The Tumbrel Diaries

In a downpour such as yesterday afternoon’s one reaches for one’s umbrella. This was not always the case. As with so many other b...

There are some books that you know are awful the moment you begin reading, but others whose awfulness creeps up on you, opening g...

This afternoon I have been nibbling at the delicate buds that seem forever to sprout afresh from the pages of one of my favorite ...

The opal exerted considerable fascination over consumers in Victorian and Edwardian Britain, yet it was also encumbered by a supe...

This brief note was addressed from Government House in Sydney to my great-grandmother Sophie Pearson by Lady Mary Lygon (1869–1927), who ...

The Leveson Inquiry into the culture, practices and ethics of the press in Britain surely challenges any reasonable listener not ...

These days most people either do not have enough imagination or spare time or superabundant creativity to list recreations in t...

According to last week’s Spectator , the game of Badminton is “the pâté de foie gras of Olympic sports.” That was before the gam...

In 1904 the Dowager Empress Marie Feodorovna of Russia purchased as a gift for her sister, Queen Alexandra, a fan composed of two-color...

I am always surprised and occasionally delighted by what found its way into the columns of the comparatively enormous number of well-writ...