THE POLICEWOMAN.

Vanity Fair (UK), March 30, 1905
 

(Owing to the fact that so many men are required for military service, women are being enrolled as police constables in Japan.)

OF all the evils we deplore,
   Which make a nation sad, distressful,
The worst beyond a doubt is War,
   E’en when one’s troops are most successful.
But still we’re apt to think a cloud
   That isn’t silver-lined a rum one,
And winds are ill, it is allowed,
   Which do not blow some good to someone.

This war, for instance, is the cause
   Of universal jubilation
To Japanese who break the laws
   Framed to control their rising nation.
They earn their daily bread in peace:
   In Tokyo now it’s rare to see males,
And all the work of the police
   Is, so they say, performed by females.

A constable’s the sort of man
   With whom it’s horrid to have dealings.
He treats the rowdy on a plan
   Which very often hurts their feelings.
His acts are difficult to bear,
   If you resist, he sometimes hits you,
Or hurls you crudely through the air,
   Being an expert at Ju-Jitsu.

But now the man who sallies out
   On what is coarsely termed the “razzle,”
At worst is greeted with a pout,
   At best with smiles which charm and dazzle.
Of violence there’s not a trace,
   For grumbling there is left but small room:
Arrests are managed with a grace
   That’s reminiscent of the ball-room.

P. G. Wodehouse.