"PERHAPS!"

King Country Chronicle, Volume VIII, Issue 722, 18 November 1914, Page 7

"PERHAPS!"

The Kaiser sat back on his throne of State, Surrounded by warbrds and maps. The while he studied a statue of Fate, Inscribed with the motto: "Perhaps!" Grimly and long he essayed to probe What that crypii« motto wcu'd tell: Whether it meant: Overlord of this globe Or a kitchen scullion of Hell — To fire up the ovena of hell!

The Kaiser rude in the van of his hosts, Neither this side nor that viewed hs: For his argosy thoughts were sailing 10 coasts That margined a limitless sen, Where fleets of dead Kaisers wrote on the sky, With their masts: Rap?, murder, and tears. And he clenched a mailed fist: "So God, and I, Will inscribe our fame on the years— Lest—lest ye forget us, 0 years." The Kaiser fled home, steed flogging he sped, Past shot-Bickled ranks of strewn sheaves — Yesternight, golden, now filthied with red: Like rust-blots on blight pitted leaves. Past altars, ablaze, whence nidorous reeks Of orphan flesh maphitic rollHaste Kaiaer, haste! lest their simitar shrieks, Cleave thy thug-ghouled superman soul--Thy millstone grained hun-human soul!

The Kaiser stood in hia chamber of State Now empty of warlords and maps, All—but the stern leering statue of Fate, And its crpytic motto: "Perhaps!"— Have fawned their last fawn in hia cancerous ears, With a dread-sick future to tryEt. His God-partner even no longer fearß, The threat of his will-crushing fist— His boneless, on:e braggart-mailed fist! —W.B.