It is still with us and will remain with us forever because it corresponds to an inner need, it is a way of self-expression. Other nations need occasional outbursts of madness and violence; the English need occasional excesses of self-discipline. Other nations, under unbearable stress, shout, howl, get into brawls, run amok; the English queue up for a cup of tea.
Demonstrations in other countries are violent affaires, with baton charges and mass arrests. Such things have occurred here, too, in the past. Today, if you are bored, you arrange a demo. It may be about the fraternal visit of some objectionable eastern potentate, or it may just as likely to be a protest against the late delivery of the morning mail, or the exclusion of dachshunds from comprehensive education. It may be a demo by coloured citizens because too few of their relates are allowed into the country, or a demo by Enoch Powell’s supporters against letting in too many. It may be a demo by bread delivery men against the low price of bread or by housewives against the high price of bread. Whether it is a demo by stamp-collectors for more special issues or by pacifists for the abolition of nuclear weapons, it does not matter, the picture will always be the same: a peaceful, smiling crowd marching, carrying boards with slogans and accompanied by a large number of bored policemen. All they will achieve is a gigantic traffic jam but that’s better than nothing. Indeed, judging by some demonstrators’ looks at frustrated motorists, it must be quite satisfactory.
In shops the English stand in queues; in government offices they sit in queues; in churches they kneel in queues; at sales time, they lie in queues all night in Oxford Street.
I was queuing myself once at the snack-bar of Hurlingham Club. The queue was long. In front of me there was a patient and silent middle-aged English couple and in front of them three crazy foreign women talking to one another in loud voices and with atrocious German accents. They had forgotten to collect their cutlery when joining the queue and they had forgotten to collect their salad from a side-table, so they were rushing backward and forward, cackling ‘I am so sorry’ with what they must have believed to be impeccable English manners. When they broke the sacred order to the queue once again, the taciturn Englishman started losing his temper and was obviously about to say something rather strong, when his wife warned him: ‘Don’t, Giles, they’re not English.’
That settled it. The man calmed down and took no further notice of the three irritating females. As they were not English one could not expect them to behave. Perhaps one could train hedgehogs, chimpanzees or foreigners to queue up in an orderly fashion, but it is not worth the trouble.
Yes, I do see the tormenting need in the English for frequent bouts of self-discipline. So I used to be puzzled by the behaviour of football fans. How did their nauseating vandalism fit my theory? I had to investigate, and my findings are not at all surprising: 97.2 per cent of all supporters of Manchester United are foreigners, mostly Dutch and Albanians. Of the rest, 2.8 per cent are Irish and Czechoslovakian, which leaves just a handful of English supporters. After the defeats of their Club these two or three English people queue up for cigarettes, then for sandwiches, then for beer, and having let off steam in true English fasion, they go home to queue up for their supper. The rest? No, Giles, they are not English.
On the national passion
uit: How to be decadent - George Mikes
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