It’s not always easy to make head or tail of this book, which is fair enough since it’s the tale of a head – a skull to be precise – and a few other bones. At least that is what is suggested by the title and subtitle of the book, though for much of the time it might just as well be a story about a cock and a bull, or about the hunting of a Snark.

When the skeleton in question was on active service it belonged to Tom Paine, who was born to a Quaker family in Norfolk in 1737 and died in New York in 1809. Between those dates he produced numerous pamphlets and books. In Rights of Man he eloquently defended the French