REPORT ON COMPETITION NO. 25 READERS were invited to compose

composite poems beginning with the line-" Who is the happy warrior? Who is he "- using not more than two consecutive lines from any one poem ; alteration of punctuation, but not of text, was to be permitted. This was a difficult competition, made perhaps unduly hard by the provision of the obligatory first line, which severely restricted comic possibilities. As a result the entries-though almost all achieving a reputable standard-tended to be in- genious rather than entertaining. The best was undoubtedly that of Miss E. M. Ferguson ; half a dozen competitors were in the running for the second prize, and " Militiaman " only won it by a short head.

First Prize.

' Who is the happy warrior? Who is he?

'0 mortal folk, you may behold and see.

'Mark where his carnage and his conquests cease, 'He makes a solitude and calls it-peace.

Like as a huntsman after weary chase, ' Sits down to rest him in some shady place.

His helmet now shall make a hive for bees, ' (Who can command and purchase what they please).

' His harp the sole companion of his way.

"Pleasures for every hour of every day.

" Pleased with this bauble still, as that before,

" Till tired he sleeps, and life's poor play is o'er.

E. M. FERGUSON.

1. Wordsworth, "The Happy Warrior. 2. Stephen Hawes,

"His Epitaph." 3. 4. Byron, " The Bride of Abydos." 5. 6. Spencer, "The Tamed Deer." 7. Geo. Peele, " A Farewell to Arms." 8. Crabbe, " The Happy Day." 9. J. Beattie, " The Minstrel." to. Crabbe, " The Happy Day." II. 12. Pope, "Essay on Man."

Second Prize.

Who is the happy warrior? Who is he? ' I am-' so all my jolly comrades say.

' When I have fears that I may cease to be ' A youth in such a jocund company ' I have no patience for a longer stay.

Where are the songs of Spring? Aye, where are they?

'In the hush'd mind's mysterious far away . . .

' Nay, I have done, you get no more of me "(In small proportions we just beauties see). " 0 God! how lonely freedom seems to-day.

" MILITIAMAN."

I. Cowper, " Alexander Selkirk." 2. Prior, "On My Birthday." 3. Keats, " Sonnet." 4. Gray, " Elegy." 5. Wordsworth, "Daffo- dils." 6. Randolph, " Ode to Master Anthony Stafford." 7 Keats, "Autumn." 8. Hood, "Autumn." 9. Drayton, " The Part- ing." to. Jonson, "Ode to Sir Lucius Cary . . ." 1I. Frede- gond Shove, " The Farmer."