2 FEBRUARY 1940, Page 17

RESURRECTION, 1940

Now that the world has left its old profession

—Dealer in drugs, and dregs, and mattress-maker- To let its sportive genius find expression

Among the benches of the undertaker—

Well, let it have its orgy with the dead ; Give it the living too: already half Have written large, indelibly, in red, The smooth iambics of their epitaph.

But I've not crowned this humour of the earth's : All I have written is a courteous letter

Bearing the name of Somewhere near the Styx,

To a remoter registrar of births, Requesting him to do his business better Than one who told some jokes, and knew some tricks.

HELEN M. SPALDING.