NOW the last thing I would like to appear is uncharitable. Mrs C and I cough up the odd copper or two to our favourite deserving causes and they shall remain anonymous: what consenting adults do is a matter for them.

But I do have to confess that, as Christmas approaches, I am beginning to suffer from what the sociologists and the likes are calling "charity fatigue".

In other words, I am getting right brassed off with the thick envelopes that land on my welcome mat every morning asking for money.

Not by the fact that they need money - don't we all? - but the way in which they ask for it.

For some of the bigger, flashier, charities seem to have substituted gentile begging with tactics verging on outright blackmail.

Time was when a nice old lady knocked on your door, smiled sweetly, and held out a collection tin. Dick Turpin himself never gained such results, even with a pair of flintlock pistols pointed at his victims' throats.

Today, charity has become a profession: you can see ads for fundraisers in some of the posher papers every week and the salaries on offer are not bad, either.

With them, this new breed of professionals have brought the tricks of the trade of spin doctors, PR men, and the more ruthless elements of the junk mail trade.

As often as not, when you pick up that thick envelope saying Free Gift Inside, it comes from a charity whose name is given only in minute print on the back.

If you have the lack of judgement to open it, you will find a cheap ballpoint pen... and a request to fill in a form to help the charity's market research analysts.

Do that and you can keep the pen. And if, in the meantime, you care to send back a donation cheque, so much the better.

Now I personally would rather stick red hot needles under my finger nails than fill in a form. Any form. To have to pay for the honour of doing so is an outrage.

But, you see, you have already opened the envelope and taken out the "free" pen.

Too late! The jaws of the trap have sunk into your heartstrings and can only be released by the judicious sweep of your pen over your cheque book.

You have become a victim to what the money men call inertia selling.

Although Mrs C is not entirely convinced of this, I have now created a simply defence mechanism to this trade. I merely mark any suspicious envelope "Return to Sender" and drop it in the postbox. Inland Revenue, please forgive me.

The Vicar caught me at it the other day outside the post office and his accusing look made me stammer out a somewhat guilty confession. To my surprise, the Rev Rupert nodded in agreement.

"Funnily enough," he said, "I have been thinking on rather similar lines myself. Could you spare me a few minutes of your time to discuss a certain project..."

As I write this, the Rev Rupe is sitting in our kitchen whilst Mrs C waits for the kettle to boil. Something is afoot and, I fear, it is going to cost me a pretty penny.

But then, one can hardly mark the Vicar "Return to Sender" can one? His boss might not be best pleased.

*The Curmudgeon is a satirical column based on a fictitious character in a mythical village.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.