RHYMES ON THE DECAY OF ROMANCE.
(Suggested by Mr. Frederic Harrison's recent Article in "The Forum.")
Oh, list to Mr. Harrison lamenting from The Forum,
Imagination done to death by latter-day decorum!
"Good boys and girls" we've all become, and modern men and maidens see
The world with such prosaic eyes, Romance is in decadency!
We're too absorbed in Politics, enamoured of Monotony,
To give an ear to Geniuses (supposing we had got any!)
But First-Class in our Fiction Mr. Harrison abolishes,
Indeed most Authors travel Third, their talent so toll-lollish is.
It's all the Fin-de-Siècle's fault—and this, of course, a true bill is;
For Genius puts its shutters up when centuries pass their jubilees!
As Mr. Harrison can prove by references historical,—
And any utterance of his is equal to an oracle.
We cannot stand a novel now, he says, if there's a shock in it;
Prefer our heroine angular, her eye must have a cock in it,
Unless she's dull and middle-aged, no sympathy have we with her,
Her sole excitement is to ask a plainer friend to tea with her!
He thinks, were Pickwick written now, we'd view it with a cooler eye,
And term the Trial Scene a piece of "riotous tomfoolery;"
While Jane Eyre's thrilling narrative of Rochester's sad revelries
Of "shilling shockers" scarcely would to-day above the level rise!
An age that's given up its gas to read by Electricity
Would naturally be repelled by Thackeray's causticity,
And scorn the characters of Scott, because they had Glengarries on,
An inference which is obvious—to Mr. Frederic Harrison!
How scathingly does he denounce our Literature degenerate,
With not a real Romancer left—or only two at any rate!
By "desperate expedients," each the old tradition carries on—
"But it's no good"—as they're informed by Mr. Frederic Harrison.
For Mr. Stevenson can write no stories worth hurraying at,
While he upon Pacific Isle persists in Crusoe playing at!
And Mr. Kipling's ceased to count—no heart in what he does is there—
He longs for death in far Soudan, a-fighting Fuzzy-Wuzzies there!
So we've only Mr. Meredith—(oh, what a sad disgrace it is!)
Though Mr. Blackmore writes romance—how poor and commonplace it is!
While Messrs. Thomas Hardy, Black, and Besant, it would seem, are all
Unworthy serious notice, mere nonentities ephemeral!
Some people like Miss Braddon, Mrs. Oliphant, Miss Broughton, too.
They're only lady-novelists—so serious readers oughtn't to,
And those who've been convinced by his invidious comparisons,
In future will eschew romance—excepting Mr. Harrison's.
The Darwinian Theory Exemplified.—At the Zoo is now being exhibited "Three White-tailed Gnus,"—"The Latest Gnus." with the best possible intelligence,—"and a Black-capped Gibbon." This last is evidently a descendant of the great historian; though, if this exemplifies "the survival of the fittest," where are the others of the race? Then "Black-capped" sounds ominous, as if this particular Gibbon stood self-condemned, and was soon to disappear. Should this be the case, the Zoo Authorities ought to advertise the fact, and give visitors a chance before it is too late.