THE VOYAGE OF ALFRED.
[See Mr. Alfred Austin's article, entitled "That Damnable Country," in Blackwood's Magazine.]
"Land, land!" cried Alfred Austin. "By my halidom, I spy land!
Many weary leagues we've wandered since we left our native shores,
Seeking still through calm and tempest a remote and barren island,
While we smote the sounding furrows of the ocean with our oars.
"Never wind availed to beat us; by the waters overweighted,
Or becalmed, with idle canvas hanging loosely from the mast,
Yet we steered her or we rowed her with our courage unabated,
And, our labours past and over, we have come to land at last.
"Though the land be bleak and barren, though barbarians its dwellers,
Let us add this last achievement to the record of our deeds;
When the savage tribes come shouting as attackers and repellers,
We can win the men with clothing and the women-folk with beads.
"There be savages in India as in Tierra del Fuego;
There be savages in Zululand with shield and assegai;
We have tamed them, whether cannibals or fed on rice and sago—
Shall a Briton ever flinch from such? No, by the Lord, not I!"
On the land he had discovered thus the Poet Austin landed;
Marco Polo or Columbus might have envied him the scene;
And in prose he has described it, in a language understanded
Of the people, and has printed it in Blackwood's Magazine.
The scenery was beautiful, so lovely that it dazed him;
He thought their manners charming, and he rather liked their rain.
He did not find them savages, which seems to have amazed him;
And he tells us all to visit them again and yet again.
We thank you for the hints you give describing what you've seen there,
It really is amazing; but——(a whisper in your ear)
You're not the first discoverer, for some of us have been there,
And shaken hands with Irish folk before the present year.
But in your precious article your wonder you exhaust in
Describing how an Irishman can really be polite:
"Behold," you say, "the Irishman as patronised by Austin;
He is not black, though painted so—in fact he's rather white."
Don't patronise so much, dear A. I do not say you write ill;
But oh that awful title, with its most offensive D——!
Devoutly do I hope, dear A., you'll find a better title,
And write a wiser article when next you cross the sea.
Studies from the New-de.—The rage for "New"-ness, which commenced with the New Humour, is extending to the theatres. The New Boy now has for a competitor The New Woman. What matters, so long as neither is a Nui-S'ance?