The central difficulty in carving, however, is found not so much in the actual chipping as in the tactful distribution of choice parts. This matter is complicated by the fact that unselfish people will lie about their preferences, polite people will refuse to disclose them, and critical people expect you to remember them. Even the expert carver, therefore, looks with favor on those convenient meats that come naturally in individual units—croquettes, cutlets, chops, sausages; here the only difficulty is the choice between brown and not so brown, large and small. There is only the mathematical matter of making the food go around, and the man with the vaguest sense of proportion can count chops and divide by the number of guests.
But when the company is large, and the platter of steak just adequate, there really is cause for anxiety. Some carvers, under such circumstances, begin cautiously, serving small helpings at first until they are sure they are safe, and then becoming gradually more lavish. Others begin recklessly, and have to retrench. A group of college students once made a study of this matter with data and statistics that would have adorned a doctor's degree. The object was to locate the seat at any table of fourteen where one could count on the most even diet, the golden mean between feast and famine, no matter which member of the faculty chanced to carve. There were many variables to be considered: some members of the faculty habitually carved with giant portions at first, and then dwindled suddenly; others varied from day to day, profiting at one meal by what they learned at the last. A few were expert dividers by fourteen. The conclusion was reached after weeks of minute toil. Like all great investigators, these students were prepared to warrant their findings for all time. The best seat at a table of fourteen—the one where you can count on the least fluctuation and the largest security—in short, Whitman's Divine Average—is the fifth seat from the professor, left. Things in that position run, barring accidents, quite well. If caution was the slogan at the outset, the plentiful supply on the platter has by that time begun to tell upon the mind of the carver, and things are looking up. If the first helpings were extravagant, there has still not been quite time to feel the real pinch of want. Fifth seat from the professor, left.
Of course, fourteen is too large a number to divide by. When it comes to long division, brain-fag is bound to set in. Since those days, I am told, food in that college is sent in ready apportioned in advance.
We should miss something in our homes, however, if the art of carving should decline. There is a certain symbolic grace in the fatherly act of hewing away at a large roast, even if a man does not do it so very well. It is true that a great many pleasant gentlemen do not feel quite at home when dealing with a meat; they do not feel quite at their best. They carve tentatively, parcelling it out at random. Until they come to their own serving, they are vague. At that point, however, the most helpless amateur takes on cheer. Watch him as he settles himself more comfortably, draws up the platter at a better angle, and selects the fragments of his choice. It is here that he does his best carving, not consciously, not at all selfishly, but because he now feels sure. He has something to go by. He knows what he wants.
After all, the task of carving at table is not an infallible test of man. Some of the most uncertain carvers in the world are great and good men, standing high in their professions and revered by a family who must nevertheless shiver for the fate of the table-linen when the sirloin steak comes on. But the fact remains that the man who can carve equitably, neatly, and with discrimination has nearly always a balanced brain and a reliable self-command. In an army test he would stand high. He is your genuine “officer material.” And he is very scarce.
THE FEELING OF IRRITATION
The feeling of irritation in its earliest form once overtook a little girl whose mother had enforced a wholesome bit of discipline. In a great state of wrath the little girl went to her room, got out a large sheet of paper, and ruled it heavily down the middle. Then she headed one column “People I Like,” and crowded that half of the sheet with the names of all her acquaintances. The other half of the page she headed “People I Don't Like,” and in that column listed one word only—“Mama.” This done, she locked the grim document in her safe-deposit box, and hid the key.
That glowering deed was the very ritual of irritation. The feeling of irritation is not merely one of heat; it is a tall wave of violent dislike that goes mounting up our blood. When we have it, it feels permanent. Our friend is not what we thought he was—our family is not what it should be—our job is a failure—we have placed our affections in the wrong quarter. When young politicians have this feeling, they bolt the ticket; when young employees have it, they resign. The first time when young married people have it, they think that love is dead. If they have too much wealth and leisure, they fly apart and eventually get a decree. But in households where the budget does not cover alimony, they commonly stay together and see for themselves how the wave of wrath goes down. The material inconveniences of resignations, abscondings, law-suits, and the like have been a great safeguard in many a career. Nothing in Barrie's plays is more subtle than the perfect moment when the young couple decide to postpone separation until the laundry comes home.
It is not necessary to be a “temperamental” person or a fire-eater of any sort in order to know how it feels to be irritated—and irritating. The gentlest folk are capable of both sensations. Any one who has seen a lovely lady deliberately stir up strife in the bosom of a genial story-teller, by correcting his facts for him and exposing his fictions, will remember the tones of restrained choler with which the merry tale progressed. Who has not remarked to a kind relative, “Well, if you know so much about it, why don't you tell it yourself?”