In the Victorian age, of course, which was one of specialisation based upon peace and plenty, one simply sent for a door-handle replacer and he put it right.  But nowadays the Door-handle Replacers’ Union is probably affiliated to an amalgamation which is discussing sympathetic action with somebody who is striking, so nothing is done.  This means that for weeks and weeks, whenever one tries to go out of the room, there is a loud crash like a 9.2 on the further side and a large blunt dagger clutched melodramatically in the right hand, and nobody to murder with it.

The man who can do everything is the kind of man who can mend a thing like a broken door-handle as soon as look at it.  He always knows which of the funny things you push or pull on any kind of machine to make it go or stop, and what is wrong with the cistern and the drawing-room clock.

Such a man came into my house the other day.  I call it my house, but it really seems to belong to a number of large people who walk in and out and shift packing-cases and splash paint and tramp heavily into the bathroom about 8.30 A.M. when I am trying to get off to sleep.  They have also dug a large moat right through the lawn and the garden-path, which rather spoils the appearance of these places, though it is nice to be able to pull up the drawbridge at night and feel that one is safe from burglars.  Anyhow, whether it is my house or theirs, the fact remains that the electric-bells were wrong.  The man of whom I am speaking lives next-door, and he came in and pointed this out.  “It is not much use having electric-bells,” he said, “that don’t ring.”

I might have argued this point.  I might have said that to press the button of a bell that does not ring gives one time to reflect on whether one really wants the thing one rang for, and thereafter on the whole vanity of human wishes, and so inculcates patience and self-discipline.  It is quite possible that an Eastern yogi might spend many years of beneficial calm pressing the buttons of bells that do not ring.  But I replied rather weakly, “No, I suppose not.”

“I’ll soon put that right for you,” he said cheerily, and about five minutes later he asked me to press one of the buttons, and there was a loud tinkling noise.  It seemed a pity that at the moment when the bell did happen to ring there should be nobody to come and answer it.

“Whatever did you do to them?” I asked.

“It only needed a little water,” he said, and I had hard work to suppress my admiration.  The very morning before, feeling that I ought to take a hand in all this practical work that was going on about the place, I had filled a large watering-can that I found lying about and wetted some things which someone had stuck into the garden.  I have a kind of idea that they were carrots, but they may have been maiden-hair ferns.  Somehow it had never occurred to me for a moment to go and water the electric bells.