For several hectic minutes the air was thick with buns, It was almost as bad, so he told me, as the shelling of the Huns, But our gallant Tennysonian held on until a clout In the eye from a metal teapot knocked him ultimately out.
A sympathetic waitress fled off to fetch the police, Whose opportune arrival caused hostilities to cease, And they carefully conveyed him to a hospital hard by Where a skilful surgeon managed to preserve his wounded eye.
It was from the self-same surgeon that I subsequently learned The first remark of the victim when his consciousness returned:-- "The Georgians may shine at shying the crumpet and the scone, But as poets they're just No Earthly compared with TENNYSON."
He never got a medal for his exploit, or a star, And his only decoration was an ugly frontal scar; But still I hold him highest among heroic men, This lone Victorian champion in the Georgian lions' den.
[Illustration: "BED, SIR? HERE IS A GENUINE JACOBEAN, FOR WHICH WE ARE ASKING ONLY TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY GUINEAS."
"WELL, TO TELL YOU THE TRUTH I WASN'T WANTING TO _BUY_ ONE. BUT I CAN'T GET A BED ANYWHERE IN LONDON, AND I WAS JUST WONDERING IF YOU COULD LET ME SLEEP IN IT TO-NIGHT."]
I will admit that it was I who gave Mrs. Brackett the idea. But to blame me for the very unfortunate _dénouement_ is ridiculous.
"I'm on my way to a registry-office," she said. "No, not that kind of registry-office; I'm not about to commit bigamy. I mean the kind where domestic assistants are sought, but mostly in vain. I suppose you don't know of a cook, a kitchenmaid, a housemaid, a parlourmaid and a tweeny?"
I confessed that I did not. But I told her the story of some friends of mine who had been in a similar position and had succeeded in reorganising their establishment by an ingenious strategy.
"The wife went away to stay with friends in the country," I said, "and the husband went to the registry-office, representing himself to be a bachelor, a rather easy-going bachelor. It seems that such establishments are popular with the few domestic servants still at large. After a short time he let it be known that he was really married, but separated from his wife; and after a further interval he called his household together and with tears in his voice informed them that he and his wife had composed their differences and that she was returning to him on the morrow. I understand that it was a complete success."