THE ARROWS

Waikato Argus, Volume XXXVI, Issue 5726, 1 October 1914, Page 3

THE ARROWS

I'm getting good at strategy, as everybody is: There's thousands of us tit to teach Lord Kitchener his biz ; By marking blobs of red and blue on Austria and France We spitlicate the Kaiser every time we get a chance ; And the object of our envy is the conscientious chap Who spend hi. nights and mornings putting arrows on the map. His arrows are convincing ; they are big and black and bold, And they tell a swifter story than the cables ever told ; They prove with sharp precision how the battle has been won, And whether France or Germany is now upon the run: The British lion's tail will wag, the eagle's wings will flap, According to the witness of the arrows on the map. There were days when every arrow from the northward pointed down, Like a barb of death and venom that was hurled at Paris town ; Then they shifted to the eastward but they still were westward flung And the croakers in our suburb talked of Britain's going bung;_ So very pessimistic were the lolks who got a slap From the menace of the arrows, the arrows on the map. But croakers now are brighter, and are hoping for the best, Since all the arrows started pointing east instead of west; Since the feathers rest on Paris, and the barb is turned away, The gloomiest Jeremiah hopes to live another day; It is good to see the Germans getting tickled in the scrap By the points of English lances and the arrows on the map.

Both east and west of Germany the lances gather fast, While every morning's arrows are a copy of the last, And soon the dav is coming when the Kaiser will grow thin To see all spear-heads pointing in a bee-line to Berlin ; The fortune of the coming fight the Rods hold on their lap May be augured from the arrows, the arrows on the map. (Dedicated to all map-makers-Sydney " Sun.)