A recent overnight stay above a noisy, sketchy bar in an English town is recounted for us by Theodore Dalrymple in his weekly Takimag column.

There are few sounds more frightening than that of the English young enjoying themselves. The English, it was once said, take their pleasures sadly; but now they take them loudly, which is far, far worse. Their pleasures are brutish, and the sounds the men emit while experiencing them are indistinguishable from those of a mob indignantly beating someone to death. As for the women, they never speak but they scream, as if being chronically raped.

We would like to wish all of our readers around the world a peaceful and merry Christmas.