Viceroy Archibald Wavell, "Jabber-Weeks" poem from 1946

Appears in Wavell: the viceroy's journal, Oxford University Press, 1973.

(July 1 1946)
I picked up Alice through the Looking Glass one evening shortly before the end of the Mission and wrote the parody below; I put it down here but doubt whether it is really worth preserving.


JABBER-WEEKS
(From Phlawrence through the Indian Ink)
Twas grillig; and the Congreelites
Did harge and shobble in the swope;
All Jinsy were the Pakstanites,
And the spruft Sikhs outstrope.

Beware the Gandhiji, my son,
The satyagraha, the bogy fast,
Beware the Djinnarit, and shun
The frustrious scheduled caste.

He took his crippsian pen in hand,
Long time in draftish mood he wrote,
And fashioned as his lethal brand
A cabimissionary note.

And as he mused with pointed phrase
The Gandhiji, on wrecking bent,
Came tripling down the bhangi ways,
And waffled as he went.

Ed do, Ek do, and blow on blow
The pointed phrase went slicker snack;
And, with the dhoti, Ghosh and goat, he
Came chubilating back.

And hast thou swoozled Gandhiji!
Come to my arms, my blimpish boy!
Hoo-ruddy-ray! O Labour Day,
He shahbashed in his joy.

Twas grillig; and the Congreelites
Did harge and shobble in the swope;
All Jinsy were the Pakstanites,
And the spruft Sikhs outstrope.

"It’s very interesting," said Phlawrence a little wearily, "but it’s rather hard to understand."
"So is nearly everything in this country", answered Hobson-Jobson. "Shall I explain some of the difficult words for you?"
‘Yes, please’, said Phlawrence.
"Well, grillig is in the hot-weather at Delhi, when everyone’s brains are grilled before 2 p.m. and don’t get ungrilled till 2 a.m. Congreelites are animals rather like conger eels, very slippery, they can wriggle out of anything they don’t like. Harge is a portmanteau word, it means to haggle and argue; to shobble is to shift and wobble; a swope is a place open to sweepers. Pakstanites are rather fierce noisy animals, all green, they live round mosques and can’t bear Congreelites. Spruft means spruce and puffed up; outstrope means that they went round shouting out that they weren’t being fairly treated and would take direct action about it."
"That seems a lot for one word to mean," said Phlawrence.
"The Sikhs don’t quite know what it does mean yet," said Hobson-Jobson.
"Well, anyway, the Gandhiji seems to have been swoozled, whatever that means," said Phlawrence, "and I expect that was a good thing."
"But he wasn’t," said Hobson-Jobson, "they found out afterwards that he had swoozled everyone else."
"Thank you very much for your explanation," said Phlawrence after a pause, "but I am afraid it is all still very difficult."