The Sport We Cannot Pronounce (Cockchafer-Baiting)

Lyrics

[Intro]
Right then, you two. Drop the lapidary work. Eyes here.
I'm about to impart a piece of history.
A genuine Edwardian field sport, straight from the lanes of old Kent.

[Verse 1]
We'd wait for May, for the dusk to settle.
The air would get thick with a sound...
a frantic, scratchy buzzing from the oaks. 
Melolontha melolontha. The May bug!
Reddish-brown, hairy things with their funny little fanned antennae.
You'd feel their little legs scrabbling in your palm.
We'd scoop them into a tin box, the air inside turning musty and sharp.

[Chorus]
And we called it Cockchafer-Baiting!
Yes! Cock-chafer-Baiting!
A test of a steady hand, a quick eye, and a bit of stout English cotton thread!
The finest sport of 1910!

[Verse 2]
Now, my Point Nemo version is an improvement. Scientific!
A proper racecourse from the parsonage wall to the first standing stone.
I've built a starting gate from driftwood.
The rules are simple: a humane tether—no pins, mind you, absolutely not—just a loop around the thorax.
First one to the finish line wins the glory. 
And a biscuit.

[Bridge]
It's educational! Entomology in practice!
Why, old Edward Tyson wrote about it. Taming the scarabaeus, he said.
And! If they fly erratically, it means rain's coming. It's meteorology!
Then Pemba appears. With that... look.
She says they are a cornerstone of the island's fragile ecosystem.
She says their grub stage is vital for soil aeration.
She says... "No."

[Chorus]
Cockchafer-Baiting. 
Ahem. Cockchafer-Baiting.
It's... frowned upon.
"Cruel to our six-legged neighbors," was the phrase, I believe. Hmph.

[Outro]
Neighbors. Bah. They're beetles.
In Sussex, we'd have thousands. A plague of them!
But here... oh, here they are *protected*.
Fine. We'll play stoolball tomorrow.
If the ball itself isn't a protected sphere of some sort.
Honestly.