Ebenezer Scrooge with Marley’s ghost – an illustration from A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, my first encounter with a Ghost of Christmas Past
That crusty old barrister Horace Rumpole once remarked how he had “reached the age when he only ever read books that he had read before”. My Grandfather Bill Chandler also reached that age, but earlier than Rumpole. Bill was a great reader, but from about the age of forty onwards, he read only the works of Charles Dickens, Victor Hugo, Alexander Dumas, Shakespeare and Chaucer, He never tired of them and had read them so often he almost knew them by heart. I once met a dear old lady who had been a “monitor” (trainee teacher) at Mt Lawley State School in the late 1930s, when Grandfather Bill was Headmaster there. “Amongst ourselves,” she told me, “The staff always referred to Mr. Chandler as ‘Old Chaucer’ because of his tendency to quote long passages from Chaucer to us at every opportunity”.
For many years now, I have also chosen to be mostly a re-reader of favourite books. These even include books I first read as a boy, for example the William books by Richmal Crompton, the Sherlock Homes stories and even an occasional Biggles adventure, the latter read for amusement not literary pleasure. Arthur Mailey’s 10 for 66 and All That is still, in my opinion, one of the finest cricket books ever written, but is also a humorous classic in its own right. I must have read it nine times over the years. I also read and re-read the short stories of Lawson and O. Henry and, like Grandfather Bill and his beloved classics, I never tire of them.
However, I admit to the pleasure of occasionally discovering a new book or author. This is usually the result either of a chance selection in the library, or a gift. A couple of years ago my daughter gave me a copy of A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles, a beautifully-written and endearing book. I have already re-read it once and will do so again. A lucky dip in the Melville library introduced me to the Chet and Bernie mystery thrillers by Spencer Quinn – I suppose many people would regard these as lightweight, but how could you disdain a book that brings a smile to the lips on nearly every page. Chet and Bernie have also been transferred directly from the category of “new discovery” to that of ‘re-reading favourite”.
Nor am I ever without a favourite book when I am in the car, in this case an audio book, preferably one by PG Wodehouse read by Jonathan Cecil. His rendition of the voices of characters like Gussy Fink-Nottle, Jeeves and Bertie Wooster’s Aunt Agatha are wonderfully well-done, and Wodehouse’s humour remains always fresh.
Christmas dinners
Speaking of re-reading, and because Christmas is just around the corner, I am reminded that I recently re-read the Christmas story in David Carnegie’s Spinifex and Sand. Carnegie was an English aristocrat who came to Australia in the 1890s to make his fortune on the Western Australian goldfields, then later undertook several epic (and near-fatal) journeys into unexplored regions, including an astonishing expedition from Coolgardie to Hall’s Creek by camel. This crossed some of the harshest landscapes in the world – thousands of km of waterless spinifex plains and sand dunes. His account of his adventures is well-written, even humorous in places, historically fascinating, and completely absorbing.
There are two contrasting images of Carnegie in his book that I particularly like:
The Hon David Carnegie before leaving England for the WA goldfields
David Carnegie doing a perish on one of his inland explorations, way east of Kalgoorlie
Carnegie’s description of a Christmas he spent in the bush near Coolgardie in 1892 and of the Christmas dinner they shared that year is especially memorable. He and his mates were working a claim, and were doing it tough, having almost run out of food, and being dependent for water on a small and muddy soak by a granite outcrop. They had built a small bough shed in which two of them sheltered from the sun while the third rode to Southern Cross for stores, a return journey of several days. “We did our best” Carnegie writes, “to spend a Happy Christmas”, but:
…somehow the climate and surroundings seemed singularly inappropriate; dust could not be transformed into snow, nor heat into frost, any more than we could turn dried apples into roast-beef and plum pudding. Excellent food as dried fruit is, yet it is apt to become monotonous when it must do duty for breakfast, dinner and tea.
For the benefit of those stricken with poverty, he then provides the recipe for dried apples:
Take a handful, chew slightly, swallow, fill up with warm water, and wait. Before long, a feeling both grateful and comforting, as of having dined not wisely but too well, will steal over you. Repeat the dose for dinner and tea.
I have never had to spend Christmas doing a perish in the bush, or had to subsist on dried fruit. On the contrary, my memory goes back to splendid Christmas dinners, starting with the traditional lunchtime roast with plum pudding when I was a boy in the 1940s, then to the innovative “variations on a theme” introduced by the Everloving in our early married days, right up to the riotous and joyous lunches on our back patio, with children, grandchildren and dogs, that are the norm these days. At these shindigs, everybody brings something to the table, there is no coordination, and the food ranges from chicken curry to sausage rolls, to salads, curried egg sandwiches, drumsticks, glazed ham, freshly baked bread rolls, fruit salad and chocolates. None of it survives the onslaught of the younger generations. I tend to eat sparingly on these occasions but have a wine bottle open by mid-morning.
Ghosts of Christmases past
Christmas dinner has not always gone smoothly. The ghosts of two dinners in particular still haunt me. These occurred when we were living down in the karri forest at Pemberton. I was the district forester at the time, and my jurisdiction extended to the Northcliffe area where we had a sub-district office, an Assistant Forester and a crew of forest workmen. I used to visit frequently, and we shared many adventures. One member of the Northcliffe gang was also a farmer, and when I called on him one Saturday I was greeted in the farmyard by an aggressive and honking gaggle of geese. “I don’t suppose you could fatten-up one for me for Christmas?” I asked. He said he would, and a price was agreed.
Destined for Christmas dinner.
A few days before Christmas, I picked up the goose, by now dispatched, plucked, cleaned, dressed and ready for the baking dish. It had been a large bird when it had been alive. Although now dead I was still surprised by its weight and heft; it occupied the passenger seat in my car to the extent that I was almost moved to affix its seatbelt. As I drove home, I reflected on the old phrase “his goose was cooked” and hoped this was not prophetic.
Then my mind wandered to a marvellous scene from another of my favourite books, re-read many times, All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque. It is a heartbreaking World War 1 story, told from the perspective of a young frontline German infantry soldier. The scene I recalled occurred one day when the narrator Paul (still not much more than a schoolboy), and his mentor the old “Front-hog” Kat, are on their way back out of the forward trenches, having only just survived a terrible bombardment and an attack. They spy some geese in the yard of an officers’ billet, and exchange glances. Later they enter the yard stealthily at night, and (with difficulty) extract a goose. Then:
…at full speed I seize it again, and with a swing toss it over the wall and clamber up … Quickly I let myself drop. Ten paces away stands Kat with the goose under his arm. As soon as he sees me, we run.
At last, we can take a breather. The goose is dead, Kat saw that in a moment. We intend to roast it at once so that nobody will be wiser. I fetch a dixie and wood from the hut and we crawl into a small, deserted lean-to which we use for such purposes. The single window space is heavily curtained. There is a sort of hearth, an iron plate set on some bricks. We kindle a fire.
Kat plucks and cleans the goose. We put the feathers carefully to one side. We intend to make two cushions out of them with the inscription: “Sleep soft under shell fire.” The sound of the gunfire from the front penetrates into our refuge. The glow of the fire lights up our faces, shadows dance on the wall. Sometimes a heavy crash and the lean-to shivers. Aeroplane bombs. Once we hear a stifled cry. A hut must have been hit … the tack-tack of machine- guns break out.
We sit opposite one another, Kat and I, two soldiers in shabby coats, cooking a goose in the middle of the night. We don’t talk much, but I believe we have a more complete communion with one another than even lovers have ….
… It takes a long time to roast a goose, even when it is young and fat. So we take turns. One bastes it while the other lies down and sleeps. A grand smell gradually fills the hut. [Eventually] Kat stands before me, his gigantic, stooping shadow falls upon me like home. He speaks gently, he smiles and goes back to the fire.
Then he says: “It’s done.”,
I stir myself. In the middle of the room shines the brown goose. We take out our collapsible forks and pocket-knives and each cuts off a leg. With it we have army bread dipped in gravy. We eat slowly and with gusto. “How does it taste, Kat?” “Good. And yours?” “Good”.
Looking back, I can see now that there was one line in there of which I should have taken more notice: It takes a long time to roast a goose, even when it is young ….
Ellen and I had roasted many fowls in our time, including domestic and wild duck; we helped roast a turkey (at Thanksgiving when we lived in America) and once in the Northern Territory I ate bush turkey, cooked Maori-style in a stone-lined hole in the ground … although I have to say I find none of them as tasty as the good old-fashioned Australian chook. But this would be the first time we tried our hands at goose – and not just a goose, but one that was a giant of the species.
In short, we seriously underestimated how long it takes to cook one’s goose. Immediately after an early breakfast on Christmas Day I had the fire going in the slow-combustion stove and not long afterwards the goose went in. The usual accompaniments were prepared and cooked: roast potatoes, parsnip, onion, carrots, green peas and a ‘boat’ of gravy, to be followed by an apple pie and cream, all to be consumed at the festive table, with a nice glass of something. There were bottles of cider, paper hats, crackers and blow ticklers. I think we might even have had guests for lunch that Christmas – I seem to remember it was a significant occasion all round.
At the appointed hour, the goose was removed from the oven and placed on the carving dish. It was massive and looked wonderful. I think I might have drooled slightly as I put an edge on the carving knife with my butcher’s steel.
Talk about disappointment!
The bird was cooked only marginally on the outside and was still raw within. It was inedible. I found out later that a goose of its size (and age - I suspect this was a fairly elderly animal, no disrespect to my mate who supplied it) needed a good 6-7 hours of slow cooking in the oven, and this is what it eventually received. Luckily there was also a cold ham in the fridge that day, and this allowed us to enjoy a festive lunch, albeit sans goose. And there were benefits: goose for dinner that night and for lunches and dinners for about the next week.
We have never eaten goose again.
The Fire at Rodney’s Farm
My other haunting ghost was a Christmas dinner in Pemberton days comprising a tin of bully beef eaten while sitting on a log.
Being Christmas, it was mid-summer, and we were in the middle of a hot spell – good bushfire weather. Already by early morning on Christmas Day, there was a dry easterly buffeting the redgums in the bush over the road Nevertheless, our day had started well, with all the normal preparations and anticipation, the house echoing to the sounds of happy children and redolent with the aroma of good cooking. The pièce de résistance that year was a leg of pork, and when it emerged from the oven it was cooked to perfection.
But just as we sat down and I had the carving knife poised over the crackling, the phone rang. It was the Duty Officer, and he advised that he had received a report of a smoke from the lookout towers. There was a fire on Rodney’s farm [I have changed the name to protect the innocent], which adjoined State forest. I was the rostered Stand-by officer for the day, so had no option but to get out there and investigate. Having arranged for the Duty Officer to round up a crew and send them on the way as well, I bade the family and my Christmas dinner a sad farewell.
It turned out to be not much. The farmer had been burning heaps, had not mopped them up, and when the easterly stirred it up, the fire had got away, burning through some rough, greenish kikuyu pasture and just into State forest where it was trickling about in a recent burn. The forestry crew had it under control very quickly. I stayed long enough to be confident that all was well, shared a billy of tea and some bully beef and a cracker with the boys, and had a little chat with farmer Rodney. This concluded with a shake of the hands and the mutual expression “Happy Christmas!” before I left them, confident that they would put the fire to bed.
I was home by late afternoon. There I discovered that Christmas lunch had long been concluded, the washing up done and the dishes put away. But there was a bottle of Swan Lager in the fridge, and the promise of some pretty good left-overs were in the offing …
As I mused over the first of two large, cold beers, another memory came to me: Henry Lawson’s poem The Fire at Ross’s Farm. I could not but remark on its relevance to the day now drawing to a close.
Lawson’s The Fire at Ross’s Farm started life as a short story and was later converted by Lawson into his famous poem.
Australians of my generation all know this poem. It was a favourite of 1940s and 1950s schoolteachers, appeared in all the poetry anthologies and school papers of the time, and was learned by heart and recited with one voice by 50 kids in every Grade 5 class in the land. It is a classic of Australian bush poetry, with a Montague-Capulet romance, a bitter feud between a squatter and a selector, galloping horses, tough bushmen and, of course, a bushfire. Also, it's Christmas.
I still recall:
… one Christmas time, when months of drought
Had parched the western creeks
The bushfires started in the north
And travelled south for weeks
At night along the riverside
The scene was grand and strange
The hill fires looked like lighted streets
Of cities in the range.
The cattle tracks between the trees
Were like long dusky aislesAnd on a sudden breeze the fire
Would sweep along for miles
Like sounds of distant musketry
It crackled through the breaks
And o’er the flat of silver grass
It hissed like angry snakes.
It leapt across the flowing streams
And raced the pastures broad
It climbed the trees and lit the boughs
And through the scrubs it roared…
Things go from bad to worse, and the old selector Ross looks like losing everything he has broken his back working for, despite the heroic assistance of young Robert Black, son of the squatter. Robert loves Ross’s daughter Jenny, and she loves him, a situation that is anathema to Robert’s father, who disowns Robert as a consequence. But just as all seems lost, there is the sound of horses’ hooves and through the smoke old man Black with his stockmen gallop in:
Down on the ground the stockmen jumped
And bared each brawny arm
They tore green branches from the trees
And fought for Ross’s farm
And when before the gallant band
The beaten flames gave way
Two grimy hands in friendship joined –And it was Christmas Day.
OK, it’s Lawson at his most sentimental, but we loved it. Not only did I remember it on the day of the fire at Rodney’s farm, I remember it to this day.
Learning poems by rote (especially bush poetry) does not cut the mustard with modern educationists, but for those of us who learnt them, and remember them 50 years later, the poems have a wonderful way of highlighting an experience or reinforcing an emotion. I still recall the occasion back in the early 1970s I was driving home from a meeting somewhere, late at night, along with my boss Steve Quain. It was windy, and there was a full moon, seen fitfully through the karri trees and scudding clouds. Steve was a rough old bushy (on the surface) but had been well-educated, old-school. Suddenly he broke the silence with an instantly-remembered quotation, perfectly apt, in his rough old bushy voice:
..the wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty trees.
The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas.
The road was a ribbon of moonlight …
I had no trouble completing the verse.
Christmas in Australia being at the height of summer, it is nearly always baking hot. Forestry officers were accustomed to spending Christmas Day on tenterhooks waiting for a call-out, or actually in the bush firefighting. But every few years we used to experience a welcome phenomenon known to us all as ‘A Foresters’ Christmas’. This involved a cool change, the passage of a cold front across the south-west, and a heavy downpour on Christmas Eve, saturating the bush. To us, this was the cream on the Christmas pudding of life, always ensuring relaxation, or at least freedom from anxiety and a time to catch the breath and enjoy the family.
I have been retired from active service for many years now, but around about December 20th every year I still put in a request to The Gods for a ‘Forester’s Christmas’. Had one arrived and had he been there at the time, my Grandfather Bill would have described it as a consummation devoutly to be wished, quoting (as he was wont to do) from one of his favourite passages in Shakespeare.
And had I been there, listening to the rain drumming down on the roof, and contemplating a peaceful Christmas dinner on the morrow, I would have agreed.
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