EDWARD AND EUSTACE
A Tale with a Moral.
Oh, uncle, why is Mister Wood
So unequivocally good?
And, in the name of mercy,
Why does his comrade look so riled,
So rigid and unreconciled,
So stern of purpose?
Hush, my child,
That is Lord Eustace Percy.
A most exemplary young man,
A blameless Sabbatarian—
By happy dispensation,
They used to rule, E. Wood and he,
In absolute authority,
That singular corroboree,
The Board of Education.
Far otherwise it might have been
But for Lord Younger’s dread machine.
A Premier, less discerning,
Might have set up, in Fisher’s chair,
Some pedagogue or doctrinaire,
Instead of that illustrious pair,
To supervise our learning.
But Providence, both wise and kind,
To British interests never blind,
The choice adroitly guided;
Giving “effective preference”
Over mere expert eminence,
To men of large experience
And virtues many-sided.
Edward and Eustace.
For Edward, who, in early days
(Screened from the prying public’s gaze),
Studied John Keble’s holy ways
And theologic fever,
Rose to be foremost underling
In Winston’s Great Imperial Ring;
And later had beneath his wing
The Council of Geneva.
While Eustace, hardy sciolist,
Was firstly a diplomatist;
And later tried his noble fist
At something in the City;
And later still enlarged his view,
As Honorary Chairman to
That product of the Irish stew
The Claims and Grants Committee.
So both must be presumed to know
The habits of the Esquimaux,
The properties of indigo,
The ways of the Equator,
The secret hopes of the Malay,
The mysteries of settling-day—
Essentials to an educa-
Tional administrator.
It is unnecessary to
Remind so wise a child as you,
No such arrangement could pursue
Its course, undislocated.
People began to make a fuss;
They said: “Two men so virtuous
Are rarer than the platypus,
And better separated.”
So Edward, calm, detached, serene,
Remained on that exalted scene,
Quaffing scholastic Hippocrene,
In learned pastures browsing;
While Eustace bent his nimble brains
To joists, light-castings, sumps and drains,
In Mr. Neville Chamberlain’s
Belated scheme of Housing.
Moral.
And if, my nephew, like E. Wood
And Eustace, you are always good,
You’ll study from your babyhood
To merit estimation.
You’ll put aside that bowie knife,
You will eschew all forms of strife,
And earn, and keep throughout your life,
The plaudits of the nation.