FUZZY WUZZY LEAVES US
WE'VE been visited by men across the seas,
And some of them could write, and some could not;
The English, French, and German—whom you please,
But Kipling was the finest of the lot.
In sooth, we're loath to lose him from our list;
Though he's not been wholly kind in all his dealings;
Indeed from first to last I must insist,
He has played the cat and banjo with our feelings.
But here's to you, Mr. Kipling, with your comments and your slurs;
You're a poor, benighted Briton, but the Prince of Raconteurs!
We'll give you your certificate, and if you want it signed,
Come back and have a fling at us whenever you're inclined!
You harrowed us with murder and with blood;
You dipped us deep in Simla's petty guile;
Yet we have found ourselves misunderstood
When we served you a sensation in our style;
And though you saw some grewsome pictures through
The Windy City's magnifying lens,
Yet we took it just a little hard of you,
A-objecting to the slaughter of our pens!
But here's to you, Mr. Kipling, and the boys of Lung-tung-pen,
And all we have to ask you is, make 'em kill again!
For though we're crude in some things here, which fact I much deplore,
We know genius when we see it, and we're not afraid of gore.
And yet we love you best on Greenough Hill,
By Bisesa and her sisters dark perplext;
In your sermons, which have power to lift and thrill
Just because they have the heart of man as text;
And when you bend, the little ones to please,
With Bagheera and Baloo at hide and seek,
Oh! a happy hour with Mowgli in the trees
Sets a little chap a-dreaming for a week.
So, here's to you, Mr. Kipling, and to Mowgli and Old Kaa,
And to her who loved and waited where the Gates of Sorrow are;
For where is brush more potent to paint since Art began
The white love of a Woman and the red blood of a Man.
So, since to us you've given such delight,
We hope that you won't think us quite so bad.
You're all hot sand and ginger, when you write,
But we're sure you're only shamming when you're mad.
Yet so you leave us Gunga Din's salaam,
So you incarnate Mulvaney on a spree;
Mr. Kipling, sir, we do not "care a damn"
For the comments you may make on such as we!
Then here's to you, Mr. Kipling, and Columbia avers
You're a poor, benighted Briton, but the Prince of Raconteurs.
You may scathe us, and may leave us; still in our hearts will stay
The man who made Mulvaney and the road to Mandalay.
E. P. C.