REPORT ON COMPETITION NO. 23

THE usual prizes were offered for descriptions of, or reflections on, the black-out in the style of any one of the following: (z) Dr. Johnson, (2) Alexander Pope, (3) Sir W. S. Gilbert, (4) Aldous Huxley, (5) Harold Nicolson, (6) Charles Morgan. This was a most agreeable competition to judge. Although there was a large entry, the standard was high, and they made pleasant reading. Numerically, the modern writers were far outstripped by the old. Pope was the most popular, Dr. Johnson came next, and Gilbert third. Messrs. Huxley and Morgan were neglected. A fair number essayed the ambitious task of parodying Mr. Nicolson, but only two of them came near the mark ; Miss E. Mackie sent in a very fair entry, and Mr. E. H. Bedwell, though his entry as a whole just failed to come off, had an admirable passage in which the Foreign Office was suggestively described as " the dowdy Victorian pile which, across the dusty plain of the Horse Guards, watches the pelicans of St. James's Park." There were a number of good Johnsons, the best of them from Mr. S. Gordon, the Rev. W. E. J. Lindfield, Mr. J. Hutton Squire, and Mr. R. S. Jaffray. The best of the Gilberts were produced by Willy Tadpole and Mr. A. A. Fletcher-Jones ; of the Popes by Miss C. M. Bowen and Mr. Duncan Wilson ; Mr. Cecil Monk Gould was the only competitor to achieve a successful Huxley ; Mr. Charles Morgan eluded the grasp of all competitors.

The prizes, with so much talent to choose from, were un- usually difficult to award. In the circumstances, the fairest course seemed to be to pool the prize-money, add a guinea out- standing from a previous competition, and give a prize of a guinea each to Miss C. M. Bowen and Mr. Duncan Wilson for their Popes, Willy Tadpole for his Gilbert, and Mr. S. Gordon for his Johnson.

POPE ON THE BLACK-OUT.

Mark how the Town unwonted aspects wears ; The streets are deserts, silent stretch the squares ; In Stygian darkness wandering to and fro The tits like shadows in Avernus go.

The houses stand, as like as pin to pin, All blank without, funereal gloom within; Or if perchance the candles shine too bright, Or some small crevice shows a gleam of light, Not long th' offence to outraged heaven will cry, Or 'scape the Warden's all-observing eye.

As in the dark, so ancient proverbs say, The feline tribe shows one unvaried grey, So too in nymphs the charms that men admire, The dimpled cheek, the eye's alluring fire, The silks and gems, procured at so much cost, All in one dim obscurity are lost.

Who then would brave the perils of the way To grace the rout, or to attend the play?

No more the wits to coffee-house resort ; No more the beaux pursue their amorous sport ; The world of fashion holds no longer sway ; D:-mestic virtues are the mode today.

Devoted matrons leave all other cares To feed their spouses and to nurse their heirs ; And nubile maids their needles nimbly ply To clothe some warrior of the sea or sky.

So war's alarms bid vain pursuits to cease, And Mars instructs us in the arts of peace.

C. M. BOWEN.

EXTRACT FROM A MORAL EPISTLE BY ALEXANDER POPE.

Invention sure would benefit the race, Could but our Reason with our wits keep pace, Whose sum of progress is, the cure to find Of evils lately by ourselves designed.

Go! look on London, once the town of light,

Embattled now to face Arminius" might,

Vain task by day, at eve her swollen state She seeks obscurely to dissimulate.

Only the Thames, untaught, with watery path Can guide the ministers of Prussian wrath.

The godlike terror of Bengal decreed "Let there be night," and there was night indeed.

Windows and streets are draped in Stygian gloom As if to mourn in time their future doom.

No candle now reveals with flattering glow The belle within to her benighted beau.

E'en the wise virgin's lamp, its veil unfurled, Blazes a bad deed to a good drab world.

Catius' no more the once resplendent sign Invites to plays to women or to wine— (More happy Gula,' whose sagacious nose

Smells out his meal, and lights him as he The poor pedestrian herd unruly strays, Jostling offensive in the darkened ways, Their only lamp, some unextinguished star Or the dim prospect of a lightening war.

Nor thus may some escape their instant fate Who see the swift advancing car—too late, And groping to avoid the wrath to come Are blind to look upon their present doom.

* * * * Thus nightly in the total shade we lie Of Adolph, the great Anarch's deputy, And our obscurity foretells too plain A second Chaos' universal reign.

(' Field-Marshal Hermann Goering. ' A luxurious nobleman satirised by the poet (Warburton). ' A bibulous judge (Warburton).]

DUNCAN WILSON.

SIR W. S. GILBERT ON THE BLACK-OUT.

A warden's a man who must do what he can To ensure that our windows we black out, And so when he hints you show too many glints Do not curse and command him to back out.

And if he should ask you to put on your mask you Should readily do so with bonhomie ; Such self-preservation supplied by the Nation Is mere common-sense and economy.

So next time when he calls and strides onto your hall's Polished parquet, remember he's trying To save you from bits of bombardment by Fritz, And be most circumspect in replying.

Although mildly ironic, he may turn demonic If angered. And then with what venom he May think he's a cute 'un unmasking a Teuton Most clearly in touch with the enemy.

Therefore be polite in the dead of the night ; Face the facts and endeavour to see whole, And soon you'll conclude that the fellow's not rude

Nor a cad with his eye on the key-hole.

Likewise do not twit him with folly nor hit him Because of his grin or his puny form, Or else, self-defeating, you soon may be meeting A man in His Majesty's uniform.

WILLY TADPOLE.

DR. JOHNSON ON THE BLACK-OUT.

Boswell: " I hope, Sir, that I see you well?" "Pish, Sir," replied Johnson with much ill-humour, " how could I be well? It is as safe to cross the Strand as the Caribbean sea. Scoundrels drive their hackney carriages to the common danger and there is no watch to apprehend them. I am lame, old and blind ; you bring me two miles through a Stygian darkness to offer me a glass of poor wine and if I come without broken bones you ask me if I am well. No, Sir, I am very ill."

Being desirous of eliciting the Doctor's true view of the recent notorious precautions ordered in the town, I essayed a new tactic. Boswell: " Samson is so incensed against the Government that he has sworn to hire a dwelling beyond the City boundary and to set candles blazing in every window." Johnson: " Sir, Samson is a fool. His candles may divert his own numskull but they may bring hell-fire upon his neighbours. Aye, Sir," cried he, warming to his work, " there is an example of your true Egotist. He can neither brook the tiny pricks and inconveniences we are called upon to bear, nor understand the reason for their infliction, so he must needs pit his little wit against the Law and imperil us all with his paltry defiance." Boswell: "But, Sir, these precautions seemed to please you ill." Johnson: "Ho, Sir, and does not bitter physic please you ill, too? Nay, but if a man is in grievous health and his nurse brings him a posses, may he toss the cup out of the window and break his neighbour's head? No, Sir, grumbling will do him no harm, but he must swallow the dose to be saved." goes).

S. GORDON.