My dear Sir,—Oft in the stilly nightMy thoughts flyIn your direction,For oft in the stilly nightIt is my unfortunate habitTo have uncomfortable dreams,And the worst of themRuns to bankruptcy.I have a horror of bankruptcy,At any rate in my dreams.I sometimes lieBetween the blanketsIn a cold sweatAnd for public examination as it were,And the presiding genius of the courtSays to me, sepulchrally,"To what do you attribute your financial rottenness?"I fall into a colder sweatAnd remark,With a humilityWhich becomes my unfortunate position,"Sir, if you please,I have been living at an hotel."At this juncture of courseI come in for every sympathy:The Court is with me,The Court has been there itself;There is not a dry eye about the place,Every man present knows what I mean,And his heart is touched accordingly.Sir,My dear Sir,You also know what I mean;In other words, you knowThat I am the victim of a convention,And that, when all is said that can be said,You are the author of that convention.As to the nature of that conventionWe will put it this way:One pound of steakTo the actual consumerShould cost, say, 1s. 2d.TrimmingsIn the way of potatoes and peas might cost, say, 6d.,Bread, 1d.,Pepper, salt, and mustard, 1d.(You will notice that I put a princely price on everything),Total, 1s. 10d.Fifty per cent. profit for you, let us say,Would bring us up to 2s. 9d.Really you ought to let one off for 2s. 9d.,But what do you do?Well,So far as I can gather from your bills,You lie awake at nightDebating with yourselfWhether you should charge one 3s. 6d. or 4s. 6d.And you usually come to the conclusionThat it will be bestFor all parties concernedTo charge one 5s.If one expostulates,You remarkWith hauteurThat you thought you were dealing with a gentleman.You are quite correct in this surmise.But—One pays,And you pocket the difference.Then, again, on one's billYou putBed, 7s. 6d.Which is cheap;And I do not murmur;But you also putAttendance, 2s. 6d.;Coffee in bedroom before rising, 1s.;Bath, 1s. 6d.;This is just 5s. too much,Especially in view of the factThat the attendance wears dirty shirts,That the bathIs lukewarm if you order it coldAnd lukewarm if you order it hot;And that the coffee before risingDoesn't cost you a farthing.I am aware, of course,That all this is very meanAnd low downOn my part,But franklyYour rapacityMatters not so much to meAs to yourself.People come once to your establishment,They read your bill,Pay your pricesAnd tip your dirty-shirted waiters,And go awayAnd forget to come back.HenceYou are bound to chargeThe next man that comes alongAs much extra as he will stand,And by slow degreesYour establishmentIs becomingA by-wordAnd a warning.My dear Sir,Have a shilling bottle of wine(For which you charge me 3s. 6d.)At your own expense,Consult with your wife,And make up your mindNever to chargeMore than 2s.For 9d. worth of goods.Honesty is its own reward—It is really.
My dear Sir,—I suppose you are having an excellent time just now.There are a large number of countiesIn England and Scotland,And I am not acquainted with one of themWherein your bang-bangAnd puffs of smokeAnd red-faced men with dogsAre not to be encountered.You like it;It is very nice;And really, when you come to think of it,It is what the counties were made for.In the history booksThey were wont to sayOf a certain Norman monarch,That he loved the red deerAs if he were their brother.Of you it may safely be saidThat you love the red grouseAnd the brown partridge.As if you were a poulterer.You are a sportsman.The man who first went out with a gunTo shoot gameProbably did it on the sly.Had he been caughtHe would no doubt have been regardedBy the sportsmen of his dayWith the same contemptThat you yourself indulgeFor the unprincipled blackguard, Sir,Who shoots foxes.But time and the gunsmithsHave changed all that;And now you are a sportsman,A shooter of birdsFor the London market.You are also a gunner,And you kill things.Oh! why do you not goAnd live at Gunners-bury?Bad joke?Well, I know it is.But I assure you, my dear Sir,That it is not half so bad as I can make themWhen I try.To come now to the regionOf practical politics,Let me explain to you right offThat, despite all that has been said against youBy people who are mad about the LandAnd the Game-laws,And the feathered kingdomAnd so forth,I,Who am always on the side of wisdom,Have discovered a justification for you.It is this:There has been a great demand of lateFor really competent shots.In response to that demandMr. Kipling has started a village rifle club.I understand that the members thereofAre, let us say, five hundred in number.Now, I put it to you, Sir,How many sportsmen are thereShooting in this beautiful country and ScotlandTo-day?Well, we will not compute;It is dangerous.But you could make a fairly big rifle club out of them.They are all good men,And of course all beautiful shots.Some day(When the war is over)England may want them.Will they answer to the call?My dear Sir,You have your uses.Go in peace.
(On its Centenary)
My dear Stock Exchange,—I am given to understandThat to-day you are a hundred years old,And that to-day thereforeYou will celebrateWhat nine men out of every ten of youCall your "Centeenary"By taking a whole holiday instead of a half one.It would be easy for me, my dear Stock Exchange,To present youWith a sort of illuminated address on this occasion;But I refrain.One short year agoI tumbled into a little money;It was "not enough to live upon,"But it was a nice sum.A man introduced me to a member of the Stock Exchange,The member of the Stock Exchange introduced me to a little game of "in and out,"And my five hundred pounds folded its tents like the Arabs—That is to say, it silently stole away.It was not the member of the Stock Exchange's fault;Certainly it was not my fault;And I will not say that it was the fault of the Stock Exchange.But I am not giving the Stock ExchangeAny illuminated addressesAt present.On the other hand, let me assure youThat I believe the Stock ExchangeTo be a highly respectable,Honourable,And useful institution.It leaves the court without a stain upon its character.I say these latter things advisedly,Because some time backA friend of mine who writes articles on food supplyHaving delivered himself of the opinionThat London's milk was largely water,Was sued for slanderBy the Amalgamated Society of Dairymen's Daughters,And had to climb down and apologise.So that on the whole I repeat that, in my humble opinion,If you want to findReally sound, white men,Men of spotless character and impregnable probity,You cannot do betterThan wend your way to Gorgonzola Hall.And joking apart, my dear Stock Exchange,You really are a blessing.If it were not for youPeople with a lot of money,And people with only a little,Would simply not lose it.It would lie in banks and old stockings and kindred receptaclesTill it went mouldy.You keep things going.You are the heart of the monetary world,You pump in the gold,You pump out all that you don't happen to want.And you go and live in Maida Vale,Keep a butler,Drive two horses,And change your name from Manassah to Howard.This "Centeenary" holiday of yoursGives me much pause.Supposing, instead of taking a day,You were to take a year,What would happen to England?SHE—WOULD—BE—RUINED!Yeth, indeed.
(November 9th)
My dear Lord Mayor,—In Fleet Street all is gayFrom min' office window I catch glimpsesOf fluttering bunting and swinging festoons.I don't know who pays for them(The bunting and the festoons, that is to say),But I am informed by the police that they(The bunting and the festoons, that is to say)Have been hung up in honour of YOU.I am also given to understand that there has been a big rushFor free windows to view your procession,Which, all being well (the Procession, that is to say)Will take place this day, Saturday;For my own part I am going into the country,And I dare say that on the wholeYou wish you were going with me;But ambition has its penalties,And if you will become Lord Mayor of London(A dizzy pinnacle to which none but the biggest-souled of usMay aspire)I suppose you must put up with the attendant inconveniencesAnd publicity.So far as I have been able to judge(And I arrive at this conclusion by dint of steadfast abstinenceFrom witnessing Lord Mayors' Shows)A Lord Mayor's Show is a distinctly inspiriting spectacle.It may be set downAs the Londoner's one annual opportunityOf seeing a circus for nothing;Hence no doubt its popularity.Think not, however, my dear Lord Mayor,That I deprecate your little pageant, gratis though it be.This country, as everybody knows,Has for centuries past been on the high road to ruin,And, in my humble opinion, its decadence has been largely dueTo a deep-rooted tendency on the part of the powerfulTo curtail and do away with mayoral and other shows.Feasts and fairs have been kicked out of EnglandBy the aforesaid powerful:If you would be a respectable communityYou must have neither feast nor fair,And, if you would be a respectable citizen of any given city,You must not array yourself in motley.A man who walked into his bankIn yellow trousers and a blue silk hatWould never be allowed an overdraft,Black and subdued greens and browns being the only wearFor persons who would get on in life.All this is wrong, my dear Lord Mayor.I am of opinion that millionairesOught to wear purple breeches;I see no reason why I myselfShould not have a morning coat of red, white, and blue,Or a waistcoat emblazoned with the armsOf the Worshipful Company of Spectaclemakers.In fact, my dear Lord Mayor,To perpetrate a Mrs. Meynellism,The colour of life is the salt of it,Just as the Lord Mayor's Show is the salt of the Lord MayoraltyAnd the one beautiful thingAbout life as people expect you to live itIn the Metropolis.Come hither, come hither, my dear Lord Mayor,And do not tremble so!We are all glad to see you going up Fleet Street,We are all glad to see you going home the other way;And we shall be equally glad to see your successorGetting through the same flowerful day's workNext year.Goodbye, my dear Lord Mayor!AndHooray?
My dear Sir,—When men have nightmares, they dream about you.I myself have been chased over the tops of pinnaclesBy flaming-eyed Panhards and DurkoppsIn my sleep.Nor is this all,For if one brings oneselfTo read reports of the proceedings of police courtsOne finds that the average citizenGets more or less chased by you sir,In his waking moments.The Police I know, sir, seldom speak the truth:They remember so well the dayWhen a horseless carriage had to be taken through the streetAt the speed of a funeral march,And with a red flag in front of it,That the spectacle of an affable motoristBowling through a Surrey villageTo the tune of six miles an hourShocks ther imagination,And they believe for the rest of their natural livesThat the affable motorist aforesaidMust have been travellingAt the rate of anything from 60 to 600 miles per minute.Hence, my dear motorist,It comes to pass that you are afforded so many opportunitiesFor airing your eloquence and the fatness of your purseBefore the police magistrates.In my opinion it seems just possibleThat the real trouble lies in the factThat you, my dear sir, do actuallyGo through villages at a very low speed,And that really the best thing you can doWould be to make a point of going through themAt the highest speed consistentWith the safety of your own person.For if you did this,No policeman of my acquaintance would be able to catch you,Hence you would never be fined.I have been out of sympathy with motor carsRight up to the other night.The other night I had the felicity to take a small trip on one.The motorist would fain have driven me to my house,Which is half an hour's cab drive from Charing Cross.He offered to do the distance in ten minutesAnd started stirring up his petroleum,But I said "No. Let us go to the Marble Arch."We went through the Mall, to Hyde Park Corner,to South Kensington, to Paddington,Into the Edgware Road, and so to the Marble Arch;Time, at the outside, 15 min.I am willing to admitThat we went down certain streets quite rapidly,What time the policemen at odd corners stared stupidly,And fumbled for their note-books.But, as a result of that trip, my dear sir,I have become an enthusiastic motorist.I am convinced that speed and wind and the smell of petroleum mixedIs the only thing which can be considered worth living for.And if you happen to know anybodyWho would be willing to takeA typewriter and a pair of skates (not much worn)In exchange for a Durkopp racer,Kindly communicate with me.
My dear Next Christmas,—It is an excellent journalistic thing,Not to say a poetical thing,To be first in the field.Behold me, therefore, advancingAt the head of that motley armyWhich will inevitably hail youWhen your time comes.For your predecessor,My dear Next Christmas,I cannot say much.He came in with several thousand inches of rain;He went out on a watery moon.There was turkey as usual,Pudding as usual,Mistletoe as usual,Peace on earth as usual.There were also the waits,The young folks,The postman,The dustman(No connection with the scavengers),And the turncock.We had a merry day.Half the world pretended to be happy,The other half pretended to be bored.The festivities, I understand,Are still being kept up.There is a ping-pong tournament at the Queen's HallAnd a children's banquetAt the Guildhall on Tuesday evening;Not to mention Mr. Dan Leno at Drury LaneAnd Mr. De Wet at the Tweefontein.It is all very cheerfulAnd very inspiriting.All the same,Let us not repine:Christmas comes but once a year,And it will come again, I fear.This couplet, of course.My dear Next Christmas,Is not intended to beDisrespectful to you;It is inserted simplyFor the sake of effect.For I never miss an opportunityOf bursting into rhyme.When the way is plain before me.My dear Next Christmas,Do not be discouraged,Come next year by all means;If I said "Don't come"You would come just the same.Therefore, I say "Come,"And I trust, my dear Next Christmas,That when you do comeYou will bring us a little luck.Ring out the old, as it were,And ring in the new;Let candied peelBe a trifle cheaper;Let the war be settledTo the satisfaction of both parties;Let the book trade flourish;Let the Income-tax be reduced:Let there be a fine Christmas EveAnd dry waits,And a little skating next morning;Let there be peace and plenty,A pocket full of money,And a barrel full of beer,And all other good things,Including a free and enlightened Press,And a strong demandFor seasonable poetry.My dear Next Christmas,Here is my hand,With my heart in it.Till we meet again—As Mr. Hall Caine says—Addio.
My dear Sir, or Madam,—When James Watt,Or some such person,Had the luckTo see a kettle boil,He little dreamedThat he was discovering you,Otherwise he would have let his kettle boilFor a million million yearsWithout saying anything about it.However,James WattOmitted to take cognisance of the ultimate trouble,And here you are.And here, alas! you will stay,Till our iron roads are beaten into ploughshares,And Messrs. Cook & Sons are at rest."When I was young, a single man,And after youthful follies ran"(Which, strange as it may seem, is Wordsworth)Your goings to and fro upon the earth,And walkings up and down thereon,Were limited by the day trip.For half-a-crownYou went to Brighton,Or to Buxton and Matlock,Or Stratford-on-Avon,As the case may be.A special tap of aleAnd a special cut of 'amWere put on for your delectation;You sang a mixture of hymnsAnd music-hall songsOn your homeward journey,And there was an end of the matter.But nowadays there is no escape from you.The trip that was over and doneIn twenty-four hours at mostHas become a matterOf "Saturday to Monday at Sunny Saltburn,""Ten days in Lovely Lucerne,"And "A Visit to the Holy Land for Ten Guineas."Wherever one goesOn this wide globeThere shall one findYour empty ginger-beer bottle and your old newspaper;The devastations,Fence-breakings,And flower-pot maraudingsWhich you once reserved for noblemen's seatsAre now extended to the Rigi,The Bridge of Sighs,Mount Everest,And the deserts of GobiAnd Shamo.Indeed, I question whether it would be possibleFor one to traverseThe trackless forests of MexicoOr "the dreary tundras of remote Siberia,"Or to put one's noseInto such an uncompromising fastness as Craig Ell Achaie(Which is the last place the Canadian Pacific Railway madeAnd which may not be properly spelled)Without coming upon youPicnicking in a spinny,And prepared to greet all and sundryWith that time-honoured remark,"There's 'air,"Or some otherEqually objectionable ribaldry.Well, my dear Tripper,Time is short,And poets fill their columns easily,So that I must not abuse you any more.You are part of the Cosmos,And as such I am bound to respect you;But, by Day and Night,I wishThat James WattHad taken no noticeOf his boiling kettle!
(On their Proposal to Banish Barmaids)
May it please your Worships,For years past, Glasgow has stood in the forefrontAs a city given over to the small-poxAnd magisterial reform.It is, I believe,An exceedingly well-managed city:In fact, it appears to be managedOut of all reasonable existence;Hence, no doubt, it comes to passThat it was lately visitedBy a smart sample of the plague.I have not the smallest doubt that your WorshipsAre sincere and clean-thinking men.I believe that you do what you do do, so to speak,Out of sheer public spiritAnd with a view to bettering the conditionOf the city over which you preside.In other words, I impute no motives:That is to say, no base motives.But, my dear Worships,Why, in the name of Heaven, would you abolishThe harmless, necessary barmaid?Have you never been young?Have you never known the tender delightOf whiling away a morningWith your elbow on the zincAnd threepennyworth of Bass before you?What, may I ask your Worships,Is Bass without a barmaid?I grant that, taking them all in all,The barmaids of ScotlandAre not what you might termAn altogether bewitching lot.Years ago, when I was young and callow,Fate threw me into the propinquityOf a lady of this ilk;She hailed from Glasgow,And she was not beautiful;On the other hand, I was young.And, out of an income which was even slenderer thenThan it is now,I purchased for that dear lady of the NorthMany bottles of perfume,Many pairs of kid gloves,And a Prayer Book or so;And, when I had consumed innumerable BassesAt her altar,And the time had, as I thought, become ripe,I offered her matrimony,To which she replied, in limpid Doric:"Gang awa hame to yer mither."That, my dear Worships,Is Glasgow!If you can weed out of GlasgowAll young femalesPossessed of this particular kind of temperament,I am not so sureBut that you would have my blessing.On the other hand, I am free to admitThat I hae my doots as to your capacity for so doing.The perfume-bottle,The kid gloves,The Prayer BookAnd "Na, na, na, I winna,"Will always remain the prerogativesOf the Glasgae lassies,If I know anything of them.Also, my dear Worships,One thing is absolutely certain,That, if the magistrates of all the citiesIn the United KingdomWould take the step you have taken,We should have gone a very considerable wayTowards solving the drink problem,And putting Sir Michael Hicks-BeachInto a fearful hole for money.
P.S.—I hate Scotch men,But I sometimes think that Scotch womenAre rather bonnie.
My dear Sir,—"There lies a vale in IdaLovelierThan all the valleysOf Ionian hills."I take itThat this is a geographical fact.Anyway it is Tennyson,And I quote itIn order that you may perceiveThat I have some acquaintanceWith the higher walks of Literature,And am therefore a manOf entirely different build from yourself.I was born a poet,And have stuck to my tradeUnto this last.Possibly you were born a bookseller.I am willing to give your credit for it,But I doubt it all the same,For I often think the average booksellerMust have been born a draper.The other day I had occasion to do a little book-buying.It was my first essayIn what I now believe to beAn altogether elegant and delightful formOf intellectual recreation.Of course, I went into a shop:From the yawning Cimmerianity at the back of that shopThere came unto me swiftly and in large bootsA fat youth.He bowed, and he bowed, and he bowed."I want a good edition of Shelley," I said.And he replied straightway"Ninepenceshillingnetoneandsixpencenethalfa-crownnettwoandeightpencethreeandnine-pencefiveshillingsnethalfaguineaandkindly-stepthisway."I said, "Thank you,But I want Shelley,Not egg-whisks."Whereat he smiled and banged under my noseA heavy volume,Bound like a cheap purse,And murmured, "There you are,The best line in the market,Two-and-eight."And because I opened it,And looked disconsolately at the stodgy running-titlesAnd the entrancing red-line border,He cast upon me eyes of contempt and disgust,And told me that I could not expectKelmscott Press and tree-calfAt the money.In fact, that fat youthAnnoyed me.HeWasA bookseller.Ah, my dear Sir,When I reflect that whatever I may write,No matter how excellent it may be,Must ultimately pass into the handsOf that fat youthAnd become to himSomethingAt ninepenceashillingneteighteenpencetwoandsix-netthreeandninefiveshillingsnetorhalfaguinea-andkindlystepthiswayThe spirit of my fathers quails within me,I know that authorshipIs a trade for fools.Go to!Ninepence me no ninepences,Two-and-sixpence me no nets,Bring yourself at onceTo your logical conclusion,And next time I call upon youFor Shelley,Sell him to me,As you appear to sell "Temporal Power."By the poundAvoirdupois.
My dear Deceased Wife's Sister,—(The wife of my bosom being still happily amongst us,The above,As the learned might say,Is a misnomer.You, on the other hand,Are a Miss ——,And I would not marry youTo save myself from boiling oil.If I had wanted youI could have had you in the beginning.And if I had married youThe wife of my bosomWould have been aunt to her own children, as it were.And in the event of your demiseShe would also have beenMy deceased wife's sister—Which is at once inconsequential and peculiar.A man cannot marry his deceased wife's sisterTill she is dead.This is quite wrong.In my humble opinionIt is also quite right.Anyway, we will close this parenthesisWith the usual sign,And proceed along the primrose pathOf business)As I have already remarkedIn my usual quaint way,A man cannot marryHis deceased wife's sisterUntil she is dead.(By "she" of course I mean the man's wife.)The bishops declareThat he cannot marry her anyhow(By "he" I mean the man,And by "her" of courseThe bishops meanThe man's deceased wife's sister.I desire to be explicit on these pointsIn order that we may avoidAmbiguity.)Well, my dear deceased wife's sister(Always remembering that Mrs. —— is still alive),What is your view of matters?Do you really wish to marry me or not?Have you any opinions about Lord Hugh Cecil?If so,Kindly state them.Was he or was he not justified in demandingOn Wednesday nightThat the word "Shame"Be put upon the record?If so, why not?If not, why so?My dear deceased wife's sister,Do not let us get confused.Let us clear our minds of Cecil.After all is saidYou are the Auntie of my children,And the great-niece of my wife's great-uncle,Not to say the sister-in-law of my children's father.Come along,Here are ducats,A ring,And a Canadian parson,Let us get married at once.Of course it is so sudden.It always is.And we have forgotten about Mrs. ——We always do.But I tell you here and now,And in good set terms,My dear deceased wife's sister,That if I wish to marryEither you or any more of your mother's daughters(Which Heaven forbid),I shall go to Canada or AustraliaAnd marry 'em.
(Before his Retirement)
My dear Sir Michael Hicks-Beach,—The devotion of one's lifeTo the service of the MusesAnd the neglect of golden opportunities,Is not without its compensations,One of the chief of them beingThat the devotee can look into the eyesOf the most rapacious of Chancellors of the ExchequerAnd smile.For my own part, dear Sir Michael,By the writing of Odes,And general inattention to business,I am able to knock up a precarious one hundred and seventy-five pounds per annum;On one hundred and sixty pounds of that sumI am always careful to claim exemption,Which leaves a taxable balance of fifteen pounds.Out of this balance, my dear old friend, you are welcome to take fifteen shillings,Or twenty-three and fourpence ha'penny,Or twenty-seven and sixpence farthing,Or any other sum that you think might come in handy.Indeed, in all the circumstances(And without prejudice),I should not be greatly upsetIf you took the lot.For well I wotThat the late WarHas cost more than the price of a row of houses,And that it is my duty, as a full-blooded patriot,To pay, and pay cheerfully;And particularly soSince it is not due for a month or so.Ah, my dear Chancellor,Who fears Black MichaelMust himself be black.They call you Black because you want a lot of money;I call them black because they've got it.However, this is not a Ruskinian oration,But an Ode,And I shall therefore proceed to give you a few tipsAs to legitimate methods of raising the wind.Judging by your recent efforts,You appear to be short of ideas.Here you are.Put sixpence a hundred on cigars."See What You Save"Will see me through somehow;Besides, I never smoke cigars.Put a bit more on all sorts of wines and liqueurs,Excepting Sauterne and Benedictine(Of which I am particularly fond);Put a bit more on beer,And sixpence a pound on arsenic(As a rule I do not take either);Tax railway tickets(I invariably travel on "passes");Tax perambulators(My sons and heirs can all walk);Tax sky-signs(Like the Omar Khayyam Club,I never advertise);Tax bicycles(I abhor exertion);Tax gold and gem jewellery(I never keep it);Tax fictionAnd "Fourth enormous" editions(We shall then hear less about them)Abolish the free breakfast-table(I invariably begin the day with lunch);Also tax ground-rents(I am not the Duke of Bedford);And seize all the unclaimed bank balances(None of which by any possibilityCan be mine).In fact, my dear Sir Michael,Tax and seize whatever you like.The opulent, and the well-to-do,Not to mention the rascally working classes,Will have to put up with it.
My dear Common Golfer,—The game you affectIs a great gamePlayed by yourselfAnd all the crowned heads of Europe,Not to mention all the fat persons who desire to bant,All the thin persons who desire to becomeVigorous and muscular, as it were,All the clerks who desire to pass for dukes,And all the dukes who relish the society of clerks.It is a great game:The people who play it are not the fault of the game.It is also a good game.If I am not mistaken,It is a game that originally came out of Scotland;Therefore it must be a good game.For everything that comes out of Scotland is good,Even the Scot.And golf being a great and good gameI do not see any tremendous reasonWhy you, my dear Common Golfer,Should not engage in it if you so choose.On the other hand, I wish from the bottom of my heartThat you did not engage in it.I know a bankWhereon the wild thyme blows(Or ought to blow):Oft of a pleasant summer mornHave I taken a cheap ticketTo a station which is not far from that bank,And there (on the bank, that is to say) reclined meWhat time I looked up into the blue dome,And watched the lazy-pacing clouds,And flicked away the midges,And wished my name was Corydon,And remembered bits of KeatsAnd bits of HerrickAnd bits of business,And so forth.Oft, I say, have I done these things;But of late I no longer do them,Inasmuch as my bankHas become (if I may so term it)Golf-ridden.The other day I repaired to the said bankOn rural musings bent.What did I find?Why, my dear old thymy bankWas in the possessionOf half a dozen gross fellows in red coats,Thy had pipes in their mouths,And a jar of beer in their midst,And they were actually talking and laughingIn the most uproarious fashion.I heard one of them say"Why did Arthur Bawl-Fore?"And the others thought hard,And trifled with their brassies and things,And could not make answer.O, my dear Common Golfer,Youwere of that party;Youwere;You are always of such parties,You are always sittingOn other people's thymy banks,And saying, "Why did So-and-so so-and-so?"And depleting village public-houses of good beer,And turning whole village populations into caddies,And dotting the landscape with your red coats,And generally appropriating the fair face of Nature.I cannot stop you, my dear Common Golfer,I cannot, O I cannot!Would that I could. O would that I could!In which case, perhaps, I wouldn't.No, my dear boy,Rural England is yours,Also the sea-side,Take them, old man, take them;I hand them over to you with the best heart in the world.Take them—they are yours—And excuse these tears.
Dear Mr. Pierpont Morgan,—I hasten to give you a hearty British welcome.Come to my arms;I am in the Trust line myself—That is to say, I used to beBefore people started putting up announcementsTo the effect that"Poor Trust is dead,Bad pay killed him."Some day, an I mistake not, Mr. Morgan,Your Trust will die:All Trusts are grass.Ponder it!I am a political economist, and I know.Meanwhile I am very pleased to thinkThat we have amongst us a man of your financial prowessAnd purchasing power.There is a certain class of British personWho apparently goes in bodily fear of you.That class of person has groaned loudly over your steel exploit,And he has groaned loudlier stillOver your purchase of the Leyland Line of Steamships.To groan over a fair deal of any kindAppears to me, my dear Mr. Pierpont Morgan,To be an entirely stupid proceeding.Nobody can come to grief by selling things,Providing they sell them at the right price.You have bought the Leyland Line of Steamships:I see no reason why you should not buy all the other linesIf you want them, and have the wherewithal to pay for them,For in the long run everything comes to him who vends.You buy my steamships, or my steelworks,Or, for that matter, my caller herrin':I take your money, I put it in your bank,And live sumptuously on the interest.You have all the troubleInasmuch as you have to rake up the interest.I sit at home and enjoy myself,You scheme, and scheme, and scheme, and scheme, and scheme, and scheme, and scheme,I am happy,I hope you are.Between ourselves I should not trembleIf you bought up Great Britain and Ireland (especially Ireland),And all that in them is,Providing always, as I have said before,That you paid the price.Indeed, I hope to live to see the dayWhen Englishmen will cease to toil and spin,And derive their incomesWholly and solely from American dividends.Fools buy things, my dear Mr. Pierpont Morgan,Wise men sell them.That is particularly trueWhen the article involved happens to be poetry.Nevertheless, as you appear to be in a buying frame of mind,I take this opportunity of informing youThat I have at my villa at HindheadA large and varied stockOf sonnets, odes, rhymes, jingles, and what not,Which I am prepared to sell at an enormous sacrifice.My price to you for the lot would beFifteen Million Dollars.If you care to deal, I undertake to melt your chequeAt your own bank,And to invest the proceeds in any concernsIn which you happen to be interested,So that you would not only get the poetry,But also your money back again.This, at any rate, is how it seems to me.Vale!
(On the Return of the "Ophir")
Most well-behaved little Prince,—As the small boyWho will one day be the Sovereign LordOf certain other small boysIn whom I am interestedI hasten to assure youOf my loyalty to the Imperial HouseOf which you are the joy and hope,And of my respect for your own podgy little person.To-day, I need scarcely tell you, my dear little Prince,Is a very big day for you,Inasmuch asTo-day your excellent parents—Their Royal HighnessesThe Duke and Duchess of Cornwall and York, KG.—Return from their wanderings,Laden, I am given to understand,With presents for his Royal HighnessPrince Edward of York,Who, I am given to understand,Has been a very good boyDuring these long weeks of separation.I am quite sureThat you deserve these presents,And that your GrandmamaWill be able to give your parents a very good account of you,And that your Grandpapa,With that tact which is only one of many of his excellent qualities,Will refrain from making reportsWhich might lead to parental chastisement,I remember quite wellThat when my own Mama and PapaReturned once from a little jauntThey brought back with them,As a present for me,A tin cylinder with a spike to it,Which you set on a piece of woodAnd spun round;Then you looked through some holes in the tin cylinderAnd beheld many wonderful things,Such as a little girl skipping,And jockeys riding a steeplechase on tigers.If your Papa, my dear little Prince,Has not brought you one of those,Be sure you ask for it.It is not rude to ask for what you do not see in the window,Providing you say "Please."And now before I goLet me add a few wordsOf kindly admonition.I hope you will grow up to be a good and great man,And that you will never give your parentsCause for sorrow,By turning Socialist,Or newspaper editor,Or attempting to imitate these Odes.To your infant mindThis last crimeMay appear to be the most innocent in the world,Because these odes(God wot)Are so easy to imitate;Diplomats, Members of Parliament, publishers' assistants,Cabmen, poets, peers of the realm,Nay, even the very crowned heads of Europe,Have, at time and time,Been consumed with a desire to do them for me;Because, as I have said,It is so easy.Well, my dear little Prince,Let us draw our moral.The easy thing is not always the wisest thing.I feel that in my inmost heart.And if you blossom into manhoodWith the same conviction,More or less,I make no doubt whateverThat you will be an immense successAs a king.I wish you the best of luck.
My dear Madame Bernhardt,—I have been very nigh addressing this odeTo the winner of the Derby.But, on second thoughts, I said,"No, no—never!"(Non, non, jamais, in fact.)"Not while we have in our midstOne of whom I wot,For is it meetThat the charming Mme. BernhardtShould return to her interesting countryPossessed of the impression that thebas AnglaisHave a greater feeling forle sportThan for thearts dramatiques,Or whatever you call 'em?Non, non, a thousand times,non!"Ah, Madame, believe me,I love my country—La patrie, la patrie, la patrie, you know:It is a fine country when you understand it,And I would have my beautiful BernhardtTake away with herNothing but splendid memories of it.I was exceedingly gladTo read in the papers the other morningThat in the opinion of thecritics dramatiques Anglais,Or whatever you call 'em,Madame had done herself proudAt the Lyceum Theatre the other evening.Onecritic dramatique Anglais,Or whatever you call him,Wrote of Madame thus:"Such passages,Wherein the eaglet is borne awayOn a flight of adoration for the dead eagle,Recur throughout the play:They are, in fact, its keynote,And Mme. BernhardtDeclaimed them with superb intensity.The famous voice has lost its golden notes,But its power to thrill remains,She runs the gamut of the emotionsWith all the grace and dexterityOfAPROFESSOR."Madame Bernhardt,You will perceiveThat thecritics dramatiques Anglais,Or whatever you call 'em,Write of nobodyThat they do not adorn;My beautiful B.,You are a made woman,You have all the grace and dexterityOfAPROFESSOR.O happiness!O crown and fulfilment of a life-time devoted to Ar-rt!Your cup, my quenchless one,Is at length heaped up,Like Benjamin's,And it runs over!Heaven bless us all!And in conclusion, my dear Mme. Bernhardt,Will you do me the honour to allow me to explainThat in the event of any young enthusiast from ParisCalling round at any of our newspaper officesWith a view to getting satisfactionFrom the person who accuses youOf having all the skill and dexterityOfAPROFESSOR,He (the young enthusiast from Paris)Will do himself no good,Because in my dear country, dear Madame Bernhardt,We do not fight the duelà la cut finger,Like gentlemen;We merely throw downstairs.