248 WATERSIDE SKETCHES. 



be the excuse for the simile only jumped from the frying- 

 pan into the fire, inasmuch as the next three entertainers 

 were terribly dull dogs. One of them floundered (why did 

 not the conveyancer try to work in the flounder ?) through 

 two sentences, and broke hopelessly down ; the other recited 

 a soliloquy on " The chief purpose of man " ; the third,, 

 who had a voice like a saw-sharpener, dashed into " Where 

 the bee sucks/' screeching in the most excruciating fashion 

 the long run on the last word in the Bat's back line. 



At this stage of the proceedings there was a universal 

 desire for a melody, in which a chorus-singer might hear of 

 something to his advantage, and the member whose turn 

 came next happened to be just the fellow for the crisis. 

 Swinging his pipe and looking round with a now-then-all- 

 together air, he roared in stentorian harmony : 



" Now Johnny the angler's a jolly lad hurrah ! hurrah ! 

 He's never disheartened and never sad hurrah ! hurrah ! 

 He's out of the racket of trouble and toil ; 

 He's king of the water if not of the soil : 



And light in his step when Johnny comes marching home/* 



There were eight verses of this home-spun material, the last 

 stanza containing the inevitable moral, in which the author 

 suggested that there could not be a better all-round bait 

 for the angler than contentment, and laid down the in- 

 disputable axiom that "Fair-play is a jewel for fishes or 

 men." Probably this was the most roughly constructed 

 song sung during the evening, but nothing could exceed 

 the gusto with which the "responses 7 ' were taken up, or 

 the fine effect produced by the raps dealt out to the 

 table as a suitable accompaniment to "hurrah! hurrah!" 

 Another member chanted in a sort of Gregorian the story of 



