OFF WITH HIS HEAD!

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 206, 31 August 1936, Page 6

OFF WITH HIS HEAD!

(By BAXTER O'NEILL.)

I 0, ilain the pomp of yesterday, J And vain the prestige too, For no man cares what George may say As once men used to do. When Fortune smiled, in glad array They gave him leader's due, Approving all he had lo say— A sycophantic crew. Then Fortune frowned as Fortune may (For Fortune is a shrew) And of that hand there stands to-day In fast allegiance—who? Fairweatlier friends, they fall away To seek alliance new, Nor pause to hear what George may say As once they used to do. When Fortune frowns then men betray, Adherents left are few Who still believe what George may say As once men used to do. My word, we're in a solemn mood to-day. And why not? Here we have all sorts of people running about saying that it is about time that the Nationalists had some other leader. Mr. Forbes, these fellows say, won't do as a leader any longer, and, as for Mr. Coates 1 , why, he can just go back to the mountains and take a good long think for the rest of his life. They don't want either of them. The fellows who are in Parliament —the Nationalist fellows, that is—have rallied round to say that George is quite O.K. But the "outs" are mumbling away among themselves, and it looks as if anything might happen. It's just the old, old story. Being a leader is all right if you win. Look at Uncle Joe. If you take tip your stand on the street corner and cry: "Uncle Joe is an ass," somebody will hit you with a brick. Uncle Joe is just the best thing that has ever happened in this country. He won. But the fellow who gets licked, oh, dear.

Woo to him whose scattered forces, decimated yield And break and leave the hated foe triumphant on the field, Who fights the battle but to find the cause completely lost, And finds he's paid in this but one instalment of the cost. For when the foeman, sated, his triumphant marching ends, The luckless leader then must meet the vengeance of his friends, More merciless than foeman's thrust, by disillusion led It sets the price of failure as the fallen leader's i head. Of what avail to George to-day that men allegiance swore? The hopes they found misplaced have but enraged them all the more, And though the small surviving band profess no troubled doubt A mutiny is gaining ground among the men who're out. Goodness, tliis won't do at all. Far too pompous. I get all out of breath trying to say it. Some shorter lines, please, Mr. Printer! Nationalists whom, George has led, Nationalists whose hopes are dead, Are you seeking George's head Beneath a chopper? Do you seek to work on him The torments of your vengeance grim, And all because with cause too slim You came a cropper? Alas, poor George I ere he goes west Consider this: He did his best As all his utterances attest; So ere you bind him Inquire if vengeance be not due, As pay for guilt, to some of you Who made the inefficient crcw Of men behind him.