A. D. Godley

“ It is better by far to be free in a hovel
Than to owe for your rent in a palace of brick!
When the Saxon invader has rows with his tenants,
It's absurd to assert that it's nihil ad rem
To inflict on yourselves a gratuitous penance,
For it irritates him and encourages them. ”

“ Have nothing less distinguished than a Bronchial Catarrh!
O when your head's a lump of lead and nought can do but sneeze:
Whene'er in turn you freeze and burn, and then you burn and freeze:—
It does not mean you're going to die, although you think you are—
These are the primal symptoms of a Bronchial Catarrh. ”

“ Hazarding ever the gains we have won—
Only perpetual flux can delight us,
Blown like a billow by winds of the sea:
Still let us bow to the shrine of St. Vitus—
Vite Sanctissime, ora pro me!
Pray, that when leaps in the darkness uncaring
End in a fall (as they probably will) ,
Mine be the credit for valiantly daring,
Others be charged with defraying the bill!
[1. Transcriber's note: The word "Exis" was transliterated from the Greek as follows: Epsilon (with the rough-breathing diacritical) , xi, iota, sigma.] ”

“ That he is not the criminal who sold the Bordereau.
Some hinted at another man, whose autograph it bore—
But this was Dreyfus' artifice, and proved his guilt the more:
No motive for the horrid deed confessedly he had:
And crimes which are gratuitous are nearly twice as bad.
They caught that Jew (did Government) and charged him with the sale;
They proved his guilt—or said they did—and shut him up in gaol;
And then, their case to justify and show their verdict true,
They took and baited every one who called himself a Jew. ”

“ But sorra step that Uncrowned King would leave the place, until
A ten per cent reduction he had got upon his bill.
Had I been there with odds to aid—say twenty men to one—
It stirs my heart to think upon the deeds I might have done!
I wouldn't then be telling you the melancholy tale
How Ireland's pride imprisoned lies in dark Kilmainham gaol.
Yet weep not, Erin, for thy son! ”

“ That captive took the soaring soul of Bach Beethoven Brown.
But ah! our Statues grovelling command their candidates
To satisfy examiners in Smalls, and Mods., and Greats,
To learn those verbs irregular which men of taste abhor,
Before you can a Doctor be or e'en a Bachelor!
O mores! and O tempora! can pedantry compel
Musicians who write choruses to construe them as well?
Is this (I ask) the way to deal with genius great and high? ”

“ Expansion is a nation's law—we've aims sublime in Greece."
With that Britannia blazed amain with patriotic flames!
They built a hundred ironclads and launched them in the Thames:
They girded on their fathers' swords, both commoners and peers;
They mobilized an Army Corps, and drilled the Volunteers!
The Labour Party armed itself, invasion's path to bar,
"Truth" and the "Daily Chronicle" proclaimed a Righteous War ”

“ And the landlord and agent are nipped in the bud!
No Saxon may venture those precincts to enter,
He is barred from their portals by Liberty's ban,
And we boycott each other, each patriot brother,
And safely deride the Emergency Man.
Though the comfort exterior, perhaps, is inferior
To the homes you have left, on a casual view—
With its excellent moral no person can quarrel,
Morality's always the weapon for you. ”

“ And when we've found Home Rule All Round the only panacea,
The Welsh perhaps will all be Aps—the Scotchmen Macs as we are—
While Englishmen will sorrow then, in shame and degradation,
To think they've not the titles got which really make a Nation.
UNITED IRELAND "Here's your fery good health,
And tamn ta Whuskey Duty!"
Though Hibernians for long in dissension have dwelt
(As a dog that resides with a cat) ,
There's a bond that the Saxon allies to the Celt—
They are perfectly solid on that! ”

“ Far different our practice is, who reign by Methodology
And guide the dunce by precepts learnt from Landon or from Fitch:
'Twas difficult by rule of thumb to check unseemly merriment,
To make your class their pastor treat with proper due regard—
'Tis easy quite for specialists in Juvenile Temperament,
Who know the books on Punishment and also on Reward! ”

“ Than rent to call a legal claim, or landlord-shooting murder.
Yet why recount our ancient loves which now you turn your backs on?
The maxim old it only proves—you ne'er should trust a Saxon:
Deceitful still, his promised plan he docks, interprets, hedges,
And when he thinks he safely can, he turns and breaks his pledges!
True Celts despise the paltry baits wherewith you try to feed 'em:
What! offer your diminished rates to men who pine for Freedom!
On County Councils ne'er can thrive a People's aspirations,
No local Government can give a place among the Nations! ”

“ That great Sir Bach Beethoven Brown is ploughed again in Smalls!
QUIETA MOVERE "Any leap in the dark is better than standing still."—New Proverb.
Talk not to us of the joys of the Present,
Say not what is is undoubtedly best:
Never be ours to be merely quiescent—
Anything, everything rather than rest!
Placid prosperity bores us and vexes:
What if philosophers Latin and Greek
Say that well-being's a Status and Exis? [1]
Nothing should please you for more than a week. ”

“ In various ways do various men invite misfortune's rods,—
Some row within their College boat,—some Logic read for Mods.:
But oh! of all the human ills our happiness that mar
I do not know the equal of a Bronchial Catarrh!
PENSÉES DE NOEL When the landlord wants the rent
Of your humble tenement,
When the Christmas bills begin
Daily, hourly pouring in,
When you pay your gas and poor rate,
Tip the rector, fee the curate,
Let this thought your spirit cheer—
Christmas comes but once a year. ”

“ The agent said he'd take the half of all the rint I owed,
Because he'd be unwilling for to put me on the road:
I said, "I thank your honour, and in glory may you be!
But that is not the way," says I, "to set ould Ireland free."
They kem an' put me out of that, and left me there forlorn,
Beside the empty ruins of the house where I was born:
I'm indepindent now myself, and have no work to do,
Until the day when Ireland is indepindent too.
"A day will come," says Blarnigan, "when tyranny's o'erthrown—
Just hould the rint a year or so, and all the land's your own!" ”

“ The men of Homer's gifted line—the sons of Socrates!"
Britannia heard the patriot's plea, she checked her murderous plans:
Homer's a name to conjure with, 'mong British artisans:
Her Army too, profoundly moved by arguments like these,
Said 'e'd be blowed afore 'e'd fight the sons of Socrates.
They cast away their fathers' swords, those commoners and peers,—
Demobilized their Army Corps—dismissed their Volunteers:
Soft Sentiment o'erthrew the bars that nations disunite,
And Greece, in Freedom's sacred name, annexed the Isle of Wight. ”

“ Then out and spake brave Morrison—"Get up, yer sowl, and run!"
(O bright shall shine on History's page the name of Morrison!)
"To see the light of Erin quenched I never could endure:
Slip on your boots—I'll let yez out upon the kitchen doore!"
But proudly flashed the patriot's eye and he sternly answered—"No!
I'll never turn a craven back upon my country's foe:
Doolan aboo, for Liberty! . . . and anyhow" (says he)
"The Government's locked the kitchen-door and taken away the key." ”

“ But he says we're that devoted to our patriot opinions
That we would not face the foeman when the marching orders come!
Is it that way, Misther Doolan, that you'd see your country righted?
Troth, to many in the Service 'twill be information new
That they'd lave the flag they followed and betray
the faith they plighted
To be comrades and companions of a gentleman like you!
Tisn't mutiny and treason will make Ireland e'er a nation:
No, we never yet were traitors, though we're rebels now and then! ”

“ You will sell all your works by denouncing the Turks,
and the public will hasten to read 'em,
When in reverent tones you are mentioned as "Jones,
the Defender and Champion of Freedom!"
L'AFFAIRE (CHAPTER ONE) It was a little Bordereau that lay upon the ground:
The Franco-Gallic Government that document it found,
And straightway drew the inference, though how I do not know,
Some Jew had sold to Germany this dreadful Bordereau.
'Tis all (they said) a Hebrew trick—-a treasonable plan—
And, now we come to think of it, why Dreyfus is the man! ”