"MOVING ABOUT IN WORLDS NOT REALISED."
(By a prejudiced but puzzled Victim of Teacaddies and Ginger-jars.)
I suppose there's a war in the East,
(I am deluged with pictures about it,)
But I can't realise it—no, not in the least,
And, in spite of the papers, I doubt it.
A Chinaman seems such a nebulous chap,
And I can't fancy shedding the gore of a Jap.
Those parchmenty fellows have fleets?
Big Iron-clads, each worth a million?
I cannot conceive it, my reason it beats.
The lord of the pencil vermilion
Fits in with a teacaddy, not a torpedo.
Just picture a Ram in that queer bay of Yedo!
It seems the right place for a junk,
(With a fine flight of storks in the offing),
But think of a battle-ship there being sunk
By a Krupp! 'Tis suggestive of scoffing.
I try to believe, but 'tis merely bravado.
It all seems as funny as Gilbert's Mikado.
And then those preposterous names,
Like a lot of cracked bells all a-tinkling!
I try to imagine their militant games,
But at present I can't get an inkling
Of what it can mean when a fellow named Hong
And one Ting (Lord High Admiral!) go it ding-dong!
A Nelson whose nomen is Whang
To me, I admit's, inconceivable.
And war between Wo-Hung and Ching-a-Ring Chang,
Sounds funny, but quite unbelievable.
And can you conceive Maxim bullets a-sing
Round a saffron-hued hero called Pong, or Ping-Wing?
A ship called Kow-Shing, I am sure,
Can be only a warship pour rire.
And Count Yamagata—he must be a cure!
No, no, friends, I very much fear
That in spite of the pictures, and portraits, and maps,
I can't make live heroes of Johnnies and Japs!