Chapter C: H. Bretherton

Jan. 22, 1919.

_Sport_

Huntin' Weather

There's a dog-fox down in Lannigan's spinney
(And Lannigan's wife has hens to mourn);
The hunters stamp in their stalls and whinny,
Soft with leisure an' fat with corn.

The colts are pasturin', bold an' lusty,
Sleek they are with their coats aglow,
Ripe to break, but the bits grow rusty
And the saddles sit in a dusty row.

Old O'Dwyer was here a-Monday
With a few grey gran'fathers out for a field
(Like the ghostly hunt of a dead-an'-done day),
They--an' some lassies that giggled an' squealed.

The houn's they rioted like the devil
(They ran a hare an' they killed a goose);
I cursed Caubeen, but he looked me level:
"The boys are away--so what's the use?"

The mists lie clingin' on bog an' heather,
Haws hang red on the silver thorn;
It's huntin' weather, ay, huntin' weather,
But trumpets an' bugles have beat the horn!

CROSBIE GARSTIN.
Jan. 5, 1916.

A February Trout-Fancy

Now are the days ere the crocus
Peeps in the Park,
Ere the first snowdrops invoke us,
Ere the brown lark
Hymns over headland and heather
Spring and her riot of weather,
Days when the East winds are moaning together,
Dreary and dark!

Still, just at times comes a hint of
Softness that brings,
Spite of the season, a glint of
April's own wings:
Violets hawked on the highway,
West winds a-whoop down a byway,
Silver clouds loose on the blue of their sky-way,
Such are the things!

Yes, though old Winter o'ertake us
Swiftly again,
These are the portents that make us
Pause by the pane--
Windows where weavers of tackle
Snare us with shows that unshackle
Dreams, as we gaze upon tinsel and hackle,
Greenheart and cane!

Visions of bud on the sallow,
Swards in gay gown,
Glimpses of pool and of shallow,
Streams brimming down;
Wail of the wandering plover,
Flute of the thrush in the cover,
Swirl of the pounder that breaks, turning over
At your March Brown!

Hark to the reel's sudden shrill of
Line that's ripped out,
Feel the rod thrill with the thrill of
Fate still in doubt,
Till, where the shingles are showing,
Yours are the rainbow tints glowing
Crimson and gold on a lusty and knowing
Devonshire trout!

Such are the fancies they throw us,
Sun and soft air,
Woven at windows that show us,
Lingering there,
Not the mere flies for our buying,
Not only rods for our trying,
But--if we've eyes for it--all the undying
Fun o' Spring Fair!

P. R. CHALMERS.
Feb. 9, 1910.

At Putney

When eight strong fellows are out to row,
With a slip of a lad to guide them,
I warrant they'll make the light ship go,
Though the coach on the launch may chide them,
With his "Six, get on to it! Five, you're late!
Don't hurry the slides, and use your weight!
You're bucketing, Bow; and, as to Four,
The sight of his shoulders makes me sore!"

But Stroke has steadied his fiery men,
And the lift on the boat gets stronger;
And the Coxswain suddenly shouts for "Ten!
Reach out to it, longer, longer!"
While the wind and the tide raced hand in hand
The swing of the crew and the pace were grand;
But now that the two meet face to face
It's buffet and slam and a tortoise-pace.

For Hammersmith Bridge has rattled past,
And, oh, but the storm is humming.
The turbulent white steeds gallop fast;
They're tossing their crests and coming.
It's a downright rackety, gusty day,
And the backs of the crew are drenched in spray;
But it's "Swing, boys, swing till you're deaf and blind,
And you'll beat and baffle the raging wind."

They have slipped through Barnes; they are round the bend;
And the chests of the eight are tightening.
"Now spend your strength, if you've strength to spend,
And away with your hands like lightning!
Well rowed!"--and the coach is forced to cheer--
"Now stick to it, all, for the post is near!"
And, lo, they stop at the coxswain's call,
With its message of comfort, "Easy all!"

So here's to the sturdy undismayed
Eight men who are bound together
By the faith of the slide and the flashing blade
And the swing and the level feather;
To the deeds they do and the toil they bear;
To the dauntless mind and the will to dare;
And the joyous spirit that makes them one
Till the last fierce stroke of the race is done.

R. C. LEHMANN.
March 16, 1910.

"Gambol"

I stood among the rapturous kennelled pack,
Rejecting love from many a slobbering jaw,
Caressing many a twisting mottled back
And gripping here and there a friendly paw.
But yet a well-known white-and-liver stern
I sought in vain amid the dappled scramble.
A sudden apprehension made me turn
And say, "Where's Gambol?"

Gambol--a nailer on a failing scent,
Leading by fifty yards across the plough!
Gambol, who erst would riot and repent,
Who loved to instigate a kennel row!
Who'd often profit by "a private view"
"Huic-ing to him" incarnadined from cover,
And when a "half-cooked hare" sat squatting, who
Through roots would shove her!

I turned with mute inquiry in my eyes,
Dire rumours of distemper made me dumb,
The kennel huntsman, chary of replies,
Behind his shoulder jerked a horny thumb.
Such silence, though familiar, boded ill;
With doubts and fears increasing every minute,
I paused before a doorway--all was still
As death within it.

Gambol was stretched upon a truss of hay,
But not the ruthless hound that I had known.
That snarling terrorist of many a fray
Now at my feet lay low, but not alone,
Then rose to greet me--slowly shaking free
Four sleek round shapes that piped a puling twitter--
And fawned, half shamed, half proud for me to see
Her brand-new litter.

MISS JESSIE POPE.
March 20, 1912.

"The Little Foxes"

This was a wisdom that SOLOMON said
In a garden of citron and roses red,
A word he wove, where his grey apes played,
In the rhyme he strung for love of a maid;
Thus went his learning, most discerning,
Thus he sang of his old designs,
"Take us the foxes--little foxes,
Little dog-foxes that spoil the vines!"

(Though SOLOMON never since he was born
Had heard the twang of a huntsman's horn,
Killing his foxes, so I'll be bound,
Without the help of a horse or hound,
Still down the ages, this his sage's
Word with gallanter meaning shines,
When we take foxes, little foxes,
Little dog-foxes that spoil the vines!)

So when the morn hangs misty now
Where the grass shows never a patch of plough,
Hark to the cry on the spruce-crowned hill,
For SOLOMON'S wisdom is working still;
Hark to the singing voices flinging,
White sterns waving among the pines,
All for the foxes--little foxes,
Little dog-foxes that spoil the vines.

The lift of a cap at the cover side,
A thud of hoofs in a squelchy ride,
And the pack is racing a breast-high scent
Like a shadow cloud o'er a windy bent!
Customer cunning--full of running,
Never a moment the game declines;
Thus are the foxes--little foxes,
Little dog-foxes that spoil the vines.

So it's afternoon, and eight miles away
That beat, dead-weary and stiff with clay
A tired mask, set for a distant whin,
Is turned on Death with a brigand grin!
There by the paling, wet brush trailing,
Still he bares them his lips' long lines;
So die the foxes--little foxes,
Little dog-foxes that spoil the vines.

This was the wisdom that SOLOMON made
In a garden of citron and almug shade,
That a man and a horse might find them fun
Wherever the little dog-foxes run,
Since of his meaning we've been gleaning,
Since we've altered his old designs.
All about foxes--little foxes,
Little dog-foxes that spoil the vines!

P. R. CHALMERS.
April 3, 1912.

To a Cuckoo, Heard on the Links

Bohemian spirit! unencumbered by Penates,
And sole performer of the woodland band
Whose contributions I can recognise with great ease,
Let others count you shifting as the sand,
But surely underneath that bosom black-barred
There lurks a sentiment that I (the hack-bard)
Can fully comprehend. So, cuckoo, here's my hand.

Not for the sake of ease you flit about the copses
And bid your partner to an alien care,
Entrust the incubation of her popsy-wopsies,
Planting the eggy mites at unaware;
But art, the voice of art, is ever calling.
How could CARUSO sing with infants squalling?
To fetter genius is to drive it to despair.

Should I not turn also my heartstrings to macadam?
I too deposit, whereso'er I could,
A host of unmelodious babies (if I had 'em)
Or in the kindly shelter of some wood
(With robins), or whatever creche was going,
Soon as I felt the inspiration flowing,
The bubbling in my brain-pan? Yes, by Jove, I should.

'Tis therefore that I sometimes wonder when I hear you
Fulfil the valley with that vagrant noise,
Now by the holm-oak yonder, now beside this near yew
(Unhampered as you are by household ploys),
Why you have never hit on something neater,
Some outburst less monotonous of metre,
Less easy to be aped by unregenerate boys.

Is it perhaps that, like that other star, the throstle,
Simply to prove your throat can stand the strain,
You too keep on, the Spring's repetitive apostle,
Piping your pæan till it haunts the brain?
I cannot say. But what I find so sad is
One never knows if you or if the caddies
Are making all that rumpus. There it goes again!

E. G. V. KNOX.
April 21, 1909.

The First Game

There comes a Day (I can hear it coming),
One of those glorious deep-blue days,
When larks are singing and bees are humming,
And Earth gives voice in a thousand ways--
Then I, my friends, I too shall sing,
And hum a foolish little thing,
And whistle like (but not too like) a blackbird in the Spring.

There looms a Day (I can feel it looming;
Yes, it will be in a month or less),
When all the flowers in the world are blooming
And Nature flutters her fairest dress--
Then I, my friends, I too shall wear
A blazer that will make them stare,
And brush--this is official: I shall also brush my hair.

It is the day that I watch for yearly,
Never before has it come so late;
But now I've only a month--no, merely
A couple of fortnights left to wait;
And then (to make the matter plain)
I hold--at last!--a bat again:
Dear HOBBS! the weeks this summer--think! the _weeks_
I've lived in vain!

I see already the first ball twisting
Over the green as I take my stand,
I hear already long-on insisting
It wasn't a chance that came to hand--
Or no; I see it miss the bat
And strike me on the knee, whereat
Some fool, some silly fool at point, says blandly, "How was that?"

Then, scouting later, I hold a hot 'un
At deep square-leg from the local FRY,
And at short mid-on to the village SCOTTON
I snap a skimmer some six-foot high--
Or else, perhaps, I get the ball,
Upon the thumb, or not at all,
Or right into the hands, and then, lorblessme, let it fall.

But what care I? It's the game that calls me--
Simply to be on the field of play;
How can it matter what fate befalls me,
With ten good fellows and one good day? ... But still,
I rather hope spectators will,
Observing any lack of skill,
Remark, "This is his first appearance." Yes, I _hope_ they will.

A. A. MILNE.
July 6, 1910.

Inland Golf

I hate the dreadful hollow, in the shade of the little wood,
Its lips in the grass above are bearded with flame-gold whin;
I have tried to forget the past, to play the shot as I should,
But echo there, however I put it, answers me, "In!"

For there in that ghastly pit long years ago I was found,
Playing the sad three-more, interring the sphere where it fell;
Mangled and flattened and hacked and dinted deep in the ground,
My ball had the look that is joy to the loafer with balls to sell.

Down at the foot of the cliff, whose shadow makes dusk of the dawn,
Maddened I stood and muttered, making a friend of despair;
Then out I climbed while the wind that had tricked me began to fawn,
Politely removing the sand that had made a mat of my hair.

Why do they prate of the blessings of golf on an inland course
Where the "pretty" is but the plain, the "rough," prehensile hay,
That yields up the ball (if at all) to a reckless _tour de force_,
And mocks with rippling mirth your search in it day by day.

And the lost-ball madness flushes up in the 12-man's head,
When the breeze brings down the impatient, contemptuous "Fore!"
Till he gives it up at last and, dropping another instead,
Envies those fortunate folk, the dead, who need golf no more.

R. K. RISK.
July 12, 1911.

To an Unknown Deer

[Somewhere above the head of Loch Fyne.]

King of the treeless forest, lo, I come!
This is to let you have the welcome news
That you will shortly hear my bullet's hum
Shatter Argyll amid her mountain dews;
Will hear, from hill to hill, its rumour fly
To startle (if the wind be not contrary)
The tripper gathering picture-postcards by
The pier at Inveraray.

This is your funeral, my friend, not mine,
So play the game, for slackness I abhor;
Give me a broadside target, large and fine,
A hundred paces off--don't make it more;
If in a sitting posture when we meet,
You mustn't think of moving; stay quite steady
Or (better) rise, and standing on your feet
Wait there till I am ready.

Lurk not in hollows where you can't be found,
Or let the local colour mock my search;
But take the sky-line; choose the sort of ground
That shows you up as obvious as a church;
Don't skulk among your hinds, or use for scouts
The nimble progeny of last year's harem
To bring reports upon my whereabouts
In case I chance to scare 'em.

If I should perforate you in a place
Not strictly vital, but from that rude shock
Death must ensue, don't run and hide your face,
But let me ease you with another knock;
And if, by inadvertence, I contrive
Initially to miss you altogether,
Stand till I empty out my clip of five,
Or make you bite the heather.

As for your points, I take a snobbish view:
I dearly love a stag of Royal stuff;
But, if a dozen's more than you can do,
Ten (of the best) will suit me well enough;
As for your weight, I want a bulky beast,
That I may win a certain patron's benison,
Loading his board, to last a week at least,
With whiffy slabs of venison.

Finally, be a sportsman; try to play
Your part in what should prove a big success;
Let me repeat--don't keep too far away;
My distance is a hundred yards (or less);
So, ere the eager gillies ope your maw,
I'll say, in tones to such occasions proper,
The while I drink your death in usquebagh,
"He is indeed a topper!"

Nor shall that sentence be your sole reward;
Our mutual prowess in the fatal Glen
Your headpiece, stuffed and mounted, shall record
And be the cynosure of envious men;
And when they see that segment of the bag,
And want the tale again and I must tell it,
I'll say how stoutly, like a well-bred stag,
You stopped the soft-nosed pellet.

SIR OWEN SEAMAN.
Sept. 14, 1910.

Medalitis

In the full height and glory of the year,
When husbandmen are housing golden sheaves,
Before the jealous frost has come to shear
From the bright woodland its reluctant leaves,
I pass within a gateway, where the trees,
Tall, stately, multi-coloured, manifold,
Draw the eye on as to some Chersonese,
Spanning the pathway with their arch of gold.

A river sings and loiters through the grass,
Girdling a pleasance scythed and trimly shorn;
And here I watch men vanish and repass
To the last hour of eve from early morn;
Dryads peer out at them, and goat-foot Pan
Plays on his pipe to their unheeding ears;
They pass, like pilgrims in a caravan,
Towards some Mecca in the far-off years.

Blind to the woodland's autumn livery,
Blind to the emerald pathway that they tread,
Deaf to the river's low-pitched lullaby,
Their limbs are quick and yet their souls are dead;
Nothing to them the song of any bird,
For them in vain were horns of Elfland wound,
Blind, deaf and stockfish-mute; for, in a word,
They are engaged upon a Medal Round.

Making an anxious torment of a game
Whose humours now intrigue them not at all,
They chase the flying wraith of printed fame,
With card and pencil arithmetical;
With features pinched into a painful frown
Looming misfortunes they anticipate,
Or, as the fatal record is set down,
Brood darkly on a detrimental 8.

These are in thrall to Satan, who devised
Pencil and card to tempt weak men to sin,
Whereby their prowess might be advertised--
Say, 37 Out and 40 In;
Rarely does any victim break his chains
And from his nape the lethal burden doff--
The man with medal virus in his veins
Seldom outlives it and gets back to Golf.

R. K. RISK.
Oct. 2, 1912.

My First Flight

Stranded at Brighton and bored to monotony,
Sadly I roamed by the crowd-haunted shore;
Fed up with bathing and boating and botany,
Languidly humming the strains of "Asthore";
Then, in the offing, descended an aeroplane,
Gaily the pilot came striding my way;
"'Afternoon, Sir!" he exclaimed. "Would you dare a 'plane
Voyage to-day?"

Turning, I gazed with an eye that was critical
At the contraption of fabric and wires;
Flying's a game which my friends in the City call
Simply gilt-edged--it uplifts and inspires.
Holiday-makers stood by in expectancy,
Cinema merchants rushed up with their reels;
"Go it!" cried somebody; "go an' get wrecked an' see
Just how it feels."

I who had fought for a seat in an omnibus
Surely could never recoil from a 'plane?
There, newly painted, she stood like a Romney 'bus,
Bidding me soar through the vasty inane.
Breathing a prayer for myself and my Fatherland
Swiftly I scrambled aboard (the First Act);
Upward we soared till I felt I would rather land
Promptly--intact.

Swift rushed the air and the engine was thunderous,
"Say, shall I stunt you?" the pilot then roared.
Clouds were above us and Brighton was under us;
Peace reigned below--there was Panic on board.
Fiercely pulsated my turbulent heart inside,
Fiercely we skidded and stunted and swayed;
Grimly I crouched in that brute of a Martinsyde--
Dazed and dismayed.

Every mad moment seemed in its intensity
More than a cycle of slow-moving years;
Finally I, in a state of dumb density,
Reached _terra firma_ mid hurricane cheers.
Since I've decided that nothing can justify
Passenger flights in a nerve-racking 'plane;
_Others_ may welcome the sport, but I'm cussed if I
Try it again.

G. R. SAMWAYS.
Aug. 13, 1919.

On Mixed Shooting

Let my Bettina take it not amiss
Nor deem that from my side I wish to shove her
If I forego the too, too poignant bliss
Of her adjacence in the hedgerow's cover,
Where I propose to lurk
And do among the driven birds some deadly work.

Linked in the dance, you cannot be too near,
Nor where the waves permit our joint immersion;
Dinners or theatres yield an added cheer
With you beside me to afford diversion
From thoughts of play or platter,
And not of fundamental things that really matter.

But here, where my immortal soul, afire
With fervour savouring almost of religion,
Fain would pursue, unvexed, its one desire--
To down the partridge or the errant pigeon,
What if you stood (or sat)
Close by and asked me if I liked your latest hat?

I could not bear it; you would sap my nerve;
My hand and eye would cease to work together;
I could not rightly gauge the covey's swerve,
And, swinging round to spray the rearmost feather,
I might mislay my wits
And blow your smart confection into little bits.

Go rather where he stands, a field away,
Yon youth who likes himself; go there, my Betty,
Beguile his vision; round his trigger lay
"One strangling golden hair" (D. G. ROSSETTI).
That ought to spoil his feats
And keep him fairly quiet in between the beats.

But later, when the luncheon-hour is come,
Be near me all you will; for then your prattle
Will be most welcome with its pleasant hum
So out of place amid the stress of battle;
Over an Irish stew,
With "Bristol cream" to top it, I am _tout à vous_.

Not that your virtues have no higher use;
Such gifts would grace the loftiest position;
But where the birds come down wind like the deuce
I mark the limit of your woman's mission;
In other circs, elsewhere,
"A ministering angel thou"; but not just there.

SIR OWEN SEAMAN.
Oct. 11, 1911.

Southward

When against the window-pane tap the fingers of the rain,
An ill rain, a chill rain, dripping from the eaves,
When the farmers haul their logs and the marsh is whisht with fogs,
And the wind sighs like an old man, brushing withered leaves;
When the Summertime is gone and the Winter creeping on,
The doleful Northern winter of snow and sleet and hail,
Then I smell the salty brine and I see you, ship o' mine,
Bowling through the sunshine under all plain sail.

I can see you, Lady love, the Trade clouds strung above,
White clouds, bright clouds, flocking South with you;
Like snowy lily buds are the flowery foaming suds
That bloom about your forefoot as you tread the meadows blue.
Oh the diamond Southern Cross! Oh the wheeling albatross!
Oh the shoals of silver flying-fish that skim beside the rail!
Though my body's in the North still my heart goes faring forth
Bowling through the sunshine under all plain sail.