THE YOUNG GUARD By E. W. Hornung London: Constable and Company Ltd. 1919 _Most of these pieces appeared during the war. The usual acknowledgements are tendered to The Spectator in three cases and The Times in two, as well as to Land and Water, The Cologne Post and sundry School Magazines._ CONSECRATION _Children we deemed you all the days We vexed you with our care: But in a Universe ablaze, What was your childish share? To rush upon the flames of Hell, To quench them with your blood! To be of England's flower that fell Ere yet it brake the bud! And we who wither where we grew, And never shed but tears, As children now would follow you Through the remaining years; Tread' in the steps we thought to guide, As firmly as you trod; And keep the name you glorified Clean before matt and God._ LORD'S LEAVE (1915) No Lord's this year: no silken lawn on which A dignified and dainty throng meanders. The Schools take guard upon a fierier pitch Somewhere in Flanders. Bigger the cricket here; yet some who tried In vain to earn a Colour while at Eton Have found a place upon an England side That can't be beaten! A demon bowler's bowling with his head-- His heart's as black as skins in Carolina! Either he breaks, or shoots almost as dead As Anne Regina; While the deep-field-gun, trained upon your stumps, From concrete grand-stand far beyond the bound'ry, Lifts up his ugly mouth and fairly pumps Shells from Krupp's foundry. But like the time the game is out of joint-- No screen, and too much mud for cricket lover; Both legs go slip, and there's sufficient point In extra cover! Cricket? 'Tis Sanscrit to the super-Hun-- Cheap cross between Caligula and Cassius, To whom speech, prayer, and warfare are all one-- Equally gaseous! Playing a game's beyond him and his hordes; Theirs but to play the snake or wolf or vulture: Better one sporting lesson learnt at Lord's Than all their Kultur.... Sinks a torpedoed Phoebus from our sight; Over the field of play see darkness stealing;