interviewers. Like the sword-stick, the great cloak and
flapping hat, it was felt by some to be Gilbert's way of attracting
attention. But it was just one of Gilbert's ways of amusing himself.
A small nephew of Frances was living with them at the time and it was
funny to watch him fencing with his huge uncle who was obviously
enjoying himself rather the more of the two. On my first visit to
Overroads, I noticed how as we talked my host's pencil never ceased.
One evening I collected and kept an imposing red Indian and a
caricature of Chesterton himself in a wheelbarrow being carried off
to the bonfire. I came in too for one of the grown-up parties in
which guessing games were a feature. Lines from the poets were
illustrated and we had to guess them. At another party, Dr. Pocock
told me, G.K. did the Inns of Beaconsfield, of which the most
successful drawing was that of a sadly dilapidated dragon being
turned away from the inn door: "Dragon discovers with disgust that he
cannot put up at the George."

Sometimes these drawings were the prize of whoever guessed the line
of verse they illustrated, sometimes they were sold for a local
charity. The Babies' Convalescent Home was a favourite object and one
admirable picture (reproduced in _The Coloured Lands_) shows the
"Despair of King Herod at discovering children convalescing from the
Massacre." The two closest friendships of early Beaconsfield life
were with the rector, Mr. Comerline and his wife, who are now dead,
and Dr. and Mrs. Pocock. Dr. Pocock was the Chestertons' doctor as
well as their friend, and he tells me that his great difficulty in
treating Gilbert lay in his detachment from his own physical
circumstances. If there was anything wrong with him he usually didn't
notice it. "He was the most uncomplaining person. You had to hunt him
all over" to find out if anything was wrong.

This detachment from circumstances still extended to his appearance
and Frances one day begged Dr. Pocock to take him to a good tailor.
It was a huge success: he had never looked so well as he did now--for
a few weeks. And then the tailor said to Dr. Pocock, "Mr. Chesterton
has broken my heart. It took twice the material and twice the time to
make for him, but I _was_ proud of it." His tailor like his doctor
was apt to become a friend. Mrs. Pocock recalls how he would go to a
dinner of the tradesmen of Beaconsfield and come back intensely
interested and wanting to tell her all about it.