More gay than day and plumier
    Than Birds of Paradise,
  It was no Court Costumier
    That made them look so nice;
  No milliners nor drapers
    On mortal business terms
  Of those sweet modes were shapers,
  Though several evening papers
    Mention the actual firms.

  But fairies wove that raiment
    Of starshine and of flowers;
  They asked no better payment,
    They craved no shorter hours;
  With eglantine and lilies
    They worked a June night long,
  And that is just where “Phyllis”
  In “Ascot frocks and frillies”
    Goes absolutely wrong.

  ’Neath beech-tree and ’neath cedar,
    In rings of moonlit green.... 
  What bilge, you say, good reader? 
    My very dear old bean,
  Think of the state of Prices,
    Think of the slump in Trade,
  Turn to the Paris Crisis,
  Ponder the cost of ices
    And buns and gingerade.

  New War-loans shriek for money;
    All work is at an end;
  It seems extremely funny
    There’s any cash to spend;
  Yet still the tide of laces,
    The foam of fluff and silk
  Comes round in cardboard cases
  To lots of people’s places
    As punctual as the milk.

  While, sworn to get revenge in,
    And waiting at the door,
  That grim three-handed engine
    Prepares to strike once more,
  Who built these gowns we mutely
    Admire on lawn and lea? 
  Who bought them (think acutely),
  With England absolutely
    As broke as she can be?

  Therefore I say the fabric
    Was wrought of faery woof,
  Not made in walls of drab brick
    Nor won with mortal oof;
  Delicate, dream-like, pretty
    As sunshine after rain,
  Worn by Miss Hodgson ("Kitty")—­
  It seems a dreadful pity
    She spilled the iced champagne.

  Therefore I say that, toiling
    With wild white roses’ bloom—­
  No printers’ vats a-boiling
    Nor labour of the loom—­
  With fern and foxglove chalice
    On tiny feet or wings
  Titania’s elves made sallies,
  And that’s how Lady Alice
    Had on those lovely things.

  EVOE.

* * * * *

A HAPPY THOUGHT.

“When the blessing had been pronounced and the bridal pair were kneeling at the altar Dame Nellie Melba, wearing a blue dress and hat, crept from the side chapel to the choir and to the joy of the audience sang the pathetic ‘Ave Maria’ that Desdemona sings in the last act of Verdi’s Othello when she feels her predestined doom approaching.”—­“Evening Standard” on a Society wedding.

* * * * *

    “Mr. Bottomley objects to By Jingo.”

    Daily Paper.

Yet in one or another of his “powerful” articles we seem to have seen something like “Damn the Kaiser” and “To Hell with Hindenburg.”