Now the last line is going to be very difficult. The tragic loneliness, the utter disillusion of this young man is so vividly outlined in the first part of the poem that to avoid an anticlimax a really powerful last line is required. _But there are no powerful rhymes._ A serious poet, of course, could finish up with _death_ or _faith_, or some powerful word like that. But we are limited to _skiff_, _sniff_, _tiff_ and _whiff_. And what can you do with those? Students, I hope, will see what they can do. My own tentative solution is printed, by arrangement with the Publisher, on another page (87). I do not pretend that it is perfect; in fact it seems to me to strike rather a vulgar note. At the same time it is copyright, and must not be set to music in the U.S.A. I have left little time for comic poetry other than Limericks, but most of the above profound observations are equally applicable to both, except that in the case of the former it is usual to think of the _last_ line first. Having done that you think of some good rhymes to the last line and hang them up in mid-air, so to speak. Then you think of something to say which will fit on to those rhymes. It is just like Limericks, only you start at the other end; indeed it is much easier than Limericks, though, I am glad to say, nobody believes this. If they did it would be even harder to get money out of Editors than it is already. We will now write a comic poem about Spring Cleaning. We will have verses of six lines, five ten-syllable lines and one six-syllable. As the last line for the first verse I suggest Where have they put my hat? We now require two rhymes to _hat_. In the present context _flat_ will obviously be one, and _cat_ or _drat_ will be another. Our resources at present are therefore as follows:-- Line 1-- ---- “ 2-- ... flat. “ 3-- ---- “ 4-- ... cat or drat. “ 5-- ---- “ 6-- Where have they put my hat? As for the blank lines, _wife_ is certain to come in sooner or later, and we had better put that down, supported by _life_ (“What a life!”), and _knife_ or _strife_. There are no other rhymes, except _rife_, which is a useless word. We now hold another parade:--- Terumti--umti--umti--umti--wife, Terumti--umti--umti--umti--flat; Teroodle--oodle--oodle--What a life! Terumti--oodle--umti--oodle--cat (or drat); Teroodle--umti--oodle--umti--knife (or strife); Where have they put my hat? All that remains now is to fill in the umti-oodles, and I can’t be bothered to do that. There is nothing in it. III In this lecture I shall deal with the production of Lyrics, Blank Verse and (if I am allowed) Hymns (Ancient and Modern).