"The London publishers, in response to an extraordinary demand, are busy producing new cookery books. All the newspapers are making a feature of recipes for meatless dishes, and the more enterprising dailies are vying with each other in this new department of daily journalism. Cookery experts have joined the staffs of the big morning and evening papers, and are paid salaries commensurate with the importance of their mission."
The splendid bard has had his day.
For long he held a regal sway
O'er studious humanity.
We read his verses by the fire,
Enthralling was his muse's ire,
Its sweetness failed not to inspire
A suitable urbanity.
The leader-writer, man of worth,
Who still pretends to run the earth
With eloquence sophisticated,
Is presently to be ignored,
Too long the reader has been bored
With his statistics, and abhorred
Presumption egotistical.
The storytellers, and the nuts
Who write about potato gluts
And vegetable particles
Will have no particular regard,
The paragrapher will be barred,
As will the other solemn card
Who writes the special articles.
In short, the gentle reader now
His vulgar taste will disavow
For ordinary bookery,
And give his leisure after toil
To burning up the midnight oil,
Perusing Grubb on "How to Broil"
And "Variegated Cookery".
The elocuter will recite
Of tarts and hash, and Melba might
Devote her great ability
To songs of how to boil and roast,
That scribe the world will honor most,
Who writes of puddings, stews and toast
With knowledge and subtility.
First published in The Bulletin, 11 July 1918
