British to American translation needed

[BonnieL]

I'm reading a Dorothy Sayers mystery and found myself puzzled by a phrase. In the 87 years since the book was published, meanings might have changed, but someone might know what she meant by it.

Here's the sentence:

"It was a small alley, rather than a street, containing nothing but the back-entrances of some warehouses and a public convenience."

What's a "public convenience"? Is it, as it seems to me, a public toilet? Which seems odd as she doesn't mention bathrooms or toilets anywhere else in the book.

[tony h]

You are quite right it is a public toilet. This is at a time when toilets may still not have been available in all buildings. It gives an added sense of - not being a place one venture after dark.


Which book?

[BonnieL]

The Five Red Herrings. It's a good mystery, but a strange story. So far she's eliminated 2 of the 5 suspects, so don't tell me whodunit!

[tony h]

The Five Red Herrings. It's a good mystery, but a strange story. So far she's eliminated 2 of the 5 suspects, so don't tell me whodunit!

Enjoy. Just for some local colour, the book was written in 1931 (I looked that up), and is set in Galloway. In the early '70s I used to go and stay with an uncle on the Galloway Ayreshire border. He was a small farmer (the farm was small and so was he). The house was a traditional stone basement and the living quarters above in wood. In the cold the cattle were herded into the basement where their bodies and the warmth of the resultant dung heap heated and perfumed the living area. There was no plumbing. Water was drawn from the well (now fitted with a hand pump) and waste went onto the composting heap.


Maybe the notice of a "public convenience" was to show the sophistication of the town.

P.S. It reminds me that Mahatma Gandhi had some campaign about being able to "spend a penny" in England but not in India - but I can't quite remember what it was all about. A penny was the coin that allowed entrance to a coin operated public convenience. Thus to " spend a penny" means to go to the toilet.

[Erik_Kowal]

Is one of the five red herrings the possibility that there might actually be six of them?

[Bobinwales]

They have them in India too.
https://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/ph ... /476957729

[gdwdwrkr]

...and free of the admission-charge....Mahatma is a penny richer.
But wait, only editors may use it, according to the sign.