| |
1903
(The Sub-editor Speaks)
FILES— | |
| The Files— | |
| Office Files! | |
| Oblige me by referring to the Files. | |
| Every question man can raise, | 5 |
| Every phrase of every phase | |
| Of that question is on record in the Files— | |
| (Threshed out threadbare—fought and finished in the Files). | |
| Ere the Universe at large | |
| Was our new-tipped arrows’ targe— | 10 |
| Ere we rediscovered Mammon and his wiles— | |
| Faenza, gentle reader, spent her—five-and-twentieth leader— | |
| (You will find him, and some others, in the Files). | |
| Warn all coming Robert Brownings and Carlyles, | |
| It will interest them to hunt among the Files, | 15 |
| Where unvisited, a-cold, | |
| Lie the crowded years of old | |
| In that Kensall-Green of greatness called the Files | |
| (In our newspaPère-la-Chaise the Office Files), | |
| Where the dead men lay them down | 20 |
| Meekly sure of long renown, | |
| And above them, sere and swift, | |
| Packs the daily deepening drift | |
| Of the all-recording, all-effacing Files— | |
| The obliterating, automatic Files. | 25 |
| Count the mighty men who slung | |
| Ink, Evangel, Sword, or Tongue | |
| When Reform and you were young— | |
| Made their boasts and spake according in the Files— | |
| (Hear the ghosts that wake applauding in the Files!) | 30 |
| Trace each all-forgot career | |
| From long primer through brevier | |
| Unto Death, a para minion in the Files | |
| (Para minion—solid—bottom of the Files)…. | |
| Some successful Kings and Queens adorn the Files. | 35 |
| They were great, their views were leaded, | |
| And their deaths were triple-headed, | |
| So they catch the eye in running through the Files | |
| (Show as blazes in the mazes of the Files); | |
| For their “paramours and priests,” | 40 |
| And their gross, jack-booted feasts, | |
| And their “epoch-marking actions” see the Files. | |
| Was it Bomba fled the blue Sicilian isles? | |
| Was it Saffi, a professor | |
| Once of Oxford, brought redress or | 45 |
| Garibaldi? Who remembers | |
| Forty-odd-year-old Septembers?— | |
| Only sextons paid to dig among the Files | |
| (Such as I am, born and bred among the Files). | |
| You must hack through much deposit | 50 |
| Ere you know for sure who was it | |
| Came to burial with such honour in the Files | |
| (Only seven seasons back beneath the Files). | |
| “Very great our loss and grievous— | |
| “So our best and brightest leave us, | 55 |
| “And it ends the Age of Giants,” say the Files; | |
| All the ’60—’70—’80—’90 Files | |
| (The open-minded, opportunist Files— | |
| The easy “O King, live for ever” Files). | |
| It is good to read a little in the Files; | 60 |
| ’Tis a sure and sovereign balm | |
| Unto philosophic calm, | |
| Yea, and philosophic doubt when Life beguiles. | |
| When you know Success is Greatness, | |
| When you marvel at your lateness | 65 |
| In apprehending facts so plain to Smiles | |
| (Self-helpful, wholly strenuous Samuel Smiles). | |
| When your Imp of Blind Desire | |
| Bids you set the Thames afire, | |
| You’ll remember men have done so—in the Files. | 70 |
| You’ll have seen those flames transpire—in the Files | |
| (More than once that flood has run so—in the Files). | |
| When the Conchimarian horns | |
| Of the reboantic Norns | |
| Usher gentlemen and ladies | 75 |
| With new lights on Heaven and Hades, | |
| Guaranteeing to Eternity | |
| All yesterday’s modernity; | |
| When Brocken-spectres made by | |
| Some one’s breath on ink parade by, | 80 |
| Very earnest and tremendous, | |
| Let not shows of shows offend us. | |
| When of everything we like we | |
| Shout ecstatic: “Quod ubique, | |
| “Quod ab omnibus means semper!” | 85 |
| Oh, my brother, keep your temper! | |
| Light your pipe and take a look along the Files. | |
| You’ve a better chance to guess | |
| At the meaning of Success | |
| (Which is Greatness—vide press) | 90 |
| When you’ve seen it in perspective in the Files. | |
| |
