Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} by P.G. Wodehouse Mike and . If Mike had been in time for breakfast that fatal Easter morning he might have gathered from the expression on his father's face, as Mr. Jackson opened the envelope containing his school report and read the contents, that the document in question was not exactly a paean of praise from beginning to end. But he was late, as usual. Mike always was late for breakfast in the holidays. When he came down on this particular morning, the meal was nearly over. Mr. Jackson had disappeared, taking his correspondence with him; Mrs. Jackson had gone into the kitchen, and when Mike appeared the thing had resolved itself into a mere vulgar brawl between Phyllis and Ella for the jam, while Marjory, recently affecting a grown-up air, looked on in a detached sort of way, as if these juvenile gambols distressed her. "Hello, Mike," she said, jumping up as he entered, "here you are—I've been keeping everything hot for you." "Have you? Thanks awfully. I say …" His eye wandered in mild surprise round the table. "I'm a bit late." Marjory was bustling about, fetching and carrying for Mike, as she always did. She had adopted him at an early age, and did the thing thoroughly. She was fond of her other brothers, especially when they made centuries in first-class cricket, but Mike was her favorite. She would field out in the deep as a natural thing when Mike was batting at the net in the paddock, though for the others, even for Joe, who had played in all five Test Matches in the previous summer, she would do it only as a favor. Phyllis and Ella finished their dispute and went out. Marjory sat on the table and watched Mike eat. Mike (Wodehouse) First published September, 1909. Reprinted in 1910, 1916, and 1919. PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY BILLING AND SONS, LTD., GUILDFORD. "ARE YOU THE M. JACKSON, THEN, WHO HAD AN AVERAGE OF FIFTY-ONE POINT NOUGHT THREE LAST YEAR?" ⁠ p. 225. CHAP. PAGE I. MIKE 1 II. THE JOURNEY DOWN 7 III. MIKE FINDS A FRIENDLY NATIVE 13 IV. AT THE NETS 19 V. REVELRY BY NIGHT 24 VI. IN WHICH A TIGHT CORNER IS EVADED 32 VII. IN WHICH MIKE IS DISCUSSED 37 VIII. A ROW WITH THE TOWN 43 IX. BEFORE THE STORM 50 X. THE GREAT PICNIC 56 XI. THE CONCLUSION OF THE PICNIC 61 XII. MIKE GETS HIS CHANCE 66 XIII. THE M.C.C. MATCH 72 XIV. A SLIGHT IMBROGLIO 80 XV. MIKE CREATES A VACANCY 85 XVI. AN EXPERT EXAMINATION 91 XVII. ANOTHER VACANCY 97 XVIII. BOB HAS NEWS TO IMPART 102 XIX. MIKE GOES TO SLEEP AGAIN 107 XX. THE TEAM IS FILLED UP 113 XXI. MARJORY THE FRANK 118 XXII. WYATT IS REMINDED OF AN ENGAGEMENT 125 XXIII. A SURPRISE FOR MR. APPLEBY 130 XXIV. CAUGHT 135 XXV. MARCHING ORDERS 140 XXVI. THE AFTERMATH 144 XXVII. THE RIPTON MATCH 149 XXVIII. MIKE WINS HOME 155 XXIX. WYATT AGAIN 166 XXX. MR. JACKSON MAKES UP HIS MIND 169 XXXI. SEDLEIGH 174 XXXII. PSMITH 179 XXXIII. STAKING OUT A CLAIM 183 XXXIV. GUERILLA WARFARE 189 XXXV. UNPLEASANTNESS IN THE SMALL HOURS 196 XXXVI. ADAIR 202 XXXVII. MIKE FINDS OCCUPATION 207 XXXVIII. THE FIRE BRIGADE MEETING 213 XXXIX. ACHILLES LEAVES HIS TENT 220 XL. THE MATCH WITH DOWNING'S 225 XLI. THE SINGULAR BEHAVIOUR OF JELLICOE 234 XLII. JELLICOE GOES ON THE SICK-LIST 239 XLIII. MIKE RECEIVES A COMMISSION 243 XLIV. AND FULFILS IT 248 XLV. PURSUIT 253 XLVI. THE DECORATION OF SAMMY 260 XLVII. MR. DOWNING ON THE SCENT 263 XLVIII. THE SLEUTH-HOUND 269 XLIX. A CHECK 275 L. THE DESTROYER OF EVIDENCE 281 LI. MAINLY ABOUT BOOTS 287 LII. ON THE TRAIL AGAIN 294 LIII. THE KETTLE METHOD 297 LIV. ADAIR HAS A WORD WITH MIKE 303 LV. CLEARING THE AIR 308 LVI. IN WHICH PEACE IS DECLARED 314 LVII. MR. DOWNING MOVES 319 LVIII. THE ARTIST CLAIMS HIS WORK 326 LIX. SEDLEIGH v. WRYKYN 334 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. BY T. M. R. WHITWELL. This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1926. The author died in 1975, so this work is also in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 30 years or less . This work may also be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works. Mike by P.G. Wodehouse. 4.0 — 1 ratings — 0 reviews. subjects: Humorous Fiction. series: Psmith (#1), School Stories (#7) Register for a free account. All our eBooks are FREE to download! sign in or create a new account. EPUB 870 KB. Kindle 970 KB. $2.99. Support epubBooks by making a small PayPal donation purchase . Description. Michael “Mike” Jackson is the youngest son of a renowned cricketing family. Mike’s eldest brother Joe is a successful first-class player, while another brother, Bob, is on the verge of his school team. When Mike arrives at Wrykyn himself, his cricketing talent and love of adventure bring him success and trouble in equal measure. In the second part, also known as Enter Psmith or Mike and Psmith, takes place two years later. Mike, due to take over as cricket captain at Wrykyn, is withdrawn from the school by his father and sent to a lesser school, called Sedleigh. On arrival at Sedleigh, he meets the eccentric Rupert Psmith, another new arrival from the superior school of Eton. Becoming fast friends, the two eschew cricket and indulge in all manner of high-jinks and adventures. (source: Wikipedia) 457 pages, with a reading time of. 7.0 hours (114,250 words) , and first published in 1909. This DRM-Free edition published by epubBooks , 2009 . Community Reviews. Your Review. Sign up or Log in to rate this book and submit a review. There are currently no other reviews for this book. Excerpt. It was a morning in the middle of April, and the Jackson family were consequently breakfasting in comparative silence. The cricket season had not begun, and except during the cricket season they were in the habit of devoting their powerful minds at breakfast almost exclusively to the task of victualling against the labours of the day. In May, June, July, and August the silence was broken. The three grown–up Jacksons played regularly in first–class cricket, and there was always keen competition among their brothers and sisters for the copy of the Sportsman which was to be found on the hall table with the letters. Whoever got it usually gloated over it in silence till urged wrathfully by the multitude to let them know what had happened; when it would appear that Joe had notched his seventh century, or that Reggie had been run out when he was just getting set, or, as sometimes occurred, that that ass Frank had dropped Fry or Hayward in the slips before he had scored, with the result that the spared expert had made a couple of hundred and was still going strong. In such a case the criticisms of the family circle, particularly of the smaller Jackson sisters, were so breezy and unrestrained that Mrs. Jackson generally felt it necessary to apply the closure. Indeed, Marjory Jackson, aged fourteen, had on three several occasions been fined pudding at lunch for her caustic comments on the batting of her brother Reggie in important fixtures. Cricket was a tradition in the family, and the ladies, unable to their sorrow to play the game themselves, were resolved that it should not be their fault if the standard was not kept up. On this particular morning silence reigned. A deep gasp from some small Jackson, wrestling with bread–and–milk, and an occasional remark from Mr. Jackson on the letters he was reading, alone broke it. List of books by P. G. Wodehouse. The following is a complete list of books by P. G. Wodehouse , including novels and collections of short stories, sorted first by date of publication and later by "series" – i.e. by recurring characters or locations. Wodehouse's work has been anthologized, recompiled, and republished under a great many titles; only the titles as originally published are listed here. Many of Wodehouse's short stories appeared first in magazines and were later published in collections, some of which include tales from several of his canons: Lord Emsworth and Others , for example, contains stories about Castle, the Oldest Member, Mr Mulliner, and Freddie Widgeon. As a consequence, precise classification of his works into one series or another is impossible; some of the compilations below overlap between series, causing several books to be listed more than once. Contents. Chronological list [ edit | edit source ] UK title and date of publication. List by series [ edit | edit source ] [ edit | edit source ] The upper-class inhabitants of the fictional Blandings Castle, including the eccentric Lord Emsworth, obsessed by his prize-winning pig, the "Empress of Blandings", are the subject of eleven novels and nine short stories, written between 1915 and Wodehouse's death in 1975. Something Fresh (1915) (U.S. title: Something New ) Leave it to Psmith (1923) Summer Lightning (1929) (U.S. title: Fish Preferred ) Heavy Weather (1933) Blandings Castle and Elsewhere (1935) – Twelve short stories, six of which are about Blandings; written from 1926 to 1928, they occur before the events of Summer Lightning . Lord Emsworth and Others (1937) – Despite its title, only one of the nine short stories, "The Crime Wave at Blandings", concerns Lord Emsworth (U.S. title: Crime Wave at Blandings ) in the Springtime (1939) (1947) Nothing Serious (1950) – One story of ten, "Birth of a Salesman" (1952) (1961) Galahad at Blandings (1965) (1966) – One story of nine, "Sticky Wicket at Blandings" (Probably to be read before Service With a Smile) A Pelican at Blandings (1969) (U.S. title: No Nudes is Good Nudes ) Sunset at Blandings (1977) – Wodehouse's final novel, unfinished when he died. The Drones Club [ edit | edit source ] The members of the Drones Club, a raucous social club for London's idle rich which was born in the stories, are the subject of a number of separate stories, told by various narrators. (1936) – Eleven short stories about members of The Drones Club, three told by Mr Mulliner Lord Emsworth and Others (1937) – A story about Dronesman Freddie Widgeon in a book of nine (U.S. title: Crime Wave at Blandings ) Nothing Serious (1950) – One Freddie Widgeon in a book of ten Barmy in Wonderland (1952) (1958) (1959) – Ten short stories. Golf stories [ edit | edit source ] Wodehouse wrote many of his short stories – though no novels – about the sport of golf, which all characters involved consider the only worthwhile pursuit in life. The Oldest Member narrates most of them. The Man Upstairs (1914) – One story in a book of nineteen (1922) – Ten stories, nine told by the Oldest Member (U.S. title: Golf Without Tears ) (1926) – Nine golf stories (U.S. title: Divots ) Mr. Mulliner Speaking (1929) – One story in a book of nine Lord Emsworth and Others (1937) – Three stories in a book of nine (U.S. title: Crime Wave at Blandings ) Nothing Serious (1950) – Five stories in a book of ten A Few Quick Ones (1959) – One story in a book of ten Plum Pie (1966) – One story in a book of nine. Jeeves [ edit | edit source ] The wealthy, foppish Bertie Wooster narrates a number of stories and novels, which, collectively called the Jeeves canon, are Wodehouse's most famous. They recount the improbable and unfortunate situations in which Bertie and his friends find themselves, and the manner in which his ingenious valet Jeeves is always able to solve them. Many of Bertie's problems stem from his aunts, the fearsome Aunt Agatha and loving Aunt Dahlia. The Man With Two Left Feet (book) (1917) – A collection of thirteen short stories, one of which, "Extricating Young Gussie", introduces Jeeves, Bertie, and Aunt Agatha, though Bertie's surname may be Mannering-Phipps rather than Wooster. Bertie has a cousin named Gussie Mannering- Phipps. Bertram did not have a surname, and it remains a matter of considerable debate amongst Wodehouse scholars as to whether he was indeed Bertie Wooster, or merely Bertie Mannering-Phipps. (1919) – Eight short stories, four about Jeeves and four about Reggie Pepper (1923) – Eleven short stories (U.S. title: Jeeves ) Carry on, Jeeves (1925) – Ten short stories, five repeated in some form from My Man Jeeves Very Good, Jeeves (1930) – Eleven short stories Thank You, Jeeves (1934) – The first full-length Jeeves novel Right Ho, Jeeves (1934) – (U.S. title: Brinkley Manor ) (1938) Joy in the Morning (1946) (U.S. title: Jeeves in the Morning ) The Mating Season (1949) (1953) – In which Bill Belfry "borrows" Jeeves from Bertie (U. S. title: The Return of Jeeves ) Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit (1954) (U.S. title: Bertie Wooster Sees It Through ) A Few Quick Ones (1959) – One Jeeves story in a book of ten (1960) (U.S. title: How Right You Are, Jeeves ) Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves (1963) Plum Pie (1966) – One Jeeves story in a book of nine Much Obliged, Jeeves (1971) – In which appears the only mention of Jeeves's Christian name, Reginald (U.S. title: Jeeves and the Tie That Binds ) Aunts Aren't Gentlemen (1974) (U.S. title: The Catnappers ) Mr Mulliner [ edit | edit source ] Mr Mulliner is a long-winded pub raconteur who tells outrageous stories about his family. Meet Mr Mulliner (1927) – Nine short stories Mr Mulliner Speaking (1929) – Nine short stories Mulliner Nights (1933) – Nine short stories Blandings Castle (1935) – Twelve short stories, five of which are about Mulliner Young Men in Spats (1936) – Eleven short stories about members of The Drones Club, three told by Mr Mulliner Lord Emsworth and Others (1937) – Nine short stories, one told by Mr Mulliner (U.S. title: Crime Wave at Blandings ) Eggs, Beans, and Crumpets (1940) – One story in a book of nine A Few Quick Ones (1959) – Two stories in a book of ten. Psmith [ edit | edit source ] Psmith is an ingenious jack-of-all-trades. The worlds of Psmith and Blandings overlap, as in his final adventure Psmith visits the Castle, becomes a friend of Freddie Threepwood and is eventually employed by Lord Emsworth. Mike (1909) – Reissued in two parts as Mike at Wrykyn and Mike and Psmith in 1953; the second part also published as Enter Psmith in 1935 Psmith in the City (1910) Psmith Journalist (1915) Leave it to Psmith (1923) School stories [ edit | edit source ] (1902) A Prefect's Uncle (1903) Tales of St. Austin's (1903) (1904) The Head of Kay's (1905) (1907) Mike (1909) Ukridge [ edit | edit source ] Stanley Featherstonehaugh Ukridge is a scheming character, always looking to enlarge his income. Love Among the Chickens (1906) – The only full-length Ukridge novel Ukridge (1924) – Ten short stories, which apparently take place before the events of Love Among the Chickens Lord Emsworth and Others (1937) – Three stories in a book of nine Eggs, Beans, and Crumpets (1940) – Three stories in a book of nine Nothing Serious (1950) – One story in a book of ten A Few Quick Ones (1959) – One story in a book of ten Plum Pie (1966) – One story in a book of nine. Uncle Fred [ edit | edit source ] Pongo Twistleton's Uncle Fred is a wily and mischievous former Pelican, with a love of taking of false identities. Young Men in Spats (1936) – Eleven short stories about members of The Drones Club, one of which introduces Uncle Fred Uncle Fred in the Springtime (1939) Uncle Dynamite (1948) Cocktail Time (1958) Service With a Smile (1961) Other [ edit | edit source ] William Tell Told Again (1904) (1907) – A semi-autobiographical novel The Globe By the Way Book (1908) – A compilation from the column "By the Way", written by Wodehouse and Herbert Westbrook, which appeared in The Globe The Swoop (1909) A Gentleman of Leisure (1910) The Prince and Betty (1912) (1913) The Man Upstairs (book) – Nineteen short stories (1914) (1917) The Man With Two Left Feet (book) (1917) – a collection of thirteen short stories, one of which, "Extricating Young Gussie", introduces Jeeves, Bertie, and Aunt Agatha – Partially a sequel to The Little Nugget (1918) My Man Jeeves (1919) – Eight short stories, four about Jeeves and four about Reggie Pepper A Damsel in Distress (1919) The Coming of Bill (1920) Jill the Reckless (1921) (1921) (1922) The Adventures of Sally (1922) (1924) Sam the Sudden (1925) (1927) Money for Nothing (1928) (1931) If I Were You (1931) Louder and Funnier – A collection of articles originally written for Vanity Fair magazine (1932) (1932) Blandings Castle (1935) – Twelve short stories: six Blandings, five Mulliner, and one about Bobbie Wickham which does not fit into any of the series The Luck of the Bodkins (1935) (1936) (1938) Eggs, Beans, and Crumpets (1940) – Four short stories about Bingo Little and one about Freddie Fitch-Fitch in a book of nine (1940) Money in the Bank (1946) (1948) Nothing Serious (1950) – One Bingo Little and one Conky Biddle in a book of ten (1951) Bring on the Girls (1951) – An autobiographical collaboration with Guy Bolton, subtitled "The Improbable Story of Our Life in Musical Comedy, With Pictures To Prove It". (1951) – Subtitled "A Self-Portrait in Letters by P.G.Wodehouse, With an Introduction and Additional Notes by W. Townend". (U.S. title: Author! Author! ) (1956) (1956) – Subtitled "An Autobiography With Digressions". (U.S. title: America, I Like You ) (1957) (U.S. title: The Butler Did It ) (1961) (1964) Plum Pie (1966) – Nine short stories: one about Jeeves, one golf, one Freddie Threepwood, two Bingo Little, one Ukridge, two Freddie Widgeon, and one Mr Mulliner Company For Henry (1967) Do Butlers Burgle Banks? (1968) (1970) Pearls, Girls and Monty Bodkin (1972) (1973) Posthumous publications [ edit | edit source ] Many early works were published in book form for the first time after Wodehouse's death; some of these collections are listed here. Strange Company. In the 1920s, Wodehouse and Milne were friends, although it was an association based largely on mutual admiration for each other’s talents than any real personal warmth. The two men were incompatible. Wodehouse was an amiable, uncomplicated man with a gift for taking life as it came. Milne was simply incompatible with everyone. He was intelligent and ambitious, but small-minded, thin-skinned, and as far as I can determine, utterly lacking in anything even vaguely resembling a sense of humor. (In 1952, his son Christopher gave an interview stating “I shall never get over my dislike of being the ‘real live Christopher Robin.’” The elder Milne’s reaction was to rewrite his will.) Wodehouse was once reported to have said that he had started a “Try to Like A.A. Milne Club.” There were no takers, until one man joined, only to resign a week later. “Since joining the association,” he explained, “I have met Mr. Milne.” A. A. Milne, via Wikipedia Despite all this, the two writers remained on ostensibly good terms until the 1930s. During that decade, not only did Wodehouse’s genius shine as brightly as ever, but his public acclaim kept increasing, culminating with an honorary doctorate from Oxford in 1939. Milne, on the other hand, seemed a writer on the way out. His books still sold, but he sensed his best days were past. Milne was a jealous nature, and Wodehouse himself believed he became increasingly resentful of "Plum's" success, seeing him more as a rival than a friend. During the ‘30s, Milne increasingly turned his attention to politics. He was originally an ardent pacifist, but when Britain entered World War II, he supported the fight with equal fervor. As his attacks against Wodehouse would show, he was never a man to do things by halves, for good or bad. Wodehouse, like Poe before him, was more cognizant of current events than one would immediately think. Both men responded to the world around them in an indirect fashion, expressing themselves through their art in a way that got their views across while avoiding overt polemics. Both men also liked to respond to antagonists by mocking them. One of Wodehouse’s most memorable characters was the aspiring dictator/designer of ladies’ lingerie Roderick Spode (“It was as if Nature had intended to make a gorilla, and had changed his mind at the last moment.”) Spode and his bumbling little army of Black Shorts (“by the time Spode formed his association, there were no shirts left") gave a view of the Fascist movement that was as cutting as it was humorous. Wodehouse and his wife had the incredible bad luck—or bad judgment—to be in France when the Germans invaded in 1940, and he was sent to an internment camp. A couple of Germans whom he had known years before when he was writing for Hollywood were now Nazi propagandists. Through them, Wodehouse was asked to make radio broadcasts describing his experiences in the camp, and, little knowing what he was getting himself into, he agreed. I will not get into the whole long story of Wodehouse’s notorious broadcasts here. His own account of the uproar can be found here, along with transcripts of his actual radio talks, which are well worth reading, and provide the necessary background for what followed. Suffice to say that in these talks, he basically did to the Nazis what he did to Oswald Mosely’s Brown Shirts—that is, he made comic sport of them. (A British Air Marshal, after reading transcripts of the broadcasts, commented: “Why the Germans let him say all this I cannot think. They have either got more sense of humour than I credited them with or it has just slipped past the censor…Wodehouse has probably been shot by now.”) It was Wodehouse’s countrymen, not the Nazis, who were calling for his head. Few in Britain had actually heard the broadcasts, which left everyone free to imagine the worst about them. The usual assumption was that he had made traitorous broadcasts aiding the enemy in exchange for favored treatment. Such was hardly the case, but hysteria against the formerly beloved author reached the point where a treason trial was no impossibility. Forefront in the public attacks on Wodehouse was A. A. Milne. Responding to claims that Wodehouse had been guilty of nothing worse than naïve judgment, Milne wrote in the “Daily Telegraph”: “Irresponsibility in what the papers call ‘a licensed humorist’ can be carried too far; naivete can be carried too far. Wodehouse has been given a good deal of license in the past, but I fancy that now his license will be withdrawn.” Milne twisted Wodehouse's healthy ability to find humor in nearly everything as mere infantilism, sniping that he “has encouraged in himself a natural lack of interest in ‘politics’—‘politics’ being all the things grown-ups talk about at dinner when one is hiding under the table. Things, for instance, like the last war, which found and kept him in America; and postwar taxes, which chased him back and forth across the Atlantic.” In a truly waspish move, this modern Rufus W. Griswold added that Wodehouse had once told him that he would have liked to have had a son, “But he would have to be born at the age of 15, when he was just getting into his House Eleven.” Milne scornfully presented this as proof of Wodehouse’s lack of character. Those words were not uttered by Wodehouse himself, but by one of his fictional characters: It is a line from “Psmith in the City.” A few people have tried to defend Milne by saying it was an honest error in memory, but his act reeks of deliberate, malicious misrepresentation. Like Griswold, Milne had finally found the means of getting revenge against a rival for the crime of being talented. After the war ended, a British government investigation cleared Wodehouse of wrongdoing, but the stigma has clung to his reputation ever since. And Plum knew where to place a good share of the blame. “Nobody could be more anxious than myself, for instance,” he said later, “that Alan Alexander Milne should trip over a loose bootlace and break his bloody neck.” As Milne was not nearly that considerate, Wodehouse than turned to a more subtle revenge. In “The Mating Season” (1949) Bertie Wooster found himself in the appalling position of having to recite Milne’s poems at a village concert. “A fellow who comes on a platform and starts reciting about Christopher Robin going hoppity-hoppity-hop (or alternatively saying his prayers) does not do so from sheer wantonness but because he is a helpless victim of circumstances beyond his control.” Later, when Wooster complained to a friend about having to recite Christopher Robin poems, the friend replied: While on the surface, this story is a light-hearted spoof, for anyone familiar with Milne’s personal life, this would have read as a grim indictment. Like Rodney, Milne saw his son as little more than source material. He took almost no interest in him as a child, gathering from his wife most of the details about Christopher that he used in his stories. And Christopher spent his adulthood convinced this cold-blooded literary exploitation had blighted his life. (He once said of his father, "One day I will write verses about him and see how he likes it.") For all Wodehouse’s mild good- nature, he was no weakling. In his own fashion, he could and did fight back against his enemies. Although his savaging of Milne was not nearly as blatant or infinitely damaging as what his opponent had done to him, Wodehouse had the truth on his side, and nothing is more devastating than that. (Ironically, Milne himself deeply resented that his children’s stories came to far overshadow his “grown-up” works.) Wodehouse’s fiction managed to get his anger against Milne out of his system. By 1954 he could write, “Poor Milne. I was shocked to hear of his illness. I’m afraid there seems little chance of him getting any better. It is ghastly to think of anyone who wrote such gay stuff ending his life like this. He has always been about my favorite author.” Milne, on the other hand, apparently retained his bitter attitude towards Wodehouse to the end. (If he felt any guilt about how he had wronged his old friend, that undoubtedly added to his feelings of resentment.) The two never spoke or wrote to each other again. Milne’s last years were deeply unhappy. He and his wife were estranged from their son, and Milne suffered a stroke in 1952, which left him an invalid until his death in 1956. Wodehouse’s life was far longer, and infinitely more fortunate. After the war, he settled permanently and quite happily in America. Although he was pained by the lingering antipathy against him in his homeland, this prejudice lifted to the point that he was given a knighthood in January 1975. (It has been said that this honor was given him in no small part due to the influence of the Queen Mother, who was one of his most devoted fans.) Sir Pelham died as serenely as he had lived six weeks later.