A football match is sometimes described as a game of two halves; this cliché may be used of Kelinchi’s trail today.  An ingenious beginning, with frequent changes of direction, and then a tour of the Devil’s Punchbowl, with virtually none.  Fortunately the autumn landscape was superb, and the weather kind, with threats of rain unfulfilled.  There is a good variety of trees in this landscape, very attractive in the sunshine.

  The Cunning Linguist once master-minded a catastrophic combination of trails here, employing a suite of junior hares.  Today he told a cock-and-bull story of where the trail started and would go, in all respects the exact opposite of the truth.  But the evidence of one’s own eyes is better in finding a start. This well-used venue (many hash dances have happened at the hotel) is fairly remote for many of you, but we proved to have over two dozen hashers, maybe even 30, including the energetic Bigfoot, who with Miss Zing (did I hear this handle correctly?) [Ed: That’s good but it’s Mee Sing In Action!] had been vexed at appearing as visitors in last week’s account: they are members.  We also had a family, well-stocked with both children and dogs, which was very welcome indeed, just the people we should be attracting.

Atalanta caught us just after 11.30, so she was less late than some weeks; 15 minutes, she said.  The front runners did an excellent job of marking the trail.

I was not a front runner today, delayed by a back-check which Kelinchi spared other runners, so in the latter part of the trail I found only a few people. 

Twinkletoes had hurt herself clambering through a fallen tree; later we found Petal with Master Bates and Fleur d’Or, and eventually Tosser, as usual confident of where to go.  The hare had said confidently 4.3 miles, and indeed by 12.20 most people were back and sampling the beer from the Bongo, Piercy and J. Arthur combining as Biermeister, and rain again threatening us.

  Our clothes reflected a variety of views on the weather, Bigfoot in just shorts and a T-shirt, others wrapped as if for a polar excursion.  In fact the morning was quite warm, unless we were exposed to the wind, and inside the Punchbowl we were fairly sheltered.  Kelinchi had ensured a very enjoyable morning for all of you who made it there.

  Those who began to read during the second World War were expected to enjoy the same books as their parents and indeed grandparents; Lewis Carroll, Kipling, Stevenson, Ballantyne (Treasure Island, Coral Island), A. A. Milne….. Ask “What are jam tarts made of?”, and accept as the only answer “Pepper, mostly”.  I dimly recall reading the adult version of Robinson Crusoe (I knew of no others) aged 6 or 7; I certainly read The Old Curiosity Shop at 9.  Along with this went authors now forgotten: “Baroness” Orczy, Jeffrey Farnol, Percy F Westerman, and one still remembered, Enid Blyton; we were quite undiscriminating.  Still, I don’t recall enjoying Biggles much, or the James Bond character of those days, called Bulldog Drummond.

  Modern children face a different choice; I had absolutely no idea of the tastes of my grand-children when they were still young (they are all adults now).  Publishers are eager to promote new authors, not re-issue classic novels for youngsters.  There was I believe an attempt to re-issue another favourite of my early days, Arthur Ransome and his Swallows and Amazons books.  (Did you know he was close to Trotsky?  I am sure my father, very right-wing in his views, did not know this).

  On On, FRB