Occasionally he was privileged to attend an operetta or a spectacular play at one of the minor theatres.

Padre Irene naturally agreed with Don Custodio and execrated French operetta.

"I've come to judge the operetta," he had replied in the tone of a Cato whose conscience was clear.

A cousin of mine was at Eton with the son of D'Oyly Carte, the man who produced the Gilbert and Sullivan operettas, and one night he told me about this peculiar schoolboy who dressed fastidiously and wore a monocle and who, when one of the masters inquired after his health, replied "Sir, I grow thinnah and thinnah."