Versos English A. D. Godley Chorus

English poem

Chorus

by (1856–1925)

Listen in the reader

Woe! Woe! Woe! Woe! What shall we do and where shall we go? Dublin or Durham, Heidelberg, Bonn, All to escape the recalcitrant don? In what peaceful shade reclined Shall the cultured female mind E'er remunerated be By a Bachelor's Degree? Pheu, pheu! Whence, O whence (here the antistrophe ought to commence), Whence shall we the privilege seek Due to our knowledge of Latin and Greek? Shall we tear our waving locks? Shall we rend our Sunday frocks? No, 'tis plain that nothing can Melt the so-called heart of man. While with loud triumphant pealings Ring his cries of horrid joy, Let us vent our outraged feelings In a wild otototoi-- Justifiable impatience, when the shafts of fate annoy, Makes one utter exclamations such as ototototoi!

Enter PROFESSOR PLACET

I ask you, ye intolerable creatures, Why raise this wholly execrable din, O objects of dislike to the discreet? Six hundred persons, also sixty-two (Almost the very number of the Beast) Have voted for you, and defend your gates. Moreover, mark my subtle argument:-- When gates are locked no person can get in Without unlocking them: your gates are locked, And I have got the key: so that, unless I ope the gates, the foe cannot get in. This statement is Pure Reason: or, if this Is not Pure Reason, I don't know what is.