[Vwoolf] "The Crocodile or, Public Decency"

[Stuart N. Clarke]

Cf. JR: “boys bathing in the Serpentine”:

Where Nile, with beneficial flood,
Improves the desert sand to mud,
The infant child, its banks upon,
Will run about with nothing on.
The London County Council not
Being adjacent to the spot,
This is the consequence.  Meanwhile, 
What is that object in the Nile
Which swallows water, chokes and spits?
It is the crocodile in fits.

‘Oh infant! oh my country’s shame!
Suppose a European came!
Picture his feelings, on his pure
Personally conducted tour!
The British Peer’s averted look, 
The mantling blush of Messrs. Cook!
Come, awful infant, come and be
Dressed, if in nothing else, in me.’

Then disappears into the Nile
The infant, clad in crocodile,
And meekly yields his youthful breath 
To darkness, decency, and death.

(AEH)
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