Some people think Surgeon’s Biscuit is the name of a town near Kakadamm. Others believe it is an old parlour game popular in the boarding houses of seaside resorts during the 1930s. There are those who suspect it to be the name of a racehorse, or perhaps a racing pigeon, or some other bird or beast of swiftness. Surgeon’s Biscuit is, of course, none of these things. It is simply a biscuit that belonged to a surgeon.
But what a biscuit! And what a surgeon! As biscuits go, it was the finest specimen the surgeon had ever seen. Two thirds of the way down a perfectly ordinary-looking packet of digestive crumblies, there it nestled, a numinous, almost golden thing, some quirk in its baking making it unutterably different from its fellows in the batch. He remembered when he first handled it. He was not a man to transfer his newly-purchased biscuits into a so-called “biscuit tin” or similar container. He ate them straight from the packet, as he had been brought up to do by his rough, tough parents in their rough, tough hovel, who can never have expected little Vladimir to grow up to become an important surgeon.
- A note to our Chinese listeners
- Google.dbsn ( This exciting new search engine can be found on the Hooting Yard Web Page)
- Blotzmann’s Compartment Controversy
- Vox Pop: A Pang Hill Orphan Speaks
- Tiny Little Hands, Decisive Moustachios
- Another Vlasto (Vlasto Cuddy)
- Surgeon’s Biscuit
- Fifty Years Ago (Dobson on the Radio)
This episode was recorded on 1st Febuary 2006.
