MANNERS AND MANNERISMS. By "Crascredo". Illustrated by Charles Simpson.

1929 1st edition. Large 4to (231 x 296mm). Ppx,108. B/w illustrations by Charles Simpson. Cream basket-weave linen with a darker chevron effect, brown titles and brown fox's mask motif.

"Dedicated, with profound admiration, to all those who are the backbone of hunting in England; but particularly (and with even profounder admiration) to those who can't afford to hunt - and do". Everything you need to know about hunting for the would-be huntsman or woman hitherto in a state of ignorance. Crascredo gives an itemised list of necessary equipment - not including tack or the animal itself - which comes to 93 pounds 15s. 6d., in an era when a reasonably successful middle-class professional might be getting 5 to 10 pounds a week. Mind you, the account includes no less than 5 pounds for a "nickel sandwich box and a glass hunting flask with their separate leather cases," so the tenant farmers and Jorrocks' grocers would have been doing it for a lot less. Chapters include: Manners and mannerisms; 'How much have you got?'; Finding a level; Miscounting the cost; 'Bosky can go tomorrow'; The Great Majority; 'You'll be amused to hear'; Many books; Cutting the super; Kennel Sundays for the young; Two-and-a-half studs; Interrupted fragment; 'Greatness'; 'What does he put into it?' How long? A good read, with some great illustrations". Crascredo" was the pseudonym of the author and illustrator Charles Simpson (Callahan p42)". Cras Credo" is probably a reference to the Latin tag "cras credemus, hodie nihil" "tomorrow we believe, but not today," "cras credo" being "it is tomorrow that I believe", or something similar. Crascredo wrote a number of books, notably one illustrated by G.D. Armour, entitled No Joke, which was an attempt to communicate to the reading public his experience on the Western Front. No Joke preceded much of the now famously nihilistic war literature and poetry, and takes a different view altogether, containing a greater number of cartoons than any of Sassoon or Owen's publications. This excluded Crascredo from serious consideration by the intelligentsia, but No Joke did lead the way to the War Books Controversy. The German Army took the point more or less, and from the 1920's onwards included flippant humour in their infantry training manual (they would). Avoiding controversy was presumably Crascredo's reason for keeping his real name quiet - he did after all conclude that the Great War had been a success and a sound basis for future peace. Manners and Mannerisms is Simpson's manual for the basically broke post-war country huntsman, in a basically broke post-war rural Britain.