To bursts of eloquence or flights of feeling;
You do not emulate the fretful tone
Of those who turn from boastfulness to squealing;
Your temperament, I am obliged to own,
Is not expansive, Celtic, self-revealing;
But some of us admire you none the less
For your laconic simple truthfulness.

No doubt you would provide far better "copy"
To the industrious drivers of the quill
If you were more emotional and sloppy,
More richly dowered with journalistic skill;
To make despatches blossom like the poppy
You never have essayed and never will;
In short, you couldn't earn a pound a week
As a reporter on _The Daily Shriek_.

Frugal in speech, yet more than once impelled
To utter words of confidence and cheer,
Whereat some dismal publicists rebelled
As premature, ill-founded, insincere--
Words none the less triumphantly upheld
By Victory's verdict, resonantly clear,
Words that inspired misgiving in the foe
Because you do not prophesy--you _know_;

Steadfast and calm, unmoved by blame or praise,
By local checks or Fortune's strange caprices,
You dedicate laborious nights and days
To shattering the Hun machine to pieces;