MESOPOTAMIA

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume XLV, Issue XLV, 19 October 1917, Page 1

MESOPOTAMIA

TBm Bttdyahd Kipling, in the 'Morning Pewt.'j They ehali not return to its., the resolute., the young, The eager and whole-hearted whom we gave; j"Rut the men who left thein thriftily to die . io their own dang—- ' Shall they come with years a"nd_ honor to the grave? ~ Thev shaD not return to us, the strong men slowly slain In sight of help denied from day to day; littfc the men who edged their agonies and chid them in their pain— Are these too strong, or wise, to put away? Our dead shall not return to us while day and _ night divide, Never while the bars of sunset hold; But the idle-minded overlings who qoihible-t

while tliey tiled— / 1 Shall they thrust fox- high employments'as of old? Shall we only threaten and be angrv for an hour? When the storm is ended shall we find How softly, but how softly, they have sidled back to power • By the favor and contrivance of their kind? Even while they soothe us, while they promise large amends. ISven while tliey make a show of fear, Fhey call upon their debtors, they lake counsel with their friends, To renew and re-establish each career, iheir lives cannot repay us, their death could not- undo The shame that- they have laid upon our race; Dili- the slothfulness that wasted and the arrogance that dew— Shall we leave it unabated in its place P