When I was a mid-Victorian nut
With a delicate taste in ties,
A highly elegant figure I cut,
At least in my own fond eyes,
And used to regard unwaxed moustaches
As one of the worst of social laches.
But now I find in my youngest son
The sternest of autocrats.
He tells me the things that must be done
And orders my collars and spats;
Prescribes mild exercise on the links
And advises me on the choice of drinks.
I've faithfully striven to imitate
My Mentor in dress and diction,
And loyally laboured to cultivate
A taste for the latest fiction;
Though I still read DICKENS upon the sly,
And even SCOTT, when nobody's by.
It's true I've managed to draw the line
At going to tango teas,
For, after all, I am fifty-nine
And a trifle stiff in the knees;
But I've had to give up billiards for "slosh,"
And pay laborious homage to "squash."
Long since my whiskers I had to shave
To please this young barbarian,
But still for a while I stealthily clave
To the use of Pommade Hungarian;
But now my tyrant has made me snip
The glory and pride of my upper lip.
"My dear old man," he recently said,
"If you go on waxing the ends,
You're bound to be cut, direct and dead,
By all of my nuttiest friends.
For it's only done, so _The Mail_ discovers,
By Labour leaders and taxi-shovers."
So the deed was done, but whenever I gaze
On my face in the glass I moan
As I think of the mid-Victorian days
When my upper lip was my own.
For now, of length and of breadth bereft,
The ghost of a tooth-brush is all that's left.
* * * * *
"MISSING NAVY PAYMASTER ARRESTED."
_"Evening Standard" Poster._
So that's where it was all the time!
* * * * *
"The Under-sheriff said ... rumours against a man's
character were like a rolling stone, gathering moss as it
went."--_Western Mail_.
"As fond of the fire as a burnt child," is another of the Under
Sheriff's favourite sayings.
* * * * *
[Illustration: _Indulgent Householder_. "WHY ARE YOU SINGING CAROLS,
MY LITTLE MAN? DON'T YOU KNOW CHRISTMAS IS OVER?"
_Youthful Caroller_. "YES, SIR; BUT I 'AD MEASLES ALL FROO
CHRISTMAS."]
* * * * *