_WITH SOME CONSIDERATION CONCERNING COMPULSORY CLASSICS._

[Illustration]

DEAR CHARLIE,--O, _ain't I_ a daisy? Excuse your old pal busting forth;
But my name's going hup like a rocket; it's spreading east, west, south,
and north.
Like that darned hinfluenza, but more so; and now, s'elp me scissors, I
find
I was famous _afore I was born_! Sounds a licker, but 'anged if _I_
mind.[1]

DAN the Dosser, a reglar Old Clo' at dead langwidges, classicks, and such,
Says it's _met'em-see-kosis_--a thing as to me, mate, is jest Double Dutch,
Means a soul on the shift, as it were, CHARLIE, tryin' fust this form,
then that,
So that 'ARRY, who once was a donkey, might some o' these days be a rat!

Leastways so the Dosser explains it, of course it is all Tommy rot.
Rummy thing 'ow a cram o' the Classicks do make yer a reglar crackpot.
Dosser hain't no more genuine savvy, he hain't, than a 'aporth o' snuff;
But he's up to the lips-like in Latin, and similar old-fashioned stuff.

Seems some old Latin cove called CAT ULLUS--a gayish old dog _I_ should
say
Knew a party called ARRIUS!--bless 'im!--as lived in that rum Roman day,
And CAT ULLUS he hups and he scribbles a "carmen"--wich then meant a song,
_Not_ a hopera, CHARLIE--about him along of some haitches gone wrong.