Punch/Volume 147/Issue 3832/Minor War Gains
The year that is stormily ending Has brought us full measure of grief,And yet we must thank it for sending At times unexpected relief;These boons are not felt in the trenches Or make our home burdens less hard;They're not a bonanza, but merit a stanza Or two from the doggerel bard.
The names of musicians and mummers No longer are loud on our lips;By the side of our buglers and drummers Caruso endures an eclipse;And the legions of freaks and of faddists. Who hailed him with rapturous awe,O wonder of wonders, are finding out blunders, And worse, in the writings of Shaw!
Good Begbie, no longer upraising His plea for the "uplift" of Hodge,Has ceased for a season from praising Lloyd George and Sir Oliver Lodge:And there hasn't been much in the papers About the next novel from Caine(No doubt he's in Flanders, the guest of commanders Who reverence infinite brain).
John Ward has forgiven the Curragh (The Curragh 's forgotten John Ward);No longer he cries "Wurra Wurra!" At sight of an officer's sword;MacDonald, the terror of tigers, Sits silent and meek as a mouse,And the great von Keirhardi is curiously tardy In "voicing" his spleen in the House.
The screeds of professors and jurists Have quite disappeared from the Press;'Tis little we hear of Futurists, And frankly we care even less;Why, Trevelyan, the martyr to candour, Who lately his office resigned,Though waters were heaving has sunkWho lately his office resigned,Though waters were heaving had sunk without leaving The tiniest ripple behind.
In fine, though there fall to our fighters Too many hard buffets and bumps,'Tis a comfort to think that our blighters Are down in the deadliest dumps;And whatever the future may bring us In profits or pleasures or painsThe ill wind that's blowing to-day is bestowing A number of negative gains.