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 A FOOL'S PARADISE
 
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 Rhymes of the East, and 
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 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 BY 
 DUM-DUM 
 
 AUTHOR OF ' THE CRACKLING OF THORNS ' 
 
 ' RHYMES OF THE EAST ' 
 
 1 IN THE HILLS ' 
 
 ETC. 
 
 LONDON 
 CONSTABLE AND COMPANY LTD. 
 
 IO ORANGE STREET, LEICESTER SQUARE 
 IQIO
 
 NOTE 
 
 MOST of these verses are reprinted (in a 
 more or less altered form) from Maga 
 and Punch. My acknowledgments are 
 due to Mr. WILLIAM BLACKWOOD and 
 Messrs. BRADBURY AND AGNEW. 
 
 JOHN KENDALL 
 
 990756
 
 WARNING 
 
 It is the poet* s part 
 
 The stormy soul to calm, 
 To brighten up the suffering heart 
 
 With what is known as balm ; 
 To bid men shun the base, 
 
 To execrate the low. 
 And, broadly, teach the human race 
 
 To give the Good a show. 
 
 Thus, from his purer height, 
 
 With deep and subtle lore 
 He brings them nearer to the light 
 
 (A long chalk] than before. 
 That is the poet' 's use: 
 
 That is his task and I 've 
 A notion it 's his one excuse 
 
 For being left alive. 
 
 But, if in all these lays 
 
 There lives one song to set 
 The feet of man in loftier ways, 
 
 I haven't found it yet ; 
 If they contain one thought 
 
 Of solace or rebuke, 
 One moral lesson, nobly taught, 
 
 It got there by a fluke.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 LIGHT SPRINGS PAGE 
 
 I. A SONG OF MARCH I 
 
 II. SPRING IN LONDON 3 
 
 III. A SPRING POET 6 
 
 BENEDICK 8 
 
 HOGWASH II 
 
 ON DELIA SINGING 14 
 
 THE PROBLEM OF THE POLES I? 
 
 THE TRUTH ... 22 
 
 MOONSHINE 25 
 
 ODE TO ONE OF THE OLD INDIAN TROOPSHIPS NOW 
 
 LYING UP AS A COAL-HULK 28 
 
 SCORN NOT THE BARD 34 
 
 ODE TO A STUFFED GORILLA OF ENORMOUS PRO- 
 PORTIONS 37
 
 x A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 PAGE 
 
 MY PARASITE ......... 42 
 
 TO THE FIRST CATCH 45 
 
 THE PLAINT OF AN ASSOCIATION FOOTBALL . . 48 
 
 THE CRY OF AN EVICTED GHOST 53 
 
 A FATHER'S LOVE 57 
 
 THE 'SILLY' SEASON 60 
 
 PARTURIUNT DENTES 63 
 
 THE LAST DROP ........ 66 
 
 THE PASSING OF AUTUMN 69 
 
 THE GIFT OF WINTER 70 
 
 TO THE 'FOURTH ESTATE' 73 
 
 AN UNPOPULAR YEAR 
 
 I. CLOSE TIME BY THE SEA 76 
 
 II. DEPARTURE . . . . . . . 79 
 
 ACHES AND IVORIES 83 
 
 ONE BETTER . . 87 
 
 ROUGH LUCK ......... 89 
 
 A TELEPATHIC SUGGESTION .92
 
 CONTENTS xi 
 
 PAGE 
 
 RISUS DRAMATICUS 95 
 
 ODE TO CONSCIENCE 98 
 
 AN AUTUMN REVERIE IOI 
 
 TO ONE ABOUT TO WED IO4 
 
 TO ALL THAT GRUMBLE 107 
 
 A CODICIL 110 
 
 BEWARE ! 113 
 
 PLEA FOR A 'WORKING MAN' 115 
 
 THE SWAN AN IDYLL 121
 
 LIGHT SPRINGS 
 i 
 
 A SONG OF MARCH 
 
 O EARLY March was early May. 
 
 Soft was the air and bland ; 
 The sun diffused a constant ray, 
 And everything combined to say 
 
 That Spring was close at hand. 
 
 Nature forsook her winter sleep ; 
 
 And through the rustling wood 
 The little birds began to cheep ; 
 And oh, to see the lambkins leap 
 
 Did one a power of good. 
 
 The early flower came gaily out ; 
 
 In buds of tenderest green 
 The cryptogam did newly sprout ; 
 The orchard blossom looked about 
 
 The best I Ve ever seen. 
 A
 
 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 And all the land put off the sere, 
 And filled the day with song : 
 
 ' The air is warm, the skies are clear ; 
 
 Then wake to life, and love, and cheer, 
 
 For Spring is here for Spring is here ! ' 
 And all the land was wrong. 
 
 There came a change 'tis ever so 
 
 First it began to rain, 
 And then to freeze, and then to blow ; 
 And after that we had some snow ; 
 
 And then it blew again. 
 
 Nipped was the budding cryptogam ; 
 
 Nipped were the early flowers ; 
 The bird was mute, the frozen lamb 
 Relieved his feelings with a dam ; 
 
 The blossom fell in showers. 
 
 I care not, though the worst befall 
 
 The green thing or the brute ; 
 Though they be damaged past recall, 
 I should not weep. But, dash it all ! 
 There won't be any fruit !
 
 LIGHT SPRINGS 
 ii 
 
 SPRING IN LONDON 
 AN ODE 
 
 Now in good sooth I know that Spring is here 
 
 The fresh, the jocund Spring, 
 
 (Ring-ting-a-ling) ! 
 
 For see, on every hand 
 
 The signs, the signs and portents re-appear, 
 
 And all is brave, and bountiful, and bland. 
 
 Now the commodious mansions of the Great 
 
 Disdain anew their wintry grime, 
 
 And in no time 
 
 The wanton one, the plumber, 
 
 Prepares them 'gainst the summer 
 
 In dress of glassy white ; 
 
 Cool, doubtless, and remarkably ornate, 
 
 Though trying to the sight. 
 
 Saving for those that wear no vernal dress, 
 For whom no paint was newly wet, 
 Who, darkly looming in the vivid row, 
 Hang out pathetic signals of distress 
 To wit' To LET ! 
 Apply to So-and-so.'
 
 4 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 And those of russet brick, 
 
 Erected in the style of good Queen Anne, 
 
 (Who is now dead) 
 
 Which show no stain upon their sober red, 
 
 And are, in consequence, extremely spick, 
 
 And highly span. 
 
 See now where at the meeting of the ways 
 Conflicting traffics press from every side 
 In Spring's delirious block ; 
 And, like a rock, 
 
 ROBERT, the cynosure of every gaze, 
 Stands in mid-stream, and, pale but calm, 
 Uprears an undisputed palm, 
 And dams the roaring tide. 
 
 And lo ! the Park ! O happy scene ! 
 
 Green are the trees, the grass is green, 
 
 So are the chairs ! 
 
 Here would we sit, and, for a fleeting span, 
 
 Let the soft breezes fan 
 
 Our brows, and breathe the Babylonian airs
 
 LIGHT SPRINGS 
 
 Save for yon minion, ever crying ' Pence '- 
 Cursed be he, I say ! Come, let us hence. 
 
 Mark now the sheep the good old London sheep ! 
 
 How strange a contrast these afford. 
 
 Some round of wool, and seeming-fat, 
 
 Black as your hat, 
 
 Rest with demure regard, as half-asleep, 
 
 Or nibble still the sward ; 
 
 While others, shorn to half their former size, 
 
 Come forth, all whitely skinned, 
 
 To the untempered wind 
 
 In outraged nakedness, with downcast eyes. 
 
 Last of the vernal signs : 
 
 Lapped in the fretted umbrage of the trees, 
 
 Calmly oblivious of the city's hum, 
 
 See where reclines 
 
 Th' unwashen wastrel in his verminous ease ! 
 
 And Spring, indeed, has come !
 
 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 in 
 
 A SPRING POET 
 
 A SIMPLE bard of Nature I, 
 
 Whose vernal Muse delights to chant 
 The objects of the earth and sky, 
 The things that walk, the things that fly, 
 And those that can't. 
 
 I paint the mild idyllic scene 
 
 When HODGE absorbs his decent grub, 
 And STREPHON, pastorally clean, 
 Cavorts with PHYLLIS on the green, 
 Or in the pub. 
 
 The ' softly sweet ' ^Eolian breeze 
 
 (Or zephyr) shares my dainty song 
 With murmurous brooks and humming bees ; 
 And on the foliage of trees 
 I come out strong ; 
 
 (The showery poplar and the pine ; 
 
 The woodland monarch's kingly boughs ; 
 Bright chestnuts, in whose shade recline 
 Fat sheep and meditative kine, 
 Not to say, cows) .
 
 LIGHT SPRINGS 
 
 I sing of bud, and bloom, and bower, 
 Of hedgerows musical with birds ; 
 The common or the garden flower 
 Adorns my numbers with a power 
 Of lovely words. 
 
 And thus from Spring's perennial store 
 
 I fashion songs for your delight ; 
 And, tho' it 's all been done before, 
 There 's always lots of room for more ; 
 So that 's all right. 
 
 For these are themes that never fail 
 
 To bid the poet's heart rejoice ; 
 And, of all things of hill or dale, 
 Give me the good old Nightingale, 
 I think, for choice.
 
 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 BENEDICK 
 
 YE lessening company of single men, 
 Weep for the bitter tidings I impart ! 
 
 For Benedick is booked, the wary Ben, 
 Old Benedick, esteemed in every art 
 Second to none : 
 
 Yes, even he, for all his epic past, 
 
 Has done it once too often he has done 
 
 It once too often now the die is cast, 
 
 And Benedick, our chief, is caught at last. 
 
 Ay, weep for Benedick ! He was well wont 
 Himself to weep when others went astray. 
 Has it not ever been his counsel, Don't ! 
 To them that would ? Have we not heard 
 him say, 
 
 How tame, how trite 
 Was wedlock ? And, with suffering eyes grown 
 
 dim, 
 
 Mourning some fallen comrade's evil plight, 
 Oft would he vow, with more than common vim, 
 To see us further ere we wept for him.
 
 BENEDICK 9 
 
 He was no scorner of the sex. Not he ! 
 
 To him the merest flutter of a gown 
 Was draw enow ; but, like the busy bee, 
 
 He loved to sip from every flower, one down 
 
 T'other come on ; 
 Seeking, or when the owl complaining mopes 
 
 Or otherwise, t' improve each hour that shone, 
 Yet ever coy, and ever raising hopes 
 For ever vain, so well he knew the ropes. 
 
 And you, dear charmers of those earlier days, 
 Will you not weep what time you hear his fall ? 
 
 You will recall, I trust, his airy ways, 
 
 His nods, th' alluring becks he wooed withal, 
 His wreathed smiles ; 
 
 Also I charge you that you should attend 
 
 The last sad rites, thronging the pews and aisles 
 
 For, as a fact, one-half of you would lend 
 
 A gloomy eclat to his fearful end. 
 
 But not from you, O mothers, not from you 
 I ask one tear on this elusive swain. 
 For this is he for whom the net you threw 
 So often and so utterly in vain 
 (Wily old bird!).
 
 io A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 You will not weep, go to ! But we, his peers, 
 
 We, relicts of an ever-dwindling herd, 
 Reft of our champion and our chief of years, 
 May be excused some horror-stricken tears. 
 
 Ah, me ! And yet what profit that we mourn 
 And tell our loss in due and wailful chant ? 
 
 For Benedick is booked ! The nuptial bourn 
 Yawns for his trembling footsteps and you 
 can't 
 
 Get out of that ! 
 
 Better it were to rally 'neath the blow 
 And, with sad foresight, circulate the hat, 
 
 Clubbing together, that he may not go 
 
 Giftless to wed ; and it comes cheaper so.
 
 HOG WASH ii 
 
 HOGWASH ! 
 
 POOR little soul ! Belgravia's iron foe, 
 
 Park Lane's destroyer, scourge of Piccadilly ; 
 Alas, that one so very wise should go 
 And be so silly. 
 
 He sought the East ; he cast his eyes around ; 
 He saw a crowd ; he heard some shrill in- 
 vective ; 
 
 He did not think of waiting till he found 
 The right perspective ; 
 
 But, firmly buckled to the baboo's tail, 
 
 And fed with facts entirely new to history, 
 Flinging aside the immemorial veil 
 Of India's mystery, 
 
 He solved all problems with his nimble eye ; 
 
 And now behold him, in the name of Freedom, 
 Hoisting the banner of his blood-red tie 
 For Bengalee-dom.
 
 12 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Poor little soul ! So lofty, so serene, 
 So deaf to all the prayers of Might and 
 
 Mammon ; 
 
 Alas, that one so great should be so green 
 When baboos gammon. 
 
 Ready to hear his native land attacked, 
 
 And eager for his raucous baboo brothers, 
 He has not grasped the interesting fact 
 That there are others. 
 
 India has many races, many creeds, 
 
 Who live just now at rest, because they 're 
 
 made to ; 
 
 Some go in pleasantly for warlike deeds ; 
 Some are afraid to ; 
 
 And possibly his friends forgot to state 
 
 That with the dawn of ' India as a Nation ' 
 The baboo would become the candidate 
 For spifflication. 
 
 Poor little soul ! He ought to take a turn 
 
 In regions where the baboos cease from crowing, 
 Where men are men indeed, and he could learn 
 A lot worth knowing.
 
 HOGWASH 13 
 
 He 'd learn of races loyal to their salt, 
 Men with no use for petty agitators, 
 Who hold disloyalty a mongrel's fault, 
 And don't like traitors ; 
 
 Of soldiers that have been too often led 
 
 By Britons to mistake the true position 
 Of a white baboo with a swollen head 
 Vamping sedition ; 
 
 Who 'd look him over with experienced eyes, 
 
 And wait, till some one offered the suggestion, 
 This is no Sahib : meaning they despise 
 The man in question. 
 
 And then they 'd take him sternly by the nape, 
 
 And cast him forth, a wiser man and sadder ; 
 Or break his head, and let the gas escape, 
 Like a pricked bladder.
 
 14 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 ON DELIA SINGING 
 
 WHEN DELIA sings, so grandly floats 
 
 The cadence of her silvery notes, 
 
 So wondrous fair she is to see 
 
 (However wide her mouth may be), 
 
 That soft, sweet dreams of harps and things 
 
 Subdue the soul, when DELIA sings. 
 
 For if the song is low and sad 
 She can make strong men cry like mad ; 
 Or gay, her archer mood beguiles 
 An audience till it smiles and smiles ; 
 And oft her lullabies have drawn, 
 Ev'n from Society, a yawn. 
 
 And as with tranced ears I drink 
 Her music in I always think 
 (Or nearly always) how divine, 
 How flawless, is this girl of mine ;
 
 ON DELTA SINGING 15 
 
 Indeed, to muse on angels' wings 
 Is quite the rule, when DELIA sings. 
 
 But when my DELIA madly turns 
 
 To songs of Love that yearns and burns, 
 
 And stings and wrings of bygone bliss 
 
 Of those last hours and that last kiss 
 
 Ah me ! I am not all at ease 
 
 When DELIA tackles themes like these. 
 
 For then, before a crowded room, 
 She stands in all her maiden bloom, 
 While from that peerless larynx gush 
 Words that would make a turkey blush ; 
 And solemn is the doubt that springs 
 Into my mind, when DELIA sings. 
 
 Maybe she does it unawares ; 
 Maybe she little knows (or cares) 
 Half what those awful words convey : 
 I 'm sure I hope so, anyway ; 
 For otherwise she 'd hardly go 
 And sing them coram populo.
 
 16 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 And yet such force those words inspire ; 
 Such passion such familiar fire 
 That solemn questions come unsought, 
 Whether she 's quite the girl I thought ! 
 Such is the grave, grave doubt that wrings 
 My trusting heart, when DELIA sings.
 
 THE PROBLEM OF THE POLES 17 
 
 THE PROBLEM OF THE POLES 
 
 MY suffering Public, take it not amiss 
 
 If, rising from the narrow bonds of Rhyme, 
 
 I seek the nobler Blankness of the bards, 
 
 Where one may stretch oneself, and go ahead, 
 
 Not pausing, save for breath, or fat, round words 
 
 To build his thought withal. I cannot help it. 
 
 I am constrained thereto by such a theme, 
 
 So deep a mystery and so obscure, 
 
 That I can tackle it no other way. 
 
 Permit me, then. And, with apologies, 
 
 I now pronounce the purpose of my song. 
 
 There is a class of man that seems to be 
 (Thanks, kindly Muse, that wrought so fair a 
 
 line !) 
 
 Afflicted with a mad desire to scale 
 Our high terrestrial poles or North or South 
 Say North. Indeed, I understand that two
 
 i8 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Claim to have done it. I propose to show 
 They haven't, and, what 's more, they never will. 
 
 (There are two North Poles really I know that ; 
 But for simplicity we '11 call them one.) 
 
 Take first the compass. This, as you 're aware, 
 Inevitably, with unerring nose, 
 Points to the North. I 'm sure I don't know why ; 
 Such is its mad, mad humour. Now, suppose 
 You stick it on the Pole ; how does it act ? 
 
 First you would say that, as it seeks the North, 
 
 And, as that lies directly underneath, 
 
 It points straight downward. So it would 
 
 appear, 
 But, mark you, what about the other end ? 
 
 This (which, with deference, we '11 call the Tail) 
 
 Has an affinity toward the South, 
 
 Equal and opposite in all respects. 
 
 One end looks North, the other end looks South.
 
 THE PROBLEM OF THE POLES 19 
 
 If, then, your nose points downward to the earth, 
 From the position of your unshamed Tail 
 The South Pole must be clean above your head. 
 But, as you 're standing on the northern end 
 Of the terrestrial axis, for a fact, 
 The South Pole, being at the other end, 
 Must stick out right away beneath your feet. 
 So that your Tail, which points toward the skies, 
 Must at the same time look the other way. 
 Dash it, it can't do both. So that won't do. 
 
 Now for another. This is harder still. 
 
 Science, for travail of geographers, 
 
 Draws a straight line through Greenwich, pole 
 
 to pole, 
 
 Which she calls nought or zero, which you will. 
 Now any place that isn't on that line, 
 Considered in connection with the poles, 
 Has bearings East or West. Contrariwise, 
 All of this world that isn't East or West 
 Must be in line with Greenwich. Mustn't it ? 
 
 Now then, suppose a person climbs the Pole, 
 In what direction must that person gaze ?
 
 20 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 South. For up there there is no East or West ; 
 And, though he screw his head off, he can still 
 Only look Southward. Thus his line of sight, 
 As it sees nothing lying East or West, 
 No matter where he looks, must pass through 
 
 Greenwich. 
 
 And, as he slowly circles round his Pole, 
 And yet can never look away from Greenwich, 
 It follows that that quaint old-fashioned spot 
 Moves, with his eye, clean round the world and 
 
 back. 
 
 But Greenwich can't go doing things like that, 
 And so where are you ? Here we are again. 
 
 But wait a minute. No. I '11 tell you what. 
 
 Man, in the limits of his finite mind, 
 
 Of finite things alone has cognisance. 
 
 All that is real, everything that is, 
 
 Must have three thingamies (Dimensions. 
 
 Thanks), 
 
 Or else it 's non-existent. Now a line, 
 Being, as EUCLID crushingly observed, 
 Length without breadth, which is ridiculous, 
 Has one di-thingamy, which doesn't count.
 
 THE PROBLEM OF THE POLES 21 
 
 We see, then, that meridian through Greenwich, 
 Saving in Science's disordered brain, 
 Doesn't exist and every spot where man 
 Can rest his foot is something East or West ; 
 There is no atom on this mundane orb 
 But has its little bearings. Very well. 
 Now put that person up his Pole again. 
 
 Recalling what we said of him before, 
 
 It becomes clear to an unbiassed mind 
 
 That the position which he occupies 
 
 Has bearings neither East nor West. And so, 
 
 If we apply the paragraph above, 
 
 Wherever else his doubtful post may be, 
 
 It forms no part of this terrestrial globe. 
 
 That is to say, there is no Pole at all. 
 
 Which being satisfactorily proved, 
 
 I fail to see why people want to go there.
 
 22 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 THE TRUTH 
 
 [It is reported that GEORGE WASHINGTON, in his later years, was 
 convicted of making a false property return. ] 
 
 IF there ever was a name 
 
 Of unpalatable fame 
 To the healthy-minded Anglo-Saxon youth, 
 
 'Tis of him that rose to glory 
 
 As the hero of the story 
 Of the Little Boy that always told the Truth. 
 
 We are told that when his sire 
 
 In a fit of petty ire 
 Had accused the lad of whittling at a tree 
 
 That was damaged in his orchard 
 
 (Tho' a very simple scorcher 'd 
 Have instinctively occurred to you and me) 
 
 He did not inform his dad 
 That he hadn't (when he had),
 
 THE TRUTH 23 
 
 But he owned the soft impeachment with a sigh, 
 And explained his indiscretion 
 Not the act, but the confession 
 
 By the statement that he ' couldn't tell a lie.' 
 
 And that tale has been imprest 
 
 On the baby at the breast, 
 It has been a source of trouble to the weans ; 
 
 We have had it from our pastors 
 
 And our governors and masters 
 And our parents from our teething to our teens ; 
 
 Not a doubt was ever heard ; 
 
 Tho' we only had his word 
 For the statement ; and, to give the boy his due, 
 
 He had never said he wouldn't 
 
 If he could, but that he couldn't, 
 Which was nothing much, assuming it were true ; 
 
 And they diligently cracked 
 
 Up that Paragon of Fact, 
 And laboriously rammed him down the gorge, 
 
 Till we really felt a bias 
 
 For the human ANANIAS, 
 As a foil to the insufferable GEORGE.
 
 24 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 But the stuffing 's knocked at last 
 
 From that phantom of the past, 
 And a sweet and blessed thing it is to learn 
 
 That the holy little terror 
 
 Was convicted of an error 
 (By a Jury) in his property return ! 
 
 For the teacher of the child 
 
 Will in future draw it mild ; 
 Being sure that if the lad did not deny 
 
 His offence by saying, ' No, Pa ! ' 
 
 It was probably a faux pas, 
 And the statement that he couldn't was a lie
 
 MOONSHINE 25 
 
 MOONSHINE 
 
 EVENING has spread her grey-toned wings in 
 
 flight ; 
 
 The skies are clear ; and, like a great balloon, 
 Charming the young hours of the amorous night, 
 Looms the romantic Moon. 
 
 How full She looks ! With what complacent 
 
 pride 
 She weaves Her spells ! 'In such a night,' 
 
 methinks, 
 
 ' Did young Lorenzo ' dally with his bride, 
 Jessica (little minx !) . 
 
 ' In such a night,' by yon same Orb inspired, 
 
 Juliet engaged the love-lorn youth below 
 In pleasing talk, and gloomily enquired 
 Why he was Romeo.
 
 26 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 ' In such a night ' but why prolong the theme ? 
 
 Thou pale Vice-regent of the starry host, 
 A night like this would startle Love's young 
 dream 
 
 Out of a very ghost. 
 
 O Thou that artfully didst lure abroad 
 
 The vague Endymion, Thou that didst attend 
 The vigils of the gentleman in Maud 
 
 Up to the bitter end ; 
 
 Pagans of old raised temples to Thy Name, 
 
 And did due homage to Thy Perfect Round ; 
 Their rites, no doubt, were wrong, but all the 
 
 same 
 
 The main idea was sound. 
 
 For O DIANA, great indeed art Thou ! 
 Fair Goddess, as it was in early days, 
 The old, old game is going on ! E'en now, 
 Wherever fall Thy rays, 
 
 The lover, buoyed upon their silvery flood, 
 
 Dashes off reams of vivid epithet, 
 Which, if he thinks them over in cold blood, 
 He '11 probably regret.
 
 MOONSHINE 27 
 
 Now, too, the army of our moonstruck bards 
 In fluent numbers beg ' yon argent Moon ' 
 To bear some lyric love their kind regards, 
 Hoping to see her soon ; 
 
 And, round me here, in garden and in glade, 
 
 Highest alike with lowest, lord and lout, 
 The daughter of the manor, and the maid 
 Who has her evening out, 
 
 All, all or all, at any rate, who can 
 
 Bask in Thy beams, and air their moony wiles ; 
 And I must be about the one wise man 
 In half-a-dozen miles. 
 
 Sail on, Old Moon ! In all Thine orby prime, 
 Sail on ! They little think, who dally thus, 
 How brief a step it is from the sublime 
 To the ridiculous.
 
 28 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 ODE 
 
 TO ONE OF THE OLD INDIAN TROOPSHIPS NOW 
 LYING UP AS A COAL HULK 
 
 How art thou fallen, fallen from thy place ! 
 Old Ship, in whom BRITANNIA did endraft 
 Even those best and noblest of their race, 
 Her Thin Red THOMAS (forrard), and (abaft) 
 Knights of all shape and sort, 
 Grim eld and giddy wart, 1 
 (Myself included) : when I see thee here, 
 Mastless, disfunnelled, black as Arthur's barge, 
 
 With pain I meditate thy proud career, 
 And think, how grave was thine imperial charge, 
 Thyself how very fine, and how exceeding large. 
 
 When thou didst start, what moving scenes 
 
 were there ! 
 
 How thronged the crowds to hail thee, out- 
 ward-bound ! 
 
 What noise what noise of cheering shocked 
 the air : 
 
 1 A very young officer.
 
 ODE TO OLD INDIAN TROOPSHIP 29 
 
 What stern command : what scurryings : 
 
 what wild sound : 
 What language, too ! And what 
 Emotion, was there not, 
 When, at the climax, that misguided band 
 Plunged with grim aptness into Auld LangSyne ; 
 And seasoned colonels, for the nonce un- 
 manned, 
 
 Hemmed, and e'en rugged THOMAS of the Line 
 Dashed from his somethinged eyes the adjectival 
 brine ? 
 
 Such was thy going ! But when fairly off, 
 
 Ah me, thy dalliance with the wanton gale ! 
 Or whether thou didst wallow in the trough 
 (Heaving thy round white belly like a whale) 
 Or with ambitious screw 
 Winnowed the vain air Ugh ! 
 Enough ! That corkscrew throb that 
 
 mounting poop 
 Those qualms those vivid qualms are with 
 
 me yet ! 
 
 Lo, I smile wanly ! I am void ! I droop 
 Pensive the bulwarks o'er ! A great regret 
 Fulfils me much of this, and I should be upset !
 
 30 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Quit we these epic foolings ! Let us dream 
 Rather of those more chastened moods, when 
 
 thou, 
 
 Under prest sail and a good head of steam, 
 In lucid waters mirrored helm to prow, 
 And with a prosperous wind 
 Shoving along behind, 
 Responsibly didst urge thy passage 
 
 Lord ! 
 
 That was more like ! To see thee waddling by, 
 Pale landsmen bared the head ! E'en those 
 
 aboard 
 (Call thee what names they might) could scarce 
 
 deny, 
 Thou Whited Sepulchre, a charm to fill the eye. 
 
 And if men cavilled at thy lack of haste, 
 Well, thou wert old, and when was age a 
 
 crime ? 
 And, for thy breakdowns in th' uncharted 
 
 waste, 
 
 Those awful newsless lapses, time on time 
 One would again be struck 
 By thy surpassing luck !
 
 ODE TO OLD INDIAN TROOPSHIP 31 
 
 So much so, that at last there came about 
 'Mongst those with private interests (either 
 
 way) 
 
 A certain strained expectancy, a doubt, 
 
 Painful but sporting, one could never say ! 
 
 Indeed, there was a tale ; whereto I shape my lay. 
 
 There was a Regiment, a mammoth Corps, 
 Whose chivalry and legion was their 
 
 name 
 
 Kept ward ubiquitous the wide seas o'er, 
 Sighing for vacancies that never came, 
 Sighing for vacancies : 
 For ('twas a way of his) 
 Promotion long had languished on the roll, 
 Slow as an Orient river low in bed ; 
 
 And, with much waiting, many a fiery soul 
 Grew passS, or, as they expressed it, fed 
 Up, so to speak, as men that saw no luck ahead. 
 
 Then came a day when thou didst bear a 
 freight, 
 
 Ah heaven, the goodliest was ever seen ! 
 For there were common Captains of long date, 
 
 And larger veterans (room for all, I ween)
 
 32 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Whereof, of that one ' Arm,' 
 (Gods keep them safe from harm !) 
 A full six score put forth. And the time past 
 Barren of news. And men's hearts sank like 
 
 stones. 
 Days turned to weeks. And many said, 
 
 1 At last, 
 
 She 's done it ! ' and in darkly boding tones 
 Made mourning for the lost, and breathed of 
 DAVID JONES. 
 
 Then through that Royal Arm a great thrill 
 
 ran ; 
 And many a knight, with prescient zeal 
 
 ablaze, 
 Crushed his bereavement down, and straight 
 
 began 
 
 To scorn delights and live laborious days, 
 Hoping 'gainst hope, to pass 
 C., D., and E. 1 Alas ! 
 There came a happy tidings, All was well ! 
 Swiftly that chestnut o'er the seas did go ! 
 
 1 At that time, subjects for examination for promotion.
 
 ODE TO OLD INDIAN TROOPSHIP 33 
 
 'Twas said, when those glad news untimely 
 
 fell, 
 
 That all that Regiment, from high to low, 
 Were stricken as one man, and reeled beneath 
 the blow !
 
 34 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 SCORN NOT THE BARD 
 
 SCORN not the bard. There is a folk 
 That treats him as a kind of joke, 
 
 A weak and tepid card, 
 The strong man's mocking and a shame ; 
 He may be that, but, all the same, 
 Scorn not the bard. 
 
 The flowing mane that you resent 
 Is there for use, not ornament, 
 
 To help him in his song ; 
 When gravelled in his dire employ, 
 A handy tress wherewith to toy 
 Gets him along. 
 
 His taste for turning things about 
 And wrong way on and inside out, 
 
 Is not to be denied ; 
 An irritating trick, I grant ; 
 But, as to helping it, he can't ! 
 You 've never tried.
 
 SCORN NOT THE BARD 35 
 
 It is the painful truth that he 
 Is prone to warble of the sea, 
 
 And overapt to cling 
 For ever to some hackneyed tune 
 Of ladies' eyebrows and the Moon, 
 Of Love and Spring. 
 
 But, tho' the scheme is bound to pall, 
 Let us be candid. After all, 
 
 This is no fault of his ; 
 However hard it be to stand, 
 The man must sing of something, and 
 It 's all there is ! 
 
 You argue that you don't see why. 
 To tell the truth, no more do I ! 
 
 I only know it 's true ; 
 Indeed, at such a point we touch 
 On things too deep for me and much 
 Too deep for you. 
 
 Fate has inscrutably decreed 
 The presence of the poet's breed
 
 36 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 In every time and state ; 
 He is the fruit of Fortune's whim ; 
 If you dislike it, don't blame him ; 
 Go and blame Fate. 
 
 E'en you, I take it, don't suppose 
 That he deliberately chose 
 
 To tend his homely trade ; 
 It 's that that comes so bitter hard 
 Poor beggar, he was born a bard ! 
 He wasn't made. 
 
 Then, readers, far from showing scorn, 
 Remember that you both were born 
 
 Alike of common clay ; 
 For you are you by Nature's laws : 
 The bard is but a bard because 
 He 's built that way.
 
 ODE TO A STUFFED GORILLA 37 
 
 ODE 
 
 TO A STUFFED GORILLA OF ENORMOUS 
 PROPORTIONS 
 
 THOU monstrous Effigy ! O stuft and stark ! 
 
 O Thou whom Nature callously designed 
 In man's rough favour for a brutal lark 
 Which might be funny, but was far from 
 kind 
 
 Lord, when I see that shape 
 I gasp, I stand agape, 
 Wond'ring if Thou be man, or I a brawnless ape. 
 
 I may not sing the beauties of thy face 
 
 Because there are none ; gnarled Thou art, 
 
 and bent ; 
 
 Massive, I grant Thee, yet for perfect grace 
 Something o'er-cumbrous, something too 
 distent
 
 38 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Of corporation, hey ? 
 A bland and gracious trait 
 In man with Thee it seems to act the other way. 
 
 But tho' we hold Thee plain (that love the 
 
 Greek) 
 
 Thou hast a something ; in thy native parts 
 I doubt not thy magnificent physique 
 Was well esteemed ; and many Simian hearts 
 Have thrilled, with soft alarms, 
 To view thy homely charms, 
 And pined to lie in fold of those colossal arms. 
 
 Nay, and Thou too hast loved. If men say 
 
 truth, 
 
 Thou hadst a swart and favourable bride ; 
 Misguided One ! She took Thee for a youth 
 Of fondest beauty ; and, upon thy side, 
 Thou wouldst proclaim her fair 
 Beyond all others there ; 
 
 And, by the gods, you must have been a bonny 
 pair !
 
 ODE TO A STUFFED GORILLA 39 
 
 Haply that frozen snarl whereat men quail 
 Has ofttimes thawed when on thy teeming 
 
 pile, 
 
 Wifely, she dallied with the nimble nail 
 Nay, even worn a rudimentary smile 
 In such fond hours to see 
 Thy child, in artless glee, 
 
 Scragging some hapless prey, or shinning up a 
 tree. 
 
 Alas ! To-day thy leathery widow weeps, 
 
 Thine heir bemoans an amiable sire : 
 We only, conscious of some inkling creeps, 
 E'en as we gaze, are awed while we admire : 
 Stuft as thou art, I fear 
 Lest I approach too near ; 
 Alive, I certainly, for one, had not been here. 
 
 Which brings me to thy murderer ? What of 
 him ? 
 
 What spurred the idiot to that fatal shot ? 
 He was not thinking, or the light was dim, 
 
 Or something ; for in goodly sooth I wot,
 
 40 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Had he foreknown his Deed, 
 He would have paid less heed 
 To a sure aim than to a first-class turn of speed. 
 
 Nay, but I see it all. Methinks he moved 
 
 In pensive error through a tropic glade 
 With thickest foliage loftily enrooved ; 
 
 When, gazing upwards on the vaulty shade, 
 Lo, through a tiny chink, 
 A patch of fur did wink, 
 
 As tho' some small, small beast had gone aloft to 
 think. 
 
 He had not fired so tiny 'twas to view, 
 He had not fired but to his eager ken 
 'Twas strange unknown ; he dreamed of 
 
 something new 
 
 In squirrels or the like ; one specimen 
 Were worth a life's renown ! 
 
 Agog to bring it down, 
 
 He raised his tube, and coolly banged ' into the 
 brown.'
 
 ODE TO A STUFFED GORILLA 41 
 
 Then through those groves a verberate protest 
 
 rolled 
 Throbbing ; the high roof swayed as in a 
 
 storm ; 
 
 He heard great timbers rending ; and, behold ! 
 Huge, bloated, spider-like, a horrible form 
 Burst the thick leaves asunder ; 
 And, with a cry of wonder, 
 The sportsman took a breath and skipped away 
 from under. 
 
 All legs and wings, hands grabbing and teeth 
 
 gnashing, 
 
 Cursing and clawing and clutching in des- 
 perate dash, 
 He saw it hanging heard the last branch 
 
 smashing 
 
 Turned him about. With one almighty 
 crash 
 
 Forty-eight solid stone 
 Of furious brawn and bone 
 Flashed like a meteor through the air and lay 
 alone !
 
 42 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 MY PARASITE 
 
 AWHILE ago, when sore opprest 
 With parlous noises on the chest, 
 I heard some lunatic suggest 
 
 That for a simple cure 
 A porous Plaster, clapped upon the breast, 
 Was cheap and sure. 
 
 This garment I made haste to don ; 
 And truly, ere a week had gone, 
 It wrought a magic spell upon 
 
 The megrims and the cough ; 
 The only trouble is, that now it 's on 
 It won't come off. 
 
 I 've tried the corners first in vain ; 
 I 've tried against and with the grain 
 Day after day, and suffered pain 
 
 Enough for any six ; 
 
 I say I 've worked it till I 've roared again, 
 But there it sticks.
 
 MY PARASITE 43 
 
 It may be that one ought to feel 
 The pathos of its mute appeal ; 
 I grant that in its dog-like zeal 
 The creature far transcends 
 The love of brothers ay, and sticks a deal 
 Closer than friends ; 
 
 Still, even then, enough 's a feast ; 
 
 Besides, the poor devoted beast 
 
 Is getting shabby, frayed, and creased ; 
 
 And, though it doesn't show, 
 It really isn't nice, to say the least ! 
 Far from it ! No. 
 
 But there it is ; and means to stay 
 
 Apparently till judgment-day ; 
 
 And doubtless when I 'm old and grey 
 
 The thing will yet be there ; 
 Soap doesn't seem to make it go away, 
 No more does prayer. 
 
 P.S. I 've just been pained to read 
 That, when the hour has come to speed
 
 44 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 The parting guest, you merely need 
 
 A strong, determined clutch ; 
 Then give a few sharp jerks, and oh ! 
 
 In-deed ! 
 Thanks very much !
 
 TO THE FIRST CATCH 45 
 
 TO THE FIRST CATCH 
 
 IN IMMEDIATE PROSPECT 
 
 COME not as, if I recollect aright, 
 
 You came last year, with sudden-soaring flight 
 
 Rising, and falling from a monstrous height, 
 
 Where I (that am not fond of fielding deep 
 Thus early) , struck all over of a heap, 
 Watched with pained eyes, and gauged your 
 downward sweep, 
 
 And raised beseeching hands to clutch you round, 
 Whence you escaped, and with one mad rebound 
 Insanely dashed yourself upon the ground. 
 
 Not from the bat's edge come, with that weird 
 
 swerve 
 
 By golfers called the slice, whose double curve 
 Foils the keen eye and shocks the high-strung 
 
 nerve :
 
 46 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Nor in the slips approach me, with a spin 
 
 That grinds you from the palm before you 're in ; 
 
 And oh, if straight I stand, or square, or thin, 
 
 Whate'er my post, in whatsoever wise 
 You come, I trust I may at least devise 
 Some plausible excuse, if need should rise. 
 
 That either I may urge : ' Good Such-an-one, 
 Almost I had it, but I was undone 
 By the surpassing glory of the Sun ' ; 
 
 Or haply, ' See, how slippery lies the grass ! 
 How dark yon tree, wherein the ball did pass 
 Clean from my ken ! Good Captain,' or ' Alas, 
 
 Good Bowler, blame me not ; such happening 
 Had foiled the most elect ; our very King 
 (God bless him !) would have missed the silly 
 thing.' 
 
 And, if this ordeal must needs befall ; 
 If there be no excuse, however small, 
 Likely to serve ; why then, confound it all,
 
 TO THE FIRST CATCH 47 
 
 Come in no gentle shape ; but come, and be 
 The Catch Impossible too fierce to see, 
 Too far to reach it makes no odds to me ! 
 
 That I, with one wild leap upon the sward, 
 May stretch a hand (the left for choice) and lord ! 
 May find you sticking of your own accord 
 
 Warm in the palm ; and, after one hushed sigh, 
 Rabble and connoisseur alike shall cry, 
 ' A miracle ! A Miracle ! 'while I 
 
 Lightly may toss you from me, with an air 
 
 Of one that holds so paltry an affair 
 
 Mere commonplace ; or, even if my pray'r 
 
 Lack fulness, if this glory be denied, 
 
 I yet may glean a melancholy pride 
 
 In the condoning tribute of, ' Well tried ! '
 
 48 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 THE PLAINT OF AN ASSOCIATION 
 FOOTBALL 
 
 THEY thrust a nozzle down my throat, they 
 
 pumped me into shape ; 
 They bound my windpipe tightly that my breath 
 
 should not escape ; 
 They laced me in the spotless buff, I wore it with 
 
 an air ; 
 'Twas tight, but it was comely and one suffers 
 
 to be fair. 
 
 I was a gay and buoyant thing. Alas, I little 
 
 dreamt 
 That all this bravery was doomed to ruin and 
 
 contempt ; 
 That, when they tricked me in my best, 'twas but 
 
 to undergo 
 The ignominy of the mire, the insult of the toe.
 
 PLAINT OF A FOOTBALL 49 
 
 Men leap not on the slumb'ring hare or meditat- 
 ing hart ; 
 
 The very evil-smelling fox is honoured with a 
 start ; 
 
 But me, in most unknightly wise, they placed 
 upon the ground, 
 
 And ten stern men on either side stood hungrily 
 around. 
 
 Their boots were harsh, their eyes were fierce, 
 
 their forms were scantly clothed ; 
 Methought they glared on me as on an object 
 
 that they loathed. 
 The sudden whistle pealed ; and in a moment, 
 
 like one man, 
 They seemed to fall upon me and the jolly fun 
 
 began. 
 
 They rolled me here, they drove me there : 
 
 where'er I sought to turn 
 There was a clumsy foot to hack, an iron head to 
 
 spurn ; 
 Ever in front was one with poised and calculating 
 
 boot ; 
 
 Ever behind a brutal thud betokened the pursuit. 
 
 D
 
 50 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 No hand was raised to help me ; save for two 
 
 apart that stand 
 Guarding the refuge nets, they shunned to touch 
 
 me with the hand ; 
 And these, when fawning I approached, but hurled 
 
 me madly back, 
 Or punched me with the knotted fist, half-stunned 
 
 before the pack. 
 
 Buffeted, dodging, doubling, in my panic-flight 
 I flew 
 
 Over the breathing-line in vain ; they haled me 
 forth anew ; 
 
 With monstrous bounds they savaged me, half- 
 maddened by the squall 
 
 Of twenty thousand raucous throats all yelling, 
 1 On the Ball.' 
 
 Their breath grew short, their eyes were glazed ; 
 
 but still in frenzied ire 
 They bruised me with their mighty feet, they 
 
 rolled me through the mire ; 
 Till bloated, sullen, desperate, I let them do their 
 
 worst, 
 Hoping, before the crack of Time, with any luck, 
 
 to burst.
 
 PLAINT OF A FOOTBALL 51 
 
 Shame on the callous mob that cheered ! Shame 
 
 on the coward host 
 That fought to gain the privilege of who should 
 
 hurt me most ; 
 And shame on him that shaped me as an orange, 
 
 to my shame, 
 Not as my eggy kinsman of the Rugby Union 
 
 game ! 
 
 It is men's task to raise him up ; from hand to 
 
 hand he flies, 
 Or, folded in their warm embrace, calm as a babe 
 
 he lies ; 
 They spare to kick him in the wind, save with a 
 
 courteous grace 
 That lifts him through th' empyreal air, soaring 
 
 aloft in space. 
 
 Ah gods, the swelling joys of such a flight ! What 
 
 pride to see 
 The world below, the wild hands stretched in 
 
 welcome ! And what glee 
 To flatter the expectant back, and then, with 
 
 impish change, 
 Dash edgeways down, and leap, in lively error, 
 
 out of range !
 
 52 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 What cheers attest his prowess as he travels high 
 
 and far ! 
 What hush of awed suspense awaits his Crossing of 
 
 the Bar ! 
 And ah, how sad to think that aught so vital 
 
 should depend 
 On being made all over round, or pointed at the 
 
 end. 
 
 For we were both of like estate ; but Fortune's 
 
 fell employ 
 Has made of me a rolling drudge, and him an 
 
 eggy toy. 
 And very much I would the boot were on the other 
 
 leg 
 Th' Association Orange he, and I the Rugby Egg.
 
 THE CRY OF AN EVICTED GHOST 53 
 
 THE CRY OF AN EVICTED GHOST 
 
 MY ancient home, farewell ! The die is cast. 
 
 Soon will rude labour cart away your stones ; 
 Your tiles have gone ; your beams are going fast ; 
 And I must quit the refuge of my past, 
 Also my bones. 
 
 There is no room but has its private ties ; 
 
 No corner but is hallowed by a host 
 Of mem'ries, humorous and otherwise 
 'Twas here that I (to my intense surprise) 
 Became a Ghost. 
 
 This is the landing where I first ' appeared,' 
 
 And first beheld the human hair erect ; 
 (It looks extremely like a turned-up beard, 
 Which, with a hat on, has a very weird 
 Sort of effect).
 
 54 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Much time has passed since that momentous day, 
 
 And many a mortal tenant come and gone ; 
 We got on very well, I 'm proud to say, 
 Once they had grown accustomed to the way 
 I carried on. 
 
 Strangers would be a little shy, no doubt, 
 
 But there especially I did no harm ; 
 Indeed, my healthy action on the stout, 
 On victims to lumbago or the gout, 
 
 Worked like a charm. 
 
 With such it was my duty and delight 
 
 To meet them at the bottom of the stairs ; 
 And one and all, at that inspiring sight, 
 Have squattered off a record up that flight, 
 Lepping like hares. 
 
 And this old room, where often I retired 
 
 For solitude ; it was a striking fact 
 That all young ardent couples were inspired 
 With the same brilliant notion which required 
 Much ghostly tact.
 
 THE CRY OF AN EVICTED GHOST 55 
 
 I had a plan both delicate and new : 
 
 When it was clear that someone had to go, 
 Stealing up silently behind the two, 
 I sportively materialised, and blew ! 
 
 Poof ! and said, ' Boh ! ' 
 
 And yon dim nook ; oh, EMMA, ghostly fair ! 
 
 'Twas here I wooed her ! To my bitter hurt 
 She gibbered out a negative ! And where 
 She 's got to now I neither know nor care ; 
 Gassy old flirt ! 
 
 Those were far days ! And you have long been 
 
 old, 
 
 And mortal tenants flock to you no more ; 
 They want strange innovations now, I 'm told ; 
 Bathrooms (good gracious !) water, hot and 
 cold ! 
 
 (Lord knows what for !) 
 
 'Tis long since last I heard the tradesmen call ; 
 
 Long since I heard your rusty door-bell ring ; 
 But I stayed on. My social needs were small ; 
 My peace was very great, and after all 
 Quiet 's the thing.
 
 56 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 And now e'en I must leave you, hallowed spot, 
 
 As from the sinking vessel flies the rat ; 
 Men claim your ' eligible building plot ' 
 For piles of flats ! And frankly I do not 
 Fancy a flat ! 
 
 Farewell ! I have no heart to stay in Town. 
 
 I know a picturesque old Haunted Mill 
 Where walks my friend, the Ghost of WILLIAM 
 
 BROWN ; 
 
 Yes, I shall toddle off and settle down 
 With Bony BILL !
 
 A FATHER'S LOVE 57 
 
 A FATHER'S LOVE 
 
 [Adapted, without exaggeration, from a book written more than 
 two thousand years ago.] 
 
 DOST thou love thine offspring dearly ? 
 
 Wouldst thou save him future pain ? 
 Beat him on the sides severely, 
 
 Beat him till he roars again. 
 
 Whoso pets his child and cockers 
 Turns him to the walks of sin ; 
 
 He that spares the knickerbockers 
 Surely spoils the child therein. 
 
 If the colt remain unbroken 
 Hast thou profit in his vice ? 
 
 So thy son ; and, more by token, 
 Thou thyself will pay the price.
 
 58 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Wherefore, lest he prove a rover, 
 
 ' Teach ' him ere the chance be gone ; 
 
 Take him up and turn him over ; 
 It shall guerdon thee anon. 
 
 Laugh not with thy child and play not ; 
 
 Wink not on him if he fall ; 
 Bow his neck lest he obey not, 
 
 And thou gnash thy teeth withal. 
 
 Short the curb and strong the fetter, 
 That his feet be not misled ; 
 
 Is he good ? He might be better ; 
 Is he naughty ? Smack his head. 
 
 Be thou tireless in correction 
 Hour by hour and day by day, 
 
 Diligent in thine affection 
 Till his youth has rolled away. 
 
 Thus by fond paternal chidings 
 Goodly shall he wax and wise, 
 
 Purged of juvenile backslidings, 
 Perfect in thy fellows' eyes ;
 
 A FATHER'S LOVE 59 
 
 And for all thy pains and labours 
 He shall make thee full amends, 
 
 As a boast before thy neighbours 
 And a bragging to thy friends.
 
 60 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 THE ' SILLY ' SEASON 
 
 THERE is a Season, by the Press termed ' Silly,' 
 When heated Law disdains the wig and gown, 
 
 When Parliament is ' up ' (and Piccadilly) 
 And a great wave of dulness floods the town ; 
 A time when all the springs of news run down, 
 
 And London's papers, curious to say, 
 
 Become more interesting every day. 
 
 At such a time, in punctual iteration, 
 With a vivacity undimmed by age, 
 
 Sea-serpents of the largest circulation 
 
 Drag their slow lengths across the middle page ; 
 And, where the Commons furiously did rage, 
 
 ' Our readers ' are politely drawn to share 
 
 The annual running of an autumn ' hare.'
 
 THE < SILLY ' SEASON 61 
 
 'Tis then that we regale the mind o' mornings 
 On strange, new foods wherewith our organ 
 teems ; 
 
 Mixed bathing, motorists, and ghostly warnings, 
 Alcohol, hats, banana-skins, and dreams ; 
 Nor do we lack for those obscurer themes : 
 
 Are Husbands Selfish, Women worth their Keep, 
 
 And can one risk a Marriage on the Cheap ? 
 
 Some will say one thing others, vice versfr ; 
 
 The married man uplifts his tale of woe ; 
 The hapless married woman puts in her say, 
 
 And tells one much that it 's as well to know ; 
 
 All are invited ; each may have a go ; 
 While many a lone soul sees his ' borrowed name ' 
 In print, and blushes not to find it fame. 
 
 Such are the themes, not fleeting but perennial, 
 Which in the Silly Season we peruse, 
 
 Grudging no price assured that every penny '11 
 Return us something to enlarge our views, 
 Something of interest, something to amuse. 
 
 Pity that, when they give such noble sport, 
 
 The boom in hares should be so very short.
 
 62 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 But all too soon, the portent of the Session 
 Drives out the foaming orator on stump ; 
 
 Bronzed editors return, and start afresh on 
 Some novel aspect of the Parish Pump ; 
 The last hare dies ; the boom becomes a slump ; 
 
 And the Sea-serpent slumbers, roll on roll 
 
 Coiled in an editorial pigeon-hole.
 
 PARTURIUNT DENTES 63 
 
 PARTURIUNT DENTES .... 
 
 ALL in the dentist's torture-chair, 
 With drumming fists, erectile hair, 
 
 And tapping of the boots, 
 I lay, and watched the long hours go, 
 While nerve on nerve our Common Foe 
 Grappled, and wrenched, all quivering, from its 
 
 roots. 
 
 I was not merry. Postured thus, 
 One rarely feels hilarious ; 
 
 And, as that icy screw 
 Plied its dread office, I confess 
 I wept ; and in my bitterness 
 I cursed my day. And cursed the dentist too. 
 
 When lo ! as oft, when skies are gray, 
 The sprightly Regent of the Day
 
 64 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Leaps from behind a cloud, 
 So on my tortured being broke 
 The sudden rapture of a joke, 
 So rich, so radiant, that I laughed aloud ! 
 
 My jaws were gagged. My mouth was full 
 (Ah me !) of rolls of cotton-wool. 
 
 The sound, I must admit, 
 Had less of laughter than the note 
 Known as a rattle in the throat. 
 It nearly gave our Enemy a fit. 
 
 Pale to the lips with sudden dread, 
 He loosed the gag, and raised my head, 
 
 And gave me drink to quaff. 
 I told him I had merely thought 
 Of something funny. It was naught. 
 I said, ' Confound you, can't a fellow laugh ? ' 
 
 He scorched me with a fiery eye ; 
 And said that I could sob, or sigh, 
 
 Such was the common lot ; 
 But that the noise of one that laughed 
 Outraged the canons of his craft ; 
 And, as he grimly urged, ' I 'd better not.'
 
 PARTURIUNT DENTES 65 
 
 Thinking a dentist, when annoyed, 
 Was quite a person to avoid, 
 
 I left him with a sneer, 
 To cast abroad my jeu d' esprit, 
 With view to pay the ruffian's fee, 
 And stimulate a doting Public's cheer. 
 
 But ' oh, the heavy change ! ' (It shows 
 That after all one never knows.) 
 
 I would have bet my money 
 That humour in a dentist's chair 
 Ought to be humour anywhere 
 And now I 'm out of it, it isn't funny.
 
 66 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 THE LAST DROP 
 
 BARBER, arise ! Prepare your keenest blade, 
 
 Bring soap ; with clippers and abhorred shears 
 Shave me this upper lip ! Don't be afraid ; 
 Come, fellow, why these tears ? 
 
 The thing, you say, is beautiful. Nay, nay, 
 
 Old flatterer ; these words are kindly meant ; 
 It has some comeliness (and well it may, 
 
 With all the time I 've spent) ; 
 
 Yet, were this growth the noblest of its kind, 
 
 Still would I charge you, on your barberhood, 
 Destroy and spare not ! And if I don't mind, 
 I don't see why you should. 
 
 What, must you argue still ? Nay, man, I know 
 All you would urge ; I grant its melting droop, 
 Its prodigal luxuriance ; but oh, 
 
 Barber, the Soup, the Soup !
 
 THE LAST DROP 67 
 
 It is the Soup. Last night, an honoured guest, 
 
 I sat among the great ; EVE'S fairest child 
 Partnered my honour ; I was at my best ; 
 Sweet heavens, how I smiled ! 
 
 Perchance I smiled too richly, for it dipped 
 Dipped, Barber and, as from an o'ercharged 
 
 squirt, 
 
 A thick, fat, slow pearl, like a pig's tear, dripped 
 Slap on my naked shirt. 
 
 Just then an angel chanced to pass o'erhead ; 
 
 The conversation, with a sudden slam, 
 Shut up ; and (much to my surprise) I said, 
 Clear as a lark, ' Oh, D ! ' 
 
 Barber, it rang out like the crack of doom ! 
 Vainly I strove to bridge it with a cough ; 
 In vain I sought one friendly soul on whom 
 I might have palmed it off ; 
 
 Warm on my breast men saw that trickling pearl ; 
 
 Indeed, my partner's leap into the air 
 Was quite enough ; (I never liked that girl ; 
 She had no savoir faire) .
 
 68 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 No, I was crushed. And there among th' elect 
 For two good hours, with ice upon my spine, 
 I sat and moaned about the retrospect, 
 A death's head at the wine. 
 
 Barber, I place my future in your hand. 
 
 My character is humbled in the dirt ; 
 That wouldn't matter, but I cannot stand 
 Spoiling a brand-new shirt. 
 
 Rase me, I pray, this fair but naughty growth ; 
 For bald-lipped I must issue from these doors ; 
 To work, stout fellow ! You need not be loth ! 
 It 's my moustache, not yours.
 
 THE PASSING OF AUTUMN 69 
 
 THE PASSING OF AUTUMN 
 
 THE splendour of the Year has gone. 
 
 The summer skies are overcast ; 
 Down the dark slope the Year moves on 
 
 To his dead fathers in the Past. 
 
 He hears no twittering from the eaves, 
 Nor music from the haggard bough ; 
 
 He stoops, and twines the fallen leaves 
 Into a chaplet for his brow. 
 
 Beneath his shadow as he goes 
 
 The last sad lily pines away ; 
 The rose the very royal rose 
 
 Drops, and is trampled in the clay. 
 
 O russet Autumn merged in gloom, 
 Thy days are done, thy tale is told ; 
 
 The dragging Year has brought thy doom, 
 And I have caught my winter cold.
 
 70 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 THE GIFT OF WINTER 
 
 Now the year is waning fast ; 
 
 Now her course is wellnigh done ; 
 Whirled like leaves before the blast, 
 
 Thousands pack their traps, and run 
 Off to Spain, the Riviera, 
 Egypt, India, anywhere a- 
 way from England, rushing to the sun. 
 
 Hushed is now the poet's lay ; 
 
 He has sung till all was blue 
 Steadily since early May ; 
 
 Now his only ' winter view ' 
 Is a songless wish to follow 
 In the footsteps of the swallow ; 
 (' Footsteps ' isn't right, but it will do) . 
 
 Not as these I touch the strings ; 
 
 Heartily though I admire 
 Flowers, and birds, and all that brings 
 
 Matter to a poet's lyre,
 
 THE GIFT OF WINTER 71 
 
 Yet the time I mostly hymn is 
 When the man has cleaned the chimneys, 
 And the hour has come to start a Fire. 
 
 Then it is that Britain's clime 
 Grows, beyond all others, fair ; 
 
 All the rigours of the time, 
 Rigours of the earth and air, 
 
 Melt before the gassy bubbling 
 
 Of the rich and radiant nubbling ; 
 And, whatever happens, / don't care. 
 
 Sweet to sit indoors, and smoke ; 
 
 Warm the heart, and toast the toes ; 
 Give the fire a friendly poke ; 
 
 Note the glamour that it throws 
 O'er my res angustce domi ; 
 For a fact, you 'd hardly know my 
 Dusky attic when the firelight glows. 
 
 'Tis the fire that sheds a light 
 O'er the sullen days ahead ; 
 
 'Tis the fire that 's ever bright, 
 Always welcome, always red ;
 
 72 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Sweet by day ; and in the small hours 
 Even sweeter ; and, of all hours, 
 Pleasantest when turning out of bed ! 
 
 When I clasp the solemn sponge : 
 
 Shiver on the icy brink : 
 Shut my eyes, and take the plunge ; 
 
 Struggle madly, gasp, and sink ; 
 Fight for life, and wildly utter 
 Cries for help ; and, with a splutter, 
 Rise, like Venus, wet and very pink ; 
 
 When I stand, superbly nude, 
 While a sympathetic glow 
 
 Warms my ' British attitude ' 
 Slowly upwards from below ; 
 
 When my calves are simply stewing 
 
 (Tho' it takes a power of doing) : 
 That 's about the finest thing I know !
 
 TO THE < FOURTH ESTATE ' 73 
 
 TO THE ' FOURTH ESTATE ' 
 
 (BY THE DEFENDANT IN A FORTHCOMING ACTION 
 FOR BREACH OF PROMISE) 
 
 O FOURTH Estate, whose soaring pens have 
 mounted 
 
 To a pure height where none may dare to climb, 
 In whose comparison are kings accounted 
 
 Nothing, the lords of Spirit and of Time 
 Puppets that cower at thy deific nod ; 
 
 The majesty of whose imperious prime 
 Shadows the cringing commons like a god : 
 Thou that alone art strong, alone art free 
 Almost to licence, hear, oh, hear my plea. 
 
 Thou that with tireless ardour penetratest 
 Through the obscure in such audacious wise 
 
 That whispering walls divulge the very latest 
 And keyholes ope like caverns to thine eyes, 
 
 Whose myrmidons, for ever on the track 
 Of a new thing, with jealous enterprise 
 
 Creep up the front stairs or infest the back ; 
 
 O Thou that knowest all, that layest bare 
 
 Skeletons in grim cupboards, hear my prayer.
 
 74 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Thou at whose newsy fount the thirsting many 
 
 Absorb their mental viand and consume 
 Draughts of intelligence at two a penny ; 
 
 Thou Trumpeter of the Unknown, to whom 
 Art, Science, Letters, Dogma, and the Stage 
 
 (Fresh apple-blossom, blushing for a boom) 
 Kneel for due favour ; Thou whose patronage 
 Quickens a pyrotechnic flash, and fame 
 Bursts with a sharp report on even the humblest 
 
 name, 
 
 Hear me, oh, hear ! I wince, I shrink, I tremble, 
 
 That seek a boon, but not as others seek. 
 Lo, I am mean ! yet how may I dissemble 
 In thy dread sight ? Or what that I am 
 
 meek ? 
 For, as the elephant's continued nose 
 
 Plucks up the pin or piles the squdgy teak, 
 So to the scheme of thine embracing prose 
 The least thing does. Yet, O promiscuous 
 
 One, 
 Thou in whose ear the faintest rumour blows 
 
 Loud as a clarion, thou that, like the sun, 
 Beholdest all, oh, hear me, lest I be undone !
 
 TO THE ' FOURTH ESTATE ' 75 
 
 For lo ! by machination of mine enemies 
 
 I am entangled in the Law's dread reach ; 
 They have appointed me so great their venom 
 is 
 
 Defendant of an imminent deadly ' Breach,' 
 Suited by one that vowed to hold me dear, 
 
 And now cries Damage ! And I do beseech, 
 Thou wilt restrain thyself when I appear. 
 
 There are some letters which the lady filed 
 (Prudent !) whereat the ribald mob would jeer ; 
 
 And some poor foolish numbers, far too wild, 
 Too sacred, for perusal, woe is me ! 
 
 Then, O great Press, I pr'ythee draw it mild ! 
 Ignore my frailty, that my song may be 
 That Thou, tho' Fourth, art First ! And blow 
 the other three !
 
 76 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 AN UNPOPULAR YEAR 
 
 i 
 
 CLOSE TIME BY THE SEA 
 
 THEY sowed the bait, with ample hand, 
 Of joys to child and adult dear ; 
 
 They praised their drainage and their band ; 
 Their lodging-houses' cordial cheer ; 
 
 The bathing from the silvery strand, 
 Or watching from the pier. 
 
 Yet vain were all their arts, and vain 
 
 The hopes whereon their faith was pinned ; 
 
 The bait was ruined by the rain ; 
 The quarry, headed by the wind, 
 
 Came, saw, and passed away again, 
 Not waiting to be skinned.
 
 AN UNPOPULAR YEAR 77 
 
 The beach whereon, serenely laid, 
 Puppa would take his yearly ease, 
 
 While Mumma, proud but half afraid, 
 Watched her small brood of he's and she's 
 
 Plying the bucket and the spade, 
 Or paddling to the knees, 
 
 Did not, as heretofore, attract ; 
 
 For Puppa found his morning sheet 
 Blown from his grasp, while Mumma smacked 
 
 Her offspring if they wet their feet ; 
 And having tried it once, they packed 
 
 Up for a swift retreat. 
 
 The bather, too, that oft of yore 
 
 Clove the gay blue with pliant limb, 
 
 Stood rooted to the yeasty shore, 
 And hardly felt inclined to swim ; 
 
 But owned the billows' hungry roar 
 Was one too much for him.
 
 78 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 In vain the vessel puff't the sail 
 Or filled the air with barren hoot ; 
 
 Like the Saharan camel's trail, 
 The minstrel Bones' colossal boot 
 
 Stamped the lone sands, while, almost pale, 
 He twanged an empty lute. 
 
 And from the marges of the deep 
 There rose a noise of sore dismay, 
 
 Especially from them that keep 
 Apartments whose expected hay 
 
 Failed with the sun who dully weep, 
 Foiled of their lawful prey. 
 
 O hostess by the summer sea, 
 
 Take courage, for the worst has gone ; 
 Look forward to the time to be ! 
 
 Look forward ! You may trust anon 
 To multiply the rent by three, 
 
 And cock some extras on.
 
 AN UNPOPULAR YEAR 79 
 
 II 
 
 DEPARTURE 
 
 O YOU that from the first 
 Have steadily been cursed 
 As just about the worst 
 
 In mortal ken, 
 Upon whose watery way 
 The sun diffused no ray, 
 Barring, perhaps, a stray 
 
 One now and then 
 
 Sweet Weather, fare you well ! 
 Tho' there be few to swell 
 The dirge, or raise the knell, 
 
 Accept, I beg, 
 
 This (tho' the metre 's hard) 
 Small tribute from a bard 
 As bald as bladdered lard, 
 
 Bald as an egg.
 
 8o A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 The joys that others greet 
 As excellent and sweet, 
 Long days of quivering heat 
 
 And brassy skies, 
 But aggravate my woes, 
 That am, from start to close, 
 A skating-rink for those 
 
 Infernal flies. 
 
 As, when the young stars wake, 
 Th' unerring wildfowl make 
 A bee-line to the lake ; 
 
 As the dry mule, 
 Freed from his toilsome pack, 
 Unless you hold him back, 
 Finds, by a happy knack, 
 
 The nearest pool ; 
 
 So to my candid pate 
 These insects congregate, 
 Come early and stay late, 
 From far and near :
 
 AN UNPOPULAR YEAR 81 
 
 They leave the sunny wall, 
 They find the ceiling pall, 
 They do not seek at all 
 The chandelier ; 
 
 Only to this gay spot 
 They come, and falter not ; 
 Such is my yearly lot, 
 
 My summer woe ; 
 Their everlasting buzz 
 Would rile the Man of Uz ; 
 And being tickled does 
 
 Annoy me so. 
 
 Wherefore, tho' some complain, 
 Finding your cold and rain 
 Go sorely 'gainst the grain 
 
 (As well they might !), 
 In that you made a clean 
 Sweep of those flies, I ween 
 This Orb has rarely seen 
 
 A year more bright. 
 
 F
 
 82 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Also I make this plea : 
 That other years may be 
 As beastly, and as free 
 
 From this my ruth ; 
 That shall be all my pray'r, 
 Being (from loss of hair) 
 Bare as a boot is bare, 
 
 Bald as the truth.
 
 ACHES AND IVORIES 83 
 
 ACHES AND IVORIES 
 
 MINE is a flat on the uppermost floor of the 
 
 mansion, 
 Far from the motor-bus, high above whistle 
 
 and shout, 
 
 Here I could give my afflatus its needful ex- 
 pansion, 
 
 Ponder my numbers and patiently worry them 
 out. 
 
 Calmly remote I pursued my professional labours, 
 Lived as a type of the homely industrious 
 
 poor, 
 Sat in content with myself and at peace with my 
 
 neighbours, 
 
 Till they imported a beast of an infant next 
 door.
 
 84 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Bagpipes and bo'suns, a bushel of average 
 
 babbies, 
 Screams of despair from a steamer that 's run 
 
 on a shoal, 
 Pulleys and brakes that want greasing, noctam- 
 
 bulate tabbies, 
 
 Cries of an errant purveyor of cabbage or 
 coal 
 
 Start them at once from the cardinal points of the 
 
 compass ; 
 Throw in a gramophone able to penetrate 
 
 walls ; 
 Then you 've a dream of the pandemoniacal 
 
 rumpus 
 
 Wafted abroad when that wicked homunculus 
 bawls. 
 
 First with the mother I entered a dignified 
 
 protest : 
 
 Said that the music was hard on poetical ears. 
 Did it have any effect ? Not the very remotest ! 
 Save when we meet in the lift, and she mock- 
 ingly sneers.
 
 ACHES AND IVORIES 85 
 
 Foiled, I endured for a fortnight ; but fiercer and 
 
 fiercer 
 Daily the melody grew ; then I turned to the 
 
 sire : 
 ' Sorry to bother, but really your baby my 
 
 dear sir, 
 
 Dammit, do something ! ' I wrote, ' Yours in 
 sorrow (and ire).' 
 
 He, the good fellow, replied that he pitied me 
 
 deeply ; 
 My lot was bitter, but his was more desperate 
 
 still ; 
 Thought, on the whole, I got off, by comparison, 
 
 cheaply ; 
 
 Begged that I 'd give him my prayers ! Poor 
 devil, I will. 
 
 As for the rest of the world, it is cold and un- 
 feeling ; 
 Even my housekeeper one in whose arms I 
 
 was nursed 
 
 Calls it a lamb ! And whenever I yell to the ceiling 
 (' Cursed be the baby,' I yell, ' be the baby 
 accursed ! ')
 
 86 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Tells me in triumph (and glares as if I were the 
 
 criminal) 
 
 I was a baby myself ! It was ever the rule 
 Give 'em a baby in range, and the soundest of 
 
 women '11 
 Sacrifice logic to sentiment silly old fool ! 
 
 Daily I labour in vain to the point of pros- 
 tration ; 
 Nightly I find myself roused by that pestilent 
 
 brat 
 
 Sitting up straight in my bed in a cold perspira- 
 tion, 
 
 Sighing for she-bears, or Herod, or something 
 like that. 
 
 Ever the demon goes on, and despairing and 
 
 hollow-eyed 
 Still (I am told) I must bear this preposterous 
 
 din 
 While there 's a tooth to be cut ; by the lyre of 
 
 Apollo, I 'd 
 
 Cut 'em I 'd teach it to cut 'em if I could 
 get in.
 
 ONE BETTER 87 
 
 ONE BETTER 
 
 DEAR, when I gaze into your eyes, 
 Whose light I give my word outvies 
 
 The very sun, 
 
 Show me, I say, a pair as blue, 
 As deep, as clear, and so forth pooh ! 
 
 There isn't one. 
 
 And when beneath the friendly trees 
 I give your hand an ardent squeeze 
 
 Down in the wood 
 I feel, whate'er of ill may be, 
 It is the solid fact to me 
 
 That this is good. 
 
 When coyly on my heaving breast 
 You, in expansive moments, rest 
 
 Your head and hat, 
 Why, then to all the world I cry, 
 Take it or leave it, what care I ? 
 
 You won't beat that !
 
 88 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 But when the failing day is low, 
 And love (inversely) seems to grow 
 
 Ever more fond ; 
 
 When, somewhat nervously, I press 
 Upon your lips a chaste caress, 
 
 And you respond ; 
 
 I am as one that 's blind I reel 
 I don't know where I am I feel 
 
 A swift shock strike 
 
 My whole soul through ; and in my bliss, 
 ' This/ I remark with fervour, ' this 
 
 Is something like.'
 
 ROUGH LUCK 89 
 
 ROUGH LUCK 
 
 CALM was the scene, and luring to repose. 
 
 The scent of balms and hair-restoring spices 
 Were blandly recommended to the nose ; 
 
 I heard the barber's garrulous advices 
 As from afar ; and the soft-clashing shears, 
 Like chirping crickets, lulled my drowsy ears. 
 
 And, in a reverie, I passed again 
 
 To those far days when, at my grand-sire's 
 
 place in 
 The golden Duchy, my redundant mane 
 
 Was hogged by JAY the coachman with a basin ; 
 (And why a basin, why of all that 's wild 
 A basin, has perplexed me from a child). 
 
 'Twas there that they constrained my stubborn 
 curls 
 
 With a dishonouring comb ! When I objected, 
 They said it was a boy's comb, not a girl's ! 
 
 They looked too plausible to be suspected ;
 
 90 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 But still the memories of my Cornish home 
 Are soured with thoughts of that infernal comb. 
 
 Mine was in truth a wild and rugged mat, 
 And uncontrollable beyond all others ; 
 
 My grown-up sisters mocked it ; worse than that, 
 Vilely compared it to my younger brother's, 
 
 A little beast, whose head was ever sleek, 
 
 And wanted soundly punching once a week. 
 
 Ah, how I suffered ! I can feel it still ! 
 
 Young JAMES got all the praise and I the 
 
 merriment ; 
 His was the head that called for every skill ; 
 
 Mine was a field for humour and experiment ! 
 I still remember how my smouldering flames 
 Burst forth and how I took it out of JAMES. 
 
 One day they had me cropped a prison crop ! 
 
 They jeered. Then rose I up against their 
 
 jeering. 
 Sternly next morning to the barber's shop 
 
 I haled the imp. I bore him from the shearing, 
 Plush on his noddle shaven like a sheep ! 
 I got a licking, too and got it cheap.
 
 ROUGH LUCK 91 
 
 Thus, with a sense of well-requited injury, 
 
 I passed through older days to times more 
 
 recent ; 
 To-day my head of hair is rich (tho' gingery) ; 
 
 JAMES is so bald as hardly to be decent. 
 My locks are much admired at balls and crushes, 
 But JAMES when JAMES removes his hat he 
 blushes !
 
 92 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 A TELEPATHIC SUGGESTION 
 
 TELEPATHISTS ! O you whose creed 
 Leaps lightly to the poet's need, 
 Excuse me (will you ?) while I plead 
 
 That any one who can 
 Will, of his wisdom, be so kind 
 As to assist the undersigned, 
 Who is unluckily a married man. 
 
 Yes, I espoused, when very young, 
 
 A wife extremely highly strung 
 
 In nerves, in temper, and in tongue 
 
 Who, in fair tete-a-tete, 
 Would talk the hind leg off a horse ; 
 A fact which comes with added force 
 Because she 's nearly twice my fighting weight.
 
 A TELEPATHIC SUGGESTION 93 
 
 I am a timid man, and hold, 
 With one of this barbaric mould, 
 That silence is the truest gold ; 
 
 Indeed, when once I did 
 Attempt to take the other side, 
 Instead of arguing, she shied 
 A tea-pot at my head, and broke the lid. 
 
 Yet, mark you, I myself can be 
 Sarcastic to the last degree ; 
 My latent power of repartee 
 
 Would floor her on the spot, 
 Bar her exceptional physique, 
 And that I hardly care to speak 
 Roughly to so remarkable a shot. 
 
 And thus, you see, like mythic Sprat, 
 
 Not only do I lose the fat, 
 
 But she takes all the lean ; and that 
 
 Is where I draw the line ; 
 At least I should, but up till now 
 I never saw exactly how, 
 While I knew her views, she could get at mine.
 
 94 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 But if it 's true, as I have heard, 
 
 That A. can get his thoughts transferred 
 
 To B. without one blessed word 
 
 Then all that I can say 
 Is that I hope some unknown friend 
 Will, of his knowledge, condescend 
 To put me on to this without delay. 
 
 Teach me, I beg, this new device ; 
 And blow the trouble, hang the price ! 
 I shall not count the sacrifice, 
 So that my end be won ; 
 Give me this mental telegraph 
 And then, well, 7 shall have the laugh : 
 
 Will some one kindly tell me how it 's done ?
 
 RISUS DRAMATICUS 95 
 
 RISUS DRAMATICUS 
 
 THERE is an ailment of the Stage a germ 
 Whose ravages are shown, in every style, 
 
 In portraits of the fair which doctors term 
 Risus Dramaticus the Frozen Smile. 
 
 This weird disfigurement appears to start 
 
 'Mongst those that fatten on that mental feast 
 
 Musical Comedy (a little Art, 
 And lots of Nature lots, to say the least). 
 
 Others, indeed, it seems content to spare ; 
 
 And, like the Vampire, seeks its prey among 
 That honeyed class which always must be fair, 
 
 And always are professionally young. 
 
 Some one has known, whose eminent careers 
 Have gained the zenith of pictorial fame, 
 
 Whose faces we have known for years and years, 
 Loved from afar, and always found the same ;
 
 96 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 But the blow falls ; the placid face becomes 
 Distorted hideously ; we see the teeth 
 
 Clenched as with tetanus ; the bristling gums 
 All naked and the lady's name beneath ; 
 
 And we behold our bright particular Stars 
 
 Smiling like clockwork see them, one by one, 
 
 At doors, with dogs, in chairs or motor-cars, 
 In plain dress, fancy dress, or next to none, 
 
 Smiling, till as we gaze the jaws grow stiff 
 With sympathy ; one's very cockles creep ; 
 
 They are not merry, these ; they look as if 
 They couldn't help it ! Would that they 
 might weep ! 
 
 Mothers of England, be it yours to wage 
 
 War in your daughters' cause on this complaint; 
 
 And when they want to go upon the Stage 
 
 And ask for your permission, say they mayn't. 
 
 Rich men of England, raise us, of your wealth, 
 A noble hospital, with spacious wards 
 
 Fitted alike for interviews and health, 
 
 For these distressing vestals of the boards,
 
 RISUS DRAMATICUS 97 
 
 Where sporting scientists and grave M.D.'s 
 May win fat knighthoods and a people's praise 
 
 By stamping out that tragical disease, 
 
 Risus Dramaticus the Smile That Stays !
 
 98 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 ODE TO CONSCIENCE 
 
 O CONSCIENCE, Conscience, you that pry 
 
 unbidden 
 
 In my dark soul, from morn till dewy eve 
 Seeking those details I would fain keep hidden 
 E'en from myself, whose pitiless qui vive 
 Guile may not baffle, nor excuse deceive, 
 Who, deaf to all opinions of my own, 
 
 Compel my conduct to your own good leave, 
 Discarnate Grundy of my moral tone, 
 Confound you, Conscience, can't you let a man 
 alone ? 
 
 All that I seek of profit or of pleasure 
 
 You would preposterously bid me shun 
 All that I do dear gods ! what words can 
 
 measure 
 
 Those after-agonies ? ' O Naughty One ! 
 Repent,' you tell me, ' This was not well 
 done ! '
 
 ODE TO CONSCIENCE 99 
 
 And, as I know of sad experience, 
 
 There is no rest for me when that 's begun 
 You have no tact, no manners : ten years 
 
 hence 
 
 You '11 still be dragging out that crusted old 
 offence. 
 
 Were you content from day to day to wake up 
 
 My waning zeal, but little need be said ; 
 But why, oh, why deliberately rake up 
 The Late Lamented, why profane the dead 
 In their cold Past and chuck them at my 
 
 head ? 
 I ask you, is it decent, is it fair 
 
 To hoist these veterans from their wormy bed ? 
 Better, far better, leave them as they were, 
 Than thrust them in a light they are not meant 
 to bear. 
 
 And, oh my Conscience, wherefore be invidious? 
 These, as I knew them, were not wholly black ; 
 
 They had their failings to the more fastidious, 
 But still, there was a pleasurable smack 
 About them somewhere why not bring that 
 back ?
 
 ioo A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Also I know not why your choice should fall 
 
 On me to bear the brunt of your attack ; 
 When some, whom it were flattery to call 
 Profligate, seem to have no conscience left at all. 
 
 For one comparatively law-abiding 
 
 To see these persons, up to every trick, 
 Pleasing themselves, enjoyably backsliding 
 In calm indifference to the gaping NICK, 
 I say, it makes me positively sick. 
 No nagging Voice withholds them from their 
 
 shame, 
 Nothing they reck of your compunctious 
 
 prick ; 
 
 I I alone must tremble at your Name : 
 No doubt it does me good ; but can't you play 
 the game ?
 
 AN AUTUMN REVERIE 101 
 
 AN AUTUMN REVERIE 
 
 WHEN the Spring is diffusing her sprightly 
 
 New spirit on all that 's alive ; 
 When the song of the sparrow turns lightly 
 To love about five ; 
 
 When the charms these emotions induce urge 
 
 The young man of parts to resume 
 Like a robe, with his flannels and blue serge, 
 Love's annual bloom ; 
 
 Then, beginning in May as a rule, I 
 
 Myself would awake to the call, 
 And in June, or at latest in July, 
 Love held me in thrall. 
 
 Ah, those halcyon summers ! How fleetly 
 
 The year galloped on to its prime ! 
 What a handful is Love ! How completely 
 It filled up one's time !
 
 102 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Not a year but I poured my devotion, 
 
 Like wine, on the fair and the young, 
 From a heart that with lively emotion 
 Was full to the bung. 
 
 And though, doomed as they were to disaster, 
 
 My spirits were apt to rebel, 
 
 They recovered, if anything, faster 
 
 Than ever they fell ; 
 
 And the time would go on till again Spring 
 
 Rose up and I never knew how, 
 But it started me off like a mainspring ; 
 It never does now ! 
 
 For alas, for the sombre confession 
 Where, where is the magic of yore ? 
 It has failed for three years in succession, 
 And this '11 make four. 
 
 'Tis in vain that I meditate numbly 
 
 On where the hiatus can be ; 
 If the ladies are growing uncomely, 
 Or if it 's in me.
 
 AN AUTUMN REVERIE 103 
 
 Can the taste have diminished, the nutty 
 
 Old feelings be lost to a heart 
 That was dough to receive, putting putty 
 Entirely apart ? 
 
 'Tis a dark and insoluble mystery ; 
 
 It throws my whole year out of joint ; 
 It 's opposed to the teachings of history 
 (Though that 's not the point) . 
 
 And my days are perceptibly duller ; 
 
 My being grows vapid and slack ; 
 And I 'm rapidly getting off colour, 
 And losing the knack.
 
 104 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 TO ONE ABOUT TO WED 
 
 THE hour draws nigh. The moments fly amain. 
 
 Rabble and guest attend the flowery shrine ; 
 The Cake is ready also the champagne 
 (A sound, dry wine). 
 
 Then, Sister, ere the last sad moment goes, 
 
 Listen, while from a brother's faltering lips 
 Drop, like essential attar of the rose, 
 Two useful tips. 
 
 If you would prosper in that married state 
 
 Which many, I believe, have called sublime, 
 Be very careful not to irritate 
 At breakfast time. 
 
 Man is not lively at that solemn feast ; 
 
 And JOHN, whom you esteem a thing apart, 
 (So strange is Love) is little more than triste, 
 Or less than tart.
 
 TO ONE ABOUT TO WED 105 
 
 Spare him your daily correspondents' views ; 
 
 Nor, from a paper that he hasn't read, 
 Think to refresh him with th' appalling news 
 That some one 's dead. 
 
 As for those details of a household type 
 
 That seem indigenous to married men, 
 Wait till he 's half way through his morning pipe : 
 Tackle him then. 
 
 But, oh my sister, lay no wifely snares ; 
 
 Think not to press him for a boon ; and don't, 
 Don't dream of getting at him unawares : 
 Because you won't. 
 
 That we will come to now. And, I should say, 
 
 I do so with a certain lingering doubt ; 
 Though, truly, if I give your JOHN away, 
 It 's his look out. 
 
 If, then, you would beguile th' unwary lad 
 
 To his undoing, first arrange to dine 
 On his most toothsome cheer (and, shall I add, 
 A sound, dry wine).
 
 106 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 And if, soon afterwards, you gently spring 
 
 Your purpose on him, 'twere an easy task 
 To lure him on to any blessed thing 
 You choose to ask. 
 
 Now must we go. The steeds are at the door. 
 Those be my precepts, Sister. Act thereon, 
 And you '11 be happy. But alas, for poor, 
 Poor, wretched JOHN !
 
 TO ALL THAT GRUMBLE 107 
 
 TO ALL THAT GRUMBLE 
 
 You that for ever are discontented 
 Save you can grumble about your lot, 
 
 Mainly because of a much lamented 
 Absence of all that you haven't got, 
 
 Listen to me, for I bring you healing : 
 If you would scatter those moods away, 
 
 If you would conquer that injured feeling, 
 Listen to me, I say. 
 
 Years ago, for a certain season, 
 
 I was a pessimist (strange but true), 
 
 And, as a matter of fact, with reason, 
 Not for the fun of the thing, like you ; 
 
 All that I merited, looked for, built on, 
 Seemed to be doomed to a fatal slump ; 
 
 Mine was the mental complaint which MILTON 
 Happily termed the Hump.
 
 io8 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Came a night and of all Decembers 
 That was the vilest I sat alone, 
 
 Bitterly smoking before the embers, 
 Hugging my grievance, and making moan ; 
 
 Out in the open a biting blizzard, 
 Whirling the gravel about like dust, 
 
 Froze the marrow, and turned the gizzard 
 Inside out, at a gust. 
 
 Then I said, this is something hellish, 
 
 (Which was a fact) , and I crossed the room, 
 
 Flung up the blind, and with sour disrelish 
 Gazed for awhile on the roaring gloom ; 
 
 Till, on a sudden, my awe-struck glances 
 Fell on a sentinel's heav'n-sent form, 
 
 Driven, by pressure of circumstances, 
 Out in that beastly storm. 
 
 High on a magazine, bleak and lonely, 
 Nobly he paced his appointed beat 
 
 (Rather like CASABLANCA, only 
 That little horror complained of heat),
 
 TO ALL THAT GRUMBLE 109 
 
 Daring an enemy's foot to trench on his 
 
 Windy preserves, he was hurled about, 
 Getting his spine well iced, not to mention his 
 Gizzard blown inside out. 
 
 Long I gazed on the gusty fellow ; 
 
 Gazed, till mine uglier moods were spent ; 
 Gazed, till my whole soul seemed to mellow 
 
 Into a chastened and bland content ; 
 And, as I blessed him, and drew the curtain, 
 
 Leaving him up on his wind-swept mound, 
 Life, I remarked, though a bit uncertain, 
 Wasn't so bad, all round. 
 
 Grumbler, such is the Grand Idea : 
 Surely the moral is plain to see ; 
 
 When you 're in need of a panacea, 
 Think of the sentinel think of me ! 
 
 Turn to Philosophy's consolation ; 
 
 Doubtless the gods may have used you ill ; 
 
 But by a Merciful Dispensation 
 
 Others are worse off still !
 
 i io A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 A CODICIL 
 
 [Written for the Omar Khayyam Club. ] 
 
 MASTER, the precepts of Whose ' golden lay ' 
 Thy sworn Disciples piously obey, 
 
 Pardon our asking, after all these years, 
 If Thou hast giv'n Thy Fellowship away. 
 
 Some we have met, whose sacrilegious mind 
 Disdains the Obvious that ever find 
 
 The Thing That Is Not in the Thing That Is, 
 And o'er the clearest Windows draw a Blind : 
 
 To them a Symbol burgeons with the Rose : 
 Thy purple Grape, the Cup wherein it glows, 
 Are nought but Parables though Whence 
 
 derived, 
 And Whither leading, ALLAH only knows !
 
 A CODICIL in 
 
 Well, let them do it ! Let them, if they please, 
 In Thy delightful Moon discern a Cheese : 
 
 So that the Night be wet, the Vintage dry, 
 What have Thy Worshippers to do with these ? 
 
 Perplext no whit with Complex or Abstruse, 
 Dining, they give the critics to the DEUCE, 
 
 And Year by Year the Shining Hour improve 
 With flagons of thine own ' familiar Juice.' 
 
 Now once again the Red Rose bids the White 
 To this Thy yearly Office ; but to-night 
 
 Methinks there is a Shadow o'er the Board. 
 A Cloud upon the Moon of our Delight. 
 
 For we, that do but gather to fulfil 
 
 Th' authentic Tenets of Thy proven Will, 
 
 Lo ! we are threatened with a later Script, 
 And stunned with Rumour of a Codicil, 
 
 Wherein 'tis written that Thou didst repent 
 The Creed we swallow with so much Content, 
 
 And bid Posterity revoke the Wine 
 For Water oh, the sorry Testament !
 
 ii2 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 O Thou that didst with Rising Morn debate 
 Repentance, and each Night repudiate, 
 
 Knowing Thy ways of old, we can but trust 
 That there has been an Error in the Date. 
 
 For if cold-bloodedly Thou wouldst debar 
 Thy True-believers from the jocund Jar, 
 
 With deference, may thy True-believers ask, 
 ' Where are we ? ' For we know not Where we 
 are. 
 
 Should this agreeable Creed whereto we swore 
 Allegiance be erased and written o'er, 
 
 Then, being 'stablished on a false Pretence, 
 We must dissolve, nor meet as heretofore ; 
 
 Or if, despite Thy lapse, we yearly dine, 
 What of the Cup, and what about the Vine ? 
 
 Ourselves, defrauded of our sole Excuse, 
 Must shun the Bowl, and to the Pump decline.
 
 BEWARE! 113 
 
 BEWARE ! 
 
 O YOU that hold that Britain grows degenerate, 
 That all her fighting spirit 's passed away, 
 
 That Luxury 's the only god we venerate, 
 And War a thing that fills us with dismay, 
 
 Go, listen to the party politician 
 
 (Who clearly represents the common folk), 
 And there you '11 find the Briton of tradition 
 
 As loud a warrior as ever spoke. 
 
 The merest phase of controversial prattle 
 
 Is lifted to a military plane ; 
 They never pass a day without a ' battle,' 
 
 And every one 's engaged in a ' campaign ' ; 
 
 The Minister, whose conduct of the nation 
 Is hampered by the party that oppose, 
 
 Can hardly make a popular oration 
 
 Without ' declaring war ' upon his ' foes.' 
 H
 
 1 1 4 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 The stumper armed with demagogic speeches 
 Invariably strikes a martial chord, 
 
 And, calling on the mob to ' man the breaches/ 
 Remarks that he 's about to ' draw the sword.' 
 
 ' The fighting ' will be fierce, no doubt, but 
 
 glorious ; 
 Their ' troops ' are being ' marshalled f to the 
 
 field; 
 
 And all their ranks, agog to be victorious, 
 Are ' marching on ' to conquer, not to yield. 
 
 The speaker means to keep the ' colours flying ' 
 (He generally ' nails them to the mast '), 
 
 And tells you straight that, if it comes to dying, 
 The ditch that he 's selected is the ' last.' 
 
 And every word is fully up to Cocker 
 And free alike of fear and of reproach ; 
 
 With lots of ' ammunition in the locker,' 
 As long as there 's a lozenge or a troche.
 
 BEWARE! 115 
 
 Let no misguided Continental Caesar 
 Imagine that the country 's on the drop, 
 
 When military phrases such as these are 
 The politician's ordinary shop. 
 
 For who can hear these martial voices welling, 
 And doubt that Britain 's warlike at the core ? 
 
 Tho' some among the brave were first in yelling 
 Against the country when she was at war. 
 
 It only shows it 's well to keep an eye on 
 The mask our heroes on occasion wear ; 
 
 That if you scratch the rat, you '11 find the lion ; 
 It takes a bit of scratching, but he 's there. 
 
 And still the ancient spirit of bravado 
 
 Is breathed into our members by the lungs ; 
 
 And the meanest is a bloody desperado, 
 And a beggar in a Battle of the Tongues.
 
 ii6 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 PLEA FOR A ' WORKING MAN ' 
 
 WHENE'ER my morning sheet I scan 
 I learn that now the ' Working Man,' 
 Proceeding on a novel plan 
 
 Of Give and Take, 
 For the first time since Work began 
 
 Is on the make. 
 
 His broad ideal seems to be 
 
 Getting his needs and comforts free ; 
 
 And as it 's natural that he 
 
 Shan't pay the bill, 
 The victim with the L. S. D., 
 
 Put bluntly, will. 
 
 A game in which you 're bound to win 
 Has charm for those that toil and spin, 
 Tho' to the man that has the tin 
 
 It may seem hard ; 
 But whereabouts do I come in ? 
 
 I am a bard.
 
 PLEA FOR A 'WORKING MAN' 117 
 
 I grant you that my trade is low, 
 And wanting in the outer show 
 Of decent Toil, so let that go : 
 
 What I impress 
 Is, Dignity of Labour, No ; 
 
 But Labour, Yes. 
 
 The proud exclusive Sons of Toil, 
 What reck they of the midnight oil, 
 Of barren labours that recoil 
 
 After they 're done, 
 Of Editors who make you boil 
 
 To give them one ? 
 
 They do their simple task per day 
 
 The minimum and pass away 
 
 To smoke, to drink, perchance to play, 
 
 Just as they like ; 
 Men whom the poet's rate of pay 
 
 Would send on strike. 
 
 Why, when in envious moods I think 
 Of all they have to spend on drink,
 
 u8 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 While, for the bard, the household sink 
 
 Fulfils his need, 
 It is enough to freeze one's ink ; 
 
 It is, indeed. 
 
 What tho' the hand the Muse employs 
 Is no more horny than a boy's ? 
 What tho' I wear no corduroys 
 
 On my two stumps ? 
 (I tried to, but their creaky noise 
 
 Gave me the jumps.) 
 
 But what of that ? I ask you, what ? 
 I say, let class distinctions rot ! 
 And if there 's boodle to be got 
 
 By Working Men, 
 Am I a ' Working ' Man or not ? 
 
 Very well, then. 
 
 By barren toil and meagre screw, 
 O Workers, I am one with you ; 
 And, if there 's any one to do, 
 
 By all means do 't ; 
 Only I mean to be there too 
 
 And share the loot.
 
 THE SWAN 
 
 AN IDYLL
 
 THE SWAN 121 
 
 THE SWAN 
 
 [The Author believes that there is an Allegory hidden in these lines, 
 but he is not sure.] 
 
 DOWN the slow current of a lazy stream 
 Floated a dying swan. The heavy day, 
 Passing, had left a weight of shimmering heat 
 On the tired air. No other creature moved, 
 Save for the light mosquito and his kind, 
 Ear-fly and eye-midge. In a neighbouring mead 
 The comfortable cow forbore to moo, 
 And, with an air of bland benevolence, 
 Matured the sidelong cud. The populous farm 
 Gave forth no sound ; and even the ribald ass 
 Found it too hot, nor made the welkin split 
 With the derisive relish of his song. 
 Oh, even as when some mighty orchestra, 
 Tuned to the fray, for instant noise alert, 
 In flushed expectancy must still await 
 Their tardy Captain, whose inspiring beat 
 Admits them to their clamorous ensemble, 
 So through that still hour every living thing
 
 122 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Panted and paused for the delaying breeze 
 To cool them, and refresh their wonted psalm ; 
 While down that hushed aisle of potential din 
 Moved the proud swan in hauteur to his change. 
 
 A dying swan. He bore no signs of death. 
 Time had not dimmed the lustre of his plumes, 
 Nor dotage with presuming finger stooped 
 That settled air of calm complacency 
 So galling in his kind. One might go far 
 Before one found a healthier-looking bird. 
 But, as he came, he sang. He did not know 
 He sang, or he had hardly been so proud. 
 Here was no amorous descant of the dove 
 Nor music of the moon-struck nightingale, 
 But disconnected, harsh, and immature, 
 And void of melody, and muttered forth 
 In broken fragments of soliloquy. 
 As when some person on a lonely road 
 Talks to himself, and, when accused thereof, 
 Says that he didn't so it was with him : 
 
 My royal home, farewell ! 
 For I must go, 
 Whither I do not know, 
 
 And cannot tell.
 
 THE SWAN 123 
 
 Others have gone before. 
 
 Each of my kingly race, 
 Passing, was seen no more 
 
 About the place. 
 
 They gave no parting word ; 
 
 Without good-bye 
 Each went, a silent bird ; 
 
 And so do I. 
 
 Slowly I wander on. 
 
 E'en as my fathers passed, 
 I go, a soured and disappointed s^an, 
 
 Mute to the last. 
 
 Thus far he sang, and, pausing, seemed to brood 
 Darkly upon his wrongs. And I, that found 
 More peevishness than pathos in the bird, 
 Waited, till he the silence broke again, 
 And with a voice of growing strength renewed 
 His vague unbosomings. And thus he sang : 
 
 King of the birds was I. 
 Monarch by right of all those meaner breeds 
 That ply a webby paddle mid the reeds, 
 Or dare to fly. 
 
 All other fowl beyond 
 In flawless majesty; by wide consent 
 Esteemed a necessary ornament 
 To any pond.
 
 i2 4 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 So radiant, and so rare, 
 That JOVE, when baffled in his fond address, 
 Assumed my form, with scandalous success 
 O'er the coy fair. 
 
 Slender of outward charm, 
 Yet of such force, that with one wrathful flap 
 Of mine imperious pinion I could snap 
 The human arm. 
 
 One thing I lacked, one thing ; 
 To me to me alone the gods denied 
 One crowning gift : however hard I tried, 
 I couldn't sing. 
 
 Bitter it was to hear 
 Offensive gander and exulting drake 
 With odious descant pointedly awake 
 River and mere. 
 
 Bitter to brood alone, 
 
 While beasts upon the sward, and in the tree 
 Birds, would make music scant of melody, 
 And poor in tone. 
 
 They had no vocal art ; 
 I, I alone, of all the natural choir, 
 Knew what song was, and felt a poet's fire 
 Deep in my heart.
 
 THE SWAN 125 
 
 Yet I alone was dumb. 
 Only to me the gates of song were shut. 
 My poet soul rang high with music, but 
 It wouldn't come. 
 
 So loud his voice had grown that, when he paused, 
 Nursing his royal ire, methought it seemed 
 To make the stillness deeper than before, 
 Which struck upon his sense. For he looked round 
 As half in doubt, and then, unconscious yet, 
 Rose from the silence into fuller song : 
 
 Now I resign my sovereignty and pride, 
 And seek new waters, whither none can say. 
 
 Nature is hushed to awe ; on every side 
 Silence respects me as I pass away. 
 O ripe occasion for one parting lay ! 
 
 O for one hour to shake my music free, 
 To show that I can sing that were enough for me ? 
 
 All vain ! All vain ! And my last chance will go. 
 
 E'en at this hour, when all the listening throng 
 Could hardly choose but hear, I lack the flow. 
 
 Filled with the memory of my lasting wrong 
 
 In disappointed pomp I pass along. 
 Down the slow stream in empty wrath I float, 
 
 Song in my heart and in my bosom song : 
 Song rising up and bubbling to my throat, 
 Song that would teach them song ! And not one 
 blessed note !
 
 126 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 Higher and higher still his last notes pealed, 
 Fuller and fuller yet his music grew, 
 And, when he stopped, so swift a silence fell 
 That with craned neck he listened ' whither 
 
 came 
 
 That strange, sweet melody ? ' and all at once 
 He knew he had been singing all the time. 
 Then with a burst of triumph, round he turned, 
 And in one loud, glad cry announced his theme : 
 
 Silence, each listening thing ! 
 O tardy breeze, a little while delay ! 
 
 Let every bird and brute 
 
 Be mute, be mute ! 
 Peace, I command you ! Hear me now, I say ! 
 
 For I, your passing king 
 
 Will now oblige ! I am about to sing ! 
 
 And, as he breathed, and for a moment hung, 
 Poised on the very ecstasy of song, 
 Over the meadows the breath of the evening came, 
 Crisping the water to ripples, and rustling the 
 
 reeds, 
 Stirring the leaves of the hedges, and waking the 
 
 woods,
 
 THE SWAN 127 
 
 And, in a flash, with vivid suddenness, 
 Nature gave tongue. The quickened cow re- 
 placed 
 
 Her frugal cud, and with deliberate moo 
 Began her vespers. From the terraced lawn 
 The irritating peacock shrilled May-oh ; 
 The garden, with the wandering guinea-fowl, 
 Echoed, Come back, in mockery. At the farm 
 Ducks quacked, hens clucked, pigs grunted, and 
 
 dogs barked. 
 
 And, as defying all things to compete, 
 With ribald intake the stentorian ass 
 Shattered the welkin. These I heard. I saw 
 The swan, with throbbing neck and gaping 
 
 bill, 
 
 Palpably singing, as a soloist, 
 Accompanied by some great orchestra, 
 Who does her best, but yelling, goes unheard, 
 Drowned in the frenzy of the blaring brass, 
 Crashing percussion, and deep-throated strings, 
 So, 'mid the deafening tumult of all throats, 
 Singing, I saw him pass, infuriate ; 
 Singing, he gained the corner, all unheard. 
 And, singing, even as he swept from sight,
 
 128 A FOOL'S PARADISE 
 
 He turned at bay, and madly flapped his wings, 
 Pouring his whole soul into one great shriek, 
 Bitter, indignant, wild with all disgust : 
 And that one note alone I heard. ' Too late.' 
 
 Printed by T. and A. CONSTABLE, Printers to His Majesty 
 at the Edinburgh University Press
 
 A 000 864 647 3