SANCTA SIMPLICITAS.
Reading edition
Housemaid. "We're getting up a Sweepstakes, Mrs. Thrupp. Won't you join?"
Housekeeper. "Gracious me, Child; not I! Why if I won a Horse I shouldn't know what to do with him!"
TO THE SEA.
An Expostulation.
Oh, smooth and smiling! I have loved thee well! Hymned thee, and heard thee; lived beneath thy spell; For years thy life-giving ozone have bless'd, That makes loose garments tighter round the chest. Paced in the dark thy sounding margent white, And voiced my rapture in the boisterous night, Striking the lurking coastguard with affright. Now on my barque—ah, no! no barque be mine! On the new packet of the Angler Line, I learn, too late, when fairly out at sea, How well they speak who speak not well of thee Implacable, inscrutable Emirs Mock not the captured foe of bloodstained years As thou hast mock'd one who ne'er did thee wrong, Save in the venial fault of unexpressive song. Or canst thou this unmeasured vengeance take, Remembering some childish duck-and-drake, Forgotten long, and never done in spite? How could it harm thy navy-rending might, Thou, whose huge waves in wanton affluence bang Their heads against the rocks, in mid-air hang, Up the sheer cliffs clamber with foamy claws, And backward plunge again, with mad applause Of all the turbulent, tumultuous press That hurl themselves to spray in wantonness? Prone, but unconquered, I have roll'd to leeward, Soothed by the merciless mercy of the steward. How can I stand when hardest steel and teak Play a vertiginous game of hide-and-seek? All is a-swing and dipping and a-roll. Oh, vain material creed! Th' informing soul! Proves well its immateriality, Defying thus the tortures of the sea, That force all else to helpless surrender; For aught but very Spirit would prefer To seek at once the illimitable inane, Than cognisant of anguish thus remain The tenant of a desolated shrine, A bare clay cabin, like this frame of mine. Oh, rich saloons! Oh, rooms of wretched state! The pomp and glory of you all I hate! Ye fulsome diving dados, would ye were Extinct as your vocabular congener! Place me where errant icebergs, anchored deep By chains of frost, a darkling vigil keep, Fixed in the pole's impenetrable wall, Dead to the warmer ocean's roving call! Far from this liquid way that heaves and rolls, This world-long switchback, bounded by the poles, This path of pain, whose undulations cease Only in that palæocrystic peace! Nay, what is this? How steady! Here we are! Field breezes mingle with the oil and tar, And with a shudder I behold anear The solid weed-hung timbers of the pier. Perfidious sea! I'll trust thee never more, And mock thy fury safely from the shore.
TO HEBE.
(See the Report of the Lady Commissioners on Women's Labour.)
Waitress! with the dimpled chin, Cap as clean as a new pin, Here's a feather to put in! For Miss Orme's report declares That no male with you compares In the showing off of wares. Be it counter, be it bar, You can "dress" it—you're its star, Bright, and most particular! Grievances you have, no doubt; Which of us exists without? Still, you do not pine or pout. Standing with reluctant feet Always ready, trim, and neat, No one tells you—"Take a seat!" Hours are long, and meal-time short, Mashing bores, who think it "sport," Say the things they didn't ought! Gather, then, the tips that fall; Don't let vulgar chaff appal; To the Bar you've had your "call"!
Con. for Competitive Sportsmen.—Q. What is the most unpopular thing in the (sporting) world? A. A "record," because it is always being "cut," by everybody, everywhere, every day.
THE GREAT AFRICAN LION-TAMER.
["He fully admitted the difficulties of the Government and Sir Henry Loch. Both found themselves to be in a most exceptionally difficult position, created by those who had gone before them by granting in the wrong way the charter to the Company. He admitted that both Lord Ripon and Sir Henry Loch did their best in the circumstances for a long time to maintain peace; both urged that war should be avoided.... Mr. Rhodes was Prime Minister of Cape Colony, and obviously Sir Henry Loch had an exceedingly difficult position in dealing as Prime Minister and as the head of the Company with that gentleman, to whom he could not say that he did not quite believe him, and that he was forcing on the war."—Mr. Labouchere on the Chartered Company and Matabeleland.]
Lion-Tamer (grandly). "Walk up, walk up, ladies and gentlemen! See the great African live lion, Matabele—called Lo Ben for short—larger than (average) life, and thrice as natural as normal (menagerie) nature! Walk up! Walk up! Taming process just about to begin——
Agent of Menagerie Proprietor (sotto voce). Oh, well you know—subject, of course, to—ahem!—every provision being made for—a—humanity—and—ahem—every precaution being taken against—a—a—needless risks, you know, and—a—obvious cruelty, you see—and—ahem!—all that sort of thing, don't you know.
Lion-Tamer (nettled). No, I don't know, dontcher know. And what's more I don't believe you know, dontcher know, nor your guv'nors neither, for that matter. What is your little game, anyhow?
Agent (with some assumption of dignity). We have no "little game." Little Game is not the word. Lions, I believe, are generally called "Big Game," by Nimrods and others.
[Sniggers as one who has scored.
Lion-Tamer (sardonically). Nimrod, indeed! Ah! a mighty hunter before the Lords you are, ain't you? You and your lot! Rural rabbits and parochial foxes are G——'s "Big Game," eh?
Agent. This is neither the time nor the place to argue that point. Your business is lion-taming; ours is menagerie-managing.
Lion-Tamer (scornfully). All right, my noble swell! Manage him!
[Pointing to Lion, who is ramping and roaring.
Agent. Not at all, not at all!
[Spectators become impatient.
Lion-Tamer. Well, look here, do you want this lion tamed for you, or do you not?
Agent. Why, cert'n'ly! Subject of course to the assistance—ahem!—I should say supervision of Loch and myself.
Lion-Tamer. Ah, "supervise" away as much as you please, only don't interfere with me. The old game! Stand by while I do the dangerous part of the business, hamper me as much as you can, and when, in spite of you all, I am successfully through, take the business—and the credit—over yourselves!
Agent (aside). Wonderful man, very. Wish I quite knew what to make of him. Lion-tamers, like fire, are excellent servants, but bad masters. All alike, all alike, Clive, Warren Hastings, Rajah Brooke, Jamaica Eyre, Bartle Frere, Gordon, all wonderful, and—in the end—very useful, but worrying, worrying!
Lion-Tamer (proceeding). Walk up, walk up, ladies and gentlemen! All in to begin! See the big black-maned African lion, fresh from Mashonaland wilds; bigger than Churchill ever chased or Selous slew, or Van Amburgh subdued, tamed in the twinkling of an assegai, conquered in the 'tss! of a Hotchkiss, by the Great South African Lion-Tamer, Rhodorowdidow the Rumbistical.
Spectators. Hooray! Hooray!! Hoo-ray!!!
Agent (aside). How wonderfully popular these thrasonical wild-beast tamers and prancing proconsul sort of fellows are—with the gallery!
Lion-Tamer (to attendant). I say, just hand me the loaded whip, and—keep the poker hot, in case of emergency——
Agent (hurriedly). Oh, here, I say; that will never do, Rhodorowdidow!
Lion-Tamer (impatiently). What do you mean?
Agent. Why, you know, loaded bludgeons and red-hot pokers read too much like—Cruelty to Animals! What would Labby and the Humanitarians say? You're none too popular already, you know, in certain quarters. Your masterful little ways and monetary success have put a good many backs up. We mustn't run any needless risks, Rhodo. Wouldn't this little toy-whip and this big bottle of (medicated) rose-water do as well?
Lion-Tamer (scornfully). Was it with Rose-water that "John Company" tamed your Indian tiger for you?
TWO WAYS OF LOOKING AT IT.
Sporting Farmer (who has been kind enough to give a mount to our friend 'Arry). "Now then! they're away. Don't you see they're gone?"
'Arry (who has been having a very bad time). "Eh! gone! and not comin' back? Wot a blessin'!"
YOU NEVER WROTE.
(To Another Man's Fiancée.)
You never wrote a single word, though I Sent prompt congratulations in a note, You gave my well-meant greetings the go-by— You never wrote. Do you remember when we took a boat, And slowly drifted 'neath a summer sky? Perhaps you don't. In fact, perhaps, you vote Such memories a bore. You can't deny That, politician-like, you turned your coat, In fine, you jilted me. Is not that why You never wrote?
Mrs. R. heard in Scotland that Monson was always a bit of a scapegoat.