Page:Poems of the Great War - Cunliffe.djvu/52

 26 WILFRID BLAIR

(Well knows the latter how to dodge,

That bullets in no deadly place may lodge !) —

Him of Eng. Law behold,

Not overbold

To reason why when sergeants bid him charge :

Him of Greek History, him of Geography,

All very fine and large,

This, swift to seize advantage of topography.

That, to announce how ne'er a corps did train

So well since Sparta went upon the wane.

And there be others :

A publisher and sundry heads of houses.

Spurred by North Oxford spouses,

Bidden go forth by yet more aged mothers ;

And, standing desperately at attention

(But looking forward to their tea and scones),

Innumerable dons

And parsons beyond mention.

IV

They are not afraid of the Boys' Brigade, for they've

taken the kiddies' guns, Which shoot nohow — but they've learnt by now to

depend on the end that stuns. And all the rules of the Final Schools combine in a

splendid spur. When the Pyrrhic phalanx does right-about-turn

and the order is "As you were !"

�� �