A SCHOOL FOR STATESMEN.

[The _Hamburger Fremdenblatt_, in an article on our Ambassador at
Petrograd, ascribes his success as a diplomat to his passion for golf--
"if one can speak of passion in connection with this cold game of
meadow billiards." "The conditions," it goes on to say, "in which this
rather tiresome game is played do really produce the qualities
necessary for any statesmanlike or diplomatic work.... Silent, tough,
resigned, unbroken ... the good golfer walks round his field, keeps his
eye on the ball and steers for his goal.... Sir George Buchanan walked
round the whole golf field of Europe for years until at last he was
able in Petrograd to hurl the ball into the goal."]

Oft have I wondered as my weapon's edge
Disintegrated solid chunks of greenery,
Or as my pillule flew the bounding hedge
Into outlying sections of the scenery,
What moral value might accrue
From billiards played beneath the blue.

Little I fancied when I topped the sphere
And on its candour left a coarse impression,
Or in the bed of some revolting mere
Mislaid three virgin globes in swift succession,
That I was learning how to grip
The rudiments of statesmanship.

Yet so it was. I schooled myself to gaze
Upon the object with a firmly glued eye,