Low life | 13 July 2017 | The Spectator

The hen party was seated at an outside restaurant table under the plane trees when I arrived. They sat with straight backs conversing normally, looked cool and lovely, and everything appeared seemly. Yet it was now ten o’clock on their first night on tour. They seemed unusually glad to see their chauffeur; apart from this, there was nothing to suggest that they were even slightly drunk. Appearances might have been deceptive, however, for they were all of them privately and expensively educated young women.

I was bidden to be seated and offered a glass of wine, which I accepted. I sat and sipped and listened to their chatter. That something or somebody was ‘cute’ or ‘insane’ appeared to be the highest possible accolade. Men and maleness were beyond a joke. We were not only irrelevant, we were on the way out. Another staple topic was menstruation. Here I was able to contribute the interesting snippet of information that French slang for beginning a period, roughly translated, is, ‘the redcoats are disembarking’ — ‘redcoats’ being British regiments, I explained, rather than Butlins entertainers.