Spoilt for choice

When I was a child Bristol was a port somewhere beyond Kent. Later on I discovered that in the plural — as in a nice pair of — it referred, mystifyingly, to mammalian tissue. Why not a nice pair of Wolverhamptons or Plymouths or Canterburys? But when I became a man I put away childish notions and ceased to see life as in a showroom window, darkly: I learnt that real Bristols were cars.

I particularly liked the svelte, curvaceous beauties of the Forties and Fifties (the cars, that is), though subsequently my taste extended through later, straighter models as far as the elegantly understated 411 (1969–76), where it stops. Twice I came close to buying a Bristol, once journeying to Cheshire to view a 403, another time venturing into Surrey in quest of a 405 (1955–58). The latter are my favourites, the only four-door car the company has made. For a while I worried that its putative tail fins — presumably a nod in the direction of the massively finned American cars of the period, or could they just possibly contribute to its impressive aero-dynamics? — spoiled the rounded rear, but now I think they set it off nicely.