Volume 156 — DEMOBILISED DAYDREAMS.
Reading edition
At 10 A.M. or so (in bed, With lowered blinds and curtains drawn), There wander lightly through my head Memories of ruddy dawn— A thing I never could have said Before we warred against the Hun, For then, although I may have heard That this phenomenon occurred, I had no notion how the thing was done.
A stranger to the birth of day, How many have I watched since then! At least a thousand, I should say (It seems to me like ten); On Salisbury Plain, austere and grey, Breaking night's gloom and deepening mine, When, crawling forth, I used to see Stonehenge all shaken visibly By the rude Sergeant's bellow, "Rise and shine!"
Gilding the foam of distant seas—
And humbly then I bowed my neck
And sank forlornly to my knees
To swab the blooming deck;
A wealth of flaming pageantries,
When, in a dusty Indian fort,
Cursing the sun and all his works
And dripping perspiration by the quart;
In Egypt, too, a pallid glow Through swirls of desolating dust— There often have I watched it grow, Fed up enough to bust; In Palestine, uncertain, slow (While standing-to, with drowsy eyes), Herald of shells and, what was worse, Waking the ancient Eastern curse, A hundred thousand million ravenous flies.
Sombre, inspiring, radiant, chill, Mysterious, wild, inert, ablaze, A thousand times on plain and hill The dawn has held my gaze; Idly I dream of it, until A sterner mood invades my brain And I grow resolute. Here and now I register a mighty vow Never to see the beastly thing again.
ONE OF THE PUNCH BRIGADE.
"The Home Secretary gives notice that summer time will be brought into force this year on the morning of Sunday, March 30, and will continue until the night of Sunday-Monday; September 28129."—Scots Paper.
By which time, it is confidently expected, the Peace Conference will be over.
Road Sweeper. "WOT'S BECOME O' BILL? I 'AVEN'T SEEN 'IM FOR MONTHS."
Female ditto. "BILL! WHY, 'AVEN'T YOU HEARD? 'E'S PROMOTED. 'E'S ON THE BINS."