To all our statesmen who for Right, Are leaders at the land's desire; Nor bend nor aid the force of Might, That gags free speech to quench the fire That burns to make the people great, In thought and deed on every hand. We freedom gave the mighty State, But lack it in our native land! CHORUS--Hands all round! All despotic laws confound! Northampton's Freemen, cheer, my friends, The hope of Britain round and sound! June 1882. E. T. CRAIG. * * * * * Tennyson's blank verse has seldom been more successfully imitated than in _The Very Last Idyll_, written by Shirley Brooks for "Punch's Pocket Book," it concludes thus:-- "And the blameless king, Rising again (to Lancelot's discontent, Who held all speeches a tremendous bore), Said, "If one duty to be done remains, And 'tis neglected, all the rest is nought But Dead Sea apples and the acts of apes." Smiled Guinevere, and begged him not to preach; She knew that duty, and it should be done: So what of pudding on that festal night Was not consumed by Arthur and his guests, The queen upon the following morning, fried." In a similar strain, but more ponderous in treatment is _Sir Tray: an Arthurian Idyll_, which appeared in Blackwood's Magazine for January, 1873. A few of the opening lines betray the whole of the jest:-- "The widow'd dame of Hubbard's ancient line Turned to her cupboard, cornered anglewise Betwixt this wall and that, in quest of aught To satisfy the craving of Sir Tray, Prick-eared companion of her solitude, Red-spotted, dirty white, and bare of rib, Who followed at her high and pattering heels, Prayer in his eye, prayer in his slinking gait, Prayer in his pendulous pulsating tail. Wide on its creaking jaws revolved the door, The cupboard yawned, deep throated, thinly set For teeth, with bottles, ancient cannisters, And plates of various pattern, blue or white; Deep in the void she thrust her hookèd nose Peering near sighted for the wished-for bone, Whiles her short robe of samite, tilted high, The thrifty darnings of her hose revealed;-- The pointed feature travelled o'er the delf, Greasing its tip, but bone or bread found none. Wherefore Sir Tray abode still dinnerless, Licking his paws beneath the spinning-wheel, And meditating much on savoury meats." The hypercritical might object that, inasmuch as the dame greased the tip of her nose whilst peering into the recesses of her store-chamber, that some small rest of edibles was there, but the poem hurries on to its tragical climax, and carries the reader breathless past such trivial objections as these.