There’s fashionably late and unfashionably late. I think two days counts as the latter.

As is the case with most of the landed gentry, Fanshawe’s about as reliable as Gary Glitter at a school fete. Only missing the deadline by an entire day, Fanshawe, the tiresome toff, has some of his wisdom to dispense on the matter of Halloween. It would’ve been up yesterday, but Jeffman was too inebriated to open his email. Read on and consider yourselves unfortunate:

Indubitably, my good fellow! I have seen some sorry showings in my time but just what the deuce is this Halloween chicanery all about?

During my days at Fanshawe towers, Pater and I were never troubled by such an affront to our naturally easy-going natures, as we had hired a little man whose job it was to pepper anybody whom he so much as suspected of glancing at our drive with buckshot. Admittedly we never received much with regards to correspondence, but Pater had a habit of burning the post and quite often the postman in a small iron basket he kept on the drawing room table, anyway. But it kept the revolting hordes at bay, which was all that mattered.

However, since my unexpected upheaval to pastures new (Fanshawe now resides in a 1-berth caravan in a lay-by along the A361, which he rents from a Gypsy named Roland Browning. Ed) my autumn evenings are plagued by young ruffians who see fit to leave their grimy paw prints over the laminated PVC of my front door.

There I was, just last week in fact, having presently returned breathless from a quick half up the Wizards Sleeve and toasting my crumpets over the Breville sandwich toaster, when there came a horrendous hullaballoo from outside. There was banging and shouting, and all manner of commotions, so with no further ado I put my trousers back on and went to see what this most disagreeable of occurrences was.

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Three cheers for Dickie Davies. He is the cut of chap that harks back to a more elegant and – dare I say? – a more innocent era. A time when a gent was well within his rights to pepper a young ruffian with buckshot, happen he was to catch such a delinquent youth loitering upon his grounds. Without fear of prosecution, one might add.

This was a time when a cad, and indeed, a bounder was readily accepted into the homes of the troublesome Proles each and every Saturday afternoon, simply because they were aware of his superior breeding and quite rightfully showed the respect that was due.

But there was more to Dickie Davies than just an exemplary bloodline. He was the quintessential English gent and the erstwhile presenter of a World Of Sport. Immaculately turned out at half past midday every Saturday, when the nation’s lower orders were staggering blind drunk out of their public houses and speakeasies, his crystal clear delivery of the Queen’s own English was only matched by a sartorial elegance that was second to none. Even if his perfectly maintained coiffure did give the impression of a man who had just finished painting the ceiling.

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Although not a fan of the species myself, I concede that women have a place in the world. After all, how is a chap going to water, feed, and clean his immaculate self without a woman there to do it for him?

But what fresh hell is this? By the deuce! It has come to my attention that there are murmurings among those of the female persuasion that they consider themselves the equal of the far superior chap.

Such lunacy can only have sprung forth from the mind of a woman and is evidence, if evidence is at all needed, that such murmurings should be treated with the all around contempt that they deserve. The foolish creatures are clearly unhinged to consider themselves of a similar cut and stature, or even to believe that they share the same capital mindset of the sporting gent.

Since learning of this blatant affront to all that is good in Her Majesty, the Queen’s, god-fearing land, I have visited my local library – where nowadays they not only allow the poor through the gate, but let them handle the Jackie Collins – and boned up a little on the subject. It did not for pleasant reading make.

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By Jingo! That awful little man sporting the trilby and lording about this here hoo-hah as though he owns the place has requested that I write some sort of profile. He thinks it would be a jolly good way of introducing myself to the scruffy shower of ruffians he imagines can actually read, and don’t just come here to gurgle in wonder at the pretty colours.

The oik has handed me a questionnaire of sorts, although completing it was quite the endeavour in itself; what with the childish, illiterate scrawl he seems to believe qualifies as legible writing in this day and age. But hey ho, old bean. Needs must and all that guff.

So if one wishes to interlope on a sporting fellow’s business, then interlope away.

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It is with the utmost incompetence that I announce the exciting news that we have a new author here at Not What it Used to Be.

Yes, indeed. The blithering, barely articulate, upper-class inbred that is Lord Thackery Fotheringay-Fanshawe, has kindly agreed to sign on as an official author to this splendid little periodical.

This hard-up toff may be on his arse, but that hasn’t tempered his views on why those not of the landed gentry should be wiped off the face of the planet.

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Putting aside any differences that may have arisen following his inaugural address upon these pages, Lord Thackery Fotheringay-Fanshawe has kindly agreed to surrender some more of his valuable time to once again tell us what is wrong in his world.

By Jove! The Sun newspaper has a bally lot to answer for. A bally lot!

It would seem that a chap can no longer spend a week or four holidaying in one of Her Majesty’s fine seaside towns, without finding himself in the unfortunate position of having to rub shoulders with the manner of fellow he would normally only retain for building work, maintaining the grounds, or a spot of shooting practice.

The sterling role that Rupert Murdoch and the News International Group played in the eradication of socialism within our borders was undone in one fell swoop when one of those journalist Johnnies over there at Fleet Street, or wherever the deuce they fetch up nowadays for whatever it is they call work, took complete leave of his collected senses and came up with the idea of the so-called ‘Sun Holiday’.

Henley Regatta! My flabber was indeed gasted, old bean, when I chose to take one of my rare holidays at a little caravan site I know in one of the more tranquil parts of God’s fair land, and found it to be overrun with the type of tattooed oik I usually have no hesitation in giving both barrels.

Primarily my thoughts were that I’d taken a wrong turning and inadvertently driven my Cushman Truckster into a gypsy encampment, Heavens forbid. There were toothless crones aplenty with hair scraped back and golden hoops adorning their ears, the size of which I had never seen before. But the absence of any burning tyres and the obligatory bear-pit drew me to conclude that this was something far worse.

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We here at Not What it Used to Be are fortunate enough to be graced by the presence of the incorrigible Lord Thackery Fotheringay-Fanshawe, who has so generously agreed to give up a portion of his valuable time to speak at us all on a subject he nurtures close to his own good heart.

By Jove! Whatever happened to the working classes?

There was a time when a chap of certain breeding could lay back in his favourite chaise lounge, take in the summer air, and dwell on a fine summer’s afternoon in the safe knowledge that his income was being maintained by the lower orders doing what it was they were born to do.

A Lord, like one’s self, was kept in the manner with which he was accustomed by the legions of drones that were ready and willing to forfeit their free time in the pursuit of contributing to the upkeep of what is the divine right of all members of the higher orders, one’s self in particular.

But by the gads! They suddenly stopped working.

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