e kind of old "tripe" . . . either here in
England or . . . well, let us say . . . the tropics?

_Relations_

Our Relations are a race apart. They are not often our friends; rarer
still are they our enemies. They are just "relations"--men and women
who treat our endeavours towards righteousness with all the outspoken
hostility of those who dislike us, whom yet we do not want to quarrel
with because then there may be nobody left except the village doctor to
bury us.

Relations always seem to know us too little, and too well. The good in
us is continually warped by the bad in us--which, in parenthesis, is
the only one of our secrets relatives ever seem able to keep. To tell
the world of our faults would be like throwing mud at the family tree.
Moreover, relations always seem born with long memories. There is no
one in this world who remembers quite so far back, nor quite so
vividly, as a mother-in-law. And one's relations-in-law are but one's
own relations in a concentrated and more virulent form. And yet
everybody is somebody's relation. You consider that remark trite,
perhaps? Well, "trite" it undoubtedly is, and yet it is extremely
difficult to realise. The middle-aged woman whom you find so charming,
so sympathetic, so very "understanding," may send her nephews and
nieces fleeing in all directions the moment she appears among them.
The man you look upon as being an insufferable bore may still be Miss
Somebody-or-other's best beloved Uncle John. It is so hard to explain.
It is almost as hard to explain as the charm of the man your closest
woman-friend marries. What she can see in him you cannot for the life
of you perceive, while he, on his part, secretly wonders why the woman
he loves ever sought friendship with such a pompous, dull ass as you
are. Love is blind, so they say. Well, so is friendship--so are
relations--blind to everything except your faults.

Another odd thing about relations is that only very rarely can you ever
make friends with them. At best, your intimacy amounts to nothing more
than a truce. You are extremely lucky if it isn't open warfare. They
know at once too little about you and too much. They never by any
chance acknowledge that you have changed, that you are a better man
than once you were. What you have once been, in their opinion, you
will always be--so help-them-heaven-to-hide-the-wine-cellar-key! You
may change your friends as you "grow out" of them, or they