Eric Gill

 It must have been about the year 1890 that a small incident occurred which, to the amateur of psycho analysis, might seem to have a grim significance. Near where we lived was a bakery. It was, from a business man's point of view, a progressive affair and was organized on factory lines. I remember the tea-table excitement when about this time they put up on the roof a great big sign with letters against the sky proclaiming CLARK'S MACHINE-MADE BREAD. I thought little about it. I had no opinions about such things at that time. Mother's cake was always held to be better than anything bought at the shop-nice and hot and crusty from the oven Madeira cake was generally held to be only less of a bore than "Seed" cake and as for "Fairy" cakes, unless hot and crisp, they are nothing but a suburban nastiness. But the mere word "machine-made" didn't signify quality, either good or bad. But one day Mrs. Hart came to call on my mother-you don't know her, never mind, she came to tea -afternoon-tea in the drawing-room, and I was brought in to say "How d'you do?." As I went in they were talking about Clark's Steam Bakery and I overheard Mrs. Hart saying in a horrified whisper, "And do you know-there was a black beetle in it..." Nothing more was said, but I dimly gather that Mrs. Hart was airing a generally acceptable notion that such a happening was a divine punishment upon those who thus profaned the domestic arts. Nothing more was said, but the atmosphere was one of horror. There was a clear implication of worse horrors to come if housewives persisted in patronizing such black arts as machine-bakery. It was all very mysterious. I have the impression that, with a child's delight in horrors, I must have asked questions about that beetle; for I have the impression that I was told to be quiet. I remember the air of mystery. Where did the beetle come from? How did it get there? Was it alive? Was it poisonous?