h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I'm still floundering. The grain silo, and all the famous people lead us to Boswell? Is that right? Are the croquet balls just any old croquet balls, or are they in a specific place? If so, has that place been identified? Ditto for the groceries.

>>It really is quite an ordinary thing although most of us do it differently today<<

Keeping in touch, phone calls etc. Early type of facebook requiring croquet balls and a sharp quill.

Croquet was the first MMPORG.

I don't know.

>>> Keeping in touch, phone calls etc. <<<<

Definite link there HD DGI+1 for that

>>> The grain silo, and all the famous people lead us to Boswell? <<<
Yes.

>>> Are the croquet balls just any old croquet balls. <<<
Yes.
>>> or are they in a specific place? If so, has that place been identified?<<<
No not exactly but it has been mentioned in passing by me

>>> Ditto for the groceries. <<<

The groceries were purchased in Boulogne in the late 1830's.

">>> Keeping in touch, phone calls etc. <<<<

Definite link there HD DGI+1 for that "

lost all my thoughts careless press of keyboard...

So some sort of message/announcement on the Bag (unless Bag is just the beginning of a type of bread which is a sure Klaxon given French Groceries, and no, as KM has said its not food).

And in the late 1830s this is nothing to do with Queen Victoria (thinking along the lines of ascending to the throne, anouncement in Paper...)

OK, what do we know about the Men mentioned so far:
Samuel Johnson - Wrote a Dictionary (and a Diary?)
James Cook - Famous Explorer "discovered" Australia (previously "discovered" by the Dutch, but thought it wasn't worth colonising, for some reason)
Voltaire - French Philosopher (?)
Dr. John Pringle - Doctor, Philosopher and inventor of potato crisps (urgh I sense a Klaxon on this levity)
Boswell - only Boswells I know are in the sitcom Bread... but from the thread I take it he was a Biographer of Johnson

Grain Silo - what do you do with a Grain Silo - store grain in it - what do you do with Grain - make bread?, Make alcoholic Beverages , distill these to make , or other .

Who invented Grain Silo? - Voltaire?

Croquet balls have been around for ages (1600 + at least) but Croquet (as a game called Croquet) has only been around since 1860s...

So it has to be a non standard use of croquet balls - as Cannon Balls? In the game of Boules?

again.

>>> So some sort of message/announcement on the Bag (unless Bag is just the beginning of a type of bread which is a sure Klaxon given French Groceries, and no, as KM has said its not food).<<<

DGI+1 for bag although the groceries were not wrapped up in a bag.

">>> Keeping in touch, phone calls etc. <<<<"

That's the clue and the direction to solving this

All the men you mention, indeed everything in the original QI is linked by this and it will lead to the final two answers (eventually )


Oh and yes your right to expect one... for crisps...
Dr. John Pringle - Doctor, Philosopher and inventor of potato crisps (urgh I sense a Klaxon on this levity)

Off to bed now, back later tonight when I wake up....

OK, groceries were wrapped up in paper of some sort- maybe an old newspaper (would make sense) but surely not a 100 year old newspaper?

Were they even around in 1730s? Actually pretty sure they were - Newspapers were where diaries got printed, and Dickens had his stories published (in the Times?)...


Or maybe the Newspaper was 100 years old that year.. Nope that doesn't make sense...

But that isn't what you use to communicate personally, which is the implication of ">>> Keeping in touch, phone calls etc. <<<<"

So it has to be a letter, from one of the above to another of the above?

Or possible about one or all of the above?

Frustrating, isn't it?

A hundred year old letter....

Voltaire well known for his correspondence, Johnson equally so?

Don't know enough about Boswell, or Pringle.

Cook... No...

Recipe?

If the letter's in France, it must have been sent by or to Voltaire. To Voltaire would make most sense (s to look over thread again to see who would have been corresponding with ZoZo in 1730s...)

knowing that Originals was an Anagram, and knowing that "in a" is usually cryptic crossword for anagram or similar:

"In a Karachi summer, no, issued forth." Sounds like another anagram or word within words to me but what? Certainly Cryptic Xword type clue....

Life... (no Life clues been solved but...) Maybe the Letter was something to do with a Biography of Voltaire by Boswell?

Ok... Maybe when Boswell wrote the biog of Johnson and sent some pages to Voltaire, which got used to wrap up some groceries a hundred years later. Then the rest of the biog got lost in the grain silo (why did it end up there)?


I guess if the British officer realised this it would thrill him...

Don't go away I'm writing up an explanation

2 hours into sleep and I couldn't so I thought I'd check (need glasses that's what I need)

Well ABTD, you've theorised your way into almost solving things and are that close that it would be churlish of me not to award a DGI+3 !

Letters and manuscripts and diary entries and journal entries is what links all these men to Boswell.
Letters to Boswell and from him and letters to Dr Johnson from other people who corresponded with him which Boswell had in his possession from which he garnered information for his biography of Dr Johnson called 'The Life of Samuel Johnston', this is the 'Life' in question here and it's manuscript long thought lost was found in the grain silo.
Boswell met the ageing Voltaire and corresponded with him, his letter and Boswells retelling of thier meeting is found in his letters and journals.
Boswell wrote up his journals on a regular basis and he kept everything that he wrote or letter that he received during his lifetime. It is an enormous amount of material by any standard

1830 in France and a English officer bought some vegetables from a grocer and was shocked to find that the paper was actually manuscript letters bearing Boswell's name and he rather excitedly asked if she had any more and she said yes as she hadn't used them all up yet!

So that is the provenance of the '100 year old groceries'

The croquet balls are another link similarly and there are points if you can guess it.


More explanation is in order here:


Carrying on from the officer in 1830 (I did try to point people in the direction of the officer and Captain Cook by earlier hinting that 'rank' was a good thing to follow up on).
Now for 70 years these letters which were published in 1856 were the most important existing biographical tool, apart from Boswell's published writings.
Boswell's hereditary estate Auchinleck in Scotland remained unoccupied after 1884 after the death of his last descendant from the male line. The daughter of this descendant married the Irish peer, the fifth Lord De Malahide, and took up residence at Malahide Castle near Dublin. Auchinleck remained unoccupied until it was sold in 1920. Starting in 1905 the Lord and Lady began to empty Auchinleck of the family papers(Boswell's) and they took an interest in Boswell's journals and actually began to type them out but leaving out the more scandalous passages_ with a view to publication. No one was interested.
For years these papers lay undisturbed in Malahide; enter a Yale Professor who was the world's leading Boswell scholar. He wrote in 1921 to the then sixth Lord Talbot asking if he had any Boswell manuscripts? He was blandly denied access but went on to publish his milestone edition of Boswells letters in 1924, believing that most of the journals had been destroyed.
In 1924 the Lord married and his wife tried to have the journals published but again no interest was shown but rumours of their existence had leaked out and the leading American collector of Johnsonia, picked up the scent and sent the Yale Professor to Malahide to to secure the journals against 'all comers'.
The American Consul-General and a local archdeacon helped the Prof to get an invite for tea at Malahide in 1925. His heart leapt when he was shown the Oak Room and his eyes fell on the black ebony cabinet ( which it was already known) containing the journals. He said later that he felt like Sinbad in the valley of rubies when he opened one of the drawers, crammed with papers, "in the wildest confusion". The Prof realised that 'a new day had dawned for Boswellians'. Lady Talbot assured the Prof that there were, in addition, two cases of papers from Auchinleck that they had not opened yet. On the spot he offered to edit whatever there was but Lady Talbot declined and he left empty handed.

Exit the Prof and enter Lieut.-Col. Ralph Heyward Isham (another reason for mentioning 'rank'). Isham was an avid book collector of limited means. After several unsuccessful attempts to meet with the Talbots he finally visited Malahide in 1926, he was a charming, dashing figure of 35 and his charm worked on the Lady and she said she would ask the lord to sell the letters for 10,000 pounds: He wanted the journals more than the letters and he said he would pay that amount for them both. Lord Talbot would not hear of selling the journals.

She later wrote to Isham inviting him back to Malahide and they spent several days going through everything but the journals and agreed on a price of 13,585 pounds.
The collection was remarkable: about 150 letters from Boswell; over 200 to him from the likes of Burke, Burns, Johnson, Goldsmith, Sir Walter Scott, Rousseau, and Voltaire.
There was the complete manuscript of his, Account of Corsica (my clue of 'Corsica someone' was not immediately taken up by anyone but I tried) and a very small amount of the MS of Life of Johnson, this was the disappointing part: where was the rest of the 'Life' ? They concluded that it had been destroyed.

Isham wrote the cheque and left with one of the choicest treasures in English literary history - the entire Malahide Boswell collection except for the journals.The Talbot's agreed to give him publishing rights as well.


Now you know part of the story of this QI.


We are now left with the main questions and a minor point dealing with croquet balls.

In a Karachi summer, no, issued forth.

Something declined; what by whom?

Hints are available on request to get the ball rolling on this. The above partial explanation contains some general pointers towards the resolution.


I'm going back to bed now(hopefully to sleep it's 1am here) and if there is any inconsistencies in the above explanation then I'll sort it when I'm wide awake

well isham is in "Karachi summer"
leaving
karc umer

mark cure

does this help- at all?

Mark Isham Cure - Oh for a quick Google...

Mark Isham sounds like a name - cure is a band.

[I am sure I should know this, but... who are/were the members of the cure?]

But then say Mark Isham Cure is the right "anagram" what does:

"no, issued forth" mean..

Not that Mark Isham? Not Mark Isham - but lt Col Isham - issued forth could mean published....

But then we need to know what was declined and by who....

Something was turned down? Maybe one's inheritance, if Mark Isham was Ralph Isham's son and turned down his inheritance... Maybe a publishing deal was turned down?

Or maybe Mark Isham had a disease, and turned down the cure to that disease (maybe a transplant?) this would be in the right era at least, if Ralph found the papers in the 1920s his son could have been in 30s or 40s when first transplants were being done... (amazing what blind alleys you can go down if you get the chance...)

Wishing KM were awake...

I reckon its got to be someone called Mark Isham turning down a cure for a disease or something, or an award?

The word No, issued forth, could just be Mark Isham saying no to an award or a cure, or something completely different...

Croquet balls, where the heck to these fit in....

Is there an award made out of Croquet balls - or is this another anagram?

Croquet Balls

Baroque
Ct lls

Rubella
Coqt s

Troubles
Cq al

Quotable
Cr ls

Racquet
o Blls


Crustal
oqe Bl


Croquet Balls

BTW does the title have to have anything to do with the answer?

Thinks - the only thing left to work out is how the stuff got into the grain silo/how it was discovered in there. Loose end croquet balls...

Maybe someone was playing croquet a ball hit the silo, made a funny noise (as Silo was meant to be empty) and someone investigated.... Doesn't feel right though...

Or more papers were discovered due to Croquet Balls? Not those in the silo?

Must do work now...