Page:A treasury of war poetry, British and American poems of the world war, 1914-1919.djvu/228

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Of the Downs to the vale of Medina and the reedy bed of the Yar,

And the mainland, a shadow; and one white gleam of the Solent afar;

Mopsus, whose name was Marvin ("Joe Marvin," I think he said),

An urchin just turned fourteen, with a round and hard-looking head,

But a not unintelligent face, for he certainly was no fool,

And they'd taught him a thing or two at a Spartan village-school

Where force was not out of fashion: "They clouted ma sisterr—she's slow

To pick up 'er learrning—on th' 'ead with a book—the teacherrs, ye know."—

Mopsus, the name just suits him, an ungainly brand of boy,

With a cheerful grin that marked him to grow up a hobble-de-hoy,

If it weren't for a certain humour, a something quaint in his talk,

A familiar twinkle, a manner of ease, a deliberate walk.

And he leaned on a broken pitch-fork ("To clout them," I told him in chaff,

"Now you're on top!") as Eumaeus of old might have leant on his staff.

"And what do you think of, Mopsus?" the conventional poet must ask;

"Is it some of the songs they taught you—the pleasant part of your task

In that school where they clout the backward—of the noon-day bee that hums

So drowsy——" "Aw noa," quoth Mopsus, "a'm mostly thinkin' o' sums."

"What, just arithmetic? Stuff that you learned in the standards?" "Aw yuss,

An' a' arst ma dad fur a cycle—three poun', an' 'e make no fuss,

No more nor as if I arst 'im fur a five-shillun pair of shoes,

An'—parrdon, but, sirr, have ye read the paper?—'s ther any noos