SPECTATOR COMPETITION No. 112 Report by Richard Usborne A prize

of £5 was offered for a ten-line love-lyric, of which the last three lines were to be : In the waiting-room Of the branch-line . On a wet Sunday in Hull.

Any other monosyllabic place-name could be substituted for Hurl.

Guy Inns wrote : " Since a lyric has presumably to rhyme and to display scansion, it taxes human ingenuity to supply an approach to such unmanageably rhythmless lines as the three devised for this disheartening exercise. Clementine ' is no help, because the last word is a monosyllable ; and how is ' Sunday ' to be accented? However comma . . . "

However comma his own rhythmical and heavily rhymed offering wins a prize. The difficulty in this competition was its lack of rules. I tried to catch some sort of beat in the verses, but otherwise I judged them with hardly any mustn'ts in mind. I thought at first that the tone ought to be joyful or sad rather than lascivious or bitter. But then I found myself being amused by points in pieces that broke that rule. So I relaxed and allowed all sorts of sense and nonsense, proper rhyme and Tin Pan Alley rhyme into my short list. The most excruciating TPA rhyme was in E. M. de Foubert's couplet : " What was it kep' you, oh me darlint, From your lad who stands in tormint ? "

There was a nice Young Visiters touch about the beginning of Anne Beach Thomas's entry. (She wrote " 13 yrs." after her name, crossed it out, wrote it again and crossed it out again.) " A happy young female sat dozing

Regardless of the rain outside Unaware that her ' lose ' was proposing And enquiring if she'd be his bride.

On receiving only a snore for his cue The young man sat wrapped in gloom, So he left her on getting no favourable sign etc., etc., Crewe."

Monosyllabic place-names chosen included Penge, Crewe, Leigh, Hythe, Looe, Rhyl, Staines, Ayr, Glamis, Mold, Hell, Slough, Lyme, Beer, March, Tring, Ware, Stroud, Deal, Goole, Poole, Kew, Aunk (M. G. Godlonton's verse didn't make it, but my thanks to her for a portion of an AA map showing that Aunk exists, near Honiton, Frome, Sale, Perth, Liss, Rye, Ryde, Cork and Leek.

In the several Spectator competitions I have set I have never known so many entries. But they weren't very rewarding. I'm afraid it was rather a disheartening exercise. D. R. Peddy's opening was good : " Cutie, Cutie, Feminine guard so chic, I'm on duty Every dam' night this week ... !!

But there was no future in it. The same applied to R. Morris's

" Oh I my love's a fireman's daughter And she's fair and full of grace.

Her name is Prudence Porter, She has that sort of face ... "

The following were the best five. £3 to the first and £1 each to the next two. The others highly commended.

FIRST PRIZE (ADMIRAL SIR W. M. JAMES)

She said love born beneath the stars Was morbid and exotic,

And love that flowered in high-powered cars And night-clubs was neurotic.

So in a B.R. railway-carriage I offered her my hand in marriage.

Our love was sealed with torrid* kiss In the waiting-room Of the branch-line On a wet Sunday in Liss.

(*The original read " torpid," but I have calmly emended it.) SECOND PRIZES (G. MARY MARSTON) At a junction, 'twas her function

To serve teas across the bar ; When I kissed her, she said " Mister !

Don't you think you've gone too far ?

Banged a cup down, Snorted " Sixpence ! "

Both her love and tea were cold ;

In the waiting-room Of the branch-line On a wet Sunday in Mold.

(Guy Items) Though like an oyster in its wet cloister Your hand is chilled, love, your visage pale ; Though likewise, damme your lips are clammy, My shivYing sweetheart, as any snail, Such thoughts suspending, the pane descending I watch two drops join, as we should do, - To prove there's mating-room In the waiting-room Of the branch-fine

On a wet Sunday in Crewe.

HIGHLY COMMENDED (W. M. L. Escosigg) Do you remember, girl of mine How we stood by a fireless grate, And vowed our vows

And plighted our troth, So glad that the train was late ?

And time stood still For you and me With our lips together glued In the waiting-room Of the branch-line On a wet Sunday in Buds.

(W. R. S. R.) In the chill sub-zero Springtime my Jemima said to me " Where shall we come together, when the leaf is on the the tree ?

Shall we wander hand in hand along the bonny banks of Doon

Or drink a cup together in some nice hotel in Troon ?

Shall we amble in a shady wood, or paddle in a burn, Or seek in some sequestered glen the bluebell and the fern ? "

It hasn't quite worked out that way. Where did we meet, ah where?

In the waiting-room Of the branch-line On a wet Sunday in Ayr.