To The King's Bulldog

Dear Brindle, -         Possibly your name is not Brindle,         But that is of no consequence;         The great point, my dear Brindle, being         That when his Majesty Edward VII.         Landed at Flushing the other day         He was accompanied         By         You.         At least so I gather from the halfpenny papers,         And I am free to admit         That when I read the paragraph         Descriptive of your landing at Flushing         My bosom swelled with honest pride.         I am not a doggy man myself,         Dear Brindle,         And no judge of points.         Also,         When I see a dog coming towards me         I invariably         Whisper         "Bite,"         And consequently         My hair         Is apt to stand on end         Like quills upon the fretful porcupine         At pretty well every canine approach.         Bulldogs especially         Affright me,         So that I can well understand         How the little foreign boy,         Assembled at Flushing         To scoff in his sleeve at the English King,         Remained to flee as it were         At the sight of you.         That, in a nutshell,         Is why my bosom swelled         When I read the paragraph         To which previous reference has been made.         It was a picturesque circumstance, my dear Brindle.         And may be taken         As one more illustration         Of his Majesty's determination         (Pray excuse the rhyme)         To do things as a king of England should.         To have alighted at Flushing         Accompanied by a Lion         Would have been a little outr,         And Unicorns, we know,         Are not obtainable -         What does his Majesty do?         Why he takes, as he always has taken,         The middle and dignified course:         He disjects himself on Flushing         With You by his side.         Next to the Lion and the Unicorn         The Bulldog may be reckoned         The truest         Exemplar and symbol         Of our great nation.         It is like this:         The Bulldog is not too beautiful,         Neither is our great nation;         But he frightens people -         So do we;         He is tenacious         And magnanimous -         Which is just our game;         He fears no foe in shining armour,         Or any other sort of armour -         That is precisely our case;         And he is kept by Lord Charles Beresford,         The Duke of Manchester,         And Mr. G. R. Sims -         Three eminently typical Britons.         In short,         The genius of the British nation,         My dear Brindle,         Is not a policeman         But a Bulldog.