1942 Did the serio-comedy of Apthorpe’s exploding thunder-box in Waugh’s Men at Arms (1952) have any source in reality? A letter the author wrote to his wife Laura on this day offers a clue. Waugh was stationed at Largs, Ayrshire, near Lord Glasgow’s estate, with No. 3 Commando, commanded by John Durnford-Slater. Some of them (not Waugh) had just returned from a raid on the Lofoten Islands. Now they were cooling their heels.
Let the author himself take over the narrative. The precision of his diction and syntax (the punctuation alone rewards close scrutiny), his comic timing and his skill at saving the best for last, as in a good joke, make it clear why Waugh has qualified as the 20th century’s best English stylist:
So No. 3 Cmdo were very anxious to be chums with Lord Glasgow so they offered to blow up an old tree stump for him and he was very grateful and he said dont spoil the plantation of young trees near it because that is the apple of my eye and they said no of course not we can blow a tree down so that it falls on a sixpence and Lord Glasgow said goodness you are clever and he asked them all to luncheon for the great explosion. So Col. Durnford-Slater, D.S.O. said to his subaltern, have you put enough explosive in the tree. Yes, sir, 75 lbs. Is that enough? Yes sir I worked it out by mathematics it is exactly right. Well better put a bit more. Very good sir. …
So soon the[y] let the fuse and waited for the explosion and presently the tree, instead of falling quietly sideways, rose 50 feet into the air taking with it ½ acre of soil and the whole of the young plantation.
And the subaltern said Sir I made a mistake, it should have been 7½ pounds not 75.
Lord Glasgow was so upset he walked in dead silence back to his castle and when they came to the turn of the drive in sight of his castle what should they find but that every pane of glass in the building was broken.
So Lord Glasgow gave a little cry & ran to hide his emotion in the lavatory and there when he pulled the plug the entire ceiling, loosened by the explosion, fell on his head.