Volume 153 — TO AN INFANT GNU.

Thomas (that may not be thine actual name But it will serve as well as any other), There be coarse souls to whom all flesh is game, Who do not hail thee as a new-born brother But merely as a thing at which to aim Their fratricidal guns; they simply smother The sense, which I for one cannot eschew, Of soul relationship 'twixt man and gnu. 'Tis not, O surely not, for such as these Those baby limbs are flung in lightsome capers; Those puny bleatings were not meant to please Facetious writers for the daily papers; Let baser beasts inspire the obvious wheeze, Wombats and wart-hogs, tortoises and tapirs; These lack the subtle spell thy presence flings About the spirit tuned to higher things. Well could I picture thee, a dusky sprite, With Dryad hoofs on Thracian ledges drumming, When day is slipping from the arms of night And all the hushed leaves whisper, "Pan is coming!" And thou before him, leaping with delight, Stirring all birds to song, all bees to humming And buds to blossoming—but lo! at hand A tablet reads, "C. Gnu. Nyassaland." Thus they've described thy formidable sire, A whiskered person with a chronic liver. I feed him biscuits to appease his ire; He eats the gift but fain would bite the giver. His eye is red with reminiscent fire, His thoughts are by the great Zambesi River Where hides the hippopotam, huge as sin, And slinking leopards with the dappled skin. No couches of the nymph and Bassarid, Or thymy meadows such as Simois glasses, Lured his exulting feet, my jocund kid, But veldt and kloof and waving jungle grasses, Where lurk the python with unwinking lid, And the lean lion, growling, as he passes, His futile wrath against the hoarse baboons That drape the rocks in chattering platoons. Free of the waste he snuffed the breeze at morn, The fleet-foot peer of sassaby and kudu; The hunting leopard feared his bristling horn, The foul hyæna voted him a hoodoo; Browsing on tender grass and camel-thorn He roamed the plains, as all right-minded gnu do; But now he eats the bun of discontent That once was lord of half a continent. And thou, my child, to whom harsh fate has dealt A captive's birthright—thou wilt never scamper With wingéd feet across the windy veldt, Where are no crowds to stare nor bars to hamper; Thou wilt not ring upon the rhino's pelt In wanton sport. But there—why put a damper On thy young spirits by recounting what Africa is but Regent's Park is not. It would but grieve thee, and, moreover, I Note that thy young attention's growing looser. A piece of cake? O fie! my Thomas, fie! The keeper said, "Please not to feed the gnu, Sir." And yet it seems a shame to pass thee by Without some slight confectionery douceur; So here's a bun; and let this thought obtrude: What matter freedom while there's lots of food! Algol.