"CABBY."

Digger (Invercargill RSA), Issue 26, 10 September 1920, Page 6

"CABBY."

In the pleasant days of the long ago, When our food was cheap and our traffic slow, And the auto. was a thing unknown, And only Icarus ever had flown ; While life was a leisurely pilgrimage, And five bob a day was a living wage — Then one of the commonest, friendliest sights, In the noonday glare, by the evening lights, Was Cabby. He was dressed in a long frock coat, once green, Or a sober black, with a friendly sheen, And an old top hat with a rakish "bell," And a pair of "pants" that he thought were swell ; And ho sometimes shaved, but more often not, Yet there wasn't a house or a vacant lot In the whole blamed town that he didn't know, And he drove at a gait that was sure, though slow, Did Cabby. He would dose in a most precarious style On his box — glued fast; I'm convinced, meanwhile. And a drop too much on his 'own inside Made him steer, perhaps, just a trifle wide; But to think that he might be drunk — oh, dear ! What a foolish thought for a glass of beer ! And he'd toucn his hat with a kind "Good day!" For a modest tip, as he drive away, Would Cabby. Oh, his was a pirate craft, I knw, And he drove at a pace that -was far too slow For the modern world with its mad, wild haste And its dread lest a moment run to waste ; So we've gained, no doubt, by our loss of him. In exchange for a chauffeur young and trim, Yet I sometimes dream of the days now past, And I long for a sight of the old outcast, For Cabby. — William Wallace Whitelock.