By KATHERINE DRAYTON MAYRANT SIMONS, Jr.
Welded in the devil-workshop of the Essen blacksmith's stall,
There conceived and consecrated to the nations' final fall,
In the iron of my entrails, in my thews of shrunken steel,
In my mighty bore of barrel, in the claw of cleated wheel,
Through the travail of my forging, was there bred the ancient hate--
Primal blood-feud of the races, which the races' blood must sate!
You, the Empress of the Ocean--did your statesmen ne'er foretell
That your fortresses should crumble at the hot kiss of my shell?
While the garnered greed of ages lay in leash beneath my breast,
Did you deem an oath of honor more than is a royal jest?
While you slept my masters labored! In the metal of my frame
Molded they the mighty promise of a continent in flame!
In the casting of my carriage, in the boring of my sheath,
They have riveted my armor with the dormant dragon teeth!
By my twelve-mile range projectile, by my weight of forty tons,
Do I mock the slender playthings which Allies now call their guns!
Ever angry and unglutted, when the rocking fight is red,
Then my slogan stirs all sleepers save the still and dreamless dead!
Lo! The past is but a promise! When my Saturnalia comes,
Then the Saxon stands uncovered to a march of muffled drums,
Then the northern snows are trampled where the Slavic horsemen sleep,
And the Latin women tremble for their lovers as they weep!
[Illustration: GEN. LIMAN VON SANDERS PASHA,
Commander in Chief of the Turkish Army.
(_Photo_ © _by American Press Assn._)]
[Illustration: GEN. KAMIO,
Commander in Chief of the Japanese Tsing-Tau Expedition.
(_Photo from Paul Thompson._)]