226 Colonel Sir Ronald Ross [June 4, 



Scour round and round to seek him, and the sea 

 Boils with their charges, bursting far below. 

 Sudden upchurned like a wounded whale, 

 Th' Assassin sees the sun and meets his doom ; 

 For now made visible he becomes our prey — 

 We rip him with swift shells — he sinks head-first. 

 Then all the classic sea is strewn with Huns — 

 Pink faces clamouring for our mercy, loud 

 To get what they give not : our soldiers rage 

 To let them drown, but still we drag them forth. 

 Two giant sea-planes, come too late to save us, 

 Acclaim our victory ; and our crowded ships 

 Leap forward for the Delphian Shore. 



We reach'd the Delphian Shore, we climb'd the Cleft 



Castalian. Euin'd all the sacred grove, 



And silent the stern faces of the rocks. 



But seven eagles, circling through the gorge 



Gave omen like the spirits of the gods 



Departed ; and, like questioners of old, 



My doubtful heart demanded one reply : 



Great god Apollo, why this dreadful strife ? 



And in the night the far-heard answer came. 



Apollo's Beply. 



I taught this lesson unto minds of worth 

 That man himself should be the god of earth, 

 Even like me, omniscient and bright, 

 In perfect wisdom, perfect beauty dight. 



But man would not be taught 



And, climbing higher, fell — 



A fancied heaven sought 



But reach'd a real hell, 



Now in their folly school'd 



They find what they desire — 



By evil idols ruled, 



To die in blood and mire. 



At least, this is what Apollo would have said if he had deigned to 

 answer at all ! By the " evil idols" he would have meant, not only 

 the Militarism and Politicalism which caused the war, but also the 

 whole brood of that parent idol, Nescience or Non-Intellectualism. 

 Men suffer chiefly because they still worship these false gods, and 

 " despise those plain eaithly teachers, Reason, Work, and Discipline." 

 On the other hand, the figures of Apollo, Pallas Athene, and the 

 Muses are the personifications of the great intellectual virtues which 

 have raised us from the barbaric state. Ab, it is a long time since 

 they were worshipped on those mountains and in those valleys cf 



