George Callender can swim better than a fish. But when he falls off the pier at Marvis Bay, he is rescued by a beautiful girl (Mary Vaughan) and 'forgets' he can swim to ensure an introduction. The girl offers him lessons and he accepts.
Unfortunately, Arthur Mifflin, an actor in Callender's comedy Fate's Footballs, decides to drum up publicity by staging a boating accident and casts George in the role of hero ...
| George Bernert Callender | a playwright in love with |
| Mary Vaughan | a girl |
| Arthur Mifflin | a leading juvenile |
First published Colliers magazine (US) 28 May 1910.
Also published June 1910 in the Strand magazine (UK).
'... once you had passed the initial zareba of fruit stands ...'
- a zareba is a hedged or palisaded enclosure (for the protection of a camp).
'... one of those kitchens where many cooks prepare, and sometimes spoil, the theatrical broth.'
- an old saying Too many cooks spoil the broth meaning that having an excess of people involved leads to an inferior product.
' "When a man's afraid," shrewdly sings the bard, "a beautiful maid is a cheering sight to see!" '
- W. S. Gilbert (and Sullivan), The Mikado, Act 2.
Roué
- a rake or debauchee, a man who gives himself to earthly pleasures.
'In the forefront gleamed, like the white plumes of Navarre, the light flannel suit of Arthur Mifflin, ...'
- probably a reference to Samuel Rutherford Crockett's book, The White Plumes of Navarre published in 1906.
Alma Mater
- the university, college or school one attended or attends. (Latin, bounteous mother.)
'... singing "Shine on, thou harvest moon", '
- probably alluding to the (1908) song Shine On, Harvest Moon by Jack Norworth and Nora Bayes.
A quid of tobacco
- not a pound's worth but a chunk of chewing tobacco, derived from the word 'cud' (as in chewing-the-cud).
Sheet
- on a yacht, the rope used to regulate tension in the sail.
'Once, in the dear, dead days beyond recall ...'
- from the song Love's Old Sweet Song with music by James Lynam Molloy and words by Clifton Bingham (1884).
Hayling Island
- along the coast in Hampshire.
Bayard
- Chevalier Bayard, a 16th Century French knight, noted for chivalry.
Lancelot
- one of the Knight's of the Round Table.
Happy Hooligan
- a comic strip by Frederick Burr Opper, which ran from 1900 to 1932, featuring a tramp (hobo) whose attempts at good deeds failed disastrously.