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Title: Modern Diplomacy, Or How The War Started
Author: Abner Cosens [
More Titles by Cosens]
August, 1914
Said Austria,--"You murderous Serb,
You the peace of all Europe disturb;
Get down on your knees,
And apologize, please,
Or I'll kick you right off my front curb."
Said Serbia,--"Don't venture too far,
Or I'll call in my uncle, the Czar;
He won't see me licked,
Nor insulted, nor kicked,
So you better leave things as they are."
Said the Kaiser,--"That Serb's a disgrace.
We must teach him to stay in his place,
If Russia says boo,
I'm in the game, too,
And right quickly we'll settle the case."
The Czar said,--"My cousin the Kaiser,
Was always a good advertiser;
He's determined to fight,
And insists he is right,
But soon he'll be older and wiser."
"For forty-four summers," said France,
"I have waited and watched for a chance
To wrest Alsace-Lorraine
From the Germans again,
And now is the time to advance."
Said Belgium,--"When armies immense
Pour over my boundary fence,
I'll awake from my nap,
And put up a scrap
They'll remember a hundred years hence."
Said John Bull,--"This 'ere Kaiser's a slob,
And 'is word isn't worth 'arf a bob,
(If I lets Belgium suffer,
I'm a blank bloomin' duffer)
So 'ere goes for a crack at 'is nob."
Said Italy,--"I think I'll stay out,
Till I know what this row is about;
It's a far better plan,
Just to sell my banan',
Till the issue is plain beyond doubt."
Said our good uncle Samuel, "I swaow
I had better keep aout of this raow,
For with Mormons, and Niggers,
And Greasers, I figgers
I have all I kin handle just naow."
[The end]
Abner Cosens's poem: Modern Diplomacy, Or How The War Started
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