The Bolshevist plan to conciliate Labour
Is based on the maxim of Beggar your Neighbour,
With the glorious result, when they share out the loot,
That ev'ry one's sure of possessing _one_ boot.

* * * * *

THE RHYME OF THE "RIO GRANDE."

By Salthouse Dock as I did pass one day not long ago,
I chanced to meet a sailorman that once I used to know;
His eye it had a roving gleam, his step was light and gay,
He looked like one just in from sea to blow a nine months' pay;
And as he passed athwart my hawse he hailed me long and loud:
"Oh, find me now a full saloon where I may stand the crowd;
I'm out to rouse the town this night as any man may be
That's just come off a salvage job, my lad, the same as me....

"Bringin' home the _Rio Grande_, her as used to be
_Crack o' Moore_, Mackellar's Line, back in ninety-three;
First of all the 'Frisco fleet, home in ninety-eight,
Ninety days to Carrick Roads from the Golden Gate;
Thirty shellbacks used to have all their work to do
Hauling them big yards of hers, heaving of her to
Down off Dago Ramirez, where the big winds blow,
Bringin' home the _Rio Grande_ twenty years ago.

"We picked her up one morning homeward bound from Portland, Maine,
In a nine-knot grunting cargo tramp, by name the _Crown o' Spain_;
The day was breaking cold and dark and dirty as could be,