The Ballad of Ensign Joy. Hornung E.W.

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      The Ballad of Ensign Joy

      THE BALLAD of ENSIGN JOY

      IT is the story of

      Ensign Joy

      And the obsolete

      rank withal

      That I love for each gentle English

      boy

      Who jumped to his country's

      call.

      By their fire and fun, and the

      deeds they've done,

      I would gazette them Second to

      none

      Who faces a gun in Gaul!)

      IT is also the story of Ermyntrude

      A less appropriate name

      For the dearest prig and the

      prettiest prude!

      But under it, all the same,

      The usual consanguineous squad

      Had made her an honest child

      of God —

      And left her to play the game.

      IT was just when the grind of

      the Special Reserves,

      Employed upon Coast Defence,

      Was getting on every Ensign's

      nerves —

      Sick-keen to be drafted

      hence —

      That they met and played tennis

      and danced and sang,

      The lad with the laugh and the

      schoolboy slang,

      The girl with the eyes intense.

      YET it wasn't for him that she

      languished and sighed,

      But for all of our dear deemed

      youth;

      And it wasn't for her, but her

      sex, that he cried,

      If he could but have probed

      the truth !

      Did she? She would none of his

      hot young heart;

      As khaki escort he's tall and

      smart,

      As lover a shade uncouth.

      HE went with his draft. She

      returned to her craft.

      He wrote in his merry vein:

      She read him aloud, and the

      Studio laughed!

      Ermyntrude bore the strain.

      He was full of gay bloodshed and

      Old Man Fritz:

      His flippancy sent her friends

      into fits.

      Ermyntrude frowned with

      pain.

      HIS tales of the Sergeant who

      swore so hard

      Left Ermyntrude cold and

      prim;

      The tactless truth of the picture

      jarred,

      And some of his jokes were

      grim.

      Yet, let him but skate upon

      tender ice,

      And he had to write to her twice

      or thrice

      Before she would answer him.

      YET once she sent him a

      fairy's box,

      And her pocket felt the brunt

      Of tinned contraptions and

      books and socks —

      Which he hailed as "a sporting

      stunt!"

      She slaved at his muffler none

      the less,

      And still took pleasure in mur-

      muring, "Yes!

      For a friend of mine at the

      Front.")

      ONE fine morning his name

      appears —

      Looking so pretty in print!

      "Wounded!" she warbles in

      tragedy tears —

      And pictures the reddening

      lint,

      The drawn damp face and the

      draggled hair.

      But she found him blooming in

      Grosvenor Square,

      With a punctured shin in a

      splint.

      IT wasn't a haunt of Ermyn-

      trude's,

      That grandiose urban pile;

      Like starlight in arctic altitudes

      Was the stately Sister's smile.

      It was just the reverse with

      Ensign Joy —

      In his golden greeting no least

      alloy —

      In his shining eyes no guile!

      HE showed her the bullet that

      did the trick —

      He showed her the trick,

      x-ray'd;

      He showed her a table timed to

      a tick,

      And a map that an airman

      made.

      He spoke of a shell that caused grievous loss —

      But he never mentioned a certain

      cross

      For his part in the escapade!

      SHE saw it herself in a list next

      day,

      And it brought her back to his

      bed,

      With a number of beautiful

      things to say,

      Which were mostly over his

      head.

      Turned pink as his own pyjamas'

      stripe,

      To her mind he ceased to em-

      body a type —

      Sank into her heart instead.

      I WONDER that all of you

      didn't retire!"

      "My blighters were not that

      kind."

      "But it says you 'advanced un-

      der murderous fire,

      Machine-gun and shell com-

      bined – '"

      "Oh, that's the regular War

      Office wheeze!"

      "'Advanced' – with that leg! —

      'on his hands and knees'!"

      "I couldn't leave it behind."

      HE was soon trick-driving an

      invalid chair,

      and dancing about on a crutch;

      The haute