]

When with another winter's horror nearing
Once more you send along the old, old dove
And frame with bloody lips that hide their leering
A canticle of love;

It has no doubt a most seductive cadence,
But we who look for argument by fact
We miss conciliation's artful aidance,
We note a want of tact.

Your words are redolent of pious unction;
Your deeds, your infamies, by sea and shore,
Go gaily on without the least compunction
Just as they went before.

We are not caught with olive-buds for baiting;
Something is needed just a shade less crude,
Something, for instance, faintly indicating
The penitential mood.

While still the stain is on your hands extended
We'll hold no commerce with your frigid spells,
Even though such a move were recommended
By Mr. H.G. WELLS.

Rather, without a break, like _Mr. Britling_
(Though the brave wooden sword his author drew
Seems to have undergone a certain whittling),
We mean to "see it through."

O.S.

* * * * *

THE GREAT MAN.

What am I doing, Dickie? Well, I'll tell you. I'm one of those
subalterns you hear of sometimes. You know the kind of things they do?
They look after their men and ask themselves every day in the line
(as per printed instructions), "Am I offensive enough?" In trenches
they are ever to the fore, bombing, patrolling, raiding, wiring and
inspecting gas helmets. Working-parties under heavy fire are as meat
and drink, rum and biscuits to them. Once every nine months, and when
all Staff officers have had three goes, they get leave in order to
give excuse for the appointment of A.P.M.'s. There are thousands of
us, and we are supposed to run the War. These are the things which
I am sure (if you get newspapers in Ceylon) jump into your mind the
moment I mention the word subaltern, and I may as well tell you that
in associating me with any one of these deeds at the present time you
are entirely wrong.

I sit in a room, an office papered with maps in all degrees of
nakedness, from the newest and purest to those woad-stained veterans
called objective maps. In this room, where regimental officers tread
lightly, speak softly and creep away, awed and impotent--HE sits.
"HE" is a G.S.O.3, or General Staff Officer, third grade. He it is
who looks after the welfare of some hundred thousand troops (when
everybody else is out). I am a