To see the world as the world's not.
And faith, 't is pleasant till 't is past:
The mischief is that 't will not last.
Oh I have been to Ludlow fair
And left my necktie God knows where, 30
And carried half way home, or near,
Pints and quarts of Ludlow beer:
Then the world seemed none so bad,
And I myself a sterling lad;
And down in lovely muck I've lain,
Happy till I woke again.
Then I saw the morning sky:
Heigho, the tale was all a lie;

The better for the embittered hour;
It should do good to heart and head
When your soul is in my soul's stead;
And I will friend you, if I may,
In the dark and cloudy day.

60

There was a king reigned in the East: There, when kings will sit to feast, They get their fill before they think With poisoned meat and poisoned drink. He gathered all that springs to birth From the many-venomed earth; First a little, thence to more, He sampled all her killing store; And easy, smiling, seasoned sound, Sate the king when healths went round. They put arsenic in his meat And stared aghast to watch him eat; They poured strychnine in his cup And shook to see him drink it up: They shook, they stared as white's their shirt:

Them it was their poison hurt.

-I tell the tale that I heard told.
Mithridates, he died old.

LIONEL JOHNSON (1867-1902)

OXFORD NIGHTS

To Victor Plarr

About the august and ancient Square,
Cries the wild wind; and through the air.
The blue night air, blows keen and chill:
Else, all the night sleeps, all is still.
Now, the lone Square is blind with gloom:
Now, on that clustering chestnut bloom,
A cloudy moonlight plays, and falls
In glory upon Bodley's walls:
Now, wildlier yet, while moonlight pales.
Storm the tumultuary gales.

O rare divinity of Night!

Season of undisturbed delight:

Glad interspace of day and day!

10

Without, an world of winds at play: Within, I hear what dead friends say. Blow, winds! and round that perfect Dome,

20

Wail as you will, and sweep, and roam:
Above Saint Mary's carven home,
Struggle, and smite to your desire
The sainted watchers on her spire:
Or in the distance vex your power
Upon mine own New College tower:
You hurt not these! On me and mine,
On me and mine,
Clear candlelights in quiet shine:
My fire lives yet! nor have I done
With Smollett, nor with Richardson:
With, gentlest of the martyrs! Lamb,
Whose lover I, long lover, am:
With Gray, whose gracious spirit knew
The sorrows of art's lonely few:
With Fielding, great, and strong, and tall;
Sterne, exquisite, equivocal;

30

40

Goldsmith, the dearest of them all:
While Addison's demure delights
Turn Oxford, into Attic, nights.
Still Trim and Parson Adams keep
Me better company, than sleep:
Dark sleep, who loves not me; nor I
Love well her nightly death to die,
And in her haunted chapels lie.
Sleep wins me not: but from his shelf
Brings me each wit his very self:
Beside my chair the great ghosts throng,
Each tells his story, sings his song:
And in the ruddy fire I trace
The curves of each Augustan face.
I sit at Doctor Primrose' board:
I hear Beau Tibbs discuss a lord.
Mine, Matthew

wrath;

Bramble's pleasant

60

Nor lives there, beneath Oxford towers,
More joy, than in my silent hours.
Dream, who love dreams! forget all grief:
Find, in sleep's nothingness, relief:
Better my dreams! Dear, human books,
With kindly voices, winning looks!
Enchaunt me with your spells of art,
And draw me homeward to your heart:
Till weariness and things unkind
Seem but a vain and passing wind:
Till the gray morning slowly creep
Upward, and rouse the birds from sleep:
Till Oxford bells the silence break,
And find me happier, for your sake.
Then, with the dawn of common day,
Rest you! But I, upon my way,
What the fates bring, will cheerlier do,
In days not yours, through thoughts of
you!

RUDYARD KIPLING (1865- >

TOMMY

71

I went into a public-'ouse to get a pint o' beer,

The publican 'e up an' sez, "We serve no redcoats here."

The girls be'ind the bar they laughed an' giggled fit to die,

I outs into the street again, an' to myself sez I:

O it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy go away"; But it's "Thank you, Mister Atkins," when the band begins to play,

The band begins to play, my boys, the band begins to play,

O it's "Thank you, Mister Atkins," when the band begins to play.

We'll wait for extry rations if you treat us rational.

Don't mess about the cook-room slops but prove it to our face

The Widow's uniform is not the soldierman's disgrace.

For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Chuck him out, the brute!"

But it's "Saviour of 'is country" when the guns begin to shoot; An' it's Tommy this, an' Tommy

that, an' anything you please; An' Tommy ain't a bloomin' fool -you bet that Tommy sees!

FUZZY-WUZZY

(Soudan Expeditionary Force)

40

We've fought with many men acrost the

seas,

An' some of 'em was brave an' some

was not:

The Paythan an' the Zulu an' Burmese;

But the Fuzzy was the finest o' the lot. We never got a ha'porth's change of 'im: 'E squatted in the scrub an' 'ocked our 'orses,

'E cut our sentries up at Suakim, An' 'e played the cat an' banjo with our forces.

So 'ere's to you, Fuzzy-Wuzzy, at your 'ome in the Sowdan; 9 You're a pore benighted 'eathen

but a first-class fightin' man; We gives you your certifikit, an' if you want it signed

We'll come an' 'ave a romp with you whenever you're inclined.

We took our chanst among the Kyber 'ills,

The Boers knocked us silly at a mile,

an' fires, an' all:

An' a Zulu impi dished us up in style: