The Schartz-Metterklume Method

"The Schartz-Metterklume Method" is a satirical novella by Hector Hugh Munro, better known by his pen name Saki. The story revolves around the unconventional approach of a fictional character, Miss Schartz-Metterklume, who offers an eccentric method for education and reform, particularly focused on transforming manners and behavior. Through a blend of wit and social commentary, Saki explores themes of societal norms, the absurdity of certain educational practices, and the complexities of human interaction. The narrative reflects Saki's keen observation of Edwardian society, making it both entertaining and thought-provoking.

• Short story

								
Lady Carlotta stepped out on to the platform of the small wayside station
and took a turn or two up and down its uninteresting length, to kill time
till the train should be pleased to proceed on its way.  Then, in the
roadway beyond, she saw a horse struggling with a more than ample load,
and a carter of the sort that seems to bear a sullen hatred against the
animal that helps him to earn a living.  Lady Carlotta promptly betook
her to the roadway, and put rather a different complexion on the
struggle.  Certain of her acquaintances were wont to give her plentiful
admonition as to the undesirability of interfering on behalf of a
distressed animal, such interference being “none of her business.”  Only
once had she put the doctrine of non-interference into practice, when one
of its most eloquent exponents had been besieged for nearly three hours
in a small and extremely uncomfortable may-tree by an angry boar-pig,
while Lady Carlotta, on the other side of the fence, had proceeded with
the water-colour sketch she was engaged on, and refused to interfere
between the boar and his prisoner.  It is to be feared that she lost the
friendship of the ultimately rescued lady.  On this occasion she merely
lost the train, which gave way to the first sign of impatience it had
shown throughout the journey, and steamed off without her.  She bore the
desertion with philosophical indifference; her friends and relations were
thoroughly well used to the fact of her luggage arriving without her.
She wired a vague non-committal message to her destination to say that
she was coming on “by another train.”  Before she had time to think what
her next move might be she was confronted by an imposingly attired lady,
who seemed to be taking a prolonged mental inventory of her clothes and
looks.

“You must be Miss Hope, the governess I’ve come to meet,” said the
apparition, in a tone that admitted of very little argument.

“Very well, if I must I must,” said Lady Carlotta to herself with
dangerous meekness.

“I am Mrs. Quabarl,” continued the lady; “and where, pray, is your
luggage?”

“It’s gone astray,” said the alleged governess, falling in with the
excellent rule of life that the absent are always to blame; the luggage
had, in point of fact, behaved with perfect correctitude.  “I’ve just
telegraphed about it,” she added, with a nearer approach to truth.

“How provoking,” said Mrs. Quabarl; “these railway companies are so
careless.  However, my maid can lend you things for the night,” and she
led the way to her car.

During the drive to the Quabarl mansion Lady Carlotta was impressively
introduced to the nature of the charge that had been thrust upon her; she
learned that Claude and Wilfrid were delicate, sensitive young people,
that Irene had the artistic temperament highly developed, and that Viola
was something or other else of a mould equally commonplace among children
of that class and type in the twentieth century.

“I wish them not only to be taught,” said Mrs. Quabarl, “but
interested in what they learn.  In their history lessons, for instance,
you must try to make them feel that they are being introduced to the
life-stories of men and women who really lived, not merely committing a
mass of names and dates to memory.  French, of course, I shall expect you
to talk at meal-times several days in the week.”

“I shall talk French four days of the week and Russian in the remaining
three.”

“Russian?  My dear Miss Hope, no one in the house speaks or understands
Russian.”

“That will not embarrass me in the least,” said Lady Carlotta coldly.

Mrs. Quabarl, to use a colloquial expression, was knocked off her perch.
She was one of those imperfectly self-assured individuals who are
magnificent and autocratic as long as they are not seriously opposed.
The least show of unexpected resistance goes a long way towards rendering
them cowed and apologetic.  When the new governess failed to express
wondering admiration of the large newly-purchased and expensive car, and
lightly alluded to the superior advantages of one or two makes which had
just been put on the market, the discomfiture of her patroness became
almost abject.  Her feelings were those which might have animated a
general of ancient warfaring days, on beholding his heaviest
battle-elephant ignominiously driven off the field by slingers and
javelin throwers.

At dinner that evening, although reinforced by her husband, who usually
duplicated her opinions and lent her moral support generally, Mrs.
Quabarl regained none of her lost ground.  The governess not only helped
herself well and truly to wine, but held forth with considerable show of
critical knowledge on various vintage matters, concerning which the
Quabarls were in no wise able to pose as authorities.  Previous
governesses had limited their conversation on the wine topic to a
respectful and doubtless sincere expression of a preference for water.
When this one went as far as to recommend a wine firm in whose hands you
could not go very far wrong Mrs. Quabarl thought it time to turn the
conversation into more usual channels.

“We got very satisfactory references about you from Canon Teep,” she
observed; “a very estimable man, I should think.”

“Drinks like a fish and beats his wife, otherwise a very lovable
character,” said the governess imperturbably.

“My dear Miss Hope!  I trust you are exaggerating,” exclaimed the
Quabarls in unison.

“One must in justice admit that there is some provocation,” continued the
romancer.  “Mrs. Teep is quite the most irritating bridge-player that I
have ever sat down with; her leads and declarations would condone a
certain amount of brutality in her partner, but to souse her with the
contents of the only soda-water syphon in the house on a Sunday
afternoon, when one couldn’t get another, argues an indifference to the
comfort of others which I cannot altogether overlook.  You may think me
hasty in my judgments, but it was practically on account of the syphon
incident that I left.”

“We will talk of this some other time,” said Mrs. Quabarl hastily.

“I shall never allude to it again,” said the governess with decision.

Mr. Quabarl made a welcome diversion by asking what studies the new
instructress proposed to inaugurate on the morrow.

“History to begin with,” she informed him.

“Ah, history,” he observed sagely; “now in teaching them history you must
take care to interest them in what they learn.  You must make them feel
that they are being introduced to the life-stories of men and women who
really lived—”

“I’ve told her all that,” interposed Mrs. Quabarl.

“I teach history on the Schartz-Metterklume method,” said the governess
loftily.

“Ah, yes,” said her listeners, thinking it expedient to assume an
acquaintance at least with the name.

                                * * * * *

“What are you children doing out here?” demanded Mrs. Quabarl the next
morning, on finding Irene sitting rather glumly at the head of the
stairs, while her sister was perched in an attitude of depressed

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