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Title: Verse and Worse

Author: Harry Graham

Release date: July 11, 2011 [eBook #36702]
Most recently updated: January 7, 2021

Language: English

Credits: Produced by Mark C. Orton, Diane Monico, and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This
book was produced from scanned images of public domain
material from the Google Print project.)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VERSE AND WORSE ***

VERSE AND WORSE

BY

HARRY GRAHAM
('COL. D. STREAMER')

AUTHOR OF 'BALLADS OF THE BOER WAR,' 'RUTHLESS RHYMES
FOR HEARTLESS HOMES,' 'MISREPRESENTATIVE MEN,'
'FISCAL BALLADS,' ETC., ETC.

LONDON
EDWARD ARNOLD
41 & 43 MADDOX STREET, BOND STREET, W.

1905

[All rights reserved]

NOTE

The Baby's Baedeker and Perverted Proverbs have been published in America by Mr. R. H. Russell and Messrs. Harper Bros. of New York.

'The Ballad of Ping-pong,' 'Bill,' and 'The Place where the Old Cleek Broke,' have appeared in The Century Magazine, The Outlook, and Golf respectively.

'Uncle Joe,' 'Aunt Eliza,' 'John,' 'The Cat,' and 'Bluebeard,' were included in Mr. Russell's American edition of Ruthless Rhymes for Heartless Homes.

		PAGE
	Author's Preface	ix
	Foreword	xi
	PART I
	THE BABY'S BAEDEKER
i.	Abroad	3
ii.	United States of America	6
iii.	Great Britain	9
iv.	Scotland	11
v.	Ireland	13
vi.	Wales	15
vii.	China	16
viii.	France	19
ix.	Germany	21
x.	Holland	23
xi.	Iceland	26
xii.	Italy	27
xiii.	Japan	30
xiv.	Portugal	32
xv.	Russia	33
xvi.	Spain	36
xvii.	Switzerland	39
xviii.	Turkey	41
xix.	Dreamland	44
xx.	Stageland	47
xxi.	Loverland	48
xxii.	Homeland	53
	PART II
	CHILDISH COMPLAINTS AND OTHER RUTHLESS RHYMES
	Childish Complaints—
	Prelude	57
	Appendicitis	61
	Whooping-Cough	61
	Measles	62
	Adenoids	62
	Croup	62
	Ruthless Rhymes—
i.	Mother-Wit	63
ii.	Uncle Joe	64
iii.	Aunt Eliza	65
iv.	Absent-mindedness	66
v.	John	68
vi.	Baby	71
vii.	The Cat	72
	PART III
	PERVERTED PROVERBS
i.	'Virtue is its own Reward'	77
ii.	'Enough is as Good as a Feast'	86
iii.	'Don't Buy a Pig in a Poke'	89
iv.	'Learn to Take Things Easily'	91
v.	'A Rolling Stone Gathers no Moss'	92
vi.	'It is Never Too Late to Mend'	96
vii.	'A Bad Workman Complains of his Tools'	99
viii.	'Don't Look a Gift-horse in the Mouth'	100
ix.	Potpourri	103
	PART IV
	OTHER VERSES
	Bill	111
	The Legend of the Author	114
	The Motriot	128
	The Ballad of the Artist	130
	The Ballad of Ping-pong	135
	The Pessimist	138
	The Place where the Old Cleek Broke	140
	The Homes of London	143
	The Happiest Land	146
	A London Involuntary	151
	Bluebeard	154
	The Woman with the Dead Soles	166
	Rosemary (A Ballad of the Boudoir)	170
	Portknockie's Porter	172
	The Ballad of the Little Jinglander	176
	Aftword	182
	Envoi	185

AUTHOR'S PREFACE

With guilty, conscience-stricken tears,
I offer up these rhymes of mine
To children of maturer years
(From Seventeen to Ninety-nine).
A special solace may they be
In days of second infancy.

The frenzied mother who observes
This volume in her offspring's hand,
And trembles for the darling's nerves,
Must please to clearly understand,
If baby suffers by and by
The Publisher's at fault, not I!

But should the little brat survive,
And fatten on this style of Rhyme,
To raise a Heartless Home and thrive
Through a successful life of crime,
The Publisher would have you see
That I am to be thanked, not he!

Fond parent, you whose children are
Of tender age (from two to eight),
Pray keep this little volume far
From reach of such, and relegate
My verses to an upper shelf;
Where you may study them yourself.

FOREWORD

The Press may pass my Verses by
With sentiments of indignation,
And say, like Greeks of old, that I
Corrupt the Youthful Generation;
I am unmoved by taunts like these—
(And so, I think, was Socrates).

Howe'er the Critics may revile,
I pick no journalistic quarrels,
Quite realising that my Style
Makes up for any lack of Morals;
For which I feel no shred of shame—
(And Byron would have felt the same).

I don't intend a Child to read
These lines, which are not for the Young;
For, if I did, I should indeed
Feel fully worthy to be hung.
(Is 'hanged' the perfect tense of 'hang'?
Correct me, Mr. Andrew Lang!)

O Young of Heart, tho' in your prime,
By you these verses may be seen!
Accept the Moral with the Rhyme,
And try to gather what I mean.
But, if you can't, it won't hurt me!
(And Browning would, I know, agree.)

Be reassured, I have not got
The style of Stephen Phillips' heroes,
Nor Henry Jones's pow'r of Plot,
Nor wit like Arthur Wing Pinero's!
(If so, I should not waste my time
In writing you this sort of rhyme.)

I strive to paint things as they Are,
Of Realism the true Apostle;
All flow'ry metaphors I bar,
Nor call the homely thrush a 'throstle.'
Such synonyms would make me smile.
(And so they would have made Carlyle.)

My Style may be, at times, I own,
A trifle cryptic or abstruse;
In this I do not stand alone,
And need but mention, in excuse,
A thousand world-familiar names,
From Meredith to Henry James.

From these my fruitless fancy roams
To Aesop's or La Fontaine's Fable,
From Doyle's or Hemans' 'Stately Ho(l)mes,'
To t'other of The Breakfast Table;
Like Galahad, I wish (in vain)
'My wit were as the wit of Twain!

Had I but Whitman's rugged skill,
(And managed to escape the Censor),
The Accuracy of a Mill,
The Reason of a Herbert Spencer,
The literary talents even
Of Sidney Lee or Leslie Stephen,

The pow'r of Patmore's placid pen,
Or Watson's gift of execration,
The sugar of Le Gallienne,
Or Algernon's alliteration,
One post there is I'd not be lost in,
—Tho' I might find it most ex-Austin'!

Some day, if I but study hard,
The public, vanquished by my pen, 'll
Acclaim me as a Minor Bard,
Like Norman Gale or Mrs. Meynell;
And listen to my lyre a-rippling
Imperial banjo-spasms like Kipling.

Were I, like him, a syndicate,
Which publishers would put their trust in;
A Walter Pater up-to-date,
Or flippant scholar like Augustine;
With pen as light as lark or squirrel,
I'd love to kipple, pate and birrell.

So don't ignore me. If you should,
'Twill touch me to the very heart oh!
To be as much misunderstood
As once was Andrea del Sarto;
Unrecognised, to toil away,
Like Millet,—(not, of course, Millais).

And, pray, for Morals do not look
In this unique agglomeration,
—This unpretentious little book
Of Infelicitous Quotation.
I deem you foolish if you do,
(And Mr. Arnold thinks so, too).

PART I

THE BABY'S BAEDEKER

An International Guide-Book for the young of all ages;
peculiarly adapted to the wants of first and second Childhood.

I

ABROAD

Abroad is where we tourists spend,
In divers unalluring ways,
The brief occasional week-end,
Or annual Easter holidays;
And earn the (not ill-founded) charge
Of being lunatics at large.

Abroad, we lose our self-respect;
Wear whiskers; let our teeth protrude;
Consider any garb correct,
And no display of temper rude;
Descending, when we cross the foam,
To depths we dare not plumb at home.

(Small wonder that the natives gaze,
With hostile eyes, at foreign freaks,
Who patronise their Passion-plays,
In lemon-coloured chessboard breeks;
An op'ra-glass about each neck,
And on each head a cap of check.)

Abroad, where needy younger sons,
When void the parent's treasure-chest,
Take refuge from insistent duns,
At urgent relatives' request;
To live upon their slender wits,
Or sums some maiden-aunt remits.

Abroad, whence (with a wisdom rare)
Regardless of nostalgic pains,
The weary New York millionaire
Retires with his oil-gotten gains,
And learns how deep a pleasure 'tis
To found our Public Libraries.

For ours is the primeval clan,
From which all lesser lights descend;
Is Crockett not our countryman?
And call we not Corelli friend?
Our brotherhood has bred the brain
Whose offspring bear the brand of Caine.

Tho' nowadays we seldom hear
Miss Proctor, who mislaid a chord,
Or Tennyson, the poet peer,
Who came into the garden, Mord;
Tho' Burns be dead, and Keats unread,
We have a prophet still in Stead.

And so we stare, with nose in air;
And speak in condescending tone,
Of foreigners whose climes compare
So favourably with our own;
And aliens we cannot applaud
Who call themselves At Home Abroad!

II

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

This is the Country of the Free,
The Cocktail and the Ten Cent Chew;
Where you're as good a man as me,
And I'm a better man than you!
(O Liberty, how free we make!
Freedom, what liberties we take!)

'Tis here the startled tourist meets,
'Mid clanging of a thousand bells,
The railways running through the streets,
Skyscraping flats and vast hotels,
Where rest, on the resplendent floors,
The necessary cuspidors.

And here you may encounter too
The pauper immigrants in shoals,
The Swede, the German, and the Jew,
The Irishman, who rules the polls
And is employed to keep the peace,
A venal and corrupt police.

They are so busy here, you know,
They have no time at all for play;
Each morning to their work they go
And stay there all the livelong day;
Their dreams of happiness depend
On making more than they can spend.

The ladies of this land are all
Developed to a pitch sublime,
Some inches over six foot tall,
With perfect figures all the time.
(For further notice of their looks
See Mr. Dana Gibson's books.)

And, if they happen to possess
Sufficient balance at the bank,
They have the chance of saying 'Yes!'
To needy foreigners of rank;
The future dukes of all the earth
Are half American by birth.

MORAL

A 'dot' combining cash with charms
Is worth a thousand coats-of-arms.

III

GREAT BRITAIN

The British are a chilly race.
The Englishman is thin and tall;
He screws an eyeglass in his face,
And talks with a reluctant drawl.
'Good Gwacious! This is doosid slow!
By Jove! Haw demmy! Don't-cher-know!'

The Englishwoman ev'rywhere
A meed of admiration wins;
She has a crown of silken hair,
And quite the loveliest of skins.
(Go forth and seek an English maid,
Your trouble will be well repaid.)

Where Britain's banner is unfurled
There's room for nothing else beside,
She owns one-quarter of the world,
And still she is not satisfied.
The Briton thinks himself, by birth,
To be the lord of all the earth.

Some call his manners wanting, or
His sense of humour poor, and yet
Whatever he is striving for
He as a rule contrives to get;
His methods may be much to blame,
But he arrives there just the same.

MORAL

If you can get your wish, you bet it
Doesn't much matter how you get it!

IV

SCOTLAND

In Scotland all the people wear
Red hair and freckles, and one sees
The men in women's dresses there,
With stout, décolleté, low-necked knees.
('Eblins ye dinna ken, I doot,
We're unco guid, so hoot, mon, hoot!')

They love 'ta whuskey' and 'ta Kirk';
I don't know which they like the most.
They aren't the least afraid of work;
No sense of humour can they boast;
And you require an axe to coax
The canny Scot to see your jokes.

They play an instrument they call
The bagpipes; and the sound of these
Is reminiscent of the squall
Of infant pigs attacked by bees;
Music that might drive cats away
Or make reluctant chickens lay.

MORAL

Wear kilts, and, tho' men look askance,
Go out and give your knees a chance.

V

IRELAND

The Irishman is never quite
Contented with his little lot;
He's ever thirsting for a fight,
A grievance he has always got;
And all his energy is bent
On trying not to pay his rent.

He lives upon a frugal fare
(The few potatoes that he digs),
And hospitably loves to share
His bedroom with his wife and pigs;
But cannot settle even here,
And gets evicted once a year.

In order to amuse himself,
At any time when things are slack,
He takes his gun down from the shelf
And shoots a landlord in the back;
If he is lucky in the chase,
He may contrive to bag a brace.

MORAL

Procure a grievance and a gun
And you can have no end of fun.

VI

WALES

The natives of the land of Wales
Are not a very truthful lot,
And the imagination fails
To paint the language they have got;
Bettws-y-coed-llan-dud-nod-
Dolgelly-rhiwlas-cwn-wm-dod!

MORAL

If you must talk, then do it, pray,
In an intelligible way.

VII

CHINA

The Chinaman from early youth
Is by his wise preceptors taught
To have no dealings with the Truth,
In fact, romancing is his 'forte.'
In juggling words he takes the prize,
By the sheer beauty of his lies.

For laundrywork he has a knack;
He takes in shirts and makes them blue;
When he omits to send them back
He takes his customers in too.
He must be ranked in the 'élite'
Of those whose hobby is deceit.

For ladies 'tis the fashion here
To pinch their feet and make them small,
Which, to the civilised idea,
Is not a proper thing at all.
Our modern Western woman's taste
In pinching leans towards the waist.

The Chinese Empire is the field
Where foreign missionaries go;
A poor result their labours yield,
And they have little fruit to show;
For, if you would convert Wun Lung,
You have to catch him very young.

The Chinaman has got a creed
And a religion of his own,
And would be much obliged indeed
If you could leave his soul alone;
And he prefers, which may seem odd,
His own to other people's god.

Yet still the missionary tries
To point him out his wickedness,
Until the badgered natives rise,—
And there's one missionary less!
Then foreign Pow'rs step in, you see,
And ask for an indemnity.

MORAL

Adhere to facts, avoid romance,
And you a clergyman may be;
To lie is wrong, except perchance
In matters of Diplomacy.
And, when you start out to convert,
Make certain that you don't get hurt!

VIII

FRANCE

The natives here remark 'Mon Dieu!'
'Que voulez-vous?' 'Comment ça va?'
'Sapristi! Par exemple! Un peu!'
'Tiens donc! Mais qu'est-ce que c'est que ça?'
They shave one portion of their dogs,
And live exclusively on frogs.

They get excited very quick,
And crowds will gather before long
If you should stand and wave your stick
And shout, 'À bas le Presidong!'
Still more amusing would it be
To say, 'Conspuez la Patrie!'

The French are so polite, you know,
They take their hats off very well,
And, should they tread upon your toe,
Remark, 'Pardon, Mademoiselle!'
And you would gladly bear the pain
To see them make that bow again.

Their ladies too have got a way
Which even curates can't resist;
'Twould make an Alderman feel gay
Or soothe a yellow journalist;
And then the things they say are so
Extremely—well, in fact,—you know!

MORAL

The closest scrutiny can find
No morals here of any kind.

IX

GERMANY

The German is a stolid soul,
And finds best suited to his taste
A pipe with an enormous bowl,
A fraulein with an ample waist;
He loves his beer, his Kaiser, and
(Donner und blitz!) his Fatherland!

He's perfectly contented if
He listens in the Op'ra-house
To Wagner's well-concealed 'motif,'
Or waltzes of the nimble Strauss;
And all discordant bands he sends
Abroad, to soothe his foreign friends.

When he is glad at anything
He cheers like a dyspeptic goat,
'Hoch! hoch!' You'd think him suffering
From some affection of the throat.
A disagreeable noise, 'tis true,
But pleases him and don't hurt you!

MORAL

A glass of lager underneath the bough,
A long 'churchwarden' and an ample 'frau'
Beside me sitting in a Biergarten,
Ach! Biergarten were paradise enow!

Verse and Worse

About This Book

The Project Gutenberg eBook of Verse and Worse

VERSE AND WORSE

VERSE AND WORSE

VERSE AND WORSE

NOTE

CONTENTS

AUTHOR'S PREFACE

FOREWORD

PART I

THE BABY'S BAEDEKER

I

ABROAD

II

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

III

GREAT BRITAIN

IV

SCOTLAND

V

IRELAND

VI

WALES

VII

CHINA

VIII

FRANCE

IX

GERMANY

X

HOLLAND