[Illustration: _First Winter Sport_ (_looking at a magnificent view of the Alps_). "Not bad, that." _Second Winter Sport._ "Yes, it's all right; but you needn't rave about it like a bally poet."] * * * * * THE HEN. To-day it is not mine to sing A lay of love, a song of Spring; I tackle no uplifting thing Of arms and men; My muse is otherwise beguiled To gentler themes and measures mild; I sing of nature's artless child, The common hen. Little she has of lyric stuff; Her bows, I grant, are merely bluff, Her sternmost pile of windy fluff Would leave one cool; Yet never since the world was planned Was aught more lofty and more grand Regarded as a mother--and Such an old fool. In laying eggs is all her joy; Its rapture never seems to cloy; She knows no worthier employ In life than this, So to collect a fertile batch Still young, still fresh enough to hatch, And thus, by sterling effort, snatch A mother's bliss. But, though the futile one will lay (When she's in form) an egg per day, She always gives the fact away With loud acclaim That all the novel truth may know; Whereby the unsleeping human foe Derives a tip on where to go To get the same. It does not make her senses reel, This mystery, or dim her zeal, Till by degrees she seems to feel Her broken lot; She roams aloof, she grows depressed; And then, her broody sorrow guessed, Men lure her to a well-filled nest And bid her squat. And now behold her, warm and wide, Her rounded form well satisfied, Though even in her highest pride She has no luck; The offspring that she tends so well Are probably of alien shell; Indeed, for all that she can tell, They may be duck. Yes, one may grant that on the whole She would not thrill the poet soul; For, tho' she plays a decent _role_ Beyond all doubt, Where mental qualities are lacked We find but little to attract; She does not make, in point of fact, The heart go out. But see her when some danger lies O'er her young brood, and, with wild eyes, Straight at the sudden foe she flies, Her full soul spurred To battle with the gnashing beak-- A roaring tiger is more meek; And somehow one is bound to speak Well of the bird. DUM-DUM. * * * * * From the "Found" column in _The Standard_:-- "Fox Skin Fur, on Hog's Back." The last place where you would look for it. * * * * * "Natal first innings--Barnes, 5 wickets for 44 runs; Rolf, 4 for 59; Woolley, 6 for 6; Douglas, 8 for 8; Hearne, none for 15; Bird, 1 for 9.--P.A. Foreign Special Telegram." _Glasgow Herald._ And yet Natal won. * * * * * THE MISSING WORD. [Illustration: The "Premier" Parrot (_emerging from profound thought_). "EX----EX----EX----EX----"