Madame Eulalie’s Rare PlumsThe Family Scapegrace.
Vanity Fair (UK), April 19, 1906
(Speaking of a celebrated centre three-quarter, a football paper says that he was originally a full back, “and it was a great grief to his father when he changed his place.”)
Oh, no, we never mention him,
His name is never heard:
Concerning this abandoned boy,
We never say a word.
Forsaking all the prospects which
Undoubtedly he had,
And deaf to all our prayers, he went
Completely to the bad.
Our John has gone to Aldershot,
Our Bertie to the Bar,
Our Willie (an explorer he)
To foreign lands afar;
And Sammy to our ancient name
Fresh lustre’s sure to add;
He’s gone to Oxford, brainy youth:—
But Dick’s gone to the bad.
Full back he used to play, and he
Was making quite a name,
Till, deaf to conscience’s appeal,
Three-quarters he became:
Yes; heedless of his mother’s tears,
The anguish of his dad,
He threw up his career, and went
Completely to the bad.
Printed unsigned in Vanity Fair; entered by Wodehouse in Money Received for Literary Work.
A similar poem appeared unsigned in the “By the Way” column of the Globe newspaper on February 23, 1906, during Wodehouse’s tenure as editor of the column:
The Black Sheep.
(A football paper states that a certain well-known centre
three-quarter used originally to play full-back, and “it was a
great grief to his father when he abandoned this position.”)
Oh, no, we never mention him:
His name is never heard.
Respecting his career to-day
We never say a word.
Forsaking all the prospects which
Undoubtedly he had,
And deaf to all our prayers, he went
Completely to the bad.
Our John has gone to Aldershot,
Our Bertie to the Bar,
Our William (an explorer he)
To foreign lands afar;
And Sammy to our ancient name
Fresh lustre’s sure to add,
He's gone to Oxford, brainy boy;
But Dick's gone to the bad.
Full back he used to play, and he
Was making quite a name,
Till, deaf to Conscience’s appeal,
Three-quarter he became:
Yes, heedless of his mother’s tears,
The anguish of his dad,
He threw up his career, and went
Completely to the bad.
* * * * *
The opening lines and the meter parody a poem by Thomas Haynes Bayly (1797–1839), the first stanza of which reads:
Oh no: we never mention Her!
Her name is never heard:
My lips are now forbid to speak
That once-familiar word.
From sport to sport they hurry me,
To banish my regret;
And, when they win a smile from me,
They think that I forget.
* * * * *
Wodehouse’s characters often allude to this stanza, from Psmith ("From ledger to ledger they hurry me, to stifle my regret" in Psmith in the City, chapter 14: see the serialized version “The New Fold” on this site) to Bertie Wooster in chapter 2 of Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves (1963).