<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=425018" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>Epistle to an Orphan after William Mackworth Praed A Letter of Advice</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">They tell me you're promised a mother, <br>to cuddle, to cosset, to care.<br>Take care for she may try to smother, <br>to cover her inner despair.<br>The experts agree that another<br>could just as well clinch the affair, -<br>and beware that you never discover<br>the father who's no longer there.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>(Parody William Mackworth PRAED - A Letter 31 October 1990) </div><div style="margin:10px 0"> <br>A Letter to PH from a Disappointed Writer </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Dear PH, I leave you this letter <br>after writing from ten until nine<br>for a site I'd delight to know better, <br>for a smile that my heart can't decline.<br>Yet one finds after wearily pacing, <br>for replies in the cold, for some sign, <br>that that heart which with hope had been racing<br>to darkest despair must incline.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Dear PH from twelve to eleven<br>each night I would knock at your door<br>in hope that an angel from heaven<br>could show me the light, - but no more<br>will I screed in my need if no answer<br>effective can echo joy's store -<br>I can't act as a puppet-stringed dancer, <br>not even for one I adore! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Dear PH the time have I waited<br>day in and day out by grief torn, <br>all write up down written, ill-fated<br>as my consonants vowed my vowels scorn.<br>The wonder my dunderhead brought you<br>tonight may steal thunder at morn, <br>but the blossoms whose beauty besought you<br>fade as fast as last season's drenched corn.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">As on Thursday applauseless, defeated, <br>so on Friday all clauseless I'm spurned, <br>is the cycle of love thus completed, <br>is this all the thanks that I've earned? <br>It is hard for a fool to be taken -<br>its a sign that one's soft in the head, -<br>but the reason that slept must awaken, <br>and the spirit, restored, won't be lead! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">I'd have offered you all in my power, <br>to cherish, to share, to be kind, <br>I'd have nurtured emotions to flower<br>and found wings for soul unresigned.<br>It is not just the whim of an hour<br>but a lifetime with no chains to bind, <br>in a warm, in a warm, tender bower<br>with blank verse, even worse, left behind! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">How can I be present tomorrow, <br>bear false witness with stanzas prewrit? <br>once again less 'in anger than sorrow'<br>I will try to bar love from my wit.<br>I will try to contain my emotion -<br>or go through the motions to ease<br>the emptiness born from devotion<br>to one who my [he]art pleased to tease.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Good luck with your plans to continue<br>support for the wor[l]d caught in art! <br>Good luck for the talent that s[w]ings you! <br>Good luck for a applause the stats chart! <br>I'll return into cold hibernation<br>all alone til your smile shines bright through<br>the slough of despondent elation, <br>these Elysean fields cropped by few.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Dear PH, ignore to this last letter<br>should sentiments biased appear, <br>yet I shall be ever your debtor -<br>who taught me to share and feel near.<br>Intuitions are fine for romantic, <br>inner feelings that flower in dreams, <br>but a chasm as deep as Atlantic<br>drowns my talent, it seems, PH, Dear! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">So sometimes recall that I follow<br>your footsteps as forward they flow, <br>and the shadow which seems to be hollow<br>is an echo which helps me to know<br>how the sun shines for YOU as Appollo<br>his steeds urges onwards, - and though<br>forgetful nights daily verse swallow<br>tomorrow dawn's brightness will glow! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">(Parody William Mackworth PRAED A Letter of Advice 12 April 2005 revised 19 November 2006) </div><div style="margin:10px 0">A Letter of Advice to Margaret Thatcher</div><div style="margin:10px 0">You tell me you've taken a lover, -<br>the Serpent - to suckle at breast, <br>what took you so long to discover<br>its worth, that you seemed to detest? <br>Is it fears of the new German eagle, <br>which now flies in the skies, to and fro? <br>Is it fear to appear far less regal? <br>Prime Minister, Maggie, say 'No! '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">You so often set foot in the City<br>among the stockbrokers and Jews, <br>until now no-one noticed that pity<br>assisted in making the News.<br>Lip service you paid as a token<br>to E.E.C., more stop than go, <br>would you now betray promises spoken? <br>Prime Minister, Maggie, say 'No! '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Dixit Maggie: <br> The arguments strongly defended<br>won time, though for whom no-one knows, <br>the endergy fiercely expended<br>I now do reverse with my prose! <br>Don't think that I'm not sympathetic<br>to common wealth causes, but so<br>urgently must I seem more magnetic, -<br>Prime Ministers learn to say 'No! '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Exports are the life of the nation, <br>and spendthrifts throw eggs from the nest, <br>why would you now import inflation<br>why risk fresh electoral test? <br>You constancy prized, never faltered, <br>what further can grandeur bestow? <br>My heart is the same, is yours altered? <br>Prime Minister, Maggie, say No! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Beware or you'll face resignation<br>from the ranks of conservative friends, <br>for instransigence breeds indignation, <br>a sign that your time nears its end.<br>Will you bend, or back down from your folly.<br>On your knees beg to Brussels, kow-tow? <br>Or defend precious pound, British lolly, <br>or become Lady Diehard, Soho? ...</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Dixit Maggie: <br> Our infantile logic was stupid, <br>and once we admitted its flaws, <br>to Snake turned like Eve to a Cupid! <br>a fig for Conservative bores! <br>A policy firm and effective<br>must govern though markets sink low, <br>while a girl learns a sense of perspective<br>at times when she simply says 'No! '</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>(7 October 1990Parody Winthrop Mackworth PRAED A Letter of Advice) </div><div style="margin:10px 0"></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>A Letter of Advice</div><div style="margin:10px 0">From Miss Medora Trevilian at Padua<br>to Miss Araminta Vavasour, in London </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Enfin, monsieur, un homme aimable; <br>Voila: pourquoi je ne saurais l'aimer. Scribe</div><div style="margin:10px 0">You tell me you're promised a lover, <br>My own Araminta, next week; <br>Why cannot my fancy discover<br>The hue of his coat and his cheek? <br>Alas! if he look like another, <br>A vicar, a banker, a beau, <br>Be deaf to your father and mother, <br>My own Araminta, say 'No! '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Miss Lane at her Temple of Fashion, <br>Taught us both how to sing and to speak, <br>And we loved one another with passion, <br>Before we had been there a week: <br>You gave me a ring for a token; <br>I wear it wherever I go; <br>I gave you a chain - is it broken? <br>My own Araminta, say 'No! '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">O think of our favourite cottage, <br>And think of our dear Lallah Rookh! <br>How we shared with the milkmaids their pottage, <br>And drank of the stream from the brook: <br>How fondly our loving lips faltered<br>'What further can grandeur bestow? <br>My heart is the same; - is yours altered? <br>My own Araminta, say 'No! '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Remember the thrilling romances<br>We read on the bank in the glen; <br>Remember the suitors our fancies<br>Would picture for both of us then.<br>They wore the red cross on their shoulder, <br>They had vanquished and pardoned their foe - <br>Sweet friend, are you wiser or colder? <br>My own Araminta, say 'No! '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">You know, when Lord Rigmarole's carriage<br>Drove off with your sister Justine, <br>You wept, dearest girl, at the marriage, <br>And whispered 'How base she has been! '<br>You said you were sure it would kill you, <br>If ever your husband looked so; <br>And you will apostatize, - will you? <br>My own Araminta, say 'No! '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">When I heard I was going abroad, love, <br>I thought I was going to die; <br>We walked arm in arm to the road, love, <br>We looked arm in arm to the sky; <br>And I said 'When a foreign postillion<br>Has hurried me off to the Po, <br> Forget not Medora Trevilian: </div><div style="margin:10px 0">My own Araminta, say 'No! '<br>We parted! but sympathy's fetters<br>Reach far over valley and hill; <br>I muse o'er your exquisite letters, <br>And feel that your heart is mine still; <br>And he who would share it with me, love - <br>The richest of treasure below - </div><div style="margin:10px 0">If he's not what Orlando should be, love, <br>My own Araminta, say 'No! '<br>If he wears a top-boot in his wooing, <br>If he comes to you riding a cob, <br>If he talks of his baking or brewing, <br>If he puts up his feet on the hob, <br>If he ever drinks port after dinner, <br>If his brow, or his breeding is low, <br>If he calls himself 'Thompson' or 'Skinner', <br>My own, Araminta, say 'No! '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">If he ever sets foot in the City, <br>Amongst the stockbrokers and Jews, <br>If he has not a heart full of pity, <br>If he don't stand six feet in his shoes, <br>If his lips are not redder than roses, <br>If his hands are not whiter than snow, <br>If he has not the model of noses, - <br>My own Araminta, say 'No! '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">If he speaks of a tax or a duty, <br>If he does not look grand on his knees, <br>If he's blind to a landscape of beauty, <br>Hills, valleys, rocks, waters, and trees, <br>If he dotes not on desolate towers, <br>If he likes not to hear the blast blow, <br>If he knows not the language of flowers, -<br>My own Araminta, say 'No! '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">He must walk - like a god of old story<br>Come down from the home of his rest; <br>He must smile - like the sun in his glory<br>On the buds he loves ever the best; <br>And oh! from its ivory portal<br>Like music his soft speech must flow! - <br>If he speak, smile, or walk like a mortal, <br>My own Araminta, say 'No! '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Don't listen to tales of his bounty, <br>Don't hear what they say of his birth, <br>Don't look at his seat in the county, <br>Don't calculate what he is worth; <br>But give him a theme to write verse on, <br>And see if he turns out his toe; <br>If he's only an excellent person, - <br>My own Araminta, say 'No! '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Winthrop Mackworth PRAED 1802_1839</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The Talented Man</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Letter From A Lady In London To A Lady At Lausanne</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Dear Alice! you'll laugh when you know it, -<br>Last week, at the Duchess's ball, <br>I danced with the clever new poet, -<br>You've heard of him, - Tully St. Paul.<br>Miss Jonquil was perfectly frantic; <br>I wish you had seen Lady Anne! <br>It really was very romantic, <br>He is such a talented man! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">He came up from Brazen Nose College, <br>Just caught, as they call it, this spring; <br>And his head, love, is stuffed full of knowledge<br>Of every conceivable thing.<br>Of science and logic he chatters, <br>As fine and as fast as he can; <br>Though I am no judge of such matters, <br>I'm sure he's a talented man.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">His stories and jests are delightful; -<br>Not stories or jests, dear, for you; <br>The jests are exceedingly spiteful, <br>The stories not always quite true.<br>Perhaps to be kind and veracious<br>May do pretty well at Lausanne; <br>But it never would answer, - good gracious! <br>Chez nous - in a talented man.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">He sneers, - how my Alice would scold him! -<br>At the bliss of a sigh or a tear; <br>He laughed - only think! - when I told him<br>How we cried o'er Trevelyan last year; <br>I vow I was quite in a passion; <br>I broke all the sticks of my fan; <br>But sentiment's quite out of fashion, <br>It seems, in a talented man.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Lady Bab, who is terribly moral, <br>Has told me that Tully is vain, <br>And apt - which is silly - to quarrel, <br>And fond - which is sad - of champagne.<br>I listened, and doubted, dear Alice, <br>For I saw, when my Lady began, <br>It was only the Dowager's malice; -<br>She does hate a talented man! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">He's hideous, I own it. But fame, love, <br>Is all that these eyes can adore; <br>He's lame, - but Lord Byron was lame, love, <br>And dumpy, - but so is Tom Moore.<br>Then his voice, - such a voice! my sweet creature, <br>It's like your Aunt Lucy's toucan: <br>But oh! what's a tone or a feature, <br>When once one's a talented man? </div><div style="margin:10px 0">My mother, you know, all the season, <br>Has talked of Sir Geoffrey's estate; <br>And truly, to do the fool reason, <br>He has been less horrid of late.<br>But to-day, when we drive in the carriage, <br>I'll tell her to lay down her plan; -<br>If ever I venture on marriage, <br>It must be a talented man! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">P.S. - I have found, on reflection, <br>One fault in my friend, - entre nous; <br>Without it, he'd just be perfection; -<br>Poor fellow, he has not a sou! <br>And so, when he comes in September<br>To shoot with my uncle, Sir Dan, <br>I've promised mamma to remember<br>He's only a talented man! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Winthrop Mackworth Praed 1802_1839<br> </div><div style="margin:10px 0">A Letter</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Dear Kitty, <br>At length the term's ending; <br>I 'm in for my Schools in a week; <br>And the time that at present I'm spending<br>On you should be spent upon Greek: <br>But I'm fairly well read in my Plato, <br>I'm thoroughly red in the eyes, <br>And I've almost forgotten the way to<br>Be healthy and wealthy and wise.<br>So 'the best of all ways' - why repeat you<br>The verse at 2.30 a.m., <br>When I 'm stealing an hour to entreat you<br>Dear Kitty, to come to Commem.? </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Oh, come! You shall rustle in satin<br>Through halls where Examiners trod: <br>Your laughter shall triumph o'er Latin<br>In lecture-room, garden, and quad.<br>They stand in the silent Sheldonian - <br>Our orators, waiting - for you, <br>Their style guaranteed Ciceronian, <br>Their subject - 'the Ladies in Blue.'<br>The Vice sits arrayed in his scarlet; <br>He's pale, but they say he dissem-<br>-bles by calling his Beadle a 'varlet'<br>Whenever he thinks of Commem.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">There are dances, flirtations at Nuneham, <br>Flower-shows, the procession of Eights: <br>There's a list stretching _usque ad Lunam_<br>Of concerts, and lunches, and fetes: <br>There's the Newdigate all about 'Gordon, '<br>- So sweet, and they say it will scan.<br>You shall flirt with a Proctor, a Warden<br>Shall run for your shawl and your fan.<br>They are sportive as gods broken loose from<br>Olympus, and yet very em-<br>-inent men. There are plenty to choose from, <br>You'll find, if you come to Commem.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">I know your excuses: Red Sorrel<br>Has stumbled and broken her knees; <br>Aunt Phoebe thinks waltzing immoral; <br>And 'Algy, you are such a tease; <br>It's nonsense, of course, but she _is_ strict'; <br>And little Dick Hodge has the croup; <br>And there's no one to visit your 'district'<br>Or make Mother Tettleby's soup.<br>Let them cease for a se'nnight to plague you; <br>Oh, leave them to manage _pro tem_.<br>With their croups and their soups and their ague) <br>Dear Kitty, and come to Commem.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Don't tell me Papa has lumbago, <br>That you haven't a frock fit to wear, <br>That the curate 'has notions, and may go<br>To lengths if there's nobody there, '<br>That the Squire has 'said things' to the Vicar, <br>And the Vicar 'had words' with the Squire, <br>That the Organist's taken to liquor, <br>And leaves you to manage the choir: <br>For Papa must be cured, and the curate<br>Coerced, and your gown is a gem; <br>And the moral is - Don't be obdurate, <br>Dear Kitty, but come to Commem.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'My gown? Though, no doubt, sir, you're clever, <br>You 'd better leave fashions alone.<br>Do you think that a frock lasts for ever? '<br>Dear Kitty, I'll grant you have grown; <br>But I thought of my 'scene' with McVittie<br>That night when he trod on your train<br>At the Bachelor's Ball. ''Twas a pity, '<br>You said, but I knew 'twas Champagne.<br>And your gown was enough to compel me<br>To fall down and worship its hem - <br>(Are 'hems' wearing? If not, you shall tell me<br>What is, when you come to Commem.) </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Have you thought, since that night, of the Grotto? <br>Of the words whispered under the palms, <br>While the minutes flew by and forgot to<br>Remind us of Aunt and her qualms? <br>Of the stains of the old _Journalisten_? <br>Of the rose that I begged from your hair? <br>When you turned, and I saw something glisten - <br>Dear Kitty, don't frown; it _was_ there! <br>But that idiot Delane in the middle<br>Bounced in with 'Our dance, I - ahem! '<br>And - the rose you may find in my Liddell<br>And Scott when you come to Commem.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Then, Kitty, let 'yes' be the answer.<br>We'll dance at the 'Varsity Ball, <br>And the morning shall find you a dancer<br>In Christ Church or Trinity hall.<br>And perhaps, when the elders are yawning<br>And rafters grow pale overhead<br>With the day, there shall come with its dawning<br>Some thought of that sentence unsaid.<br>Be it this, be it that - 'I forget, ' or<br>'Was joking' - whatever the fem-<br>-inine fib, you'll have made me your debtor<br>And come, - you _will_ come? to Commem.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Green Bays Parody 1893 Arthur QUILLER-COUCH<br>Parody - Winthrop Mackworth PRAED A Letter of Advice</div><div style="margin:10px 0">HER LETTER - Francis Bret Harte to William Mackworth Praed</div><div style="margin:10px 0">I'm sitting alone by the fire, <br>Dressed just as I came from the dance, <br>In a robe even you would admire, -<br>It cost a cool thousand in France; <br>I'm be-diamonded out of all reason, <br>My hair is done up in a cue: <br>In short, sir, 'the belle of the season'<br>Is wasting an hour upon you.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">A dozen engagements I've broken; <br>I left in the midst of a set; <br>Likewise a proposal, half spoken, <br>That waits - on the stairs - for me yet.<br>They say he'll be rich, - when he grows up, -<br>And then he adores me indeed; <br>And you, sir, are turning your nose up, <br>Three thousand miles off, as you read.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'And how do I like my position? '<br>'And what do I think of New York? '<br>'And now, in my higher ambition, <br>With whom do I waltz, flirt, or talk? '<br>'And isn't it nice to have riches, <br>And diamonds and silks, and all that? '<br>'And aren't they a change to the ditches<br>And tunnels of Poverty Flat? '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Well, yes, - if you saw us out driving<br>Each day in the Park, four-in-hand, <br>If you saw poor dear mamma contriving<br>To look supernaturally grand, -<br>If you saw papa's picture, as taken<br>By Brady, and tinted at that, -<br>You'd never suspect he sold bacon<br>And flour at Poverty Flat.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And yet, just this moment, when sitting<br>In the glare of the grand chandelier, -<br>In the bustle and glitter befitting<br>The 'finest soiree of the year, ' -<br>In the mists of a gaze de Chambery, <br>And the hum of the smallest of talk, -<br>Somehow, Joe, I thought of the 'Ferry, '<br>And the dance that we had on 'The Fork; '</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Of Harrison's bar, with its muster<br>Of flags festooned over the wall; <br>Of the candles that shed their soft lustre<br>And tallow on head-dress and shawl; <br>Of the steps that we took to one fiddle, <br>Of the dress of my queer vis-a-vis; <br>And how I once went down the middle<br>With the man that shot Sandy McGee.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Of the moon that was quietly sleeping<br>On the hill, when the time came to go; <br>Of the few baby peaks that were peeping<br>From under their bedclothes of snow; <br>Of that ride, - that to me was the rarest, <br>Of - the something you said at the gate.<br>Ah! Joe, then I wasn't an heiress<br>To 'the best-paying lead in the State.'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Well, well, it's all past; yet it's funny<br>To think, as I stood in the glare<br>Of fashion and beauty and money, <br>That I should be thinking, right there, <br>Of some one who breasted high water, <br>And swam the North Fork, and all that, <br>Just to dance with old Folinsbee's daughter, <br>The Lily of Poverty Flat.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">But goodness! what nonsense I'm writing! <br>(Mamma says my taste still is low) , <br>Instead of my triumphs reciting, - <br>I'm spooning on Joseph, - heigh-ho! <br>And I'm to be 'finished' by travel, -<br>Whatever's the meaning of that.<br>Oh, why did papa strike pay gravel<br>In drifting on Poverty Flat? </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Good-night! - here's the end of my paper; <br>Good-night! - if the longitude please, -<br>For maybe, while wasting my taper, <br>Your sun's climbing over the trees.<br>But know, if you haven't got riches, <br>And are poor, dearest Joe, and all that, <br>That my heart's somewhere there in the ditches, <br>And you've struck it, - on Poverty Flat</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Francis Bret Harte 1830_1902</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Song of a Plebutante</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Oh Mumsy, it's the starters of the Season<br>And here I am with not a thing to wear; <br>If I'm lucky I may stumble<br>On a T-shirt in a jumble<br>That won't look too outrageous in Sloane Square.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">I know we really can't afford a party, <br>With unions pushing Britain down the drain, <br>And I'm sorry poor old Daddy<br>Has to borrow from his caddie<br>And cycle to the City in the rain.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">I've had a teeny tete-a-tete with Tanya; <br>She couldn't fit me in at her boutique, <br>So I've joined the ranks of labour<br>With an office job at Faber, <br>And they're starting me at forty pounds a week.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Oh, getting up at eight won't be too ghastly, <br>(Fiona says that filing can be fun) , <br>But the times they are a-changing<br>And the marriage you're arranging<br>Will have to wait until I'm twenty-one.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Oh, Mumsy, please stop crying, there's a darling, <br>Oh, Daddy, I can't bear it if you shout; <br>But if Quentin Crisp can do it<br>There can't be that much to it, <br>And nothing's going to stop me coming out! </div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Roger WODDIS 1917_1993 <br>Parody Winthrop Mackworth PRAED A Letter of Advice</div><div style="margin:10px 0">A Letter of Advice, to My Godson </div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>TO MY GODSON.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">(Aged six weeks) </div><div style="margin:10px 0"> Small bundle, enveloped in laces, <br> For whom I stood sponsor last week, <br> When you slept, with the pinkest of faces, <br> And never emitted a squeak; <br> Though vain is the task of illuming<br> The Future's inscrutable scroll, <br> I cannot refrain from assuming<br> A semi-prophetical _role_, </div><div style="margin:10px 0"> I predict that in paths Montessorian<br> Your infantile steps will be led, <br> And with modes which are Phrygian and Dorian<br> Your musical appetite fed; <br> You'll be taught how to dance by a Russian, <br> 'Eurhythmics' you'll learn from a Swiss, <br> How not to behave like a Prussian-<br> No teaching is needed for this! </div><div style="margin:10px 0"> Will you learn Esperanto at Eton? <br> Or, if Eton by then is suppressed, <br> Be sent to grow apples or wheat on<br> A ranche in the ultimate West? <br> Will you aim at a modern diploma<br> In civics or commerce or stinks? <br> Inhale the Wisconsin aroma<br> Or think as the Humanist thinks? </div><div style="margin:10px 0"> Will you learn to play tennis from COVEY<br> Or model your stroke on JAY GOULD? <br> Will you play the piano like TOVEY<br> Or by gramophone records be schooled? <br> Will you golf, or will golfing be banished<br> To answer the needs of the plough, <br> And links from the landscape have vanished<br> To pasture the sheep and the cow? </div><div style="margin:10px 0"> Your taste in the region of letters<br> I only can dimly foresee, <br> But guess that from metrical fetters<br> The verse you'll affect must be free; <br> And I shan't be surprised or astounded<br> If your generation rebels<br> Against adulation unbounded<br> Of MASEFIELD and BENNETT and WELLS.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"> Upholding ancestral tradition<br> Your uncle has booked you at Lord's, <br> But I doubt if you'll sate your ambition<br> Athletic on well-levelled swards; <br> No, I rather opine that you'll follow<br> The lead that we owe to the WRIGHTS, <br> And soar like the eagle or swallow<br> On far and adventurous flights.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"> But no matter-in joy and affliction, <br> In seasons of failure or fame, <br> I cherish the certain conviction<br> You'll never dishonour your name; <br> For the love of the mother that bore you, <br> The life and the death of your sire<br> Will shine as a lantern before you, <br> To guide and exalt and inspire.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 152, March 28,1917 <br>Author Unknown Parody William Mackworth Praed</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Jonathan+Robin">Jonathan Robin</a><div class=q> <img src="https://www.citatepedia.ro/g/32share.png" style="float:left" alt="Share"> <script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=425018" data-title="Epistle to an Orphan after William Mackworth Praed A Letter of Advice de Jonathan Robin" data-description="They tell me you're promised a mother, to cuddle, to cosset, to care. Take care for she may try to smother, to cover her inner despair. The experts agree that another could just as well clinch the affair, - and beware that you never discover the..."></div> </div> </div>

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