A RUBAIYAT.
(By Selwyn Rider)
In his "Time That Passes'" column ii: the ''New Zealand Times," Selwyi Rider says: I am writing and intend shortly to publish, "The Rubaiyat of a Wowser." You must not object to the term or sound of "Wowser." I mean no disrespect to any alarmed or beligerent pietist; but the name does so appeal to my sense of fitness ihat j needs must use it. A wowser 1 take t'' be a man who, lacking grace to love his brother as he ought, suspects his brother with all his might. We have had so many Rubaiyat since FitzGerald led the way that it seems to me that in common fairness the Wowser ought t.» have a show. I shall commence something like this: QUAKE! for I rise grim-snarling in my Might To drag the Nation back into the Night; With Zest I poison every Fount of Joy, And with my Breath shall put the Stars to flight!
I wish to present the Wowser as he is—surly and sincere. I think he ought to have a chance to express himself, and as he has no personal gift of expression I feel that it is kind of me to make, myself his mouthpiece, the tender Boswell of this lumpish Johnson. His opinions are remarkable, arid it is fully time that the world of average men ?nd women should know them in their nudity undisguised. It seems such folly that we should cherish our wowsers, and pass laws at their bidding, and yet not know them as they are. Needless to say, one can generally distinguish them already by certain external signs. A few years ago, th** males of the species frequently wore chin-beards and shaved their upper lip-i. That custom died out, and I think that Mr Livingstone Hop kins and Mr Norman Lindsay greatly assisted to kill it. To-day, the male wowser is chielly distinguished l-y tlv. cold droop of his lips at the corners, fey the blank and hungry inhospitality of his eye, by the sad sagging of his trousers at the knees. The female of the species is not so easy to detect. Shs d< arly loves all conventions and meetings of her kind. She dogmatises loudly on men and politics; of which vexed matters she knows slightly less than nothing. She sings, "Blest be the tie that binds Our hearts in Christian love;*' but if you don't happen to belong to her congregation or acquaintance (or I even if you do), she will tear you to j tatters cheerfully for the sake of the exercieo. In the end the Wowser will
become extinct, like the Pterodactyl aud other ravening creatures. _.*ut in the meantime we have to endure him, and we might just as well know clearly what he feels and thinks.
A RUBAIYAT.
Northern Advocate, 21 June 1911, Page 3
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