You may be a flabby fellow, and lymphatically yellow, that will
matter not a mite. 
If you take yourself in hand, in a way you’ll understand, to become
a Son of Light. 
On your crassness superimposing the peculiar art of glosing in sleek
phrases about Sin. 
If you aim to be a Shocker, carnal theories to cocker is the best way
to begin. 
And every one will say,
As you worm your wicked way,
“If that’s allowable for him which were criminal in me,
What a very emancipated kind of youth this kind of youth must be.”

Human virtues you’ll abhor all, and be down upon the Moral in
uncompromising style. 
Your critical analysis will reduce to prompt paralysis every motor
that’s not vile. 
You will show there’s naught save virtue that can seriously hurt you,
or your liberty enmesh;
And you’ll find excitement, plenty, in Art’s dolce far niente, with a
flavour of the flesh. 
And every one will say,
As you lounge your upward way,
“If he’s content with a do-nothing life, which would certainly not
suit me. 
What a most particularly subtle young man this subtle young man must be!”

Then having swamped morality in “intensified personality” (which,
of course, must mean your own),
And the “rational” abolished and “sincerity” demolished, you will
find that you have grown
With a “colour-sense” fresh handselled (whilst the moral ditto’s
cancelled) you’ll develop into—­well,
What Philistia’s fools malicious might esteem a vaurien vicious
(alias “hedonic swell"). 
And every one will say,
As you writhe your sinuous way. 
“If the highest result of the true ‘Development’ is decomposition,
why see
What a very perfectly developed young man this developed young man
must be.”

With your perky paradoxes, and your talk of “crinkled ox-eyes,” and
of books in “Nile-green skin.” 
That show forth unholy histories, and display the “deeper mysteries”
of strange and subtle Sin. 
You can squirm, and glose, and hiss on, and awake that nouveau
frisson which is Art’s best gift to life. 
And “develop”—­like some cancer (in the Art-sphere) whose best answer
is the silent surgeon’s knife! 
And every man will say,
As you wriggle on your way,
“If ‘emotion for the sake of emotion is the aim of Art,’ dear me! 
What a morbidly muckily emotional young man the ‘developed’ young
man must be!”

* * * * *

THE AMERICAN GIRL.

[An American Correspondent of The Galignani Messenger is
very severe on the manners of his fair countrywomen.]

[Illustration]

  She “guesses” and she “calculates,” she wears all sorts o’ collars,
    Her yellow hair is not without suspicion of a dye;
  Her “Pappa” is a dull old man who turned pork into dollars. 
    But everyone admits that she’s indubitably spry.