let alone by a sign to all concerned, He orders Jonah to travel there; rather than simply spiriting the wayward prophet off the ship or causing him to fall overboard, He punishes the entire ship's crew until they do His dirty work. Reluctant to throw Jonah overboard, the men attempt to row back to land; but this is insufficient to propitiate God, who refuses to let the storm abate until they throw Jonah into the sea. It is not enough for Jonah to repent his disobedience: the sailors, who are not Hebrews and have no covenant with Him, must acknowledge His power and make themselves complicit in His sadistic games, although they still have the wit to throw a paraphrase of "not my will, but Thine" back in the tyrant's face.

In the end God spares Nineveh once all its inhabitants have abased themselves and starved their animals; He justifies Himself to the disgusted Jonah by arguing that the city's hundred and twenty thousand people and their cattle cost Him a certain amount of trouble to create. In this we see one possible explanation for a later and indeed still continuing embarrassment: the unfortunate delay in fulfilling the Saviour's boast about the coming of His kingdom within the lifetime of certain first-century Palestinians (Matthew 24 xxxiv; Mark 13 xxx). Though nobody loves a holocaust more than the Father does, making new toys can sometimes be just a bit too much bother.

Journal of the Plague Year

continued, by a Gentleman

It appeareth that Mr Kamu was not altogether in error when he ſpoke of the Blood being polluted with bodily Particles, for I have heard that a certain Dutchman hath put together an Arrangement of Lenſes, that can magnify and make viſible that which the unaided human Eyeball is too coarſe and crude to detect, in accordance with the Sublimities of the Divine Plan. However, I am ſure it hath not been proven, that the reſpective Conſtitutions of Engliſh and Dutch blood are in any way comparable, eſpecially as regards the Preſence of poiſonous Particles of Naſtineſs and Noiſomeneſs.

Fortunately, Her Majeſty's Government hath convoked a Comiſsion of Prieſts, Aſtrologers and other approved Men of Science, in order to enſure the continuing Pre-eminence of the National Intellect, and hath appointed to it no leſs a Perſonage than my Lord Spooges the Marqueſs of Glanders, whoſe Expertiſe in the Realm of Medicine is unrivalled in its Dominican Diſintereſtedneſs. I once had the Privilege of meeting my Lord Spooges during the great Campaign for Parliamentary Reform, when he gave out many printed Leaflets upon the Neceſsity of ſimplifying the Franchiſe to eliminate ineſsential Elements, the which he propoſed to accompliſh by amalgamating every Conſtituency in the Land into a ſingle Rotten Borough with Electors to be nominated by Miniſters of the Crown, thus enſuring the Democratick Accountability of the Voters. The diſtinguiſhed Perſpective and ſincere Ejaculations of my Lord Spooges will undoubtedly do much to eaſe the Peril of the Commiſsion's Engliſh Concluſions being contaminated by any Hollandiſh Facts.

Hot Air

To the many deplorable aspects of the present pandemic must now be added yet another: the coronavirus has lost its chance at being a source of profit to Sir James Dyson. As an enthusiastic purveyor of Brexit and other noisy toilet articles, Dyson was considered an ideal contractor to produce medical ventilators, but has now been laid off, having spent about £20 million on the project. According to the wealth creator himself, the company will not be seeking to cover its costs at the expense of the British taxpayer, except in a manner too sneaky and underhanded to raise undue objections.

Once the Department for Profitable Healthcare had decided that buying medical equipment from suppliers of medical equipment would constitute an unacceptable ideological deviation, several other companies were also commissioned to produce own-brand ventilators, but none of the new devices has gained approval from the regulator and the Government has found that its requirements are in any case somewhat lower than expected, since fatal diseases tend to be a self-solving problem provided treatment is sufficiently delayed. The only company to produce ventilators to the proper standard is a consortium that adapted proven devices rather than building new ones: an approach that in less glorious times would have been called conservatism.

Not One of Us

Upon an isle of emerald green
And other shades less often seen
Set in a sea of silver hue
(To fishlessness and plastic due),
Dwelt buxom maids and hearty chaps
In plucky fiscal near-collapse.

The Saint arrived with lance and shield
To seek a holy battlefield,
And slay a wyrm, and cleanse a hex,
Rescue a wench and not have sex:
In other words, to claim as rights
The tax-free trade of native Knights.

"How dark his face! how black his hair!
A burden we're too frail to bear!
Thou beastly Turk! how durst approach here?
Now get thee back to Cappadocia!"
And where control once more was got,
The Dragon stayed, and scoffed the lot.

Samuel Grimsnipe

Journal of the Plague Year

continued, by a Gentleman

There are certain Rumours abroad, that the heathen Province or Diſtrict or City or Hamlet or Perſonage of Woo Han in China hath begun to demonſtrate inſidiouſly enigmatick Signs of Recovery from the Peſtilence. Aſsuming the Truth of these Tidings (and I have them from the moſt aſsertive Pamphleteers and reputable Opium-ſellers in Towne), we witneſs once again the Fatal Combination of Byzantiniſm and Booriſhneſs, with which the Oriental hath ever been habituated to proceed in his Dealings with Civiliſation. For all their Bowings, Cow-towings, the ſubmiſsive Smile behind the tortuously-trained Antennae of the villainous Mouſtache and ſuchlike ſpecious Courteſies, the Heathen will never fail to watch for the Chink in the Armour of more advanced and ſtraight-forward Cultures, through which at the opportune Moment a Venomous Stab may be delivered. It was juſt the ſame when they invented Gun-powder and Bureaucrats before we got the Chance. Now they are forcing their Peaſantry back to Rude Health before the World has had any Opportunity of righting the economick Balance, and in two ſhakes of a Parliamentarian's Pizzle they will be ſubjecting our Drug Shipments to Blockade and ſtockpiling Scimitars in every Laundry in the Kingdom. I wonder whether this would be a good Opportunity for me to make my Offer for a Poſition in the Diplomatick Service.

Worthy Tidings

True citizens and loyal subjects will rejoice that the birthday of Her Madge Gawblesser has been commemorated in appropriate fashion, with a senior official from the Ministry for Wogs, Frogs and Huns confirming another Government decision to endanger thousands of non-essential lives. It emerged last month that Britain had self-isolated from four procurement schemes for obtaining medical equipment to help with the pandemic; the jabbering homunculus Michael Gove claimed that it was because of a communications failure. Presumably the idea was meant to be that EU emails are less plucky and buccaneering and so tend to fall by the wayside; or perhaps the Government's staff have been too busy on social media recently. In any case, it now appears that ministers were fully briefed about the schemes, but decided not to participate for fear that any equipment thus obtained would be fatally tainted by foreignness. The stalwart heart of Her Madge Gawblesser will indubitably be gladdened at the thought of little people dying for patriotism.

A Very Greasy Wetback

Since the Gulf of Mexico consists in large part of waters, it is only natural that the Trumpster, whose every whim and utterance is guided by the defecations of his hydrophobic orange head-tribble, should harbour a need to trouble them. Accordingly, the regulation of the oil industry which was introduced by the Islamo-Kenyan occupying forces after the Deepwater Horizon mishap is now to be relaxed still further, so that some friends of the British Museum can demonstrate just how nicely they can manage things provided they have the freedom to mark their own homework. A statement by BP proclaimed that the Gulf has "recovered well" and is therefore fit for work and should stop lounging around while the bottom drops out of the oil market and executive pay stands still for minutes on end.

The Father of Teeth

Text for today: II Canines xliv-lxi

Nevertheless, by the time the Father of Teeth arrived a great pandemic had long ravaged the city, and every street resounded with the brisk axe-hacking of coughs and the ripe-peach bursting of buboes. The dead swelled lazily in the gutters, and the healthy stooped over each corpse in order to breathe deeply of its aroma. Sidling up to one citizen thus occupied, and unleashing one of his less antiseptic grins, the Father of Teeth inquired the reason for this fragrant respiratory ritual.

"Most insolent and malodorous stranger," said the citizen politely, "this act is no ritual indulgence, but a profound and prophylactic duty, incumbent on all in this blighted city who have not been excused on the grounds of personal deceasement."
"Its profundity I can well observe," said the Father of Teeth, "for I see it in your green-faced gasping and hear it in the appreciative rumblings of your no doubt salutarily stimulated digestive tract; but I confess that the prophylactic value of inhaling a corpse's perfume escapes me."
"Our rulers have proclaimed," said the citizen, "that this along with patriotism is the way to gain immunity from infection; the proclamation was made several weeks ago and has been regularly repeated since, so nowadays we expect to see positive results almost before they occur."
"I trust your rulers are not unduly discommoded in the meantime," said the Father of Teeth.
"They have secluded themselves," replied the citizen, "in gardens behind high walls, where they tell one another risqué stories and lament the ingratitude of the populace."
"Far away and long ago," said the Father of Teeth, while the citizen continued his pulmonary precautions, "there was a man who proclaimed that there are plagues and victims, and wherever possible one should not be on the side of the plague."
"That sounds reasonable enough," said the citizen.
"When the plague next arrived," continued the Father of Teeth, "it was the first to register as an invalid. It put itself forth as a victim and bemoaned the antibodies that bullied it, and denounced in the most fulsome language all those who died, because of the deprivation caused by their lack of consideration as hosts."
"We all must do our part," coughed the citizen.
"In the end," said the Father of Teeth, "a statute was passed protecting the rights of certain organisms to wreak due havoc among the populace, provided only that they confined their attentions to non-essential citizens and refrained from inflicting upon the wealthy and powerful any biological indignity that might work to the detriment of their authority, and hence of all things fine and noble."
"Compromise and legal guarantee are the essence of living in a civilised society," said the citizen, whose face had become patriotically mottled in red, white and blue.
"Very possibly," said the Father of Teeth, "but a bloodstream clear of noxious microbes may also help matters on occasion."

The citizen was about to explain that his nation's ideals of patriotism were far more advanced and enlightened than mere foreign superstitions about purity of the blood; but greatly to his surprise he found himself suddenly horizontal and helplessly expiring, with a queue of eager breathers waiting to inhale his purifying vapours. The Father of Teeth, who had more than enough gas of his own, was not among them.

Journal of the Plague Year

continued, by a Gentleman

That voluble and opinionated Phyſician, the Sawbones Maſter Pynche-Mydwyfe, was waxing moſt indignant yester-eve at the Bloater and Blueſtocking Coffee-houſe. Owing to the Crudity of his Diſcourſe much of his Meaning was loſt upon me, but it ſeemeth that Her Majeſty's Government is attempting to utiliſe the Peſtilence as a Means of reſtricting the Liberties and Privileges traditionally accorded to the Engliſh Yeoman and Craftſman, and ſpefifically as an Excuſe towards the Impoſition of a regulated Mode of Dreſs upon all Practitioners of the Aſclepian Art. The Indignation of Maſter Pynche-Mydwife was moſt eſpecially exerciſed upon that Statute which provides, that Surgeons ſhall refrain from wearing Aprons during the Proceſs of Amputation, in order that no Shortage of protective Clothing ſhould afflict the vital and related Induſtries of Barbering and Carpentry. Mr Pynche-Mydwyfe when wielding his Barber's Razor is proudly habituated to an amuſing Apron embroidered in the Likeneſs of a Whore's Undergarments, and maintained that he knew not why he ſhould not ſport the ſame Badge of Britiſhneſs when about his ſecondary Buſineſs of bodily Exciſion and Cautery.

Worthy of Albion

Economically responsible patriots will rejoice that the pandemic has done little to deter Her Majesty's Government's favourite Islamic fundamentalist head-choppers from carrying out their duty to British values. According to the UN, the first quarter of the year has seen more than five hundred people killed in Yemen, where buccaneering Britishness has been arming and training the forces of moderation and respect for royalty during a five-year Saudi-led rampage. In accordance with the usual provisions of British honour, especially in the more exalted echelons of Her Majesty's Government, the most severe month of bombardments in a year and a half was carried out under the rubric of a "unilateral ceasefire."

You Can Be Sure of Shell

Since nobody is forcing them to do better, some of the world's most prominent corporate climate vandals are adding a little gloss to their greenwash. Doubtless spurred by the spirit of buccaneering laissez rien faire in the British Conservative Party, Royal Dutch Shell has set itself a target of carbon neutrality in thirty years' time; though not, of course, by any such crude and primitive method as cutting its fossil fuel production. Rather, it hopes to work with its equally conscientious friends in the airline industry to incentivise renewable consumption, while maintaining a millenarian faith in future cleaning-up technology and offsetting its profiteering by letting other people plant trees. Presumably in the next few decades we shall see the Niger delta bloom forth as a conifer forest, while Shell executives and the British Conservative Party shake their heads in pained wonder at the natives' obstinate refusal to set up house in the affordable trees. Still, in justice to the company it should be noted that the plans are apparently good enough for the Church of England's pensions board; which is really all anyone needs to know.

Freedom Screams Horribly

Periods of crisis, much like the periods of complacency with which they alternate, and indeed the periods of discontent which turn up now and again, are notoriously susceptible to manipulation for the nefarious ends of the ruthless and unscrupulous. Hence, even as Bozza bravely battles the bug for Britain, and nobly postpones the deportation of health workers who give their lives to protect the master race, the ghastly Euro-wogs are plotting to inflict yet another burden on the world's most vulnerable people. According to a new diktat being drafted in the salt-mines of Strasbourg, competition is to be banned and state regulation imposed upon the just rewards of entrepreneurial pluck and gumption. Owing to the viral taint of rampant nationalisation, companies will be unable to eat their competitors, and executives and shareholders will be prevented from fulfilling their wealth-creating function by voting more wealth for themselves. Ghastliest of all, Britain will have no mitigating influence over these rules, because its new-found independence has provoked the beastly Euro-wogs to retaliate by treating it as if it were no longer a member of the European Union.

Journal of the Plague Year

continued, by a Gentleman

Our ungrateful Coloniſts and the malicious Conquered are ready as ever to indulge their vile ſpirit of Rebellion, and have taken to treacherouſly importing themſelves into the very Heart of Empire and then expiring in ſuch prodigious Numbers as to impede the normal Progreſs of Economy. Nay worſe: many go ſo far as to ſet themſelves up as Surgeons, Apothecaries, Nurſes and ſuchlike Profiteers of Peſtilence, and then after ſome perfunctorie Attendance upon the Indigent Ineſsential, proceed to Render up their Souls in the moſt hiſtrionick Manner, to moſt dire moral Effect. Their Demiſes are ſo cunningly contrived as to pre-empt their very Deportations, ſeeking thereby to accomplish a fatal Diſsolution of our Britiſh Phlegm and leave our mighty Britannia a ſhrinking and hapleſs Maiden whoſe chaſte white Thighs and fathomleſs purple Boſom can do naught but wobble in Abject Terror before the maſsed and diſcoloured Todgery of rampant Foreignneſs. Truly it were a Proſpect to make one perſpire with Apprehenſion, even without the daily Annoyance of Litter-bearers tripping over the duſky Corſes of thoſe who have died on the wrong ſide of the Road.

Too Exalted a Role Model

Although Brazil's own Boris Johnson has made heroic efforts to overcome his racial handicap and inject a goodly clyster of British spirit into his nation's adoring populace, it appears he has been less than fortunate in his choice of health minister. Like the People's Haystack, Bolsonaro is facing unpatriotic dissent from mere experts, with his contribution to medical science, impressively labelled vertical isolation, being pithily dismissed as "like a swimming pool with four people in it - and only two of those people are allowed to urinate." Nevertheless, by contrast to our own Secretary of State for Profitable Healthcare, Bolsonaro's health minister has publicly criticised the fertile Johnsonian free-for-all brought on by his leader's posturing, and has even gone so far as to contradict the great man's statement that the virus "appears to be going away." Patriotic Britons will rejoice that no such behaviour can be expected from Johnson's junior representative for Dyson Limited, whose limpetlike attachment to the Führerprinzip has covered him so liberally with British blood and soil.

Bad Theology

Text for today: Joshua 11 i-xx

Hearing of Joshua's genocidal rampage across Canaan, several of the country's remaining kings form an alliance. With God's help, Joshua's army defeats them and kills every inhabitant of every city except for one which makes peace, because God has hardened the hearts of all the others in order to keep them from receiving any mercy.

As theologians, we are not concerned with the likelihood that the historical Hebrew migration into Canaan was a far more gradual and less warlike affair than its Scriptural depiction. We are concerned only with justifying the ways of God as revealed through the word of the Bible. Since God is the foundation of goodness, it is not the historical but the moral aspect of Joshua's various genocides that must be considered, and on this matter the Scriptural source is fortunately quite clear. As in the cases of Pharaoh during the plagues and the sons of Eli, God's responsibility for the slaughter is explicitly stated. He hardens the hearts of the Canaanites specifically in order that the master race need show them no mercy.

Despite some superficial sales-talk about a new covenant, this position was enthusiastically endorsed by Joshua's later namesake, the reactionary fundamentalist and rabid xenophobe who proclaimed that all things are possible for God, but not for human beings. God could redeem us all from the flaws He has given us; but He chooses not to, and orders us to love Him for it.

Cultural Revolution

Despite the best environmental efforts of Her Majesty's Government, foreign students continue to dilute the fiscal Britishness of our comfortably padded seats of learning. A third of universities' income from tuition fees is paid, with bestial Nazi cunning, by foreign students; and now, with insidious Oriental duplicity, the Heathen Chinee are plotting to impose austerity. Whether through their innate hatred of the white man, or an inexplicable foreign dislike of being assaulted by stoical patriots for the crime of subversive respiration, a majority of students are either unsure whether they will enrol or else likely to cancel altogether. Fortunately, thanks to the unique entrepreneurial gumption of the plucky British spirit, the fiends will be foiled and our great nation's culture will live another day to fight the straw men of tomorrow; for the alien mind of the Heathen Chinee is too fatally enwrapped in its own infinite subtleties to penetrate the crass, crude fact that Her Majesty's Government cares as much about education as it does about public health.

Journal of the Plague Year

continued, by a Gentleman

Truly it ſeemeth that the Preſervation of our Democracy can be achieved onlie through the harſheſt Meaſures, for the common People are ſo lacking in Diſcipline and Britiſhneſs of ſpirit, that ſooner than allow them unfettered Liberty, one ſhould place a ſlave-ſhip under the command of the Negroes in the Hold, and truſt them not only to bring it ſafely in to Port, but to ſell themſelves fairly on the open Market and take Charge of their own Caſtigation towards a proper Effort in the Fields.

This Truth manifeſted itſelf moſt plainly to me yeſter-eve, on the Occaſion of my neceſsarie Excurſion to the Bloater & Blueſtocking Coffee-houſe. My Litter proceeded through Street after Street of common People who, far from confining themſelves to the healthy Aſceticiſm of their Hovels, were diſporting and engaging in Buſineſs even to the Extent of exchanging Filthy Lucre and indulging their Carnal Appetites.

My Moral Compaſs was naturally ſtirred at the ſpectacle of theſe unholy Revelries while God's appointed Firſt Lord of the Treaſury ſtill languiſhes and toſses upon his Bed of Agonie, but my Remonſtrances to this effect fell on ſtony Ground, and ſome of the Children were ſo lacking in Deportment as to gather quantities of Horſe-dung for an uncivil Purpoſe.

Upon reaching the Bloater & Blueſtocking I encountered the Miniſter for Indigence & Vagrancie, whoſe Parents are both down with the Peſtilence. With his cuſtomary Compaſsion he had brought them to the Coffee-houſe in hopes that a Poultice of boiling Gin and ſmall Beer might ſtimulate their hideouſly coughing Organiſms. The Miniſter and I had a moſt ſtimulating Diſcuſsion upon the ſubject of moral Degeneration in the Populace, and he ſuggeſted that I put down my Thoughts upon the matter for a brief Article to be printed in the Spectator.

Nobody's Clapping For Crispin

As the bestial forces of German militarism continue to donate their fiendish ventilators, the mainstream idea of a modern Holocaust victim has decided to inject some originality into British punditry by drawing yet another parallel with the 1930s. Crispin Odey, a Brexit profiteer recently graduated to pandemic profiteer, drew criticism from the forces of far-left antisemitism after he and his chums had a bit of a rah-rah about the squillions to be made from gambling, beneath the benignly bleary gaze of some whooping political cowboys, on the various stampedes of a panicky free-market herd. Odey is worth about £800 million, so presumably it was in a soothing spirit that he predicted a global financial crisis on the scale of the Great Depression, which helped place Europe in the power of some well-known friends of business and believers in a flexible labour market. It remains as yet unclear whether this altruistic plea for non-profitable calm will have the effect unquestionably merited by the saintliness of the source.

British Spirit

He took it on his foremost chin;
The virus saw, and charged right in.
The medics gave him goodly care
Like any common squillionaire,
And so the country might not seek
To kick them out before next week;
And though he has been very ill,
He's sitting up and lying still.

Sir Winston de Pfeffel Shakespeare

Death's Purifying Scalpel is One Thing, But Let's Not Go Too Far

Like any crisis, the coronavirus pandemic has brought to the fore many extreme and even atavistic viewpoints, including the pernicious superstition that diseases are best treated by medical personnel rather than with applied Britishness and a bit of laissez-périr rah-rah. That such prejudice can lead to momentous and awful consequences for democracy is apparent in the demand by MPs that foreigners should be allowed to remain in the country provided they succeed in infiltrating the National Health Service. In the traditional spirit of British tolerance, the swarming surgical hordes have already been granted a one-year stay of deportation as long as they continue to help the master race; but even this is not enough for the subversive cross-party group, which includes some opportunistic ex-Deputy Conservatives and one member of the Parliamentary Brexit Party who seems to have strayed into the wrong meeting by mistake. The perversion of British pragmaticism amounts to nothing other than the idea that medical workers, even migrant medical workers, are somehow important, as if they were venture capitalists or members of the scumbag press. It has therefore been met with understandable incomprehension at the Ministry for Wog Control, where the relevant minister has apparently had a timely attack of the vapours.

Journal of the Plague Year

continued, by a Gentleman

It appeareth my aſpirations towards a Government poſition are receiving attention in the highest Echelons, for I am in receipt of a ſigned Communication from the Prime Miniſter himſelf, directing me perſonally to look to my Health and to enſure that all the Servants are thoroughly waſhed with Carbolick before and after uſe. I am inſtructed to remain indoors, doubtleſs in order that further Communications from his Exalted Hand may reach me promptly and in Confidence. He proclaimeth, with that gentlemanly Drift towards the outer reaches of Coherence which conſtitutes ſo much of his Charm and hath devaſtated so many Foes electoral and foreign, that in his Judgement the Spine of the Nation hath been inſufficiently ſtiffened, and calleth upon the Racial Spirit to ſee us through the preſent Criſis now that ſo many medical Perſonnel have been deported for Crimes against Britiſhness.

Carrying out my Orders with a will, I inſtructed the Maids to diſpenſe with the Riding-crop for the time being and uſe a Scrubbing-bruſh inſtead, but it is not clear to me as I ſit here that the ſubſtitution will be a happy one. As a further Precaution I shall denounce to the relevant Authorities all thoſe at the Bloater & Blueſtocking Coffee-houſe who perſiſt in availing themſelves of exceſsively intimate Liberties at table. Mr Pynche-Mydwyfe the Sawbones is a groſs Offender in this regard and hath been known to wilt a Periwig at a ſingle Belch. To ſee ſuch a publick Menace confined to an Inſtitution for the criminally Miaſmatic would be a ſervice which the Crown could hardly fail to reward, and would indubitably gain me the Gratitude of the Electorate ſhould the Nation ſo greatly ſuffer in this Peſtilence as to deſcend into a Democracy.

The Father of Teeth

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It was thus by no means coincidental that after an inordinate length of time the Father of Teeth chewed his way to the surface and emerged in the geometrical centre of a vast pit strewn with startled students. The sky above was blue and bright, the sun was hot and high, and the Father of Teeth glared up at them both in disgust.

"Steady on," said a middle-aged woman in a broad-brimmed hat, who had made her way through the students, and their mats covered in tools and plastic bags and fossilised anatomy, to find out what was causing the hold-up. "You will do your eyes little good," she advised the Father of Teeth, "staring into the sun like that." She glanced down at the aperture from which the Father of Teeth had just emerged in all his chthonic indigestibility, and added, "Especially if you've just come from down there."

Hauling himself from the earth, the Father of Teeth looked about him. The pit, he now saw, was no simple hole but an elaborate excavation on several different levels, which had yielded considerable pickings in fossil fragments and prehistoric plastic. Beyond the pit's edges the landscape was arid and scrubby, like those regions of his scalp from which no head-louse returned.

"The last time I was here," said the Father of Teeth, "or perhaps the time before, this place was considerably more busy."
"This place was once the site of a large settlement," the woman said; "it had an extensive rubbish dump, many of whose contents have survived the ravages of time."
The Father of Teeth picked up a fossil bone, in which globules of plastic were embedded like fossil globules. "You are digging up the past," he said.
"Quite so," agreed the woman. "There is much about the past that is obscure to us, on which we hope to throw some light. When we have shone our light on the great civilisations of the past, we may find illumination for the future of our tribe."
"There is a theory," said the Father of Teeth, "that the sun expels light as the body expels waste, and that the ocular discomforts of a direct gaze are the result, so to speak, of God pissing in your eye."
"Is that why you buried yourself? Reasons of personal hygiene?" The woman was upwind of the Father of Teeth, which doubtless was what enabled her to maintain a straight face until he unleashed his grin.

Isolation Undermined

In yet another cunning attempt to further their numerous sinister agendas, the beastly Euro-wogs have called for, of all things, a global ceasefire. Such a man-made catastrophe would, of course, have a disproportionate impact on Britain's ally, the World Cop by the grace of God, whose military might is such that it has lain all a-tremble every night for sixty years in fear of being conquered by Cuba. A Euro-wog with a funny name implied that the Heathen Chinee should be permitted to trade with the evil empire of the Caribbean, and that the USA should call a moratorium on its democratisation by starvation of Iran and Venezuela. Essentially, of course, this amounts to nothing less than an insidiously subtle variant of that fiendish tendency towards ever closer union between nations which God, Nature and the Recrudescent Imperium of Westminster, Gibraltar and the Falkland Islands have put asunder.

Creeping Dictatorship

Although expecting the market to preserve their natural habitats would be sinful and blasphemous beyond compare and reason, there is every possibility, now that they are dying out, that insects might be bred as food for human beings, This expedient was suggested by a Belgian ecologist some years ago, leading to encouraging speculation about the prospects of at least one natural pest; but only now are the beastly Euro-wogs preparing to bureaucratise the matter with their fiendishly-woven mosquito nets of strangulating red tape. No response has yet been forthcoming from the heartlands of true Britishness, but there will certainly be protests from the country sports lobby. They may (possibly) not yet be hunting insects on horseback with dogs; but where is the pleasure in swatting, or even pulling wings off, when eating the victim has been pronounced legitimate by Brussels?

Journal of the Plague Year

continued, by a Gentleman

While out to-day at the Taylor's having my ſecond-beſt Cummerbund re-guſsetted, I heard from a moſt reliable Seamſtreſs, that the very Helmsman of the ſhip of State hath fallen victim to the General Tribulation. The Prime Minſter himſelf is ſtruck down by the Peſtilence, and hath diſpatched an Array of fops and ſycophants in his place to deliver the daily Announcements, which retain a comforting Unanimitie in blaming the Alchemiſts and Apothecaries for changing the Science, and in demanding that the People unite to ſave our Democracy from the Dictatorſhip of Aſclapius.

This is what comes of an exceſs Flexibility in the diſpenſing of publick Offices. Mr Wyde-Wyndpype at the Bloater and Blueſtocking Coffee-houſe, who in his Cups tends towards the Hiſtoriographical, doth aſsure me that all was very different in that Golden Age before the Power and Luxuriance of Empire corrupted the Britiſh Spirit and ſoftened the ſinews of the Yeomanrie. In thoſe times the Serfs knew their place, and Engliſh Juſtice being enforced by more forthright Methods than our puny ſentimental Drawings and Quarterings, was by no means the meek and rotten Friend of Criminality which it is today. And a Gentleman of good Family could with the greateſt of Eaſe gain Employment ſuited to the Dignitie of his Name, and might without ſtooping to mere Competence command a veritable Army of Expendables in honourable Battle againſt the Beastlie Foreign.

Mr Wyde-Wyndpype is of the Opinion, that the Blacke Death was the Beginning of the End, as it led to a ſhortage of Labour and hence to a lack of motivating ſtarvation among the Peaſants. Given today's exorbitant Price for a ſimple re-guſsetting of a ſecond-beſt Cummerbund, all ſane men muſt pray God our preſent Trouble ſhall have no ſimilar Conſequence.

Wings on Welfare

Never mind those uppity NHS workers who are too busy saving inessential lives to buy their own protective equipment; never mind, if you please, those infected expendables who lack the British pluck and gumption to go on breathing until Dyson can re-purpose its old hand-driers as ventilators; the pandemic's real victims are, as ever, the wealth creators who have responded, as ever, by squealing for a bung from the taxpayer. In particularly parlous straits are the airlines, which fought to base their targets under the Paris climate agreement on emissions levels from 2019-20, only to find that this year's emissions are likely to fall somewhat below the expected shareholder-friendly stage of ecocide. As ever, society's most vulnerable citizens have been targeted by tree-hugging do-gooders and Euro-wogs with funny names, who seem to think the inevitable bailout should have conditions attached, as though the people responsible for jetting the one-per-centers upon their vital business were somehow morally equivalent to benefits claimants.