THE ADVERTISEMENT FIEND.
(Written in the Train by an Irate Traveller.)
["The English landscape is being transformed into a dumping-ground for catchpenny eyesores."—See the "Nineteenth Century" for June.]
For Soap and Pill each English slope and hill
Is now a background, and the cry is, "Still
They come;" these public nuisances, that mar
The fair earth's face, like some unsightly scar.
Who possibly can care, I ask, to learn
That Juno Soap Saves Washing, or to turn
A gaze disgusted on some blatant board,
By which the devious tourist is implored
To try the Lightning Pill that never fails
To spot the Spot, or cure whatever ails?
John Bull, his missus and the kids, I hope,
Do not entirely live on pills and soap.
And yet you'd surely think so, when you've scanned
The nostrum-signs that so adorn our land!
Oh! heavily I'd tax 'em, if I might!
And keep the landscape clear. Am I not right?
[Terminus. Exit, fuming.