Volume 158 — OF CERTAIN BRUTUSES WHO MISSED THEIR MARK.

Have you heard of the coming of Nemesis, How she glides through the ambient gloom That envelops the Downing-Street premises Where George is awaiting his doom? For the hour of his utter discredit Has struck and the blighter must go If the Carmelite organs have said it It's bound to be so. The Cabinet's daily imbroglio Amounts to a permanent brawl; Mr. Barnes has resigned a portfolio Which never existed at all; It is true he was, anyhow, going, Yet it serves (in The Times) for a sign Of the symptoms, perceptibly growing, Of George's decline. Mr. Asquith (of Paisley) endorses The sentence of violent death, Though he leaves him alternative courses For yielding his ultimate breath; He allows him an optional charter— To swing by his neck from a tree, Or to perish a piteous martyr To felo-de-se. And what of poor Damocles under This horror that hangs by a thread? Does he wilt in a palsy and wonder How soon it will sever his head? Are his lips and his cheeks of a blank hue? Does he toy with his victuals and drink? Not at all; on the contrary, thankyou, His health's in the pink. He'll be bashed to the semblance of suet, So say the familiars of Fate; But they don't tell us who is to do it Or mention the actual date; Though the lords of the Circus assure us His voice will be presently mute, Yet the victim, pronounced moriturus, Declines to salute. All colours, from purple to yellow, The oracles kill him in print, But he turns not a hair, for the fellow Is hopeless at taking a hint; Apparently free from suspicion And mindless of what it all means, He careers on the road to perdition, Ebullient with beans. O.S.