And that is called paying the Dane-geld; but we've proved it again and again, that if once you have paid him the Dane-geld you never get rid of the Dane.
We have done with Hope and Honour. we are lost to Love and Truth, We are dropping down the ladder rung by rung; And the measure of our torment is the measure of our youth. God help us, for we knew the worst too young!
There rise her timeless capitals of empires daily born, whose plinths are laid at midnight and whose streets are packed at morn; and here come tired youths and maids that feign to love or sin in tones like rusty razor blades to tunes like smitten tin.
Nations have passed away and left no traces, And history gives the naked cause of it - One single simple reason in all cases; They fell because their peoples were not fit.
And the talk slid north, and the talk slid south With the sliding puffs from the hookah-mouth; Four things greater than all things are Women and Horses and Power and War.
Yet there be certain times in a young man’s life, when, through great sorrow or sin, all the boy in him is burnt and seared away so that he passes at one step to the more sorrowful state of manhood