GENTLEMEN BOTH
Not all of us have the best manners always about us. The fortunate are they whose reaction is instant; but those also are fortunate who, after the first failure—during the conflict between, say, natural and acquired feelings—can recapture their best, too.
At a certain country house where a shooting party was assembled a picture stood on an easel in a corner of the dining-room. It was a noticeable picture by reason of its beauty and also by reason of a gash in the canvas. Coffee was on the table when one of the guests, looking round the walls, observed it for the first time, and, drawing his host's attention to its excellence, asked who was the painter; and the host, who was an impulsive, hearty fellow, full of money, after supplying the information and corroborating the justice of the criticism, remarked to the whole company, "Now here's a sporting offer. You see that cut across the paint in the middle"—pointing it out as he spoke—"well, I'll give any one a thousand pounds who can guess how it was done."
They all rose and clustered before the easel; for a thousand pounds are worth having a try for, even when one is rich—as most of them were.
"It was done only last week," the host continued, "and it was such a queer business that I don't intend to have it repaired. Now then, all of you, a thousand of the best for the correct answer."
He rubbed his hands and chuckled. It was a sure thing for him, and there would be a lot of fun in the suggestions.
The guests having re-examined the cut with minuteness, one by one, seated themselves again, and pencils and paper were provided so that the various possible solutions might be written down. The real business then began—no sound but pencils writing and the host chuckling.
Now it happened that one of the party, a year or so before, had seen somewhere in Yorkshire a picture with a not dissimilar rent, caused, he had been told, by a panic-stricken bird which had blundered into the room and couldn't get out again. Remembering this, and remembering also that history sometimes repeats itself, he wrote on his piece of paper that, according to his guess, the canvas was torn by a bird which had flown into the room and lost its head.