Acid reign

You won’t believe me when I tell you this but I swear it’s the truth: until this week, I had never watched Downton Abbey(Sunday, ITV). Some old-fashioned notion about not respecting myself the morning after? A curious primness preventing me from just gritting my teeth and getting it over with? Yes to both — and yes to a touch of anti-bandwagon mulishness (which has, no doubt, kept me from so many of life’s little treats).

My lack of experience might have counted against my enjoyment of Sunday night’s episode — the first of a third series — were it not for the skill of Julian Fellowes who, like the perfect host, makes it his business to welcome one and all to the party at whatever inconvenient time they might turn up expecting to be entertained. Late arrivals are not chastised for their rudeness or their poor timekeeping but are found a chair, introduced to everyone, put at their ease and made to feel at home.