Your talk is vanity, you who lightly vouch
That we, indifferent to the country's call, shun
A crisis under which the People crouch
Like DAMOCLES beneath the pendent falchion;
That from our minds, incredibly deluded,
Ulster is still excluded.

It is not so. All day (between our meals)
We find this topic really most attractive;
In watches of the night it often steals
Into our waking dreams, and keeps us active,
Like sportsmen whom the rude mosquito chases,
Trying to save our faces.

But we have other tasks, and "Duty First"
Must be our cry before we yield to Pleasure;
Our Annual Estimates must be rehearsed
Ere more alluring themes engage our leisure;
The Budget's claims are urgent; Ulster's fate
Can obviously wait.

Besides, no Government should go to war
Without the wherewithal to pay for forage,
For ammunition and a Flying Corps
And canned meats to stimulate the courage;
And this applies, as far as we can tell,
To civil wars as well.

For, though our foes confine us to a sphere
Of relatively narrow operations,
We are advised that they may cost us dear,
And therefore, in our coming calculations,
As Trustees of the Race we dare not miss
To estimate for this.

Hence these delays--all carefully thought out.
But when from hibernation we emerge on
The vernal prime and things begin to sprout,
Our Ulster policy shall also burgeon;
With sap of April coursing through our blood
We too shall burst in bud.

O. S.

* * * * *

THE GREAT RESIGNER.

(_A Forecast._)

_March, 1914._

Mr. WILLIAM O'BRIEN describes Mr. JOHN REDMOND as "brother to the
middle-aged sea-serpent from the County Clare."

Mr. JOHN REDMOND denies that he is a sea-serpent.

Mr. WILLIAM O'BRIEN, having denounced this denial as "the last effort
of a defeated dastard," resigns his seat for Cork City.

Mr. O'BRIEN is re-elected without a contest.

_April, 1914._

Mr. WILLIAM O'BRIEN in an impassioned speech advocates conciliation
all round in Ireland, and refers to Mr. JOHN REDMOND as "a moth-eaten,
moss-gathering malingerer of unparalleled ferocity."

Mr. REDMOND is seen to smile.

Mr. O'BRIEN, declaring that he has never been so much insulted in his
life, resigns his seat for Cork City.

Mr. O'BRIEN is