Or ever the battered liners sank With their passengers to the dark, I was head of a Walworth Bank, And you were a grocer’s clerk. I was a dealer in stocks and shares, And you in butters and teas, And we both abandoned our own affairs And took to the dreadful seas. Wet and worry about our ways-- Panic, onset, and flight-- Had us in charge for a thousand days And a thousand-year-long night. We saw more than the nights could hide-- More than the waves could keep-- And--certain faces over the side Which do not go from our sleep. We were more tired than words can tell While the pied craft fled by, And the swinging mounds of the Western swell Hoisted us Heavens-high.... Now there is nothing--not even our rank-- To witness what we have been; And I am returned to my Walworth Bank, And you to your margarine! SEA CONSTABLES A Tale of ’15 The head-waiter of the Carvoitz almost ran to meet Portson and his guests as they came up the steps from the palm-court where the string band plays. “Not seen you since--oh, ever so long,” he began. “_So_ glad to get your wire. Quite well--eh?” “Fair to middling, Henri,” Portson shook hands with him. “You’re looking all right, too. Have you got us our table?” Henri nodded towards a pink alcove, kept for mixed doubles, which discreetly commanded the main dining-room’s glitter and blaze. “Good man!” said Portson. “Now, this is serious, Henri. We put ourselves unreservedly in your hands. We’re weather-beaten mariners--though we don’t look it, and we haven’t eaten a Christian meal in months. Have you thought of all that, Henri, mon ami?” “The menu, I have compose it myself,” Henri answered with the gravity of a high priest. It was more than a year since Portson--of Portson, Peake and Ensell, Stock and Share Brokers--had drawn Henri’s attention to an apparently extinct Oil Company which, a little later, erupted profitably; and it may be that Henri prided himself on paying all debts in full. The most recent foreign millionaire and the even more recent foreign actress at a table near the entrance clamoured for his attention while he convoyed the party to the pink alcove. With his own hands he turned out some befrilled electrics and lit four pale-rose candles. “Bridal!” some one murmured. “Quite bridal!”