* * * * *
[Illustration: "OH! DO WEAR YOUR KHAKI TIE, DAD, OR ELSE NO ONE WILL KNOW
YOU'RE A SOLDIER."]
* * * * *
TRAVEL WITHOUT TRAINS.
(_Suggested by some recent remarks in "The Observer" on eccentric place
names._)
Now that the rise in railway fares
(At which no patriot cavils)
Has chained us elders to our chairs
And circumscribed our travels,
I love to play the festive game
Of astral gravitation
To any neighbourhood whose name
Is fraught with fascination.
I've never sampled in the flesh
The varied charms of Bootle,
But mentally I find them fresh
And redolent of footle;
And, though my steps to that resort
I never up till now bent,
Imagination can transport
My spirit into Chowbent.
Always alert upon the track
Of rich and strange emotion,
To Pudsey and to Wibsey Slack
I pay my fond devotion;
My heart is in the Highlands oft,
Though age its glow enfeebles,
And soars triumphantly aloft
At the mere sound of Peebles.
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