2 JULY 1942, Page 9

SONG ON SHIPBOARD

Give me a rail on which to lean And a glass to put to my eye, A lively sea and a sky swept clean And a string of flags up high, And you can have the solid earth Of the land that gave me birth.

A heaving deck beneath my feet And a shudder in the hull, And you can have the fields of wheat And the river running full, For I have all the world to roam And never a place called home.

O1 was never a marrying chap

Who settles to one girl, Nor a steady chap nor a tarrying chap But a chap whose life's a whirl, For what I seek is beyond the skies Or the love in a woman's eyes.

J. L. HoDsom.