Punch, or the London Charivari | Page 6

time reading and answering them? I hope this letter will be the last one I shall find it necessary to write to you.
Re your postscript. Try prussic acid, but pray do not confine it to the toilets of your carrots. A few drops on the tongue would, I am sure, make you take a less distorted view of things, and you would cease to worry over such trifles as the braying of a harmless animal.
Faithfully yours, FREDERICK PETHERTON.
Of course I simply had to reply to this, but made no reference to the tu quoque question. He had evidently failed to grasp, or had ignored, the rather obvious suggestion in the last few words of my first letter on the subject. I wrote:--
MY DEAR CHAP,--Thanks so much for your prompt reply and valuable information about prussic acid. There was, however, one omission in the prescription. You didn't say on whose tongue the acid should be placed. If you meant on the donkey's it seems an excellent idea. I'll try it, so excuse more now, as the chemist's will be closed in a few minutes.
Yours in haste, HARRY F.
Petherton was getting angry, and his reply was terse and venomous:--
SIR,--Yes, I did mean the donkey's. It will cure both his stupid braying and his habit of writing absurd and childish letters.
But if you poison my donkey it will cost you a good deal more than you will care to pay, especially in war-time.
It is a pity you're too old for the army; you might have been shot by now.
Faithfully yours, FREDERICK PETHERTON.
I had now got on to my fourth speed, and dashed off this reply:--
DEAR FREDDY,--I like you in all your moods, but positively adore you when you are angry. As a matter of fact I am very fond of what are so absurdly known as dumb animals, and am glad now that the chemist's was closed last night before I decided whether to go there or not. BALAAM himself would have been proud to own your animal. It roused me from my bed this morning with what was unmistakably a very fine asinine rendering of the first few bars of "The Yeoman's Wedding," but unfortunately it lost the swing of it before the end of the first verse.
Yours as ever, HARRY.
Petherton gave up the contest; but I let him have a final tweak after seeing the announcement of his splendid and public-spirited action to help on the War Food scheme.
DEAR OLD BOY (I wrote),--How stupid you must have thought me all this time! Only when I learnt from the paragraph in this morning's Surbury Examiner that, in response to the suggestion of the Rural District Council, you have lent your field to the poor people of the neighbourhood for growing War Food did I realise the meaning of the dulcet-toned donkey's presence in your field.
The growing of more food at the present time is an absolute necessity, but it was left to you to discover this novel method of proclaiming to Surbury that here in its midst was land waiting to be put to really useful purpose.
I do not know which to admire the more, your patriotism or the ingenuity displayed in your selection of so admirable a mouthpiece from among your circle of friends.
Yrs., H.
Petherton has left it at that.
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NURSERY RHYMES OF LONDON TOWN.
(SECOND SERIES.)
XVIII.
BAYSWATER.
The Bays came down to water-- Neigh! Neigh! Neigh! And there they found the Brindled Mules-- Bray! Bray! Bray! "How dare you muddy the Bays' water That was as clear as glass? How dare you drink of the Bays' water, You children of an Ass?"
"Why shouldn't we muddy your water? Neigh! Neigh! Neigh! Why shouldn't we drink of your water, Pray, pray, pray? If our Sire was a Coster's Donkey Our Dam was a Golden Bay, And the Mules shall drink of the Bays' water Every other day!"
XIX.
KENTISH TOWN.
As I jogged by a Kentish Town Delighting in the crops, I met a Gipsy hazel-brown With a basketful of hops.
"You Sailor from the Dover Coast With your blue eyes full of ships, Carry my basket to the oast And I'll kiss you on the lips."
Once she kissed me with a jest, Once with a tear-- O where's the heart was in my breast And the ring was in my ear?
* * * * *
[Illustration: Head of Government Department (_in his private room in recently-commandeered hotel_). "BOY! BRING SOME MORE COAL!"]
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WAR'S ROMANCES. [Now that fiction is occupying itself so much with military matters, it is necessary to warn the lady novelist--as it used to be necessary in other days to warn her in relation to sport--to cultivate accuracy. There is a constant danger that the popular story will include such passages as follow.]
"Corporal Cuthbert Crewdson," said the Colonel in a kindly