Punch/Volume 147/Issue 3826/The Great Petard
(Being some further reliable information about the enormous siege gun which is to shell us from Calais.)
This is the tale of the Master Hun And how, on thinking it over,He bade his henchmen build him a gunWith a belly as huge as the Heidelberg Tun To batter the cliffs of Dover.
See how the Uhlans' lances toss! As a mother her child they love it;Guarding it well from seathe and lossThey have stamped its side with a big Red Cross, And the white flag waves above it.
First it was cast in Essen town; Junkers in gay apparelFlocked to sample its high renown,And a dozen or more, they say, sat down To dinner inside its barrel.
Fair and free did the Rhine wine flow Till the face of every gluttonShone with a patriot's alter-glow,And then they retired a mile or so And the War Lord pressed the button.
Hoch! The howitzer stood the test, Belching like fifty craters,And (this is perhaps the cream of the jest)There was more than metal inside its chest, For they hadn't removed the waiters.
Now it has come on armoured trains To the further side of the Channel;Prayers are said in a hundred fanesFor its godlike soul, and whenever it rains They muffle its throat with flannel.
Strange indeed is the cry of its shells, Like a pack of hounds in full wail,Like the roar of a mountain stream that swellsOr like anything else from a peal of bells To the bark of a wounded bull-whale.
But the worst of it is that when—and if— It begins its work of slaughterIt will possibly harm the Kentish cliff,But it's perfectly certain to go and biff The French one into the water.
So when you shall hear a noise on high Like the medium brush of a barber,And a monstrous bullet falls from the skyAnd blows off the head of a Prussian spy As he dallies in Dover Harbour,
You shall know that at last the War Lord's host, By dint of a stout endeavour,Have chipped off a bit of the Calais coastAnd caused the isle that they pant for most To be further away than ever.Evoe.