Byron, “Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage.”

* * * * *

[Illustration:  Inspecting Officer.  “WHICH IS THE MOST IMPORTANT NUT ON THIS LORRY?”

Driver (ex-infantry).  “I AM, SIR.”]

* * * * *

A CAREER.

(The Right Man in the Right Place.)

You should see our son James! 
You should just see our James! 
As bright as a button, as sharp as a knife! 
My wife says to me and I say to my wife,
“You’ll never have seen such a son in your life
As our jammy son, James.”

He is now three years old;
He’s a good three years old;
When the fellow was two you could see by his brow
(At the age of a year, you could guess by the row)
That this was a coming celebrity.  Now
He’s a stout three-year-old.

Question:  What shall he be? 
Tell us, what shall he be? 
Shall he follow his father and go to the Bar,
Where, passing his father, he’s bound to go far? 
“But one knows,” says his mother,"what barristers are. 
Something else he must be!”

Do you fancy a Haig? 
Shall our James be a Haig? 
The War Office tell me he’s late for this war,
Have the honour to add there won’t be any more
Since that’s what the League of the Nations is for;
So it’s off about Haig.

But his mother sees light
(Mothers always see light). 
“This League of the Nations we mentioned above,
With the motto, ‘Be Quiet,’ the trade-mark, a Dove,
Will be wanting a President, won’t it, my love?”
Jimmy’s mother sees light.

Yes, that could be arranged;
Nay, it must be arranged. 
In the matter of years Master Jimmy would meet
Presidential requirements.  What age can compete,
In avoiding the gawdy, achieving the neat,
With forty to fifty?  Thus, forty-five be’t. 
Given forty-two years, he’ll be finding his feet
And the Treaty of Peace should be getting complete.... 
And so that’s all arranged.

HENRY.

* * * * *

“I am sorry to have to say that this statement is a ------, and if
any of my readers have any doubt as to whether I used that strong
term without just reason, I invite them to communicate with the
Ministry of Shipping on the subject.”—­Letter in “The Observer."

We respect our contemporary’s discretion, but we should like to know what was the “strong term”.

* * * * *

“The Literary Class has grown beyond all expectations, the numbers attending the last few meetings averaging nearly 100.  Papers have been read and discussed on Dickens’ Works, Tess, Tale of Two Cities.”

    The Highway.

Flushed with success, the Literary Class is expected next to tackle HARDY; Jude the Obscure and The Mystery of Edwin Drood being the first objectives.