Wanted: Time Machine - a Whiff of Foy's 10th Law

Following on from yesterday's posting on the Solo Campaign, and with particular reference to the second week of my Siege of Ciudad Rodrigo, I received a comment which bothered me a little more than I would have expected. For a start, it was something of a put-down - informative in a way which is clearly intended to demonstrate the superiority of the informer rather than to provide help. For another thing, it was anonymous, which I don't care for either, so I didn't publish it. So there.

I am reminded of my old Hooptedoodle note about Foy's Tenth Law, which you can find here if you are interested.

To clarify a point, I am aware that a siege was a complicated process, involving a series of formal, defined steps, a lot of science and received methodology, a load of back-breaking labour and in incredible amount of bravery. I'm certainly not an expert, but I've read enough to understand roughly how it worked. My nameless correspondent felt that my reducing something as "immense" as a siege to a series of "stupid dice rolls and a look-up table" was trivialising an "important and dingified" [sic?] aspect of warfare in a way which he considered to be pathetic. My own irritation is probably at least partly due to my recognising some truth in this(!), but sadly he did not go on to explain how I could have done a more satisfactory job of fitting open-ended sieges into a map campaign with a weekly order-cycle. If you're still out there, my friend, I'd be pleased to hear more.

All wargames are by definition artificial and unrealistic to an extent - a favourite hobbyhorse of mine - otherwise we would not survive them. What we really need, for complete realism, is to be transported back to the actual event and take part in it. I haven't any good ideas how to do that, either, but if Mr Anonymous has, I hope he will take the trouble to stand right on the top of the Great Breach during the height of the action.  

Solo Campaign - Week 16 - CRUNCH!

Well, Sod's Law raises its ugly head yet again. Just when I'm a bit short of time, this week in the campaign throws up two battles, one divisional-sized one at Malpartida, near Almeida, and one of rather more than twice that size at Allariz, south of Orense. Not sure just when I'll get these games played, but it should be within a week or two - I'll publish the updated army returns and a new map when the battles are done.

In the meantime, the Mathematical Siege of Ciudad Rodrigo has undergone its second week, and the French are making a real mess of the fortress. It proves, once again, that all the science in the world is not as useful as lucky dice. 

I haven't written up a narrative summary of Week 16, since it just means writing everything twice (not to mention reading it twice). Here's the nuts-&-bolts report, in exactly the form that I promised not to publish them. 

Old Bridge at Allariz

Week 16

Random Events

None.

Housekeeping

The 3D3 activation throws give Allies 5, French 4 – Allies elect to move first.

As a result of Br.Gen Silveira being sent with the Brunswick hussars to Almeida, temporary command of the fortress garrison at Elvas devolves to Col. De Souza of the Abrantes militia (rating 0).  

Moves

Allies (5 allowed)

1 – Sp D (Maceta, at Talavera) marches to Toledo.

2 – A (Wellington, at Braga) rests his force after the march from Orense.

3 – F (Framlingham, at Elvas) detaches a new force, H, consisting of the Brunswick Hussars under the command of Br.Gen Silveira (rating 1) of the Portuguese service ...

4 – ...and sends them to join Von Alten at Almeida. The first leg of this journey is over a difficult road to Abrantes, the march therefore requires a test:

2D3 = 4 +1 (Silveira’s rating) -1 (brown road) = 4   - the march is completed, but the force arrives tired in Almeida (which means they will suffer a deduction of 1 die in any combat).

Church Parade - the militia at Almeida - not a good turnout

5 – The Tomar battalion of Portuguese militia, plus a regular Portuguese Artillery howitzer battery are detached from the garrison of Almeida (Group F), and join Von Alten’s Group C, in the countryside near Almeida.

You mean go out there and face the French?
(Gunner - 4th Portuguese Artillery)

[Intelligence step –

• no scouting orders]

French (4 allowed)

1 – O (Clauzel) advances into Portugal, from Ciudad Rodrigo (which he may pass through, since the fort is under siege) to Almeida, where he attacks the Anglo-Portuguese Groups C and H (Karl Von Alten)

2 – N (Marmont) marches 1 step from Lugo to Orense. Since this is a difficult road (they are all difficult around here), a test is required:

2D3 = 4 +3 (Marmont’s rating) -1 (brown road) = 6   - the march is completed without problems.

Marmont then attacks Graham’s force (B, and possibly Sp B).

3 – C (D’Orsay’s bde of Bonet’s Divn, Armee du Nord), march from Valladolid to Salamanca.

[Intelligence step -

• no scouting orders]

Supplies and Demoralisation

All units are in supply. No-one is Demoralised.

Contacts

(1) The siege of Ciudad Rodrigo enters its second week.

The medieval chapel on the Malpartida battlefield

(2) Karl Von Alten, with the Anglo-Portuguese Light Division and the 1^st Hussars of the KGL, and now augmented by the Brunswick-Oels Hussars (under Col. Ernst von Schrader – this unit is classed as Tired), the Tomar battalion of Portuguese militia and a Portuguese howitzer battery (these last two units seconded from the Almeida garrison), defends a position on the Almeida road, south of the settlement of Malpartida, within a mile or two of the Portuguese border, but inside Portugal. This position is chosen primarily for political reasons (since he can call on Portuguese militia support, though in the event the dice decree that he receives only a single battalion). The region is high, virtually treeless, and he has a position on a ridge overlooking a small river – so small that it will not appear on the battlefield. A large quarry, dating back to Roman times, is a feature of the field. Von Alten has a total of about 5000 infantry (including 3 battalions of riflemen), 600 cavalry and 12 guns available.

The quarry where they got the stone for the old chapel - might

just get to use CCN's rules for a quarry - always wondered why they were there

He is opposed by Bertrand Clauzel’s Division of the Armee de Portugal, supported by Picquet’s dragoon brigade and two batteries from the reserve artillery of the Armee de Portugal. Altogether 10 battalions of infantry and some 5 squadrons of dragoons (including the formidable 6eme, who recently wrecked Le Marchant’s British heavy brigade), but some of these are understrength, and his force is estimated at 6200 infantry, 400 cavalry and 24 guns, all of heavier calibre than the Allied artillery.

The advanced guards are in contact at dawn on Saturday 9^th May – the Battle of Malpartida, as it will become known, is critically important – if Von Alten loses, Almeida is immediately vulnerable and the road to Lisbon is threatened. Clauzel has the chance to place his army between the besieged town of Ciudad Rodrigo and any relieving force sent by Wellington from Braga.

(3) Marmont’s northern force, advancing from Lugo, is in contact with Graham near Orense. The original agreement between Wellington and the Spanish army was that the town of Orense was to be defended, but Graham has abandoned Orense to the French and adopted a defensive position closer to the Portuguese border, near the village of Allariz.

In this campaign, whenever a Spanish force is required to support an Anglo-Portuguese one, a dice is rolled to check the level of co-ordination. The rule is:

4+           No problems – full co-ordination

3              Spanish force arrives late – 1D6 each turn – 5 or 6 they arrive

2              Spanish force arrives late – 1D6 each turn – 6 they arrive

1              Spanish force does not arrive

In this case the dice came up 2, so the Conde de Espana’s little army, which was quartered around Arabaldo on the River Minho, expecting to be ordered to defend Orense, will take a little while to reach the field. One imagines a little tension between Graham and the Conde, since Graham has retreated almost to the border – I had considered making the Spanish force demoralised, with some deduction from their combat effectiveness, but decided against it on the grounds that an outnumbered Graham has little enough going for him already – I may change my mind again, of course.

Marmont’s army consists of Foy’s Divn and about ¾ of the cavalry of the Armee de Portugal, Guye’s Divn of the Armee du Centre (King Joseph’s Guard and a brigade of Joseph’s Spanish line troops), plus the entire cavalry of the Armee du Nord – about 5 regiments including the 13e Cuirassiers. His total force is estimated at about 17850 men with 24 guns. He has a considerable superiority in cavalry.

Graham, without De Espana, has the Allied First and Seventh Divns, plus the cavalry brigades of Von Bock (KGL dragoons) and Otway (Portuguese). Total is about 11500 men with 12 guns.

De Espana has about 6000 men, of whom a proportion are voluntarios (classed as militia), and 2 batteries, which between them have 10 guns.

The battle of Allariz takes place on Friday 8^th May.

Siege of Ciudad Rodrigo (Week 2)

Bombardment phase: Spanish now have a Garrison Value (GV) of 4, thus roll 4D6 - they come up 6 3 2 1 – the 6 reduces the attackers' Battering Value (BV) by 1, but there are no 5s, so no losses from the besiegers’ Assault Value (AV).

Simultaneously, the French battering guns (BV = 5) roll 5D6 – 6 6 5 3 3 (once again, the French siege batteries are good/lucky) – each 6 deducts one from the defenders’ Fortress Value (FV, the strength of the place itself), and the 5 deducts one from their Garrison Value (GV).

Removing the losses, next week’s figures will be FV = 2, GV = 3 (total = 5) for the Spanish, while AV = 7, BV = 4 for the French. The walls are not looking good – a storm is becoming a distinct possibility, but the French – confident that they have another week before the Allies can interrupt them with any kind of relieving effort – decide to continue bombardment for a further week. They do, however, summon the fortress to surrender. One of Marshal Jourdan’s aides, Col. Alfonse-Maurice-Louis Merveilleux, is sent on 10^th May under a flag of truce with a letter from Jourdan for the governor, General Hermogenes Reixas, requesting that he lower the Spanish flag within one hour. Merveilleux is returned, unharmed, but trussed up with rope, with a dead chicken hanging around his neck. Despite this additional provocation, no storm is attempted.

Casualties for the week: Spanish defenders have lost 1/4 of their GV, so have lost 1/10 x 1/4 of the remaining 2320 men engaged, which is 58 men killed and wounded. Again, loss in combat effectiveness is proportionately far higher, and the walls of the town are in a sorry state. French besiegers suffered no deduction from their AV, so their strength is unchanged at 16330. This does not mean, of course, that no-one was hurt – it simply means that returns from hospital and so forth cancel out any new losses.

Solo Campaign - Weeks 14 & 15

Ciudad Rodrigo

Week 14

Random Events

Everything calm in the British Parliament this week.

Maj Gen RB Long has arrived to take command of the heavy cavalry brigade previously commanded by Le Marchant.

Housekeeping

The 3D3 activation throws give Allies 6, French 6 – since they moved first last week, French elect to do so again.

Moves

French (6 allowed)

1 – Group H (Clauzel, with 6700 men of AdP) to march from Zamora to Salamanca

2 – Group M (D’Armagnac, with 6400 of AdC) to do the same

3 – Group K (Marshal Jourdan, with 11200 from AdP and AdC) to march from Avila to Salamanca

4 – Group K to scout into Ciudad Rodrigo area

5 – Groups H & M to merge with K, all under command of Jourdan.

[Intelligence step -

• Jourdan learns only that there are Allied forces in the area around Ciudad Rodrigo, and the gunners at Rodrigo itself fired at his cavalry patrol!]

Allies (6 allowed)

1 – C (Von Alten, at Ciudad Rodrigo) retreats into Portugal, at Almeida.

2 – Sp D (Maceta, at Ciudad Rodrigo) must dice to see if he will enter Portugal with Von Alten, in contradiction of his orders from the Junta de Castilla. In fact, he rolls a 2, which means he will follow his orders (Maceta is rated 2), so his force separates from the British and marches south to Caceres.

3 – A (Wellington, at Lugo) orders a march to join Cotton at Orense. This involves a difficult (brown) road, so requires a test

2D3 = 4 +3 (Wellington’s rating) -1 (brown road) = 6   - the march is completed without problems.

4 – Group E (Cotton) now merges with A.

[Intelligence step –

• no scouting orders]

 

Supplies and Demoralisation

All units are in supply. No-one is Demoralised.

Contacts

None.

Narrative

Joined by the forces from Zamora under Clauzel and D’Armagnac, Jourdan enters Salamanca, his total strength now being 25300 men, including the siege train and engineers of the Armee de Portugal.

Karl Von Alten, with the Anglo-Portuguese Light Division, retires into Portugal – to Almeida – to avoid confrontation with this much larger force. Maceta, with the Spanish force from the Junta de Castilla attached to Von Alten, is prevented from entering Portugal by his orders, and thus separates from the British, in spite of their requests that he should not do so, and retires southwards to Caceres.

The Spanish garrison at Rodrigo, under General Hermogenes Reixas, are now unprotected, and expect to be attacked very soon.

Wellington, with the Anglo-Portuguese main army marches south over difficult roads without problem, joining Cotton’s troops at Orense.

Maj.Gen Long has now arrived to take over Le Marchant’s heavy brigade. 

Week 15

Random Events

Change in rule – test will be made on British Parliament around 15^th of each month, rather than weekly as at present.

Housekeeping

The 3D3 activation throws give Allies 5, French 7 –French elect to move first.

Moves

French (7 allowed)

1 – K (Jourdan, at Salamanca) advances to Ciudad Rodrigo...

2 – ...where a new Group O is split off, consisting of Clauzel’s Divn of the Armee de Portugal, with Picquet’s dragoon brigade and 2 batteries from the reserve artillery, a total of 6600 men with 24 guns

3 – K commences siege operations against Rodrigo

4 – N (Marmont) marches 1 step from Leon to Lugo. Since this is a difficult road, a test is required

2D3 = 5 +3 (Marmont’s rating) -1 (brown road) = 7   - the march is completed without problems.

5 – C (D’Orsay’s bde of Bonet’s Divn, Armee du Nord), march from Sahagun to Valladolid.

[Intelligence step -

• no scouting orders]

Allies (5 allowed)

1 – Sp D (Maceta, at Caceres) marches to Talavera.

2 – A (Wellington, at Orense) scouts into Braga...

3 – ...and into Lugo.

4 – Finding a large French force at Lugo, he divides Group A, splitting off a new Group B, under Lt Gen Sir Thomas Graham, comprising the First & Seventh Divns, with Bock’s KGL dragoon bde and Otway’s Portuguese cavalry – a total of 11530 men with 12 guns. This force, together with Sp B (Espana) will remain at Orense...

5 – while the remainder of Wellington’s Group A march south into Braga. Again, this is a difficult road, so a test is needed:

2D3 = 2(!) +3 (Wellington’s rating) -1 (brown road) = 4   - the march is completed, but the army is Tired, and must rest at Braga.

[Intelligence step –

• A (Wellington) gets a Detailed Report on Marmont’s force at Lugo, helped by information from civilian spies – he is aware of both strength and composition]

Supplies and Demoralisation

Note: By abandoning Sahagun, the French give up the right to route supplies from France through that Area, so all such supplies now come through Burgos. All units are in supply. No-one is Demoralised.

Contacts

The French force under Marshal Jourdan commences siege operations against Ciudad Rodrigo.

Siege of Ciudad Rodrigo (Week 1)

Initial Fortress Value (FV) is 6 – which is also the max size of the garrison. Reixas (commander, rating 2) has 1 line battalion plus 2 of militia, plus 3 batteries of 8 guns each, one of these batteries being of militia calibre. Counting ½ each for the militia – Garrison Value (GV) is 4½ - say 5 - and since Reixas is officially rated as 2 (Good), add 1, giving 6.

Attackers – Jourdan’s force consists of 34 combat units, of which 4 are cavalry and count ½ each; this gives a total of 32. Dividing by 4 gives Jourdan an Assault Value (AV) of 8, plus 1 since Jourdan rates as 2 (Good). The French siege train has 5 batteries of heavy guns, so the Battering Value (BV) = 5.

So, at the outset, Spanish defenders have FV = 6, GV = 6, French besiegers have AV = 9, BV = 5.

Bombardment phase: Spanish have GV of 6, thus roll 6D6 - they come up 5 5 4 3 2 1 – no 6s, so no damage is done to the attackers' BV, but the two 5s cause a deduction of 2 from the attacking troops’ AV

Simultaneously, the French battering guns (BV = 5) roll 5D6 – 6 6 5 5 2 (remarkable shooting) – each 6 deducts one from the fortress (FV), and each 5 deducts one from the garrison (GV).

Removing the losses, next week’s figures will be FV = 4, GV = 4 (total = 8) for the Spanish, while AV = 7, BV = 5 for the French. The French do not bother asking the fortress to surrender, since their AV of 7 is not promising for a storm against the defenders’ (FV + GV) = 8. No storm.

Casualties for the week: Spanish defenders have lost 2/6 of their GV, so have lost 1/10 x 1/3 of the 2400 men engaged, which is 80 men. Loss in combat effectiveness is proportionately much higher. French besiegers have lost 2/9 of their AV, so have lost 1/10 x 2/9 of the 16700 men engaged, which is 370 killed/wounded.

Narrative

Jourdan has divided his army – Clauzel has a covering force, while the remainder have now started the siege of Ciudad Rodrigo. Brisk fire from the garrison coupled with the unhygienic conditions in the trenches have caused the French fairly high casualties, but the French siege guns have performed extremely well, doing much damage to the fortress and the morale of the garrison.

Marmont has moved his army to Lugo, where he can now threaten Wellington from the north, with the option of marching to La Coruna and threatening the Allied supply base at Vigo. Wellington has a very accurate idea of Marmont’s strength and movements, and has detached Thomas Graham with the Anglo-Portuguese First and Seventh Divisions, with the cavalry brigades of Otway and Von Bock. Graham is to hold position at Orense, with support from the Conde de Espana’s Spanish army.

Wellington marched the rest of his force south to Braga. Once again, the roads were difficult, but the army did not fare well [awful dice] – the march was completed in good enough order, but Wellington’s force are tired and must rest for a week.

Col D’Orsay, with a brigade from Bonet’s Division of the Armee du Nord, has moved from Sahagun to Valladolid. This has implications for the routing of French supplies from Bayonne, which must now all come through Burgos.

Maceta’s Castillan army has orders to return to Toledo, and has reached Talavera.

More New Troops - More Spanish Officers

The recipe is as before, except these fellows are mounted on what in Scotland are traditionally known as "cuddies". The recipe? - something like 80% Jorg Schmaeling, 1% superglue, 19% coffee. If they'd all been destined for the same unit I would have varied the horse colours a bit, but it's not worth the bother at one horse per regiment - no-one will notice. It just means that, in addition to the officers clearly all being brothers, their horses are brothers too.

New Falcatas for June include these

My plans for completing my Spanish army may be about to change again, since Falcata have announced some new General Staff figures for June, plus an assortment of new Peninsular War offerings - including light infantry in bicornes and marching militia in round hats. Oh, well.

New Troops - Spanish Officers

To celebrate my release from eBay packing duties, I got the first six of my converted Spanish infantry officers finished while listening to the Champions League Final this evening. There are four mounted colleagues for them which are about half done, but all the rank & file of the six new units are still to come back from the painter, so I have a couple of days to get them done.

The chaps in the picture were originally Art Miniaturen Dutch-Belgians, and they now have various new hats and heads attached. I'm pleased with them - something very satisfying about non-catalogue figures in your army.

Where the Heck was I?

Today I was going to do a little post on my new Spanish line officers, but sadly I haven't finished painting them, so that will have to wait a day or so. I was also going to write up the next week of the solo campaign, but I haven't got the housekeeping sorted out yet, so that will have to wait as well.

One of the things which has taken up time in the last couple of weeks is the auction of various Historex items which I volunteered to sell on eBay to raise money for cancer charities. Since I volunteered I can hardly complain about the hassle, but it has reminded me of the amount of labour needed to sell stuff on eBay, especially if you are as verbose as I am when it comes to the listings. Then there's all the questions to answer, and all the peeking to see if anyone else is watching or bidding yet...

Everything is sold now - some 100 unopened kits from the 1970s, plus a collection of 60-odd finished figures. Some things I learned about Historex during the last few weeks:

(1) The interest is very substantially from outside the UK - most of the items have sold to buyers in Italy, Germany, France and the USA. Unfortunately, because of the weight, I could not offer the big collection of complete figures outside the UK, though most of the questions and interest I got came from overseas. In particular, the insured shipping cost of the 2Kg+ parcel to the USA worked out at about £90, which is crazy.

(2) Maybe predictably, the kits generated much more interest than the completed figures - there seems to be more interest in building them than purchasing someone else's efforts, however good. That shouldn't have been a surprise, I think.

(3) The completed figures are horrifyingly fragile - you dare not sneeze near them, and some of them will hardly support their own weight. A challenge - even for a fastidious (fusspot) packer like me. (I love the sound of bubblewrap in the morning.)

Anyway, they are all sold and mailed now - one or two still have to be formally accepted as safely received, but shipping has been remarkably quick. One small packet to Indianapolis arrived in a little over 2 days, which is fantastic. I have to make a detailed breakdown of proceeds-less-expenses, since I have to pay the net amount over to the charity, so I have been more than usually focused on the fees charged by eBay and PayPal. Man, they are not cheap. OK - I'm not really grousing - there is no other easy way to sell stuff like this, but the 10% completion fees on eBay really add up. However, I'm delighted to say that - assuming the last few items have arrived safely and we don't get into any disputes, we should have raised about £730 for the charity, so I'm very pleased with that.

It fairly knocked a hole in the time available for painting and other hobby stuff, though.

Next topic. I wrote a post not long ago about my apparent weakness for big shiny wargame books, and how they are usually not as useful as they might look. Well, I did it again. Having already bought and browsed Wargames Foundry's Napoleon rule book (great title, by the way, guys), I had decided against looking at Warlord Games Black Powder publication, which looked like another of the same sort of figure-promotion-disguised-as-rules jobs.

However, a few people whose judgement I have a lot of respect for have played the game and made positive noises about it. The most guarded comment I have heard was from John C, who said the game he played was "the most excellent fun, but had very little to do with Napoleonic warfare". So, when I got the chance of a good, cheap, second hand copy, I bought it, and it has been my bedtime reading this week - it is a bit large and heavy to be ideal for bedtime reading, and it also tends to hit the floor with an alarming thump when I doze off, but it has been most enjoyable.

It is refreshing to read a wargames book which appears to have been written by adults who have a nice way with humour and who can actually write both entertainingly and grammatically, and without getting unpleasantly nerdy or giving in to the temptation to slag other people's efforts. Anyway, the book is entertaining, the game looks like a lot of fun, and a few bells rang.

For a start, all ranges, moves and everything else are given in multiples of 6 inches - Ding! - hexes, I thought. I'm not sure if I intend to rush to try the rules - I think I'd like to sit in on someone else's game first. Fat chance around here. One slight difficulty I have is that, since the book is written in a nice, conversational style, there isn't a formal statement of scales and so on - or at least I didn't find one. The illustrated scenarios seem to be played with 28mm figures (as you would expect) on a 6-feet-by-12 table (and no-one expected that...), but they do not appear to be very large games, in the sense of numbers of units.

Anybody played Black Powder? Any views on what size of battle it works for? What did you think of it? I realise a lot of people use these rules, but I hadn't really considered them before. They look practical, and I like the simple, commonsense approach - anyone like to offer a brief critique?

If you'd like to invite me to watch a game, I'll be delighted - please just send the return air fare and I'll bring some beer.

Hooptedoodle #53 - The Dreaded Small Print

This is intended to be an observation rather than a rant - I state this right at the start in case you cannot tell the difference.

I think my theme is basically the counter-productive effect of our modern dedication to Health & Safety. All the warnings printed on everyday items, all the overcomplicated messages printed on product packaging, all the safety stuff in user manuals, all those crazy garbled codas on radio adverts for financial services - all that - be aware that no-one actually cares whether you hurt yourself, or suffer financial loss, or even die. This is not to say that they wish you any harm, of course, but their main concern - you could say obsession - is to ensure you do not blame them or try to get any money out of them if something goes wrong.

I recently bought a new flat-screen TV, which came with a very thick owner manual. Being very careful to keep my back straight when I lifted the manual, I found that it was printed in 17 languages, including Arabic and Slovene. The remaining 8 pages in English started off with 5 sides of safety information, including details of how to dispose safely of the item and its packaging, a surprising amount of detail about the risks of epileptic seizure if I watched the thing, and solemn advice about not watching it underwater, or on top of a mountain in a thunderstorm. Whatever goes wrong, they have told me about it in 17 languages, so what's my problem? Sadly, the manual did not explain how to edit the tuned channels, or configure the DVD player, and was very sketchy about quite a few other practical operational matters. This is partly explained by the fact that the manual is issued with a whole range of very different models, and so can only refer in general terms to some topics. In truth, the TV is fine, once you poke around with the menus and stuff, but, basically, the manual says:

"Congratulations on buying this TV. We think it's quite a good TV - don't do anything daft with it, and further instructions on anything that isn't intuitive about the operation might have been found at the following internet URL if we hadn't moved it 2 years ago. If anything goes wrong, or you hurt yourself, don't bother getting in touch - our legal department is bigger than our technical development section."

And it says this in 17 languages. One reason why these documents have to be so multilingual was made clear to me some years ago when the previous Mme Foy recruited the services of a student to help with the housework. If there is any implication of a fantasy au pair in a short overall, forget it - this girl was not of that breed, and her main qualification for the job was that she was penniless and Mme felt sorry for her. Maria didn't understand how to use the vacuum cleaner, or how to do much else, as far as I could see. The arrangement lasted some 5 weeks, until the Great Bath Disaster. Because she had poor eyesight, and was Spanish, she had problems with printed English instructions on packages, and one morning she cleaned the bath with a cleaner which said, in small print on the package, "Caution: not suitable for enamel baths". Remarkably, she must have put an unusual amount of energy into cleaning that bath, because she turned it into a horrible, matt-finished, piebald item which had to be replaced - could not be rescued. It was about 4 years old, and it cost something like £1500 to remove it, replace it and restore the bathroom to a proper state. Neither the cleaner manufacturer nor my insurer were the slightest bit interested in sharing the financial grief, since the product package said clearly it was unsuitable for enamel baths - assuming you had very good eyesight and could read English - and that got everyone off the hook. This was about 20 years ago, and £1500 bought a lot of food and beer in those days.

I confess that in some ways I am a slow learner, but I took due note of the incident. The warnings are not there to help the customer - primarily, they are there to protect the manufacturer.

What brings it all to mind this morning is that, once again, I find that the present Comtesse Foy - bless her - has put interesting bottles of new products in the shower. Some of them may be familiar items with new packaging - I wouldn't really know, mostly, but I had better be sure to do a little label-reading to be on the safe side. It might seem astonishingly remiss - even eccentric - but I tend not to wear my spectacles in the shower - is that unusual? - I wouldn't have thought so. Whatever, it is not unknown for me to attempt to wash my hair with skin cream or bathe with something which turns out to be hair conditioner. It hasn't got any worse than that, but the scope for disaster is impressive - chilling, even. If a new green plastic squeezy bottle appears on the shower shelf, there is no immediate way that I can identify what it is unless they give me some very large print and maybe some pictures. It could be a new German shampoo containing caffeine, which is fine - Mme Foy is a tireless researcher - or it could be Mr Muscle's Extra Strong Barbecue Cleaner. I wouldn't know. Taking a shower can be a major act of trust.

Of course, it could be that the legal requirement to print all those disclaimers and warnings on the label in microscopic fonts leaves no room for pictures. There is probably even a message that says, "If you can't read this, it isn't our problem - have a nice day."