Part 2

Published the year I went to school— The second of life’s seven ages— How fragrant of Victorian rule Are these forgotten pages! When meat and fruit were still uncanned; When good CHARLES DICKENS still was writing; And SWINBURNE’S poetry was banned As rather too exciting.

No murmurs of impending strife Were heard, no dark suggestions hinted; Our novelists still looked on life Through spectacles rose-tinted; And Paris, in those giddy years, Still laughed at OFFENBACH and SCHNEIDER, Blind to the doom of blood and tears, With none to warn or guide her.

The index and the authors’ names, Their stories and their lucubrations, Recall old literary aims And faded reputations; We wonder at the influence That SALA’S florid periods had on His fellows, and the vogue immense Of versatile Miss BRADDON.

And yet I read _Aurora Floyd_ In youth with rapture quite unholy— Not in the way that I enjoyed Mince-pies or roly-poly; While “G. A. S.” appeared to me Like a Leonid fresh from starland, Not the young lion that we see Portrayed in _Friendship’s Garland_.

And there are tinklings of the lute In orthodox decorous fashion, But altogether destitute Of “elemental” passion; And illustrations which refrain From all that verges on the shady, But glorify the whiskered swain, The lachrymose young lady.

The sirens of the “sixties” showed No inkling of our modern Circes, And swells had not evolved the code That guides our precious Percys; Woman, in short, was grave or gay, But not a problem or a riddle, And maidens still were taught to play The harp and not the fiddle.

And writers in the main eschewed All topics tending to disquiet, All efforts to reorganize Our dogmas or our diet; You could not carp at MENDELSSOHN Without creating quite a scandal, And rag-time on the gramophone Had not supplanted HANDEL.

Blameless and wholesome in their way, At times agreeably subacid, I love these records of a day Long dead, but calm and placid; And with a sigh I now replace This ancient volume of _Belgravia_ And turn the “latest news” to face _Mutans amaris suavia_.

NEW MEN AND OLD STUDIES

[A volume has recently appeared under the title of _The Value of the Classics_, in which “three hundred competent observers, representing the leading interests of modern life” in America, and including three living Presidents of the United States—WILSON, TAFT, and ROOSEVELT—testify their conviction that classical studies are of essential value in the best type of liberal education.]

O ye Humanists half-hearted, now reluctantly resigned To concede the claim of Science to control the youthful mind, Once again cry _Sursum corda_—reinforcement comes at last From an unexpected quarter in a wondrous counter-blast.

If there is a modern country which effete tradition hates, Surely ’tis the Great Republic known as the United States, Home of hustlers and of boosters, home of energy and “vim,” Filled with innovating notions bubbling over at the brim.

Nowhere else can we discover, though we closely scan the map, Such a readiness in scrapping anything there is to scrap; Yet the pick of her progressives boldly swarm into the lists As the most unflinching champions of the harried Humanists.

WILSON, TAFT and TEDDY ROOSEVELT figure in the foremost flight, Followed by three hundred chosen men of leading and of light— Men of great and proved achievement in diversified careers, Statesmen, lawyers, doctors, bankers, railwaymen and engineers.

Dons of course may be discounted, also College Presidents, But the most impressive statements come from scientific gents, Who admit that education on a humanistic base Gives their students vast advantage in the specializing race.

Botany relies on Latin ever since LINNÆUS’ days; Biologic nomenclature draws on Greek in countless ways; While in medicine it is obvious you can never take your oath What an ailment means exactly if you haven’t studied both.

Heads of business corporations, magnates in the world of trade, ’Neath the banner of the Classics formidably stand arrayed, Holding with a firm conviction that their faithful study brings Knowledge of the art of handling men and regulating things.

Courage, ye depressed upholders of the old curriculum, Quit your mood apologetic, bang the loud scholastic drum, For the verdict of the Yankees queers the scientific pitch When the Humanists were struggling in their last defensive ditch.

Honour, then, the brave Three Hundred who, like those renowned of yore, Strive to guard from rude barbarians Hellas and her precious lore; And let all of us determine firmly never to forget Βλώσκω, ἔμολον, μέμβλωκα, _piget_, _pudet_, _pœnitet_.

REMUNERATIVE RHYMES

[In the new _History of American Literature_ it is stated that ROBERT TREAT PAINE, the Boston poet (1773-1811), enjoyed such a reputation “that he could command five dollars a line for his verse, a price never before approached in America, and perhaps never since equalled.”]

Say, is it true, O priceless ELLA WHEELER, That you, the blameless Sappho of the West, Stricken humanity’s most potent healer, Consoler of the doubting and distressed, Passion’s intense, impeccable revealer, Of all best-sellers quite the very best, Than TUPPER’S self far sweeter and sublimer, Were equalled by an early Boston rhymer?

It cannot be that such ecstatic yearning, Such pure domestic raptures uncontrolled, Such lavish use of old proverbial learning Of ancient saws cast in a modern mould, When measured by the crucial test of earning, By market value, reckoned up in gold, Never secured you, prophetess benign, More than a bare five dollars to the line.

Tried by this test, I own, scant was the gleaning Of MILTON—just five “jingling tingling quid” Paid for his _Paradise_; but then his meaning Was wilfully from artless readers hid. Besides, he wrote blank verse and from a leaning To heresy was never wholly rid; _Your_ creed is crystal clear and orthodox, _Your_ rhymes salute us like a postman’s knocks.

Five dollars for a line! Oh, no, great ELLA, That clearly cannot mark your maximum; The market-price of your _celestia mella_ Must far surpass that negligible sum. Let some obscure American Apella Believe it, _I_ am sure it cannot come To half the rate a high-browed journal pays For one of your incomparable lays.

WAR WORKERS AND OTHERS

TO MR. BALFOUR ON HIS RETURN

Our hearts go out with all our ships that plough the deadly sea, But the ship that brought us safely back the only ARTHUR B. Was freighted with good wishes in a very high degree.

There are heaps of politicians who can hustle and can shriek, And some, though very strong in lung, in brains are very weak, But A. J. B.’s equipment is admittedly unique.

His manners are delightful, and the workings of his mind Have never shown the slightest trace of self-esteem behind; Nor has he had at any time a private axe to grind.

For forty years and upwards he has graced the public scene Without becoming sterilized or stiffened by routine; He still retains his freshness and his brain is just as keen.

His credit was not shipwrecked on the fatal Irish reef; He has always been a loyal and a sympathetic chief; And he has also written _The Foundations of Belief_.

As leader of the Mission to our cousins and Allies, We learn with satisfaction, but without the least surprise, That he proved the very cynosure of Transatlantic eyes.

For the special brand of statesman _plus_ aristocratic sage, Like the model king-philosopher described in PLATO’S page, Is uncommonly attractive in a democratic age.

“BALFOUR Must Go!” was once the cry of those who deemed him slack, But now there’s not a single scribe of that unruly pack Who is not glad in every sense that BALFOUR has come back.

_June 20, 1917._

THE SUBMERGED LEADER

(_February, 1917_)

What is Master WINSTON doing? What new paths is he pursuing? What strange broth can he be brewing?

Is he painting, by commission, Portraits of the Coalition For the R.A. exhibition?

Is he Jacky-obin or anti? Is he likely to “go Fanti,” Or becoming shrewd and canty?

Is he in disguise at Kovel, Living in a moujik’s hovel, Penning a tremendous novel?

Does he run a photo-play show? Or in _sæva indignatio_ Is he writing for HORATIO?

Fired by the divine afflatus Does he weekly lacerate us, Like a Juvenal _renatus_?

As the great financial purist, Will he smite the sinecurist Or emerge as a Futurist?

Is he regularly sending HAIG and BEATTY screeds unending, Good advice with censure blending?

Is he ploughing, is he hoeing? Is he planting beet, or going In for early ’tato-growing?

Is he writing verse or prosing, Or intent upon disclosing Gifts for musical composing?

Is he lecturing to flappers? Is he tunnelling with sappers? Has he joined the U-boat trappers?

Or, to petrify recorders Of events within our borders, _Has he taken Holy Orders_?

Is he well or ill or middling? Is he fighting, is he fiddling?— He can’t only be thumb-twiddling.

These are merely dim surmises, But experience advises Us to look for weird surprises.

* * * * *

Thus we summed the situation When Sir HEDWORTH MEUX’ oration Brought about a transformation.

Lo! the Blenheim Boanerges On a sudden re-emerges And, to calm the naval _gurges_, FISHER’S restoration urges.

A MINISTERIAL WAIL

[“The most trenchant critics of the Government since its formation have been Mr. PRINGLE and Mr. HOGGE.”—_British Weekly._]

The gipsy camping in a dingle I reckon as a lucky dog; He doesn’t hear the voice of PRINGLE, He doesn’t hear the snorts of HOGGE.

The moujik crouching in his ingle Somewhere near Tomsk or Taganrog I envy; he is far from PRINGLE And equally remote from HOGGE.

I find them deadly when they’re single, But deadlier in the duologue, When the insufferable PRINGLE Backs the intolerable HOGGE.

I’d rather walk for miles on shingle Or flounder knee-deep in a bog Than listen to a speech from PRINGLE Or hearken to the howls of HOGGE.

Their tyrannous exactions mingle The vices of Kings Stork and Log; One day I give the palm to PRINGLE, The next I offer it to HOGGE.

The style of _Mr. Alfred Jingle_ Was jumpy, but he did not clog His sense with woolly words, like PRINGLE, With priggish petulance, like HOGGE.

I’d love to see the _Bing Boys_ bingle, To go to music-halls _incog._, Instead of being posed by PRINGLE And heckled by the hateful HOGGE.

My appetite is gone; I “pingle” (As Norfolk puts it) with my prog; My meals are marred by thoughts of PRINGLE, My sleep is massacred by HOGGE.

O patriots, with your nerves a-tingle, With all your righteous souls agog, Will none of you demolish PRINGLE And utterly extinguish HOGGE?

THE FLAPPER

[Dr. ARTHUR SHADWELL, in the _Nineteenth Century_ for January, 1917, in his article on “Ordeal by Fire,” after denouncing idlers and loafers and shirkers, falls foul “above all” of the young girls called flappers, “with high heels, skirts up to their knees and blouses open to the diaphragm, painted, powdered, self-conscious, ogling: ‘Allus adallacked and dizened oot and a ’unting arter the men.’”]

Good Dr. ARTHUR SHADWELL, who lends lustre to a name Which DRYDEN in his satires oft endeavoured to defame, Has lately been discussing in a high-class magazine The trials that confront us in the year Nineteen Seventeen.

He is not a smooth-tongued prophet; no, he takes a serious view; We must make tremendous efforts if we’re going to win through; And though he’s not unhopeful of the issue of the fray He finds abundant causes for misgiving and dismay.

Our optimistic journals his exasperation fire, And the idlers and the loafers stimulate his righteous ire; But it is the flapper chiefly that in his gizzard sticks, And he’s down upon her failings like a waggon-load of bricks.

She’s ubiquitous in theatres, in rail and ’bus and tram, She wears her “blouses open down to the diaphragm,” And, instead of realizing what our men are fighting for, She’s an orgiastic nuisance who in fact _enjoys_ the War.

It’s a strenuous indictment of our petticoated youth And contains a large substratum of unpalatable truth; Our women have been splendid, but the Sun himself has specks, And the flapper can’t be reckoned as a credit to her sex.

Still it needs to be remembered, to extenuate her crimes, That these flappers have not always had the very best of times; And the life that now she’s leading, with no Mentors to restrain, Is decidedly unhinging to an undeveloped brain.

Then again we only see her when she’s out for play or meals, And distresses the fastidious by her gestures and her squeals, But she is not always idle or a decorative drone, And if she wastes her wages, well, she wastes what is her own.

Still to say that she’s heroic, as some scribes of late have said, Is unkind as well as foolish, for it only swells her head; She oughtn’t to be flattered, she requires to be repressed, Or she’ll grow into a portent and a peril and a pest.

Dr. SHADWELL to the PREMIER makes an eloquent appeal In firm and drastic fashion with this element to deal; And ’twould be a real feather in our gifted Cambrian’s cap If he taught the peccant flapper less flamboyantly to flap.

But, in our way of thinking, ’tis for women, kind and wise, These neglected scattered units to enrol and mobilize, Their vagabond activities to curb and concentrate, And turn the skittish hoyden to a servant of the State.

She’s young; her eyes are dazzled by the glamour of the streets; She has to learn that life is not all cinemas and sweets; But given wholesome guidance she may rise to self-control And earn the right of entry on the Nation’s golden Roll.

THE FEMININE FACTOTUM

[The _Daily Chronicle_, writing on women farmers, quotes the tribute of HUTTON, the historian, to a Derbyshire lady who died at Matlock in 1854: “She undertakes any kind of manual labour, as holding the plough, driving the team, thatching the barn, using the flail; but her chief avocation is breaking horses at a guinea per week. She is fond of Pope and Shakespeare, is a self-taught and capable instrumentalist, and supports the bass viol in Matlock Church.”]

Though in the good old-fashioned days The feminine factotum rarely Was honoured with a crown of bays When she had won it fairly; She did emerge at times, like one For manual work a perfect glutton, Blue-stocking half, half Amazon, As chronicled by HUTTON.

But now you’ll find her counterpart In almost every English village— A mistress of the arduous art Of scientific tillage, Who cheerfully resigns the quest Of all that makes a woman charming, And shows an even greater zest For gardening and farming.

She used to petrify her dons; She was a most efficient bowler; But now she’s baking barley scones To help the FOOD CONTROLLER; Good _Mrs. Beeton_ she devours, And not the dialogues of PLATO, And sets above the Cult of Flowers The cult of the Potato.

The studious maid whose classic brow Was high with conscious pride of learning Now grooms the pony, milks the cow, And takes a hand at churning; And one I know, whose music had Done credit to her educators, Has sold her well-beloved “Strad” To purchase incubators!

The object of this humble lay Is not to minimize the glory Of women of an earlier day Whose deeds are shrined in story; ’Tis only to extol the grit Of clever girls—and none work harder— Who daily do their toilsome “bit” To stock the nation’s larder.

TO A NEW KNIGHT

Momentous sage of Mona’s Isle, Pride of your fellow-Manx, Renowned alike upon the Nile And by the Tiber’s banks—

What though sour critics, whom it irks To watch your widening reign, And elders of illiberal kirks Affect a harsh disdain;

What though fastidious souls declare Your style distinction lacks Or sacrilegiously dare To mimic it, like “Max”;

So long as countless myriads hold Your lucubrations dear, And, side by side, the copies sold Would circumvent the sphere?

Let pert reviewers carp and jibe, Let jealous pens deride, The interviewers, noble tribe, Are solid on your side.

Have you not shown in all its bloom Rome’s grandeur to mankind, And, culling “copy” at Khartoum, Laid bare the Arab mind?

Did not your heroine, _Glory Quayle_ Our views of life transform; Did not all modern heroes pale Beside the great _John Storm_?

As long as char-à-banc or ’bus Brings trippers to your shrine, Shall the new star Cainiculus High in the welkin shine.

Loud booms the wave in Bradda’s cave, Yet with a muffled tone Matched with the sound, immense, profound, From your great trumpet blown.

THE TENTH MUSE

She tells us all we needn’t know; She always draws the longest bow; She dramatizes guilt and crime; Exalts the mummer and the mime; Worships success, however won; Confounds vulgarity with fun; Lends credence to each passing craze, Fans party rancour to a blaze, Till people of a sober mind Grow envious of the deaf and blind. O what are all the other Nine, The Muses fondly deemed divine Matched with the Tenth, the modern Muse, That now manipulates our news.

LAYS OF THE LARDER

SUGAR

AN ELEGIAC ODE

Queen of the palate! Universal Sweet! Gastronomy’s delectable Gioconda! Since with submission loyally I greet And follow out the regimen of RHONDDA, I cannot be considered indiscreet If I essay, but never go beyond, a Brief elegiac tribute to a sway By sterner needs now largely swept away.

Thy candy soothes the infant in its pram; Thou addest mellowness to old brown sherry; Thou glorifiest marmalade, on Cam And Isis making breakfast-tables merry; Thou lendest magic to the meanest jam Compounded of the most insipid berry; And canst convert the sourest crabs and quinces To jellies fit for epicures and princes.

Thou charmest unalloyed, in loaf or lumps Or crystals; brown and moist, or white and pounded; I never was so deeply in the dumps That, once thy fount of sweetness I had sounded, Courage returned not; even with the mumps I still could view with gratitude unbounded The navigators of heroic Spain Who found the New World—and the sugar-cane.

Sprinkled on buttered bread thou dost excite In human boys insatiable cravings; On Turkish (I regret to say) Delight Thou lurest them to dissipate their savings, Instead of banking them, or sitting tight, Or buying useful books and good engravings; And lastly, mixed with strawberries and cream, Thou art more than a dish, thou art a dream.

Before necessity, that knows no ruth, Ordained thy frugal use in tea and coffee, Some Stoics banned thee—men who in their youth Showed an unnatural dislike of toffee; For sweetness charms the normal human tooth, Sweetness inspires the singer’s tenderest strophe, Since old LUCRETIUS musically chid The curse of life—_amari aliquid_.

_Eau sucrée_, I admit, is rather tame Compared with beer or whisky blent with soda; But gallant Frenchmen, experts at this game, Commend it highly either as a _coda_ Or prelude to their meals, and much the same Is sherbet, which the Gaekwar of Baroda And other Oriental satraps quaff In preference to ale or half-and-half.

Nor must I fail, O potent saccharin! Thou chemic offspring of by-products coaly, Late corner on the culinary scene, To hail thy aid, although it may be lowly Even compared with beet; for thou hast been Employed in sweetening my roly-poly— Thou whom I once regarded as a dose And now the active rival of glucose!

But still I hear some jaundiced critic say, Some rigid self-appointed _censor morum_, “Why harp upon the pleasures of a day When freely sweetened was each cup and jorum, Ere stern controllers had begun to stay The genial outflow of the _fons leporum_? Now sugar’s scarce, and we must do without it, Why let regretful fancy play about it?”

True, yet it greatly goes against the grain, Unless one has the patience of Ulysses, Wholly and resolutely to refrain From dwelling on the memory of past blisses; Forbidden fruits allure the strong and sane; Joys loved but lost are what one chiefly misses; This is my best excuse if I deplore “So sad, so _sweet_, the days that are no more.”

TEA SHORTAGE

[Mr. M. GRIEVE, writing from “The Whins,” Chalfont St. Peter, in the _Daily Mail_ of the 12th October, 1917, suggests herb-teas to meet the shortage, as being far the most healthful substitutes. “They can also,” he says, “be blended and arranged to suit the gastric idiosyncrasies of the individual consumer. A few of them are agrimony, comfrey, dandelion, camomile, woodruff, marjoram, hyssop, sage, horehound, tansy, thyme, rosemary, stinging-nettle and raspberry.”]

Although, when luxuries must be resigned, Such as cigars or even breakfast bacon, My hitherto “unconquerable mind” Its philosophic pose has not forsaken, By one impending sacrifice I find My stock of fortitude severely shaken— I mean the dismal prospect of our losing The genial cup that cheers without bemusing.

Blest liquor! dear to literary men, Which Georgian writers used to drink like fishes, When cocoa had not swum into their ken And coffee failed to satisfy all wishes; When tea was served to monarchs of the pen, Like JOHNSON and his coterie, in “dishes,” And came exclusively from far Cathay— See “China’s fragrant herb” in WORDSWORTH’S lay.

Beer prompted CALVERLEY’S immortal rhymes, Extolling it as utterly eupeptic; But on that point, in these exacting times, The weight of evidence supports the sceptic; Beer is not suitable for torrid climes Or if your tendency is cataleptic; But tea in moderation, freshly brewed, Was never by Sir ANDREW CLARK tabooed.

We know for certain that the GRAND OLD MAN Drank tea at midnight with complete impunity, At least he long outlived the Psalmist’s span And from ill-health enjoyed a fine immunity; Besides, robust Antipodeans can And do drink tea at every opportunity; While only Stoics nowadays contrive To shun the cup that gilds the hour of five.

But war is war, and when we have to face Shortage in tea, as well as bread and boots, ’Tis well to teach us how we may replace The foreign brew by native substitutes, Extracted from a vegetable base In various wholesome plants and herbs and fruits, “Arranged and blended,” very much like teas, To suit our “gastric idiosyncrasies.”

It is a list for future use to file, Including woodruff, marjoram and sage, Thyme, agrimony, hyssop, camomile (A name writ painfully on childhood’s page), Tansy, the jaded palate to beguile, Horehound, laryngeal troubles to assuage, And, for a cup ere mounting to the stirrup, The stinging-nettle’s stimulating syrup.

And yet I cannot, though I gladly would, Forget the Babylonian monarch’s cry, “It may be wholesome, but it is not good,” When grass became his only food supply; Such weakness ought, of course, to be withstood, But oh, it wrings the teardrop from my eye To think of Polly putting on the kettle To brew my daily dose of stinging-nettle!

MARGARINE

A HOUSEKEEPER’S PALINODE

Margarine—the prefix “oleo-” Latterly has been effaced, Though no doubt in many a folio Of the grocer’s ledger traced—