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The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Colonial Mortuary Bard; "'Reo," The Fisherman; and The Black Bream Of Australia, by Louis Becke This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org Title: The Colonial Mortuary Bard; "'Reo," The Fisherman; and The Black Bream Of Australia 1901 Author: Louis Becke Release Date: February 18, 2008 [EBook #24639] Language: English Character set encoding: ASCII *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE COLONIAL MORTUARY BARD *** Produced by David Widger _THE COLONIAL MORTUARY BARD_; "'REO," THE FISHERMAN; and THE BLACK BREAM OF AUSTRALIA By Louis Becke T. Fisher Unwin, 1901 _THE COLONIAL MORTUARY BARD_ A writer in the _Sydney Evening News_ last year gave that journal some amusing extracts from the visitors' book at Longwood, St. Helena. If the extracts are authentic copies of the original entries, they deserve to be placed on the same high plane as the following, which appeared in a Melbourne newspaper some years ago:-- "Our Emily was so fair That the angels envied her, And whispered in her ear, 'We will take you away on Tuesday night!'" I once considered this to be the noblest bit of mortuary verse ever written; but since reading the article in the Sydney paper I have changed my opinion, and now think it poor. Bonaparte, however, was a great subject, and even the most unintelligent mortuary verse-maker could not fail to achieve distinction when the Longwood visitors' book was given up unto him. Frenchmen, especially, figure largely. Here, for instance:-- "Malidiction. O grand homme! O grand Napoleon! Mais la France et toi aont venge-- Hudson Lowe est mort!" The last line is so truly heroic--French heroic. It instantly recalled to me a tale told by an English journalist who, on a cycling tour in France just after the Fashoda crisis, left his "bike" under the care of the proprietor of an hotel in Normandy. In the morning he found the tyres slashed to pieces, and on the saddle a gummed envelope, on which was bravely written, "Fashoda." This was unintentional mortuary poetry. The gallant Frenchman who did the daring deed when the owner of the "bike" was asleep did not realise that the wo
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