Over their dead bodies-- Fair enough! Then there are the Suppressors of Vice; The Boys Who Made the Name of Cabell a Household Word. Their aim is to keep art and letters in their place; If they see a book Which does not come right out and say That the doctor brings babies in his little black bag, Or find a painting of a young lady Showing her without her rubbers, They call out the militia. They have a mean eye for dirt; They can find it In a copy of "What Katy Did at School," Or a snapshot of Aunt Bessie in bathing at Sandy Creek, Or a picture postcard of Moonlight in Bryant Park. They are always running around suppressing things, Beginning with their desires. They get a lot of excitement out of life,-- They are constantly discovering The New Rabelais Or the Twentieth Century Hogarth. Their leader is regarded As the representative of Comstock here on earth. How does that song of Tosti's go?-- "Good-bye, Sumner, good-bye, good-bye." There are the Movie Censors, The motion picture is still in its infancy,-- They are the boys who keep it there. If the film shows a party of clubmen tossing off ginger ale, Or a young bride dreaming over tiny garments, Or Douglas Fairbanks kissing Mary Pickford's hand, They cut out the scene And burn it in the public square. They fix up all the historical events So that their own mothers wouldn't know them. They make Du Barry Mrs. Louis Fifteenth, And show that Anthony and Cleopatra were like brother and sister, And announce Salome's engagement to John the Baptist, So that the audiences won't go and get ideas in their heads. They insist that Sherlock Holmes is made to say, "Quick, Watson, the crochet needle!" And the state pays them for it. They say they are going to take the sin out of cinema If they perish in the attempt,-- I wish to God they would! And then there are the All-American Crabs; The Brave Little Band that is Against Everything. They have got up the idea That things are not what they were when Grandma was a girl. They say that they don't know what we're coming to, As if they had just written the line. They are always running a temperature Over the modern dances, Or the new skirts, Or the goings-on of the younger set. They can barely hold themselves in When they think of the menace of the drama; They seem to be going ahead under the idea That everything but the Passion Play Was written by Avery Hopwood. They will never feel really themselves Until every theatre in the country is razed. They are forever signing petitions Urging that cigarette-smokers should be deported, And that all places of amusement should be closed on Sunday And kept closed all week. They take everything personally; They go about shaking their heads, And sighing, "It's all wrong, it's all wrong,"-- They said it.