A Children's Party on Boxing Day

Priorsford by O Douglas   

(aka Anna Buchan)

 published 1932

[excerpt] [A Boxing Day party, aimed primarily at children]

Mirren Strang's party began on the doorstep, where to the children's delight, the hanging lamp had become a presentiment of the Man in the Moon. When the front door opened all was gaiety: a log fire burned in the black and white hall: the big blue jars on the oak chest were filled with what Alison called 'magic lanterns,' two handsome cats, Crian and Kitty by name, boasted scarlet bows.

The tea-table, glittering with icicles, might have come out of the Snow Queen's palace: snowballs lay at each plate: an enormous iced cake was guarded by scarlet-clad soldiers: the children ate and stared, stared and ate, bereft of speech. The hostess in a bright red dress seemed everywhere at the same moment...

After tea they played such games as: Oranges and Lemons, Have you any Bread and Wine?, Musical Chairs…

Jean looked at the absorbed face of her hostess as she helped Peter to explode a firework, described as a 'parlour bomb,' and laughed. 'I don't think she'd call it a trouble,' she said. 'At this moment Mirren's about Peter's age, and enjoying everything as much as he is. . . . It's such a pretty party.'

 

comments: Posts earlier this year explain how I ended up reading all available O Douglas books, torn between annoyance and admiration. As tosh comfort reads (not necessarily a criticism around here) they are very high on the list.

Priorsford honestly shows signs of running out of steam, but still has its moments, such as the children’s Christmas party here. Mirren Strang is something of a Mary-Sue character – a popular novelist whom literary critics might disdain, but, plainly, a very good party hostess.

And there are some excellent moments here: my favourite line (possibly in the whole Douglas oeuvre) comes from a young woman called Rosalind:

'And the house is simply full of Old Masters.'

'How nice,' said Rosalind mechanically, then she added: 'No, I don't think really it would be a bit nice. Old Masters are better in public galleries: you can keep away from them there.'

And there is an early, and neat, description of what we might nowadays call ‘a frenemy’:

“When I’m away from Betty I like the thought of her, but I haven't been with her five minutes before she says something that makes me absolutely loathe her"

There is amateur dramatics, and the Rural Institutes, which we have noted before as a feature of Scottish life at the time. Everything you need and want from an O Douglas book.

Children dressed up NYPL. Children’s party NYPL.