TUT, TUT, TINO.

Free Lance, Volume XVI, Issue 847, 29 September 1916, Page 6

TUT, TUT, TINO.

King Constantine's Cheek

W T begins to look as if. before many i days are over. . the "dear Tino," of so many famous telegrams from Potsdam .to Athens., may have to. pack up his crown and personal regalia in his kit-bag- and switch on to the Orient express for Berlin;; -that is if lie can manage to break through the cordon of the Allies' troops in the-Epirus. A wave of revolt against the Kaiser's brother-in-law and contemptible minion is gradually spreading.'all over Greecej and, despite the ; machine guns with which he has fortified his palace, he may find himself in a mightily unpleasant; and unsafe position. Meanwhile, it is vastly amusing ; to see "the colossal cheek of the Kaiser's ' puppet. Note "how he apes the Kaiserliche airs and graces, the unbridled arrogance and consummate cheek of the haughty Hohenzollerns. "You are my soldiers; mine only! You are to obey my orders," etc., etc.- ' '.'" •

"Quos Dcus vult perdere prius dementat" —"whom the gods would destroy they first make mad" is a free translation. Dear Pino has been drifting into dementia ever since lie vainly dreamt of the Allies being foolish enough to leavfe Salonika for the north and leave him to give them a stab in the back with that army which the Allies compelled him to demobilise. Even to-day he is still dreaming, his latest delusion being thesmashing of Rouniania by the Bulgarians,,, aided by. Von Mackensen's Germans. But this, like Dear Tino's earlier dreams, is fatal, so it would seem-by the latest cables, to j>rove .as empty and profitless as its predecessor's. Once the Greek people begin to understand how Constantino—and the Kaiser—have befooled them, the days of the present Greek monarchy will be numbered. And the. progress of such enlightenment bids fair to be very rapid. -