Major General Grant Peterkin, an officer of the Queen's Own Highlanders and educated at Ampleforth, reliably could sing:
I am the very model of a modern Major-General,
I've information vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I know the kings of England, and I quote the fights historical
From Marathon to Waterloo, in order categorical;
I'm very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical,
I understand equations, both the simple and quadratical,
About binomial theorem I'm teeming with a lot o' news,
With many cheerful facts about the square of the hypotenuse.
I'm very good at integral and differential calculus;
I know the scientific names of beings animalculous:
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.
I know our mythic history, King Arthur's and Sir Caradoc's;
I answer hard acrostics, I've a pretty taste for paradox,
I quote in elegiacs all the crimes of Heliogabalus,
In conics I can floor peculiarities parabolous;
I can tell undoubted Raphaels from Gerard Dows and Zoffanies,
I know the croaking chorus from The Frogs of Aristophanes!
Then I can hum a fugue of which I've heard the music's din afore,
And whistle all the airs from that infernal nonsense Pinafore.
Then I can write a washing bill in Babylonic cuneiform,
And tell you ev'ry detail of Caractacus' uniform:
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.
In fact, when I know what is meant by "mamelon" and "ravelin",
When I can tell at sight a Mauser rifle from a javelin,
When such affairs as sorties and surprises I'm more wary at,
And when I know precisely what is meant by "commissariat",
When I have learnt what progress has been made in modern gunnery,
When I know more of tactics than a novice in a nunnery—
In short, when I've a smattering of elemental strategy—
You'll say a better Major-General has never sat a-gee.
For my military knowledge, though I'm plucky and adventury,
Has only been brought down to the beginning of the century;
But still, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.
Unlike the clerk who, despite coming from the Department of Employment technical and vocational education initiative, and currently pretending to the oldest post of royal bodyguard in England dating from around 1189 in the time of Richard I, wouldn't know an education from a hole in the ground.
And if there is to be flaunting in black and lace and silken tights, Angels would rather it were by an officer of the Queen's Own Highlanders, as it would seem does the Queen, than one of the fat-thighed, clumsy women favoured by New Labour.
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6 comments:
And no doubt, like the rest of us, you too have a rather long little list of those who'll not be missed.
We really could do with a reincarnation of G&S to vilify today's politicians; that would be fun! But there seems to be nobody around these days with the necessary talent.
Reading the verse, much of it is so difficult. I know of the existence of those areas of knowledge (though not a worrying amount of the content) and would have a hard time even calling them to mind to write it, never mind scan and rhyme it (so to speak) and make it funny too. A standard education isn't up to much, is it? A sub-standard education isn't up to anything except lack of awareness.
Nick Drew can do it, but he's probably too busy right now.
Sterling down to 1.16 against the euro. When I loaded up the Saab in the New Dawn, and left, all those New Labour years ago, it was around 1.70. Even just under a year ago it was 1.48.
You keep warning, Nomad, but people can't believe it's happening.
Hear hear.
Exactly what my brother said.
He served five years as Met Police security there. He is equally dismayed by the continual degrading of office.
It all comes from Brown E-K. He destroyed any potential rival until he finally destroyed Blair. When you look at the politicians around him, none are worthy of the offices they hold.
It's clear now that he's destroyed and degraded all the permanent offices of the state as well as the government, no matter at what level, if they come anywhere near the interference with his use of power.
The judiciary, the civil service, the police, the army, the Church, he's been there wrecking and devaluing. He's been at the monarchy too, palling about with Charles.
"Sterling down to 1.16 against the euro. When I loaded up the Saab in the New Dawn, and left, all those New Labour years ago, it was around 1.70. Even just under a year ago it was 1.48."
Yes, HG when I did something similar the euro rate was around 66p where it stayed for ages. It is now somewhere in the mid 80s. which represents a substantial loss of funds merely on the exchange rate, but people who live in the UK will not notice this difference until they start taking the springtime away-day cruises to France. As you know, I do not deal with euros by my local rate over the past 6 months has declined from 7:1 to 5 and-a-bit:1 so still a serious depletion of transferable wealth.
{Sorry can't resist it, but the wv for this box is "nopelf". Says it all really.}
(I wonder how many younger readers will understand that without looking it up?)
There is not the smallest corner of our land,traditions and history that new labour does not wish to smash,destroy or subvert....I went past angry a long time ago.
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