First and Last by Belloc, Hilaire, 1870-1953

Tonya Allen, Eric Eldred, Charles Franks, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team

FIRST AND LAST

BY

H. BELLOC

CONTENTS

ON WEIGHING ANCHOR

THE REVEILLON

ON CHEESES

THE CAPTAIN OF INDUSTRY

THE INVENTOR

THE VIEWS OF ENGLAND

THE LUNATIC

THE INHERITANCE OF HUMOUR

THE OLD GENTLEMAN'S OPINIONS

ON HISTORICAL EVIDENCE

THE ABSENCE OF THE PAST

ST. PATRICK

THE LOST THINGS

ON THE READING OF HISTORY

THE VICTORY

REALITY

ON THE DECLINE OF THE BOOK

JOSE MARIA DE HEREDIA

NORMANDY AND THE NORMANS

THE OLD THINGS

THE BATTLE OF HASTINGS

THE ROMAN ROADS IN PICARDY

THE REWARD OF LETTERS

THE EYE-OPENERS

THE PUBLIC

ON ENTRIES

COMPANIONS OF TRAVEL

ON THE SOURCES OF RIVERS

ON ERROR

THE GREAT SIGHT

THE DECLINE OF A STATE

ON PAST GREATNESS

MR. THE DUKE: THE MAN OF MALPLAQUET

THE GAME OF CARDS

"KING LEAR"

THE EXCURSION

THE TIDE

ON A GREAT WIND

THE LETTER

THE REGRET

THE END OF THE WORLD

FIRST AND LAST

On Weighing Anchor

Personally I should call it "Getting It up," but I have always seen it in print called "weighing anchor"--and if it is in print one must bow to it. It does weigh.

There are many ways of doing it. The best, like all good things, has gone for ever, and this best way was for a thing called a capstan to have sticking out from it, movable, and fitted into its upper rim, other things called capstan--bars. These, men would push singing a song, while on the top of the capstan sat a man playing the fiddle, or the flute, or some other instrument of music. You and I have seen it in pictures. Our sons will say that they wish they had seen it in pictures. Our sons' sons will say it is all a lie and was never in anything but the pictures, and they will explain it by some myth or other.

Another way is to take two turns of a rope round a donkey-engine, paying in and coiling while the engine clanks. And another way on smaller boats is a sort of jack arrangement by which you give little jerks to a ratchet and wheel, and at last It looses Its hold. Sometimes (in this last way) It will not loose Its hold at all.

Then there is a way of which I proudly boast that it is the only way I know, which is to go forward and haul at the line until It comes--or does not come. If It does not come, you will not be so cowardly or so mean as to miss your tide for such a trifle. You will cut the line and tie a float on and pray Heaven that into whatever place you run, that place will have moorings ready and free.